CHAPTER I.
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CANTERBURY SKETCHES.
LIFE FROM THE EARLY DAYS.
CHAPTER I.
IN these days of progress, and to use an American phrase-- "go-a-headisim" --men I are more inclined to look to the future, rather than to the past, but there still may be a few who will care to read a simple but faithful record of the early days of this our adopted country. Some of the early settlers may read these few chapters and look back with regret to those happy times; aye, happy in spite of hard work and the many discomforts they had to endure. A bond of no ordinary friendship united the "Pilgrims," as we were called, we had all left "dear old England" with the same object--to try our fortunes in a new and strange land. I shall endeavour, to the best of my ability, to give some idea of our life in Canterbury from the early days, and commence these pages with the arrival of the first four ships in Lyttelton, on the 16th of December, 1850. I may here mention that this Canterbury Fleet, consisting of the Charlotte Jane, the Randolph, and the Cressy, sailed together from Plymouth on the 7th of September, 1850, and the Sir George Seymour on the morning of the 8th, and curiously enough, three of the
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ships came in sight of New Zealand the same day, the Randolph and the Sir George Seymour being the only two that sighted each other during the three months' voyage. It was on a bright beautiful morning, with a true New Zealand sky of deep blue, and not a cloud to be seen, that the Charlotte Jane came to anchor at eight o'clock in the morning of the 16th of December, and earned the proud distinction of being the first ship to land emigrants on the shores of the Canterbury Settlement. The Randolph arrived the same evening, the next day the Sir George Seymour, and last of all the Cressy, on the 27th. The first view of Port Cooper (as it was then called) was most picturesque, the sun was just setting, and bathed the hills and harbour with a soft golden light. I give here a short Poem, published in the first number of the Lyttelton Times, January the 11th, 1851.
OUR FIRST NEW ZEALAND SUNSET.
Sett'st as thou wert wont to do,
Old fount of light?
Bathing with familiar hue
Tree, dale, and height.
Casting still old England's shades
Thou art aye the same,
If on land the vision fades,
Then, be ours the blame.
Grand old friend! thou shinest still,
Guiding to the work;
To the steadfast mind and will,
Never dim or mirk.
Glorious type! of fond old ties
Fate may have bereft us,
Paint thou with unfailing dyes
God hath not left us.
--D. T. WILLIAMS.
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The following description of Port Cooper I have taken from Mr. Godley's private journal, published in the Canterbury Papers:--
"The harbour is very fine, both in a utilitarian and picturesque point of view. None of us were prepared for the beauty of the scenery, it took us more by surprise than at Otago, for the sketches we had seen in England were far from inviting. The character is very different from that of the lovely bay on the banks of which Port Chalmers stands, but I am not sure that I prefer it. The hills are bold, both in face and outline, bare for the most part, that is, with only small patches of wood at the bottom of the glens or gullies, but with much of that sublimity, which is produced by extent of view and rugged wildness."
Another extract runs thus:-- "One might have supposed that the country had been colonised for years, so settled and so busy was the look of the Port. In the first place there is a splendid jetty; from thence a wide beaten-looking road leads up the hill, and turns off through a deep cutting to the eastward (this was the Bridle-path). On each side of the road there are houses scattered, to the number of about twenty-five, including two Hotels and a Custom-House (in the shape of a small weather-boarded hut certainly, but still a Custom-House). In a square railed off close to the jetty are four excellent houses intended for Immigration Barracks, with a cook-house in the centre; next the square comes a small house, which Captain Thomas, Chief Surveyor, inhabits, but which is destined for an Agent's office. Behind this, divided from it by a plot of land intended for a garden, stands a stately edifice, which was introduced in due form to us as our house, it is weather-boarded and has six rooms and a verandah, in short, after seeing it, we could not help laughing at our anticipations of a shed on the bare beach with a fire at the door."
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Mr. Godley at that time was Agent for the Canterbury Association, and the following extract is from his memos.:-- "From the 16th of December, 1850, to December 22nd, 1852, when Mr. Godley sailed for England, he was in all but the name, the governor of the settlement, which he had originated and formed. Such a career is not granted to many in this life; most men are but the agents to carry out the schemes of others; it was given to Mr. Godley to carry out his own design. What he was amongst us during the first two years of the settlement, some of us remember, and most of us know by tradition; not with coffers full, and facilities abundant, but in poverty of funds, amid great difficulties, amid much discomfort, amidst the disappointment of many sanguine expectations, and the ill-concealed hostility of a Government which appeared vexed at the additional trouble imposed upon it, by the founding of a new Colony within its jurisdiction, Mr. Godley guided the infant fortunes of Canterbury in the full and entire conviction of the result which must one day come."
I now go on to our first view of the Plains of Canterbury. A party of us made up our minds to climb to the top of the Bridle-path; the track lay up what might fairly be called a mountain, so after a stiff walk, we were glad to stop, and admire the view; in fact the admiration of the landscape (behind us) necessitated our stopping so often that our leader said, "Come this will not do, we shall never get to the top at this rate, let us take a good rest, and start again." We were all thankful to do so, and sat and lay down in various comfortable attitudes. Some amongst us offered a sacrifice to St. Nicotina, and others did a little sketching. After a short rest, we soon reached the top of the hill, and had our first view of the Canterbury Plains, and our future home. How
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shall I describe them? In the far distance lay an amphitheatre of snow-capped mountains, and a vast yellowish plain without the smallest apparent inequality on its surface, lay stretched between them and the sea; there were also several dark patches, which proved to be Riccarton, Papanui, Rangiora, Ohoka, and Oxford Bushes, and also some rivers which, from their flowing in deep channels, made but a small show in the distance. From one point we could see the pretty bay of Port Cooper on one side, and on the other the grand Plains, with forty miles of surfy beach, the whole backed up by our glorious Southern Alps.
The first view of the Plains was rather disappointing to English eyes, that is, we missed the greenness which the growth of grass in a country long cultivated exhibits, but we soon grew to like our yellow tussocks, when we found what feed it made for cattle and sheep; and only the other day I was talking to a friend who told me, that the hares that were found on the Plains where the tussock still grows, were stronger and more vigorous than those fed on English grass, and gave better sport for coursing.
After a rest we started homewards, and found, as is often the case in human life, far easier to travel down hill. Some of our party had made arrangements to stay on board their respective ships for a time, a proceeding which our Emigration Agent, Mr. Fitzgerald, highly approved of, as it was most difficult to find accommodation for all in the Barracks. A sad accident happened a few days after our arrival; as a party of young men were coming down the hill, they saw a man sitting, as if he were resting at the side of the road, on coming up to him they found to their horror that he was at rest for ever, for he was dead. They carried him down to Lyttelton to his
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poor widow and children, he was a Mr. John Williams, a passenger by the Randolph; he bore a high character amongst those who had an opportunity of knowing him, and was respected and liked by his fellow passengers. The cause of his death appeared to have been heart complaint. This sad event threw a gloom over our little community.
Our first Sunday in Lyttelton I can just remember, and I am indebted to my valued friend, the Very Rev. the Dean of Christchurch, for the following graphic picture of our first Sunday:-- "I wish to draw now a little picture of our first Sunday in Canterbury, which I ought to be able to do, as it was my privilege to officiate at the very first service, simply because, for reasons I need not enter into, I was the first of the Pilgrim Chaplains to leave the ship, and take up my abode on shore. There was no church, no schoolroom, no place even in which it seemed possible service could be held. There was a warehouse on Norwich Quay, close by the water-side, full above and below (for it had two storeys) of sugar barrels, flour barrels, tar barrels, tar tarpaulins, coils of rope, and what not, a most unecclesiastical exterior, a most unattractive interior. It was a barn, with of course a lean-to. The lean-to style of architecture predominated in those days, so much so, that many buildings were lean-to's pure and simple, having nothing where-to to lean. The upper storey of this warehouse was to be our church, better after all, or at least more wholesome and airy than the "Catacomb's" in which our Christian forefathers were fain to find a refuge and a sanctuary; but though airy it was dark, for there were no windows, but only a wide opening at the seaward end, whereat protruded a windlass for lifting barrels and heavy goods. Stairs of course there were none whereby to ascend to the church aloft, a
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ladder sufficed, but if I remember rightly, something like a permanent ladder was erected with a back to it, before Sunday came round. The seats were rough planks resting on cases, the lectern a case upon a case. Very hearty and happy notwithstanding were our first services in this shapeless ungainly looking building. The first service was held in the early morning, Mr. and Mrs. Godley and a few others attended, the bulk of the passengers of the three ships had not yet come to live on shore. A sermon was preached, and the Holy Communion was administered. At half past ten o'clock, which was the usual time of service for some years afterwards, several boat-loads of colonists came ashore for a second service, and strange it was to see the bright summer costumes and the pink and blue ribbons of the Pilgrim mothers and daughters, contrasted with those rough planks and cases, and that dingy, cob-webbed, lowering roof. Not less marked was the excellent singing and chanting we had at those services."
This extract is a vivid picture of our first service, and the Psalm for the day, the 22nd, was wonderfully applicable to us. These are the verses I refer to, "And there He setteth the hungry that they may find them a city to dwell in; that they may plant their fruits of increase. He blesseth them so that they multiply exceedingly and suffereth not their cattle to decrease." It seemed as if the Almighty had given us His blessing on our new life, and may we not say, on looking back through the long vista of years, that He has blessed many of us abundantly, and made us a prosperous and happy people? To return to mundane affairs, not a month after our arrival, on the 11th of January 1851, the first number of the Lyttelton Times was published, Mr. Fitzgerald being the able editor. I quote a few extracts from the first
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leader. "In order to the successful establishment and conduct of a newspaper, it is essential, first, that there be some unoccupied room it is proposed to fill; some literary want which it is designed to supply; secondly, that the paper be conducted in such a manner so as to meet the deficiency. It probably never before happened that a resolution was formed to print and publish a weekly journal upon the shores of a bay, situated in the remotest corner of the globe; when at the time the surrounding country was a desert, and where scarcely twenty human habitations were in existence. These, however, were not all the circumstances. The establishment of the Lyttelton Times is but a chapter in the history of the foundation of the Colony itself; with that story our readers are already acquainted; they know it was designed to found a colony which should contain as far as possible within itself, all the elements of society in the more complete stages of development at which it had arrived in the more advanced communities of the old world."
The first number of the Lyttelton Times was on a very small scale, and contained a few advertisements, a leader, shipping intelligence, a poet's corner, and a small space devoted to news of the day. It was published weekly, and we looked forward to its advent every Saturday with pleasure. I find that the London Times of July 5th, 1851, thus noticed its small contemporary:--
"A slice of England, cut from top to bottom, was despatched in September last, to the Antipodes. A complete sample of civilization, weary of the fight for bread within the compass of these narrow isles, took ship at Gravesend in search of less crowded markets in New Zealand. The step was enthusiastic but by no means wild. It was not a blind helter-skelter risk from known troubles at home, to more
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painful hardships to be discovered abroad, but a deliberate, long considered, solemn, and devoted pilgrimage to a temple, erected by nature for the good of all comers, blessed with strong limbs, and courageous hearts. Greece, in the heyday of heathen glory, had given her picture in little to the colonies she designed to establish, why should not England exhibit her own Saxon face to her new born dependencies? Noah's Ark did not more completely treasure up specimens of the creature world, than did the ships bound for Canterbury preserve casts from all the old moulds left behind them in the old country. At the head of the Pilgrims stood an actual Bishop, behind him were working clergy, working schoolmasters, working landlords, working labourers-- workers everyone. Between deck and keel, were the elements of a college, the contents of a public library, the machinery for a bank, and the constituent parts of a constitutional Government. It is superfluous to say that the enterprising voyagers took on board with them type, a press, an editor, a reporter, pens, ink, and paper, and a determined resolution to start a journal for the enlightened public of New Zealand, the very earliest opportunity.
"It is certainly not a matter of astonishment, that the Canterbury settlers should settle upon an organ, half an hour after they were fortunate enough to reach a distant home; but it is really worthy of remark and admiration, that all the conditions of a highly influential journal should present itself in an instant to an antipodean contemporary on a desert coast, quite as readily, as to the journalist in the centre of this ever restless city. It is difficult to glance at the first number of the Lyttelton Times, now before us, and associate its existence with a community not a month old. So far from being ashamed
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of our name-sake, we are positively proud of his acquaintance, and envious of his power. If the Editor of the Lyttelton Times can create so much out of nothing, what would he make of such a breeding heap as this of London?"
