A LUCKY FIND
A strangely shaj-ed log of wood was found by a settler of ■ luritehere, near Te Kuiti, - on his bush section. ,He investigated the fern-covered mass and found it to be, to his astonishment, the hull of a nearly-finished Maori canoe, about 40 feet "long, burned out of a single giant tree. Ferns, mosses, fungus, and the accumulation of generations of forest rubbish cleared away with the slashers and a canoe of totara, perfect with the exception of a little rot on the outside, lay revealed. The makers of this ancient dug-out must have been disturbed in their wort—for they left it unfinished—probably by some marauding war . party from : down the coast. That the' remains are very old was easily proven by the charred appearance of the inside of the canoe, which, if. appearances tell truly, was burned and dubbed into shape by little Maori adzes. The nearest float water is th e S ea —a mile distant—and the old workers of wood and stone would have had to negotiate a high ridge before reaching their destination.
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Bibliographic details
New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7392, 21 March 1911, Page 10
Word Count
179A LUCKY FIND New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7392, 21 March 1911, Page 10
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