Transactions Of The New Zealand Institute, 1896. I.—Miscellaneous.

Art. I.—Traces of Civilization: an Inquiry into the History of the Pacific. By Joshua Rutland. Communicated by E. Tregear, F.R.G.S. [Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, 22nd July, 23rd September, and 11th November, 1896.] I.—introduction: Cultivated Plants of New Zealand. Ever since Nũnez de Balboa first beheld its waters from the heights of Panama, the Pacific Ocean, or Great South Sea as it was long familiarly styled, has been a region of mystery. Until Magalhaens discovered the strait that bears his name it seemed to be walled off from the Atlantic, or North Sea, and from the civilized world beyond, by an unbroken barrier of land that stretched from pole to pole. After European mariners were afloat on its surface, what lands, what continents, what islands lay within its broad expanse and around its shores, remained for centuries unknown. As the explorer and the geographer solved these questions new sources of wonder revealed themselves. Strange forms of animal and vegetable life—pouched quadrupeds, wingless birds, leafless trees—were brought to light, setting the poet rhyming and the naturalist thinking how these discoveries agreed with long-cherished beliefs they were destined, to subvert.