NEW ZEALAND
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NEW ZEALAND.
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INTRODUCTION.
A longer residence in New Zealand might have made the author of the following sketches more familiar, not only with the natural capabilities of the country, but likewise with the political dissensions of the people--although a longer period for praise of the one, or censure of the other, would not have increased the writer's present high opinion either of the colony or its incomparable climate.
To the interest taken in the progress of New Zealand, may be attributed the reprehension of those local evils by which that progress is impeded.
In New Zealand, as in other colonies, may be found a swarm of political blue bottles, incapable of good themselves, although they seriously affect what has been or might be prepared and dispensed for the public weal. But these lilliputian statesmen, in attempting great characters, present the world with an unenviable picture of their own littleness.
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With the exception, however, of a few of these provincial trumpeters, and certain members of the house of clamour and confusion, by which some of the provinces are misgoverned, and the commercial expansion of others retarded, the inhabitants are in every respect superior to those in either of the Australian settlements. And if asked to name the first colony in the southern hemisphere, as a desirable home for the intending emigrant, the writer, with the most impartial sincerity, would answer--NEW ZEALAND.
Of greater interest than a long editorial preface will be found the following pointed and sensible address of the new Governor; and if certain New Zealand politicians only profit by a gentle rebuke for past mischief, by following good advice for future action--if they will only evince a little more regard for the general welfare of the country than for private purposes or provincial squabbles --they will prove themselves more worthy of a colony which is indeed worthy of nature's noblest sons.
GENERAL ASSEMBLY. --LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.
The fourth session of the General Assembly of New Zealand was opened on the 10th of April, by his Excellency the Governor, with the customary formalities. At two o'clock, his Excellency entered the Legislative Council, and the members of the House of Representatives having been sent for, his Excellency read the following address:--
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"HONORABLE GENTLEMEN OF THE LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL, AND GENTLEMEN OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATATIVES.
"Various causes prevented the last Assembly from legislating on many subjects materially affecting the welfare of the colony, and it has been reserved for you to undertake that important duty.
"Questions involving numerous conflicting interests remain for your consideration and adjustment, and in the solution of these difficulties an arduous task awaits you.
"To enable me to call to my Councils advisers possessing the confidence of the General Assembly, is naturally a subject which will engage your earliest attention. This may be considered the corner stone on which all other legislation should be built; and I now repeat in the most explicit terms the assurance which I gave on the prorogation of the last Assembly, that I would give my confidence to the gentlemen who possess that of the Legislature, and that whenever changes become necessary I would allow no personal feelings to influence my public conduct.
"I doubt not that the gentlemen who accept from you a responsibility conferring such an honorable distinction on themselves, will consign to forgetfulness all of the past which has no reference to the future; that they will arm themselves with a determination to disregard all private interests; and, devoting themselves heart and soul to those of New Zealand, they will declare what ought to be enacted for the welfare of the colony at large.
"Such conduct will ensure respect from opponents and the esteem of Englishmen, not only in this colony but throughout the empire; not only at the present time but in the future, when party feelings and local interests have been obliterated and forgotten, and history records the strength or weakness of those who guided the infant steps of a great country.
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"If, on the contrary, the men chosen for this honorable trust should prove unequal to it, looking for the applause and preferring the interests of a party or a province to that of the colony at large, then will the power they are unable to wield remain but a moment in their nerveless grasp, and, once released, it will oscillate backward and forward until seized on by some statesmen worthy of their adopted country, strong in the rectitude and integrity of their intentions, and regardless of all considerations which can in any way hinder the progress of the public weal.
"Such are the men whose counsel I desire, and by whose advice I hope to be guided.
"I rely entirely on your patriotic aid, and feel assured that, however divided you may be by political or party feelings, your best efforts will always be directed to secure the interests of the inhabitants of this country, mindful that their welfare depends on our efficient and faithful exercise of the powers vested in us by the Imperial Government.
"My recent visit to the different provinces has enabled me to bear testimony to their general prosperity, and to the evident signs of progress and improvement in each and all of them.
"I have witnessed with great satisfaction the strong feelings of loyalty and attachment entertained throughout the colony to the throne and person of our gracious Sovereign; and I feel deeply grateful for the cordial reception everywhere accorded to myself as her Majesty's representative.
"Information has been prepared on various subjects, with a view to enable the gentlemen honored by your confidence to lay before you certain measures of importance: among them I may mention a proposal to extinguish the claim of the New Zealand Company, on terms which are therein explained; another for a uniform postal communication with the mother country; the improvement and extension of our own overland posts; and an alteration in the custom laws;
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and I trust you will lose no time in authorising the formation of a commission, with full powers to settle the many vexed questions connected with land claims, and for the quieting of disputed titles.
"Another subject will, I trust, engage your early attention, namely, the propriety of adopting some plan of final audit for the accounts of the General Government which will be more satisfactory than the one at present in force.
"Gentlemen of the House of Representatives.
"The utmost economy has been practised in the expenditure of the funds placed at my disposal by the late House of Representatives. The fullest accounts shall be submitted for your approval, and the most complete information afforded to your inquiries.
"I have to request you to make an early provision for the repayment of £14,086 11s. 5d. advanced by the Union Bank of Australia, being part of a sum of thirty thousand pounds obtained under sanction of a resolution of the late House of Representatives.
"Gentlemen of the Assembly.
"Your deliberations will be viewed with interest in the mother country; for whether in Great Britain or the colonies, Englishmen watch the proceedings of their legislative bodies with the greatest attention.
"But the Legislature of this colony has no reason to shrink from such a scrutiny, for while adopting all that is good in the laws and usages of our native land, it has a cause for congratulation of which few other lands colonized by Europeans can boast.
"In order to form this flourishing and rapidly increasing colony, no property has been wrested from its native owners; no hospitality has been violated; no laws of humanity or justice have been trampled under foot. The land enriched
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by the sweat of our brows has been honestly acquired and is rightfully enjoyed. Nor, when we consider that, in place of a dreadful form of idolatry, we have communicated to the natives a knowledge of the blessings of Christianity, and of the arts and appliances of civilization, can it be urged that the advantage has been exclusively on the side of those who gave money and received land alone in exchange for it.
"These are considerations which make England proud of her youngest colony--and she has reason to be so. Situated in the same relative position in the southern hemisphere; similar in size to Great Britain; like her, separated from other lands by broad seas; possessing the same natural advantages and colonized by the same hardy race--New Zealand cannot fail to become the Britain of Australasia.
"Free institutions, deeply graven in the hearts of Englishmen, the glory of the British nation, framed, amended, and maintained by the wisdom and perseverance of successive generations, have devolved on you as an inheritance. To them we owe much of that enterprise and independence which have been and are the characteristics of our nation in all parts of the world. They have been transplanted for you in their maturity, and their broad shadow spreads already over this favored land.
"The history of the growth of these institutions during a thousand years in our native country would be but a tale that is told, and the retrospect of the past but an idle dream, if they teach us no lessons of wisdom. May we profit by them; and when time has consigned all who now hear me to the stillness of the grave, and children's children have succeeded to the inheritance of their fathers, may those who will then review the acts of this Assembly feel for you that admiration and esteem which we cannot withhold from the time-honored men to whom we owe our origin and our laws.
"THOMAS GORE BROWNE.
"Auckland, April 15, 1856."
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NEW ZEALAND.
"Though last, not least in our estimation."--HAMLET.
IN describing the Australian Colonies agreeably with a matured judgment, and with the painful conviction that our own feeble but impartial sketches would be in direct opposition, not only to the majority of accounts previously published by visitors and settlers, but likewise to impressions created by the fluent pens and imaginative pencils of absentee poets and painters, we availed ourselves of every opportunity, consistent with fairness, to qualify the unfavorable opinions formed from personal observations during a residence of twelve months in the golden region. The country, the climate, the social and intellectual condition of the people--Australia and all we beheld therein, save and except the precious metal, appeared so completely to negative everything we had either heard or read on the subject, that we paused for a time in penning a verdict
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which might cover the recorder with colonial abuse. But as the united indignation of the entire population of Australia would have caused us less pain than that which would spring from the disguise of an honest opinion, we preferred the chance of a penalty from the least painful alternative, and entered our verdict accordingly.
We now find ourselves placed in another dilemma--although one of an opposite character. The hesitation caused by an unfavorable impression of Australia confronts our mind like the apparition of some condemned criminal, now that New Zealand compels us to furnish of this more favored land, a sketch the very reverse of that which forms the subject of the neighbouring colonies. If in a social point of view we reluctantly pronounced Australia to be the most objectionable of all British dependencies, and the inhabitants, as a body, to be the most depraved, immoral and reckless of any and every European country with which we are acquainted, we may possibly be accused of prejudice when we declare New Zealand to be the finest colony in the world, and the majority of its people to be equal in respectability, intelligence, temperance, and honesty, to those in a similar scale of society in any part of Europe. The fear however of reproach, or the false accusation of prejudice in no way influenced our judgment in the former case, and the certainty of either, or both, or of a more bitter censure
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still, would be insufficient to check the expression of an honest opinion in the present instance. As stated in our prefatory remarks, we write neither for party nor party purposes, and being entirely independent of and uninfluenced by either, our simple motto is--truth.
We once either read a prediction or heard it predicted that "New Zealand would at no very remote period become the Great Britain of the southern hemisphere." Although we have but little faith in modern prophets and prophecies generally--least of all in those theological and political compounds of the Cumming creation-- we confess ourselves sufficiently credulous to accept and believe in the above prediction as an exception to the rule.
Comparatively little known, as she is at present, New Zealand will, no doubt, some day become an important and populous country, if not a great nation. She possesses all the elements to warrant such an opinion and to justify such a belief. With a fine, if not the finest climate in the world, the colony has every corresponding advantage. The capabilities of the land are so great and the produce therefrom so astounding that a stranger and an eye witness is almost afraid to record what, to distant landowners, will naturally appear more like fiction than fact. But as no imaginary sketches --nothing but facts collected from and authenticated by the best authorities will find room in the
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pages of this volume, the reader may be assured of dealing with truths, however strange or extraordinary may appear the matter they reveal.
Having visited and personally inspected each and all the provinces of New Zealand from Auckland to Otago, we intend, after a few general remarks on the colony, to transcribe our observations in the chronological order in which they were taken--supplying at the same time, through the kind assistance of the leading settlers, those valuable statistical and other records of the respective settlements which--without such aid--it would have been impossible to furnish after a hasty visit of barely six months.
The following brief but able description of the position, &c, of New Zealand (from "Chambers' Papers for the People") so completely accords with what we have gathered from personal observation and other authentic sources, that we will not vary or mystify so concise an account for the purpose of obtaining credit for originality:--
"New Zealand lies in the immense Austral Ocean between New Holland and Cape Horn. On the east that ocean rolls to South America, on the south to the Pole, on the west to Van Diemen's Land, and on the north it stretches boundlessly away to the Arctic Circle. The group is situated between 34 and 48 degrees south latitude, and between 160 and 179 degrees east longitude. It consists of two large islands--the North and the Middle, otherwise New Ulster and New Munster, with a lesser one called Stewart's, or New Leinster, and several scattered islets. The extreme
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length from North to South Cape exceeds 1100 miles; its breadth varies from 300 to 1 mile, though 100 is the average. The larger islands are separated by Cook's Strait, and Stewart's is divided from the Middle Island by Fourneaux's Strait. The North Island contains, it has been computed, about 31,174,400 acres of area; the Middle 46,126,080; and Stewart's 1,000,000.
"To afford the reader an idea, by familiar comparison, of their extent, we may say that the North Island is about a thirty-second part less than England, exclusive of Scotland and Wales; that the Middle is about a ninth less; and that the whole group contains 78,300,480 acres, or not more than 50,000 acres less than the whole of Great Britain and Ireland with all the adjacent isles: consequently we have in New Zealand an extensive country, capable, in respect of its size, of accommodating 25,000,000 persons at the least. Its natural capabilities are by no means of inferior proportion. Tracts of barren hills, irreclaimable begs, naked sandflats, and considerable expanses of water-surface, there certainly are; but amply allowing for these, it appears no exaggeration to assert that at least two-thirds, or about 52,000,000 acres, are fitted for settlement, and might yield abundant sustenance to a population, whether by herds and flocks, or vintage and grain. New Zealand is most nearly of all countries the antipodes of Great Britain. It lies 1200 miles east of the mighty island of New Holland; and if we suppose an immense semicircle formed by the continents of Asia, Africa, and America, extending in a sweep from Cape Horn, by Behring's Strait, to the Cape of Good Hope, encompassing the Indian and Polynesian Archipelagos, and comprising the greatest oceans on the globe, New Zealand occupies nearly the centre.
New Zealand, like many other groups in the Southern Sea, is of volcanic origin. A chain of lofty hills, broken into high sharp peaks, runs along the Middle Island from
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north to south, their summits towering in some instances to a height of 14,000 feet. The most elevated pinnacles are wrapped in a robe of everlasting snow; and during the winter season, when the whole ridge is clothed in this magnificent covering, its effect is beyond the power of art to describe. The mariner has compared it to a gigantic crest of foam rolled up by the billows of the Austral Ocean, and appearing ever ready to sink down and disperse over the waves. In the North Island the hills are lower and less distinctly connected; but a few of their isolated peaks invade the regions of perpetual snow. One of them, Mount Egmont, is an extinct volcano, reckoned to be 8840 feet high: it is situated at the South-West Cape, near Cook's Strait. The first person who ascended it was the intelligent traveller Dr. Dieffenbach in 1839. Tongarroo, a volcano still active, and Ruaperhue, whose fires have long been extinguished, stand in the centre of the island--one 6200, the other loftier, both crowned with perpetual snow, and forming, with two or three others, a magnificent group of mountains, reared in the middle of a more level but picturesque country. Mount Edgecombe is an extinct volcano near the Bay of Plenty. No one has ever been known, to ascend its summit, which is supposed to be about 7000 feet high. Hence the surface of the island north-east to Mount Egmont wears the traces of violent volcanic action, chiefly proceeding from the crater of Tongarroo. Boiling fountains break from the ground in many places, geysers spout up their foam, fumeroles emit columns of sulphury steam, solfataras shoot forth clouds of luminous vapour, and hot springs in constant ebullition spread over the district in an extended line. In White Island, lying in the Bay of Plenty, exists a low crater, with the rim composed of alloyed sulphur. A chain of lakes, closely connected with the volcanic agencies we have enumerated, gives additional proof of the formation of the region. Lake Tago, in the south-west, is the most
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extensive. Of an irregular triangular shape, its greatest length is about thirty-six miles, its width twenty-five. Many little creeks indent its borders, and several streams feed it from the south; while the Waikato River, flowing away westward, bears to the sea the superabundant waters. Around spreads a broad level tract or table-land, beyond which the surface is depressed, and gradually formed into hills and valleys, where the drainage of the peaks, ranges, and plateaus, accumulated in the beds of streams, is carried to the ocean. Detached ridges, more or less elevated, diversify the aspect of New Zealand, lying almost invariably in one direction--from north to south--and dividing the low alluvial plains from the high table lands.
"As in most other countries presenting similar geographical features, New Zealand presents numerous indications of mineral wealth. Copper, silver, and iron, with coal, sulphur, and manganese, have been discovered, each in at least one spot, and worked with considerable success. They already form articles of exportation, and will probably furnish materials for manufacturing on a large scale. Lead-ore, tin-ore, and what is supposed to be nickel, have been detected, but not hitherto procured in any extraordinary abundance. Many other riches remain, doubtless, for further research to discover; but it will be well if what has been already brought to light is developed even to a moderate extent. Compared with the geological formation of the Andes, the ranges of New Zealand present very similar characteristics, and it is believed they may contain even the more costly metal which is found in the giant chain of South America.
"In these mountains are traced the sources of streams and rivers which flow into the sea at various points along the extensive coast-line. Some rise from many springs, play down the slopes in rivulets, accumulating and meeting until their associated waters form a river. Others gush
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from copious fountains, and break into many brooks, which ramify until they shoot like threads of silver over the surface of the plains. Rising, as all the streams do, at a considerable elevation above the level of the sea, into which they discharge themselves after a very abrupt course, or long windings through a rugged country, they are not generally navigable for any great distance. Some, however, tortuous and broken as they are by falls and rapids, flow one, and even two hundred miles. The high peaks of the hills, intercepting masses of cloud formed by the congregated vapours of the surrounding ocean, bring them down in floods, which supply the rivers with a perennial flow, affording an exhaustless water-power in every hollow and valley of New Zealand. Advantageous as they would thus be were the region densely peopled in the more elevated tracts, they are in the lower provinces blessings to the population, spreading out wide alluvial flats, fertile beyond exaggeration, large spaces of which are now ready for the plough and the drill; while in others the axe of the woodman and the task of drainage still remain to render the land susceptible of cultivation.
"Few regions in the world--in comparison with the extent of coast-line, about three thousand miles--equal New Zealand in the excellence and abundance of their harbors. Here a commodious, safe, and central rendezvous is offered to the vast shipping trade of the Southern Seas, including myriads of islands, many of them the most fruitful in the world. It might form the entrepot of commerce between the Indian and Polynesian Archipelagoes; and will probably, when its affairs have been liberally settled, literally become, as many orators, writers, and economists have prophesied, another Great Britain in the Austral Ocean.
"To the British emigrant, however, one consideration is paramount above all views of profit. It is nothing to him that a region abounds in harbors, ports, and bays; that it
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has a fertile soil, is rich in minerals, abounds with timber, and promises wealth to the industrious settler, unless its climate be genial to the European constitution. A mine of gold or an estate near Cape Coast Castle would not induce him to make his habitation there; the gold-washings of Borneo will not allure him to live amid its marshes; but in New Zealand soil and climate equally invite his enterprise. We have with respect to this subject heard many erroneous statements; but a careful examination of accounts by the most competent authorities imposes on us but one belief. We maintain without reserve that the climate of New Zealand is better adapted to the English constitution than that of any other British colony. The immense preponderance of water over land in those latitudes causes a less degree of average heat than in the northern regions, where the land greatly preponderates over the water. In temperature, therefore, New Zealand resembles that of the country between the south of Portugal and the central departments of France, or rather that which, from its insular character, Great Britain would enjoy if its centre lay twelve hundred miles to the west of Cape Finisterre."
Previous to a distinct review of each, locality, we will make a few general remarks--such as would naturally occur to the mind of a stranger or any one who has noted or may note the political and social atmosphere of New Zealand in visiting the respective provinces. In the first place (without inquiring into or suggesting a remedy for the cause of the disease or attributing blame to any particular class of persons) our honesty compels us to declare that politics, politicians, and petty jealousies, constitute the great if not the only
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barrier to the rapid progress of the colony, and to the social and mental elevation and prosperity of the inhabitants. Although prosperity and material wealth are within the grasp of, and easily obtained in a few years by the humblest individual in New Zealand, it is to be regretted that such desirable acquirements are not more frequently accompanied with peace of mind to the owners and good will towards others. Men aspire to, or are elected to fill seats in the legislative assemblies who are in no respect qualified for the senatorial and (in the colony) anything but peaceful honor. But while these persons are not qualified for their position they obstruct others that are. It appears to us that many of these gentlemen would make a larger and more substantial provision for their families and a smaller number of enemies for themselves if they would attend to their private affairs instead of obstructing public ones. Without venturing a positive opinion on the subject, it appears to us not unreasonable to submit the question, whether the cause of this may not be traced to the form or forms of government provided by the mother country rather than to the colonists themselves; for where opportunities occur for petty statesmen to fill great parts in a little play, the farce will not fail for want of characters to represent it. With six local governments and a general assembly, in place of one efficient government for the entire colony, it is perhaps not to be
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wondered at that the general good is sometimes retarded or sacrificed to the local or provincial elements of jealousy, malice, or ambition.
The contracted or selfish views of certain influential tradesmen or merchants will likewise strike a close observer, as something to be regretted, if not deserving of censure, as the want of favor or unity on the part of a few of the leading settlers in a province, has to our own knowledge often been the means of losing what would have advanced the general interests of the country. Suppose for instance an opportunity offers to benefit the colony by increased local or distant steam communication, on a plan proposed by Messrs. Patriot and Co.; Selfish, Brothers and Co. at once oppose the plan--of course on public grounds--because increased facilities for the passage of persons and goods from one place to another might at the same time have a prejudicial effect on periodical consignments received by Selfish, Brothers and Co. from a distant part of the world.
With the New Zealand provinces, as with jealous and ill-natured individuals, the same unfortunate rule is found to exist; and it would be easier to mix oil with water than to induce the spirits in one province to unite with those in another, although the want of unity might be injurious to all. These evils however are but trifles in a country where the advantages possessed by a settler are greater by tenfold than the
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disadvantages; for while such impediments may obstruct for a time the rapid progress of small communities, they will gradually disappear as the districts become more thickly populated, and when the public voice for the public good grows too powerful to be suppressed by the influence of a few selfish and bigoted individuals.
Nothing but some unforeseen and dire calamity, emanating from a higher power than man, can check the gradual progress of the finest colony in the world, or prevent the immense resources of New Zealand from being more generally known, so soon as, through increased enterprise and additional manual and other appliances, her resources are more fully developed.
The internal and dormant riches of a country, like real sparks of genius in the retiring mind of man, may be obscured for a time by the smoke and steam of more imposing but less sterling objects, but flashes from concealed merit occasionally attract attention, till the strength of the flame dispels the surrounding vapour and finally obtains for its possessor the public recognition of true worth.
New Zealand is essentially a poor man's country, although there are but few poor in it. It is a country to which those of the working classes in England who have the means or intend to emigrate should direct their steps; for it is a colony in which nine out of every ten who land therein
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rise in the course of a few years from poverty to affluence, or from a poor to a good position. With industry and sobriety, the artisan, or laborer, soon becomes his own master, landowner, or farmer; and the majority of the most wealthy men in the colony are those who landed a few years since without any capital beyond that which is most valuable in New Zealand--individual labor. At the present time the colonial government are trying, in vain, to obtain common laborers to work on the roads at eight shillings a day. A good mechanic can obtain treble that amount per diem. Indeed the laboring classes--even while laborers--may be termed the independent gentry of the colony. Their wives have never been waited on by servants in the mother country, and have not to experience that loss which is severely felt by those accustomed to good society, and who, owing to the difficulty of obtaining domestic servants, have frequently to undertake any and every menial office. We have known kind and considerate husbands--solicitors, merchants, and some of the leading men in a province--rise early in the morning, and as a singular prelude to their professional or commercial duties, open the business of the day by lighting the fire, washing the dishes, or scrubbing the floor for their amiable ladies. Servants are so scarce and so independent that the difficulty of obtaining them is exceeded by that of keeping them when obtained. We have more than once dined with
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a family of respectability who have themselves cooked and served the dinner, presided at the dinner table, and afterwards favored us with a little instrumental or vocal music, or joined their friends in a polka or quadrille. To a few heavily taxed and good-natured husbands in the United Kingdom we take the liberty of suggesting that twelve months residence in New Zealand might prove of infinite service to those gentle partners whose fair features dare not enter their own kitchens, from the fear of being smoked or overheated. Yet strange to say, we have never in New Zealand met a well educated lady who was less the lady on account of having for a time to submit to social discomforts and privations, the very mention of which would make some of our English drawing-room dolls turn pale in disgust, or red with shame. A sensible lady not only submits with good grace to the requirements of an altered position, or the necessities of the moment, but she likewise retains her title and her dignity, even though circumstances compel her to become her own waiting-maid or cook.
With a working man in England a large family is not unfrequently regarded as a social calamity. In New Zealand a large family proves a source of ultimate wealth, as any lad of twelve or fourteen years of age can, in return for his services, readily obtain a comfortable home with a salary of £20 or £30 a year. On this subject there is one im-
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portant fact, the knowledge of which may be found useful to or taken advantage of by a few married but childless individuals in the mother country. While many or most parts of the colony under consideration are highly favorable to agricultural or pastoral purposes, the invigorating effects of its delightful climate would appear to be equally favorable to a local increase in the population. We have met with settlers who for many years in England had despaired of ever becoming parents; but since their arrival in the colony they have been blessed with the parental title--a title without which man's estate, however bountifully supplied with the periodical riches of the land, would be still poor without those tender saplings which can alone perpetuate the seed of domestic bliss.
The newspaper press in New Zealand is certainly not calculated to lessen our unfavorable opinion of colonial periodicals and colonial literature in general. With two worthy, independent, and honorable exceptions, to which we will not more particularly allude, the New Zealand newspapers represent all those petty jealousies and political animosities with which so many of the inhabitants are infected, and which the residents of one province evince towards those in another. European intelligence and occasional extracts from the English papers comprise the leading matter of interest --or rather only that which is at all likely to interest any one unconnected with local squabbles.
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Whatever is said or done by one party, or the leaders of a party, is sure to be disapproved or condemned by another. It occurs to us that these journals, which should rather endeavour to subdue than irritate the public mind on trifles, would prove of greater service to the colony and the settlers, if in their repeated attacks on persons and places they were to display less violence and more moderation--which would be news indeed.
Returning however to the advantages of New Zealand, as the most desirable home for those who are about to emigrate from the United Kingdom, we deem it desirable to be clearly understood on this point. While we are anxious to afford useful information to all intending emigrants, the entire worth of New Zealand would not (intentionally) induce us, in stating our own opinion, to allow anything to escape in the shape of praise which might either create a false impression in the minds of others, or justify some future colonists in saying (what thousands in Australia, who have been deluded by false representations, have had occasion to say) "that book deceived us."
If any poor but well educated families--and in England there are unfortunately hundreds of such families--who prefer the fascinations of polite society to the more substantial rewards of industry and social retirement--families, the male branches of which regard the interior of a billiard-room or a casino as indispensable margins on the page of
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life, while the female members of such families would rob their craving stomachs of a good dinner for the latest fashion in the shape of a bonnet or a boot--if such, or any such persons would rather prolong their lives than die with melancholy we earnestly advise them to remain where they are.
For a colonial life, threadbare notions of refined gentility will be found useless appendages in an emigrant's outfit; and those who are still anxious for the display of such ornaments will do well to keep them and themselves away from a land where these things and a variety of conventional forms have no existence, or are of no avail. But if such persons can submit, without murmur and without regret, to hard work, and to the loss of artificial pleasures, they may then derive profit by a change which, without ready submission to the sacrifices enumerated, would otherwise lead to disappointment.
Well educated persons whose means enable them to live in moderate ease should likewise remain at home--presuming that home to be England. To people accustomed to good society and the independence arising from an experienced and attentive suite of servants, the discomforts of a colonial life will be found great and many. But, on the other hand, if those needy ladies and gentlemen whose brains are heavily taxed to keep up a respectable appearance on a hundred or a hundred and fifty pounds a year, derived from funded or
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other property, are disposed to submit to a few inconveniences (many of them temporary ones) for a delightful climate and an increased revenue, by taking their three or four thousand pounds to, and residing in New Zealand, they may attain the summit of their desire; and at the expiration of a few years they may, if they choose, return to their native land with their capital doubled, or probably trebled.
In most, if not in all the provinces of New Zealand ample landed security can be obtained for money on loan at ten, twelve, and in some instances, fifteen, or even twenty per cent, per annum. The ultimate ruin of the borrowers may probably be predicted by those residing in a country where money is more abundant, and where people are unacquainted with the circumstances which justify so large a rate of interest. A few words will satisfy the reader that such a prediction would prove quite fallacious, and that the security named for loans at the rates quoted will be ample, while the interest is justifiable. For instance, the owner of a piece of land of the value of four or five hundred pounds may wish to purchase a few sheep. He has no ready money, but obtains on the security of his land three hundred pounds at fifteen per cent. The increase of his live stock will yield, on the smallest computation, from forty to fifty per cent., which would leave a surplus profit over and above the interest paid of from twenty-five to
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thirty-five per cent. This will be yearly augmented by the compound increase in his stock, which in a few years will leave the owner thousands for hundreds, or in other words, a pound sterling for every two shillings previously invested. We are acquainted not with one only, but with many persons who at the present time are owners of ten, fifteen, or twenty thousand sheep, and who but five or six years since dated the commencement of their rise with an investment of fifty, one hundred, or a hundred and fifty pounds.
For making capital in New Zealand, by lending and borrowing money, various other modes might be instanced, but the cases above alluded to will be sufficient to prove that in one part of the world at least--though not in the United Kingdom-- people may pay or receive a handsome income for a small investment, or give or take a high rate of interest without danger of ruin either to themselves or others.
Respectable society on a limited scale may, but good society--that which in England is termed good society--cannot be found in New Zealand. In speaking of society we must be understood to refer to the want of a sufficient number of persons in any particular district or community to constitute the society alluded to. To this there are of course many individual and family exceptions. But we speak of the rule not the exception; and
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although, on certain occasions large numbers of the inhabitants are invited to Government House, the majority of such persons are regarded rather as favored visitors than friendly guests. Some of the provinces can boast of better society than can be found in others; but this and other social matters we leave for notice under the head of the respective localities.
This great preponderance both in the capital and in some of the provinces of uneducated or illiterate people will fully account for the absence of a refined taste with regard to anything of an intellectual character, either in the shape of amusement or instruction. As in Australia, a lecture on poetry or the fine arts would be alike unappreciated and unattended, or attended only by a select few--while a mountebank on the back of a horse would prove a source of attraction and delight for the multitude. Unless a public entertainment be of an exciting character, such as a farewell dinner to Tom Stiles or Harry Stokes-- although neither of the honored guests would be allowed to utter half a dozen sentences without interruption--it would cease to be attractive. Professor Thimblerig can at all times insure a large audience, while Doctor Mental's classical dissertation commands an empty house. It is however the poorer classes--or rather the working classes, for there are no poor in New Zealand--by which amusements are chiefly patronised. The educated
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portion of the community derive their pleasure in their own family circles. In addition to this, their minds and minutes are so entirely devoted to money-making, that their time appears to he entirely absorbed in this and this object only.
There is one rather remarkable fact respecting the movements of those who have resided a few years in New Zealand, and who during their residence therein have--like the majority of colonists --endeavoured to amass a large amount of money in a short space of time, for the purpose of returning to live in peace and plenty, if not in luxury, in their own native land. The fact alluded to, or rather the revelation therefrom, is simply this--those to whom it relates talk of going home for a considerable time before they actually go; and having gone, nine out of every ten, after a short absence, return again to the land of their adoption. Making allowance for the loss of friends and acquaintances, and many other unattractive features which might cloud the imagination on the emigrant's return, the simple fact of his having the means to procure every pleasure where every pleasure is procurable, and that he finally leaves all for a climate, friends and habits more in accordance with his feelings and his taste, furnishes a truth, the evidence from which, in favor of New Zealand, is stronger than any other we can adduce.
The Maori or native race of New Zealand are in every respect superior to any colored race with
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which we are acquainted. Through the interest and attention of the present indefatigable Bishop, many schools have been established; and not only can a large number of natives at present read and write, but some of them have been ordained as ministers of the gospel. Though they want the industry and perseverance of the European, even the uncivilised portion of them are not deficient in honesty; and most of their evil propensities have been copied from their civilised but bad companions from the mother country. If honestly dealt by, the dealer may be sure of an equivalent in the transaction; but if treacherously dealt with, they will, if possible, retaliate. We have travelled amongst them (unarmed) into the interior, and would not hesitate to journey for any distance in any part of the colony, satisfied not only of hospitable treatment at the hands of the natives, but also of perfect security both with regard to life and property.
But like other native races in countries where Europeans have permanently settled, the New Zealanders are annually on the decrease, and will no doubt in the course of time--perhaps forty or fifty years, become nearly, if not entirely, extinct.
We will at present briefly observe--it being our intention to notice the subject more fully at a subsequent stage of our work--that an erroneous opinion prevails in England with regard to the earthquakes which periodically take place in one
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part of the colony. It is generally supposed that the whole of New Zealand is subject to those convulsions of the earth, which in reality seriously affect one province only. The extreme provinces in which extinct volcanoes prove the complete exhaustion of internal commotion, may note, as the rumbling of distant thunder, or by a slight vibration from the effect of the shock, the periods at which the most violent convulsions take place, although, as we previously stated, their effects are chiefly confined to the locality in which they occur.
Although New Zealand cannot at present boast of rich gold fields fully developed, like those of Australia, a treasure more valuable and inexhaustible may be found in the periodical riches of her soil. The excessive draughts of Australia, by which thousands of sheep perish and whole crops decay, are totally unknown here. "Whether the coming season may or may not reward the Australian settler for his labor and his outlay is entirely a matter of speculation; while here the crops are as regular and as luxuriant as the seasons themselves. Rivulets and running streams of the purest water, unknown in Australia, are here everywhere to be found. The comparative condition of the cattle in the respective colonies is alone a sufficient proof of this. Poor and emaciated, like the aboriginal tribes in the golden region, the oxen of that country present a miserable spectacle. But here, through the
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invigorating effects of a pure atmosphere, rich pasture, and an abundant supply of water, the cattle, like the Maori, or human native race, are everywhere healthy, robust, and in excellent condition. Of vegetable and other productions we shall speak in due course; and the English farmer will no doubt be somewhat surprised to hear of unmanured land producing fifty, sixty, and seventy bushels of wheat to the acre, not for one year only but for several years in succession. But these and all subjects relating to figures will be confirmed by the signatures of the respective and most competent authorities in each province.
Having thus given in a few prefatory and cursory remarks a rough and general outline of what will be embodied in detail in the progressive stages of the work, we will proceed with a description of the capital and the respective provinces.
But in penning the attractive and other features of New Zealand, it is not our intention to extend the description beyond the actual requirements of the subject, nor to tax the patience of the reader with a rigmarole of personal adventures, which are generally uninteresting and of little value to the public. We will merely furnish a simple record of facts, gathered from our own observation and corroborated by those whose experience is called on to attest their accuracy. And although we earnestly advise those industrious persons who are about to leave England for another home, and
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who value health, sure advancement, and ultimate independence, to choose the colony above all others in which, with temperance and industry, a moderate hope of future success in life would be certain of realization, we will not recommend any particular province to the prejudice of another, but, after a distinct though brief description of each, we will leave those who may adopt our advice, in the selection of this fine colony for their future abode, to select the province they may deem the best adapted to their calling or their wants.
For the information of those who cannot afford the entire amount required for their passage to New Zealand, we may observe that resident London agents, as the representatives of some parts of the colony, are empowered to assist respectable and suitable applicants.
New Zealand is divided into six provinces, viz., Auckland, Taranaki (or New Plymouth), Wellington, Nelson, Canterbury, and Otago. Each province is governed by a superintendent (elected by the local residents) and a provincial council. And each province contributes its proportionate share of members to the House of Representatives which legislates for the entire colony, the members of which meet annually for the purpose of general legislation.
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With regard to the probable extent of the mineral riches of New Zealand, or the value of the recently discovered gold fields, it would, at present, be impossible for any one to venture more than a speculative opinion. But from all we saw and heard during our stay in the colony, as well as from private advices received since our return, we are inclined to think that not only gold, but likewise copper and other minerals will shortly be found and exported in considerable quantities-- that is, so soon as a supply of labor will enable explorers and settlers to turn recent discoveries to the best advantage. It will however be unnecessary to do more than direct attention to a few brief but more general remarks on the subject, which will be found in our review of the province of Nelson.
New Zealand is open alike to foreigners of every nation without reference to country or creed. We merely revert to this subject for the purpose of supplying what we omitted to state elsewhere-- that in the colony of Victoria a recent legislative enactment imposes a tax of £8 or £10 per head-- the latter we believe--on all immigrants arriving from at least one country with which England has extensive commercial transactions. The reason for the Executive omitting from the "Victorian Tariff" this duty on human flesh is obvious.
