SKELETONS ON EGMONT.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18325, 15 February 1923, Page 6

SKELETONS ON EGMONT.

NO SOLUTION OF MYSTERY. TRAGEDY OF LONG AGO. [BY TELEGRAPH.—OWN CORRESPONDENT.] NEW PLYMOUTH. Wednesday. The three skeletons found on Mount Egmont have been brought to New Plymouth. The position in which they were found in a crevice on the rugged mountainside suggested that they had been placed there rather than that they had died there. They cannot be said to be anything like complete skeletons. .*■■'"- There are three skulls and a number of the larger limb bones, 10 of them being apparently leg tones v and • the•;■; others (about 20) have the appearance of belonging to the arms. Some of them are much decayed, and are far from complete, and all showed signs lof having lain in the place in which they j were found for many years. Many of the bones were closely covered with mountain growth, from which they had to be disentangled. ; v One of the ... skulls contained .several teeth, which were in a fair state of preservation, while another held two or three of the . large double teeth. The third skull, which was , found .at a little distance from the cave, showed 'signs of having suffered much • more exposure than the others. All the bones that "could be found in a thorough search were placed in a bag and brought away.; . Up to the present neither • the police nor the coroner have anything to say on the subject, beyond the fact that the bones will be submitted for examination in an endeavour to determine whether they are those of Maoris,or Europeans. ' ! The suggestion that the bones may be those of a party of surveyors is not seriously entertained,; as it is pointed out if such a party had gone astray on the mountain the occurrence would have teen well known in the locality and the story of the disaster would have been recorded in some form. - ;