ich
the kauri grew, had been partially filled up by the scaling off of the
bark of the tree; which, falling off in patches, as it is constantly
doing, had raised a mound of decaying bark round the root of the tree.

Another evidence of a very large number of people having once inhabited
these hill forts is the number of houses they contained. Every native
house, it appears, in former times, as in the present, had a fire-place
composed of four flat stones or flags sunk on their edges into the
ground, so as to form an oblong case or trunk, in which at night a fire
to heat the house was made. Now, in two of the largest hill forts I
have examined (though for ages no vestige of a house had been seen)
there remained the fire-places--the four stones projecting like an
oblong box slightly over the ground; and their position and number
denoted clearly that, large as the circumference of the huge volcanic
hill was which formed the fortress, the number of families inhabiting
it necessitated the strictest economy of room. The houses had been
arranged in streets, or double rows, with a path between them; except
in places where there had been only room on a terrace for a single row.
The distances between the fire-places proved that the houses in the
rows must have been as close together as it was possible to build them;
and every spot, from the foot to the hill-top, not required and
specially planned for defensive purposes, had been built on in this
regular manner. Even the small flat top, sixty yards long by forty
wide,--the citadel,--on which the greatest care and labour had been
bestowed to render it difficult of access, had been as full of houses
as it could hold; leaving only a small space all round the precipitous
bank for the defenders to stand on.

These little fire-places, and the scarped and terraced conical hills,
are the only mark the Maori of ancient times have left of their
existence. And I have reasons for believing that this country has been
inhabited from a more remote period by far than is generally supposed.
These reasons I found upon the dialect of the Maori language spoken by
the Maori of New Zealand, as well as on many other circumstances.

We may easily imagine that a hill of this kind, covered from bottom to
top with houses thatched and built of reeds, rushes, and raupo, would
be a mere mass of combustible matter; and such indeed was the case.
When an enemy attacked one of these places, a common practice was