crunch of footsteps on the gravel, and the click of light switches tell me it is time for lights out. I take a last look around my hut. Cobwebs in one corner, the many nail holes that were used to tack pin-ups and pictures, the many hundred holes caused by the far too healthy appetite of the wood-happy eating borers, spread over the timber like tiny ants, acting a ballet scene, from some Disney natural life film. Magazines and novels together with my writing papers, ink and water paints. All in a mad topsy-turvey jumble, clothes hanging from nails, at all angles, while at the top of my bed, my abstract painting of a famous American film actor looks down at me, its brilliant colours clashing with the dull green of the interior of my hut. The footsteps are much nearer now, and the sound louder. Then a click and all there is is darkness, and the long hours of night. Now is the time to travel the winding pathways of memories paved with thoughts pleasant and sad, and as my head nods with drowsiness, I am filled with a heart-warming conviction that sleep, and the ability to do so, is truly one of Our Creator's kindest gifts to mankind. For when we are asleep we forget the little daily incidents, things big and small that clutter our lives, bringing to us treasured dreams and golden visions of hope. By the way I forgot to tell you, I'm a Maori prisoner doing time.

MUTTON BIRD? OR JUST TITI? by PAUL POTIKI Call it what you will, it is one of Maoridom's most favoured foods. The pakeha too is rapidly finding out that the Titi is a most palatable meal. How many of us, however, know anything of the fascinating habits of the Titi? How many of us know anything of the methods of catching and curing which have come down through generations of Stewart Island Maoris? Sometimes I even wonder whether many of us know how best to cook the Titi, especially when one hears of elaborate methods which involve several changes of water followed by baking in the oven with a clove of garlic in each bird? The Titi belongs to the Petrel family and the correct name for the Stewart Island species is Sooty Shearwater. It is migratory in its habits and spends from late spring to mid-winter in South Pacific waters, where it breeds and rears its young. The main colonies seem to be Tasmania, Cape Horn, the Snares Island south of New Zealand and the small islets which lie close to the east and south west of Stewart Island. It is from these small scrub-covered islets that the main supply for the New Zealand table is taken. The Titi may also be found on some of the islands in the north, especially White Island, the Three Kings and the Poor Knights but birds taken from these are usually for personal use and not the open market. At the time we imported Titi from Tasmania but these were mainly for the northern markets where the Stewart Island birds rarely reach owing (Continued on page 63)

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