Besides cattle and sheep (which have flourished exceedingly) the colonists introduced rabbits, pheasants and the honey-bee, and later on quails, hares, deer, and trout. Clover depends on bees for its fertilisation and seeding. White clover, taken over there for pasture, did not seed in New Zealand until the honey-bee was imported in 1842, and later, as they could not seed red-clover without it, the colonists had to introduce the humble-bee, and the red-clover now also seeds freely and the imported farm-beasts have their accustomed food. Besides the animals already named, the colonists have introduced ferrets and weasels, to reduce the destructive excess of the imported rabbits; and they, whilst failing to subdue the rabbits, have themselves become a serious nuisance. Of small birds there were introduced the house-sparrow, which is too prolific, and is hated by the farmers; the greenfinch, a pest; the bullfinch, a failure. The introduced skylark and the blackbird (alas! poor colonists) are not the joy of New Zealanders--the farmers hate them. The European settlers had the audacity to introduce also the most beautiful and beloved of all birds, our own perfect "Robin Redbreast," and they add want of manners to their violent and uncalled-for hospitality by speaking ill of this sweetest and brightest of living things. After this, I am rather glad to report that the esteemed table-delicacies, pheasants and partridges, don't get on well in New Zealand; nor do turtle-doves. The thrush is spreading and meets with the approval of the hypercritical New Zealander. The hedge-sparrow, the chaffinch and the goldfinch have flourished abundantly, but the linnet has failed. A very interesting and important problem for New Zealand naturalists to solve is that as to why one bird succeeds in their remote land and another does not. The British trout have grown to an enormous size and are destroying all other fresh-water life. Imported red-deer flourish, and are shot with great satisfaction by the colonists. The American elk has been introduced in the South Island, and the mountain goats--the ibex and the thar--are to be acclimatized in the mountains, so that unnatural sport may flourish in this ancient land of quiet and of wondrous birds, turned topsy-turvy by enlightened man. CHAPTER XXIV THE EFFACEMENT OF NATURE BY MAN