COLLECTED BY COOK.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 97, 24 April 1912, Page 2

COLLECTED BY COOK.

RELICS OF THE FAMOUS CAPTAIN [VALUABLE GIFT' TO THE DOMINION. "Amongßfc the articles which they brought to barter this day, we could not help taking notice of a particular sort of cloak and cap. The first one 1 nearly of the size and shape of the short cloaks worn by the women in England. The ground of them is a net- work, upon which the, most beautiful red and yellow feathers are so closely fixed, that the surface might, be, compared to the thickest dad richest which they resemble, both as to th© feel and the glossy appearance. The cap is made almost exactly like a helmet, with the middle part or crest sometimes a hand's breadth, and it cits very close upon the head, having notches to admit the ears. It is a frame of twigs and osiers, covered with a net-work into which are wrought feathers as in the same manner as upon the cloaks. . . ." Despite associations, it is a far cry from, the Dominion Museum to 'the cabin of the ship Discovery, 300 tons, Captain Cook, from London. to ports unknown. Nevertheless, the above extract from the chronicles of the great circumnavigator aptly describes this identical helmet and cloak at present in the Wellington Museum. These specimens, together with many other articles, form the gift of Lord St.- Oswald, whose forefathers bought them at a sale of Bullock's Museum on 29th. April, 1819— the sixth day of the sale.' "When Mr. Bullock, the famous antiquary, died, his collection was offered to the British Museum for £50,000, but was refused and subsequently disposed of at auction. The most notable specimens of the collection so generously giveu to the people of New Zealand are the, feather cloak and helmet which were put upon the n«*ad and shoulders of the great .Cook by the King of Owyee, and which is so particularly described in his account of the voyage of 1766—1780. Both articles are in a wonderful state of preservation, and the robe, which is mad© mainly from countless Email feathers of the yellow "oo" (Destia Rai Coxinia), a small bird long eince extinct, is remarkable for the vividness of its colouring. With infinite patience the fea-thers nave been woven singly into the groundwork of fibre until the whole has been covered. A "BRITANNIA" HELMET. The lielmet is perhaps even more interesting. Everyone is familiar with the ■ngure of Britannia seated uncomfortably on her shield on some of our coins. Had the feather helmet in this collection been modelled on the headgear worn by tho "ruler of the waves," it could not have been made much more like it. Ihe crest, or comb, seen in ancient frescoes, and worn by the gladiators of net and trident, is almost identical, and the holes — or as Cook says, " the notche* for the ears" — are also a characteristic of the early Roman helmet. Of course, headgear something following this style was worn in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and it may be that the natives took for their patterns ■the helmets of some early Spanish navifators. Almost certain it is that/ the paniards reached' these islands before Cook, for did he not discover, quaintly hung about the neck of an Otaheitian chief, a pair of silver spoons of Spanish workmanship? .HATS AND OTHER IDOLS. There is also amongst the relics a Hawaiian hat of the time of Cook. It. has a round crown and a broad brim. With the addition of a- few feathers and ' a buckle or two it could be worn inconspicuously, and therefore, perhaps, without attaining the main object of much present-day headgear, by any racegoer or visitor at a garden party! Another cloak there is made principally of the long black tail-feathers of the powhee bird, and prinkt out with smaller red and yellow plumes of other birds now extinct. "The scarlet birds," says Cook, "were never met with alive, but we saw a single small one about the size of a canary-bird, of deep crimson colour. » « . ." So perhaps even at that time the inroads of these dusky milliners into their feather-store had somewhat depleted the stock. The next exhibit to catch the eye is a Hawaiian feather idol with a grinning mouth, in which are set dog' 6 teeth. Not the least interesting thing about these relics, more especially the cloaks, is the manner in which they have dodged the collector. Professor Binham, of Honolulu, is acknowledged the greatest authority on these garments, and he has searched the world over to gather in all the specimens he could. But for all these years these mueh-sought-a"fter relics have been hiding in a quiet North,country seat in England. A fly-flap is another of the presents made to Captain Cook by a Native chief, and' the> handle of this is made from a human arm-bone iingeS with.spermwhale ivory and tortoise-shell. '• Flies would apparently laugh at an ordinary wooden handle, and for this reason perhaps the handle is made from" the armbone .of a, chief taken in hattlel There is also the counterpart of the every-day meat-hook seen in butchers' shops and copybooks. This hook is, however, mado of wood' elaborately cawed and chiselled,' and waa u^ed only for the hanging-up of human flesh. Another wonderfully-contrived garment is a waist mat of pearl shell mad© from long strips of the nacre, threaded together into a network. Two whalebone beatere, made for hammering out the tappa-cloth of tho islands, just as the native washerman at Colombo hammers out your most expensive garments, are chiefly of interest, because the natives have long since ceased troubling to make .these mallete from anything but wood. new Zealand articles. Of New Zealand articles 'in the collection, there are many valuable ones, and some absolutely unique. A maori nosoflute, with a figure in high' relief carved upon it, is remarkable for its fine workmanship. There is also a double noseflute — only one other is known to exiet-y also carved. Two greenstone " heitikis," described in the catalogue of the 1819 sale as "superb idols of jade,-stone from New Zealand," and a shark'a tooth knife were sold for a comparatively email sum. The knife is one of those tieed at tangis by the relatives of the deceased for tearing their flesh in sign of mourning. In the illustrations to Cook's journal there is a wooden " pa-tv," a fighting weapon, which might have been, and probably was, drawn from one in this collection. Other thinge there are, all of interest, including ceremonial paddles from High leland in the Austral group, and a stono sinker with the original flax string of two colours tied round the waist cut in 'it. Allthese put together form an almost priceless collection.