up, we must come
to the conclusion that the inhabitants of the fort, though so numerous,
were merely the population of the country in the close vicinity.

Now from the top of one of these pointed, trenched, and terraced hills,
I have counted twenty others, all of equally large dimensions, and all
within a distance, in every direction, of fifteen to twenty miles; and
native tradition affirms that each of these hills was the stronghold of
a separate _hapu_ or clan, bearing its distinctive name. There is also
the most unmistakable evidence that vast tracts of country, which have
lain wild time out of mind, were once fully cultivated. The ditches for
draining the land are still traceable, and large pits are to be seen in
hundreds, on the tops of the dry hills, all over the northern part of
the North Island, in which the _kumera_ were once stored; and these
pits are, in the greatest number, found in the centre of great open
tracts of uncultivated country, where a rat in the present day would
hardly find subsistence. The old drains, and the peculiar growth of the
timber, mark clearly the extent of these ancient cultivations. It is
also very observable that large tracts of very inferior land have been
in cultivation; which would lead to the inference that either the
population was pretty nearly proportioned to the extent of available
land, or that the tracts of inferior land were cultivated merely
because they were not too far removed from the fort: for the shape of
the hill, and its capability of defence and facility of fortification,
was of more consequence than the fertility of the surrounding country.

These _kumera_ pits, being dug generally in the stiff clay on the hill
tops, have, in most cases, retained their shape perfectly; and many
seem as fresh and new as if they had been dug but a few years. They are
oblong in shape, with the sides regularly sloped. Many collections of
these provision stores have outlived Maori tradition, and the natives
can only conjecture to whom they belonged. Out of the centre of one of
them which I have seen, there is now growing a kauri tree one hundred
and twenty feet high, and out of another a large totara. The outline of
these pits is as perfect as the day they were dug, and the sides have
not fallen in in the slightest degree; from which perhaps they have
been preserved by the absence of frost, as well as by a beautiful
coating of moss, by which they are everywhere covered. The pit in wh