1866 - The New Zealand Handbook (11th ed.) - CHAPTER II. NATURAL FEATURES.

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CHAPTER II.

NATURAL FEATURES.

POSITION. --New Zealand, extending from about 34 deg. to 48 deg. south latitude, lying in the great South Pacific ocean, nearly antipodal to England, and 1200 miles south east of Australia, occupies one of the most central, independent and commanding, positions in the southern hemisphere. Speaking on this point, a popular writer uses the following words:-- "Estimating the advantages of position, extent, climate, fertility, adaptation for trade--all the causes which have tended to render Britain the emporium of the world--we can observe only one other spot on the earth equally, if not more, favoured by nature, and that is New Zealand. Possessing a salubrious climate, serrated with harbours, securely insulated, of such extent and fertility as to support a population sufficiently numerous to defend her shores against any invading force, New Zealand, like Great Britain, lies contiguous to a large neighbouring continent, Australia, from which she will draw resources, and to which she bears the relation of a rich homestead with a vast extent of outfield pasturage. In these advantages she equals Britain, while she is superior to Britain in having the weather guage of an immense commercial field: Sydney and Melbourne, California and Columbia, the hundred Islands of the Pacific, the rich regions of South America, the marts of India and the Indian Archipelago, the vast accumulations of China and Japan lie, all, within easy sail of her harbour-dotted shores."

CONFIGURATION AND SIZE. --New Zealand, as shown by the accompanying map, consists of two great Islands, the North and the South, parted by Cook's Strait, a fine deep-sea channel and marine highway 150 miles in length by from 20 to 80 in breadth, and of a small Island called Stewart's Island, about the size of

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Hampshire, parted from the mainland by Foveaux Strait.

The North Island is 520, and the South 580, miles in length--each, from east to west, at the broadest part, being about 200 miles in breadth. The coast line of the two measures 3000 miles; their united area has been estimated at seventy-five millions of acres, about the same as that of Great Britain and Ireland, and three-fourths of this broad territory are more or less fitted for agricultural and pastoral pursuits.

SURFACE-CHARACTER, SCENERY, &c. --New Zealand, while exhibiting some noble open plains and numerous undulating champaign districts, may perhaps be described, generally, as a wooded-highland country, clothed with luxuriant, evergreen, vegetation. Its origin was volcanic, and no country presents a greater variety of interesting features to the geologist. Many of the smaller elevations of the North Island are old extinct craters; Tongariro, 6000 ft. high, still occasionally emits smoke and cinders; while, in what are called the Lake Districts of the North Island, Tufas and Solfataras, boiling springs and bubbling mud-pools, further attest the existence of igneous action. Shocks of earthquake, too, are still occasionally felt along the shores of Cook's Strait, at Wellington, and elsewhere; but they are not shocks of a very serious character, and even the good people of Wellington seem to regard the possibility of their occurrence with as much equanimity as we might regard the prospect of wet harvest or wintry spring.

Numerous wooded ranges of moderate elevation, and two snow-capped giants, Ruapahu and Mount Egmont, are found in the North Island; while a chain of rugged forest ranges, displaying that New Zealand monarch of mountains. Mount Cook, 14,000 feet high, extends along the coast of the South Island almost from Cape Farewell to Dusky Bay.

The North Island contains only two or three moderately extensive plains; but abounds in large luxuriant

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valleys, and in sheltered dells and dales. The South Island, on its western side, consists chiefly of mountain forest ranges and of the wildest Alpine regions; but on the east, it displays some magnificent plains and open districts admirably adapted for the plough and the golden fleece.

With a coast line of more than 3000 miles, New Zealand exhibits a multitude of bays, creeks, coves, estuaries, and anchorages, and possesses some of the finest naval and commercial harbours in the world-- though these latter are found rather in isolated groups than in equally dispersed order along her shores.

One of the most striking natural features of the colony, and one which gives it a great superiority as a pastoral and agricultural country over our South African and Australian Possessions, is the abundance of water. The Thames, Waikato, Kaipara, Hokianga, Wanganui, Manawatu, Pelorus, Clutha, and a few others, may be called the only rivers navigable 50 miles up for anything larger than a boat; but there are some fine lakes, such as Taupo, 30 miles long by 20 broad, and Rotorua, in the North Island, together with Wanako, Hawea, Wakatip, and Te Anau near the gold districts in Otago--while, from north to south, the country is studded with rivers, rivulets, brooks, and bums, mostly of the clearest, softest, water, running over pebbly beds, and bearing a close resemblance to many of our trout and salmon streams, such as the Dove, Tamar, Deveron, Tweed, Don, and Dee.

CLIMATE. --In weighing the natural advantages of any new country in which we hope to improve our fortunes and plant a home, "goodness of climate" should be made one of our very first requirements, for men live by air as much as by bread. "In old countries like England"--says Mr. Hursthouse in his work on New Zealand--"art may certainly lessen our dependence on climate. There, if we have to dine with a friend three counties off, be it snow, hail, sleet, rain, we can step into a flying parlour and be borne to the

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feast without a feather ruffled--there, if, instead of flowers, Spring bring us bitter east blasts, luxurious wealth may pile up the fire and hibernate in warm snuggeries through a vernal winter, while for coughs, colds, bronchitis, and rheumatics, M. D. is ever round the corner. But in new emigration countries where we lead a wholesome out-door life and face the weather in the fields; where, instead of brick and slate, it may be weather-board and shingle; where we have to rough it more, and where the doctor is not always at hand in the next street, climate may almost be called our elemental lord and master--whence it follows that in making choice of any Emigration Field 'goodness of climate' should be insisted on as one of our very first requirements; for on this will depend our health and strength, and on the continued enjoyment of health and strength will mainly depend our happiness and success."

Now, in this great desideratum. New Zealand stands remarkably high. Indeed, in general suitability to the Anglo-Saxon constitution, in sanatory and recruiting properties for the invalid, and in marked fitness for agricultural and pastoral pursuits, the climate of New Zealand deservedly ranks as one of the finest in the world. In general terms, it might almost be described as the climate of England with about half the cold of the English winter, for while the summer is only rather warmer than a warm English summer, the winter is seldom colder than a cold English March, or sharp cold October. New Zealand, however, being nearly the antipodes of this country, north, with her is the warmest quarter, and the seasons are reversed-- July being her coldest month--January her hottest. All native trees and plants, too, being evergreens, there being no autumnal fall of the leaf, the country appearing almost equally verdant at all periods of the year, the change of seasons is far less marked than in England, and is, indeed, so gradual as to be scarcely appreciable. September, October, and November are, however, called spring; December, January, and

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February, summer; March, April, and May, autumn; June, July, and August, winter.

COMPARATIVE CLIMATIC TABLE.

	Mean Annual Temperature.	Mean Temperature of Coldest Month.	Mean Temperature of Hottest Month.	Annual Fall of Rain in Inches.	Number of Dry Days in the Year.
London	50	37	63	30 1	180
Madeira	64	59	71	29	290
New Zealand, (North Island)	57	48	66	45	240
New Zealand, (South Island)	52	43	62	35	260
Montpelier	57	42	75	30	285
Queensland	68	60	76	43	260
1   Average fall in England.

It will be seen by this table that, taking the mean of the two Islands, New Zealand's climate, as a whole, is warmer than England's by about five degrees; and that while her hottest month is only one degree hotter than our hottest English month, her coldest month is nearly nine degrees less cold than our coldest month. The annual fall of rain is about one-fourth greater than in the British Isles; but at the same time the number of fine dry days in the year is upwards of one-third greater, showing that rains, though heavier, are less frequent than with us. Nevertheless, there is no dry or rainy season in New Zealand, such as we find in some tropical and semi-tropical countries: most rain falls in winter, but there is no month without its copious showers, so that climatic scourges like the Droughts which now and then parch up South Africa and Australia are, happily, unknown.

The climate is a more windy one than that of England: stiff gales are experienced in all seasons, while even in the height of summer cool sea breezes generally prevail. With less wind, the climate, for half the the year,

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would be a more luxurious and pleasant one--but the constant breeze, in drying up superfluous moisture, and in blowing oceanward malaria, miasma and seeds of disease, is undoubtedly one cause of New Zealand's remarkable salubrity.

Fogs are seldom seen, while thunder storms are even less frequent and severe than in the British Isles. There is but little twilight: in summer, it is dark about an hour sooner than in England, in winter, about an hour later; and in all seasons the nights are from 10 to 12 degrees colder than the days.

Slight frosts, producing half-inch ice, occur in the North Island; but snow, save on mountain peaks, is rarely seen there. In the South Island snow occasionally lies a few days on the plains; but the mildness even of the winters of the South Island is shown by the delicate little Parroquet never leaving the country, and by the Tree Fuschia and the Tree Fern flourishing there throughout the year.

Testing New Zealand by her vegetable productions, too, we find she is only a warmer England. Speaking generally, it may be said that every grain, grass, fruit, flower, shrub, and vegetable of the British Isles grows as vigorously and attains as great a degree of perfection in New Zealand as it does here. In many districts, the fig, apricot, nectarine, and peach flourish as standard trees, the melon is almost everywhere abundant, while in the warmer valleys of the North Island the horticulturist may rear the orange, citron, lemon, pomegranate, and loquat. The taro, also, a native of the Sandwich Islands, the kumera (a sweet potato) and maize, are grown by the northern natives; but, under common field cultivation, Maize, a plant affording one of the nicest tests of heat of climate, will not generally ripen in New Zealand, and seldom appears there, a farmer's common crop, as it does in Australia, America, and other countries where summer and autumnal heats are more steady, permanent, and intense. The vine, too, succeeds only a little better in the open, than it does in England, and New Zealand will have no glad

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vineyard workers paying honours to that jovial god,

As to shrubs and flowers, it must suffice to say that, in the North, hedges, even, may be formed of geranium and myrtle; and that arum, balsam, heliotrope, and various delicate plants of our English conservatories, flourish in the open air.

Great, however, as may be the merits of the New Zealand climate in respect to pleasantness, and to fitness for agricultural and pastoral pursuits, its salubrity is perhaps its most remarkable feature. In Dr, Thompson's 1 luminous and scientific work on New Zealand he treats fully of the climate in relation to its sanatory properties, and among other remarkable proofs of its healthfulness gives as the following pregnant tables, prefacing them with these remarks:--"Conclusions drawn from the sickness and mortality among Troops are admitted to be the best standard for measuring salubrity of climate, because soldiers in every British regiment of the line are about the same age, feed on the same quantity and quality of food, are exposed to the same injurious agents, and preform nearly the same amount of labour wherever they are stationed."

NUMBER of SOLDIERS in 1000 who Annually Die from Different Diseases at various Military Stations:-- »

New Zealand	8
Australia	11
Great Britain	14
Cape of Good Hope.	15
Malta	18
Canada	20

NUMBER of SOLDIERS in 1000 Annually attacked, and the Number who Annually die from CONSUMPTION at various Military Stations:--

	Attacked.	Deaths
New Zealand	60	2
Cape	98	3
Australia	133	5
Malta	120	6
Canada	148	6
Great Britain	148	8

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The Registrar's returns for England and Wales show that the annual number of "births" are 33 per 1000, of "deaths" 22; whereas in New Zealand, while the births, owing to the comparative scarcity of the gentler sex, stand at 32, the deaths are as low as 10, per 1000. Of course, the per centage of young people being much greater in New Zealand, the death-rate, quite independently of Climate, would be low there. But, allowing amply for this, and at the same time bearing in mind that numbers of those who now form a portion of the colonist population of New Zealand were the sickly or delicate, emigrating thither partly for the very purpose of bracing up constitutions, these figures, taken in conjunction with Dr. Thompson's, will, we think, be found well worthy the attention of all who may be contemplating a radical change of habitation or pursuits partly in the hope of securing a permanent improvement of health for families or for themselves.