t this has been shown to be an error.[117] The
poverty of New Zealand in bats is very remarkable when compared with our
own islands where there are at least twelve distinct species, though we
have a far less favourable climate.

Of the existence of truly indigenous land mammals in New Zealand there is
at present no positive evidence, but there is some reason to believe that
one if not two species may be found there. The Maoris say that before
Europeans came to their country a forest-rat abounded and was largely used
for food. They believe that their ancestors brought it with them when they
first came to the country; but it has now become almost, if not quite,
exterminated by the European brown rat. What this native animal was is
still somewhat doubtful. Several specimens have been caught at different
times which have been declared by the natives to be the true _Kiore
Maori_--as they term it, but these have usually proved on examination to be
either the European black rat or some of the native Australian rats which
now {475} often find their way on board ships. But within the last few
years many skulls of a rat have been obtained from the old Maori
cooking-places, and from a cave associated with moa bones; and Captain
Hutton, who has examined them, states that they belong to a true Mus, but
differ from the _Mus rattus_. This animal might have been on the islands
when the Maoris first arrived, and in that case would be truly indigenous;
while the Maori legend of their "ancestors" bringing the rat from their
Polynesian home may be altogether a myth invented to account for its
presence in the islands, because the only other land mammal which they
knew--the dog--was certainly so brought. The question can only be settled
by the discovery of remains of a rat in some deposit of an age decidedly
anterior to the first arrival of the Maori race in New Zealand.[118]

Much more interesting is the reported existence in the mountains of the
South Island of a small otter-like animal. Dr. Haast has seen its tracks,
resembling those of our European otter, at a height of 3,000 feet above the
sea in a region never before trodden by man; and the animal itself was seen
by two gentlemen near Lake Heron, about seventy miles due west of
Christchurch. It was described as being dark brown and the size of a large
rabbit. On being struck at with a whip, it uttered a shrill yelping sound
and disappeared in the water.[119] An animal seen so closely as