CHAPTER XXII
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CHAPTER XXII.
River Waikato--Wainga-roa--Aotea--Kawia.
In Kauwitu, on the south side of the harbour, we fell in with a number of natives from the river Waipa, who were returning from a visit to Waitemata, and who agreed to carry our baggage from Manukao over the portage to the Awaroa, where they had their canoe, and thence to the Waikato. Lieutenant Best accompanied them, but I started for the embouchure of the river Waikato, round the southern head of Manukao, and along the beach. I was anxious not to disappoint Captain William Symonds, who had arranged to accompany me into the interior, and I therefore walked during the night, as it was moonlight, and the air balmy and agreeable, from Manukao. The distance to the Waikato is thirty miles, and the coast, which consists of a broad and hard sandy beach, with soft sandstone cliffs of a moderate height, runs nearly north and south. There is only one spot which is impassable at high water. My path took me near a few poor native huts, and during the night I met a great number of natives quietly returning from a great Missionary
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WAIKATO RIVER.
meeting at the heads of the Waikato. The whole district between the sea-coast and the Awaroa (great river), which branches off from the Waikato eight miles from its mouth, is called Tauroa. The soil is very light, and in some places sandy, but the kumera, of which there are many plantations, thrives very well in it. About ten miles from the north head of the river Waikato sand has been carried by the winds a long distance inland, and is mixed with a great quantity of pumicestone, which is often so firmly imbedded in it as to form a pavement. This pumicestone, and occasionally pieces of black obsidian, are brought down the Waikato river from the volcanic group of the Tongarido, which is situated in the centre of the island, and from which the Waikato takes its rise.
I have been told that between the Waikato and Manukao there lived formerly a numerous tribe-- the Nga-te-iwi; but in the wars with the Waikato tribes they have disappeared entirely, their name being only remembered in disputes about boundaries amongst their successors.
The left shore of the Waikato consists, for about eight miles from the sea, of shifting sand; the right shore is hilly, and at the foot of the hills, near the embouchure of the river, is the station of the Church Missionary Society, Maraenui, established two years ago.
The outlet of the Waikato does not form a bay, but is a narrow channel, where, at low water, only
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MISSIONARY MEETING.
vessels of about thirty tons can enter. But inside the headlands the Waikato is a stately stream, and when the tide has increased its depth it is navigable even for larger vessels for about a hundred miles, where it is joined by the river Waipa, which is navigable for boats sixty miles farther.
Near the mission-station are several native pas, numerously inhabited, but only during certain seasons, as the natives generally live in their plantations higher up, on the banks of the river. About 2500 were present at a meeting which took place the day after my arrival; the manner in which it was carried on, and the eloquent orations of the chiefs, who, in addressing the assembled multitude, alluded to their altered and improved condition, seemed to prove that they are fast progressing in civilization. Such progress is certainly owing to the efforts of the missionaries. A great feast and war-dance concluded the meeting, after which the natives returned to their homes. The Rev. Mr. Maunsell, who is at the head of this mission, is a very zealous minister, and carries on his work with true Christian disinterestedness. Among those present at this meeting was Lady Franklin, who has done much for the encouragement of science in the southern hemisphere, as her distinguished husband, Sir John Franklin, the present Governor of Van Diemen's Land, has done for the same cause, all over the world, by his important discoveries within the arctic circle, and who was at this time
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NATIVE DYES.
engaged in the long and arduous task of visiting many parts of New Zealand.
A party of about seventy natives, who were returning to their homes at Aotea, having offered us their services, we started in the morning of the 6th, and, marching in a long file, followed a path on the hills of the coast towards Waingaroa. The hills are partly wooded, partly covered with fern and flax. In the woods the hinau was very plentiful. This tree (Elaeocarpus hinau) belongs to the family of the Elaeocarpeae, and attains a moderate size. The natives obtain from it the very durable and jet-black dye which they use for dyeing their garments. A greenish mud, which is obtained from the rivers, and probably contains muriate of iron, is macerated for a short time with the bark of the tree and the flax, and this is the whole of the process. I have no doubt that this bark will become an important article of export, as the tree is very common in many parts of the island. The fruit forms the favourite food of the large parrot; and even the natives do not despise it. They separate the farinaceous shell from the hard and oily kernel by friction in a wooden trough, and form it into cakes.
The hills are steep on both sides, and run parallel to the coast, to which, after a short walk, we descended. It consists partly of cliffs and partly of steep slopes; and the formation is a solid white sandstone, composed of comminuted shells and grains of
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COUNTRY NEAR AOTEA.
quartz, and often rising to a height of 120 feet. The rock has broken down in some places, where prosilient cliffs interrupt the generally straight lines of the sandy coast. Everywhere creeks and rivulets fall into the sea.
On the 7th our way led us up and down the coast hills. These consist of a yellow argillaceous slate; and as I descended to the sea-coast I observed in many places laminar basalt, the plates of which were often of a rhomboidal shape; and also compact basaltic rock. Buttresses of the main chain of the hills run off towards the sea-coast, forming narrow valleys. In the widest of these we encamped. The neighbouring hills were moderately high, of undulating outlines, and wooded towards their crests, and the soil of the valleys appeared to be very fertile. It rained violently in the night and during the morning of the 8th, but we started in the afternoon, as the weather had improved and the atmosphere was clear and refreshing. The sandstone cliffs drew close to the sea, and we had to follow a dangerous path on the sides of the cliffs, scarcely practicable except for goats. We passed a small native pa, in which were a few inhabitants; they were the first natives we had seen since leaving the Waikato. We encamped in their neighbourhood: the hilly coastland had now assumed the character of plateaux and basins; and although they were covered with vegetation, I could discover that they owed their origin to trap formation. The sandy downs of
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WAINGAROA HARBOUR.
the coast shelter these places; the soil is a light fertile mould. The appearance of the land continued unchanged until we reached the harbour of Waingaroa. Before we came there we met several families of natives, who seem to be under the authority of a very intelligent and civil old patriarch. All the members of his family were remarkably well-looking. They carried on a lively and joyful conversation with us till late in the night, and I felt truly sorry in the morning when we parted from them.
On starting on the 10th we had only a few miles to proceed before reaching Waingaroa. Our road was covered with the Veronica speciosa, which is a true child of autumn, and grows to the size of a moderate shrub. On the beach the sandstone formation was again interrupted by irregular dykes of whinstone. We pitched our tent on the northern shore of Waingaroa Harbour. This consists of very picturesque limestone cliffs, corroded by the action of the water, and half concealed by the over-hanging verdure. The cliffs are from sixty to seventy feet high. The limestone is more or less crystalline, and coarse grained; and contains fossils, belonging to the genera Terebratula, Venus, Ostrea, Pecten, Echinus, and Asterias. At the head of the harbour there is a large district consisting of a bluish clay, without, however, any organic remains. The southern shore is formed mostly of a soft ferruginous sandstone. At an arm of the harbour, which here
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WAINGAROA HARBOUR.
extends for some distance inland, basaltic rock is seen, containing small grains of olivin. Woody Head, or Karaoe, which forms the southern headland of Waingaroa Harbour, appears to consist entirely of this formation. I tried to ascend the craggy and rocky summit of this group of hills, the base of which is thickly covered with wood or high fern, and which rises about 900 feet above the level of the sea; but after a fatiguing march I abandoned the attempt, as I found it impossible to penetrate through the brushwood without a much greater expenditure of time than I had anticipated.
In Waingaroa there are about 1200 natives, belonging to the Waikato tribe. They are mostly Christians, and on the southern shore is a missionary establishment belong to the Wesleyan Society. The natives assembled in the morning of the 11th, and Captain Symonds expounded to them the new system of government. They were highly pleased to be in future subject to the English law, the leading principles of which, as affecting their own position, they appeared perfectly to understand.
The harbour of Waingaroa is a long inlet, with a bar at the entrance; it has, however, a channel of twelve feet at low water, and admits smaller craft, which find shelter in several bays on the northern shore. Off the southern and northern head of the harbour are spits of sand, and the navigable channel is equidistant from both heads. The tide rises ten feet, and at full and change it is high water at ten
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WAINGAROA HARBOUR.
o'clock. Several small vessels from Sydney, of about sixty tons burden, visit this harbour regularly for the purpose of trading in salt pork and flax, which are obtained from a few Europeans who have settled here.
Two rivers empty themselves into the harbour, of which the smaller one comes from the northward, and is called Waingaroa. The larger one comes from the eastward, and is called Wai-te-Tuna: it has a channel for boats; and from the point at which, on account of falls, it becomes impassable for boats or canoes, an easy walk of four hours leads to the banks of the river Waipa.
The coast-hills between Waikato and Waingaroa, which I have described in the course of my journey, separate the waters of the Waipa and those which rise in the hills and run to the west coast. These hills have an easy slope, both towards the plains of the Waipa and towards the sea-coast. They are lowest at the Wai-te-Tuna, where the common native road is, and here a communication with the interior is most easily established. Thus the harbour of Waingaroa offers many advantages for a settlement, especially as the land in its immediate vicinity is most excellent, both forest and agricultural. Nevertheless the purchases of the Europeans have not been so extensive here as in other parts of the island.
The missionaries have a bridle-road, cut by the natives, for about six miles towards the harbour of
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AOTEA.
Aotea; this we followed on the 11th. It leads along the wooded crest of the hills. The forest contains many tanekaha or parsley-leaved pines (Phyllocladus trichomanoides). The stem of this tree is very straight, and much like that of the kauri, and its wood is still more durable; but I have never seen it growing to the same size, from a foot and a half to two feet being its usual diameter. The middle island, especially Dusky Bay, has more tanekaha, forests than the northern, but this tree has never been much sought after.
On the 12th we reached Aotea. It is a long and shallow estuary, with a bar at its mouth, but has several times been entered by a schooner of sixteen tons burden. In Aotea the limestone again appears on the sides of the hills which bound the harbour. On the northern shore is a Wesleyan mission-station, and the native population amounts to 1200. They assembled at the summons of the missionary, who exhorted them concerning some cases of murder which had lately occurred, resulting from a belief in witchcraft. In one case a dying chief had accused a poor old man of having caused his illness by makuta, or sorcery. A young relative took upon himself to revenge the supposed crime, and killed the man. The majority of the natives felt not only the culpability, but also the absurdity, of such a procedure, and were of opinion that it should in future be discontinued.
We crossed to the southern shore in the boat
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KAWIA HARBOUR.
belonging to the mission. I traced there some thick beds of lignite under cliffs of a soft ferruginous sandstone.
From Aotea a two hours' walk brought us to Kawia. Another good road leads round by the beach, which is here bounded by hills of drift-sand. At a little distance behind them the land is flat and good. We passed many flourishing native plantations stocked with the common vegetables.
The harbour of Kawia is one of the most important on the western coast of the northern island. It has a clear entrance about a mile and a quarter broad, and with two fathoms at dead low-water spring-tides. The tide rises twelve feet, and at full and change it is high water at eight o'clock. The best anchorage is along the northern shore, where the depth varies from five to eight fathoms. The harbour forms an irregular basin, and is joined by two rivers, which descend from the coast range, and admit boats; the one to the north is the Awaroa, which receives a tributary, the Kauri river, so named from a few kauri-trees which grow here, and are strictly "tapu:" from the right bank of the river the road leads over the hills into the plains of the Waipa; the river to the south is the Wai Arekeke, and here another road leads into the Waipa district, more circuitous, but less hilly.
The principal geological feature of the estuary of Kawia is an extensive calcareous formation, which can be examined on the left shore of the Awaroa
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GEOLOGY OF KAWIA.
and on the south side of the harbour. The limestone is of the same description as that in Waingaroa, and contains the same fossils, with the addition of great numbers of a large Ostrea, often a foot in length; next to these the Terebratulae are the most numerous, and in an excellent state of preservation. The nature of the fossils would seem to place this formation in the tertiary series; they are, however, such as are found in formations of all ages, and it is difficult to form at present a decided opinion on this point. The calcareous cliffs are corroded in various ways; chasms have been formed by the dripping water, and stalactites hang from their sides and roofs. In one of these deep chasms is the old bury-ing-place of the tribe of Rauparaha, the Nga-te-toa, a division of the great Nga-te-awa tribe. But these places, to which such sanctity is usually attached by the New Zealanders, have not met with more respect from the Waikato than has the tribe of the Nga-te-toa itself, who about twenty-five years ago were driven from this place to the south, when Rauparaha settled at Entry Island. On the northern shore are still to be seen the extensive remains of his fortifications, trenches, and walls, and I thought I could distinguish in their construction that sagacity for which Rauparaha has been always famous.
The principal settlement of the Waikato, who are now in possession of this part of the island, is near the Wesleyan mission-station on the south shore.
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GOOD SITE FOR A TOWN.
They are about 1500 in number, and of late most of them have become Christians. There are about forty Europeans settled on the northern shore, who have lived here for several years past: but the mixed members of this little community do not keep up the best understanding amongst themselves; and it would be well to establish soon some authority at this place, as, from its being almost the best harbour on the western coast, and the only one of consequence between Manukao and Port Nicholson, from the quality of the surrounding country, as well as from the immediate neighbourhood of the extensive and fertile Waipa plains, a town might be established here with every prospect of immediate success. The greater part of the land in the vicinity of Kawia is claimed by Europeans.
We settled with our numerous followers to their entire satisfaction, a shirt or a gown being the payment to each. Amongst them was a chief, Te Kiwi, with whom I was particularly pleased. He had been formerly a renowned warrior in the wars of his tribe with the Nga-te-awa. Although fully tattooed, his countenance displayed much mildness, and his behaviour to us was conciliating, polite, and attentive. In his exhortations to the rest of our companions he often used the powerful weapons of sarcasm and irony, which had the more weight as they were delivered without arrogance and in perfect good humour. He took great care of his daughter, a fine little girl, who had volunteered to
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OPARAU RIVER.
carry Mr. Best's knapsack. Te Kiwi had become a convert to Christianity, and had a kind and feeling heart, although in his younger days a renowned cannibal. His costume was most peculiar: he was dressed in a shabby black dress-coat and trousers, the offcast of a missionary's clerical wardrobe, with an extremely dilapidated gossamer hat on his head.
On the 20th we went in a canoe to Oparau, a small river a little to the northward of the Awaroa. Its banks are of moderate height: the soil is a good loamy earth, and covered with a luxuriant vegetation of fern and flax. We halted in a native potato-plantation, not far from the harbour, as our companions, amongst whom was Te Waro, a chief from the river Waipa, who had offered to accompany us into the interior, had not yet all arrived.
The next day our road led us up the hills, which ascend gently from the sea. We kept along the ridges, and had to pass several ravines and narrow valleys. The formation of the hills, as was shown by the fragments which appeared on the surface, is volcanic: they consisted of a solid basaltic matrix, with numerous pentagonal columns of augite. Many parts of these hills are covered only with fern; others, especially in the ravines, are still clothed with forest, which seems to have formerly covered the whole. We stopped at a very ancient rata-tree: its stem was fifty-four feet round, and, having been hollowed out by fire, served for a convenient shelter to the natives. It was "tapu," that is, no one was allowed
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EXTENSIVE VIEW OF THE
to cut down any portion of it, the whole having been set apart for general use. We ourselves pitched our tent, but it rained so violently during this and the following day, that everything got wet. In the night flashes of lightning threatened every moment to strike the trees around us, and the thunder resounded majestically from the surrounding hills. During the night we heard the shrill monotonous voice of the weka, or Rallus australis. This bird, which has become very scarce, on account of its being destroyed by the wild dogs and cats, lives in the darkest recesses of the forest, where the soil has become saturated with water, and muddy, and where it finds the insects which, together with seeds, serve for its food. I kept one for some time, feeding it on potatoes and cockroaches, of which insect it was very fond. The natives catch it in snares, or decoy it by imitating its voice.
On the 23rd we continued to ascend the hilly and wooded ridge which separates the Waipa from the sea-coast. From an open spot I had a view of Kawia and Aotea. Albatross Point bore S. 55 deg. W.; the south head of Kawia S. 50 deg. W.; Maunga-Tau-tari, a volcanic ridge in the interior, N. 65 deg. E. Higher up the hills become very rocky and steep: the formation of basaltic and augitic rock continues. In some places the hills are only covered with scanty and stunted trees. When we reached the top an extensive view opened before us: the broad and open valley of the Waipa stretched out towards the north-
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VALLEY OF THE WAIPA.
east, and was bounded to the east by distant hills. To the south-west the eye reached to the hilly chain of Rangitoto, near Mokau, on the western coast, which bore S. 20 deg. W. In the valley of the Waipa rose an isolated conical hill, Maunga-Kaua, whilst here and there a small part of the Waipa river itself was visible. I had a good view of the country inland of Waingaroa and Aotea Harbours; and I observed that everywhere the coast-hills descended gradually towards the interior, and that all these hills were covered with forest. Only some small spots of the valley of the Waipa were wooded. On these we observed burnt and bleak stems of old trees, the only sign we could perceive of the intrusion of man upon the dominion of Nature. The undisturbed silence in which the whole was wrapped imparted an agreeable repose to the landscape. Pirongia, as the hill on which we stood is called, seems to be the highest point of the coast-chain: it rises to the height of 2428 feet, measured themometrically, the point of boiling-water being 207.5 deg., the temperature of the air 51 deg., and the mean between that of the sea-shore being taken as 55 deg. Fahrenheit. We descended into the valley of the Waipa, following the course of one of its tributaries, which rolled rapidly over a bed of rounded and smooth boulders. At the foot, of the hill we halted at a small settlement of natives. The news of our approach having preceded us, they placed before us, at
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NATIVE HOSPITALITY.
the moment of our arrival, long rows of baskets filled with articles of food, such as green calabashes, kumeras, pumpkins, water-melons, and dried fish. This is an old native custom in regard to strangers, and is rapidly giving way to European modes of hospitality.
