g the customs and manners of these people, the governor favoured
the writer with the following particulars:

The New Zealanders inter their dead; they also believe that the third day
after the interment the heart separates itself from the corpse; and that
this separation is announced by a gentle breeze of wind, which gives
warning of its approach to an inferior Ea-tooa (or dinity) that hovers
over the grave, and who carries it to the clouds. In his chart Too-gee
has marked an imaginary road which goes the lengthways of Ea-hei-no-maue,
viz from Cook's Strait to the North Cape, which Too-gee calls Terry-inga.
While the soul is received by the good Ea-tooa, an evil spirit is also in
readiness to carry the impure part of the corpse to the above road, along
which it is carried to Terry-inga, whence it is precipitated into the sea.

Suicide is very common among the New Zealanders, and this they often
commit by hanging themselves on the slightest occasions; thus a woman who
has been beaten by her husband will perhaps hang herself immediately. In
this mode of putting an end to their existence, both our visitors seemed
to be perfect adepts, having often threatened to hang themselves, and
sometimes made very serious promises of putting it into execution if they
were not sent to their own country. As these threats, however, were used
in their gloomy moments, they were soon laughed out of them.

It could not be discovered that they have any other division of time than
the revolution of the moon, until the number amounted to one hundred,
which they term "Ta-iee E-tow," i.e. one Etow or hundred moons; and it is
thus they count their age, and calculate all other events.

Hoo-doo and Too-gee both agreed that a great quantity of manufactured
flax might be obtained for trifles*, such as axes, chisels, etc., and
said, that in most places the flax grows naturally in great quantities;
in other parts it is cultivated by separating the roots, and planting
them out, three in one hole, at the distance of a foot from each other.
They give a decided preference to the flax-plant that grows here, both
for quantity and size.

[* This circumstance all the people belonging to the _Fancy_ fully
confirmed; for during the three months that vessel lay in the Thames,
they replaced all their running-rigging by ropes made of the flax-plant.]

It may be expected (says Governor King) that after a six months
acquaintance between us and the two New Zealander