Austral English Part 160

"Norman is a pus.h.i.+ng young Maorilander who apparently has the Britisher by the right ear."

Maori, White, New Zealand miners' name for a stone.

See quotation.

1883. `A Citizen,' `Ill.u.s.trated Guide to Dunedin,' p. 169:

"Tungstate of lime occurs plentifully in the Wakatipu district, where from its weight and colour it is called White Maori by the miners."

Mapau, n. a Maori name for several New Zealand trees; called also Mapou, and frequently corrupted by settlers into Maple, by the law of Hobson-Jobson. The name is applied to the following--

The Mapau-- Myrsine urvillei, De C., N.O. Myrsineae; sometimes called Red Mapau.

Black M.-- Pittosporum tenuifolium, Banks and Sol., N.O. Pittosporeae; Maori name, Tawhiri.

White M.-- Carpodetus serratus, Forst., N.O. Saxifrageae; Pittosporum eugenoides, A. Cunn.; Maori name, Tarata (q.v.); called also the Hedge-laurel (q.v.), Lemon-wood, and New Zealand Oak. See Oak.

The first of these trees (Myrsine urvillei) is, according to Colenso, the only tree to which the Maoris themselves give the name Mapau. The others are only so called by the settlers.

1868. `Transactions of the New Zealand Inst.i.tute,' vol. i., `Essay on Botany of Otago,' p. 37:

"White Mapau, or Piripiri-whata (Carpodetus serratus), an ornamental shrub-tree, with mottled-green leaves, and large cymose panicles of white flowers... . Red Mapau (Myrsine Urvillei), a small tree common at Dunedin. Wood dark red, very astringent, used as fence stuff."

1883. J. Hector, `Handbook of New Zealand, p. 132:

"Tawiri, white-mapou, white-birch (of Auckland). A small tree, ten to thirty feet high; trunk unusually slender; branches spreading in a fan-shaped manner, which makes it of very ornamental appearance; flower white, profusely produced.

The wood is soft and tough."

1889. T. Kirk, `Forest Flora of New Zealand,' p. 75:

"By the settlers it is frequently called `black mapou' on account of the colour of the bark... . With still less excuse it is sometimes called `black maple,' an obvious corruption of the preceding."

Maple, n. In New Zealand, a common settlers'

corruption for any tree called Mapau (q.v.); in Australia, applied to Villaresia moorei, F. v. M., N.O. Olacineae, called also the Scrub Silky Oak.

See Oak.

Maray, n. New South Wales name for the fish Clupea sagax, Jenyns, family Clupeidae or Herrings, almost identical with the English pilchard.

The word Maray is thought to be an aboriginal name.

Bloaters are made of this fish at Picton in New Zealand, according to the Report of the Royal Commission on Fisheries of New South Wales, 1880. But Agonostoma forsteri, a Sea-Mullet, is also when dried called the Picton Herring (q.v). See Herring and Aua.

Marble-fish, n. name given to the Tupong (q.v.) in Geelong.

Marble-wood, n. name applied to a whitish-coloured mottled timber, Olea paniculata, R. Br., N.O. Jasmineae; called also Native Olive and Ironwood.

Mark, a good, Australian slang.

1845. R. Howitt, `Australia,' p. 233:

"I wondered often what was the meaning of this, amongst many other peculiar colonial phrases, `Is the man a good mark?'

I heard it casually from the lips of apparently respectable settlers, as they rode on the highway, `Such and such a one is a good mark,"--simply a person who pays his men their wages, without delays or drawbacks; a man to whom you may sell anything safely; for there are in the colony people who are regularly summoned before the magistrates by every servant they employ for wages. They seem to like to do everything publicly, legally, and so become notoriously not `good marks.'"

[So also "bad mark," in the opposite sense.]

Mariner, n. name given in Tasmania to a marine univalve mollusc, either Elenchus badius, or E. bellulus, Wood.

The Mariner is called by the Tasmanian Fishery Commissioners the "Pearly Necklace Sh.e.l.l"; when deprived of its epidermis by acid or other means, it has a blue or green pearly l.u.s.tre.

The sh.e.l.ls are made into necklaces, of which the aboriginal name is given as Merrina, and the name of the sh.e.l.l is a corruption of this word, by the law of Hobson-Jobson.

Compare Warrener.

1878. `Catalogue of the Objects of Ethnotypical Art in the National Gallery' (Melbourne), p. 52:

"Necklace, consisting of 565 sh.e.l.ls (Elenchus Bellulus) strung on thin, well-made twine. The native name of a cl.u.s.ter of these sh.e.l.ls was, according to one writer, Merrina."

Marsh, n. a Tasmanian name for a meadow.

See quotation.

1852. Mrs. Meredith, `My Home in Tasmania,' vol. i. p. 163:

"Perhaps my use of the common colonial term `marsh' may be misunderstood at home, as I remember that I myself a.s.sociated it at first with the idea of a swamp; but a `marsh' here is what would in England be called a meadow, with this difference, that in our marshes, until partially drained, a growth of tea-trees (Leptospermum) and rushes in some measure enc.u.mbers them; but, after a short time, these die off, and are trampled down, and a thick sward of verdant gra.s.s covers the whole extent: such is our `marsh.'"

Marsupial, adj. See the Noun.

Marsupial, n. an animal in which the female has an abdominal pouch in which the young, born in a very immature state, are carried. (Lat. Marsupium = a pouch.) At the present day Marsupials are only found in America and the Australian region, the greater number being confined to the latter. See quotation 1894, Lydekker.

1848. W. Westgarth, `Australia Felix,' p. 129:

"The marsupial type exhibits the economy of nature under novel and very interesting arrangements... . Australia is the great head-quarters of the marsupial tribe."

1860. G. Bennett, `Gatherings of a Naturalist,' p. 5:

"I believe it was Charles Lamb who said, the peculiarity of the small fore-feet of the Kangaroo seemed to be for picking pockets; but he forgot to mention the singularity characterizing the animal kingdom of Australia, that they have pockets to be picked, being mostly marsupial. We have often amused ourselves by throwing sugar or bread into the pouch of the Kangaroo, and seen with what delight the animal has picked its own pocket, and devoured the contents, searching its bag, like a Highlander his sporran, for more."

[See Kangaroo, quotation 1833.]

1885. H. Finch-Hatton, `Advance Australia,' p. 106:

"An Act known as the Marsupial Act was accordingly pa.s.sed to encourage their destruction, a reward of so much a scalp being offered by the Government... . Some of the squatters have gone to a vast expense in fencing-in their runs with marsupial fencing, but it never pays."

1890. C. Lumholtz, `Among Cannibals,' p. 29:

"One of the sheep-owners told me that in the course of eighteen months he had killed 64,000 of these animals (marsupials), especially wallabies (Macropus dorsalis) and kangaroo- rats (Lagorchestes conspicillatus), and also many thousands of the larger kangaroo (Macropus giganteus)."

1893. `Sydney Morning Herald,' Aug. 5, p. 9, col. 1:

"In South Australia the Legislature has had to appoint a close season for kangaroos, else would extinction of the larger marsupials be at hand. We should have been forced to such action also, if the American market for kangaroo-hides had continued as brisk as formerly."

1894. R. Lydekker, `Marsupialia,' p. 1: