A VOICE FROM THE PAST

Korero (AEWS), Volume 3, Issue 8, 21 May 1945, Page 28

A VOICE FROM THE PAST

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(c yV/ell/’ said the man in the uniform \<y of blue, “ what can Ido for you ? ” “ Ha,” I said. ‘‘Weller—as a matter of fact—um—l’ve been sent out here to interview the Sphenodon Punctatum, or tuatara.” He composed himself somewhat after two minutes. The one at the zoo had died. But he thought a chap at the Dominion Museum could help. * So I went to the Dominion Museum. “Have you a live tuatara?” I asked. “ Too right,” they said (in effect), and took me down in a lift to an open-air basement. They led me over to a strawstrewn case with a glass front. “ It’s in there —sleeping. It sleeps all winter, and a good deal of the summer, too.” “Go on. What do you feed it ? ” “ Little squares of cow-beef. It doesn’t eat in the winter. But when it’s on it’s tucker, it’ll eat 2 oz. of raw meat a fortnight.” “ Water ? ” “It likes water. Swims in it. Lies under it. Changes its skin in it, too, once a year, starting from the top of its back and peeling down.” “ Where did you trap him ? ” “On the Chickens Islands in 1934. Only 10 in. long then, but now 1 ft. 8 in. And it’s not a him, she’s a her. She laid ten eggs once, and that’s the only way you can find out their sex. We preserved the eggs.” (I hoped the tuatara wasn’t listening.) But I needn’t have worried. A lot of straw had to be pulled away before they found the tuatara. A dusty brown, not the usual olive-green, she resembled a very fierce and dangerous lizard, or a diminutive dragon. A ridge of skin, planted with small, muddy- quills, ran from

the back of a V-shaped head to where the tail began. This tail, almost as long as the body, looked just as if it had been cut from a miniature crocodile and gummed into place. Four stubby legs, each with five fingers ending in pointed claws, were planted firmly in the straw. The eyes were large, and round, and cold. They seldom blinked, and when they did a sort of film passed across the pupils, which were vertical —like those of a cat. I didn’t like her eyes. Still, that interview . " Do you mind leaving us alone for a minute ? ” I asked. We’ve got something rather personal to discuss.” “As you wish,” they said. But she’s never spoken to us, ever. Still, you can try. If you want help, just bawl out.” And off they went. * Without a blink she watched me bring out paper and a pencil. I leaned forward, carefully, and saw something approaching a gleam come into the cold mysterious eyes. At the same time I believe an almost benign expression passed over that crinkled countenance. “ Oh, tuatara,” I said, “ what do you know ? ” And then she spoke. It was an old, tired voice. A voice of long-rotted leaves. A voice with old, decayed moa bones in it. A faded voice whispering : “ The game’s crook. Can’t you let a joker alone ? ” “ Well,” I said, “ I was expecting something much better from you, the oldest living creature and New-Zealander. Something like : ‘ Things aren’t what they used to be in Two Million B.C.’ ” “ I was only trying to be modern,” said the tuatara, ‘‘and that’s a mighty effort for a person who comes out of the Triassic Period, three hundred million years ago.”

" Our readers will be most interested.” “ Yes,” said the tuatara, “ we can trace our ancestors as far back as that. Some of our family degenerated into common reptilesthere’s the turtle and tortoise family, the alligator and crocodile crowd, and the snakes and lizards, but we tuataras, in a class of our own, we are the oldest of them all.” “ Your eyes seemed very, very old I thought.” The tuatara looked pleased. “ Once upon a time we had four eyes,” she said, “ two more at the back of our head. But our ancestors grew tired of the two back ones and began to use only one. Time passed, and from three eyes we went down to these two you see in front. Under my skin, at the back of my neck, you could find a little lump, like a tiny pine cone. That’s what remains of my third eye. But very few people know you can find traces of my fourth eye. Another thing, too, you might like to know is that we have two sets of ribs.” ‘‘You look as if you’ve got no teeth.” “ That’s right. Just hard jawbones, with good rough edges like a fine saw.” “ How can you tell the difference between a headache and toothache ? ”

The tuatara ignored this flippancy, so I went on hurriedly : “ Er—forgive me, but how do you breed ? ” “ A reasonable question,” said the tuatara grandly. “In November or December, we female tuataras lay from ten to seventeen eggs, about if in. long and with very thin white shells. We scratch earth over ’em. The yolks begin to develop until March, when the cold

keeps them dormant until spring. Then they start growing again, and hatch out in January. Simple, eh ? ” “ Thanks,” I said, “ but what about this ? I have in my pocket a copy of the Lyttelton Times of 1903. Listen: ‘ The tuatara lizards at Opawa fisheries seem to be susceptible to music. They will come out of their holes in the rocks to hear a song when nothing else will induce them to appear. They prefer a good rousing chorus rather than a solo.’ ” Tell that to the mutton birds who live with us on the Chickens Islands,” said the tuatara sourly. “ Where else do you live ? ” “ Karewa, Motiti, East Cape, and The Brothers Islands. And, ah, yes, Stephen’s Island, where there’s a queer little chap, the Stephen’s Island frog, who hatches out of his egg a complete frog.” “ Is it true you live up to three hundred years ? ” “ Time means nothing to us, and the pakeha race has not lived long enough in New Zealand to find out. But the Maori say we do. They gave us our name, tuatara, meaning ' spikey-back.’ ” ‘‘But how did you get to New Zealand ? ”

“ Millions of years ago,” began the tuatara, ever so wisely, “ New Zealand was part of a great southern continent. And this great continent was linked by land right up to Southern Asia. I have heard old tuataras say there was a time when New Zealand went far away west to South America, and even down to the South Pole. That was before the Great Snow and the Great Ice came. Then in

the period of the Great Unsettlement the seas reached out, the land went down, and only a few islands were left.” “ And you lived through all this ? ” “ We did.” She paused. Her voice became stern. “ We tuataras survived the heat and the cold, the rising and falling of the earth beneath the sea, the coming and going of glaciers, the passing of millions of years and hundreds of forms of life—and then you—you blundering blind things in a mere breath of 50 years you very nearly killed us all.” “ I’m sorry,” I said, humbly and inadequately. You pakehas came with your fires and your great hungry pigs, your dogs and your heavy-footed animals, and you

burnt and you ate, you killed and you crushed, until only our skeletons remained amongst the lonely sand-dunes upon the mainland. That, oh biped, is only one of the sad stories told just before dawn by the sighing wind.” “ Look,” I said, “ for more than fifty years you’ve been protected by Act of Parliament — which is far more than can be said for the human race. Come now ” But the cold look had returned to the eyes again. I knew the tuatara would say nothing more. The museum men came back saying : “We bet you didn’t get a darned thing.” " That’s all you know,” I said. '