The Timaru Herald MONDAY, JULY 19, 1909. "MURIHIKU."

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13958, 19 July 1909, Page 4

The Timaru Herald MONDAY, JULY 19, 1909. "MURIHIKU."

Mr R. MeNab is now nearly as well Known to INow Zealandcrs as a. man with a Jiobby, as ho is through his recent career as a politician. Perhaps only a small .minority of Now Zcalauders can sympathise with him in his devotion to tliat hobby, the- collection of. material for the writing of a history of the earliest relations between Kurope and New Zealand, between "bite man' and Maori. All who can do so will recognise, on learning what ho has done in the search for old records, and understand that during the years he devoted to the search, he had something to live for, and that ho was a happy man. He prospected odd places, in Australia, Europe, America, and amid much dust and through much tedious labour, lie found pay-dirt and

nuggets of the gold of information ho was in search of. Mr, MeNab set out with quite a. modest programme. Ho desired merely to learn "something A the history of the early soaling and whaling industries on the shores of Scuthland; but the information of this kind he was able to find was linked with the records of the early explorations and with references to longer stretches of coast lino. Some o£ those records' were unknown in New Zea-

land, others imperfectly known, and

having found them, they were too interesting, too valuable, to ignore*, and through tho acquisition of these,. Mr McNab's object widened until it eni-

braced the history of the shoro lino nf the whole of the. South Island. Ho has not yet completed his work, and has recently ..gone, back t° * i "? C;d World to resume the search for old navigators' logs and reports of explorers. The results so, far obtained he has thrown into book form, and under the title of " Murihiku," tho book lias been published by Whiteombo and Tombs, a well-got-up volume of about 500 pages. An earlier abstract

and compilation was published a couple of years ago, but the present volume has been to a considerable extent rcwritten and largely added to. On his return, the author hopes to bring with him a valuable collection of additional information, filling up gaps, completing half-known facts, explaining obscure hints at old-timo occurrences of which records are wanting. "Murihiku" begins with the visit of Abel Tasman in 1642 —over 250 years ago — 'with the exploring ships sent out !iy the Dutch Government, of Batavia, contains a, copy of Tasman's chart yE tho north-west coast of this island, and tells of the unfortunate attack by the Maoris of "Murderers' Bay" (Golden Bay) upon a boat's crew, which laid the foundation of the bad name

which so long attached to the natives oE New Zealand. Then eomo short references to tho four visits of Captain Cook (1770 to 1788) short because those arc fully described in the now widely distributed "Voyages." Then.' came- La Peronso, sent out by tho l'Voneh Government to see whether the British had formed any settlements, and to' obtain information regarding the remarkable fibro plant of tho'islands. Vancouver, who had been with Cook, revisited New Zealand in 1791. The next world explorer to reach these islands was a Spaniard, Malaspina, who had surveyed tho eastern and western coasts of South America. Ho entered Doubtful Sound in 1793, guided by the accurate charts of Cook. It is soniew/hat remarkable how attractive theso Sounds were to tho early explorers, who must have been more charmed by tho magic of grand scenery than by tho prospects, elsewhere vis-. iblo along the coast-line, of. country suitable for human occupation. Tho early visitors must have told attractive stories of the wealth of seals and whales about those Sounds, for tho first attempts at exploiting tho natural resources of the South Island were made by scaling parties fitted out at Sydney in 1792, and whalers followed shortly after. Both were at first under charter to the British East India Company, and the sealskins were in-

tended "for the China market." ,Thc Bcaling was carried on asliorc, the whaling from ships at sea. Mr McNab has cleared up the mystery attaching to tho old Endeavour wreck lying in Dusky Bay, proving from records of tho ship that the vessel carried from Sydney a party of scalers—and about 4.1 convict escapee stowaways. The vessel was unseawortby, and was stripped and allowed to .drift ashore, the' party, after much hardship, escaping by other vessels. The history <if the sealing business occupies many pages, and the industry was extended southwards to Stewart Island, which was thoroughly exploited, and then dtwn to the Macquarric Islands. One of the most interesting passages in the book is an extract from the records of a Russian scientific expedition of two ships under Bellingshausen, who followed Cook into Cook's Strait, and entered Queen Charlotte Sound in 1820. Tliis extract, translated direct from the Russian, is so clear and simple, so human, so "British," that it might have been a bit from "Cook's "Voyages." Bellingshausen met with natives who- liad evidently not seen a wlute man before (they may have heard of them—probably bad) and be got on very well with them. Mr McNab is not'unduly proud of having discovered these records of the Spanish and Russian visits; and'of the quantity of information regarding the early scaling and whaling days, which he found in old Sydney newspapers, and in old ships' loss stowed away in musty boxes in American sea-ports, whence so many of the whalers hailed. By such means "Murihiku" has been produced- It is not likely to be, is not expected to Ik?, a " nopular" work; but it is the port of book to be secured for the shelves of the reference department of the public libraries.