"Here is Hawaii. They would start with a north-westerly trade wind. That would be a fair wind. I may say that the whole affair took place far further back than is usually supposed. We have to get back to astronomy for our fixed date. Don't imagine that the obliquity of the ecliptic was always 23 degrees."
"The Maoris had a fair wind then?"
The compasses stabbed at the map.
"Only down to this point. Then they would come on the Doldrums—the calm patch of the equator. They could paddle their canoes across that. Of course, the remains at Easter Island prove——"
"But they could not paddle all the way."
"No; they would run into the south-easterly trades. Then they made their way to Rarotonga in Tahiti. It was from here that they made for New Zealand."
"But how could they know New Zealand was there?"
"Ah, yes, how did they know?"
"Had they compasses?"
"They steered by the stars. We have a poem of theirs which numbers the star-gazer as one of the crew. We have a chart, also, cut in the rocks at Hawaii, which seems to be the plot of a voyage. Here is a slide of it." He fished out a photo of lines and scratches upon a rock.