Australia and New Zealand [New Zealand Chapters Only]

Anthony Trollope

First published by G. Robertson in 1873

Digitised and made available online by the University of Auckland Libraries and Learning Services.

Epub © 2013 Early New Zealand Books Collection

ISBN 978-1-927288-09-2

[TITLE PAGES]

[Cover]

[Page ii not found]

AUSTRALIA
AND
NEW ZEALAND

BY
ANTHONY TROLLOPE

AUTHORIZED AUSTRALIAN EDITION
MELBOURNE
GEORGE ROBERTSON LITTLE COLLINS STREET WEST
MDCCCLXXIII.
This edition being printed for circulation in the Australasian Colonies only, all persons offering it for sale elsewhere will be liable to prosecution.

MELBOURNE: PRINTED BY WALKER, MAY, AND CO., BOURKE STREET WEST.

[CONTENTS]

CONTENTS.

I. – INTRODUCTION L

QUEENSLAND.

II. – OCCUPATION OF LAND ..... 16

III. – GLADSTONE AND ROCKHAMPTON ..... 27

IV. – ABORIGINALS ..... 39

V. – GOLD ..... 50

VI. – SQUATTERS AND THEIR TROUBLES ..... 61

VII. – DARLING DOWNS ..... 72

VIII. – SUGAR LABOUR FROM THE SOUTH SEA ISLANDS ..... 86

IX. – GOVERNMENT ..... 101

X. – LABOUR ..... 108

NEW SOUTH WALES.

XI. – BEASTS, BIRDS, FISHES, REPTILES, AND STEAMBOATS ..... 121

XII. – EARLY HISTORY OF THE COLONY ..... 128

XIII. – SYDNEY ....... 135

XIV – RELIGION AND EDUCATION ..... 144

XV. – LEGISLATURE AND GOVERNMENT ..... 151

XVI. – COUNTRY TOWNS, RAILWAYS, AND ROADS ..... 161

XVII. – LAND ....... 171

XVIII. – MEAT ..... 178

XIX. – METALS ..... 182

XX. – COUNTRY LIFE IN THE BUSH ..... 193

XXI. – SCENERY IN NEW SOUTH WALES ..... 204

XXII. – THE RIVERINA ..... 212

VICTORIA.

XXIII. – SEPARATION ....... 227

XXIV. – EARLY HISTORY OF PORT PHILLIP ..... 233

XXV. – MELBOURNE ....... 247

XXVI. – BALLARAT ...... 260

XXVII. – BENDIGO OR SANDHURST ..... 270

XXVIII. – GIPPS LAND, WALHALLA, AND WOODS POINT ..... 278

XXIX. – LAND ....... 287

XXX. – LADIES AND GENTLEMEN ..... 301

XXXI. – NEWSPAPERS, BOOKS, RAILWAYS, ROADS, TOWNS, AND WINES ..... 313

XXXII. – RAMA YUCK ...... 324

XXXIII. – LEGISLATION, GOVERNMENT, AND COMMERCE ..... 328

TASMANIA.

XXXIV. – PAST HISTORY ..... 335

XXXV. – PORT ARTHUR ....... 348

XXXVI. – PRESENT POSITION ..... 359

XXXVII. – FUTURE PROSPECTS ..... 375

WESTERN AUSTRALIA.

XXXVIII. – EARLY HISTORY ..... 386

XXXIX. – ROTTNEST AND FREEMANTLE ..... 402

XL. – PRESENT CONDITION ..... 410

XLI. – FUTURE PROSPECTS - - - - - 422

SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

XLII. – EARLY HISTORY ..... 435

XLIII. – ADELAIDE ..... 447

XLIV. – AGRICULTURE ..... 455

XLV. – WOOL ..... 467

XLVI. – MINERALS – – – 478

XLVII. – THE NORTHERN TERRITORY. – TELEGRAPH AND RAILWAY ..... 487

XLVIII. – LEGISLATURE AND GOVERNMENT ..... 492

AUSTRALIAN INSTITUTIONS.

XLIX. – SCHOOLS, LIBRARIES. POORHOUSE, ARMIES, AND CHURCH ..... 499

L. – AUSTRALIAN LEGISLATURES ..... 506

LI. – AUSTRALIAN SPORTS ..... 521

NEW ZEALAND.

LII. – EARLY HISTORY ..... 529

LIII. – OTAGO, – THE LAKE DISTRICT ..... 541

LIV – OTAGO – DUNEDIN..... 553

LV. – JOHN ROBERT GODLEY ..... 562

LVI. – THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS .... 572

LVII. – MARLBOROUGH AND NELSON .... 582

LVIII. – THE MAORIS ..... 589

LIX. – WELLINGTON AND THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT ..... 609

LX. – TARANAKI ...... 628

LXI. – AUCKLAND ..... 630

LXII. – THE AUCKLAND LAKES AND HOT WELLS ..... 639

LXIII. – THE WAIKATO ..... 652

LXIV. – CONCLUSION ..... 656

APPENDIX ..... 659

INTRODUCTION.

AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION.

I HAVE attempted in this volume to describe the Australian Colonies as they at present exist; and to tell, in very brief fashion, the manner in which they were first created. In doing so, it has been impossible to avoid speculations as to their future prospects, – in which is involved the happiness of millions to come of English-speaking men and women. As a group, they are probably the most important of our colonial possessions, as they are certainly the most interesting. Their population is, indeed, still less than half that of the Canadian dominion; but they are very much younger than the Canadas; their increase has been much quicker; – and we made them for ourselves. Canada and Nova Scotia, – of which New Brunswick was then a part, – we took, ready colonized, from the French. The Cape we got ready colonized from the Dutch, as also British Guiana. Jamaica and Trinidad we took from the Spanish. The early possession of Newfoundland was a moot point between ourselves and the French, till at last we obtained it by treaty from Louis XIV. Ceylon, which, in truth, is not a colony, though reckoned in our list of colonies, – was possessed first by the Portuguese, and then by the Dutch, before it fell into our hands. The Mauritius we got from the French. Among the colonies, which we ourselves first colonized, Barbadoes and Bermuda are the most important that still remain to us, – excepting those of which I am now about to speak.

When we make mention of "colonies" we should be understood to signify countries outside our own, which by our energies we have made fit for the occupation of our multiplying race. India is the possession of which we are most proud; – but India is in no respect a colony. It should be our greatest boast respecting India,

that we hold that populous country to the advantage of the millions by whom it is inhabited; but we do not hold it for the direct welfare of our own race, though greatly to the benefit of our own country. The Europeans who are spread over India, exclusive of the military, are less numerous than the inhabitants of Tasmania.

The United States are, in the most proper sense, a British colony; and it is the colony in which, of all others, Great Britain should feel the greatest glory, – because therein has been achieved the highest prosperity by those who leave the shores of our islands from year to year. That India and the United States, – so absolutely unlike each other in all the conditions of humanity, and yet each so prosperous after its own fashion, should, the one be governed from England, and the other speak the English language, is a combination which makes an Englishman conscious that, let the faults have been what they may, the race has been more successful than other races.

The Australias and New Zealand have been and still are colonies in every sense; and they are colonies which have been founded by ourselves exclusively, – for the prosperity and the deficiencies of which we and the colonies are solely responsible. No French element, no Dutch element, no Spanish element can be pleaded by us as having interfered with our operations in Australia. And the real colonization of these Eastern lands, which did not in truth commence till the system of using them as penal settlements had been condemned, has been so recent that the colonists and the Government at home have had the advantage of experience, and have taken lessons both from the successes and the failures of earlier enterprises. Colonizing theorists have arisen, who have done something for the better management of a new world, and philanthropists also have aided. Statesmen have become wiser as they observed the errors of their predecessors. Intending colonists themselves have left their old homes with clearer ideas of their own wants. And advancing science has carried out and acclimatized, not only men and women, but beasts, birds, and fishes, fruit and vegetables, rich grasses and European trees, with a rapidity and profusion of which our grandfathers never dreamed, and which even our fathers hardly ventured to anticipate. New Zealand, the latest of our great colonies, of which in truth the occupation did not commence till 1840, contained no animal life and no native fruit useful to man when we first reached its shores. It is now so wonderfully prolific in life and vegetation imported from Europe that the visitor sees there groves of wild peach-trees and herds of wild horses. Australia was nearly equally destitute. Nevertheless, Australian capitalists are already

engaged in the task of sending from Australia European meats to our home markets, and are thus relieving the wants of those at home who are too destitute to improve their fortunes by migrating to happier lands.

That Australian colonization has prospered greatly no one who sees it, – no one who studies it without seeing it, – -can doubt. Whether the progress might not have been quicker, greater, more thorough – whether it might not have been made to contain a more confirmed assurance of future well-being, many profess to doubt. To me it seems that the work, taken as a whole, has been well done. That anything should ever have been so well done that it could not have been done better, few will be found to allege in reference to a matter as to which no standard of excellence exists. Had this or had that line of conduct been followed in colonizing these new-countries, who can say what might have been the effect? Or if there be any one who thinks that he can show that such and such results would have followed a certain course, there will be another equally sure that he can prove the contrary.

The assailants of our colonial work who are most positive in asserting that mightier results and an improved condition would have come from management other than that adopted, generally blame the English Minister of the day for the alleged shortcoming of the colonists. There are many the tendency of whose minds leads them to discredit statesmen; who are prone to antagonism against authority; and who believe, almost as a matter of course, that the doings of Cabinet Ministers and their subordinates are customarily fatuous and often dishonest. Such men in dealing with our colonies speak of Downing Street, – where is the official domicile of our Colonial Ministers, – as a slough of despond whose mud has long clogged the wheels of our colonial enterprise. To such men it is enough that a member of Parliament shall take a seat in that building to render him harsh, unpatriotic, and unsympathetic, whatever may have been his character before he stained it by taking office. The teaching of such men has been spread so far that a large world of followers, who neither inquire nor think, but only hear, is educated in the idea that were it not for Downing Street our colonies might thrive. It does not occur to them to reflect that the man selected to sit in Downing Street has a wider source of information than others, a greater need to study the subject than others; that he performs his functions with the light of day upon him; and that he is chosen from among those who have made themselves prominent by their knowledge and sagacity. We are all willing to

admit that two sets of men, – the Cabinet which is in and the Cabinet which is out, – contain, as a rule, the best politicians of the day; but most of us are ready to denounce the one Minister who holds authority in any matter in which we are personally interested. In reading books on the colonies, mostly written by colonists, I have been struck by the very small amount of praise ever bestowed on a Minister for the Colonies at home, and by the repeated allusions made to the want of judgment and indifference displayed by these gentlemen. I must add also, that the Australian colonists of the present day do not in ordinary conversation speak with enthusiasm of Downing Street.

It would be well if colonists and Englishmen interested in the subject, could learn what it is that is done for the colonies in Downing Street. I am speaking here, of course, of such colonies as those in Australasia. I am inclined to think that it is very little. The Colonial Office cannot plant a colony. It cannot even grant a patent to a great man, in order that he may plant one, – as was done in the days of the Stuarts. It is called upon to judge, – and in so judging must carry with it the support of Parliament, – at what period of its life a young community of Englishmen on a distant shore shall receive the sanction of the Crown for its enrolment in the catalogue. And even in this matter the judgment of the Minister of the day is controlled by the circumstances of the case. When South Australia obtained her charter as a colony, Downing Street could not have retarded it, – as, indeed, she could not greatly have accelerated the granting of it. When, first, Victoria and afterwards Queensland, separated themselves from New South Wales, Downing Street simply complied with the wishes of the colonists. When New Zealand was established, Downing Street, which was then notoriously timid in reference to the creation of a colony in a land inhabited by a race at the same time more than ordinarily savage and more than ordinarily intelligent, simply complied when compliance was demanded in a voice loud enough to show that it expressed an earnest conviction. It was the determination of Englishmen to settle there, which settled the question. The people have made the colonies. That which Downing Street has done, or could have done, is but a small thing.

And then, as these colonies have settled themselves, they have themselves prescribed the forms of government under which they would be ruled. That form has always been self-reliant. "You shall not rule us at all, but we will rule ourselves," the colonies have said; and in every case the concession has been made. No one reading-

the history of our colonies can doubt that further concessions would be made if further concessions were demanded. Let any one who knows the system of our Government at home think how long any Minister of the Colonies could have held that position, who would have attempted to impede this action after the demand for it had become earnest. That there must be some power to regulate such action, to prescribe limits here and there, to apportion the powers and privileges of communities so closely connected as are the colonies and the mother country, no one will deny. When the colony has been once established, and free Government conceded, the operations of the Colonial Office are mainly confined to the accurate observation of these limits.

But the fault now found in the colonies with Colonial Ministers is, that they are prone to govern too little, not that they govern too much; that they are anxious to abandon altogether the responsibility of any concern in the government of colonies which have free institutions. There has gradually grown among us, at home in England, a feeling, stronger than any of the same nature existing in the colonies, that they are to do just as they please with themselves. We say to them practically: – "You are English just as we are, and therefore, in the name of heaven, let us be friends to the end of time. Our interests must be conjoint interests, and our history a conjoint history. Let us not blot the history and mar the interest by any selfish divergence of political opinion. You are not, and probably you will agree with us in saying that you cannot be, represented in our Parliament. It is not open to you and to us to be politically one whole, as are the United States. But surely we can so arrange our matters that there need be no quarrel and no political hatred. We will interfere with you as little as may be. Parliaments of your own? Certainly. You have them. Collection and use of your own revenue? Certainly. You are collecting and using it. Possession of your own lands – which did by a sort of fiction belong to the Crown? Certainly. Your own lands are in your own hands. Is there aught else? Would you think it well to join together as one nation with one set of customs duties? Would you form one federation in all things? Would you wish for – Separation?" Such words are not spoken, but they are nearly spoken; and that which is not spoken is filled in by the ready imagination of the colonists. The colonists say that they are spoken, and that coming from men in office, they signify the indifference of England to her colonies. And then, not unfrequently, there is a burst of eloquence in reference to England's fading glory.

I do think that some of us in England have been a little too forward in our assurances to the colonies that they have only to speak the word themselves, and that they shall be free, even from such slight control as England now exercises over them. I believe that any words so used have sprung from that tendency among us to lessen the bondage of authority, which has grown among the middle classes till it has become the doctrine of British statesmen. But they have been accepted as bearing a more defined sense in the colonies, and we are bound, as far as it may be in our power, to abstain from inflicting even sentimental grievances on our friends. Separation, though it may be ultimately certain, is, I think, too distant to have a place as yet in the official or parliamentary vocabulary of a Colonial Minister. Writers may speculate on it, and men of no political mark may discuss it in conversation. But when a Prime Minister in England or a Colonial Minister speaks of Separation in the House of Commons, or alludes to it in a dispatch as that which the future must bring forth, it is generally supposed that he intends to verify his own prophecy during his own term of office.

The loyalty of the colonies is very strong. In England, to speak the truth, we do not know much about loyalty. We believe in our form of government; we believe in the Crown and in Parliament; and we believe in the practical sense of the people at large. We are satisfied that we are doing well, and we think that should we make any material change, – such as would be the substitution of a democratic republic for the monarchy we possess, – we should improve ourselves not at all, and might injure ourselves very much. We value trial by jury, primogeniture, and an hereditary House of Parliament, because they have helped to make us what we are; and we are generally contented with our position. This may be better than loyalty, but it is not loyalty. Now and again some spring may be touched, as when the Queen's household was attacked, or when the Prince was lying ill; but the feeling thus induced is not the normal condition of the British mind. England's greatness is too near to us at home to create sentiment; – but in the far Antipodes loyalty is the condition of the colonist's mind. He is proud of England, though very generally angry with England because England will not do exactly what he wants. He reconciles this to his mind by telling himself that it is the England of the past of which he is proud, and the England of the present with which he is angry. But his hopes are as bright as his memories, – or, at any rate, less dim than his insight into the evils of the day, – and he still clings to

the prospects of England in the future. He does not like to be told that he is to be divided from her. He is in truth loyal. He always speaks of England as home. He remembers the Queen's birthday, and knows the names of the Queen's grandchildren. He is jealous of the fame of Nelson and Wellington; and tells you in praise of this or that favourite colonial orator, that – he would be listened to in the House of Commons. All this is true loyalty, – which I take to be an adherence to certain persons or things from sentiment rather than from reason.

It may well be understood that on minds so impressed threats of separation, – or allusions to separation, which by men ready to take offence are mistaken for threats, – produce anger and indignant remonstrance. "You want to get rid of us because we still cost you, or in certain emergencies may cost you, some trifle. You are, in these degenerate days, indifferent to the glory of England. We have come out here as pioneers, and by our energies and our intellects have added a new world to your empire; and now, as a reward for our sufferings, perils, and labours, we are to be cut adrift from that empire, and divided from our country!" Then there are two forms in which the remonstrance is continued. They whose loyalty exceeds their anger declare that no such cutting adrift shall be perpetrated, and that wiser men with wiser councils must be found. Bat the more loudly indignant declare that if it is to be done it shall be done in earnest, and that in such case the cutting adrift shall be a total separation, and that the division from the old country shall be a division in everything.

In all these differences it seems to me that the mother country is too rational, and the colonies too irrational. Something should be allowed to sentiment, something to the impetuousness of youth, and something also to its ignorance; something, perhaps, to the natural self-importance of juvenile legislatures, and colonial cabinet ministers whose opportunities for studying state-craft have been limited. I do not say that any Minister at home has been provoked into speaking of Separation by the annoyance, either of demands or remonstrances sent home from the colonies. I can understand that the first operation on a stateman's mind, when a colony in the plenitude of the power of self-government makes wild demands, and answers the refusal of them with impetuous language, should be one of anger and disgust. I can understand that he should be tempted to tell the colony that if it can do better alone than when subject to the slight control which at present binds it to England, it had better start at once and go alone. But I can understand also that

he would not act on that first impression, and that he should resist that temptation.

I do not believe, however, that the colonies, either in regard to separation from the mother country or adherence to it, will be guided by the discretion or indiscretion of any Minister. The work of separation, when it is effected, will be done by Ministers, but they will do it on behalf both of the mother country and of the colonies, as the servants of the people, and because the people have thought that the time for such separation has come. There can be little fear now that the consummation of such a wish, were it once in truth expressed, would be forcibly opposed by Great Britain; and as little, I think, that separation will be forced on the colonies. Even had we an imprudent Secretary of State, his imprudence would not effect so great results.

It is a matter of much importance that men should fix in their minds the objects which they have in view when they think of "holding" the colonies, or of the adherence of the colonies to Great Britain. There are two distinct objects, which, without much thinking, we are apt to blend together, and to regard as one whole. But, though they may for a while act together, they are essentially separate, and, from the nature of things, must, as years roll on, be separated altogether. These two objects are the glory and greatness of Britain, and the happiness of a new home for Britons. Are we to "hold" the colonies in order that England may be great, or that Englishmen may be happy? If it be conceded that the first object be the one for which we should work, then I can understand that it should be regarded as a crime against our country even to speak of separation. But if we altogether ignore the first, when considering the welfare of the colonies, – as I think we are bound to do, both by justice and philanthropy, – then the discussion of separation is as open to us as is that of any other political condition.

Some years since it was undoubtedly the idea of all Englishmen that whatever England did was to be done for her honour, glory, and prestige. With this view we took distant spots on the globe from foreign nations, because they would afford us shelter for our fleets, or opportunities of exercising power, or because wealth was to be obtained for ourselves at home, and wealth deducted from our enemies abroad. It was after this fashion, too, that the Spanish colonies were established; – and in no wise that happy homes might be formed for coming races of Spaniards. And when Englishmen lodged themselves on distant shores in order that they might live

with less restraint or with greater material comfort than they could at home, – as was done by those who first colonized Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, – though the colonists themselves were no doubt looking to their own future prosperity, there was no national movement in that direction. Certain privileges were granted as favours to certain individuals by certain kings; but after that these individuals were left to sink or swim by their own efforts, Raleigh, the first of them, sank. Lord Baltimore, and Lord Willoughby, and Penn were more fortunate. But the country did nothing till the colony was established, and then held it politically as forming a part of its own possessions, and as adding to its own power. Even Burke, than whom no politician of the last century was more philanthropical, clearly had this idea of the colonies. "My hold of the colonies," he says, "is the close affection which grows from common names, from kindred blood, from similar privileges, and equal protection. These are ties which, though light as air, are strong as links of iron. Let the colonies always keep the idea of their civil rights associated with your government, – they will cling and grapple to you, and no force under heaven will be of power to tear them from their allegiance." Nothing can be grander, – nothing sweeter, – than this. There may still be some who think that nothing truer could have been spoken. But the good thing of which Burke is speaking, the result to be obtained by a certain noble line of conduct, is England's hold upon her colonies, the perpetuation of England's greatness by the continued possession of these colonies, – and not the well-being of the colonists. Those colonies are gone, – with what results most of us know. There are probably not many now who think that our "hold" of them could have been continued to this day, even had Burke's counsel been followed. They now form the homes of more millions than live in our own island, and could hardly have remained subject to us, though we had granted them privileges similar to our own. To my thinking Burke's prophecy must have been untrue, let the British method of conducting that business in Burke's time have been what it might. But the good things which he foretold for Great Britain were to be good things in respect of her power, of her prestige, of her national greatness, possibly of her lasting endurance among the nations; – and the treatment of the colonies was to be liberal and humane in order that this might be secured.

That, no doubt, was the view in which Britons generally regarded the dependencies of the nation. It is the view in which some still regard them. But, if I be not mistaken, the tendencies of the

national mind in this matter are changed. It is not thus that the great body of Englishmen now think of such colonies as the Canadian dominion, the Cape Colonies, and the Australasian group. Malta, Gibraltar, and Bermuda we may keep as strongholds of power, – strongholds which in other hands might be pernicious to us and to the world at large. Others, which are but of little use to ourselves or to those who cultivate their soil, we may still hold because it would not suit Great Britain to abandon her children. One or two we retain, perhaps, simply because we do not like to lessen the long list. But of all these places it may be said that they are not true colonies. It is not in these that the working Englishman seeks a new home, in order that he may earn higher wages, get better education for his children, and enjoy what he regards as fuller freedom than he can do at home. In the Australias and New Zealand, in the colonies of South Africa, and in Canada, – as also in that much greater American colony, the United States, – this is the process which is now taking place. Our people are going out from us, as bees do, – not that the old hive is deserted, but that new hives are wanted for new swarms. For a while it is our duty to take some care of these new homes. The most populous has long been freed from our control and our protection, and is successful. To say that the others also will be freed is only to say that they also will be successful.

If this be so, I do not see how we can venture to cling to that idea of England's glory. Even if the theory be correct, and the glory of the nation, otherwise doomed to perish, can be thus maintained, upon whom or upon how many of us will this glory radiate? Will the ploughman between his stilts, with barely bread to eat and no shoes for his children's feet, be the better for it? Will the artisan acknowledge it, who knows that the increase to his wages bears no proportion to the increased cost of the food and the fuel which he must buy? Will the young woman acknowledge it, whose hard lot in life gives her no chance of being a mother of children in a happy home? Will it warm the wanderer in the street, or teach the destitute child, or in any way help us to remove those terrible burdens of poverty which every Englishman, proud as he may be of his country, should feel as an incubus on his soil? As we are the richest of people, so are we also among the poorest. High as is our wealth, so deep is our want. Proud as are our acquirements, so lamentable are our deficiencies. By that theory of maintaining England's glory we can never cure these evils, or acquit ourselves of our disgrace. The system is not

intended to work in that direction. The gist of it is to make the whole grand, and not to make the parts happy. But in the other direction there is hope.

It must generally be the case that discussion on this subject, and the action following such discussion, will be in the hands of those whose distant removal from want may enable them to feel the glory. You, my friend, want no shoes for your children. Though meat and coal may be dear, there is plenty of food and fuel at your hearth. Your daughter is not debarred from salutary social intercourse with those of the other sex. Your boys are not naked in the streets. Leisure and luxurious living allow you to indulge in glory. But for that poor man you know of, would not 5s. a day, with no song, be better than 2s. a day, and Rule Britannia? And for that young woman, would not £30 for a year's services, and at the end of it a husband able to keep her, be better than £16 a year and no husband, even though no regimental band should go by the windows once a fortnight, playing up "Steady, boys, steady," for the gratification of her patriotism?

Gradually there has grown upon us a conviction that there is something more to be achieved than glory, – that, after all, glory in either a nation or a man is but a means to an end, and that that end is well-being; – as regards a man, the well-being of himself and those whose happiness forms his happiness; and as regards a nation, the well-being of the greatest number. A people despised, trodden under foot, and subject to injury from without, cannot indeed be happy. It is well therefore that a nation should have power to protect itself against these evils. Nor without power to be independent, power to support itself, power to hold its own, can a nation do those great things which are necessary for the well-being of its members. Without the power which Great Britain possessed, Canada would have been French, South Africa Dutch, and Australia and New Zealand either French or Dutch. Having the power which she did possess, Great Britain was able to provide for her children homes in these lands. It would be unwise, indeed, to abandon the power which has enabled us to do so much. But it would be equally unwise to regard the power and not the well-being as the thing to be achieved.

I trust, indeed, that they may be inseparable, – that as the one advances so must the other, and that the greatness of England may for many years to come be based, in part, on the increasing wealth, and the increasing population of Australia. The one may be consequent on the other. The greatness of the nation may be

perpetuated by the strength of her off-shoots. But it is not for that reason that we should endeavour to make these off-shoots strong. Every man who goes out thither has a right to demand that his political status shall be used so as best to contribute to his own happiness, and that it shall not be manipulated. to the advantage of others, except in so far as he is part and parcel with those others. This was the mistake which we made with the revolted American Colonies – that we were to hold them for our advantage, not for theirs. I think it very improbable that we shall make such a mistake with the Australias. But it would be well that every Englishman who gives a thought to the colonies, should bear in mind the conviction that their connection with the mother country is to be weighed by colonial measures. When the question of separation does arise, let it then be considered solely in regard to the interests of the colonists.

It may be taken as nearly certain that, after some rough fashion, colonists will manage things for themselves, and that they will not submit to much management from home. Military depots must be governed from home. Sugar islands which are, in fact, inhabited not by white men but by negroes and half-castes, may be governed from home. Such dependencies as Ceylon and Singapore, in which again the real population is not European, may be governed from home or by home-sent governors. But I regard such government to be impossible in a true British colony. The inhabitants are not represented in the British Parliament, and will not therefore be taxed by it. They raise and spend their own taxes, and consequently must govern themselves. It is out of the question therefore that we should hold them for our glory and power, rather than to their own comfort, even were we so minded. But that theory of England's glory, which is no longer permissible to us, is happily permissible to them. How different are the words, whether spoken by us at home or by colonists. "We will keep you in our hands in order that we may be great." That is what we in such case should say. "We wish to remain in your hands because we are proud of your greatness." This is what they may say. And as yet they do say it. In such a connection the adhesion should altogether come from them. Let them be ours as long as such adhesion is felt by them to be for their benefit. To us they are of infinite service, giving us room for our capital, room for our intellects, room for our energies, and above all some means of redemption for a portion of our poor from that grinding poverty which we are unable to cure at home. To have founded such colonies is the greatest blessing

which we have above other nations. They are open to others as well as to ourselves, and are open with no privileges curtailed because of diverse nationalities. That it is so, is to be seen by the condition of the Germans who have gone in crowds to the United States and to Australia. But it may be seen with equal clearness that the language spoken indicates the superiority of the race which speaks it. The Englishman who emigrates to a British colony has everything in his favour. Such favour is also his in the United States – except in so far as it is lessened by the superior claims of those who have been born in the land. So also will it be in the Australias when time shall have allowed them to produce for themselves their own leading men. But even then their Washingtons and Franklins, their Websters, their Longfellows and Hawthornes, will be the sons and grandsons of British parents.

An Englishman visiting the United States, if he have any purpose of criticism in his mind – any intention of judging how far the manner of life there is a good manner, and of making comparison between British and American habits, should be ever guarding himself against the natural habit of looking at things only from his own point of view. As he would not buy gloves for his friend by the measure of his own hand, so should he not presume that an American will be well-fitted or ill-fitted in the details of his life according as he may or may not wear the customs and manners of his life cut after an English fashion. Should he find Americans to be educated, plenteously provided, honest, moral, and God-fearing, he might perhaps, in such case, safely conclude that they were prosperous and happy, even if they talked through their noses and called him Sir at every turn in their speech. We would not wish our sons to say Sir, and talk through their noses; neither would they like their sons to undergo the fagging which is common to our boys at school. Such things may influence the happiness of an individual, may make the United States an uncomfortable home for a middle-aged Englishman, or London a dreary domicile for an American well established in his own customs. They have no bearing at all on the well-being of a people, and yet they have often been taken as indicating national deformity, and sometimes national calamity. Our writers have fallen into this mistake in writing of America, and American writers have done the same in writing of us. On each side compassion has been expressed, so deep as to indicate a feeling that the persons so pitied must be the most miserable on the earth, and this compassion has been bestowed on account of habits of life altogether immaterial to actual well-being.

The gloves are the worst gloves in the world, are absolutely worthless and abominable, because they do not fit our own hands.

And if this care be necessary in visiting America, if we are bound to rid our minds of such prejudices in looking at that now perfectly established British colony – as to which nothing which we can say or do can make much difference – the care is doubly necessary, and the obligation twice as sacred, when we attempt to form a judgment on young colonies, the success of which must still in a great degree depend on the opinion respecting their condition which shall gradually spread itself among the inhabitants of the old world. Nothing that any of us can say or write can now influence much the prosperity of the United States. But there are still many in England who have to learn whether Australia is becoming a fitting home for them and their children, and the well-being of Australia still depends in a great degree on the tidings which may reach them. The great object of those who undertake to teach any such lesson, should, I think, be to make the student understand what he, in his condition of life, may be justified in expecting there, and what are the manner and form of life into which he may probably fall. With this object in view, hoping that by diligence I might be able to do something towards creating a clearer knowledge of these colonies than at present perhaps exists, I have visited them all. Of each of them I have given some short account, and have endeavoured to describe the advancing or decreasing prosperity of their various interests. I hope I have done this without prejudice for or against the ways of a country to which I would not willingly migrate myself, being too old for such movement; but in which I have a son who has made his home there.

I should, perhaps, explain to the reader the method in which the different colonies are taken in my narrative. The course has been neither chronological nor geographical, – but has been arranged as I arranged my journey. I went first to Queensland, thence south to New South Wales, – the parent of Queensland; south again to Victoria, one of Queensland's elder sisters, and the most prosperous of the family, – and thence south again across the Straits to Tasmania, a daughter also of New South Wales, and the elder of the three. These colonies, which I visited first, all came from the convict depot founded on Sydney harbour in 1788, in consequence of Cook's discovery, – which we used erroneously to call Botany Bay. For in truth Botany Bay was found to be unfitted for the purpose, and was never used. I next visited Western Australia, which is far distant from the other colonies, and but little connected with

them, – and from thence I went back to South Australia. Neither of these two colonies has sprung from any connection with New South Wales. Having thus visited the six Australian Colonies, I went on to New Zealand, and returned home across the United States, journeying always eastwards.

The reader might perhaps have found it more convenient had I taken the colonies in the order of their birth, first New South Wales, and then Tasmania, – ending with Queensland. But I felt that by doing so, I should be writing of things almost in the present tense, long after they had occurred. Statistics which were new when I was in Queensland in August, 1871, had become quite stale by the time that I had reached New Zealand in October, 1872. I will, too, take the reader into my full confidence, and let him know that my book has been written as I went on. I do not know that I could have done my task otherwise. Queensland, and all that I had learned about that colony, – her land-laws, her habits, and her prosperity, had been as it were dispatched and cleared out of my mind before I had reached Melbourne on my return journey. Tasmania and Western Australia were finished before I quitted Adelaide – and so on. And having written my book in this order, I found myself obliged so to publish it, – convinced that the confusion created by any other arrangement would be greater than any which this may produce.

I will venture to say once more, that in all that I have written, I have endeavoured to keep in view the conviction that the mother country, in regarding her colonies, – such colonies as those of which I have written, – should think altogether of their welfare, and as little as may be of her own power and glory.

CHAPTER LII. EARLY HISTORY.

NEW ZEALAND.

CHAPTER LII.

EARLY HISTORY.

IN an appendix to his work on New Zealand, Dr. Thomson gives a catalogue of more than four hundred different publications which had appeared before 1860, in reference to that colony, and he does not state that it is exhaustive. In the face of this immense bulk of literature about New Zealand, I am almost bound to feel that more writing would be superfluous. I reflect, however, that till I had conceived the intention of visiting the colony myself, I had never even opened one of these four hundred publications; and thinking that others may have been as remiss as myself, I venture to add another to the list, hoping that it may reach some few who have hitherto neglected, as I had done, the multitudinous opportunities of information afforded them.

It is, I believe, now recognized as an historical fact that the Maoris, or natives whom we found in New Zealand when we first visited the land, are a Polynesian race who came to these islands from Hawaiki, – which was probably one of the Navigators. As to the latter point, however, there is a difference of opinion, some thinking that the migration was from a point as far east as the Sandwich Islands. It is stated that Cardinal Mezzofante declared the Maori language and that of the Sandwich Islands to be the same. We are told not only the names of the chiefs who brought the travellers, but also those of the boats in which they came; nor is there any absurdity in this, as the traditions of the Maori people have been preserved with tenacious fidelity, and the period at which the migration took place is not very remote. They were, for the most part, a brown people, of the Malay race, and seem to have

found no human inhabitants before them when they landed. It has been calculated from the succession of chiefs, of whose names tradition has kept the record, that the Maoris landed in New Zealand about the beginning of the fifteenth century. It is perhaps impossible now to fix the date with accuracy. Of all the people whom we have been accustomed to call savages, they were perhaps, in their savage condition as we found them, the most civilized. They lived in houses; had weapons and instruments of their own made of stone; held land for cultivation as the property, not of individuals, but of tribes; cooked their food with fire; stored property so that want and starvation were uncommon among them; possessed a system for the administration of justice, and treated their wives well. But they were greatly addicted to civil wars, and they ate their enemies when they could kill or catch them.

They are an active people, – the men averaging 5 feet 6 1/2 inches in height, and are almost equal in strength and weight to Englishmen. In their former condition they wore matting, now they wear European clothes. Formerly they pulled out their beards, and every New Zealander of mark was tattooed; now they wear beards, – and the young men are not tattooed. Their hair is black and coarse, but not woolly like a negro's, or black like a Hindoo's. The nose is almost always broad, and the mouth large. In other respects their features are not unlike those of the European race. The men, to my eyes, were better looking than the women, – and the men who were tattooed better looking than those who had dropped the custom. The women still retain the old custom of tattooing the under lip. The Maoris had a mythology of their own, and believed in a future existence; – but they did not recognize one Supreme God. Virtue with them, as with other savages, consisted chiefly in courage, and a command of temper. Their great passion was revenge, which was carried on by one tribe against another to the extent sometimes of the annihilation of tribes. The decrease of their population since the English first came among them, has been owing as much to civil war, as to the injuries with which civilization has afflicted them. They seem from early days to have acquired that habit of fighting behind stockades, – or in fortified pahs, – which we have found so fatal to ourselves in our wars with them. Their weapons, before they got guns from us, were not very deadly. They were chiefly short javelins and stones, both flung from slings. But there was a horror in their warfare to the awfulness of which they themselves seemed to be keenly alive. When a prisoner was taken in war, he was cooked and eaten.

CANNIBALISM.

I do not think that human beings were slaughtered for food in New Zealand, although there is no doubt that the banquet when prepared was enjoyed with a horrid relish. I will quote a passage from Dr. Thomson's work in reference to the practice of cannibalism, and will then have done with the subject. Whether or not cannibalism commenced immediately after the advent of the New Zealanders from Hawaiki, it is nevertheless certain that one of Tasman's sailors was eaten in 1642; that Captain Cook had a boat's crew eaten in 1774; that Marion de Fresne and many other navigators met this horrible end; and that the pioneers of civilization and successive missionaries have all borne testimony to the universal prevalence of cannibalism in New Zealand up to the year 1840. It is impossible to state how many New Zealanders were annually devoured; that the number was not small may be inferred from two facts authenticated by European witnesses. In 1822, Hongi's army ate three hundred persons after the capture of Totara, on the River Thames, and in 1836, during the Roturua war, sixty beings were cooked and eaten in two days." I will add from the same book a translation of a portion of a war-song: – "Oh, my little son, are you crying, are you screaming for your food? Here it is for you, the flesh of Hekemanu and Werata. Although I am surfeited with the soft brains of Putu Rikiriki and Raukauri, yet such is my hatred that I will fill myself fuller with those of Pau, of Ngaraunga, of Pipi, and with my most dainty morsel, the flesh of the hated Te ao." In these wars they threatened each other with cannibalism, and boasted of the foes they had devoured.

The two islands of New Zealand together are about as big as Great Britain. The French, Spaniards, and Dutch, all claim to have been the first discoverers, but the honour is now conceded to the latter. A. Jan Tasman, he who also discovered for us Tasmania, is supposed to have been the first to have seen New Zealand closely, though he never put his foot upon it. He came over from Batavia in 1642, anchored off the north-western coast of the middle island, and gave to the country the Dutch name of New Zealand. There was doubtless some fighting, but, according to his story, the natives first attacked him. His discovery was of no service to him, for he could get neither water nor food, – and so he went his way. After that we have no distinct record of any visit to the islands till Cook landed there in 1796. Cook had much intercourse with the natives, frequently trading with them, and as frequently fighting them. It is, perhaps, hardly worth the while of any English reader now to sift the merits and demerits of the two parties, or to attempt to

discover which first used violence to the other. But it is impossible not to feel that whereas the strangers had no moral right to attack the natives, the natives cannot have been morally wrong in attempting to destroy their invaders.

It has generally if not always been the case on such occasions, that the new-comers have intended to be gracious, if the natives whom they found would only be gracious also; – but have as firmly determined to be masters, if not by fair means, then by foul. They have claimed what they wanted as though it were their own, and have punished offences against their own laws with a high hand. In all the intercourse of Europeans with savage races it has been so, – though in a less degree in our intercourse with the New Zealanders than with any others "We desire your land for high purposes of our own which you cannot understand. If you will give it us without molesting us, you shall live on it and not be molested. But you must live as we direct you." Such have been the orders given to races who could not be made even to understand them, – and the orders, if not obeyed, have been enforced. Perhaps in no case since Europeans have sought for new homes in distant countries, has so true an attempt been made to treat the old inhabitants with justice as has been done in New Zealand, – and it has been so because New Zealand has been the last discovered; but the result has been the same In other countries, as in Australia, we have simply declared the land to be our own. In New Zealand, we at last declared the land not to be ours, to be the property of the Maoris, – but as a fact, by far the greater portion of the land belongs to us already, and the remainder will soon be ours. Possession of New Zealand was taken by Cook in the name of George III., but the English nation never acted on the claim so made. It is, indeed, still stated in the official records of the Colonial Office, that New Zealand was added to the British Empire by "settlement" in 1814; but such settlement was a settlement only on paper, was followed by no governing action, and, if ever of any avail, was superseded by acts of recognition on the part of Great Britain of the independence of the natives of New Zealand. For seventy-five years after Cook's first visit, we had continual dealings with New Zealand, without any official assumption of political dominion. English traders, not always of the best character, frequented the shores, bringing away the native flax, in return for which they supplied the New Zealanders with firearms; catching seals and whales, marrying New Zealand girls, sometimes domesticated with the people, sometimes governing them, sometimes flying in dread from their awful

COLONIAL DIFFICULTIES.

practices, – and sometimes eaten. Missionaries settled among them, sometimes obtaining great influence, – and, again, sometimes eaten. Attempts were made by individuals, subjects of the British Crown, to obtain kingly authority over the people; – and as late as in 1835, an English gentleman, who was styled the British Resident, who had been appointed by British authority, and who died but the other day, endeavoured to establish an independent native government, which was to be in some sort subject to himself. This was Mr. Busby; but nothing came of his New Zealand constitution, – as nothing had previously come of a former attempt made by that famous New Zealand settler, a Briton with a French name, Baron de Thierry, to make himself king in the country. But these doings show that Great Britain exercised no real authority over the islands while they were in progress. Though the European inhabitants were growing in number, though their influence was becoming great if not supreme, though the work of the missionaries was progressing, – and in speaking of the early days of New Zealand, even so cursorily as I am doing now, it would be wrong to leave the name of Mr. Marsden unmentioned, – though that which we call civilization was extending itself among the Maoris, who were gradually adopting European habits, – yet the British Crown hesitated to found a colony. New Zealanders were brought to England and shown at Court, and elsewhere, – and were, no doubt, the more interesting because they were cannibals. But cannibals they still were, and authorized colonization among them was felt to be difficult. They must either be exterminated or Christianized, – and probably the too rapid extermination which would go hand in hand with the slower Christianization, might bring more blame than praise upon a philanthropic Secretary of the Colonies.

There can, I think, be no doubt that the difficulty was of this nature. There were two parties, each anxious to do good; – a colonizing party which desired to create a home for Englishmen in a country fitted apparently above others for the purpose by soil and climate, and which sought by its influence and its arguments to force the Colonial Office to give way to their views of colonization; and a missionary party, whose philanthropy was exercised, not on behalf of Englishmen, but for the native inhabitants of the colony. The missionaries were altogether hostile to the colonizing schemes of such men as Lord Durham, Francis Baring, and Edward Gibbon Wakefield, and desired to keep in their own hands any civilizing operations which might be extended from England to New Zealand. Christianity for the heathen, even though it might be hardly more

than a nominal Christianity, was their object. Land for emigrating Britons, even though it might be bought by the extermination of the heathen, was the object of their opponents. The Colonial Office was for a long time inclined to favour the missionaries rather than the colonists. There was less of political danger on that side. It is asserted that when Lord Normanby, as Colonial Secretary, at last gave orders for asserting the Queen's right to New Zealand, he told, the first governor that the colonization of New Zealand had been deferred as long as possible, because it had been found that the progress of the white men among savages had always led to the extirpation of the native race.

But it was in vain that any Secretary of State should endeavour to stop the tide of those who have been born to people the earth. The advantages to be gained were too great to be hidden out of sight, or withdrawn from the uses of the world. In 1825, a New Zealand company had been formed under the auspices of Lord Durham with the avowed object of buying land from the natives, – thus recognizing the right of the natives to sell the land. The recognition was of course not a national recognition, nor in any way sanctioned by British authority; – but it showed the tendency of the minds of the leading men who at that time interested themselves in the science of colonizing. Land was bought, but this first company did not effect much. In 1836, renewed attention was drawn to the subject by two Committees of the House of Commons, which were appointed to inquire, one into the condition of the colonial Aborigines generally, and the second as to that vexed question, the manner in which colonial lands should be sold; and in the subsequent year the New Zealand Association was formed, of which Mr. Francis Baring, afterwards Lord Ashburton, was chairman. The Colonial Office was evidently adverse to the Association from the first, – fearing that although its own official responsibility would remain, its privileges and influence in regard to the management of colonization would be taken from it. It refused to give a charter to the Association, on the ground that the Association was not a company bound together for any commercial purpose. It was a political, not a commercial speculation, – and as such, it was at last refused all countenance by the Colonial Office. There can, I think, be but little doubt that there existed a desire on the part of one of the leaders of the New Zealand Association, – and that leader, the man who was most energetic in the matter, – to stultify and conquer the Colonial Minister of the day, and to raise himself on the ruin he might thus make. No one can read

NEW ZEALAND COMPANY.

Mr. E. G. Wakefield's written words, – either his book on the "Art of Colonization," or his published Letters, – without feeling that such was his purpose.

But Mr. Gibbon Wakefield was joined with men who were both too good and too strong to be put down by any minister. In 1839, out of the ashes of the Association arose the New Zealand Land Company, – another New Zealand company. Of this Lord Durham was the governor; and among its members were Lord Petre, Francis Baring, Russel Ellice, William Hutt, Sir William Molesworth, John Abel Smith, and others almost as well known. Mr. Wakefield was not a director, – but he was one who often directed directors. It is not probably too much to say that he was the moving spirit of the company, and the parent of the scheme which in truth led to the adoption of New Zealand as a colony by Great Britain. The scheme, however, had by no means that object. As the Colonial Office had thwarted the Association, the Company resolved upon going to work without the Colonial Office, and buying land on their own authority, as though the New Zealand chiefs were altogether independent of the British government. In 1839 their first ship sailed for the islands. I have been told that the day before it sailed Lord John Russell, the Secretary of State of the time, hearing of its intended purpose, declared the illegality of the proceeding, and his intention of making known to these embryo pioneers of New Zealand colonization that they would not be allowed to take up land from the natives without sanction from the Crown. But in the course of that very night the ship weighed anchor in the Downs, and my informant assured me that during the night Gibbon Wakefield himself travelled from London down to Deal, gave the necessary orders, and was back in London on the following morning. The story may probably be inaccurate in its details, – possibly altogether untrue; but it passes as true in New Zealand. At any rate the ship went, and it was known to the Colonial Office that it was the purpose of those on board of her to make purchases of land from the New Zealand chiefs as though the Colonial Office had no voice in the matter.

It was felt that the time had come in which some action must be taken. Great Britain could not with reason forbid her children to settle on the shores of New Zealand in independence of herself, unless she was prepared to form some plan by which they might do so with the usual dependence on her protection. She could not be a dog in the manger to her own children, refusing to take New Zealand herself, and forbidding them to take it because she claimed

it, though she would not use it. In spite of the horrors of cannibalism, in the teeth of the missionaries, who with true courage but mistaken philanthropy were anxious to endure all the perils of Christianizing these people after some fashion which should not also exterminate them, the Colonial Office did take the matter up when she found that the new company had sent out a shipload of colonists; and on the 15th of June, 1839, New Zealand was proclaimed a part of the colony known as New South Wales, and subject to the government there exercised. On this occasion a step towards real possession was taken. Captain Hobson was appointed as the first lieutenant-governor, – at first indeed with the name of consul, but with powers in his possession to assume the higher functions of governor.

The settlers had been sent out by the New Zealand Land Company, under the guidance of Colonel Wakefield, a brother of Gibbon Wakefield, and they landed in August, 1839, on the southern extremity of the northern island, in Wellington Harbour as it is now called. Captain Hobson in the following January disembarked at the Bay of Islands, which is almost at the northern extremity. Both gentlemen seem to have gone to work earnestly to perform the tasks assigned to them. Before the end of 1839 Colonel Wakefield and his followers had bought land enough for a kingdom, a tract, it is said, as large as Ireland, paying for it in goods. Muskets, gunpowder, ball-cartridge, bullet-moulds and flints, red nightcaps, pocket-handkerchiefs, looking-glasses, jews'-harps, shaving-brushes, and sealing-wax, are all conspicuous in the list of the chattels for which the land was bartered. For a time everything was rosy-coloured, both with the savages and the newcomers; but it appeared before long, – as of course would be the case, – that the New Zealanders had understood but little of the terms of the contract, and that in many cases they who had professed to sell the land, had no commission from their tribes and no title of their own to make the sale.

A few days after the landing Captain Hobson initiated his powers by entering into a treaty with the natives, which was diametrically, though not at the time intentionally, opposed to the transactions of the Company. This was the treaty of Waitangi, which was signed at Waitangi by 46 chiefs, and afterwards by 512 Maoris in all, throughout the two islands. It stipulated, first, – that the united tribes of New Zealand owned the Queen of Great Britain to be their Queen, – secondly, that the Queen of Great Britain owned that the land of New Zealand, for all purposes of private possession,

NEW ZEALAND A COLONY.

belonged to the native tribes; – and thirdly, that the Queen would protect the tribes. This treaty is still law, and is the basis on which Great Britain really founds its claim to the possession of New Zealand. As far as first principles of truth and justice are concerned, it must probably be acknowledged that they who on the part of New Zealand executed the treaty of Waitangi, knew what they were about no better than their brethren who received bullets and red nightcaps for the land round Wellington Bay. But then, had we as a nation been always scrupulous as to first principles, we should never have colonized any country. Had we done nothing, sent out no first governor of New Zealand, and made no attempt, either by treaty with the natives or by imperial power, to put ourselves in a position to govern the land, three very adverse interests would have torn New Zealand to pieces between them, – the natives, the missionaries, and the colonists. The natives would have eaten many missionaries and many colonists; but the colonists would finally have extirpated both the natives and the missionaries. And terrible injustice would have been done, without even law to give it a seeming justification. Probably no better step towards civilization could have been taken at the time than the treaty of Waitangi.

The colony was thus founded, and Great Britain as a nation was bound to protect and to keep hold of that which was now her own. The Bay of Islands offered no good site for a town, and Governor Hobson moved down south and placed his seat of government at a place which he called Auckland. Till 1865 Auckland was the capital of New Zealand. It was then removed south, to Wellington, at which place the New Zealand Company had founded its first town, as being central for both the islands. In 1842 New Zealand became a bishopric, and Dr. Selwyn, the first bishop, arrived.

But, as we all know now, the real work of colonizing the country had barely as yet been commenced. Indeed the mode in which it had been commenced, though noticeable as far as the home government was concerned for its intended justice, was, by reason of its very justice, ill-adapted for quick permanent settlement. The one thing which uncivilized races have possessed, and which invading colonists have required, has been land; and it has all but universally been held that the invading nation had a right to take the land as national property, either without price, or at a price to be settled by itself. At Port Phillip Batman was not allowed to purchase land from the Aborigines of the country, because the land was held to belong to the Crown. This assumption on the part of the Crown renders colonization easy. Anything done afterwards for

the natives is done under the guise of charity. The natives are supposed to possess nothing, and therefore nothing can be taken from them. This has been felt so universally to be the practice of colonizing nations, that even in regard to New Zealand, many years after the treaty of Waitangi, by which it was stipulated that the land should be left in the possession of the natives, a despatch was sent out from the Colonial Office intimating that the native inhabitants of the islands had no right of property in land which they did not occupy. It was abhorrent to the feelings of the Colonial Office generally, – as indeed it is to those of almost every Briton, – that land in which men could live should be allowed to remain waste. But by the treaty of Waitangi it had been acknowledged that the actual ownership of all land in New Zealand was in the hands of the New Zealand tribes. Such being the treaty which had been completed, it was not likely that Colonel Wakefield's companions would be allowed to retain possession of the enormous territories which they had bought for a small ship's cargo of English goods.

Mr. Fox, who, when I reached Wellington in August, 1872, was premier of the colony, endeavours to show, in his history of the war in New Zealand, that the war between the settlers and the Maoris did not owe its origin to quarrels about land. I hardly think that he has succeeded. It is at any rate manifest that the condition which enabled the Maoris to maintain a war was one which arose from the rights which we gave them, and that their disposition to wage a war with us was created by the idea of European weakness which our concessions to them had generated. I do not say that those concessions were wrong. In abstract justice they were no doubt right, – unless wrong in that they did not concede enough. But they paved the way to the war. When government was established on the basis of the treaty, Europeans claimed to have bought something over forty-five millions of acres; but it was necessary to investigate the claims, and to ascertain with some sort of rough justice for how much land some payment, which might be presumed to be adequate, had in truth been made. It was enacted that the title of the purchaser should be made good by crown grants, the crown grants to be given on examination of land claims. The land claims were disallowed, and the grants, or titles, refused, unless the purchase was shown to have been made from tribal authorities entitled to sell, and at adequate prices. The greater portion of the land said to have been bought was restored to the natives, – to the great disgust of the colonial landholders, – or landsharks, as they were soon afterwards called.

ORIGIN OF THE WAR.

Mr. Fox explains – and no doubt with some truth – that certain small preliminary wars between the natives and the colonists, – in 1845 and afterwards, – were not immediately produced by any quarrels as to land; but even these -could hardly have occurred had not the natives been taught to think that, great as the Europeans at first appeared to them, that greatness was on the wane. Auckland and Wellington were not the only spots at which Europeans had begun to colonize. Settlements had been formed, and towns had grown up, at Nelson, on the north-western coast of the Southern Island, at New Plymouth, in the province which still keeps the native name of Taranaki on the western coast of the North Island, and at other places, before the days of the great war came; but Otago and Canterbury, the now flourishing provinces of the Southern Island, were not as yet founded. At all these settlements the acquisition of land was the one great object.

The feeling of the natives may be best ascertained from their action. In 1853 a land league was formed among them, originating in Taranaki, where the great war afterwards originated, with the object of preventing any further alienation of their lands by the New Zealanders to the white men. "The money," they said, "which we receive for our land is soon gone, but the land remains with the Europeans for ever"! In this league there was much of the spirit of the "unions" at home, the members of which, not content with binding themselves to certain stipulations, endeavoured to carry out their views by ill-using those of their trade who would not join them. Tribes willing to sell were deterred from selling, and so strong was the league at Taranaki, that not an acre of land could be bought round New Plymouth by the white settlers. Then the natives in the centre of the North Island determined, like the Jews, that they would have a king of their own. It was natural enough that they should not understand the precise extent of the submission which they, or others on their behalf, had made to Queen Victoria. They did understand that Queen Victoria's governors did not govern them in accordance with their own laws, – and also that the laws of the white men did not suit them. They seemed to have acknowledged among themselves that British authority was to prevail in the parts of the country which belonged to the colonists, and on lands which they recognized as having been sold; but they considered themselves justified in appointing a king for themselves, to rule them within the pale of the lands which were still their own. So the king was appointed, – the title having been adopted as that to which the new-comers

amongst them had accustomed them, – and a part of the North Island became his kingdom. He was, and still is, but a mock king, for few even of the natives have recognized his power, – but he was strong enough to shut up his country, to keep a body of armed followers whom he called his army, to forbid the formation of roads, to defy the British law, and to keep himself beyond the reach of European contact. And this king still exists, shutting up a portion of the Northern Island, not only against individual enterprise, but also against the Queen's authority.

It is not within the scope of my purpose to write a history of New Zealand. Neither my knowledge of the subject or my space would allow me to do so. It has simply been my intention to endeavour to describe to those who are as ignorant of New Zealand as I was before I visited her shores, the circumstances under which she became a British colony. When speaking of the Northern Island further on I will venture to say something of the Maoris and their wars. To this chapter I will only add a few dates. Captain Grey, now so well known in connection with New Zealand as Sir George Grey, landed in the colony in November, 1845. At that time the governor was aided by a council, but was in fact supreme. The condition of the colony on Captain Grey's arrival was one of warfare with the natives, which warfare continued till peace was proclaimed, on 21st February, 1848. In 1852 gold was first found, in the North Island in the province of Auckland, but was not then worked to any success. It was not till 1860 that gold was found in the Middle Island, and that New Zealand became one of the great gold-fields of the world. In 1846, Sir George Grey being Governor, an Act was passed by the British parliament "to make further provision for the Government of the New Zealand Islands." I need not specify the provisions of the Act. In 1852, still during the reign of Sir George Grey, – his first reign, for, as all know who are interested in New Zealand, Sir George was twice Governor, – another act was passed, with the object of giving a constitution to New Zealand. That constitution, though it has been much amended, still exists, and is certainly not deficient in its enactments for the liberty of the subject. It created a New Zealand parliament, called the General Assembly, consisting of the Governor as king, – a Legislative Council, in which there were at first ten members, the members being nominated by the Crown for life, and of a House of Representatives elected for five years. An electoral qualification was instituted, which still exists, and is about equal in its bearings to household suffrage at home, and of which the lowest

THE CONSTITUTION.

terms are £10 household in the town, and £5 household in the country. So far, the constitution of New Zealand is similar to that of the Australian colonies; but, in addition to this, the colony was divided into provinces, – at first six provinces, Auckland, Wellington, Taranaki, Nelson, Otago, and Canterbury, – and to each province was given a separate legislature, under a superintendent elected by provincial votes. This scheme was, no doubt, taken from the State legislature of the United States. By the constitution the Maoris were endowed with political rights equal to those of the white men – which rights they still enjoy. Indeed, they have now higher privileges, as four Maoris sit in the House of Representatives as members returned by exclusively Maori constituencies. By these constituencies no white man can be returned, but a Maori can sit for any electoral district in the country.

The constitution came out to New Zealand in 1853, – and the Provincial Council at once went to work. Sir George Grey left New Zealand at the close of that year, and the first General Assembly sat at Auckland in 1854.

OTAGO – THE LAKE DISTRICT.

CHAPTER LIII.

OTAGO – THE LAKE DISTRICT.

I HAD landed at Melbourne on 27th July, 1871, and left that place for New Zealand on the 29th July, 1872, having spent a year and two days in seeing the Australian colonies. From Melbourne we took the steamer for The Bluff, the name given to the southern part of the Middle Island. It may be well to explain to any who have omitted New Zealand from their acquired geography, that the colony bearing that name consists of the North Island, the Middle Island, and Stewart Island, – which latter is a small affair, forming a part of the present province of Otago, and at present only interesting on behalf of its scenery. It must be understood that both the Northern and Middle Island are divided into different provinces. The government is attempting to form a fishing establishment in Stewart Island, and to induce immigrants to come out with the object of following that occupation. That there is abundance of fish, including oysters, is an established fact. The island is at present very thinly occupied, chiefly by Maoris and a half-caste race. The colony of New Zealand in fact consists of the

Northern and Middle Islands. The southern portion of the latter is now the province of Otago, and is, of all the New Zealand provinces, the first in point of population. Three years ago there were two separate provinces, Southland and Otago, which are now combined. The Bluff, at which we landed, is the seaport of Southland, and hence there runs a railway to Invercargill, – which was its capital when as a separate province it had a capital, – and twenty miles beyond it to a place called Winton. On landing I immediately asked to be shown some Maoris, but was told that they were very scarce in that part of the country. Indeed, I did not see one in the whole province, and it seemed as though I might as well have asked for a moa, – the great bird which used, in former days, to stalk in solitary grandeur about the island. The place at which we landed had a quay, and a railway, a post office, and two inns; – but it had nothing else. The scenery was wild and pretty, – more like the western sea-coast of County Cork than any other that I have seen. The land was poor, and for some distance around apparently useless. There were hills on all sides, and mountains in the distance. It would be impossible to imagine any country more unlike Australia, – a remark which I may as well make once for all, and which may be applied to everything in New Zealand. The two countries both grow wool, and are both auriferous. Squatters and miners are common to them. But in all outward features they are dissimilar, – as they are also in the manners of the people, and in the forms of their Government.

I found myself struck, for a moment, with the peculiarity of being in New Zealand. To Australia generally I had easily reconciled myself, as being a part of the British Empire. Of New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land I had heard so early in life, as to have become quite used to them, – so that I did not think myself to be very far from home when I got there. But New Zealand had come up in my own days, and there still remained to me something of the feeling of awful distance with which at that time I regarded the young settlements at the Antipodes, – for New Zealand is, of all inhabited lands, the most absolutely Antipodean to Greenwich. I remembered the first appearance in public of the grim jokes attributed to Sydney Smith, as to the cold curate, and the hope expressed that Bishop Selwyn might disagree with the cannibal who should eat him. The colony still retained for me something of the mysterious vagueness with which it was enveloped in early days, so that when landing at The Bluff I thought that I had done something in the way of travelling. Melbourne had been no more than

ANIMALS AND BIRDS.

New York, hardly more than Glasgow, certainly not so much as Vienna. But if I could find myself in a Maori pah, – then indeed the flavour of the dust of Pall Mall would for the time depart from me altogether. Most travellers have experienced the feeling, – have anticipated a certain strangeness which they have never quite achieved. But when I reached Invercargill, the capital of Southland, I felt exactly as I might have felt on getting out of a railway in some small English town, and by the time I had reached the inn, and gone through the customary battle as to bedrooms, a tub of cold water, and supper, all the feeling of mystery was gone. I began to inquire the price of tea and sugar, and the amounts of wages which the men were earning; but had no longer any appreciation of my Antipodean remoteness from the friends of my youth.

I can hardly explain how it is that Invercargill, and indeed all New Zealand towns, are more like England, than are the towns of Australia; – but so it is. When one gets into the country the reasons for this are apparent. The everlasting gum forests do not belong to New Zealand, and the trees which are indigenous to the soil are brighter in hue than the dull-coloured foliage of the eucalyptus tribe. And "the bush," at any rate in the Southern, – or so-called Middle, – Island is not sempiternal, as it is over so vast a proportion of Australia. At first it struck me that there was an absence of timber, and in some places I found that fuel was terribly expensive, in consequence of the distances over which wood had to be carried. Again, no animal is now seen in New Zealand different from those which are familiar to us in England. There is, I believe, a rat in the country whose ancestors are said to have existed there previous to the coming of the English, – though some naturalists cast a doubt even upon the rat, – but there is no other four-footed animal that has not been imported and acclimatized. There are a few native birds, but those which are commonly seen are to the eye in no way different from English birds. The moas have left their skeletons, which are to be seen standing in the museum at Christchurch from 11 to 13 feet high, – but the last moa died some say more than 1,000 years ago, while others contend that they existed down to the coming of the Maoris, who were supposed to have eaten the last of them not more than 250 years since. In Australia there is a whole class of animals very strange to British eyes, – kangaroos, wallabies, and paddymelons, running about on their hind legs, and carrying their young in their pouches; – and there are parrots and cockatoos, laughing jackasses, and native-companions,

lyre-birds, and bell-birds, – all of which savour of a strange land. But I found nothing strange in the province of Otago. All English animals have not only acclimatized themselves, but seem to thrive with a prolific increase beyond that which we know at home. The hens lay more eggs, the bees swarm more frequently, the rabbits breed more quickly; – the ewes are more certain with their lambs than they are with us. This is, no doubt, the case in Australia also, – but then in Australia there is an animal life of its own. In New Zealand everything is English. The scenery, the colour and general appearance of the waters, and the shape of the hills, are altogether un-Australian, and very like to that with which we are familiar in the west of Ireland and the highlands of Scotland. The mountains are brown and sharp and serrated, the rivers are bright and rapid, and the lakes are deep, and blue, and bosomed among the mountains. If a long-sleeping Briton could be awaked, and set down among the Southland hills, and told that he was travelling in Galway or Cork, or in the west of Ross, he might be easily deceived, though he knew the nature of those counties well, – but he would feel at once that he was being hoaxed if he were told in any part of Australia that he was travelling among Irish or British scenery.

We were unfortunate in the time of the year, having reached the coldest part of New Zealand in the depth of the winter. Everybody had told me that it was so, – and complaint had been made to me of my conduct, as though I were doing New Zealand a manifest injustice in reaching her shores at a time of the year in which her roads were all mud, and her mountains all snow. By more than one New Zealander I was scolded roundly, and by those who did not scold me I was laughed to scorn. Did I imagine that because August was summer in England, therefore it was summer at the other side of the world; or did I think that I should find winter pleasant in Otago, because winter might be preferable to summer in Queensland? I endeavoured to explain that I had had no alternative, – that I must see New Zealand in winter or not see it at all; but one always fails in attempting to make one's own little arrangements intelligible to others, and I found it better to submit. I had come at the wrong time; – was very sorry for it, but would now make the best of it. Perhaps the roads would not be so very bad. I was assured that they could not possibly be worse.

Nevertheless, as I had come to see scenery, I determined to see it as far as my time and strength would allow. I had learned that Lake Wakatip was the great object to be reached, – Wakatipu is

MISFORTUNES OF TRAVELLING.

the proper name, but the abbreviated word is always used. From Invercargill I could certainly get to Wakatip, as the coach was running, and from Wakatip I might possibly get down to Dunedin, – but that was doubtful. If not, I must come back to Invercargill. I hate going back, and I made up my mind that if the mud and snow were no worse than British mud or British snow, we would make our way through.

We were accompanied by a gentleman from Invercargill, whose kindness I shall never forget, and whose fortitude in adversity carried us on. After staying two days at Invercargill, – which is a thriving little Scotch town without any special attractions, but which boasts a single cab, and a brewer who was very anxious that I should take a barrel of his beer home to England in order that the people there might know what New Zealand could do in the way of brewing, and who generously offered to give me the barrel of beer for that purpose, – we started on our journey by rail to Winton. Although I know how utterly uninteresting to the general reader are the little trials of a traveller's life, I cannot refrain from explaining that we, – I and my wife were "we," – were constrained to send the bulk of our luggage on to Dunedin by steamer, as it was impossible to carry overland more than one or two leather bags, and that it was long before we regained our boxes. As in Australia, so in New Zealand, locomotion is effected chiefly by means of coasting steamers. The boat in which we had come from Melbourne to The Bluff, would pass in its usual course up the eastern coast, touching at Port Chalmers, the port for Dunedin; at Lyttelton, the port for Christchurch; at Wellington, the capital, which lies at the extreme southern point of the Northern Island, through Cook's Strait which divides the two islands to Nelson, and down the western coast of the Middle Island to Greymouth and Hokitika, and from that place back to Melbourne. This is done every fortnight, and in the alternate weeks another steamer takes the reverse course, reaching Hokitika direct from Melbourne, making its way round to The Bluff, and returning thence to its home at Melbourne. There are also smaller boats plying occasionally from port to port, – and in this way the New Zealanders travel from one province to another; – but of all the conveyances with which I have had dealings, these New Zealand steamboats are the most regularly irregular, and heart-breaking. If a would-be traveller should be informed that steamboats would start from a certain port to another, one on the 1st and another on the 15th of the month, his safest calculation would probably be to

make his arrangements for the 8th. Of course travelling by sea cannot be made as certain as that by land, – and equally of course boats which depend for their maintenance chiefly on freight must be dependent on the incidents to which freight is liable. I make no complaint; – not even on the score that I never could be at any place at the same time with my clothes. I used to be unhappy, but accepted my misfortune as a part of the necessity of the position. But it is right to say that travelling in New Zealand was uncomfortable. We could not carry our portmanteaus overland, and therefore trusted them to the steamers with copious addresses, with many injunctions to persons who naturally were not quite so strongly interested in the matter as we were ourselves. After a long and painful separation we and our luggage did come together again; but there was much of intermediate suffering. A hero, but nothing short of a hero, might perhaps sit down comfortably to dinner with the full-dressed aristocracy of a newly visited city in a blue shirt and an old grey shooting jacket.

I will endeavour to say no more on a subject which at the time occupied too many of my thoughts. With great misgivings as to the weather, but with high hopes, we started from Invercargill for Lake Wakatip. Our first day's journey was by coach, which was tolerably successful, though fatiguing. A Swede drove us who owned the coach, and kept an inn half-way, at which we got a very good dinner. He was married to a half-caste Maori woman, – and I made a note that the mixture of the breed on the female side seemed to be favourable to cookery. A better boiled turkey and plum-pudding were never put upon a table. I did not like the Swede himself so well, as I entertained a suspicion that he made us pay double fare, as strangers to the country. I fancy that this practice is prevalent in Otago generally, which is a canny province, colonized by the Scotch, given to thrift, and prosperous accordingly. Indeed it was impossible not to remember the story of George III., who when charged a guinea by some innkeeper for a boiled egg, suggested with gentle sarcasm that eggs were probably scarce in that part of the country. "No, your Majesty; – but kings are." Travelling strangers are scarce in Otago, especially in winter, – and therefore it answers better to make something of the bird in the hand than to allure birds out of the bush by reasonable charges. For the present, perhaps, the practice may be prudent; but as the scenery of the country is both lovely and magnificent, as it has had bestowed upon it by nature all those attractions which make Switzerland the holiday playground of Europe, and as it is near enough

NEW ZEALAND SQUATTERS.

to the growing cities of Australia to offer the same allurements to them, it may soon be well for the innkeepers up the country to consider whether it may not answer their purpose to establish some fixed rate of charges, and to look to what may be got from the public generally rather than to the individual victim of the moment. Again I make no complaint. It is better for the traveller to pay high prices for poor accommodation than to find none at all. In New Zealand the prices are no doubt very much higher than in Australia generally; – in Otago they are perhaps double the Australian prices; and in Australia they by no means startle the traveller by their lowness.

The first night we stayed at a squatter's house, and I soon learned that the battle between the squatter and the free-selector, of which I had heard so much in the Australian colonies, was being waged with the same internecine fury in New Zealand. Indeed the New Zealand bitterness almost exceeded that of New South Wales, – though I did not hear the complaint so common in New South Wales that the free-selectors were all cattle-stealers. The complaint made here was that the government, in dealing with the land, had continually favoured the free-selector at the expense of the squatter, – who having been the pioneer in taking up the land, deserved all good things from the country of his adoption. The squatter's claim is in the main correct. He has deserved good things, – and has generally got them. In all these colonies, – in New Zealand as well as New South Wales and Victoria, – the squatter is the aristocrat of the country. In wealth, position, and general influence he stands first. There are no doubt points as to which the squatters have been unjustly used, – matters as to which the legislature have endeavoured to clip their wings at the expense of real justice. But they have been too strong for the legislature, have driven coach and horses through colonial acts of parliament, have answered injustice by illegal proceeding, and have as a rule held their own, and perhaps something more. I soon found that in this respect the condition of New Zealand was very similar to that of the Australian colonies. The gentleman who accompanied us was the government land commissioner of the province, and, as regarded private life, was hand and glove with our host; – but the difference of their position gave me an opportunity of hearing the land question discussed as it regarded that province. I perceived that the New Zealand squatter regarded himself as a thrice-shorn lamb, but was looked upon by anti-squatters as a very wolf.

Lake Wakatip is about seventy miles from Invercargill, the road to it being fairly good, – for a "bush" road. The name must be taken in its colonial sense. There was hardly a tree to be seen throughout the journey, but the word has made its way over from Australia, and the traveller when he is out of the town is in the bush; and a country road which is merely formed and not metalled is a bush road, though it pass across an open plain, or up a treeless valley. We passed up such a valley, broad, with mountains on each side of us, some of which were snow-capped. We crossed various rivers, – or more probably the same river at various points. About noon on the second day we reached the lake at a place called Kingstown, and found a steamer ready to carry us twenty-four miles up it to Queenstown, on the other side. Steamers ply regularly on the lake, summer and winter, and afford the only means of locomotion in the neighbourhood. But no sooner were we on board than the rain began to fall as it does only when the heavens are quite in earnest. And it was very, very cold. We could feel that the scenery around us was fine, that the sides of the lake were precipitous, and the mountain tops sharp and grand, and the water blue; but it soon became impossible to see anything. We huddled down into a little cabin, and endeavoured to console ourselves with the reflection that, though all its beauties were hidden from our sight, we were in truth steaming across the most beautiful of the New Zealand lakes. They who cannot find some such consolation from their imagination for external sufferings had better stay at home. At any rate they had better not come to New Zealand in winter.

Queenstown is probably the biggest and most prosperous of the Otago gold-field towns. The greater portion of the province is divided into different gold-fields, which are being worked with more or less success. The process at present is chiefly that of alluvial washing, which always goes before quartz-crushing. I had visited so many Australian gold-fields that I determined not to devote myself to similar inspection in New Zealand; – and as I have written so much about Australian gold, I will say but little as to that of New Zealand. I found, however, that miners' wages in New Zealand were considerably higher than those in Australia, averaging as much as 10s. a day for eight hours' work, and running sometimes as high as £4 a week. I was assured that the miners, at any rate in Otago, do not themselves embark in speculation so constantly as do their brethren at Sandhurst and Ballarat. Surface gold-seeking, the work of washing the dirt extracted from gullies

QUEENSTOWN.

and river-beds, is of course carried out by the speculation of the seekers and washers themselves; and at this a man may earn nothing for three weeks and 20s. or £20 in the fourth week. In this work speculation is of course a necessity to the worker. But the men employed on deep sinking at weekly wages are not so commonly given to gambling as they are in Australia, The opportunities for doing so are probably not so readily afforded to them. But if they do not gamble so much, they drink more.

Queenstown on Lake Wakatip is a town of about 2,000 inhabitants, – looking, as is the case with all these towns, as though it were intended for more than double that number. It is built close down upon the water, and is surrounded by mountains, – on all of which the snow was lying. There are many towns so placed in Switzerland, and on the Italian lakes, – which in position this New Zealand mining borough much more closely resembles than anything at home; but the houses, and something in the fashion of the streets, the outside uses and bearings of the place declare it to be unmistakably English. The great drawback to New Zealand, – or I should more properly say to travelling in New Zealand, – comes from the feeling that after crossing the world and journeying over so many thousand miles, you have not at all succeeded in getting away from England. When you have arrived there you are, as it were, next door to your own house, and yet you have a two months' barrier between yourself and your home.

A steamer from Queenstown generally runs up to the top of the lake one day, returning the next, making the journey once or twice a week; but the good-natured captain, who, I believe, was also the owner of the boat, on being asked, at once consented to take us up and down in one day. The distance is about thirty-six miles, making the entire length of the lake about sixty miles. It was a bright clear cold day, with the temperature at freezing-point from morning to evening. There were two ladies in the party for whom cloaks and opossum rugs were very necessary. I myself spent a great part of the day within the genial influence of the funnel. But I enjoyed it greatly. I do not know that lake scenery can be finer than that of the upper ten miles of Wakatip; – although doubtless it can be very much prettier. The mountains for the most part are bare and steep. Here and there only are they wooded down to the water's edge, – and so much is the timber in request for fuel and building, that what there is of it close to the water will quickly disappear. As the steamer gradually winds round into the upper reach, which runs almost directly north and

south, one set of peaks after another comes into view. They are sharp and broken, making the hill-tops look like a vast saw with irregular gaps in it. Perhaps no shape of mountain-top is more picturesque than this. The summits are nearly as high as those of Switzerland, that of Mount Earnshaw at the head of the lake being 9,165 feet above sea-level. The mountains themselves, however, do not look to be so big as the Alps. There is no one peak which strikes one as does the Matterhorn, no one head like the head of Mont Blanc; – no one mountain which seems to be quite so much of a mountain as the Jungfrau. But the effect of the sun shining on the line of peaks was equal to anything I had seen elsewhere.

The whole district around is, or rather will be in coming days, a country known for its magnificent scenery. Among the mountains there are vast glaciers, – but the means of reaching them are not yet at the command of ordinary travellers. To the south-west of Lake Wakatip, and nearer the coast, are Lake Teanau and the Manipori Lake, of the beauty of which I was told very much. The woods come down to the water's edge, and in summer all is green and sweet, secluded and soft. To the north-east is Wannika Lake, running into the province of Canterbury, insight of which stands Mount Cook, over 13,000 feet high. About forty miles to the northwest of Wakatip Martin's Bay may be reached, on the western coast, at which place when I was in Otago a few settlers were struggling to make a home. I was assured that unless the government would do something for them, – would make them a road across to the lake, or send occasionally a ship to. them with provisions, the place must be abandoned. Down the coast, south from Martin's Bay, there is a series of so-called sounds, which are said to resemble closely the Norway Fiords. They are very numerous, and are at present desolate, without inhabitants, and almost unknown. The late Governor of the colony visited them in the spring of 1872 in H. M. S. "Clio," and I publish in the appendix his account of the voyage. Dr. Hector, whose words Sir George Bowen quotes, is curator of the Wellington Museum, and a Fellow of the Royal Society. This part of New Zealand is so little known, and is at the same time so remarkable for that wild landscape beauty which during the last fifty years Englishmen have gone over the world to find, that it may be well to let some English tourists know where they may discover new fields for picturesque travelling and Alpine climbing. At present these lakes and fiords are difficult to reach, – and New Zealand is very far from London. But that very difficulty will to many enhance the charm, – and from year

IRON HOUSES.

to year the distance, as computed by time, will become less and less. It may be as well to remind travellers that the English winter, – or perhaps the English spring as late as March or April, – is the time of year in which the scenery of New Zealand should be explored. I was there in the New Zealand winter, and could not reach the sounds on the coast or the lakes either to the north-east or south-west of Lake Wakatip.

From Queenstown we journeyed overland to Dunedin, the capital of Otago, and the journey was one which to me will ever be memorable. It is generally performed in three days. It took us six, – during the first five of which we travelled in a buggy with a pair of tired horses. Our average daily distance was about twenty-five miles, our pace about three miles an hour, and the cost of travelling about 3s. 6d. a mile. When I think of the road which we traversed I feel that the pace was good, and the price reasonable. But the tedium was great, and the inns at which we stopped were not delightful. The scenery, however, was grand almost throughout the journey. We came down the course first of one river and then another, crossing them now and again by means of double punts, which are fastened to ropes and carried over by the effect of the stream, – as is done on different bridgeless rivers in Italy. We journeyed on from one gold-field town to another, finding the people always in a state of prosperity. Ordinary labour throughout the country receives 5s. or 6s. a day, – or 4s. with rations. The little towns seemed to be well to do, all having banks and numerous hotels. The life is rough; but is plenteous and comfortable. Things are ugly to European eyes, but are neither poor nor squalid. There have been three successive styles of architecture in these towns, indicating different periods. The first is the canvas style, – in which men live in tents. That had passed away from the Otago gold-fields before our arrival. The second is the corrugated-iron period, and that style was flourishing at the time of our visit. The third is the wooden period, beyond which no advance has as yet been here made in many of the New Zealand towns. Corrugated iron does not make picturesque houses. Probably my readers all know the thin fluted material of which I speak, drawn out so fine that it can be cut like cloth with a pair of shears. It is very portable; very easily shaped; capable of quick construction; and it keeps out the rain. It is, however, subject to drawbacks. The rooms formed of it of course are small, and every word uttered in the house can be heard throughout it, as throughout a shed put up without divisions. And yet the owners and frequenters of these

iron domiciles seem never to be aware of the fact. As I lay in bed in one of these metal inns on the road, I was constrained to hear the private conversation of my host and hostess who had retired for the night. "So this is Mr. Anthony Trollope," said the host. The hostess assented, but I could gather clearly from her voice that she was thinking much more of her back hair than of her visitor. "Well," said the host, "he must be a-fool to come travelling in this country in such weather as this." Perhaps, after all, the host was aware of the peculiarity of his house, and thought it well that I should know his opinion. He could not have spoken any words with which at that moment I should have been more prone to agree.

On the fifth day, – the worst of all, for the snow fell incessantly, the wretched horses could not drag us through the mud, so that I and the gentleman with me were forced to walk, and the twelve miles which we accomplished took us five hours, – we reached the town of Tuapika, whence we were assured there would run a well-appointed coach to Dunedin. Tuapika is otherwise called Lawrence, – and it may be as well here to remark that in this part of New Zealand all towns have two names. The colonists give one, – sometimes, as in the case of Tuapika, taking that of the natives, – and the government gives another. We had come through Dunedin alias Clyde, through Teeviot alias Roxburgh, through Beaumont which had some other name which I have forgotten, and at last reached Tuapika alias Lawrence. The rivers and districts have been served in the same way, and as the different names are used miscellaneously, the difficulty which travellers always feel as to new localities is considerably enhanced. At Tuapika we found an excellent inn, and a very good dinner. In spite of the weather I went round the town, and visited the Athenaeum or reading-room. In all these towns there are libraries, and the books are strongly bound and well thumbed. Carlyle, Macaulay, and Dickens are certainly better known to small communities in New Zealand than they are to similar congregations of men and women at home. I should have liked Tuapika had it not snowed so bitterly on me when I was there.

On the following day we got on board the well-appointed coach at six in the morning. It certainly was a well-appointed coach, and was driven by as good a coachman as ever sat upon a box; but the first stage, which took us altogether six hours, was not memorable for good fortune. There was a lower new road, and an upper old road. The former was supposed to be impracticable because of

COACH ACCIDENTS.

the last night's snow, and the man decided on taking the hills. As far as I could see we were traversing a mountain-side without any track; but there was a track, for on a sudden, as we turned a corner, we found ourselves in a cutting, and we found also that the cutting was blocked with snow. The coach could not be turned, and the horses had plunged in so far that we could with difficulty extricate them from the traces and pole-straps. The driver, however, decided on going on. Shovels were procured, and for two hours we all worked up to our hips in snow, and did at last get the coach through the cutting. But it was not practicable to drive the horses down the hill we had ascended, and we therefore took them out and brought it down by hand, – an operation which at any rate kept us warm. We had hardly settled into our seats after this performance, before one of the wheelers slipped into a miner's water-run, and pulled the other horse under the pole atop of him. The under horse was, as it were, packed into the gully and buried, with his brother over him, like a tombstone. So we went to work again with the shovels, and dug out first one animal and then the other. We were wet through, and therefore a good deal the worse for our task, but the horses did not seem to mind it. At last we reached the town of Tokomairiro alias Milton, where comforts of all kinds awaited us. In the first place, there was a made road into Dunedin, and a well-horsed coach to take us. We had descended below the level on which the snows were lying. My wife found a kind hostess who took her to a fire and comforted her with dry stockings, and I got some dinner and brandy-and-water. About eight in the evening we reached Dunedin, alive, in fair spirits, – but very tired, and more ready than ever to agree with that up-country innkeeper who had thought but little of the wisdom of one who had come travelling by winter in Otago.

CHAPTER LIV. OTAGO – DUNEDIN.

CHAPTER LIV.

OTAGO – DUNEDIN.

IT must be understood that New Zealand has a double form of government, resembling in some of its features that of the United States. There is a great federal congress in the United States which concerns itself with the affairs of the whole empire, and there is also in each State a separate smaller legislature, which is never-

theless a legislature complete in all its functions, making laws for its own State. So in New Zealand, there is the General Assembly, which sits at Wellington, and is endowed with all those parliamentary powers which belong to the parliaments in the Australian colonies, and there is also a Provincial Council in each province, which manages the revenue of the province, sells the land of the province, and within certain limits makes laws for the province. And as in each of the United states there is a governor elected by the people, so in each of the provinces of New Zealand there is a corresponding officer called the superintendent. And this superintendent has his own cabinet, – his own set of responsible advisers, – as the governor of the colony has his cabinet, who of course sit in the General Assembly. There are at present eight provinces in New Zealand, four in the Northern and four in the Middle Island, – and there is also in the Middle Island the county of Westland, which has also a quasi-provincial establishment. The provinces are Otago, Canterbury, Nelson, Marlborough, with the county of West-land in the Middle Island, – Wellington, Taranaki, Hawke Bay, and Auckland in the North Island. There are therefore eight separate governments, and a half-government, under the general government. On the 1st of January, 1872, the total population of New Zealand was estimated at 267,000 in round numbers, so that the average population of these separately governed states is not above 30,000 each. But in truth the population of three of the provinces, Taranaki and Hawke Bay, in the Northern Island, and Marlborough, in the Middle Island, is below 10,000 each. And yet in these, as in the others, there is a separate paid legislature, and separate paid officials. In the United States no territory has been held entitled to be proclaimed a State till it has gathered together for itself a population of 100,000 souls, and the average population of the States is about 100,000 each. The stranger in New Zealand is certainly tempted to think that this copying of State government has been premature, if not in itself unnecessary.

There can hardly be a doubt, I think, that New Zealand is over-governed, over-legislated for, over-provided with officials, and overburdened with national debt. That it will have strength to struggle through with all the weight imposed upon it is not improbable. It has a magnificent climate, rich mineral gifts, good soil, – and among its people a resolution to succeed which is in itself equal to half a battle won. It is from this elasticity of pride on the part of the New Zealanders themselves that these burdens have sprung. "Don't tell us that 5,000 human beings are not enough to justify a

OTAGO.

separate legislature, cabinet, government, and the rest of it. If the things be good in themselves we will have them, let the cost be what it may. We are not afraid of expense!" It is thus they seem to speak of themselves and their affairs; and so the thing is done. And certainly there has hitherto been no ruin, no collapse, no crying out for external assistance, although the costliness has been very great.

The superintendent of each province may sit in the General Assembly if he be returned by any constituency. When I was in New Zealand, all the eight superintendents were in the Assembly, and one of them was in the cabinet. From this it follows that the General Assembly and the Provincial Assemblies never sit at the same time. The session of the General Assembly may last for about three months. It is considered that those of the Provincial Assemblies should complete their work in about six weeks. As the General Assembly was sitting when I was in New Zealand, I saw none of those Provincial Assemblies at work.

Otago is the most populous, and I believe I may add the richest, province in New Zealand, and its capital, Dunedin, is its largest city. According to the census of 1871 the population of the province was 69,491, being something above a fourth of that of the whole colony. Dunedin contains about 21,000 people. The settlement at Dunedin was founded on 28th of March, 1848, when a small band of Scotch emigrants, under Captain Cargill, first landed, and pitched their tents on the present site of the town. The rise, both of the province and of the town, has been very quick, having been greatly accelerated by the rushes after gold made from the various Australian colonies. It seems that from the first finding of gold in New Zealand, the gold-fields there have exceeded in popularity those of Australia. The higher rate of miners' wages would seem to justify this, were it not rather the result than the cause. I found that New Zealand still enjoyed much of the charm of novelty in reference to other pursuits as well as that of gold. The wool growers, graziers, agriculturists, and miners of the younger colony were, I will not say, envied by Australians generally, but regarded as having had almost unfair advantages bestowed upon them. The climate has had much to do in producing this happy condition. It is, however, an undoubted fact that during the last ten years there has been a considerable re-emigration from the Australian colonies to New Zealand.

Dunedin is a remarkably handsome town, – and, when its age is considered, a town which may be said to be remarkable in every

way. The main street has no look of newness about it. The houses are well built, and the public buildings, banks, and churches are large, commodious, and ornamental. It strikes a visitor as absurd that there should be six capitals in New Zealand, a country which forty years ago was still cursed with cannibalism; – but it strikes him as forcibly with wonder that it should so quickly have possessed itself of many of the best fruits of civilization. This prosperity has come, I think, less from any special wisdom on the part of those who endeavoured to establish New Zealand colonies on this or another scheme than from the fact that in New Zealand British energies have found a country excellently well adapted for their development. In regard to Otago and Dunedin, it was the intention of the founders, or at any rate of those who instigated the founders, to establish an especially Presbyterian settlement. Doubtless many Scotch families did come out to it, and Scotch names are predominant. The Scotch have always been among the best, – or perhaps the very best, – colonizers that the world has produced. But Otago is by no means now an exclusively Presbyterian province, nor is Dunedin an exclusively Presbyterian city. In the now united provinces of Otago and Southland the Presbyterians are less than half the population. As to Dunedin we have heard lately more of its desire to have a Church of England bishop of its own than of any other propensity. And it is going to have a bishop, – I may say has got one, though when I was there the prelate had not yet arrived. A former bishop did indeed come out, – but he was not approved of, and was returned, having never been installed. It is marvellous to me that the Australian and New Zealand sees can find English clergymen to go out to them. The pay is small, – generally not exceeding £500 a year. That bishops do not become bishops for money we are all prepared to admit. But the power also is very limited, the patronage almost none at all, and the snubbing to which they are subjected is excessive. It seemed to me that this latter process was exacerbated by the small remnant of baronial rank which is left to them. The colonial bishop is still called, my lord; – and of course wears an apron – and lawn sleeves when he is in church. But there is a growing determination that the clergymen of one Church shall have no higher rank than those of another, – and that a Church of England bishop, therefore, shall have no special social position in his colony. At present this feeling is less strong in New Zealand than in Australia, and is to a certain degree restrained by the quiet, unproclaimed action of colonial governors, who like these bishops, and do

DUNEDIN.

what in them lies to preserve the rank. But the operation of the colonist's mind, even when he belongs to the Church of England, works in the other direction. I shall no doubt be told that bishops do not undertake their duties with any view to the places that may be assigned to them in. walking out of rooms, – as to patronage, or even to power. But we know that authority cannot be maintained without its outward appendages, and that clerical authority has needed them quite as much as civil or military authority. Dunedin did not like the first bishop chosen for the see, because he was supposed to have lent his countenance to some High Church ceremonials. He was, therefore, sent back again. The salary offered is small, and as yet uncertain. No house, or "palace," is provided. I was told that it was considered indispensable that the new bishop should be a member of Oxford or Cambridge, a gentleman distinguished for piety and eloquence, – and a man of fortune. "Upon my word I think you are very exigeant," I said to my informant. He answered me by assuring me that they had now got all that they asked. The colonial sees always do find bishops. There are six at present in New Zealand, – with a population about half as great as that of Manchester, of which not more than two-fifths belong to the Church of England.

The Provincial Council was not sitting, but I was shown the chamber in which it is held. The members sit, like Siamese twins, in great arm-chairs, which are joined together, two and two, like semi-detached villas. I was specially struck by what I cannot but call the hyper-excellence of the room. There has been, in most of the New Zealand provinces, a determination that the Provincial Assembly shall be a real parliament, with a Speaker and Speaker's chair, reporters' galleries, strangers' galleries, a bar of the house, cross benches, library, smoking-room, and a "Bellamy," – as the parliament refreshment-rooms are all called, in remembrance of the old days of the House of Commons at home. The architecture, furniture, and general apparel of these Houses, – such of them as I saw, – struck me as being almost grander than was necessary. The gentlemen as they sit are very much more comfortable than are the members in our own House at home, and are much better lodged than are the legislators in the States of the American Union. The Congress of Massachusetts sits in a building which has indeed an imposing exterior, but the chamber itself inspires less awe than does that of Otago.

In one respect the New Zealand legislatures have preferred American customs to those which they left at home. They are paid

for the performance of their legislative work. The pay of a member of the Provincial Council in Otago used to be £1 a day. It is now 19s. 11 1/2d. When this information was first given to me, I own that I disbelieved my informant, attributing to him an intention to hoax a stranger. But I was assured that it is so. And it was arranged in this way. The legislature, bent on economy, reduced the salaries of various provincial officers, and with that high-mindedness for which all legislative chambers in free countries should be conspicuous, reduced their own allowances from 20s. to 12s. a day. But, on trial, it was found that the work could not be done for the money. The Otago gentlemen who came from a distance, could not exist in Dunedin on 12s. a day, – which, if it be considered that a member of parliament should be paid at all, is surely very low in a country in which a journeyman carpenter gets as much. A proposition, however, to raise the sum again to 20s. was lost by a small majority. The rules of the House did not permit the same proposition to be again brought before it in the same session, and therefore in another notice the nearest sum to it was named – and carried. The moderation of the members was shown in the fact that a fraction under, and not a fraction over, the original stipend, was at last found to satisfy the feeling of the House. I think that in Otago a more general respect would be felt for its legislature if the gentlemen sitting in it altogether repudiated the receipt of the small sum, perhaps £50 per annum, which is paid for their services.

The chief products of Otago are gold and wool; – but agricultural pursuits are extending themselves in all parts of the province. The number of free-selectors, or "cockatoos," is increasing, and by their increase declare their own prosperity. Individually, they almost all complain of their lot, – saying that the growth of their corn is precarious, and its sale when grown effected at so poor a price as not to pay for the labour of producing it. The farmers are in debt to the banks, and their lands are not unfrequently sold under mortgage. But such complaints are general all the world over. No man is contented unless he can make a fortune, – and no man is contented when he has made a fortune. The squatters, the miners, the cockatoo farmers, and the labourers working for him, all say the same thing. They regret that they ever left England. It is a mistake to suppose that the colony is a blessed place. Argyleshire or even County Galway is much better than Otago. But in Otago all men live plenteously. Want is not known. If a man fails as a free-selector, he still lives plenteously as a labourer. I will quote a few words from a printed despatch respecting Otago, sent home by Sir

SUCCESS OF THE PROVINCE.

George Bowen, the Governor of the colony, in 1871 – "After the lapse of only twenty-three years" – from the first settlement of the province, – I find from official statistics that the population of the province of Otago approaches nearly to 70,000, that the public revenue, ordinary and territorial, actually raised thereon exceeds £520,000; that the number of acres farmed is above a million; that the number of horses exceeds 20,000; of horned cattle 110,000; and of sheep 4,000,000. The progress achieved in all the other elements of material prosperity is equally remarkable; while the Provincial Council has made noble provision for primary, secondary, and industrial schools; for hospitals and benevolent asylums; for athenaeums and schools of art; and for the new university which is to be opened at Dunedin in next year." I found this to be all true. The schools, hospitals, reading rooms, and university, were all there, and all in useful operation; – so that life in the province may be said to be a happy life, and one in which men and women may and do have food to eat, and clothes to wear, books to read, and education to enable them to read the books.

The province is now – (1873) – twenty-four years old, and has 70,000 inhabitants, and above four million sheep. Poor Western Australia is forty-five years old, and, with a territory so large, that an Otago could be taken from one of its corners without being missed, it has only 25,000 inhabitants, and less than one million sheep, – sheep being more decidedly the staple of Western Australia than of Otago. I do not know that British colonists have ever succeeded more quickly or more thoroughly than they have in Otago. They have had a good climate, good soil, and mineral wealth; and they have not had convicts, nor has the land been wasted by great grants. In founding Western Australia but little attention was paid either to climate or soil; – land was given away in huge quantities, and convicts were introduced to remedy the evils, and to supply the want of labour which that system of granting lands produced. And in Western Australia gold has not been found. I know no two offshoots from Great Britain which show a greater contrast.

Otago possessed no railways in 1872, – but a whole system of railways was in preparation, – partly as yet only on paper, and partly in the hands of working contractors. This system, indeed, is one intended to pass through the entire middle island, and to be carried out in conjunction with an equally extended system in the northern island. For, where public works are concerned, millions are spoken of in New Zealand with a reckless audacity that staggers

an economical Englishman. Debt does not frighten a New Zealand Chancellor of the Exchequer. Legislators in New Zealand take a pride in asserting that every New Zealander bears on his own shoulders a greater debt than do any other people in the world. Telegraphic wires run everywhere in Otago, and before long railways in the low countries will be almost as common. As it was we determined to travel by coach into the next province of Canterbury, – finding that the boats were uncertain, and that the coach ran three times a week from Dunedin to Christchurch. The coach takes three days, travelling about sixty miles a day, and stopping during the night. We were told that the journey was harassing and tedious, but it would not be so harassing and tedious as that we had already made; – and then, by this route, we should see the country.

Leaving Dunedin, we rose up a long wooded hill, with a view to the right over the land-locked arm of the sea down to Port Chalmers, which is the port for Dunedin. It was a most lovely drive. The scenery of the whole country round Dunedin is beautiful, and this is the most beautiful scene of it all. After a drive of about sixteen miles we breakfasted at a place called Waikonaite, at which we found the landlord firing guns up the chimney to put out the fire. In spite of this little confusion, we were excellently provided, – getting a much better coach breakfast than used to be common in England. I may now say a few words on the disagreeable nature of New Zealand names. Wai is the most customary prefix to the names of places, and signifies water. When divided in this manner, from what follows, it would seem to form a very simple addition; – but in truth it makes the word complex, difficult to catch, and almost impossible to be remembered. There are no less than twenty-eight post-towns beginning with Wai, and of course the post-towns are but few in comparison with the less important places. In the north island Nga, or Ngate, is the prefix which the reader most frequently meets in records of the early days of New Zealand. It signifies son, and corresponds with the Scotch Mac and the Irish O. In Dr. Thomson's history of New Zealand he recapitulates no less than forty-five subdivisions of one tribe, the names of forty of which begin with Ngate. The sound, however, has not found favour with the colonists, and has been dropped in the names which they have adopted. From Waikonaite the coach goes on to Palmerston, – which sounds more familiarly to English ears. As far as this place, a distance of about thirty-five miles, the road is as good as any in England; – but then there comes a change, and

NEW ZEALAND RIVERS.

thence on to the bounds of the province the road was very bad indeed. The first night's rest was, for the coach, at a small town called Oamaru, and for us at a squatter's house four miles further on. This we reached at nine P.M., and left the next morning at six A.M; – hours at which in fully civilized countries one does not expect a stranger to entertain one; but we found our hostess expecting us at dinner, and in the morning she got up and gave us our breakfast. Twelve miles of as miserable a road as ever I travelled brought us to the Waitaki river, which is the boundary of the province. It was a piercingly cold morning, and we felt aggrieved greatly when we found that we had to leave the coach and get into a boat. But the dimensions of our own hardships lessened themselves to our imagination when we found that two of the boatmen descended into the river, and pushed the boat for half a mile up the stream. During a part of the way three men were in the water, and yet the boat hardly seemed to move. For this service we were charged 2s. a piece, which sum was not included in the coach fare. Pitying the men because of their sufferings, I gave them something over "to drink." It was taken, but taken without thanks, and with evident displeasure, and handed over with the ferry money to the employer. In New Zealand, and in some much lesser degree in Australia also, you may ask any man, or any number of men to drink, without running the slightest risk of displeasing them; but the offer of money is considered to be offensive. The drinking must be done at the bar of a public house; and the money must be paid to the publican and not to your friend who drinks. I think I have elsewhere described the practice of shouting or "standing drinks all round," which I found to be in full force in New Zealand. Even servants will refuse money offered to them. A poor girl whom I had injured, knocking down into the mud the line on which all her clothes were drying, though she was in tears at the nuisance of having to wash them again, refused the money that I offered her, saying that though she was only a poor Irish girl without a friend in the world, she was not so mean as that. Another girl told my wife, in perfectly friendly confidence, that she did not think that she ought to take money. It is odd that so excellent a lesson should be learned so quickly. The pity is that in the course of years it will doubtless be unlearned.

There are many such rivers as the Waitaki running into the sea on the eastern coast of New Zealand, very dangerous in crossing, and the cause of many accidents. We were then in the depth of

winter, and they are not then full. It is after the winter rains, and after the snows, when the mountains give up their load of waters, that the streams become full, and the banks overflow. In the spring the coaches often cannot pass, and are occasionally washed away bodily when the attempt is made. At other rivers besides the Waitaki there is a custodian, who is in some degree responsible for the safety of travellers, and who seems always to charge 2s. a head, whether he preside over a ferry with boat and boatmen, or simply over a ford, across which he rides on horseback showing the way.

When across the Waitaki, we found ourselves in the great Church-of-England province of Canterbury.

CHAPTER LV. JOHN ROBERT GODLEY.

CHAPTER LV.

JOHN ROBERT GODLEY.

FROM Otago we went north into the province of Canterbury, – a name which was selected for a then undetermined part of New Zealand about twenty-five years ago. As far as I can ascertain, the Canterbury Association, so called, was first started in 1848; but the idea of such a settlement, to be established in some part of New Zealand, had existed for a considerable time before that date. Mr. Gibbon Wakefield, in a letter to Mr. John Abel Smith, dated 30th November, 1847, says, "We adhere to the old plan of a settlement to consist of 300,000 acres, with right of pasturage attached, to be purchased from the Company for 10s. per acre, or £150,000. The place to be, if possible, the valley of Ruamahanga, near Wellington, which is delineated in the illustrations of my son's book." Wellington, however, is in the northern island, and the Province of Canterbury is in the middle island. The settlement was to be made in strict connection with the Church of England, and was to be a model colony. Without a doubt the aspirations which produced first the idea and then the thing were nobly philanthropic. Many colonizing reformers, among whom were such men as Mr. Adderley, Mr. Aglionby, Mr. J. A. Smith, Lord Lyttelton, and Sir John Simeon, were strongly of opinion that British men and women seeking a home in the new lands which their country possessed were not put in the way of effecting their purpose happily by the operations of the Colonial Office. The old belief, which had created the New Zealand Association, still remained. There was the same

NEW THEORY OF COLONIZATION.

desire to establish a colony with which our Colonial Office should have little or nothing to do. There existed a feeling that something great might be done for a small portion of the British race, by establishing a settlement on an entirely new footing, in which the best of everything English should be retained, English habits of life, English principles, English local government, English freedom, and above all the Church of England. And there existed also a feeling that the interference, bureaucracy, and incapacity of the Colonial Office in Downing Street had up to that time debarred our existing colonies, such as Canada, New South Wales, and Van Diemen's Land, from the enjoyment of these blessings. I can hardly but fail in expressing at the same time, and with equal strength, my admiration for the spirit in which these gentlemen worked, and my conviction that they were wrong both in their condemnation of the Colonial Office and in their theory as to the construction of a settlement in which colonists should live a blessed life after some special fashion to be fixed by them. The scheme had all the merits and all the faults which have attended the fabrication of Utopias, since the benevolence of men has taken that direction. But it has to be acknowledged that they did succeed in creating a prosperous settlement – though the success has not been of the nature which they anticipated. Many of their aspirations have been realized, – especially that of so-called responsible local government; but the local government has come, not specially to Canterbury, but to Canterbury as a part of New Zealand; and not especially to New Zealand, but to New Zealand as one of those thoroughly British dependencies of the mother country which have gradually acquired for themselves the power of parliamentary self-government.

The two names which are most prominent in the history of the Canterbury settlement are those of John Robert Godley and Edward Gibbon Wakefield. I put that of Godley first because in truth it was his heart and courage which founded the settlement rather than the head of the man who first formed the plan. Mr. Wakefield had been a colonial reformer of an early date, who had for many years devoted himself to preparing schemes of colonization, and who in the prosecution of his schemes had fallen very foul indeed of the office in Downing Street. Mr. Wakefield, as I have said, in speaking of South Australia, had been perhaps the author, certainly one of the authors, of the plan by which that colony was originated. His scheme had been by no means fully carried out, and he had conceived great enmity against the officials of the Colonial Office who had not sympathized with his ideas as to the settlement of a

colony without any other control from home than that which might be necessary to make it a part of the British empire in reference to foreign affairs. In February, 1849, he brought out a book on the art of colonizing, which professes to be a correspondence between himself and an English statesman, in which he propounds his scheme. But by far the greater part of the book is devoted to exposing what he believed to have been the evil policy of Great Britain to her colonies, and especially to the virulent abuse of one special minister for the colonies, – namely, the present Earl Grey. Clever as that work is, I can hardly imagine that it could convince any reader. To me it is one of those books which from first to last creates in my mind a feeling of antagonism to the writer, on account of its special pleading, its injustice, and its egotism. He says himself, in one of his published letters, that the book is "awfully personal to Lord Grey," and in another letter to Mr. Rintoul, the editor of the "Spectator," "You are sure to think the preliminary matter, – the statement of the subject, and the personalities, and the egotism, – far too long." After reading Mr. Wakefield's book and his letters, I cannot think him to have been a good guide for a young colony; but undoubtedly he did hit upon certain truths, the first and chief of which was the inexpediency of bestowing grants of land on colonists, and the wisdom of selling the public lands at a certain fixed price. In addition to this he saw that the future prosperity of the thoroughly British colonies would render self-government on their part essential. But I imagine that all who gave their minds to the subject saw this also, – differing from Mr. Wakefield only as to the mode in which the concessions should be granted, and the date from which they should commence. It was a part of his theory that a colony, – or set of colonists, – should go out with a full constitution in the pocket of some leading colonist, which should be granted by the Crown, – as a power of ruling was granted by the Crown in former days to Lord Baltimore in reference to Maryland, and to Mr. Penn in reference to Pennsylvania. In this present work I should probably only annoy my readers were I to attempt to show that in the time of Mr. Penn, and still less in the time of Lord Baltimore, the Crown had no power to bestow that superintendence on its colonies which it possessed from the first settlements in Australia, and down to the settlement of New Zealand, and to show also that the constitution of those colonies which were founded under direct superintendence from home, has been much happier than that of the early American colonies established without this superintendence. Such an argument would

CLASS-COLONIES.

certainly be beyond my scope, probably beyond my ability. But I can hardly give the short description of the settlement of Canterbury which is necessary for my purpose, without stating my impression of Mr. Wakefield's views on colonization. He was an eager, hard-working, clever man, very energetic in his purposes, – but who, in all his colonizing work, seems to have thought more of his own schemes than of the happiness of the colonists whom he proposed to send to their future homes, – and who was quite as anxious to rule his colonists from home by laws made by himself as was ever a Secretary of State in Downing Street.

It was his influence, however, that worked upon Mr. Godley, and induced that gentleman to become the real leader of a special band of colonists to New Zealand. Mr. Godley, whom I remember as a boy at school, thoroughly respected by all his schoolfellows, seems early in life to have been taught by the Tractarian movement at Oxford that the religion of a community should be its most important consideration. He was a religious man himself, and his friends were men whose thoughts about religion were serious, and whose convictions were sincere. His letters to his friend Mr. Adderley have been published, – or at any rate printed and circulated; and no volume of correspondence ever fell into my hands which left upon my mind a higher impression of the purity, piety, philanthropy, truth, and high-minded thought-fulness of the writer. They are written with all the elegance which education gives, and all the abandon which the privacy of loving friendship produces. I fear that they are only known among his friends. It appears that Mr. Wakefield and Mr. Godley came together in 1847, when Godley's thoughts had been turned towards colonization by the state of the Irish during the famine. He was an Irishman belonging to one of the poorest counties in Ireland, and ideas as to a happier home for his countrymen were thrust upon him by the tragedies of the famine and the pestilence which followed it. But with those ideas were others which sprang from his devotion to the Church which he loved, and of these Gibbon Wakefield took advantage. Mr. Wakefield was ever at work seeking for colonists who would act under his impulses, and who would do credit to his theories by their education, character, and social position. For him I doubt whether the Church of England had any special charms. He had been instrumental in founding a colony in South Australia, of which, according to his friends, it should have been one leading feature, one governing principle, that there should be no ascendant Church. He had assisted in establishing a Scotch, and therefore a

Presbyterian, colony in Otago, – in regard to which it was his intention that the Presbyterians should have complete ascendancy. It is rumoured of him in New Zealand that at one time he had set his mind on the formation of an Anglo-Jewish settlement, a community which should be subject to the British Crown, but in which the Jews should govern themselves after their own laws. It is told how he propounded this to a wealthy Jew in New Zealand. "What, – no Christians!" said the Jew. "None at all," said Mr. Wakefield; "not a Christian; – why should not Jews have a happy home to themselves as well as others?" But the Jew dissented. "I do not see how Jews shall thrive without Christians to make money by," said the wise Jew; – and that scheme fell to the ground.

There is no reason why the same man should not propose a Church of England colony, a Presbyterian colony, a Jewish colony, and a no-Church colony, and should not be equally anxious for each, – as a minister for education may be zealous both for sectarian and undenominational schools. No blame attaches to a man for so wide a sympathy. But the wide sympathy is not compatible with strenuous advocacy of a peculiar doctrine. The anxiety of Mr. Wakefield was more in regard to his scheme than to the Church. When in the course of his letters we find him struggling to get first one man as a bishop for his colony, and then another, trying to overcome one man's scruples, and then loud in praise of another of whom we are aware that he could only have heard the name the day before, we feel that he had caught, or was trying to catch, an obedient sympathizer with his plans, and a colonist who would prove himself to be a Wakefieldite rather than a staunch ecclesiastical supporter. In every word that he wrote and spoke and in every act he was fighting the Colonial Office at home for colonial influences, not propagating either one church or another. With Godley it was very different, he brought to the joint work strong religious convictions and a warm philanthropy. It was in his heart to be one of the means by which a country might be built up in which men should live religious lives in peace and plenty, – and with this view he was ready to devote himself to the cause either at home or in the colony. But he allowed himself to be imbued with his fellow labourer's especial views, and was for a time as hotly in favour of a colonial government, carried on by the Canterbury Association at home in lieu of one administered from Downing Street, as was Mr. Wakefield himself.

And it must be admitted that many others shared these views, including those whose names were mentioned at the beginning of

COLONIAL CONCESSIONS.

this chapter. The idea seemed then to prevail, as it has at all times prevailed with regard to one or another of our public departments, that the man entrusted with power was of all men the least capable of exercising that power with wisdom, and the least likely to exercise it with fidelity. The barque of the British empire has upon the whole been steered with success, – and yet the man at the helm is always being denounced as blind, and feeble, and foolish. No sooner is a leading man advanced to high place than in the minds of many of us he is already condemned for undertaking a task which it must be manifestly the duty of some one to perform. In regard to the colonies this was much more strongly the case twenty-five years ago than it is at present, as twenty-five years ago the question of constitutional government in the colonies was not settled as it is now. I will not say that the battle for colonial parliamentary governments was being fought, because I do not admit that there was an enemy with whom to fight. Before parliaments could be established it was necessary that there should be a distinct assurance that they were desired, and before they could sit and act, some proof that there were men to sit in them. I think that the future writer of the history of the Australian colonies will acknowledge that representative government was given to each colony at any rate as quickly as the circumstances demanded. With reference to the proposed Canterbury settlement, and to the Canterbury Association by which it was produced, it was desired that perfect powers of self-government should be bestowed upon it at once, and that it should start, not as a part of New Zealand, but as a thing separate, standing alone, ruling itself. This the government of the day would not allow, – and Canterbury now exists as one province of the colony which we call New Zealand, and has never held the position in which Mr. Wakefield was anxious to launch it upon the waters.

Mr. Godley had intended to work for the Association at home, – at any rate to remain at that work longer than he did; but in 1849 his health failed him. His chest was weak, his lungs in danger, and his friends recommended that he should leave England for a while. Though the eldest son of a man of property in Ireland, he was himself poor, and therefore some payment for the work of his life was necessary to him. In these circumstances he undertook to proceed to New Zealand as the salaried officer of the Canterbury Association, – not as a colonist himself in the usual acceptation of the term, not as one bent on making a new career and a fortune for himself and his children, but as an agent who should busy himself exclusively for the advantage of others. Bearing this in mind he never owned

an acre in Canterbury. With this intention and these prospects before him he left Plymouth for New Zealand, in December, 1849. As he started he wrote to Mr. Gladstone a letter on the condition of the colonies generally, which I venture to reprint in an appendix (Appendix No. 8.), as it gives a fair sample of the man's mind, and shows the intensity of his patriotism and the noble eagerness of his convictions. There is not much in that letter with which I agree. I have no fear that the British empire will be broken up through the discontent of her children. I think that the colonies should remain attached to England or be separated from them, not with reference to England's prestige or glory, – but as such continued adherence, or such separation, may be best for the happiness and prosperity of the colonists. If the colonies were separated on friendly terms they would, I think, by no means be rendered less available than at present for British immigration. I think that the writer's fears were groundless, – -and that the anticipation of shipwreck felt by the colonial reformers of that day arose from an imperfect study of the subject. But not the less is the letter the genuine production of an ardent and most philanthropic man, who was grandly anxious for the welfare of others.

In truth that which can be done for a new country by government is very little, – very little indeed, for a new colony colonized from Great Britain. Englishmen are so accustomed to be free, have had so little experience of thraldom, that on settling themselves down on new lands they proceed in truth to govern themselves, let the forms of government be what they may. In the establishment of convict colonies, – of penal settlements as they have been better called, – of course it is not so. In them it has been necessary to adapt the life and habits of the place to the requirements of a huge prison; and free men who have chosen to place themselves near to such prisons have of necessity been subject to police regulations. But with this exception our colonists have in fact governed themselves. They have at any rate been as free, – free to go and free to come, free to buy and free to sell, – free to marry and to give in marriage, – free to pray or to let it alone, – free to work and to eat, or to be idle and starve, as have ever been any people on the face of the earth. In their material condition very little change has been made by the substitution of parliamentary for home government, – so little that he who has not busied himself in politics has not felt the change. Of all the colonists who came with Godley to settle in Christchurch, few probably cared aught about the form of government which might be adopted, caring much, however,

THE CANTERBURY PLAINS.

caring indeed all in all about the nature of the land on which they were to settle. They would trust to England for freedom with an unanxious faith; – but as to the land and the crops which it could bear, as to their future meat and drink and shelter, there were doubt and fear enough, alternate hopes and doubts, – alternate fear and joy. "I am a little puzzled," says Mr. Godley, in one of his letters, "as to what ought to be done in political matters. The people are thinking too much just now of getting on their land to care much about attending public demonstrations." No doubt they were. In the meantime Mr. Wakefield was earnest at home that the colony should be ruled by Wakefield, and not by Earl Grey or any other Secretary of State in Downing Street.

On the 11th April, 1850, the "Lady Nugent," in which Godley had sailed, came to anchor in Lyttelton Harbour, – or Port Cooper, as it was then called. The town of Lyttelton now stands at the head of the harbour named after the nobleman without whose aid the Association could not have made its settlement. The two bold rocks which form the entrance are called Godley Head and Adderley Head. From that date till the time of his departure, nearly three years afterwards, Godley worked at his appointed task, and no doubt did succeed in forming the settlement of which we used to speak as the Colony of the Canterbury Pilgrims. Land had been purchased from the Maoris by the New Zealand Company, and was repurchased from the New Zealand Company by the Canterbury Pilgrims. This land is that which we now know as the Canterbury Plains. Lyttelton stands down upon a sea inlet, surrounded on every side by mountains, with hardly room around it to grow a few potatoes. On the other side of these are the plains which stretch thence to the range which forms the backbone of the Middle Island. These inner hills must have been a sad affliction to the early comers, as their future farms and future city lay beyond them. Mr. Godley truly wrote word home that the track lay up the side "of what might fairly be called a mountain." I walked it, and found it to be a veritable mountain. Now not only has the city, Christchurch, been built on the other side, and the farms tilled, and the distant country stocked, but a railway has been made through the mountains from Christchurch to the sea-port, at a cost of £200,000, about a mile and a quarter in length. This tunnel was a gallant undertaking for so young a community.

The community throve, – but it did not thrive by reliance on the theory on which it was founded. Godley soon found that the association at home, with Mr. Wakefield at the back of it, was quite as bad

as Downing Street. His complaints on this head are most amusing, as showing the difference which had been achieved in so short a time by experience between Utopian theory and practical reality. "I often think," he says to Mr. Adderley, "of the fun we should all have taken in old times out of the didactic despatches which are written to me, if they had emanated from Downing Street." Again, "So long as the practical management of Canterbury affairs is carried on at Adelphi Terrace," – the domicile of the Association, – "we have no right to complain of the Colonial Office." Again, "I earnestly hope and firmly believe that we have now seen the last of colonizing associations. I long held with Wakefield that they were positively good; then I came to look on them as lesser but necessary evils; – now I am convinced that they do more harm than good." Again, "Wakefield out-Herods Herod in the outrageous virulence of his abuse; tells me I am inconsistent, ungrateful, wild, furious, incapable, worn out, perverse, delirious, and winds up by advising me to retire into the country." This was the dear friend who had acceded with warmth to all Godley's Church views, and had declared Godley to be absolutely essential to Canterbury, – as long as Godley had agreed with him! The less colonists are meddled with by powers outside themselves the better they will thrive; but meddling by responsible government officers is better at any rate then meddling from an association.

In his letters Godley says very little about the Church of England characteristic of the settlement. After a while a bishop was found who came out, but did not suit the place, and went back again. After that the present bishop, Dr. Harper, – who is now primate of New Zealand, – accepted the see, which he has since administered with success. But there has been no strong Church of England peculiarity about the community. Dr. Harper's see, which is, I believe, coterminous with the province of Canterbury, as it was before the West land gold-fields were divided from it, contains a population of 62,158, of which 30,038 are claimed by the Church of England. The proportion is no doubt greater than in the Australian colonies or other parts of New Zealand. It would have been odd had no results come from the efforts which were made to found a Church of England settlement. But the numbers show the impracticability in these days of dictating to any community the religious convictions by which it shall be guided. In a few years the very idea of Canterbury being specially the province of one denomination will be lost to the memory of the colonists themselves; – unless indeed it be perpetuated by the huge record

STATUE OF GODLEY.

of their failure which the town of Christchurch contains. In the centre of it there is a large waste space in which £7,000 have been buried in laying the foundations of a cathedral; – but there is not a single stone or a single brick above the level of the ground. The idea of building the cathedral is now abandoned. It was a sad sight to me to look down upon the vain foundations.

Opposite the spot where the door would have been, stands a statue, by Woolner, of my old schoolfellow, – the great ornament of the city of Christchurch. Judging from portraits of the man, the likeness is excellent, though the artist never saw his subject. The statue itself, which was known to many Englishmen before it came out to New Zealand, is very noble. Among modern statues, I know no head that stands better on its shoulders.

Godley came home to England, held high office for some years in the Civil Service, and died on November 17th, 1861, of the disease which had made his journey to New Zealand a necessity. Of a better or more earnest man I do not remember to have read the record.

I cannot finish this short notice of one of those men, who with true energy and in a real spirit of philanthropy instituted the colony of Canterbury, without making some reference to another of the body, without whom Canterbury must have been a failure. This I may perhaps best do by quoting a passage from a speech made at Christchurch on Feb. 6th, 1868, at a breakfast given to Lord Lyttelton and Mr. Selfe, who were then visiting the colony with which their names are so intimately associated, Mr. T. E. Fitzgerald, than whom no New Zealand colonist is better known, in proposing the health of their English guests, spoke as follows of Lord Lyttelton; – and spoke with accurate truth: –

"I well remember soon after I first joined the Canterbury Association, and when we were falling into all kinds of difficulties, when we had no money to pay our agent's expenses in the colony, when bills were coming due and we had no funds to meet them, and when in fact there began to be every appearance of an awful failure – I well remember, after a long conversation with Mr. Gibbon Wakefield, going down to consult Lord Lyttelton, and appearing before him suddenly at eleven o'clock at night at Brighton. The result was that his Lordship came up at once to London and took charge of the affairs of the Canterbury Association; and from that time, and for a long time afterwards, laboured in those affairs as few men ever did labour in any public office. Without the smallest prospect of remuneration, he advanced thousand after thousand of pounds to keep the settlement going till the time should come when its own funds would be available. The very roads on which some of you may have worked were made out of funds supplied out of the pockets of two or three members of the Canterbury Association, of whom Lord Lyttelton was the foremost. [Loud

cheers.] It is a fact of which Canterbury may be justly proud – nay, without which none of us could dare to show our faces here to-day – that the debt thus incurred has been repaid; but though the money has been repaid we can never forget the feeling with which it was advanced, nor cease to remember how much we owe to the generous self-sacrificing spirit which carried the colony in safety through the difficulties that beset the first year of its existence."

CHAPTER LVI. THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS.

CHAPTER LVI.

THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS.

ON crossing the Waitaki River in the manner I have described in the last chapter but one, we found ourselves in the province of Canterbury, and among the people, – very few and far between for the first few miles of our journey, – who are still called the Canterbury Pilgrims. The precise spirit of the name will be easily understood. The founders of the colony, – for it was in truth a separate colony created with a distinct settlement of its own, – came out with the express idea of forming a religious community, and were thus entitled to be called pilgrims. The name of the chosen locality was assumed as having a special Church of England savour, and thus a happy old combination was revived, which from different causes sounded pleasantly in the ears of the educated men and women who had determined to make this part of New Zealand their future home.

From the Waitaki to Christchurch, the capital of Canterbury, was a journey of two days, through the towns of Waimoti and Timaru. The rivers here form the chief peculiarity of the country. They are very broad, having generally two, three, or more courses, which when flooded by rains or by melting snow form one broad and rapid course. They are for the most part unbridged, and therefore at certain times impassable. Over one river with apparently endless different courses, called the Rangitata, we were preceded by a horseman who for his services charged us 2s. a piece. Over another, the Rakaia, the first elements of a railway bridge had been constructed, and we were taken over on a truck dragged by a horse who kept the bed of the river where it was dry or the water shallow, and ascended to the level of the frail-looking bridge where the stream was deep. The whole thing looked like sudden death, – but we reached the farther side of the Rakaia in safety, and were only charged 2s. a head for all that was done for us. It may be taken as a rule that rivers in Canterbury cost so much and no more.

PRICE OF LAND.

During our whole journey from the Waitaki to Christchurch, we were crossing the Canterbury Plains, – of the fertility of which so much has been heard in England. It is an uninteresting journey as far as scenery is concerned. To the left the great range of mountains which runs throughout the island was always in sight with its snow-capped peaks, – somewhat relieving the dulness of the plain; – -but they are not sufficiently near to create landscape beauty. To the right was the sea, often close at hand during the first day, but seldom visible. We passed on from one squatter's run to another, through vast paddocks containing perhaps 20,000 acres each, without a tree. The grass consisted of long coarse tussocks – brown in colour, – with nothing of green prettiness to relieve the monotony. To the eye it certainly was not charming, but I had already learned enough of sheep to know that as a pastoral country it was good. I was told that it would carry two sheep to three acres. Any pastures that will do that on aboriginal grasses must be very good.

I had thought that we should pass through more cultivated ground than I saw on the road. Indeed I had expected to find the Canterbury plains one vast expanse of corn-bearing land. This is by no means the case. Owing to the course which the road takes the traveller sees little of agriculture, except in the neighbourhood of Timaru, till he reaches Selwyn, within a few miles of Christchurch. For this there are two apparent reasons. The land which has been purchased for tillage at a distance from Christchurch lies chiefly on the river beds, and has been taken up with reference to water frontages. It runs, therefore, in strips down from the mountains to the sea, and does not meet the traveller's eyes. And then the squatters have found it worth their while to buy large tracts of land for pastoral purposes, – so as to keep free-selectors and farmers at a distance. The price of land under the Canterbury Association was at first £3 an acre, – and at this rate the land round Christchurch was sold to the first settlers, by those who bought it from the New Zealand Land Company on behalf of the Association. The price was then reduced to 10s. an acre, at which rate much of what was then considered the distant districts of the province was alienated to a few happy capitalists. But for some years past the price for all land in the province has been £2 an acre. For £2 an acre any man who can pay the money down, may purchase as many sections as he desires containing twenty acres each; – and he may pick the sections as he pleases, buying a bit here and a bit there, – a practice which in Australia they call picking the eyes out of "the

country," – and one which the framers of the land laws in the different Australian colonies have done their best to prevent. In Canterbury it is urged that at the higher price thus exacted for land, – 40s. an acre in lieu of 20s. or less, with ready money in lieu of deferred payments, – the colony can afford to welcome any purchasers, and that purchasers picking out the best land, and thus opening up the country, will soon be followed by others who will content themselves with the second best, – and so on. I have heard many lengthened arguments on both sides of the question, – with which I will not trouble my readers. Each colony may perhaps be fairly presumed to know what mode of sale will suit its own circumstances. In the excellence of its land Canterbury has been very happy; and as a consequence of that excellence, it is second in achieved success to no colony sent out from Great Britain.

The majority of the land bought of late has been purchased by squatters, and not by farmers or free selectors. In the year ended the 30th June, 1872, run-holders, – or squatters, – bought 23,184 acres in the province, and other persons, who no doubt all purchased as farmers, bought 17,807 acres. The figures are interesting as showing the progressive nature of pastoral pursuits in New Zealand. No squatter in New South Wales or Queensland can afford to pay 40s. an acre for land on which to run sheep, – nor even 20s. When he does pay the latter sum, it is done with the object of protecting himself against the inroad of free selectors, by the purchase of some special block, – so that by obtaining possession of that block, he may raise a barrier against his enemy. But in New Zealand the purchaser lays down artificial grasses, and in a few years is enabled to carry five, six, or seven sheep, instead of perhaps half a sheep to an acre. In every province of New Zealand which I visited, – and I visited them all except Hawke Bay, – I saw English grasses in profusion, and English-looking fields. In Australia English grasses have no doubt been introduced, but I have never seen the side of a mountain covered with them, as I have in New Zealand. The cause of this is to be found in the climate. In New Zealand it seems that everything thrives which ever throve in England. The Southern, – or Middle, – Island is a second England, only with higher mountains, bigger lakes, and rougher shores. She has indeed gold instead of iron and coal, 1 and is in that respect much the poorer country of the two.

RAILWAYS.

The province of Canterbury already exports large quantities of grain, assisting to feed all the other provinces of New Zealand, and occasionally exporting wheat to Victoria and to England. The ports from which it is sent are Lyttelton and Timaru. The first object of a colony should be to grow wheat enough for itself, – if it be placed in a country capable of growing wheat. New Zealand in the year 1871 exported wheat and flour to the value of £75,176, – but imported to the value of £127,040, – showing a deficiency of £51,164. But the province of Canterbury, in regard to the production of wheat, holds her head high. Not only does she supply the greater portion of the breadstuffs exported from New Zealand to other countries, but largely helps to supply her weaker sister provinces. In 1870 she supplied the other provinces with corn and flour to the value of £127,000, and in the first six months of 1871 to the value of £59,800.

Beginnings of railways, with railway rumours, railway prophecies, and railway fears, met us everywhere on our passage up the islands. It must always be remembered that these colonial railways are not private speculations as they are with us, but are constructed, – or to be constructed, – with money borrowed by the colony for the purpose. If it be calculated that the money can be borrowed at 5 per cent., and that the expected traffic will pay for the working of the railway, – two positions which the advocates for the New Zealand railway system take for granted, – then the question is this: will the value of railway communication to the colony be worth the interest which the colony must pay for the money borrowed? Any partisan could talk by the hour, – if given to talking, or write by the chapter, – if given to writing, either on one side or the other; or first on one and then on the other. Facts can prove nothing in the matter, and speculation must carry the day either on that side or on this. That a national debt is a grievous burden to a young community is of course not to be denied. That railways running through a country, at present deficient in roads, will increase trade, and add greatly to the value of the land and to the value of the produce of the land, is equally manifest. Such a question in a community governed by free institutions, representative parliaments, and responsible ministers, at last becomes simply one of partisan politics. There will be the borrowing and spending side of the House, the members of which will be great in their oratory on behalf of progress, – and there will be the cautious side of the House, which would fain be just before it is generous, whose oratory will be equally great in denouncing the reckless audacity of the spend-

thrifts. The borrowing and spending side will generally have some great prophet of its own who can look far into futurity, who can see ample returns to the community for any amount of expenditure, who is himself fond of political power, and who can see at any rate this, – that the great body of voters in the country, on whom he must depend for his power, are for the most part indifferent to future circumstances so long as money at the moment be spent in profusion. When I reached New Zealand Mr. Vogel was the great prophet of the hour, – and under his auspices money had been largely borrowed, and great contracts had been given for railways which are ultimately to run through the two islands from The Bluff up to Auckland and north of Auckland. Of Mr. Vogel and his fate, while I was in the colony, I shall have to say a few words when speaking of the Parliament at Wellington; but I have found it impossible to touch the subject of railways in New Zealand without mentioning the name of a man who I was assured by one party will hereafter be regarded as the great promoter of the success of his adopted country, – or, as I was assured by another party, be denounced as her ruin.

At Selwyn we got upon one of these beginnings of railways, which took us into Christchurch, a distance of twenty-three miles, through one of the richest districts of the settlement. Christchurch as a town is certainly not magnificent, but it is comfortable and thoroughly English. The houses are chiefly of wood, – as are also the greater number of the churches. The banks here, as elsewhere, luxuriate in stone. Throughout all these colonies I have grudged the grandeur of the banks, being reminded by every fine facade of percentages, commission, and charges for exchange. I believe that in Australia and New Zealand a man might melt his money down to nothing quicker than anywhere else, simply by transferring it from one place to another. I feel myself to be ill-natured in saying this, as personally I received great courtesy from bankers; – but not the less did I find that the melting process was the practice.

Christchurch as a city is certainly much less imposing than Dunedin. The population of the city is about 8,000, – that of the electoral districts of Christchurch is something over 12,000. The special religious tenets of the founders of the colony may be gathered perhaps more clearly from the names of the streets than from any other characteristic which a stranger will observe. They are all named after some Church of England bishopric, – and in the choosing of the special dioceses which were to be so honoured, there has certainly been no mean time-serving, no special worship of the

THE CANTERBURY PARLIAMENT.

great ones of the Church. The Irish Church has been specially honoured, for there are Armagh Street, Tuam Street, and Cashel Street. There are also Gloucester Street, and Lichfield Street, and Hereford Street, and St. Asaph Street. But there is no York Street, or London Street, or Winchester Street. There is, however, an Antigua Street, a Barbadoes Street, and a Montreal Street; and the chief street of all is Columbo Street.

I have already spoken of the failure of the Canterbury pilgrims in reference to the building of a cathedral. There is the empty space, with all the foundations of a great church laid steadfast beneath the surface; but it seemed to be the general opinion of the people that a set of public offices should be erected there instead of a cathedral. I could not but be melancholy as I learned that the honest high-toned idea of the honest high-toned founders of the colony would probably not be carried out; but, perhaps, on that spot in the middle of the city, a set of public offices will be better than a cathedral. Public offices all the community will use. A cathedral will satisfy something less than one half of it; – and will greatly dissatisfy the other half. Such a church, by its site, by its magnificence, by the very zeal of those who are hot in its erection, proclaims ascendancy; – and if there be one feeling more repugnant than any other to the genuine British colonist it is that of Church ascendancy. Many of the settlers have come away from their old homes in order that they may be rid of it. It savours to them of tyranny and priest-rule. They do not dislike the worship of the Church of England, – perhaps they prefer it on the whole to any other. Statistics show that it is still more popular than any other one form of worship in the colonies. But colonists as a body are averse to any assertion that one Church is by its own merits deserving of higher outward honour than another. The name of a cathedral may be innocent enough, – but the builders of them in the colonies should, I think, for the present make them large only in accordance with the wants of their flocks. In Christchurch there is no doubt a disappointed feeling of ungratified ascendancy,

Canterbury has a parliament of its own, as has Otago, – and in Christchurch there still exists a hope, as there does also in Dunedin, that a good time is coming in which the General Assembly may be moved south from favoured Wellington to its own halls, – if only for a time. I trust the colony will at any rate never make the mistake into which Canada once fell of having a peripatetic parliament, an arrangement which makes it necessary that all the appurtenances of government, – secretaries, clerks, messengers, blue

books, stationery, and red tape, – should be kept moving continually from one town to another. The hall in which the Provincial Council of Canterbury sits is spacious and very handsome, and I was told that it was built with a view to accommodate the Colonial House of Representatives. I was assured afterwards at Wellington that the question of such a journey southwards was still considered to be open. The hall in question is perhaps a little too highly coloured, but is certainly very fine. I was accompanied by a member of the Provincial Council, who admitted that it had one slight drawback. Those who spoke in it could not make themselves heard. I myself had no opportunity of testing it, as the General Assembly was sitting at Wellington while I was in the colony, and the General Assembly and the Provincial Councils never sit together. This hall forms part of a set of buildings erected for the management of the affairs of the province, which as a whole pleased me very much. It is partly of stone, and partly of wood, but is Gothic throughout, the woodwork being as graceful and as true to the design of the whole as the stone. It stands on the banks of the little river Avon, which meanders through the town, having a few willows on the bank, with a wooden footbridge. The buildings form a quadrangle, and look as though one of the smaller and prettier colleges had been transplanted thither bodily from the banks of the Cam. As I stood and looked at it I could not but think that some exiled member of the university may some day have consoled himself with the same feeling.

I found that allotments of land for building purposes within a mile or two of the town were worth from £50 to £150 an acre. In all these towns the great proportion of comfortable villa residences to poor and squalid cottages is very striking. Indeed there are no poor or squalid cottages. All round Christchurch there are houses which in the neighbourhood of an English country town would denote an expenditure of £500 or £600 a year, and which here certainly cannot be maintained at a lesser rate. The one great complaint made by the ladies who occupy these houses, – the one sorrow indeed of the matrons of New Zealand, – arises from the dearth of maid-servants. Sometimes no domestic servant can be had at all, for love or money, and the mistress of the house with her daughters, if she have any, is constrained to cook the dinner and make the beds. Sometimes a lass who knows nothing will consent to come into a house and be taught how to do house-work at the rate of £40 per annum, with a special proviso that she is to be allowed to go out two evenings a week to learn choral singing in the

MAID-SERVANTS.

music-hall. By more than two or three ladies my sympathy was demanded on account of these sufferings, and I was asked whether a country must not be in a bad way in which the ordinary comfort of female attendance could not be had when it was wanted. Of course I sympathized. It is hard upon a pretty young mother with three or four children that she should be left to do everything for herself. But I could not help suggesting that the young woman's view of the case was quite as important as the matron's, and that if it was a bad place for those who wanted to hire maid-servants, it must be a very good place for the girls who wanted to be hired. The maidservant's side of the question is quite as important as the mistress's. The truth is, that in such a town as Christchurch a girl of twenty or twenty-three can earn from £30 to £40 a year and a comfortable home, with no oppressively hard work; and if she be well-conducted and of decent appearance she is sure to get a husband who can keep a house over her head. For such persons New Zealand is a paradise. It is not only that they get so many more of the good things of the world than would ever come in their way in England, but that they stand relatively in so much higher a position in reference to the world around them. The very tone in which a maid-servant speaks to you in New Zealand, her quiet little joke, her familiar smile, her easy manner, tell you at once that the badge of servitude is not heavy on her. She takes your wages, and makes your bed, and hands your plate, – but she does not consider herself to be of an order of beings different from your order. Many who have been accustomed to be served all their life may not like this. If so they had better not live in New Zealand. But if we look at the matter from the maid-servant's side we cannot fail to find that there is much comfort in it.

I would advise no young lady to go out to any colony either to get a husband, or to be a governess, or to win her bread after any so-called ladylike fashion. She may suffer much before she can succeed, or may probably fail altogether. But any well-behaved young woman who now earns £16 as a housemaid in England would find in New Zealand a much happier home.

I must say a word about the museum at Christchurch, though museums are things of which I am very ignorant. I was taken to the museum by the curator, Dr. Haast, to see the skeletons of various moas, in the arrangement and reconstruction of which he is a great authority. There is a little world there of moas and kiwis, and a collection of large stones which the moas have swallowed, as other birds pick up gravel, to assist digestion, and of eggs which the

kiwis have laid almost as big as themselves. Next to the Maoris, who are not as yet quite extinct, the moas, which are, must be regarded as the most wonderful productions of New Zealand. They fed upon grass, with stones an inch in diameter to assist their digestion. They were twelve feet high, and seem at one time to have had the islands almost to themselves. In the museum are various clusters of their broken bones, – of bones which have been found broken; and from these fractures Dr. Haast draws the conclusion that there were, before the Maoris, a race of moa-hunters, who regaled themselves with the marrow which was thus obtained. I do not express doubt of the correctness of his view. I never do doubt the facts which science proclaims to me. But I found men in New Zealand who would not believe in the moa-hunters. In the museum there is a portrait of Gibbon Wakefield and his dogs, portions of which are said to have been painted by Landseer. The statue of Godley is at a little distance outside, – and is as much superior to the picture as the character and attributes of the man sculptured were greater than those of him who was painted.

The appearance of the country round Christchurch is especially English. The land is divided into small English-looking fields, with English grasses, and English hedges. In regard to the hedges it may be well to remark that the gorse, which has been brought over from England and acclimatized, has taken so kindly to its new home that it bids fair to become a monstrous pest. It spreads itself wide over the land and lanes, and unless periodically clipped claims the soil as its own. But each periodical clipping, with rural labour at 6s. a day, is a serious addition to the expense of farming.

Lyttelton is the port by which Christchurch imports and exports what it buys and what it produces; and between Christchurch and Port Lyttelton there is a range of mountains so steep as almost to defy traffic. When the first Canterbury pilgrims landed at Port Lyttelton their courage for new adventure must almost have passed away from them, when they perceived that the settlers in the plain beyond the mountains would be divided by such a barrier from the sea. A road has indeed been made over the barrier, not so steep but what a horse may travel it, and round from the harbour there is a tedious navigation by the channel of the Heathcote River nearly up to Christchurch. But neither of these modes of transit suffice to put a town into comfortable communication with the sea. Consequently the Canterbury folk determined to make a railway, and in doing so have carried a tunnel through the mountain, a distance of a mile and three-quarters, at an expense amounting to £200,000.

MOUNT COOK.

It was a great enterprise for so small a community, and was absolutely essential to the well-being of Christchurch as a town. There can be no doubt, however, that the tunnel has doubled the value of the land lying immediately on the inland side of the hills. Port Lyttelton itself is a very picturesque place, hemmed in on every side by hills, at the head of a narrow land-locked bay, with the mountains of Banks's Peninsula standing over it.

I must say a word of the county of Westland before I have done with Canterbury, – of Westland and its capital, Hokitika, which till 1868 were comprised within the province of Canterbury. Hokitika is a thriving gold-town on the western coast, and is the centre of various gold-fields. When gold "broke out," as the phrase goes, on the western side of the Middle Island, and when the rush to Hokitika, together with the export of gold from Hokitika, became a great matter, the pastoral and agricultural province of Canterbury not caring to maintain an alliance with interests so different from those to which it was accustomed, severed itself from the gold-fields. Then the name of Westland was assumed, and Westland became, not exactly a province, but a county independent of any other province, with municipal institutions of its. Time did not admit of my crossing the island from Canterbury to the west coast, so that I saw none of the glories of Hokitika, – to my infinite regret. For, though the district is famous for its gold, it is, if possible, more famous for its scenery. It lies under Mount Cook, the monarch of New Zealand mountains, less, but only less, in altitude than its brother monarch in Europe. I had heard much of the beauty of the road across the Island, much of the scenery around Mount Cook and its glaciers, and I had determined to visit them. But Australia and New Zealand together cover a wide space, – and I was obliged to give up the west coast of the Middle Island. Of course to my dying day the conviction will haunt me that when in New Zealand I did not see the one thing best worth seeing in the colony.

1 There is coal in the Middle Island. In Otago they burn a kind of coal, by no means of a pleasant nature, which they call lignite. Coal has been found also in Nelson, but has not hitherto been profitably worked.

CHAPTER LVII. MARLBOROUGH AND NELSON.

CHAPTER LVII.

MARLB0ROUGH AND NELSON.

FROM Port Lyttelton we went by steamer to Wellington, the political capital of the colony, which is situated at the southern extremity of the Northern Island; but as we touched at Picton, in the province of Marlborough, and at Nelson, in the province of that name, on our journey from Wellington northwards to Auckland, and as these two provinces are in the Middle Island, it may be well that I should take them first. I am entitled to say but little about them, as I did in fact but touch them.

The journey from Wellington to Nelson, through Cook's Strait, which divides the two islands, is very picturesque, especially if the steamer take Picton in its course. The headlands and broken bays, with the rough steep mountains coming sheer down into the blue waters, the closeness of the land, and the narrowness of the passages, all tend to create a mysterious charm, which he who gazes at them finds himself unable to analyze. He feels tempted to land at every gully which runs up among the mountains and to investigate the strange wild world which must be beyond them. He knows, in truth, that there is nothing there, – that one brown hill would lead only to another, that there is no life among the hills, and that the very spots on which his eyes rest really contain whatever there may be of loveliness in the place. But though he knows this as fact, his imagination will not allow him to trust his knowledge. There is always present to him a vague longing to investigate the mysteries of the valleys, and to penetrate into the bosoms of the distant hills. The sweetest charms of landscape are as those of life; – they consist of the anticipations of something beyond which never can be reached. I never felt this more strongly than when I was passing from one land-locked channel to another along the coast of Cook's Strait.

We left Wellington during the night, and at six in the morning we were entering Tory Channel on the opposite island, so called from the name of the vessel in which Wakefield's first party of emigrants arrived. From thence we passed into Queen Charlotte's Sound, at the top of which is the little town of Picton, which till lately was the capital of the province of Marlborough. I believe it still considers itself to be so, but the Provincial Council, – the

PICTON.

presence of which I presume to be the truest mark of a New Zealand capital, – has been removed to the other town which the province possesses, called Blenheim. Neither of these places has as yet a population of 1,000 inhabitants, and the whole province, by the census of 1871, possessed no more than 5,235 souls, and yet in 1860, when the number was very much less, the people of the district found it essential to their well-being to separate themselves from the province of Nelson. The land in those parts, they said, was sold by the Nelson Council or the Nelson Executive, and the money forthcoming for the land was spent in Nelson, instead of being used to open up the very country which produced it. As to the expedience or inexpedience of the change, I have no opinion, – but it strikes an Englishman as strange that a scattered community of a few thousand persons spread among the mountains should require a separate government for themselves, – with a separate parliament, and all the attendant expenses. I could not, however, but remember how I had been myself convinced of the necessity of separating the Riverina from New South Wales, for the very reasons which caused the separation of Marlborough from Nelson, and I was disposed to think that the people of Marlborough may have been right. The population of the Riverina was indeed much larger, but one fails to see the exact limit at which a population may claim its right not to have its wealth consumed by a larger population at a distance. Marlborough, however, carried its point, – and Picton became a capital, among New Zealand capitals, till further jealousy removed its honours to Blenheim. Small as Marlborough is in numbers, there is a smaller province, that of Taranaki, of which I shall speak by-and-by.

At Picton I found the son of an English friend, who himself had been among the earliest of the New Zealand settlers, superintending the creation of a railway from thence to Blenheim, – a railway with about 700 people at each end of it, and which may perhaps benefit in some remote way an entire population of 2,000 or 3,000! The financial ministers of New Zealand have certainly been very brave. Navvies, I found, had been brought out from England under contracts to work for a certain time at certain rates; but, of course, these contracts were ignored by the men when they found, or thought that they had found, that they could do better for themselves by ignoring them. It is absolutely useless for any employer of labour to take labour out to the colonies for his own use, paying the expense of the transit. Unwilling services are of all services the dearest, and such services if they be kept at all are sure to be unwilling.

Picton itself is a pretty, straggling, picturesque little town, lying as do all these New Zealand ports, pressed in between the mountains and the sea. It is a strangely isolated place, with no road anywhere but to its rival Blenheim. Once a week from Wellington, and once from Nelson, a steamer touches there, and thus it holds its communication with the world. How it lives I could not find out. The staple of the province is wool, and it owns over 600,000 sheep, – about as many as all Western Australia possesses, – but Nelson is not the port at which the wool is shipped. That goes down to another bay near to Blenheim. It is hard to discover how such towns do live, as 700 persons can hardly make their bread by trading on each other; and as they import their clothes, their brandy, their tobacco, and, I am sorry to say, their wheat also, they must produce something wherewith to purchase those good things. Whilst navvies are earning 6s. or 7s. a day by making a railway I can understand that trade should go on. The wages of the men fall into the little town like manna from heaven. But such a fall of manna as that is apt to come to a speedy end. As far as outward appearances go, Picton seemed to be doing very well. There were good shops and tidy houses, and pretty gardens, and a general look of sleepy, well-fed prosperity. In all these places the people are well fed and well clothed, whatever may be the sources from whence the food and raiment come. I may say also that Picton enjoys a beautiful climate, produces all English fruits in rich abundance, is surrounded by fields deliciously green, and has for an immediate background some of the finest scenery in New Zealand.

The great sight of the province of Marlborough is a hill a few miles behind Picton, which was the scene of the so-called Wairau massacre. This was not exactly the beginning, but it was one of the beginnings of the rebellion of the Maoris against their English masters. The treaty of Waitangi, by which the Maoris professed subjection to the Crown of Great Britain and obedience to English laws, was made in 1840. In 1843 a party of English settlers, armed with proper magisterial authority, attempted to arrest two Maori chiefs, Rauparaha and Rangihaeta, who had interfered with the work of a surveyor who had been sent to survey the Wairau valley, on the plea that it had been purchased from the natives by the New Zealand Land Company. The two Maori chieftains denied the purchase, and resisted the arrest. A fight ensued, in which thirteen settlers were killed and five wounded, and after the fight Rauparaha murdered in cold blood nine other settlers whom he and his party

NELSON.

had taken prisoners. But this was not all. After the massacre Rauparaha and Rangihaeta were not taken, and there arose a question, not only whether there was force enough in the country to apprehend them, but whether they were subject to English writs. It will easily be understood how such doings as this would shake the prestige of their British masters in the minds of these New Zealand savages. "The Wairau conflict," says Dr. Thomson, "attracted the attention of Europe, and created interest in the minds of men who never thought about colonies. It completely stopped emigration to New Zealand, called forth the sympathy of people in different parts of Great Britain; and at Paris," – oh, unfortunate New Zealand! – "at Paris a proposition was made to commence a subscription to enable the unfortunate settlers to return home." What a bathos of misery into which to fall!

This was the Wairau massacre, which, as I have said, was one of the commencements of the Maori war; and the scene of the massacre, with the graves of those who fell, is but a few miles above Picton, and is shown with awe to such travellers as have been to visit the spot. I heard the tale, but did not visit the graves.

From Picton we came back through Queen Charlotte's Sound, up Admiralty Bay, which is another of the wonderful land-locked harbours with which the coast is indented, and through the French pass, as it is called, on to Nelson. Admiralty Bay is not in fact an indentation of the land, but is formed by D'Urville's Island, and the French pass is a very narrow channel, – made doubly interesting by a fatal rock in the very centre of it, – between the island and the main land. It is all very well now for steamers with charts and coal and all nautical appliances to thread their way in and out through these marvellously intricate passages; but one is lost in wonder at the audacity of the men when one thinks of the work which such sailors as Tasman and Cook were called on to perform.

Nelson is a settlement which has attracted much more attention at home than has been paid to Picton. Few parts of New Zealand, indeed, were oftener made the subject of conversation in England some years back than the settlement of Nelson. It has a bishop, too, of its own, – a sturdy clergyman of the right sort for such a position, who looks as though he had been created to manage the clergy of a colonial diocese, – a man who can put the collar on his own horse, or ride fifty miles at a stretch, or hold his own in any conflict either by word or hand. A colonial bishop should be hale, vigorous, young, and good-humoured, ready to preach, to laugh, or to knock a fellow down at any moment. But when I say this I do

not forget thee, thou best of all bishops that now in these latter days wearest an apron, though thou too art colonial and hast held thy charge till years are creeping on thee, so that thou canst now hardly knock down any man except by argument. Old schoolfellow, how pleasant thou wert to me when thou spokest of former things, – and how urgent for good, how strong in faith, how pugnacious, and yet how gentle! After I know not how many years of rough and battling life in a rough and battling colony thou wert still the English gentleman fresh from his college. Did it ever occur to thee how great to me was the relish of thy decorous pleasantries?

Nelson was first settled by the New Zealand Land Company. In 1841 the company issued a prospectus for the Nelson settlement, encouraged to do so by the great avidity with which their purchases at Wellington and New Plymouth, in the Northern Island, had been re-purchased by intending emigrants from England. In September, 1841, the future Nelson settlers reached Wellington, and it seems that, in spite of the choice of a name already made for the place of their destination, there was at first a doubt where they should be located. It was the heyday of Wakefield's success, when he could still boast that he had purchased on behalf of the company a territory as large as Ireland, – when he may have looked forward to re-name New Zealand Wakefieldia, and almost have dreamed of future sovereignty. A brother of his, – who was afterwards murdered in the Wairau massacre of which I have just spoken, – led this Nelson expedition. Governor Hobson, who was then at Wellington, wished to send the immigrants on north into Auckland. Some of the settlers themselves had already heard of the plains of which the Canterbury settlers afterwards became the owners, and desired to be taken thither. But the Wakefield interest at last prevailed, and Blind Bay, on which the town of Nelson now stands, was chosen for the settlement. It seems that these emigrants had bought land from the Company, though no one among them knew where was the land they had bought, – except that it was to be found somewhere in New Zealand. Lots of twenty acres each were sold at 30s. an acre, with a town lot added to each, – the site of the town not yet fixed. But of the money so paid none was intended to go, and I am not aware that any did go, into the pockets of any speculator. Half was to be applied to further emigration; two-sixths were to be applied to re-imbursing the company, – which had made the original purchase from the natives with Jew's harps, gunpowder, and shaving-brushes, and had not provided itself with those

PURCHASE OF LAND.

articles or transported them to the Antipodes for nothing; and the remaining sixth was to be, and was, expended in improving the condition of the settlers. It was applied to education, and created a still existing fund.

All this was very delightful. It was a system of co-operation established on the purest philanthropical motives. But there were difficulties. The purchased lands were to be distributed by lot. So many thousands of acres were to be divided by arbitrary lines, which on a map would give the necessary quantity to each settler; but these chess-board partitions would have placed many an astounded settler on the rough side of a barren mountain, and elevated others to the sublimity of snowy peaks. And then the Maoris, who seem to have been very courteous to the strangers, disputed the purchase. Dr. Thomson quotes the speech they made when they declined the cunning gifts of their visitors. "We welcome the white men," they said, "but decline their presents, lest they be construed into proofs that the land were fairly purchased." We may discredit the accuracy of argument, but we can well understand that the feeling indicated would exist and find expression in some language. However, they did admit a purchase, and made no opposition to the survey of a town site.

The air was pleasant, the scene was beautiful around them, the harbour though difficult of entrance was secure, and though there was snow on the mountains close around them, there were sweet flowers on the plain, and good herbage. When subsequently, in 1843, a report was made to the government by the land commissioner who had been appointed to inquire for how much land the New Zealand Land Company had really given value to the natives, it was decided that at Nelson 151,000 acres had been fairly purchased, – and on that amount of territory, which would have been amply sufficient for their purposes had there been no beautiful but barren mountains, the settlers made themselves a home, and established Nelson, by no means the least important of the New Zealand provinces.

But there was of course quarrelling with the natives, who did not understand the extent to which they were supposed to have alienated their lands. Coal and lime were found, and there was quarrelling about that. Then there was the Wairau massacre, – and the vain attempts to make the Maoris subject to English laws after a manner intelligible to themselves. Certain words quoted by Dr. Thomson from a despatch written about this time by Lord John Russell, show very plainly what have been the hopes and what the

difficulties, – what at last the despair of European colonizers in reference to the savage tribes with which they have been brought in contact. "To rescue the natives of New Zealand from the calamities of which the approach of civilized men to barbarous tribes has hitherto been the almost universal herald, is a duty too sacred and important to be neglected, whatever may be the discouragements under which it may have been undertaken." Most true, thou honest and philanthropic quondam prime minister and secretary of state! It is this truth which is grinding the heart of us all as we deal with these people, either in buying their lands or making laws for them, or writing books about them. - We would fain be just and also generous. But we must populate the land. That will be done at any rate. And if they who be just, and generous, and great, the Lord John Russells of the day, desist from all efforts in the matter, the thing will be done with infinite injustice and cruelty. By their interposition the injustice and cruelty are brought within certain limits, and do not absolutely appal us by their horrors. I do not know that we can hope for more. I doubt whether the statesman whom I have named ventured to hope for more when he penned that paragraph. We cannot be just to these native tribes, because our justice is not their justice. We cannot weigh goods with them, because we have no common standard. Very slowly we force our standards upon them; but by the time that they have taken our laws and our weights and measures home to themselves, – they have perished out of the land and are gone. As lately as 1858 the number of natives in the North Island was estimated at 53,000. Fifteen years have since passed, and they are now under 40,000 in number. In the other islands they are all but extinct.

Nelson is in the Middle Island, and the Maoris now there are altogether harmless. A few may be seen loafing about, smiling, apparently contented, and dying out after no very unhappy fashion. The settlement has no longer troubles of that nature. Nor do I know that it has any troubles, – but those which may arise in the minds of individuals from slowness of progress. The town contains 6,000 people, and the province something over 22,000. I was told that the land was good, but light and worn out from continual cropping; that nearly all the land in the province available for agriculture was sold; that farming, or at any rate growing wheat, did not pay, unless a man could get his work done by the inmates of his own family; and that there was but slight material prosperity in the place. One or two men might be making fortunes, – but, for the rest, Nelson was a slow spot. There was no money there, and

THE MAORIS.

no enterprise. They did not even grow wheat enough for themselves, though they professed to be an agricultural community. There was certainly a sleepiness about the place when regarded with commercial eyes.

But, though sleepy, it seemed to be happy. I was there about the beginning of September, – a winter month, – and nothing could be sweeter or more pleasant than the air. The summer heats are not great, and all English fruits, and grass, and shrubs grow at Nelson with more than English profusion. Every house was neat and pretty. The site is, I think, as lovely as that of any town I ever saw. Merely to breathe there, and to dream, and to look around was a delight. Nobody seemed to be either rich or poor, – to be either great or humble. They have their own Parliament House, and their own parliament, and manage themselves after a sleepy, fat, and plentiful rather than prosperous fashion, which is not without its advantages in the world. The children are generally well taught, – and certainly should be so, as there is nothing to pay for education. Every householder pays £1 per annum towards the school, and for every child between five and fifteen the parents pay 5s. a year, whether the child be at school or not. The payments are made as a matter of course, and the children are educated.

I was very much in love with Nelson during the few hours that I passed there; but it is not the place to which I would send a young man to make a fortune.

CHAPTER LVIII. THE MAORIS.

CHAPTER LVIII.

THE MAORIS.

I FEEL it incumbent on me to write a chapter on the Maoris, and the Maori war. It is indeed impossible to write even a fraction of a book about New Zealand without it. This arises not only from the importance of our dealings with these people to the colony generally, but also from the fact that in our thoughts and conversation about New Zealand at home, we take more heed of the Maoris and of their battles than of any other details concerning the colony. Of the mining prosperity of Otago, Westland, and Auckland we hear little, unless we dabble in gold ourselves. The agricultural prosperity of Canterbury hardly touches us, unless we have known some one who, twenty years ago, knew Gibbon Wake-

field, Mr. Godley, or the present Lord Lyttelton. Even the politics of Wellington and the statecraft of Mr. Vogel interest us but slightly. Of Nelson we hear but little. Of Marlborough, Taranaki, and Hawke Bay, as provinces of New Zealand, who out of the Colonial Office, has ever heard even the names? As Bishop Selwyn has returned to us uneaten, and now, to the advantage of some and the delight of all, presides safely over a comfortable English diocese, even he is in danger of oblivion. But we do not forget that within ten years from this date we had 10,000 British soldiers fighting in New Zealand, with by no means triumphant success, – and that the Maoris were the people over whom we failed to triumph.

Of the early history of the Maoris I have said a very few words, but perhaps sufficient, in a former chapter. We have always heard of them as savages and cannibals; – and have heard truly. But in spite of their savagery and cannibalism they seem in early days, – we will say before 1840, – to have been delighted to have European settlers among them. Pakeha is the native word for stranger, and a Pakeha Maori is a stranger who has come and lived among Maoris more or less after their own ways. They were always glad to have Pakeha Maoris among them, and allowed wonderful liberties to these comers, – giving up their women, and even submitting, in some instances, to the desecration of their religious observances. And this welcome was not without a substantial reason. The Pakehas were traders, and brought with them all manner of good things, – clothes, seed potatoes, iron tools, domestic utensils, pigs, poultry, and corn, – and above all, they brought with them guns and gunpowder with which enemies could be killed. What the Pakehas took in return for this was not of much value to the Maoris. Native flax was the chief article, and of native flax there was abundance. Whale oil, seal skin, and kauri-gum when it was found, could be equally well spared, and the amount of land which the first Pakehas wanted was very small. It was a great thing for a tribe to have a few Pakehas to trade with, – so great a thing, at last, that no tribe could get on without them. The tribes which got the guns and gunpowder killed and ate up, root and branch, the unfortunate wretches whom no God-sent Pakeha had furnished with that blessed means of rapid destruction. And so the Pakehas were very popular.

This went on till 1840 with a fair amount of comfort on both sides. The British merchants who engaged in the trade were not perhaps of the highest order, – nor were their lives passed after any

COLONIAL GOVERNORS.

very regular fashion. Now and again one may have been eaten, but the number who achieved martyrdom after that fashion was small. And in those days there were missionaries as well as Pakeha Maoris in the land who did what they could to soften matters, and who were not averse themselves to the acquiring of land. It will be remembered that at this time, though Great Britain had made a nominal claim to the islands, she had not exercised sovereignty. Then came the New Zealand Company in 1839; and in 1840 there came Governor Hobson and the treaty of Waitangi.

It must be remembered that at this time the Northern Island only was concerned, and that in speaking of the Maoris, little need be said concerning the other two islands. The Maoris of the north, having at first enjoyed nearly a monopoly of guns and gunpowder, seem to have pretty well eaten up their southern brethren, before the days of Otago and Canterbury. Late in 1841 Mr. Wakefield's Nelson settlers occupied a part of the northern extremity of the Middle Island, – where in 1843, took place the Wairau massacre. But the chiefs by whom this was effected were Maoris connected with the Northern Island. Cook's Strait, which divides the islands, is a narrow passage, and the southern shores of it were easily accessible. But the Maori battles all took place in the Northern Island; and before the wars and before the coming of Governor Hobson the doings of the Pakeha Maoris were mainly confined to the North.

The books which I have read about New Zealand almost always abuse the governor. Dr. Thomson, – whose story of New Zealand is the most comprehensive and impartial that I have read – is by no means complimentary even to Governor Hobson, and covers acting-Governor Shortland and Governor Fitzroy with ridicule. In Mr. Fox's history of the war, he deals very hardly both with Sir George Grey and Sir Thomas Browne. The present governor, – or rather he who was governor during my visit, for his governorship has now passed away, – has so far escaped. I trust his good fortune may continue, – but books have not as yet been written about him. I take it to be the fact in regard to governors of colonies that they have either so easy a time of it that they can hardly go very wrong, – in which case they are abused for doing nothing; or so difficult a time that they cannot possibly go altogether right, – in which case they are abused for doing too much. The early governors of New Zealand were certainly called upon to reign under the latter condition. It was probable that things might drift into order, – wafted on by that tendency to well-being which we call Providence,

but which in truth arises from the combined intelligence of the community, – but it was impossible that it could be governed into order. In the last century, when governors were thought nothing of at home, but were really governors in the dependencies which they were deputed to rule, it was different. Governor Phillip, when he was sent out to create a penal settlement at Botany Bay, had at any rate plenary power. He could do what he pleased either with aboriginals or Europeans, and being a man capable of the work, he did govern, and was successful. But with Governors Hobson, Shortland, and Fitzroy it was very different. They had power neither over the natives nor over the Europeans, – and yet it was necessary that they should always be doing something. When Governor Hobson arrived the New Zealand Land Company claimed to have bought twenty million acres, or nearly a third of New Zealand. This acreage was reduced, by government inquiry and government decision, to less than a quarter of a million. Of course after this there would be ill-blood between the government and the settlers. Of this quarter of a million, – 282,000 was the exact number of acres, – 60,000 were around a young settlement called New Plymouth, on the western coast of the Northern Island, in the district of Taranaki, – now a province of that name, – as to the present condition of which I will speak in another chapter. But certain Taranaki natives declared that the 60,000 acres, though paid for, had not in truth been bought, as the purchase had been made from natives who had no title to sell. This was in Governor FitzRoy's time. When complaint was made to the governor he inquired into the matter energetically. But how were any inquiries to enable a governor to go right in such a matter? The complaining natives had lost the land in question by warfare, and the selling natives had gained the land by conquest. Now transference by conquest of the absolute possession of the land, with the right to sell, had always been Maori law, – and in respecting the Maori rights we had been forced to recognize Maori laws. The complaining natives had certainly been conquered and driven off their lands, – which had been sold to us by the conquerors. But there is another Maori law, that the conquerors do not in truth obtain the right to sell the land unless they have occupied it as well as conquered it; and the conqueror who had driven the old natives from their land, – and had very effectually performed his part of the sale by getting the money from the Europeans, who had regarded his title as good, – though his conquest was not disputed, was held never to have occupied the soil. Should any lawyer ever read these lines, let him

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

think of this little trouble, and of the position of a governor called upon to decide in such a matter! The money had been paid. The conqueror, by name Te Whero Whero, – who was afterwards elected as the first Maori king, and was known as King Potatau, – was secure. Restoration of the money would be out of the question. The settlers had been put into possession of their reduced estate amounting to 60,000 acres, – the original purchase having been infinitely larger; but the complaining natives were entitled to have the question adjudicated by their own laws! Come what come might, the natives were to be protected in their rights. Captain Fitzroy reduced the purchased area to 3,500 acres. The settlers were of course disgusted and half-ruined. The natives were of course convinced that they had made a great mistake from the beginning in supposing the white men to be greater or stronger than they.

This is one story out of many that might be told as to the disposal of land between the natives and the Europeans. Justice on our part was tantamount to weakness in their eyes. The juster a governor might attempt to be, the weaker would he be in the eyes of the natives, and the more injurious in the eyes of the settlers.

And there was soon another cause of dissatisfaction among the natives. The Pakehas had been the best of fellows as long as they were only traders, – taking flax, and bringing guns and gunpowder, and living after the Maori fashion; but they were very much less agreeable as permanent residents when they began to exercise ways of their own. A certain number of chiefs had accepted the treaty of Waitangi, – partly overawed by the natural ascendancy of Europeans, and partly through appreciation of the material good things which the Pakehas brought with them. But now the very beauty and charm of the Pakeha trade was destroyed by new Pakeha inventions. Custom-houses were established, which to the Maori mind seemed to be utterly hostile to trade! The chief scene of Maori-cum-Pakeha commerce had been at the Bay of Islands, where Governor Hobson had first touched, and had placed his government before he moved down south to the harbour on which the town of Auckland now stands. Custom-houses and other abominable European fashions utterly destroyed the genuine old trade in the Bay of Islands. The American whaling-ships no longer came there. Blankets and tobacco became dear. Guns and gunpowder no longer were to be had. The very nature of the Pakehas seemed to be altered. Now a flag-staff had been set up on the hill

over Kororeka, the once flourishing scene of Maori and Pakeha trade at the Bay of Islands.

It came to pass that the new European fashions and the new European dominion connected themselves in the minds of certain natives, and especially in the mind of a leading native named Heke, with the flagstaff; and this Heke, on the 8th of July, 1844, with a body of followers, cut down and burned the flagstaff, thereby destroying the symbol, and intending to destroy with the symbol the reality, of the authority which had come among them. The flagstaff, – after some delay caused by the necessity of sending to Sydney for soldiers, – was again erected; but at the same time Kororeka was declared a free port. The obnoxious custom-house was abolished. This was a concession, – but was of course accepted as a sign of weakness, and in the following year the flagstaff was again cut down. It was a third time erected, and after the third erection was protected by troops. But for the third time it was cut down by Heke, and on this occasion there was a battle. The natives had by far the best of it, and the Europeans evacuated Kororeka and were carried off in three or four ships, which were lying in the port. This was in 1845, and was the beginning of the Maori wars, and Heke was the hero of the hour.

The governor then felt that he must fight and put down Heke. Either that must be done, or the place must be abandoned, and all the emblems of the Queen's authority taken away. Of course the native chiefs had not understood the treaty of Waitangi, – and the natives generally had known nothing about it. To accuse Heke and his allies of treachery and rebellion would be absurd. A condition of things which no New Zealand native had contemplated was coming about, – and thraldom was the purpose of the Pakehas. Thraldom no doubt was intended. It was our purpose to be masters of New Zealand, and to rule over those people; and therefore there must be war. But the war then, as it has often been since, was disastrous. We have kept the country by numbers, by money, and by intelligence. We have held it in spite of military misfortune. We followed up Heke to a pah at Okaihau, and there we were repulsed with terrible loss. We did not even get possession of the pah. With renewed forces we again followed Heke to a pah at Oheawai, again attacked, and were again defeated, – though on this occasion the Maoris deserted the pah in the night. After this, poor Governor Fitzroy departed from the scene, and Governor Grey took his place. He commenced his career by victory. The natives now divided their forces, and we followed, not Heke, but his ally

COLONIAL DIFFICULTIES.

Kawiti, to a pah at Ruapekapeka, and from thence we succeeded in driving him and his men. But their food was exhausted, – and, as savages, they had had enough of fighting for one war. After this there was unconditional pardon, with intentions of brotherly love and Christianity, – and so the first war ended in January, 1846.

It was thus that the natives gradually learned the art of constructing fortifications and fighting within them, which throughout all the Maori contests was so terrible to us. It seems that our men could not be brought to endure the idea of starving them out, but always attempted to "rush" the pahs, – generally making the attempt in vain. The Maoris were seldom adequately provided with food for a siege, and hardly ever with water; – but within their pahs they were almost impregnable to sudden attacks. The defence of the pah depended chiefly on the nature of its ditch, and the description of the ditch as given by Dr. Thomson may perhaps interest my readers. "In an English fort the ditch is deep, and outside the defences; in a New Zealand pah the ditch is shallow, and inside the palisades. In an English fort the ditch is made to obstruct the enemy; in a New Zealand pah the ditch is made to cover the defenders, who stand in it and fire at the besiegers."

After this there were two wars in the province of Wellington, – one in the valley of the Hutt, and the other in the country between the towns of Wellington and Wanganui, which lasted from the beginning of 1846 to the beginning of 1848. They were not absolutely disastrous, as had been the attacks against the pahs in Auckland, – but they were very unsatisfactory in their results. Whether the rebellious Maoris were pardoned or punished, it seemed to be impossible to treat them at the same time with justice and wisdom. Without punishment rebellion could not be put down, – and there seemed to be cruelty in hanging men who felt that they were fighting for the preservation of their own property. It would often occur that those of their deeds which were most horrible in our eyes were done in the performance of duties absolutely exacted by their laws, – and for those deeds it was necessary that we should hang them! Blood for blood is law with them, even though the first blood should have been shed in accident. We, of course, declared that such was not our law, and that they must obey our laws, – because of the treaty of Waitangi. When we can bring ourselves in our dealings with a people so different to ourselves to act upon the law of bold and unscrupulous expediency, – when we declare to a people, as we did to the Australian aboriginals, that they are utterly deprived by us, for our advantage, of

all ancient rights, of all laws of their own, and of all property, – the road, though it be rough, is straight. The colonist may be humane, – as he is to a horse, – but he is persistent. But the mixed treatment which we have tried with the New Zealand natives has made government and life among them very difficult. All that we can do is to drift through the difficulties, – while they are melting.

These little wars, as we may call them, were brought to an end in 1848, and then there came a period of peace, during which fond hopes were entertained that the Maoris were becoming peaceful subjects, and that the great question as to the possibility of civilizing a savage race had been happily solved by the rulers of New Zealand. In three years very much was done for the Maoris. Mills were built for them, – and churches and schools. Agricultural implements were given to them. In all contests with the settlers as to their lands or privileges there was a tendency to favour the natives, – a tendency which in the circumstances of the colony was very natural.

But in these years, and even from the very year in which the first wars had ceased – namely, in 1848, – the seeds of the future wars were sown. In this year commenced both the land league and the king faction, – of both I have already spoken. The land league was a union carried on with the professed object of preventing land from falling into the hands of the settlers, and was, in truth, not only the cause of the latter wars, but the beginning of them. There were certain tribes about the centre of the North Island, and especially upon the west-central coast, which had been consistently averse to selling their land, – and who were perfectly justified by the treaty of Waitangi in their policy, as regarded land belonging to themselves. While they confined their operations to their own territory their course of action was not illegal, even in accordance with our own laws. But when they interfered either by arms or threats to thwart the purchases made from other tribes, then, – in accordance with the treaty of Waitangi, – they became rebels. The chief among these were the Waikato tribe, who inhabited the fertile valleys of the river of that name, and of the Waipa, and the Ngatimaniapoto, who owned the wild district further south. The country of the Waikato has now been confiscated, and the valleys are green with English grasses. The Ngatimaniapoto still hold their land, and among them lives the Maori king. The league from year to year became a great and still greater impediment to European settlers, – and looking back at it now I

LAND LEAGUE.

find it hard to conceive any measure short of war by which its evils could be stayed. It was allowed to progress, and its success, of course, taught the Maoris, among whom it had originated, to think that they had discovered the means by which they could stop the growing ascendancy of the white man in their country. The election of a king was of the same nature, and was equally intelligible. I do not suppose that at the beginning of the king movement there was any belief among the Maoris that they could drive the Europeans out of the islands, – an idea which did grow among them after their subsequent successes; – but there was a feeling that as the Europeans had a Queen and a government of their own, the Maoris should have the same. It was another protest against the political ascendancy of the strangers, made no doubt in direct contravention of the treaty of Waitangi as understood by us, but probably with no conception on their part that they were violating any law to which they had in truth made themselves subject.

I have spoken of the difficulty which befell Governor Fitzroy as to the purchase of land in Taranaki in earlier days. Taranaki, or New Plymouth, has from the commencement of its career been the most unfortunate part of New Zealand. It was here again that the wars commenced. A native named Taylor 2 declared himself willing to sell certain land at Waitara, in the province; but the chief of the tribe, named William King, declared that the land should not be sold. On inquiry it was decided that Taylor's claim was good, and the purchase was made. But King, with his followers, would allow no Europeans to enter on the land. This led to a war which lasted for months, and brought New Plymouth almost to death's door. King was assisted by a great chief from the Waikato tribe named William Thompson, a leading man among the Maoris, and one who did more than any other to enforce the land league on Maoris who were willing to sell. Thompson sent down a body of the Waikato fighting men to reinforce the Taranaki natives, but these men were encountered by Europeans on their arrival, and were beaten. Then Thompson himself went down and a truce was made. This occurred in the first six months of 1861. But, though a truce was made, the question as to the Waitara land was not settled. The native, Taylor, had got the price, or a part of it; but

the government, which had been the purchaser, had not got the land, and the poor settlers of Taranaki were again ruined.

Then there arose a question as to carrying the war into the Waikato country, – so as to punish those who had instigated the rebellion in Taranaki. Governor Browne was for war; – but his ministers were against it. Mr. Fox, whose narrative of the war I shall follow in the few details which I shall give, is of opinion that had we then attempted to invade the Waikato territory, the results would have been disastrous. General Cameron, who for the next four years held the command in New Zealand, had arrived; – but it is alleged that he had no more than 3,000 men, and that as he afterwards had as much as he could do to clear the Waikato with 15,000 men, he would have failed in any attempt in 1861. I cannot but doubt whether this follows. The Maoris used, as we did, the time which followed for preparation, and were strengthened in all their feelings, in their prestige, in their self-confidence, in their growing disregard of the white man, by the fact that their interference was successful. Of those 15,000 men whom General Cameron afterwards had, 5,000 were furnished by the colony, and these would have been forthcoming on our side as quickly as were the Maori recruits on the other side. This, however, now is but matter of speculation. The question of the immediate attack on the Waikatos was settled by the withdrawal of Governor Browne, and the return of Governor Grey, who, – as we well remember in England, – was sent back in this time of difficulty as the great New Zealand governor. He arrived in September, 1861.

Governor Grey began by an attempt to settle the question of that Waitara land which had been bought but not occupied, – and of which the occupation by European settlers was still prevented by the Maoris. As long as that was unsettled we were practically confessing ourselves unable to hold our own against the Maoris. There were conferences, therefore, and offers to refer the matter to arbitration. It was not the absolute land which we wanted so much as an opportunity of getting out of the scrape without disgrace in the eyes of the Maoris. But they saw that as well as we did, and were determined that we should be disgraced. They would neither give up the land nor consent to arbitration. Thompson, who was the leading spirit of the day, would do neither. He was the Maori king's great support, and now apparently began to think that he might, by persistent opposition, drive the Europeans altogether out of the land. The governor went to the stiffnecked Waikato tribe and was magnanimous. The minister went and was persuasive.

WAR OF 1863.

The bishop went and preached to them. Other natives were got to operate upon them. Anything was better for us than war with a race whom we had thought to bind to us by giving them the blessings of civilization. But it was all of no avail. They would do nothing in a friendly spirit about the Waitara land. During the whole of 1862 and the early months of 1863 these peaceful efforts were continued.

And other land, undoubtedly purchased in unfortunate Taranaki, was in the meanwhile taken from the settlers by the Maoris. As it was necessary that something should be done, European soldiers were sent to re-occupy this land. A party of these soldiers, consisting of eight men and two officers, were killed by a Maori ambuscade, and thus the war was recommenced. This was on the 4th May, 1863, – and it now seemed to be our only choice whether we should abandon New Zealand or put down the Maoris altogether. Singularly enough we have not as yet absolutely done either, – and it is to be hoped that we never shall do either. Other outbreaks had been occurring in the Waikato itself much about the same time. A magistrate whom we had appointed was turned out of his district, and a court-house which we were building was pulled down and thrown into the river. It was very evident that William Thompson's country must be the scene of the war.

It is not my purpose to give a history of the war of the Waikato. In the valley of this river and of its confluent the Waipa, the great Maori contest of which we heard so much, was mainly carried on. General Cameron had 15,000 men under him, and the fighting Maoris were computed at 2,000. It must not be supposed that these numbers were ever brought together at one spot, – or even in one part of the North Island; but such are supposed to have been the relative proportions of the men in arms, and in our different engagements with them we generally outnumbered them almost in that proportion. But they never met us in the open field, and gained their successes either by ambuscades or within their pahs. We were always fighting them as a master may be supposed to fight a mutinous boy. It was essential that we should conquer them, but we wished to do it with the least possible injury to them.

On the 12th July, 1863, the campaign began, at the lower end of the valley of the Waikato, about thirty-eight miles from Auckland, at a spot that had been reached by the frontier settlements of the Europeans, and it was ended by the escape of the Maoris from the Orakau pah on April 2nd, 1864, at the top of the valley. During

the time we had slaughtered probably a third of those who were in the Waikato, had captured nearly another third, and had driven the remainder out of their own tribal grounds into those of their allies. In fact we put an end to the Waikato tribe. But we did this at a terrible cost to ourselves, and achieved but little glory in doing it. They fought their way back, from one pah to another, with extraordinary persistency, – and at Rangariri, where they stationed themselves in two pahs, we lost one hundred and thirty-five in killed and wounded before we could drive them out. Out of one of the pahs they who were not killed escaped through a swamp. All those in the other gave themselves up as prisoners.

These prisoners were afterwards sent to Kawau, an island which was the property of the governor, and were then released from absolute constraint on parole. But they all escaped. It does not appear, however, that they ever had an opportunity of taking up arms against us again, even were they so disposed.

During this Waikato campaign there had been fighting also in another direction, on the east coast, – and here had occurred a disaster even worse to our arms than that at Rangariri. I remember well how we felt in England when the news readied us of the repulse of our men from the Gate pah, little thinking then that I should ever see the scene of their slaughter and the spot in which they were buried. Tauranga is a harbour on the east coast in the neighbourhood of which hostile Maoris were congregated, and from which re-inforcements both in men and provisions were sent across the country to the Waikato. Consequently it was thought necessary to attack the Maoris at Tauranga. The Gate pah was a fortification which they had constructed about three miles from Tauranga, at which place we held a redoubt called Te Papa. The pah was of the usual description, with an exterior palisade, a ditch within, and with more than the usual amount of holes and caves made for rifle-pits. It is supposed to have been held by 300 Maoris. We had nearly 1,700 men with which to attack. We had also, enormous Armstrong guns. We fired into it, – or not into it, as it might be, – an infernal hail-storm of shot and shell throughout an entire day till four P.M., and then our men attempted to "rush" it. They made their way in, and the poor Maoris seem to have attempted to escape at the back. But they were turned by others of our men who had got round the pah, – and as they came back, in the dark, their numbers were multiplied in the imagination of the British soldiers who had entered the pah, – and a panic ensued. We lost 27 killed and 66 wounded, of whom many died, and among

THE GATE PAH.

the dead there were 11 officers, The Maoris remained in possession of the pah that evening, – but during the night they evacuated it. They returned to another pah a few miles distant called Te Ranga, from which they were dislodged the next day, – and almost annihilated. The Tauranga natives were crushed, – but at a vast expense both of life and of prestige.

It was wonderful to me, as I stood and looked at the remnants of the Gate pah, also as I walked about among the mounds left at Rangiriri, that human beings could have existed there under such fire as was poured upon them. That a 110-pounder Armstrong gun should not at once destroy a Sebastopol, or frighten all the besieged out of their lives, I can comprehend; – but that it should be fired point blank against palisades and not cut everything before it to pieces, or that assault should be endured by savages within without panic, I cannot comprehend. Earthworks we know are very efficacious against heavy guns, but these earthworks, though admirably adapted to protect men with muskets and rifles against other men with muskets and rifles, would, I should have thought, have buried the besieged in dust when knocked about by such a force as was employed. The besiegers of the Gate pah had fourteen other cannons of various kinds. The mysteries of warfare, like other mysteries, are very wonderful to the uninitiated.

Like most of our fighting in New Zealand, this fighting at Tauranga was disastrous, but finally successful. We did stamp out the rebellion there, and the lands of that neighbourhood have now been confiscated, and a portion of them divided among military settlers, as has been done with the lands in the valley of the Waikato. But that day at the Gate pah, – the 28th April, 1864, – was I think of all days the most unfortunate in our New Zealand annals. It is only fair here to remark that nothing could have exceeded the dogged bravery with which the Maoris awaited death within their palisades.

We must now go back again to unfortunate Taranaki, – for it was necessary that the war should be brought to an end here, as had been done in the Waikato. There the natives had by no means surrendered, or owned themselves conquered; but they had either been destroyed or had receded. The country from whence the armed opposition to us had been instigated was now in our hands, – and the reader may as well remember that it has remained so since. But in Taranaki the rebels were also as firmly in possession of our land as we were of theirs in Waikato. A renewed war commenced there on 24th March, 1864, of which it became ultimately the object to clear the way from New Plymouth down the west

coast by the settlement of Wanganui to Wellington. South of Wanganui the affair was pleasantly managed by the adhesion to our interests of an old chief named Wi Tako; but north of Wanganui, and indeed all through the province of Taranaki, except immediately round New Plymouth, the Maoris were still in arms against us.

And now, during this campaign, there arose among the Maoris a further scheme of opposition to the Europeans. At first these people liked us, and liked our dealings with them. Appreciating our superiority, they, or some among them, consented to a treaty with us, by which they no doubt did understand that after some fashion they were acknowledging our superiority; – but they did so in the supposition that they would thereby render easier and more frequent, more lucrative and more attractive generally, those dealings of which I have spoken. But after a while they began to feel that absolute submission was required of them; – and against this they struggled. Such was the nature of the cutting down of the flagstaff; such was the Wairau massacre in Nelson; such were the first quarrels about land in Taranaki and elsewhere; such was the land league and the king movement; – and of this nature also was the determination to which various tribes now came to throw aside the Christian religion, and to set up, not any old Maori worship, but a new religion in its place. This religion was called by its votaries the Pai Marire, and they who practise it are called Hau-Haus, – pronounced How-Hows, – from the fact that a considerable portion of its ceremonies consist in the repeated and violent exclamation of that sound in the hour of battle, or when fighting is imminent. It would be useless here to describe the childish mixture of Bible legends and horrible Maori practices which constituted the forms of this faith. The object was to make those who adopted it believe that it would give them victory against their enemies, and also to induce a feeling that the separation thus effected from European habits was final; – that it was of a nature to defy the missionaries, and that by it would be severed altogether any cord which might still be binding between the two races.

One of the earliest objects of the missionaries had been the abolition of cannibalism, and for many years, – from 1843, namely, down to this war in 1864, – they were able to boast that cannibalism at any rate had been brought to an end. Whether the Maoris were or were not persistent Christians, whether they did or did not so far understand Christianity as to be able to regulate their lives by the religious teaching they had received, – -so much had been done. And

FRIENDLY NATIVES.

the boast was true. Dr. Thomson commences a chronological list of the improvements which the Maoris had received at our hands, by stating that in 1770, when we first knew them, they were cannibals; that in 1836 cannibalism was still practised; but that since 1843 cannibalism had been, discontinued. Dr. Thomson's book was published in 1859, and his statement was then no doubt correct. But the Pai Marire religion produced, if it did not demand, a return to this horrid custom. After its adoption the Maoris drank their enemies' blood, and swallowed the eyes of those they murdered. Another great object with the missionaries had been to render sacred the marriage vow; but the Pai Marire religion requires that men and women shall live together in common, basing the order on the mistaken notion that thus would the Maori race become more numerous.

This new religion sprang up first in Taranaki, and became a leading principle during the remainder of the war. When speaking of our own Church in Auckland, in a subsequent chapter, I shall venture to express there an opinion of the result of missionary labour on the religion of the Maoris; – but I may as well state here that the Hau-Hau religion is still held by a large portion of them, not only among the King-people, but among tribes who are on friendly terms with us. It may be that it has been softened in some of its aspects, that it has got itself mixed up with some forms and names of Christian worship, – but they who follow it ignore the teaching of Christian pastors, and claim thorough religious independence for themselves.

The remainder of the war along the coast was diversified by two occurrences, which changed the nature of the proceedings. The governor and the British general quarrelled bitterly, and our successes, – for at last we were successful, – were due to colonial troops and to friendly natives rather than to the British soldiers, – in reference to whom it had been decided at home that they should leave the colony as soon as they could be spared. As to the quarrel, the nature of my little narrative does not require that I should say anything. It was, however, unfortunate, and must have retarded the suppression of the Maoris generally. In regard to the friendly natives, it is perhaps not generally known in England that, while during the entire war many tribes have been altogether inactive, – as has been the case with all the tribes north of Auckland, since the days of Heke and of the cutting down of the flagstaff, – other tribes have fought gallantly for us. This was done, in a most picturesque fashion, by certain of the Ngatihau tribe who lived

near Wanganui, and who in this campaign fought a kind of duel in our behalf with a body of the Hau-Haus, who had proclaimed their intention of coming down the Wanganui Elver to attack us. It seems that a certain number of men was fixed for each side, and that they agreed to fight on an island in a river called Montona. The fight came off, and our allies beat our enemies, – but not without great loss.

The war was brought to an end early in 1865, by the gradual reduction of the strongholds of the natives, – a service in which the colonial forces seem to have taken the most prominent part, – and by the opening up of the entire road between New Plymouth and Wanganui, as had been declared necessary; – and then there was a proclamation of peace. But the Maoris never owned themselves beaten, and do not do so to this day.

I have not attempted here to narrate all the wars that were waged, – much less all the battles that were fought. There was another campaign in 1865, if it can be so called, upon the east coast, – south-east from Tauranga, at Opitiki, – which arose from the murder of a missionary, Mr. Volkner. In this war we were again assisted by a friendly tribe, the Arewas. The hostile Maoris were hunted down, slaughtered, and taken prisoners by colonial forces, who seem to have shown themselves better able to cope with natives in bush-fighting and in pah-fighting than soldiers of the line.

After this there was more fighting lower down on the east coast, and the town of Napier, the capital of Hawke Bay, was attacked by natives. This was in 1866, at which time there was in those parts a certain Maori, now widely known through New Zealand as Te Kooti, – whose name, I am informed was Scott. A little examination will reconcile the reader to the alteration. This man was a "Friendly," or pretended to be so; but he was found to be intriguing with the Haus-Haus against us, was arrested, and was banished to the Chatham Islands, with three hundred other Maoris who had been taken with arms in their hands. These islands are a dependency on the colony of New Zealand. From thence he made his escape in 1868, with nearly all his remaining fellow-prisoners. This he effected by making himself master of a schooner which had gone there with stores, and compelling the captain to land him and his friends at Poverty Bay, on the east coast of New Zealand, just north of Hawke Bay. From thence he made his way across the North Island, and for four years, up to May, 1872, the New Zealand government and the New Zealand troops were employed in hunting

THE NEW ZEALAND "PALE."

him. He has been wounded three times, but on each occasion, has contrived to escape, though not above thirty of the men who returned with him are now left alive. During these four years Te Kooti has been the Maori hero, – as William Thompson was during the Waikato campaign.. There has been other fighting, – especially in Taranaki, where one Tito Kowaru headed a faction, – but Te Kooti has been the great difficulty. As many as 2,000 men have been in the field after him, and he has cost New Zealand the incredible sum of nearly half a million. Te Kooti has not been caught, and is now living on the Mokau river, which is the northern boundary of Taranaki. He is of course an outlaw, but when I was in New Zealand the pursuit of him had been abandoned as hopeless, and the question was discussed whether a general amnesty should not be proclaimed, in which he should be included.

At the same time the king was living among his own people, – and though apparently powerless to do the settlers or the colony injury, was living in defiance of New Zealand laws, holding his own land, not only as his own property but as a territory into which he would admit no white man except on sufferance. The present governor, in sending home to the Secretary of State, on June 10, 1871, a certain map, says in his despatch that on it his "Lordship will recognise a 'pale,' in the sense familiar in Irish history, with the important difference that in Ireland the 'pale' was set up by the colonists against the natives, whereas in New Zealand it is set up by the natives against the colonists."

The existence of such a pale is a fact which is not without humiliation to us. It has not been intended by us. We have never surrendered our jurisdiction over this country. That jurisdiction has been taken from us, and has been held from us by force of arms. I can easily understand that colonial ministers in New Zealand should have been anxious to take Te Kooti, and to reduce the King Tawhiao as he is called, 3 – the son of Potatau, the first king. But after the money that has been expended in the wars, and the enormous cost of the vain hunt after Te Kooti, and as it is acknowledged on all sides that the Maoris are melting, it may well be questioned whether the game is worth the candle. Things are quiet now, and will probably remain so if left alone. The Maoris, though they are conscious of having troubled us much by their personal prowess, though they doubtless believe themselves to be, man for

man, very much better soldiers than we are, have learned that our combined power is too great for them. As they "melt" they will gradually sell even the lands from which we are at present banished, – and so at last; even Taranaki will be at rest. The feeling of the colony is, I think, in favour of such conduct, – and it is recommended by humanity as well as prudence.

Before the pursuit after Te Kooti had commenced, and when we were doubting whether we should or should not wage war against the king, a loyal Maori chief, in an interview with the Governor, gave him this advice: – "O Governor, Matutaera is now like a single tree left exposed in a clearing of our native forests. If left alone it will soon wither and die. My word to you, O Governor, is to leave Matutaera alone." I think that the Maori chief gave good advice.

Before I close this chapter I will mention one or two Maori peculiarities. It is singular that they have never learned our language. On the contrary they have forced many among us to learn theirs. They have doubtless been aided in this by the action of the missionaries, who felt, as has been common with those who have based the progress of civilization chiefly on religious teaching, that they could retain a more exclusive hold on the natives by learning their language than by teaching to them the language of the settlers. The effect has been greatly to increase the difficulty of amalgamating the races. Those difficulties have been overwhelming, and no amalgamation is now possible.

The Maoris, with all the teaching that has been lavished on them, seem never to have overcome the incubus of barbarous superstition. The "tapu," before we came, was with them all powerful. Doubtless the power has been weakened, but it has not been got rid of even by Christian Maoris. The "tapu" makes a thing sacred, so that it should not be touched; – sacred, or perhaps accursed. Priests are "tapu." Food is very often "tapu," so that only sacred persons may eat it, and then must eat it without touching it with their hands. Places are frightfully "tapu," so that no man or woman may go in upon them. Chiefs are "tapu," – particularly their heads. Dead bodies in some circumstances are "tapu." Indeed there was no end to the "tapu," and it is easy enough to see how strongly the continuance of such superstition must have worked against civilization.

The desire of accumulating property, combined with the industry necessary for doing so, is perhaps of all qualifications for civilization the most essential. But the Maoris had, and still have, an institu-

THE MURU.

tion terribly subversive both of the desire and of the power to collect wealth. This is called "muru," and consists in the infliction of punishment for faults, or accidents, – or even for faults or accidents committed by others. Sometimes it is enforced in the way of compliment, – and a Maori in such cases would consider himself to be slighted if he were not half-ruined by a "muru." Those who perform the "muru" visit the afflicted one, eat up all his provisions, and take away all his movables. The expedition that thus performs justice is called a "taua." If a man's wife runs away, a "taua" of his own friends visits him as a mark of condolence; another "taua" of his wife's friends visits him to punish him for not taking better care of her. A third "taua," on behalf of the Lothario, comes, because he also has got into a mess, – and between the three the unhappy victim is denuded of everything. The author of that very amusing book "The Pakeha Maori," – which all who care to learn anything about the Maoris should read, – thus describes the "muru:" –

"The offences for which people were plundered were sometimes of a nature which, to a mere Pakeha, would seem curious. A man's child fell into the fire and was nearly burned to death. The father was immediately plundered to an extent that almost left him without the means of subsistence; fishing-nets, canoes, pigs, provisions, – all went. His canoe upset, and he and all his family narrowly escaped drowning; – some were perhaps drowned. He was immediately robbed, and well pummelled with a club into the bargain, if he was not good at the science of self-defence, – the club part of the ceremony being always fairly administered, one against one, and after fair warning given to defend himself. He might be clearing some land for potatoes, burning off the fern, and the fire spreads farther than he intended, and gets into a 'wahi tapu,' or burial ground. No matter whether any one has been buried in it for the last hundred years; – he is tremendously robbed. In fact, for ten thousand different causes a man might be robbed; and I can imagine a case in which a man for scratching his own head might be legally robbed.

"Now, as the enforcers of this law were also the parties who received the damages, as well as the judges of the amount, which in many cases, – as in that of the burned child, – would be everything that they could by any means lay hands on, it is easy to perceive that under such a system personal property was an evanescent sort of thing altogether. These executions or distraints were never resisted. Indeed in many cases it would have been felt as a slight and an insult not to be robbed; – the sacking

of a man's establishment being often taken as a high compliment, – especially if his head was broken into the bargain. And to resist the execution would not only have been looked upon as mean and disgraceful in the highest degree, but would have debarred the contemptible individual from the privilege of robbing his neighbours."

As the old Pakeha Maori well remarks, personal property, in such a state of things, was an evanescent kind of thing altogether.

I must also observe, that though the morality of married women among the Maoris is not low for a savage people, – -for I was informed by those who ought to know that the wives are generally true to their husbands, – that of the unmarried girls is as debased as possible. The feeling of it does not exist, and the girl commits no offence either against father and mother, or against public opinion. And yet illegitimate children are rare. I need hardly say that a race so circumstanced must melt away. In 1812 they were estimated at 114,000; in 1850 at 70,000; in 1858 they were numbered at 55,790. In 1860 Mr. Fox estimated them at 45,000. In 1872 I was assured that they were below 40,000. None of these numbers may have been correct. None of them probably were correct, as no accurate census of them has been possible. But the estimates have been made as well as the Government could make them, and they indicate clearly the course which the race is taking.

It is with pain that I write as I do about a gallant people, whose early feelings towards us were those of kindness and hospitality, and as to whom I acknowledge that they have nearly had the gifts which would have enabled us to mix with them on equal terms. And I feel grieved that I cannot participate more cordially than I do with the sympathies of those who have been stirred by a certain romantic element in the Maori character, to build up in their own imaginations the fiction of a noble race. More than one such has pointed out to me in glowing language the poetry of the Maori story, and has pointed out to me that it required but a New Zealand Walter Scott to make the Maoris equal to the Highlanders. I cannot but answer to this that the blood of the Highlander is to be found at present wherever the English language is spoken, and that among all mankind no man is less likely to melt away than he. But the Maoris are going. No doubt the story of the Maori may be told with poetry. Such an attempt is not in my way; but as far as I have told it, I have endeavoured to tell it with truth.

2 By this time many of the natives had grown up to manhood with names taken from European godfathers, but which they altered to suit their own language, – multiplying the vowels, and eliminating the consonants. Teira is Taylor; Tamati is Thomas; Pooipi is Busby; and so on.

3 This man was originally named and probably christened Matutaera, which stands for Methuselah; – but when he became a Hau-Hau, he rejected his Bible name, and called himself Tawhiao.

CHAPTER LIX. WELLINGTON AND THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT.

WELLINGTON AND THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT.

CHAPTER LIX.

WELLINGTON AND THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT.

WE went from Port Lyttelton by steamer to Wellington, passing on our way northwards the Kaikora mountains, which make the coast of the province of Marlborough magnificent. They are snow-clad, and of beautiful form, and to a member of the Alpine Club, would offer, I should think, irresistible temptation. The town of Wellington, now the capital of the colony, stands high up in a bay which was originally called Port Nicholson, and is still so named on the map. The site as seen from the sea is very lovely, as the town is surrounded by hills, and is open only to the water. It reminded me much of St. Thomas, – among the Virgin Islands; but in appearance only. St. Thomas is one of the most unhealthy places frequented by man, whereas there is perhaps no spot more healthy than Wellington. It is, however, noted for being windy, and the character seems to be deserved. The town is built only of wood, 4 including even the Parliament House, which is a very spacious building, and the Government House, which is a handsome English mansion. This has been found to be necessary, as the locality is subject to earthquakes. In 1848, the town, which was then but a small thing, was nearly destroyed, and there have been slighter shocks since that time. In 1848, the panic was so great that it was considered for a time that it would be necessary to desert the place. From the position in which Wellington stands, and the manner in which it is surrounded by the sea on all sides but one, it is too closely hemmed in, and too destitute of land immediately around it for extensive prosperity as a town. It contains something under 8,000 inhabitants, whereas the population both of the city of Auckland and Dunedin, with their suburbs, is over 20,000 each, and that of Christchurch is over 12,000. But it is a pleasant little town, and when the General Assembly is sitting it is gay enough. Of course, it is subject to the condition of all cities which have been chosen as capitals, not on account of their commercial prosperity, but because they are centrally situated for political purposes. Washington is a

very poor place when Congress is not there, and I imagine that life at Ottawa must he slow when the representatives of the people are away from it.

There are interesting spots around Wellington. Within two or three miles of the town there are the remains of a New Zealand forest, – than which no forest is more lovely. They are absolutely impervious, unless a way be cut through them, owing to the thick growth of the forest vines. They are green throughout the year, – not with a dull greyish green tint, such as that of the Australian gum, – but are bright with semi-tropical growth. The hills all round the town were a few years since covered with such forests, but there is now but little left of them. A botanical garden is in course of construction, which has great advantages in the lie of the lands and the shape of the surrounding hills. It is a pity perhaps that it was not commenced before so much of the surrounding timber was taken away. I visited the valley of the Hutt, so named after that old colonizer, the present member for Gateshead, up which one of the new railways is being formed, – with, I should think, questionable political economy, as there is water-carriage from Wellington up to the Hutt, and there may well be doubts whether the pastoral districts in the valleys beyond will afford traffic sufficient to pay for working the line. But it is the policy of New Zealand to spend money, and to look for that prosperity which is supposed to come from a generous expenditure. And I was taken up to the Horokiwi valley, a beautiful glen, some forty miles out of the town. From the head of the valley, on the coach-road from Wellington to Wanganui and Taranaki, the traveller rises on to a range of hills from whence he looks down on to the eastern coast, and the river, and the island of Kapiti. The view here is very fine, and at the same time very interesting to those who concern themselves closely in the history of New Zealand and her troubles; for here it was that the great chief Rauparaha lived, and near to this spot, at Porirua, he was taken prisoner, not in warfare, but by stratagem.

I cannot stop to tell the story of Rauparaha, with all its incidents, nor should I interest general readers were I to do so; – but he was a representative man, perhaps more so than any other chieftain, – in the early days of our New Zealand troubles. It was he who instigated the resistance which led to the Wairau massacre on the southern side of Cook's Strait, though the massacre itself was consummated by his companion in arms, Rangihaeta. After this he went across to the Northern Island, and lived either in the island of Kapiti, or opposite to it, at Otaki, on the mainland. Then there arose a great

RAUPARAHA.

question whether Rauparaha should be taken and punished; but there was a doubt whether he were not justified in what he did by Maori laws, and he was pardoned, – to the great indignation of many settlers. Then he was for a time our ally, in the war about the Hutt and Wanganui, in 1845 and 1846, – our ally, or pretended ally. He was a great man, and great in our councils, – though still hated by the settlers, – till evidence came that he was in alliance also with the Maoris who were fighting us under Rauparaha's old friend, Rangihaeta; and then he was surrounded in his tent, near the Horokiwi valley, and taken prisoner. This was in July, 1846. He was kept ten months on board a man-of-war, and after that, was allowed to live in dignified but secure seclusion from the world till 1848, when at his own request he was permitted to go home to Otaki. There he died in November, 1849, – being then about eighty years of age. He had been a great cannibal, and had been a horrible scourge to the Maoris of the Middle Island, of whom he had devoured many. But he had a great reputation for wisdom, and managed, after all his troubles, both with Maoris and white men, to die in his bed at a fine old age. I had the pleasure of meeting his son at the Governor's table, and of playing battledore and shuttlecock with him in the Governor's hall. For this Rauparaha also is a great man among the Maoris, and is very friendly with the white men. It is said of him, the present man, that he has killed men, but never eaten them; of his father, the hero of my little tale, that he had killed and eaten men, – and he had no doubt eaten a great many; but of his grandfather, that he had killed men and eaten them, and had then himself been killed and eaten, like a true old Maori warrior as he was.

At Horokiwi we dined and slept, and the Governor, whose guests we were, asked an old chieftain who was coming along the coast to dine with us. He was tattooed all over, up to his hair, and round almost to the nape of his neck, – and he wore a great chimney-pot about 15 inches high, as some men used to wear in London a quarter of a century ago. He was very careful with his hat, and ate his dinner solemnly, with excellent appetite. When asked his opinion about this and that other Maori chief, he shook his head in disgust. They were all bad men, and had had too much land awarded to them. He rode a wretched old horse, and said that he was going about for pleasure to spend a month among his friends.

Of course it is known to all men that at present there are no imperial troops in New Zealand, and that it is not the intention of

the British government to send troops there again. The subject is one on which many settlers in New Zealand still feel very keenly, – expressing, almost with indignation, their conviction that if England really cared about New Zealand, she would not leave the colony altogether unprotected, – would not at any rate begrudge a few companies of soldiers, the whole expense of which the colony would willingly pay. But then I found also another conviction to exist, which seemed to me to be hardly compatible with the one I have above stated. All the European successes in the war, – say the colonists, – were achieved by colonial volunteers, and not by regular soldiers. The regulars were not fit for bush-fighting, and could not cope with the Maoris as men could do who had known them intimately. Without meaning here to question the efficiency of the British army in New Zealand, I cannot but say that I agree with the latter opinion. I have no doubt at all but that the settlers themselves are strong enough and astute enough to keep down the Maoris, – and that their personal interest will be keen enough to induce them to do so.

Two certainly adequate reasons have existed for the withdrawal of the British troops. I will first put forward that which probably operated most strongly in producing the decision of our ministers at home. When the Maori early wars began, New Zealand was governed from home, and all responsibility for her well-being attached to our Secretary of State. In 1852, between the little and the big war, a free constitution was given to the colony as to her European affairs, but all matters affecting the Maoris were still left in the hands of the imperial authorities. In that condition of circumstances we sent 10,000 soldiers to New Zealand, and paid for them about £12,000,000. During the war the Statesmen in the colony complained of this divided government, and demanded that the management of Maori affairs should be given to them also. In this I think that they were distinctly right, as the "imperium in imperio" was unmanageable and dangerous. But it should have followed as a consequence in the minds of those who made the demand, that British troops could not be left in New Zealand at the disposal of a colonial parliament no more responsible to our parliament than is the Congress of the United States. An amalgamation of imperial and colonial authority was attempted in reference to our troops during the war, – with consequences so unfortunate and so absurd, with so many little jealousies, so much bickering, and so small a result, that now, – when it is all over, – he who attempts to review the past can only feel that the less said about the thing the

WITHDRAWAL OF BRITISH SOLDIERS.

better. The only excuse for referring to it is to be found in the necessity of showing that Great Britain has not behaved with that harshness to the colony of which she has been accused by Colonial Ministers of State.

The second reason is to be found in the fact that British troops were not needed for the purpose of suppressing the later Maori rebels. It was asked that one regiment should remain merely as a moral support: – that they should not be asked to fight; – that they should simply garrison towns and do that out-of-danger work in aid of the colonial soldiers, which in times of common peril has been often done by women in aid of their husbands and brothers! We were to lend a regiment of our men, with perhaps 1s. 6d. a day pay, to do this sort of work at the rear of colonial fighting soldiers, with 5s. a day pay each – and to do it under the control of colonial ministers who had already declared very plainly that they regarded the British soldier in no very high repute! Let any one consider how the British soldiers would have borne their condition; and consider also what moral support men so placed would be able to give! As for that third-rate work on which they were to be employed, surely New Zealand could find a thousand colonists to do it without borrowing an English regiment.

Mr. Fox, who was Prime Minister of New Zealand during my visit, in the despatches and memoranda which as Colonial Minister he has caused to be sent to our Secretary of State, deals largely with threats when he is applying for the retention of the regiment. The removal of the regiment will "precipitate a conflict," and "invite the rebels in arms to unite in devastation and massacre." He speaks of the "fearful loss of life which the removal of the imperial force at this perilous juncture would probably entail." One of his colleagues, writing under his auspices, and demanding the continued services of the regiment, says that the colony, "should be practically recognized as an integral part of that empire," – meaning of course Great Britain, – "and not thrust out beyond its pale, as of infinitely less consideration than a British subject in foreign lands." Mr. Fox, again, himself accuses our ministers at home of "unpatriotic harshness," and allows himself to say, in an official document, in reference to one special minister, that "To satisfy the theories of Lord Granville as to responsibility, New Zealand must cease to be a part of the empire." Mr. Fox has not only been a War Minister in New Zealand, but he has also been the historian of the war, – and I must put Mr. Fox the historian into the witness-box to give evidence against Mr. Fox the minister.

Mr. Fox the minister is never weary in asking for a regiment of British troops to be used in New Zealand, under the control of a New Zealand statesman, – and when the request is not granted, uses towards statesmen at home terms of reproach which are not common in official documents even from superiors to inferiors, and which between equals are tantamount to the abandonment of the courtesies of life. But, as historian, Mr. Fox is never weary of telling us that all the successes of the war were achieved by colonial forces, and that the management of the imperial forces in New Zealand was so ridiculously bad as to make them comparatively useless. The reader, with Mr. Fox's history in his hands, is led to feel that New Zealand would hardly have had a war with the Maoris at all, – or, if so, would have got out of it very readily, – had there been no British troops, no 10,000 idlers, to trouble her. But when he has Mr. Fox's despatches in his hands, he is taught that New Zealand can be saved by one British regiment, but that salvation without it is impossible.

Up to the beginning of 1870, the Governor continually sent home remonstrances of this nature, – for the production of which he was not responsible, and which he could not repress. Read without the light of latter days, these documents would be very dispiriting. They foretell triumph to the Maori rebellion, and massacre to the Europeans, should the last regiment go. Early in 1870, the last regiment returned home. In 1872, the Governor, with his suite, made a journey through the very centre of the North Island, going through districts which a short time before had been a part of the "King" country, – and in his official report of his trip, has declared that he was received everywhere with enthusiastic loyalty. We have not yet conquered the Maoris. We probably never shall conquer them. They will melt. "O Governor, my word to you is to let King Tawhiao alone." I think no one now pretends to say that a better state of things than that existing would have been produced, had the one regiment been left to garrison the towns and afford moral support.

The Colonial Ministers of New Zealand in asking for a British regiment to be left in their hands, for them to do as they pleased, were asking for the top brick of the chimney. And they have cried very loudly because they did not get it.

But then there always arises in these discussions the sentimental view of the question, – "Why not let us have a few companies wearing the colours that are so dear to us, seeing that it is only for love that we ask them, and seeing also that we are ready to pay all

FIRST CONSTITUTION.

the cost?" I could never get any colonist to agree with me that it was impossible for the colony to pay all the cost, – that the chief cost was the cost in men, and that England found a difficulty in getting soldiers enough for her absolute needs. It was quite in vain too that I pleaded that a bargain should be held as a bargain as well between friends, as between strangers or enemies; – and that as New Zealand had at her own request been allowed to raise her own revenues, and spend them, and to govern herself, there should be no semblance left of dependence on English assistance. There is a pride in seeing an English redcoat, which even an Englishman must visit the colonies to understand. Indeed, the pride which is felt in all English institutions, and the pride in England herself, makes itself very much more conspicuous among our distant offshoots than it is at home. I have found it cropping up even in the States of America, in a manner that it hardly takes among ourselves. "We, too, are English by descent, and speak the language, and are governed by the laws, and are therefore as good as you are." It is this feeling which, with its various ramifications, repeats England all round the world; and it is one with which an Englishman cannot but be in love. I have always myself felt a soft regret when I could not admit that there ought to be a company of English soldiers in a colonial town.

In the meantime, they have taken the matter up in New Zealand with substantial prowess, and have a body of armed constabulary, – who are in truth soldiers, – and whose head-quarters are at Wellington. In addition to this, there is an armed contingent of Maoris, and there are the volunteers. I am inclined to think, that in regard to force with which to protect herself against the Maoris, New Zealand is better situated than when she had 10,000 British troops to protect her.

I have already spoken of the chief peculiarity of the constitution under which New Zealand is governed, the working of which was not fully commenced till the arrival in 1855 of Colonel, now Sir Thomas Gore Browne, as Governor. In 1846, an attempt had been made to divide New Zealand into two colonies, with a governor-in-chief and two lieutenant governors. The colonies were to be re-christened New Munster and New Ulster, and two lieutenant-governors were actually appointed. There was to be a Legislative Council appointed by the Crown, – and a House of Representatives elected by the people. But it was enacted that no man could vote who could not read and write English! Then, too, came out that doctrine from the Colonial Office, opposed to the

assumption of property in land not absolutely occupied by the reputed owners, which was considered to be opposed to the treaty of Waitangi. From the first it was seen that this constitution could not work, and no real attempt was made to work it. It was out of the question that the Maoris should be told, – as they had been told over and over again, – that in the eye of the law, under their first sovereign, Queen Victoria, they were the same as white men, and that nevertheless they should be governed by a parliament with which they could have no concern unless they could read and write a language, of which none of them then had, and of which none of them still have, any knowledge. No doubt those very men who were most keenly alive to the necessity of giving votes to the Maoris, – and Governor Grey among the number who remonstrated against the constitution on this ground, and was authorized on this ground to postpone its execution, – all felt in their hearts that a parliament returned by Maoris would have unfitted the country altogether for European settlers. But they felt, also, that though the power of voting should be given to the Maoris, the Maoris would not use the privilege. In 1853, when the first elections really took place, and when another new constitution had come out, in which there was no clause as to reading and writing English, there was a very large majority of Maori population in the North Island which then returned twenty-three members to the House of Assembly, and a majority of white men only in the Middle Island which at that time was called upon to return but fourteen members. But the interference of the Maoris had no appreciable effect on the elections. It was, however, out of the question that they should be excluded from the franchise, after having been invested with the property in land, and having at the same time been made subject to English law.

In 1852 the parliament of Great Britain passed the act which gave its present constitution to New Zealand. Of course it contains the old arrangements as to king, lords, and commons, – the Governor taking the place of the king, the Legislative Council of the Lords, and the House of Representatives of the House of Commons; and there soon followed, as a matter of course, an Executive Council, consisting of the responsible ministers of the day, and taking the place of our cabinet, – though this natural sequence was not effected without considerable commotion among the new and untried politicians of the colony. In addition to all this the colony was divided into provinces, and to each province was given its own Provincial Assembly elected by the people, its own

SECOND CONSTITUTION.

Superintendent, also elected by the people, – as are the governors of the separate States of America, – and its own political officers, who act as the Superintendent's cabinet. There can, I think, be no doubt that in all this there has been an attempt to graft the American form of State government on the monarchical forms of England. As regards the Upper House of the General Assembly the constitution is less democratic than that of Victoria or South Australia, in which colonies the members of the Legislative Council are elected by the people. In New Zealand they are appointed nominally by the Crown, in reality by the minister of the day, – as they are in New South Wales and Queensland. In other respects the constitution of New Zealand is more democratic than that of any other British colony, as it gives to each province the power of making certain of its own laws, of disposing of a large proportion of its own taxes, and of dealing with its own land, without reference to the General Assembly. The Governor has no doubt a veto on the laws passed in the Provincial Assemblies, – -as he has on the general legislation of the colony, – but this is a defence against crude legislation which cannot be frequently used, and which when used is of course unpopular. By this system of sub-government in the provinces a class of men of a standing lower no doubt in social condition, and lower probably in education, than those who find their way into the General Assembly, are enabled to act as legislators. Political critics will approve or disapprove of this according to their diverging political tendencies, – but there can, I think, be no doubt that the system has been devised with the intention of bringing the manipulation of political power closely into the hands of the people. There can be as little doubt that incompetent persons have been tempted to play at a little game of House of Commons at the public expense.

It must be acknowledged on the other hand that in these Provincial Assemblies is found a certain safeguard against dangers which have been injuriously felt in the Australian colonies. Taking the instance of New South Wales, we can see that the settlers in remote parts of that vast dominion feel no confidence in the manner in which they and their lands are dealt with by a parliament assembled at Sydney. Lands sold at, we will say, Moreton Bay, were supposed to be sold to the advantage of the people living very far from Moreton Bay. Duties collected at Moreton Bay were supposed to be spent in the vicinity of the favoured capital. The Executive was composed of men living at Sydney. The great bulk of the legislature was composed of men living at any rate much

nearer to the centre than to the extremities, and thus was created a justifiable suspicion that a Sydney legislature was prejudicial to districts which were not only very remote from Sydney, but which had but very little communication with that city. Hence arose a cry for division, and Queensland became a separate colony. But Queensland itself is very large, and now it is thought that the interests of the settlers on York Peninsula and north of Rockhampton are sacrificed to Brisbane and Ipswich. No doubt to a great extent it is so. Brisbane, Ipswich, and the southern districts of the colony, return the greater part of the House of Representatives, and members of parliament will prefer the interests of places which return them to those of distant districts with which they have no concern. The same feeling prevails now with reference to the Riverina. The interests of the Riverinan district are naturally subordinated to those of the Illawarra, the Hunter, New England, Bathurst, Goulburn, and Sydney itself, which being more thickly inhabited, altogether dominate the Riverina in the councils of New South Wales.

The question must of course be one of degree, and the proposal for increased legislature may easily be carried to an absurdity. At home we should not be disposed to grant a separate parliament to the Isle of Wight, were she to consider herself injured by her connection with England at large. We are not even willing to grant a separate parliament to Ireland, which says that she is so oppressed. But with us at home the different elements have been more perfectly welded into one whole than can as yet be the case in a colony, and from that it comes to pass that our leading statesmen are taken from the country at large, and not as a rule from one favoured part of the country. There is hardly a suspicion that London receives more than it gives because of the action of parliament, and such a suspicion could hardly be well founded, as London has a thinner representation in parliament than any other part of the country. There are those who complain of this, not perceiving that what London loses in representation she gains by the presence of the entire parliament. But in the colonies there is no such balance of advantages, – and I shall hardly be unjust to colonial statesmen generally in saying that the condition of the colonies does not yet admit of the production of men capable, from education, position, and habit, of regarding the country as one whole which, as a whole, is confided to their patriotism, – as is I believe the case with us. Time and wealth have with us produced a race of statesmen and a race of legislators, and the feeling with us is general

SYSTEM OF REPRESENTATION.

that the interests of the country will be fairly dealt with, let the men who deal with them come whence they may. Now and again there may be a gradual shifting of representation; – but, as a rule, Devonshire is not suspicious of Yorkshire, nor Lancashire of the metropolitan counties. In the colonies it is certainly otherwise; and the provincial governments of New Zealand have a tendency not only to allay the suspicion, but to prevent the injustice which has occasionally produced it. I must confess that at first I was tempted to ridicule these provincial parliaments, but before I left New Zealand I was reconciled to their action.

I found, however, in the colony generally, and, as I think, among the best men in the colony, a prevailing opinion antagonistic to the Provincial Councils, and from this I am led to imagine that they will gradually be deprived of their powers, and be ultimately abolished. They will by that time have perhaps done the work demanded of them.

The first elections under the new constitution took place in 1853, and the provincial parliaments at once went to work. The General Assembly did not sit till 1854, when it was convened by Colonel Wynyard, who acted as governor for twenty months, between the first reign of Governor Grey and that of Governor Browne. The Legislative Council at first consisted of ten members. In 1857 it was increased to twenty, and it now consists of forty-five, a number which seems to be out of all proportion to the size of the colony. There is nothing in the Constitution to prevent the Governor and the Minister of the day together from increasing the number as they may please, – as there is nothing to prevent the Queen and her Ministers from increasing the number of peers indefinitely in England. The number of the representatives was at first thirty-seven and is at present seventy-eight, which seems to be large for a population hardly, if at all, exceeding 300,000, – the Maoris included. By the census of 1871 the European population was found to be 250,393, – whereas the Maoris are estimated to be under 40,000 in all the islands.

I have found it difficult, in more than one of the colonies, to ascertain the exact condition of the public purse in reference to revenue, annual expenditure, and public debt; and though in New Zealand the greatest courtesy was shown in supplying me with everything that had been published on these subjects, I have not been able altogether to understand the figures thus supplied to me. I imagine that a special education is necessary to the easy comprehension of Treasury accounts. Additions and deductions

have to be made to and from all the totals before the real fact sought for can be attained; and though, no doubt, the necessary information for such additions and deductions is given, – if the seeker after financial facts only knew as much as the compiler of the accounts, – it generally occurs to the poor tyro, when he begins to manipulate his figures, that he finds himself in the position of a man who should attempt to drive a locomotive without having learned the first principles of a steam-engine.

I think, however, that I can collect without doubt from the pages before me that the total revenue for New Zealand for the year 1871, exclusive of money borrowed, was £1,342,116. The total expenditure for that year is given as £2,657,586; but from this has to be deducted, as far as I can understand, something like £250,000 for money repaid, – so that the expenditure for the year would exceed the actual revenue by about £l,100,000, in a community consisting of less than 300,000 persons. I can state at any rate with certainty that the amount of the public debt up to June 30th, 1872, was £9,983,341; – in round numbers, ten million pounds. I doubt whether any community ever got together has shown the same energy in obtaining and spending money on public purposes.

The circular published under the authority of the Colonial Office for the year gives the following details as to the population, revenue, and expenditure of certain colonies; but in looking at these figures the reader should remember that the column in which the revenue is stated can hardly be taken as affording accurate information, as the sums named contain not only the year's actual revenue but the amounts borrowed during that year for the year's wants. The population and the sums expended may no doubt be taken as exact: –

Population.

Revenue.

Expenditure.

Canada

Victoria

New South Wales..

Jamaica

New Zealand

4,283,000

731,000

485,000

441,000

283,000

£4,500,000

3,175,000

3,890,000

414,000

1,864,000

£4,574,0001

3,273,000

3,494,000

355,000

3,890,000

1   In regard to Canada the amounts are stated in dollars, and for the sake of ready reckoning the dollar has been computed at 4s.

This certainly gives to New Zealand a grand pre-eminence. With a population not quite a fifteenth that of Canada, she can spend an

REVENUE.

amount of public revenue less than that of Canada by not quite a ninth. While Canada spends little more than £1 a head, New-Zealand spends more than £13 a head. But Canada with its partly French population may be thought to be a sleepy place. Victoria, however, is wide awake, and is supposed to know the value of stirring business. She spends about £4 10s. a head; and New South Wales, who nattered herself that she was certainly not deficient in spirit during that year, spent something over £7 a head. Poor Jamaica had not even £1 a head to spend, and lacked the spirit to spend all she had. There can be no doubt that if audacity, dash, and a true adherence to "go-a-head" principles will make a colony, New Zealand ought to flourish.

There is perhaps no subject more open to argument on both sides than that of the expenditure of public money; – no question on which a public orator would find it easier to declaim, first in one direction and then in the other, than the expediency of public economy and the expediency of public liberality. In private life it is the same. One man will tell you that you should never put out your arm so far as to lose the power of drawing it back, and that you should never owe more than you can pay, – while another will assure you that he who nothing dares will nothing have, and that no man can thrive as a merchant who trusts solely to ready money and ignores a system of credit. And then the same man will give you both the one lesson and the other almost in the same breath.

It must, I think, be conceded in reference to new countries, such as are our Australian colonies and New Zealand, that it would not only be impossible that they should develop their resources without borrowing money on the security of the wealth to be produced, – but also that it would be unjust to the present generation to make the attempt, were it thought possible that success should be so achieved. In an old country, such as our own, – or at any rate in the old country, which is our own, – the government is not called upon to develop its resources. I will take railroads as an illustration of what I mean when I speak of the resources of a country. Railroads with us have been made by private companies, the members of which have considered that they saw the means of turning their capital to good account in such enterprises. Whether they have been right or wrong in so considering, the capital and the spirit to spend it have been sufficient, and the railways have been made. But in the colonies such a state of things is out of the question. The capital does not exist, and the fact is patent to all

men that the railroads when made would not pay a fair interest, – very often that they would pay no interest whatsoever, – on the money to be expended on their construction. It is equally patent that nothing tends so quickly to enrich a country and to enable a people to use the wealth which God has placed within their reach, as a ready conveyance for themselves and their goods. Wheat is not grown, because it cannot be conveyed to market. Copper and iron and coal are left unworked, because they cannot be profitably conveyed away. Wool-growers dare hardly venture to distant pastures, awed by the same difficulty. The young colony therefore demands a railroad, – which the government only can make, and can do so only by the means which its parliament shall grant to it. Then arises the question whether the present or a future generation shall pay for the railroad, – and it becomes at once apparent to the shallowest thinker that, even were it possible to saddle the country with immediate taxation sufficient for the purpose, it would be most unjust to do so. Why should we, who are struggling here to-day, make a railroad for the benefit of those who are to come after us, and who in all human probability will be much better able than we are to bear the expense? This same argument applies to roads, harbours, bridges, public buildings, and all institutions as to which the public will possess the completed property. Therefore the money is borrowed, and the present generation feels that it bears its fair share of the burden by paying the interest as it accrues.

The argument is good, and the practice will probably have the adherence of all sagacious statesmen, as long as the value of the property actually created by the expenditure does not sink below the amount of the debt incurred. As long as such a state of things is preserved, the colony or country cannot in truth be said to be in debt at all. Its assets are equal to its liabilities, and its annual revenue in such a condition will infallibly preserve it from any inconvenient pressure upon its means. The colony of Victoria now owes a debt of twelve millions, but very nearly the whole of this sum has been expended in railways, and the remainder on works of similar permanent value, – and Victoria is in truth not indebted. That unfortunately is not the case with New Zealand. Her wars with the Maoris, which have been declared by competent authority at home to have cost England twelve millions, have cost that colony nearly four millions and a half.

And again, in considering the matter of borrowing money for public works it must be remembered that, unfortunately, induce-

POLITICAL DANGERS.

ments other than those of the direct public good may allure ministers to ask for loans, and may allure members of parliament to grant them. Or even if the motives of ministers and of members be as pure as Patriotism herself, there may be lacking the sagacity necessary for the profitable expenditure of public funds. Or, as is much more commonly the case, the motives, and the sagacity also, may be mixed. A minister may assure himself that his sole object is his country's good, that he is spending himself night and day on her behalf, that he is remunerated, by a clerk's beggarly salary, for energies and intellect which would make a fortune for him if devoted to trade; and in this way he may be as sure of his own virtue as were Pitt and Peel. But not the less does he teach himself to think that the one thing most necessary for his country's welfare is his own continuance in office, and to effect that, – simply for his country's good, and to his own personal ruin, – he will make compromises with dishonesty, or perhaps rush into a policy of which the only value to his country will consist in the fact that it will obtain for himself a popularity among voters outside sufficient to keep him in office.

When a minister achieves the power of handling millions in the manufacture of railways, the temptation to waste hundreds of thousands is very heavy on him. Each portion of a colony, each district, or each province, wants its railway. "A railway for you gentlemen down south!" says a northern member. "Certainly, – but on condition that we have one here, up north!" To an eager politician, anxious to please his own constituency, it matters little that it be shown to him that there will be nothing for the northern railway to carry, while the other may be expected to do a fair business. Votes are counted, and the northern gentleman has his way. Then, again, it comes to pass that a large part of the population in a new country finds so great a benefit from the immediate expenditure of the money, – labourers who get the government wages, and of course vote, and tradesmen who cater for the labourers, and of course vote, – that the patriotic minister, anxious only for his country's good, finds that the country will certainly be robbed of his services unless he maintain this popular condition of things. In such circumstances a minister is apt, – I will not say to become unscrupulous, – but to allow a great latitude to his scruples.

And then there is also the danger, – from which nations, as well as colonies, have suffered, – of there arising some Cagliostro in politics, some conjuror in statecraft, who shall be clever enough to

talk steady men off their legs by fine phrases, and to dazzle the world around him by new inventions in the management of affairs. Such men can invest democratic measures with tendencies purely conservative, can run into debt upon theories of the strictest economy, and commingle patriotic principles with cosmopolitan practices in a manner very charming to weak minds. A statesman of this class is of necessity unscrupulous, and to a young community may be ruinous. It is his hope to leap to great success by untried experiments, – and being willing himself to run the risk of extermination if he fail, he does not hesitate to bind his country to his own chariot-wheels as he rushes into infinite space. Such a minister in a colony, should he get the power of the purse into his hands, will throw his millions about without any reference to the value of the property acquired. He will learn the charm of spending with profusion, and will almost teach himself to measure the prosperity of the community which is subject to him, by the amount which it owes.

When I reached Wellington, a vote of want of confidence in the present ministry had just been brought before the House of Representatives by Mr. Stafford, so that I had the opportunity of hearing a debate in which the ministry and their opponents were fighting for the possession of immediate political power. The same thing had occurred when I was at Sydney, and there the minister had been forced to resign, – after having obtained the Governor's sanction for the dissolution of the House, and having tried what a new parliament would do for him. I had again been present at a similar battle in Melbourne, in which the minister was defeated there also, – and had been driven to resign, after a terrible conflict, at the close of which the Governor refused to him the privilege of dissolving the House, for which he had pleaded. These facts doubtless affected the conditions of the combat in New Zealand. It was felt that the Governor would not dissolve the House, and that the ministers, if beaten, would not risk the chance of a refusal. There was therefore no immediate means of effacing their defeat within their reach, should they be beaten by the vote then to be given; and the fight was therefore signally one of life and death. Both at Sydney and Melbourne the ministry had been beaten by a very narrow majority, and the tendencies of men's minds were sufficiently well known to make it certain that the numbers would be very nearly equal at Wellington. When I reached the capital general opinion gave the ministers a majority of three or four. As days passed by this imagined superiority dwindled to a supposed

MR. VOGEL.

tie. On the morning of the day on which the division was taken it was believed that there would be one against them. On that night they were beaten by a majority of two.

Three adverse resolutions were proposed to the House, but, as is usual in such cases, they who attacked the ministers assailed their entire policy. It did not require a long sojourn in the colony to enable an observer to understand that distrust of Mr. Vogel was the feeling which first made the attack possible and then rendered it successful. Mr. Fox was Premier, but I think that I shall not be held by that gentleman to do injustice to his position as a minister, if I say that Mr. Vogel was regarded in the colony as the acting spirit of the cabinet. Mr. Fox held no portfolio, whereas Mr. Vogel was, as we say, Chancellor of the Exchequer, or Colonial Treasurer as he is called at the Antipodes. Now New Zealand had latterly been pre-eminently conspicuous for spending money, – and conspicuous also for the amount of money which she intended to spend. It had seemed to be Mr. Vogel's theory of government that blood should be infused into the veins of a young community, and energy given to the action of the heart, by an open-handed, and I may perhaps say, profuse liberality. Railways were to be created throughout the colony. Railways in Auckland, railways in Wellington, railways as I have before said even in Marlborough, railways from the southern point of the Middle Island through Otago and Canterbury, up to Nelson were to leave no district in the colony unsatisfied. And the natives were to be kept quiet by a good-humoured liberality, which would leave them nothing to gain by rebellion. That a colony should have life in it all New Zealanders were willing to allow, – for they are an energetic people. And they were ready to admit that public credit is too grand a thing not to be used for raising this life, – -for they are a sanguine people. Mr. Vogel's theory had had its charms for them, as is proved with sufficient clearness by the money which he has borrowed. But that which at first was taken for dash and good courage, seemed to many after a while to become recklessness and fool-hardihood. Mr. Vogel was playing a great experiment, at the expense of the community, and the colony began to ask who was Mr. Vogel, that it should trust him? I am constrained to say, looking back at the figures on the previous page, that I think. the colony trusted him too far.

The old ministry was beaten, and a new ministry came in. But when I left New Zealand it was held to he doubtful whether the new ministry could stand, and since I have returned home Mr. Vogel has been restored to his seat on the Treasury Bench. A

majority of two for purpose of defeat does not give assurance of a working majority, – and it was said at once that there were dissensions. As I have given my own opinion of Mr. Vogel as a minister, I am hound to say that many men in the colony believe in him, – that they think that a new prophet has arisen whose absence of timidity will enable him to manage politics as they have never been managed before, and who will create prosperity out of expenditure. Mr. Vogel is now again in a position to throw his money broadcast over the land, and it may be that he will continue to do so, – while the credit of the colony lasts.

I was often asked in New Zealand whether the line of parliamentary debate in that colony did not contrast favourably with that which I had heard in the Australian parliaments. I am bound to say that at Wellington I heard no word to which any Speaker of a House could take exception, and that this propriety of language was maintained while very hard things were being said by members, one of another. This is, I think, as it should be. The life necessary for political debate cannot be maintained without the saying of hard things; but the use of hard words makes debate at first unbearable, and after a time impracticable. But I thought that the method of talking practised in the New Zealand House of Representatives was open to censure on another head. I have never in any national debating assembly, – not even at Washington, – seen so constant a reference to papers on the part of those who were speaking as was made in this debate. It seemed as though barrows full of papers must have been brought in for the use of gentlemen on one side and on the other. From this arises the great evil of slowness. The gentleman on his legs in the House, – when custom has made that position easy to him, – learns to take delight in delaying the House while he turns over one folio after another either of manuscript, which has been arranged for him, or of printed matter which he has marked for reference. And then, to show how very much at home he is, while gentlemen are gaping around him, he will look out for new references, muttering perhaps a word or two while his face is among the leaves, – perhaps repeating the last words of his last sentence, and absolutely revelling in the tyranny of his position. But while doing so, he is unconsciously losing the orator's power of persuasion. I doubt whether Demosthenes often looked at his papers, or Cicero when he was speaking, or Pitt. Judging from what I have seen from the strangers' gallery at home, I should say that a New Zealand minister had learned to carry to an absurdity a practice which is authorized, and no more than authorized, by the

HAWKE BAY.

usage of our House of Commons. A Speaker, on observing such fault, can hardly call the offender to order, – but he might have the power of putting out the gas.

I cannot conclude my remarks about the Wellington Assembly and the debate which I heard there, without saying that the four Maori members discreetly split their votes, two supporting, and two voting against, the ministry.

The province of Hawke Bay I did not visit at all, or even look upon its coast. It was separated from Wellington in 1858, and now contains a population of 6,059 souls, exclusive of natives, – of which 2,179 belong to its capital, the town of Napier. The staple industry of the province is the growth of wool on artificial grasses. Hawke Bay possesses nearly as many sheep as the whole of the remainder of the North Island put together, and considerably more than either Nelson or Marlborough, in the Middle Island; – but it produces little else. I am told that the province is prosperous. It has not been disturbed by war with the natives, as have Auckland, Wellington, and poor little Taranaki. Its land has belonged to a great tribe, the Ngatikahungunu, who have been friendly to the Europeans, – so that the grass farmers of Napier, Clive, and the Wairau, have been able to carry on their operations in comparative peace. It must be remembered by those to whom the pastoral concerns of New Zealand are a matter of interest, that the sheep-farming of the North Island is not at all like that of Australia. In Australia sheep are chiefly pastured on original grasses, at perhaps an average allowance of three acres to the sheep. In northern New Zealand they are pastured on artificial English grasses, at an average of perhaps five sheep to the acre. In the Middle Island of New Zealand the Australian system prevails, but even here the growth of English grasses is being adopted, to the greatly increased value of the land. Perhaps the most noticeable fact in reference to Hawke Bay is the circumstance that a rental of £12,500 a year is paid to the Maoris for pastoral lands used by the Europeans.

4 Throughout all New Zealand, houses are generally built of wood. In the whole colony there are 57,182 houses, including 2,402 tents used as houses. Of these 45,951 are built of wood, and only 1,540 of stone or brick.

CHAPTER LX. TARANAKI.

CHAPTER LX.

TARANAKI.

BY the constitution of 1852 New Zealand was divided into six provinces, of which New Plymouth was the smallest in area, in white population, and in the amount of land purchased from the natives by the Europeans; but in native population it ranked next to Auckland and Wellington, and among all the native tribes there were perhaps none so hostile to the settlers as those of Taranaki. In 1858 the province of New Plymouth assumed, by Act of the General Assembly, the old native name of Taranaki, keeping the English appellation for its capital. In 1853 the native population of the province was estimated at 3,000, and the Europeans were counted to be 1,985. In 1871 the Europeans had increased to 4,480, having something more than doubled themselves. In the province of Auckland they had increased sixfold; in that of Wellington, including Hawke Bay, – a new province formed out of Wellington, – they had increased more than fourfold; in that of Nelson, – including Marlborough, formed out of it, – nearly sixfold; in that of Canterbury, – including the county of Westland, formed out of it, – nearly sixteenfold; and in that of Otago twentyfold. In the meantime, the Maori population has certainly decreased in every province except that of Taranaki, – in which, owing to the shifting of the tribes in consequence of the wars, it has not improbably increased. As by far the greater portion of the province is not at present accessible to Europeans, as we have no settlements in those districts, occupy no land, and as, in fact, the Queen's law does not run there, no information can be obtained with any precision as to the number of natives there located. The figures above given are sufficient to show that of all parts of New Zealand, this has been the least progressive, and that in the improbable event of a further Maori war, property here would be more precarious than elsewhere.

I was informed at New Plymouth, – during the few hours that I stayed there, – that the settlers are presumed to own about 150,000 acres, claiming to have bought that amount from the natives; that of this about 80,000 were in the possession of persons preparing to occupy them, – that is, ready to go on their property when things should be sufficiently settled to enable them to do so, – but that no

NEW PLYMOUTH.

more than 22,000 acres were actually at present in permanent use. I find that in 1870 no acre of country land, – as distinct from urban and suburban land, – was bought by the settlers in Taranaki, though in that year such land in all the other provinces was either bought, or given to immigrants, or made over to military settlers. Wool-growing is the trade of the Middle Island rather than of the Northern; but from every other province in both the islands rent is received by the government for pastures. But no such rent is received by the government from Taranaki.

And yet when the New Zealand Land Company planted a young community of settlers here in 1841, New Plymouth was called the garden of New Zealand. The land is said to be good, but light. Hitherto the people have not grown wheat enough for their own consumption The little town is beautifully situated under Mount Egmont, which is 10,000 feet high, – with a lovely summit of snow, sharp almost as a church steeple. The land around Mount Egmont is grandly timbered, and said to be of high quality; but, at thirty miles distant from the town, it is held by the natives, and is inaccessible. And then there is no harbour at New Plymouth, – a want which must itself go far to mar the prosperity of the settlement.

All along this coast the sand is composed chiefly of iron, or, as the people there say, of steel; – so that when you handle it, though it be as soft as sand, it is almost as heavy as iron. I was told that from some of it 70 per cent, of pure metal has been extracted. Works have been established at New Plymouth for utilizing the iron, and making steel, – but have never as yet prospered, from the want of a proper flux for the metal. I heard the matter discussed there, at Auckland, and elsewhere, and the opinion seemed general that ultimately these sands would become the source of great wealth. They are found along the east shore of the North Island as far as Manukau harbour, in the province of Auckland. The sensation of weight when the soft stuff is gathered in the band is very remarkable.

Of the way in which the Maori troubles originated in Taranaki, of the original difficulties as to the purchase of land from the natives, and of the manner in which those troubles were perpetuated by the war, I have spoken in a former chapter. The miracle is that the settlement should have survived after the perils to which, in its isolated position, it was subjected, – and that the inhabitants did not flee from it as they did from Kororareka, when Heke for the third time cut down the flagstaff. But they did not flee, but are

still there, expecting golden days and future prosperity. "I do not quite see," said I, to one of the leaders among the citizens, who was kindly showing me the place, "how ordinary trade can hold its head up in a place so small and so remote." "It does," said he, "and we never have any bankrupts." I could not continue my ill-nature by remarking that there can be no bankruptcy without credit.

But there is the province, with its own little House of Commons, with its own Superintendent, and its own three members in the General Assembly at Wellington; and if it lives, – as it surely now will live, – till the Maories have melted, it will have scope for its energies, and land on which to grow its own corn.

CHAPTER LXI. AUCKLAND.

CHAPTER LXI.

AUCKLAND.

AUCKLAND still considers herself to be, and certainly has been, the leading province of New Zealand. In the old days, before the colony had been divided into provinces, – before the colony was a colony, – the northern portion of the Northern Island was the only part of New Zealand with which Europeans were acquainted. It was here that the Pakeha Maoris settled themselves and dwelt with the natives. It was here that Governor Hobson fixed the seat of the government. It was here, – up at Kororareka, in the Bay of Islands, – that Heke cut down the flagstaff. It was here that Bishop Selwyn was settled when there was only one bishop in New Zealand, and it was here that all the governors have lived, and here the general parliament was held, till the seat of government was moved to Wellington in 1864. The province of Otago is now the most populous of the provinces, and its capital, Dunedin, the most populous of New Zealand cities. And as Otago is also the most southern province, and is therefore far removed from Auckland; and as Canterbury, also in the south, has grown in power and population; there came to be the same feeling in regard to Auckland that existed in Canada respecting Quebec, – and therefore the capital was removed to the central, but comparatively small town of Wellington.

Because of its age, and old history, and early dealings with the Maoris, I regard Auckland as being the representative city of New Zealand, – -as Melbourne is of Victoria, or Sydney of New South

ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF NEW ZEALAND.

Wales. Dunedin, which hardly knows the appearance of a Maori as well as does London, where the interesting stranger has been seen at Exeter Hall, has no title to be considered. Dunedin is a Scotch town and Christchurch an English town, here planted, – and Wellington is a chosen site for a parliament; – but Auckland is redolent of New Zealand. Her streets are still traversed by Maoris and half-castes, and the Pakeha Maori still wanders into town from his distant settlement in quest of tea, sugar, and brandy.

And the councils by which New Zealand has been governed as a colony in the perilous days which she has passed, were all held at Auckland. It was here that over and over again peace with the natives has been decided upon as the policy of the day, till peace was no longer possible and the colony drifted into war. Though both parties desired peace, – and such I believe was the desire of each party, – peace was impossible because they did not desire it on the same basis. "Peace, certainly, – but of course we must hold our own;" said the white man. The Maori said identically the same thing, – but the possession claimed as "our own" was one and the same, namely, the right to decide questions of property, each according to his own laws. It may be imagined that at Auckland there is a feeling that Dunedin and Christchurch are interlopers, as New Zealand towns. The Maori war has been the great feature of the colony of New Zealand, and Otago and Canterbury have had no more to do with the war than Buckinghamshire and Berkshire. Therefore Auckland still considers itself to be the capital of the colony, – and it has much reason in its claim.

It may be well to notice here the fact that as Auckland considers herself to be the cream of New Zealand, so does New Zealand consider herself to be the cream of the British empire. The pretension is made in, I think, every British colony that I visited. I remember that it was insisted upon with absolute confidence in Barbadoes; that no Demeraran doubted it in British Guiana; that it was hinted at in Jamaica with as much energy as was left for any opinion in that unhappy island; and that in Bermuda a confidence in potatoes, onions, and oleanders had produced the same effect. In Canada the conviction is so rife that a visitor hardly cares to dispute it. In New South Wales it crops out even in those soft murmurings with which men there regret their mother country. In Queensland the assertion is always supported by a reference to the doubtful charms of her perhaps too luxurious climate. In Victoria the boast is made with true Yankee confidence in "our institutions." Victoria declares herself to be different from England, and therefore better.

But in New Zealand the assurance is altogether of a different nature. The New Zealander among John Bulls is the most John-Bullish. He admits the supremacy of England to every place in the world, only he is more English than any Englishman at home. He tells you that he has the same climate, – only somewhat improved; that he grows the same produce, – only with somewhat heavier crops; that he has the same beautiful scenery at his doors, – only somewhat grander in its nature and more diversified in its details; that he follows the same pursuits and after the same fashion, – but with less of misery, less of want, and a more general participation in the gifts which God has given to the country. He reminds you that at Otago, in the south, the mean temperature is the same as at London, whereas at Auckland, in the north, he has just that improvement necessary to furnish the most perfect climate in the world. The mean temperature of the coldest month at London is 37 deg., which is only five degrees above freezing, whereas at Auckland it is 51 deg., which enables growth to continue throughout the whole year. Of the hottest month the mean temperature at Auckland is only 68 deg., which, – says the Aucklander, – neither hinders a European from working, nor debilitates his constitution. All good things have been given to this happy land, and, when the Maori has melted, here will be the navel of the earth. I know nothing to allege against the assurance. It is a land very happy in its climate; – very happy in its promises. The poor Maori who is now the source of all Auckland poetry, must first melt: and then, if her coal-fields can be made productive, – for she has coal-fields, – and if the iron which is washed to her shore among the sands of the sea, can be wrought into steel, I see no reason why Auckland should not rival London. I must specially observe one point as to which the New Zealand colonist imitates his brethren and ancestors at home, – and far surpasses his Australian rival. He is very fond of getting drunk. And I would also observe to the New Zealander generally, as I have done to other colonists, that if he would blow his trumpet somewhat less loudly, the music would gain in its effect upon the world at large.

Gold-fields, in which I do not believe much as the source of permanent prosperity, Auckland has already. New Zealand gold was first found in 1852 at Coromandel, in the province of Auckland, on the peninsula on the further side of the Frith of Thames, about forty miles cast of the town; but the diggings here did not prove productive. In the southern provinces gold "broke out," to use the diggers' phrase, in 1860; but in the Northern Island the

KAURI GUM.

business did not really commence till 1867, when gold was found on the Thames River. The city of Graham's Town, which is now the capital of the Auckland gold-fields, was founded in 1868. Up to the 31st December, 1871, counting from the first finding of the metal, gold to the value of £11,207,760 had been exported from the province of Otago; to the value of £6,343,835 from the county of Westland, which includes Hokitika; to the value of £4,458,340 from the province of Nelson; and to the value only of £2,193,946 from the province of Auckland. But for the year ended 31st December, 1871, Otago exported only £619,760; Westland, £531,648; Nelson, £439,936; whereas Auckland exported, as the produce of that year, £1,888,708. As I had seen many gold-fields in Australia, and gone down many mines, – to the great disturbance of my peace and happiness, – and had generally come away with the impression that I had learned but little by my personal inspection, I did not visit the Thames gold-fields. I am, however, able to say, from inquiry on the subject, that the miners as a body conduct themselves with that general courtesy of manners which I found to be universal among the Australian mining population. I own that I had thought before visiting the colonies that contact with gold made men rough. I am bound to say that, as regards the workers themselves, it seems to have the opposite effect.

Kauri gum – an article of trade found, as far as I am aware, only in the province of Auckland, – has been of material service to the colony. It is used in the glazing of calico, and as a cheap substitute for copal varnish in the preparation of furniture; and also, – if the assertion be not calumny, for the manufacture of amber mouthpieces. I chipped a morsel of kauri gum one day with my penknife in a merchant's store, and then chipped the mouthpiece of my tobacco pipe. The chipping seemed to be identical. I don't see why kauri gum should not make very good mouthpieces for pipes; but, if so, the consumer ought to have the advantage. Kauri gum, at the wholesale price, is worth from 30s. to 40s per cwt.; and as it is very light, a great many pipes could be made beautiful with a hundredweight of kauri gum. In 1870 the amount exported fetched £175,074; and in 1871, £107,958.

The kauri gum exudes from the kauri tree, but is not got by any process of tapping, or by taking the gum from the tree while standing. The tree falls and dies, as trees do fall and die in the course of nature; – whole forests fall and die; and then when the timber has rotted away, when centuries probably have passed, the gum is found beneath the soil. Practice tells the kauri gum-seekers

where to search for the hidden spoil. Armed with a long spear the man prods the earth, – and from the touch he knows the gum when he strikes it. Hundreds of thousands of tons probably still lie buried beneath the soil; but the time will come when the kauri gum will be at an end, for the forests are falling now, not by the slow and kind operation of nature, but beneath the rapid axes of the settlers.

I was taken out from Auckland by a friend to see a kauri forest. Very shortly there will be none to be seen unless the searcher for it goes very far a-field. I was well repaid for my trouble, for I doubt whether I ever saw finer trees grouped together; and yet the foliage of them is neither graceful nor luxuriant. It is scanty, and grows in tufts like little bushes. But the trunks of the trees, and the colour of the timber, and the form of the branches are magnificent. The chief peculiarity seems to be that the trunk appears not to lessen in size at all till it throws out its branches at twenty-five or perhaps thirty feet from the ground, and looks therefore like a huge forest column. We saw one, to which we were taken by a woodsman whom we found at his work, the diameter of which was nine feet, and of which we computed the height up to the first branches to be fifty feet. And the branches are almost more than large in proportion to the height, spreading out after the fashion of an oak, – only in greater proportions.

These trees are fast disappearing. Our friend the woodman told us that the one to which he took us, – and than which he assured us that we could find none larger in the forest, – was soon to fall beneath his axe. When we met him he was triumphing over a huge monster that he had felled, and was splitting it up into shingles for roofing houses. The wood as it comes to pieces is yellow and resinous with gum, and on that account, – so he told us, – was super-excellent for shingles. The trees are never cut down for their gum, which seems to be useless till time has given it a certain consistency. Very soon there will not be a kauri tree left to cut down in the neighbourhood of Auckland.

Many of us still remember the kind of halo which surrounded Bishop Selwyn when he first came out to New Zealand. People thought more about him and his mission than they ever thought of any colonial bishop, – till their thoughts, from quite other causes, were given to Bishop Colenso. This arose partly from his reputation, partly from his being much loved by many good men, partly, no doubt, from the fact that his episcopate was an experiment among a more than usually savage race of savages, – who also, as savages,

MISSIONARY LABOURS.

were more than usually powerful and intelligent. Bishops who went to Calcutta and Sydney were sent out simply to guide the churches of England established lor the use of exiles from our own shores. They certainly did not go out as missionaries. The proselytism of Hindoos, and Mahomedans has ever been looked upon with disfavour at home, – and the Australian savage has generally been regarded as beyond the reach of the Christian teacher. There have been exceptions in both cases, but I think that I have, in the general, stated the truth. But the Bishop of New Zealand went out, not only to guide the Church of England on behalf of the colonists, but also to Christianize the Maori. There can be no question of the zeal, the intellect, and the sagacity with which he did his work.

As to the colonists, there can be as little question as to his success. I doubt whether there be any part of the British dominions in which the Church of England numbers, proportionally, a greater part of the population than in New Zealand. Taking the whole island, she claimed, in February, 1871, 102,359 out of 250,393, or more than two-fifths of the whole. In the province of Auckland, – which on the bishop's arrival was the scene of his first labours, – she claims 28,210, out of 62,335, – thus coming very near to the same proportion. The members of the Presbyterian and of the Roman Catholic Churches, which are the next most numerous, do not together amount to the numbers of the Church of England, either in the colony at large, or in Auckland in particular. I am not saying that these people became members of the Church of England through the exertions of Bishop Selwyn, – -but I think that their numbers show that the Church of which he was the first guide and pastor was well shepherded.

But perhaps his work, as missionary to the natives, was nearer to his heart even than that of ruling the Church of his countrymen. No question is more fiercely debated in New Zealand than that of the success of these endeavours That there was great apparent success, achieved by great labour, and with results of a certain class very widely visible, is certain. It is impossible to arrive at correct numbers with regard to the Maoris, but, undoubtedly, a very large proportion of them became professing Christians. They learned to read, and read the Bible more than any other book. They attended churches, and sung hymns, – and took delight in calling themselves Christians. While I was in the province, a Maori of the name of Wiramu, fifty years old, was ordained a clergyman of the Church of England. But I fear that these efforts,

though they have been unceasing, have in truth but availed little in bringing the very pith of Christianity home to the minds of these people. They have many virtues. They are too proud for petty dishonesty; they are good-natured, and have a manly respect for themselves and for others; they are, in the main, truthful and brave; and their hospitality is proverbial. But these were their virtues of old, – before we came to them; and many who know them will say that these virtues are fading under their assumed Christianity. The virtue of so living, or of striving so to live, that a man's life shall be beneficial to others, and not a curse, – which I regard as the very essence of Christianity, – they have not learned. And that which they did learn very quickly, the forms of the Church, Bible history and Bible stories, the singing of psalms, and especially the ceremonial observance of the Sabbath, is departing from them. Prolonged contact with Europeans has dimmed in their eyes the lustre of European observances, and there is no longer any pride in being a Christian because the Pakehas are Christian. Familiarity has bred contempt. Very many have professedly dropped their Christianity, and, assuming a new form of worship, call themselves Hau-Haus. Among the Kingites, I am told that there remain vestiges of Christian teaching, but joined to forms of worship quite opposed to the lessons they had received from Christian pastors. Even among the friendly tribes the zeal for the thing has died out, and with most of them I think but little remains but a not uncomfortable understanding that Sunday should be more thoroughly devoted to idleness than other days.

I was surprised to find that in New Zealand generally education progresses less favourably than in the Australian colonies. New South Wales, with a population in round numbers of half a million, has 71,503 boys and girls at school, of whom 59,814 are at the common or public schools, and 14,089 at private schools. This gives something over one in seven for the whole population. New Zealand, with a quarter of a million inhabitants, has 18,180 scholars at the common or public schools. I have not the means of getting at the number educated at private schools, but, presuming the proportion to be the same as in New South Wales, the number would be about 4,000. This would give a total of 22,180 at all schools, – or something less than one in eleven. In the North Island the average at the public schools alone is not much above one in twenty, – that in the Middle Island about one in nine.

It is fair, however, to observe with reference to New Zealand generally, that I got no information as to the public schools later

AGRICULTURE IN AUCKLAND.

than that for 1870. None later had been published. For the province of Otago the number had risen from 6,227 scholars in 1870 to 8,662 in 1871, – or by more than one-third. If the two statements be correct, – and I have no reason to doubt either, – the progress shows that the province will very soon be open to no reproach on this head. I fear, however, that such progress as this has not been in the Northern Island. In Auckland I found that the province made no public provision whatever for the education of its children.

A supreme court, with one judge, is held in each of the provinces, – and a court of appeal, at which the judges sit together, is held at Wellington. The chief justice of the colony, Sir George Arney, is, at any rate, at present attached to the province of Auckland. This apparent anomaly has arisen from the removal of the seat of government from Auckland to Wellington.

Auckland is becoming an agricultural province. In another chapter I shall speak of what has been done in the Valley of the Waikato. 2,702,582 acres of land are now held within it by Europeans, with titles confirmed by government; but, nevertheless, it is not a corn-growing country. Meat and wool are its staples. While it contains 181,521 acres under artificial grasses, it had in 1872 but 2,455 acres under wheat. In the year, up to the 30th June, 1872, it imported breadstuff to the value of £59,392. It may, therefore, be accepted as certain that hitherto the farmers of the Northern Island have not found the growth of wheat a profitable employment, and that meat and wool are the produce of the land from which the best return can be had. I may add here, that in the province of Auckland the Maoris still own 11,275,036 acres, of which they hold 2,587,350 acres with a title that has been fixed by passing through the courts and which is recognized by the Crown as enabling the owners to sell the land; – and that they hold 8,687,686 without any such authorized record, which land, therefore, they cannot sell so as to give a recognized title to the purchaser. But in regard to all the land comprised under the latter head, no difficulty would be made by the land court in conferring the title, if the tribes who hold it would consent among themselves to have the property individualized. The ownership by the Maoris is not contested by the European government. At the close of the war, 3,006,905 acres in the province were confiscated from the natives in retaliation for the injury done by the Maori rebels. A small portion of this has been sold; – a portion was restored to the natives. The greater portion of it remains in

the hands of the government. Much of it is at present nearly worthless.

When at Auckland I had the pleasure of meeting Sir George Grey, whose name has been so intimately connected with the fortunes of New Zealand, whether in peace or war. He is now residing at the island of Kawau, some miles from the harbour, and is there turning a wilderness into a garden. I have endeavoured in my remarks about the colonies to abstain from offering opinions as to the conduct of governors who are still living. From many I have received kind hospitality, and I think that a writer for the public should not praise when he feels himself to be deterred by friendship from censure. But, as to Sir George Grey, I may fairly say, without expressing any opinion of my own as to his conduct as governor, that he certainly managed to endear himself in a wonderful way to a population with whom it was his duty to be constantly fighting. There can be no doubt of Sir George Grey's popularity among the Maoris.

The harbour of Auckland is very pretty, – though hardly so picturesque as those of Lyttelton or Wellington; – and it is trustworthy for ships. The immediate harbour is landlocked by the island called Rangitoto, and the bay beyond, called Hauraki Gulf, is again guarded by two further islands, called the Great and Little Barrier. Its ports have been the making of Auckland, which stands on so narrow a neck of land, that it has another harbour, called the Manukau, within seven miles of the city on the western coast, – Auckland itself being on the eastern. This double seaboard has given the place a great advantage, as a portion of the intercolonial trade is made by the eastern route. Thence is made the quickest route to Wellington, Nelson, and Hokitika, and to Melbourne; – and by this route the passengers from Otago and Christchurch generally reach the north. But the direct course from Auckland out to the world at large is by Rangitoto and the Barriers. Till within the last few years, the direct course from Great Britain to New Zealand was round the Cape of Good Hope, or by the Isthmus of Suez and the Australian colonies; – and the direct route home was by Cape Horn, or back by Suez; but now a line of American steamers has been established direct from San Francisco to Auckland, which carries the mails under a contract with the New Zealand government, and which will be a popular route for passengers as soon as a certain prejudice is overcome which in British minds is apt to attach itself to American enterprises.

CHAPTER LXII. THE AUCKLAND LAKES AND HOT WELLS.

THE AUCKLAND LAKES AND HOT WELLS.

CHAPTER LXII.

THE AUCKLAND LAKES AND HOT WELLS.

THE scenery of the Middle Island, though perhaps as fine as anything in Europe, is, I think, altogether unknown even by character, to English travellers. At any rate, I heard little or nothing of it till I was on mv way to New Zealand, and was preparing myself by inquiry for the journey. But I had heard much of geysers or hot springs of the province of Auckland, and was aware that I could see in the North Island jets of boiling water and of steam, – such as could be found elsewhere only in Iceland. One of my first anxieties was to be put in the way of making an excursion into the hot-water territory in such a fashion that I might see whatever was worth seeing, – and this, through the kindness of the Governor, I was enabled to accomplish.

It must be understood that at present there is no road into this country, which lies south of the city of Auckland, – or I may perhaps more accurately say south of the Bay of Plenty, which forms a considerable bight in the very irregular north-western coastline. There is at present no completed road, but roads to it are being made in three directions. There is the route north from Napier, the capital of Hawke Bay, by which a coach runs, – with a short intermediate space of ten miles, over which passengers were still carried on horseback in September, 1872, – as far as Lake Taupo, which is the centre of the island and the largest of the New Zealand lakes. But though there are hot springs near Lake Taupo, and though the grandest jet of all, when it pleases to disport itself, is on Tongariro, a mountain to the south of Taupo, the traveller will see but little of that which he desires to see at the big lake. Lakes Tarawera and Roto Mahana are in truth the spots of which he is in search, and they lie forty miles north of Lake Taupo. The second route is by the valley of the Waikato River, up which a coach runs from Auckland, as far as Cambridge, making the journey in two days. But Cambridge is ninety miles from Taupo, and about fifty from the district of the hot springs. The third route is by Tauranga, a seaport on the Bay of Plenty, which is reached by steamer from Auckland in about twenty hours. From Tauranga, the lakes I have named lie about forty or fifty miles. In either direction, either from Taupo, Cambridge, or Tauranga, the journey

must be made on horseback, – or on foot. Such was the condition of the places at the period of my visit, – but the road from Tauranga was being made through to Taupo, and when this is finished, the lakes and hot springs will be easily accessible. I went by steamer from Auckland to Tauranga, thence I rode through the lakes down to Taupo and back to Cambridge, and returned to Auckland on wheels, having taken a fortnight for the excursion, during seven days of which I was in the saddle. We rode something over thirty miles a day, carrying such baggage as we required ou our horses before us, – carrying also, during a portion of the journey, our provisions also. I was informed that any one desirous of seeing the lakes could hire horses and a competent guide at Tauranga. The trouble of doing this was taken off my hands, as I was accompanied by Captain Mair, of the Native Contingent, and by two orderlies, one a Maori and the other a European. There can, however, be but little doubt that in a year or two the trip will be made easy to all lovers of scenery, and that Roto Mahana and Tarawera will be reached from Auckland, if not so quickly, still as readily as Dartmoor or Windermere from London.

At Tauranga, on the Bay of Plenty, I found myself close to the Gate pah, which was the scene of the massacre of European soldiers on April 29th, 1863, of which I have before spoken. That was the most fatal day throughout the unfortunate Maori war. The pah is now but the relic of a ruined earthwork, in viewing which one requires to be told that the sand-holes covered with briars were rifle-pits, and the stranger, ignorant of strategy as I am, fails to understand how the poor creatures within it could have lived under the storm of iron that was rained upon it. Three miles from the pah, on the very beach of the sea, – so close that a sea-wall has been necessary to prevent the inroad of the waves, – there are the graves of the sixty men, British soldiers, who fell on that unfortunate day. They lie in two lines, and the name of every man is given. But the visitor is chiefly struck by the number of officers who were killed. I counted, I think, the names of eleven on the tombs in the grave-yard.

From Tauranga we rode eighteen miles along the beach to Maketu, when I found myself in the midst of Maoris. These Maoris belong to the Arewa tribe, who were always friendly, – -whereas, at Tauranga the natives were hostile. Consequently the land round Tauranga has been confiscated, and divided among military settlers, whereas the Arewas still hold their ground, – not at all as far as one can see to the advantage of humanity at large.

MOKOIA.

At Maketu I walked up among their settlements, and shook hands with men and women, and smiled at them, and was smiled upon. At the inn they came and sat alongside of me, – so near that the contiguity sometimes almost amounted to an embrace. The children were noisy, jovial, and familiar. As far as one could judge, they all seemed to be very happy. There was a European schoolmaster there, devoted to the Maori children, – who spoke to me much of their present and future condition. He had great faith in their secular learning, but had fears as to their religious condition. He was most anxious that I should see them in school before I departed on the next morning, and I promised that I would do so. Though I was much hurried, I could not refuse such a request to a man so urgent in so good a cause. But in the morning, when I was preparing to be as good as my word, I was told that the schoolmaster had got very drunk after I had gone to bed, had smashed the landlord's windows, and had been carried away to his house by two policemen, – greatly, I hope, to the sorrow of those Maori scholars. After this little affair, it was not thought expedient that I should trouble him at an early hour on the following morning. I cannot but remark here that I saw very much more of drunkenness in New Zealand than in the Australian colonies; and I will remark, also, for the benefit of those who may ever visit these lakes, that there is a very nice little inn at Maketu.

On the following day we rode thirty-five miles, to Ohinemutu through a very barren but by no means unpicturesque country. The land rises and falls in rapid little hills, and is tossed about in a wonderful fashion; – but there is no serious ascent or descent. The first lake seen is Roto Iti, at the end of which we had to swim our horses across a river, passing over it ourselves in a canoe, – as we had done also at Maketu. And here at the end of the lake, we found a very fine Maori house, or whare, – I believe the word is properly so spelt, but it consists of two syllables. And by the whare was a huge war-canoe, capable of carrying some sixty men at the paddles. These, as far as I could learn, were the property of the tribe, rather than of any individual. The whare was a long, low room, with high pitched roof, with an earthen floor, and ornamented with grotesque and indecent carvings. I may, however, as well say that I doubt whether I should have discovered the indecency had it not been pointed out to me. I don't think any one lived in the whare, – -the chief of the tribe, as is usual, preferring his own little hut. No doubt had I wished to stay there, I might have slept on one of the mats with which a portion of the floor is covered.

Roto Iti, as I saw it, was very pretty, but I did not stop to visit the farther end of it, where, as I was told, the chief beauty of it lay. It may be as well to state that Roto is the Maori word for lake. We went on to Ohinemutu, passing a place called Ngae, on the lake Roto Rua, – -whence, according to the Maori legend, a Maori damsel, hearing the flute of her lover in the island Mokoia, swam off to him. As the distance is hardly more than a mile, and as the Maoris are all swimmers, the feat did not seem to me to be very wonderful, – till I heard that the flute was made out of the tibia of a man's leg. At present there is a telegraph station at Ngae, and I found an unfortunate telegraphist living in solitude, inhabiting a small office on the lake side. Of course one took the opportunity of telegraphing to all one's friends; – but as visitors to Roto Rua are as yet but very scarce, I can hardly think that the station can pay its expenses.

On the farther side of Roto Iti I had seen great jets of steam at a distance. At Ohinemutu, on Roto Rua, I came to the first hot springs which I saw closely, and I must own that at first they were not especially pleasing. Before reaching the spot, we had to take our horses through the edge of the lake up to their bellies, at a place where the water was so impregnated with sulphur as to be almost unbearable on account of the stench. I had known the smell of sulphur before, – but here it seemed as though the sulphur were putrid. Ohinemutu itself is a poor little Maori village, which seems to have collected itself round the hot springs, close on the borders of the lake, with a view to the boiling of potatoes without the trouble of collecting fuel. Here was a little inn, – or accommodation-house, as it is colonially called, – kept by a European with a half-caste wife, at which the traffic must be very small indeed. He appeared to be the only white inhabitant of the place, and I cannot say that I thought him happily placed in regard to his neighbours or neighbourhood. At Ohinemutu there is nothing pretty. The lake itself has no special loveliness to recommend it. But close upon its edge, there are numerous springs of boiling water, – so close that some of them communicate with the lake, making the water warm for some distance from the shore. There were half-a-dozen pools within a couple of hundred yards of the inn, in which you could boil potatoes or bathe at your will, choosing the heat which you thought desirable. Close beside the gate was one pool which is always boiling. My companion told me that a Maori man had come to him at that spot, desiring to be enlisted in the Maori Contingent. He was bound to refuse the recruit as being too old, –

BATHING AT OHINEMUTU.

whereupon the disappointed man threw himself into the pool and was boiled to death. Along the path thence to the bathing-pool mostly frequented by the Maoris, there were various small jets here and there, some throwing up a little water, and others a little steam, – very suggestive of accidents in the dark. Such accidents are not at all uncommon, the thin crust of earth not unfrequently giving way and letting through the foot of an incautious wanderer into a small boiling cauldron below. Farther on there is the small square pool, round and in which Maoris are always clustering; – on which no European would, I should imagine, ever desire to encroach, for the Maoris are many, and the waters are not much. Above and around this, flat stones have been fixed on the earth over steam-jets, – and here the Maoris squat and talk, and keep themselves warm. They seem to become so fond of the warmth as hardly to like to stir out of if. A little to the left, there is a small landlocked cove of the lake in which canoes were lying, and into which a hot spring finds its way, – so that the water of the whole cove may perhaps average ninety degrees of heat. Here on the following morning I bathed, and found myself able to swim without being boiled. But on the previous evening, about nine, when it was quite dark, I had bathed in another pool, behind the inn. Here I had gone in very light attire to make my first experience of these waters, my friend the Captain accompanying me, and here we found three Maori damsels in the pool before us. But this was nothing, – nothing, at least, in the way of objection. The night was dark; and if they thoroughly understood the old French proverb which has become royally English, why should we be more obstinate or less intelligent? I crept down into the pool, and as I crouched beneath the water, they encouraged me by patting me on the back. The place was black, and shallow, but large enough for us all. I sat there very comfortably for half-an-hour while they conversed with the Captain, – who was a Maori scholar. Then I plunged into a cold river which runs into the lake a few yards from the hot spring, and then returned to the hot water amidst the renewed welcomings of the Maori damsels. And so I passed my first evening among the geysers, very pleasantly.

At Ohinemutu I saw nothing of uplifted columns of boiling water; – nor throughout the district did I see any thing of the kind at all equal to the descriptions which I had read and heard. Indeed, I came across nothing which I could call a column of water thrown up and dispersed in the air. At some spots there were sudden eruptions, which would rise with a splutter rather than a column,

perhaps six or eight feet high, – throwing boiling spray around, and creating an infinite quantity of steam; but these were not continuous, – lasting perhaps for a minute, and remaining quiescent for four or five, during which the rumbling and boiling of the waters beneath would be heard. In others places, jets of steam would be thrown up to a considerable height, – probably over twenty feet. As to the jets of water, I was told that I was unfortunate, and that the geysers were very tranquil during my visit. I have, however, observed, all the world over, that the world's wonders, when I have reached them, have been less than ordinarily wonderful.

But I had not yet come to Roto Mahana, and was therefore not disappointed with Ohinemutu. Any deficiency in the geysers had been made up by the courtesy of the girls, – and it had been something to bathe in a lake, in water almost boiling me. On the next morning we rode up to a place called Wakarewarewa, about three miles from the lake, at which the sulphur, and the steam, and the noisy roaring boiling processes, were going on with great ferocity at various holes. Perhaps in some respects the thing is better realized as I saw it, than when columns of water are thrown up. I could stand and look down into the holes, and become thoroughly aware that a very slight spring, a step forward, would not only destroy me, but destroy me with terrible agony. All around me were small boiling pools, – for the most part delightfully blue, – each of which had its own boiling spring at the bottom. And among the pools were great holes in the rocks, crusted with sulphur, out of which the geysers ought to have been lifting their heads, but down which instead I could look, and see and hear the ferocious boiling waters. At Wakarewarewa there were no Maoris, and no inhabitants of any kind.

From thence we rode on past a beautiful little sheet of water called the Blue Lake to Kaiteriria, on another lake, – Roto Kakiki. Kaiteriria is the spot at which a certain number of the native contingent force, – the Maori soldiers in the pay of the government, – are kept, I cannot say in barracks, but in what I may perhaps call a Europeanized pah. The men live in huts of their own, but the huts are surrounded by a palisade, at the two gates of which Maori sentinels are stationed. The men are under the command of a European officer, who had two other Europeans with him in the depot. There seemed to be no danger of any disturbance among the men. As long as they are paid, and fed well, and not overworked, these Arewa Maoris are too well alive to the advantages of their military service to risk them by mutiny or disobedience. The value

LAKE TARAWERA.

attached to the service may he understood by the act of the man who boiled himself to death because he could not be admitted.

The entrance to Roto Mahana is by a beautiful little stream, which empties that lake into Tarawera, and Tarawera is about four miles from Kaiteriria. At the head of Tarawera, – which, in point of scenery, is by far the finest of all these lakes, as Roto Mahana is the most interesting, – much had been done to form a civilized settlement of Maoris. There was a church, a clergyman's house, a corn-mill, and a considerable extent of cleared land lying amid the beautifully broken ground. The church was empty, and deserted. The clergyman's house was falling into decay, and was occupied by a Maori woman and a Frenchman. The corn-mill was choked up, and in ruins. On the laud there was no sign of crop, or of preparation for crops. Peach-trees had been planted in abundance, – and here and there patches were bright with the pink peach-blossom. English primroses were in full flower up at the parsonage. But everything was going back to the savageness of the wilderness. The attempt had been made, and had been made among a friendly tribe; – but it had failed, and the failure seemed to have been acknowledged. There were Maoris in plenty, – a village full of Maoris. When I asked how they lived, I was told that they were Friendlies, and that therefore the government fed them. This Maori chief had a salary, – and that Maori chief. Then there were men on the roads who received wages, – and the sugar-and-flour policy was prevailing. It might be better to feed them than to have to fight them.

I do not at all intend to find fault with the policy at present pursued in regard to the Maoris, – neither with the existing policy nor with any previous policy. I know the great difficulty of the subject, – arising from our desire to do, after some fashion that shall be as little unjust as possible, a thing which according to our light seems to be radically unjust from the beginning. The attempt at justice has been so earnest that adverse criticism is stopped. And any one presuming to criticize should have had much more opportunity of mastering the subject than has come in my way. But I think that I could see that the race was not progressing towards civilization, either with or without Christianity, as it was our thought that they would progress. The people are dying out, – and thus, and thus only, will the Maori difficulty be solved.

The deserted church and parsonage, with the Maori village, which no longer wanted a corn-mill because rations of flour and rations of biscuit were at their command, were most picturesquely placed

among the hills from which we descended to Lake Tarawera. Here we found a canoe with three natives, our own party consisting of the Captain, two Europeans under his orders, and myself. The passage across the lake to the mouth of the little stream coming out of Roto Mahana, took us four hours. The shape of the lake is so fine, the mountains so well grouped, and the timber so good, that the spot will undoubtedly become famous with tourists on some future day, even if there were no hot lake near, and no geysers to attract holiday wanderers. Tarawera has this advantage among lakes, – that it is almost equally lovely on all sides. At the mouth of the river the Captain and I got out and walked to Roto Mahana, while the men worked the long canoe against the sharp stream, one or two of the natives getting into the water for the purpose. Before leaving the larger lake the water had gradually become warm, and in the river which came cut from Roto Mahana it was almost tepid. For the hot springs round Roto Mahana are sufficiently numerous to warm the whole lake, which is small and irregularly formed, being perhaps a mile long and half a mile broad.

Here we found an incredible number of ducks, – as to which I was told that the Maoris do not approve of their being shot. In fact they are "tapu," or sacred by Maori law, – in order that they may be the better preserved for a great slaughtering and preserving process, which takes place once a year, in December. But the "tapu" in these days has become, even to Maoris themselves, a thing very much of pounds, shillings, and pence, or of other material conditions. The "tapu" was taken off the ducks for the Duke of Edinburgh, when he visited Roto Mahana, – and might, I think, be lifted for awhile to accommodate any one who would pay high enough for a day or two's shooting.

It was nearly dark when we reached the lake, – there being just light enough for us to see the white terraces as we passed across the lowest part of them. We were to eat our supper and sleep in a whare on the side of the lake, a little away from the terraces, in the midst of various steam-jets and water-jets. As I followed my leader through the bush I was cautioned not to step aside here, or to make a blunder there. In one place the Governor's aide-de-camp's dog had been boiled alive in a mud-jet, and in another a native girl had dropped a baby, and had herself plunged in after the poor infant, – hopelessly, tragically gone for ever amidst horrible torments. I heard more, however, of the Governor's aide-de-camp's dog than I did of the girl and the baby. These mud-jets, or solfataras, are to be seen throughout the whole district, and are very far from being

ROTO MAHANA.

lovely. By some infernal chemistry, probably not very low beneath the surface, earth and water are mixed and are sent up in a boiling condition. When the aperture is small the mud simply boils and bubbles. When the mouth is large it is thrown up, and lies around in a great bubbling ring of dirt, soft and hot, and most damnable to any one who should place a foot upon it. Solfataras is a very pretty name, but the thing itself is very ugly both to the eye and to the imagination.

Our whare was close upon the lake-side, close also to various boiling springs. Here we cooked our bacon and potatoes, and then, when it was dark, crouched into a warm pool, and sat there and enjoyed ourselves. When the water became too warm I crept out into the lake, which was close at hand, with a barrier of stones dividing them, and which was warm also, though less warm than any of the pools. And then I got back again into the pool, conscious of the close vicinity of a naked Maori, who was supposed to see that I fell into no difficulties. But here the companions of the bath were of the less interesting sex, and I almost wished that they were away. The bathing was certainly good fun, but the night in the whare afterwards was less enjoyable. The ground was hard, the adjacent stream made the air hot and muggy, – and I had a feeling as of many insects.

The glory of Roto Mahana is in the terraces. There are the white terraces on the side on which we had slept, and the pink terraces across the lake. I will endeavour in describing these to avoid any word that may seem to savour of science, – being altogether ignorant in such matters, – -and will endeavour simply to say what I saw and felt. These terraces are formed of a soft friable stone, which is deposited by the waters streaming down from the hot pools above. The white terraces are in form the finer of the two. They are about three hundred feet in width, and rise nearly two hundred in height from the lake. As you ascend from the bottom you step along a raised fretwork of stone, as fine as chased silver. Among this the water is flowing, so that dry feet are out of the question, but the fret-work, if the feet be kept on it, assists the walker, as the water, though it runs over it, of course runs deeper through it. As you rise higher and higher, the water, which at the bottom is hardly more than tepid, becomes warmer and warmer. And then on one terrace after another there are large shell-like alabaster baths, holding water from three to four feet deep, – of different temperatures as the bather may desire them. Of course the basins are not alabaster, – but are made of

the deposit of the waters, which is, I believe, silica; – but they are as smooth as alabaster, only softer. And on the outside rims, where the water has run, dripping over, century after century, nature has carved for herself wonderful hanging ornaments and exquisite cornices, with that prolific hand which never stints itself in space because of expense, and devotes its endless labour to front and rear with equal persistency. On the top terrace is the boiling lake from whence the others are filled.

We had swum in Roto Mahana early in the morning, and did not bathe at the white terraces, having been specially recommended to reserve ourselves for those on the other side. So we crossed the lake to the pink terraces. In form, as I have said before, the white terraces are the finer. They are larger, and higher, and the spaces between the pools are more exquisitely worked, – and to my eye the colour was preferable. Both are in truth pink. Those which have the name of being so are brighter, and are salmon-coloured. They are formed after the same fashion, and the baths are constructed, – of course by nature, – in the same way. But those which we last visited were, I was told, more delicious to the bather. I can, indeed, imagine nothing more so. The bather undresses on a piece of dry rock a few yards distant, and is in his bath in half a minute without the chance of hurting his feet, – for it is one of the properties of the stone flooring which has here been formed that it does not hurt. In the bath, when you strike your chest against it, it is soft to the touch, – you press yourself against it and it is smooth, – you lie about upon it and, though it is firm, it gives to you. You plunge against the sides, driving the water over with your body, but you do not bruise yourself. You go from one bath to another, trying the warmth of each. The water trickles from the one above to the one below, coming from the vast boiling pool at the top, and the lower therefore are less hot than the higher. The baths are shell-like in shape, – like vast open shells, the walls of which are concave and the lips of which ornamented in a thousand forms. Four or five may sport in one of them, each without feeling the presence of the other. I have never heard of other bathing like this in the world.

And from the pink terraces, as you lie in the water, you look down upon the lake which is close beneath you, and over upon the green broken hills which come down upon the lake. The scene here, from the pink terraces, is by far the lovelier, though the white terraces themselves are grander in their forms. It is a spot for intense sensual enjoyment, and there comes perhaps some addition

ROTO MAHANA.

to the feeling from the roughness you have encountered in reaching it; – a delight in dallying with it, from the roughness which you must encounter in leaving it. The time probably will soon come in which there will be a sprightly hotel at Roto Mahana, with a table d'hote, and boats at so much an hour, and regular seasons for bathing. As I lay there, I framed the programme of such a hotel in my mind, – and I did so, fixing the appropriate spot as I squatted in the water, and calculating how much it would cost and what return it would give. I was somewhat troubled by the future bathing arrangements. To enclose the various basins would spoil them altogether to the eye. To dabble about in vestments arranged after some French fashion would spoil the bathing to the touch. And yet it must be open to men and women alike. The place lies so broad to the world's eye that I fear no arrangement as to hours, no morning for the gentlemen and evening for the ladies, would suffice. Alas, for the old Maori simplicity and perfect reliance on the royal adage! The ladies, indeed, might have the pink, and the men the white terraces; but the intervening lake would discourage social intercourse, – and there would be interlopers and intruders who might break through the "tapu" of modern propriety. After bathing we went to the top, and walked round the hot spring from which the water descends. It has formed a lake about a quarter of a mile in circumference, the waters of which are constantly boiling, and are perfectly blue. In the centre it is said to be many feet deep. The colour is lovely, but in order to see it we had to get behind the wind, so that the steam should not be blown into our faces. As we came down we found parts of the crusted floor perfectly yellow with pure sulphur, and parts of the fretted stone-work on the under curves of the rocks, where they were not exposed to the light, as perfectly green. Then there were huge masses brightly salmon-coloured, and here and there delicately-white fretwork, and the lips and sides of the baths were tinted with that delicate pink hue which we are apt to connect with soft luxury.

We returned across the small warm lake, and down the rapid river, – which has some Maori name meaning the "breaking of canoes," derived from the accidents occasioned by the rapid windings of the stream; and we were rowed again across the great lake Tarawera to the deserted chapel and the broken corn-mill, – and thence we walked to Kaiteriria, where I slept amidst the Native Contingents.

Having done this I had really seen the hot springs of the province of Auckland, and I would advise no traveller who is simply desirous of seeing them to go farther south. One cannot travel through any

part of that wild country without seeing much that is worth seeing, and south of Roto Mahana or of Kaiteriria there are are very many steam-jets and geysers. As I have said before, the greatest geyser of all, when it chooses to play, is on Tongariro, south of Lake Taupo. But jets of boiling water, and jets of steam, and jets of mud, though they are wonderful, are hardly in themselves beautiful; – and in the neighbourhoods of Ohinemutu and of Roto Mahana there are enough to gratify even an ardent curiosity. But I had made my plans to see Lake Taupo, and to return by the Valley of the Waikato, and this I did. From Kaiteriria to Taupo it was a long day's work, – the distance of which we increased from forty-five to fifty miles by losing our way. On the route we passed a hot river in which we bathed, – a river which became hot at a certain point by the operation of a boiling spring, and then cooled itself by degrees, – so that the bather might wade into hotter or into cooler water as he might wish. Fifteen miles beyond this we crossed, for the first time, the Waikato River, which in the lower part of its course had been the scene of so much fighting, and here we left the friendly Arewa tribe and got among the Wharetowa, who in the time of the war were our foes. When we crossed the river we found a village, and another close to the lake, – looking poor, miserable, and dirty. At ten o'clock at night we crossed back over the Waikato, and found ourselves at the town of Tapuaeharu, which consists of a large redoubt held by European armed constabulary, and of an inn. There were a few Maori whares round about, but they clustered chiefly on the side of the river we had just left.

I crossed the lake, which is about twenty-five miles long and twenty-two broad, in a boat rowed by six constables, and put up for the night at the Maori village of Takano at the other end. The country all around, – as it had been indeed since we left Maketu, with the exception of small patches at the head of Tarawera, – was not only uncultivated but apparently barren and poor by its nature. The ordinary growth is a low stunted fern, which sometimes gives place to tufts of thick yellow> grass. I was told that sheep had been tried upon it in places, but that they had fallen off and had perished. The attempt had been a failure. At Tokano there was a large village, and here I found in the valley of the river some potato patches. The land was better than it had been beyond the lake; but I saw nothing that savoured either of prosperity or of civilization. Old tattooed natives came and grinned at me. Young women, tattooed, as are all the women, on the under-lip, sat close to me and chattered to me; and young mem kindly shook me by the hand. I

THE WAIKATO.

encountered nothing but Maori friendship; – but at the same time I encountered no Maori progress. As I had not time to go on to Tongariro I returned on the next day to the other end of the lake, – and during the following three days I rode to Cambridge, a new little town on the Lower Waikato.

The distance is about ninety miles, and a more desolate country it would be hard to imagine. In the first eighty miles there is not a sign of cultivation. The land is fern-covered, and is very poor, and is not yet in the hands of Europeans. During the whole distance we descended the course of the Waikato, though at some places we were miles away from it. Our first night we spent at another depot of the native contingent force, in a collection of huts similar to that at Kaiteriria. Here again we bathed in a warm spring close to the river, and here again we crossed the Waikato in a canoe.

Some of the scenery on this route was certainly very fine. We passed through one winding gorge, with the rocks high above our heads, which seemed to be the very spot for another Thermopylae And at certain places the river had made for itself a grand course, rushing down rapids, and cutting a deep channel for itself between narrow banks. But the desolation of the country was its chief characteristic. There were no men or women, and nothing on which men and women could live. There were no animals, – hardly even a bird to be seen, till as we came near to European haunts, we occasionally put up one of the pheasants with which the Lower Waikato has been stocked. There is perhaps no country in the world more destitute of life than the wilder parts of the Northern Island of New Zealand. During one long day a wild cat was the only animal we saw after leaving the neighbourhood of the place from which we started. On that night we slept at a Maori pah, which we did not reach till dark, – and before reaching it we had to pass through a dense wood in darkness so thick that I could not see my hand. I mention the fact in order that I may express my wonder at the manner in which my friend the Captain made his way through it. That night I had a small Maori hut all to myself, – one in which were deposited all the tokens of recent Maori habitation. There was a little door just big enough for ingress, – hardly big enough for egress, – and a heap of fern-leaves, and a looking-glass, and a bottle which looked like perfumery, – and the feeling as of many insects. In the morning two old women cooked some potatoes for us, - -and I rode away, intending never to spend another night among the Maoris.

They are certainly more highly gifted than other savage nations I have seen. They are as superior in intelligence and courage to the Australian Aboriginal as they are in outward appearance. They are more pliable and nearer akin in their manners to civilized mankind than are the American Indians. They are more manly, more courteous, as also more sagacious than the African negro. One can understand the hope and the ambition of the first great old missionaries who had dealings with them. But contact with Europeans does not improve them. At the touch of the higher race they are poisoned and melt away. There is scope for poetry in their past history. There is room for philanthropy as to their present condition. But in regard to their future, – there is hardly a place for hope.

CHAPTER LXIII. THE WAIKATO.

CHAPTER LXIII.

THE WAIKATO.

IN 1864, when the war in the Waikato was over, though no final victory had been won, and no peace proclaimed, we assumed the power of conquerors, and confiscated in the North Island the lands from which we had driven the fighting Maoris. In this way we took possession of nearly four million acres, and, as regards this territory, we have so far settled the land difficulty that we have held the ground ever since. More than half of these acres are in the province of Auckland, and nearly a million and a quarter lie in the Valley of the Waikato. Now the Waikato tribe were among our enemies. Most of them we have killed, and the rest have receded among a tribe who were still more bitterly inimical to us, the Ngatimaniapoto, – who are still enemies, though at present quiet enemies, who have the king among them, and live according to their own laws, and will not allow our telegraph posts to be put up, – and are altogether a great nuisance to the young colony. But the Waikato tribe, as a tribe, is exterminated.

The acquisition of the Valley of the Waikato, which contains excellent land, was a great thing done. The natives by the treaty of Waitangi, had been declared to be the owners of the land, – -and the difficulty in buying land from them was great. There was trouble in getting it from them unfairly; – more trouble in getting it fairly. But acquisition by war settled all this. A great portion

FARMING ON THE WAIKATO.

of the acquired land was divided out among military settlers, and the remainder kept for sale to selectors. The military settlers have not generally succeeded as farmers in New Zealand; – but the general process has been successful. After a short period of occupation, the old soldiers were enabled to sell their lands, and have very generally done so. The purchasers have gone upon it with true colonizing intentions, and now the upper part of the Lower Waikato and the Valley of the Waipa which runs into it, the districts round the new towns of Cambridge, Alexandra, Hamilton, and Newcastle, are smiling with English grasses. I was there in 1872; the first occupation of it by Europeans had been in 1865; and the wilderness had become a garden. I do not know that I have ever seen the effects of a quicker agricultural transformation. This has been effected on the land of natives who had been hostile and had fought with us, and who had therefore lost their possessions. Among the Arewas, "the Friendlies," I did not see one cultivated patch of ground.

Coming down the Waikato during our last day's ride, the king's country had been on our left, just over the river. I had been told, and I believe truly, that a European might now travel through it safely if he wore no uniform or were not ostensibly armed. And among the Kingites, as they are now called, a certain amount of agriculture is carried on. They want potatoes and corn, and cannot get them by other means. The question now is whether they shall be allowed to die out on their own territory, – which is claimed by us as British territory, but in which the British law, or the law of the colony, does not run, in which we cannot put up a telegraph wire or make a road, – or whether we shall make good our claims to political dominion? In the meantime the natives in these parts still hold the escaped criminal Te Kooti, in endeavouring to retake whom we have spent something like half a million of money, and may on any day make a raid on our advanced settlers on the Waikato and Waipa. All politicians in New Zealand find consolation at any rate in the reflection, that while the matter is being considered the Maoris are melting. The flour-and-sugar policy, 5 joined with the melting policy, will probably carry the day to the end.

A party of gentlemen from Auckland met me at Cambridge, which is as it were the frontier settlement of civilization in that direction. From thence we were driven by Mr. Quick, that gallant American coach proprietor and true descendant of the great Cobb,

through Ohaupo to Alexandra, thence to Hamilton, Newcastle, Rangariri, fatally known to British arms during the war, and then on through Mercer and Drury back to Auckland. During the earlier part of this journey, and down to the junction of the Waipa and Waikato at Newcastle, we were for the most part among fields green with English grasses. The fern, which throughout the district had occupied the land, is first burned off, the land is then ploughed, and grass seeds are sown. Then in two years' time it will carry five, six, and on some ground seven sheep to the acre. I saw very little wheat farming, and was told here, – as I was in all parts of the Northern Island, – that it did not pay to grow cereal crops. A man might produce what oats he could use, – and what wheat he wanted if he had a mill near him. But the high rate of wages, – averaging over 4s. a day, – and the cost of transit combined, make the farmers afraid of wheat. Though the land is excellent for the purpose, and the climate not unpropitious, I saw on the road flour, imported into Auckland, on its way up to these agricultural settlements. As in most of the Australian colonies, so in most of the New Zealand provinces, farmers who no doubt know what they are about, are afraid of growing wheat. They cannot get in their seed and get their crops off without hired labour, – and for hired labour wheat at 5s. a bushel will not enable them to pay. The labourer with his 4s. a day will get more out of the crop than the farmer who employs him. Meat is at present the great produce of the Waikato valley, – for sheep and oxen will feed themselves if there be grass, and will then carry themselves kindly to the market. All English fruits grow there, and all vegetables. It is a country of great abundance, – and the day will come when the valley will be yellow with corn.

At Alexandra, which is the European outpost in the direction of the Ngatimaniapoto tribe and the Kingites, – -and which is so near the "King" country that a moderate walk of three or four miles would place you in his Majesty's dominions, – we found a large fort or redoubt in the course of construction. It was being made, we were told, as a place of refuge for the inhabitants, should the king's people ever attempt to make a raid upon the town. "It would be the saving of the lives of all the women and children," said one of my companions. I could not help thinking that I would not like to live in a place where such refuge might be necessary, – and that it was a pity that it should still be necessary in any part of her Majesty's dominions. The inhabitants, however, seemed to fear nothing, and were of opinion that the Kingites would not come

BACK TO AUCKLAND.

down upon them. I found the feeling to be general throughout the islands that if the property now left to the natives were respected, – not only in regard to those rights of property which belong to individual owners in all civilized lands, but also as to political rights, – if the Europeans should not insist on extending their dominion, as they would do, for instance, if they were to continue their attempts to retake Te Kooti, – then there would be peace; but that the Kingites would surely fight, should we practically assume dominion over the small portion of the Northern Island still left to them. Some time since the Governor thought that it would be expedient that he should meet the king, on friendly terms. But the king thought otherwise, – "What have I to do with the Governor, or the Governor with me?" So there was no meeting.

Rangariri, where the fighting took place in 1863, – where the natives held two redoubts when General Cameron attacked them, and escaped from the one in the night, surrendering the other on the following morning, after a terrible slaughter inflicted on our men, – is on the Waikato, below Newcastle. Here again I saw the crowded graves of British soldiers, and the wooden memorials, bearing the name of each, already mouldering into dust. The redoubts are now but heaps of earth, one of which is already hardly discernible by the remnants of the rifle-pits which remain.

From this, down to Mercer, and nearly as far as Drury, – so called from my old friend and school-fellow, Captain Drury, Lord Byron's godson, who surveyed the coasts in these parts, and selected the site of the capital, – the land is again poor. There is now a railway in course of construction from Auckland up to Mercer, and from thence there is water-carriage by the two rivers to Cambridge and Alexandra. That the colony can afford to make these railways, I will not take upon myself to say. The making of them is a part of that grand go-ahead policy of which Mr. Vogel is the eminent professor. That the Waikato district will be benefited by the railway when it is made there can be no doubt whatever.

I returned to Auckland under Mr. Quick's able guidance, and then my wanderings in these colonies were over. Three days afterwards I shipped myself on board the famous American steamer "Nebraska," Captain Harding, and was carried safely by him as far as Honolulu, among the Sandwich Islands, on my way home.

5 The flour-and-sugar policy is the nickname given to the practice by which the Government bribes the tribes into submission.

CHAPTER LXIV. CONCLUSION.

CONCLUSION.

CHAPTER LXIV.

CONCLUSION.

I HAVE now finished my task, and have very little, I may almost say nothing, to add in a final chapter. My ideas as to the general condition of the colonies I have given in the introduction; and I have, I hope, told plainly, – have certainly told at full length, – the impressions which I received of each of them as I went on. I am aware, indeed, that I have endeavoured to tell too much; and that in a work which from its nature must necessarily be desultory and hurried, – conditions which are obligatory on a writer who desires to produce his descriptions fresh by writing them as he goes, – I have been tempted to details, the value of which depends on their accuracy. I have striven to be accurate, but I know that I must often have failed. I think, however, that the general result of the figures which I have given will be found to be correct.

The phenomenon in regard to the Australian colonies which most powerfully strikes the observer is the intensity of the feeling of separate interest which divides one from another. There is at present very little tendency among them to that combination which seems to me to be essential to their future greatness. That they will at some time combine themselves I look upon as certain. When the leading politicians of the colonies are "colonial born" there will rise up among them a feeling of Australian patriotism, – rivalling, and at last exceeding, that British patriotism which is at present felt as a passion among the people. Regard for the country of their birth will lead them to look for Australian greatness, and the way to that condition can be found only in Federation. And, as certainly, Federation will lead to ultimate Separation from the mother country. Here, in these few last words, I will not trouble the

reader by repeating what I have already said on this tender subject. I will not again argue that they who love Great Britain well, may, without offence to her or her Colonial Empire, look forward with satisfaction to the future separation of Australasia. But I agree with those who think that the day for such a step has not yet come, and that much has yet to be done before it can arrive. Holding this view I can see with less regret that present fashion among the colonies of holding themselves aloof from each other of which I have spoken.

But there is a step which I regard as precursive of Federation which I think should be taken at once, and as to which I would hope that action might be commenced in aid of it by our Colonial Office in Downing Street. The immediate prosperity of the colonies is greatly injured, and their career impeded by the want of a customs union among them. They cannot consume the produce one of another, and therefore cannot lay themselves out for the productions for which they are best qualified, because prohibitory customs duties exist among them. Sugar from Queensland, wine from New South Wales, flour from South Australia, and fruit and hops from Tasmania cannot reach the Victorian consumers without a customs duty, – and consequently the producers of those articles, each in his own colony, are restricted in their work of producing. Consequently also the people of Victoria are restricted in their consumption. My first immediate wish for the colonies is that they should join in establishing a customs union.

Here, in England, we naturally regard the colonies chiefly as the recipients of our redundant population. In that respect they are invaluable to us. We may probably be justified in saying that our great increase of people has been given to us in order that we might populate such lands. But we have much redundant population for which they are not fitted. The penniless young man who wants a genteel position, and who bases his claim to that condition of things on his education, will not generally find his claim allowed. If he go out with his position assured to him by interest it may be well with him, otherwise he will descend into the lowest grade of servitude, and will probably find himself a shepherd. The same fate in a different form will be the fate of ladies who emigrate hoping to earn by their talents and acquirements that bread which a too crowded market makes it difficult for them to find here. For their wares, excellent as they are, the market is also crowded there. Such are not the emigrants that Great Britain should be most urgent to send.

But for men who can and will work with their hands, for women who can cook and be generally useful about a household, for girls who are ready to learn to cook and to be generally useful, these colonies are a paradise. They will find the whole condition of life changed for them. The slight estimation in which labour is held here will be changed for a general respect. The humbleness, the hat-touching, the servility which is still incidental to such work as theirs in this old country, and which is hardly compatible with exalted manhood, has found no footing there. I regard such manhood among the masses of the people as the highest sign of prosperity which a country can give.

[Appendix No. VII. and Appendix No. VIII]

APPENDIX.

Appendix No. VII., page 550.

SIR GEORGE BOWEN'S ACCOUNT OF THE SOUTH-WESTERN SOUNDS OF NEW ZEALAND.

WE left Wellington on the. 4th of last February, but the "Clio" was much delayed at first by baffling winds, and afterwards by a strong contrary gale with a heavy sea. We reached Milford Sound on the 11th, and remained there, thoroughly examining that extraordinary inlet, until the 17th February.

Admiral Richards has observed 6 that the only harbours of shelter for large ships along the West Coast of the Middle Island of New Zealand – a distance of five hundred miles – are the thirteen sounds or inlets which penetrate its southwestern shore between the parallels of 44 deg. and 40 deg. south latitude, including a space of little more than one hundred miles. They are, counting from the north, and according to the names given chiefly by the adventurous whalers, who alone have frequented these inhospitable regions, as follows: – 1. Milford Sound; 2. Bligh Sound; 3. George Sound; 4. Caswell Sound; 5. Charles Sound; 6. Nancy Sound; 7. Thomson Sound; 8. Doubtful Inlet; 9. Daggs Sound; 10. Breaksea Hound; 11. Dusky Bay; 12. Chalky, or Dark Cloud Inlet; 13. Preservation Inlet. As I wrote to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, these arms of the Great Southern Ocean, cleaving their way through the massive sea wall of steep and rugged cliffs, reach far into the wild solitudes of the lofty mountains which form the Cordillera, or "dividing range," of the Middle Island. These mountains attain their highest elevation further north, in Mount Cook, a snowy peak rising 13,200 feet above the sea level, and visible in clear weather at a distance of more than a hundred miles to the mariner approaching New Zealand; thus forming a noble monument of the illustrious navigator who first recommended the planting of an English settlement in this country. Though Milford Sound far surpasses the others in stern magnificence of scenery, these inlets have many features in common. To quote Admiral Richards: – "A view of the surrounding country from the summit of one of the mountains bordering the coast, of from 4,000 to 5,000 feet in elevation, is perhaps one of the most grand and magnificent spectacles it is possible to imagine; and standing on such an elevation rising over the south side of Caswell's Sound, Cook's description of this region was forcibly called to mind. He says: – 'A prospect more rude and craggy is rarely to be met with, for inland appeared nothing but the summits of mountains of a stupendous height, and consisting of rocks that are totally barren and naked, except where they are covered with snow.' We could only compare the scene around us as far as the eye could reach, north to Milford Haven, south to Dusky Bay, and eastward inland for a distance of sixty miles, to a vast sea of mountains of every possible variety of shape and ruggedness; the clouds and mist floated far beneath us, and the harbour appeared no more than an insignificant stream. The prospect was most bewildering; and even to a practised eye, the possibility of recognizing any particular mountain, as a point of the survey from a future station, seemed almost hopeless."

The following extract from Dr. Hector's account of Milford Sound shows the probable mode of its formation: – "Three miles from the entrance of the sound it becomes contracted, to the width of half a mile, and its sides rise perpendicularly from the water's edge, sometimes for 2,000 feet, and then slope at a high

angle to the peaks that are covered with perpetual snow. The scenery is quite equal to the finest that can be enjoyed by the most difficult and toilsome journeys into the Alps of the interior; and the effect is greatly enhanced, as well as the access made more easy, by the incursion of the sea, as it were, into their alpine solitudes. The sea, in fact, now occupies a chasm that was in past ages ploughed by an immense glacier; and it is through the natural progress of events by which the mountain mass has been reduced in altitude that the ice stream has been replaced by the waters of the ocean. The evidence of this change may be seen at a glance. The lateral valleys join the main one at various elevations, but are all sharply cut off by the precipitous wall of the sound, the erosion of which was no doubt continued by a great central glacier long after the subordinate and tributary glaciers had ceased to exist. The precipices exhibit the marks of ice-action with great distinctness, and descend quite abruptly to a depth of 800 to 1,200 feet below the water level. Towards its head the sound becomes more expanded, and receives several large valleys that preserve the same character, but radiate in different directions into the highest ranges. At the time that these valleys were filled with glaciers, a great 'ice lake' must have existed in the upper and expanded portion of the sound, from which the only outlet would be through the chasm which forms its lower part."

On account of the great depth of water in these inlets, and of the sudden storms of wind rushing down from the mountains above, vessels are generally obliged to moor to trees or pinnacles of rock, whenever they reach a cove in which an anchor can be dropped. Accordingly, while we were in Milford Sound the "Clio" lay at anchor in Harrison's Cove, only a few yards from the shore, and moored head and stern to huge trunks of trees. Immediately above rose Pembroke Peak to the height of nearly 7,000 feet, covered with perpetual snow, and with a glacier reaching down to within 2,000 feet of the sea. The lower slopes of the mountains around are covered with fine trees, and with the luxuriant and evergreen foliage of the tree-fern and the other beautiful undergrowth of the New Zealand forests. Two permanent waterfalls, one 700 and the other 540 feet in height, add picturesque beauty to the gloomy and desolate grandeur of the upper part of Milford Sound. During a storm of wind and rain, mingled with snow and sleet, which, though it was the middle of summer, raged during three days of our stay, avalanches were often heard thundering down, with a roar as of distant artillery, from the snow-fields above; while a multitude of foaming cascades poured over the face of the lower precipices, hurling with them into the sea masses of rock and trunks of trees. On the other hand, nothing could exceed the charm of the few fine days which we enjoyed during our voyage.

Appendix No. VIII., page 568.

EXTRACTS FROM LETTER FROM MR. GODLEY TO MR. GLADSTONE.

Plymouth, December 12, 1849.

On the eve of leaving England for one of our most distant colonies, I cannot resist the desire of saying a few words before I go, to the British public, on the subject of colonial politics, under the new aspect which they have lately assumed; a subject in which I have long been speculatively interested, and in which I am now about to acquire a deep and immediate personal concern. I have ventured, with your kind permission, to prefix your name to my observations..... A year or

two ago I thought, as perhaps you think now, that, though a system so absurd in theory, and so unsuccessful in practice, as that by which our colonies are ruled, must break down sooner or later, still it might last indefinitely; for ten years to come, perhaps for twenty; and that our efforts might safely be directed to a gradual amelioration of it. I am convinced now that I was wrong. The real danger is, not that the despotism of the Colonial Office will last ten or twenty years, – not that the colonists will be oppressed by it for an indefinite time to come, – but that it may last just long enough to break up the British Empire, a consummation which, at the present rate of progress, will not perhaps take a great deal more than ten or twenty months. I shall be very glad now to be as sure that the flag of my country will not be hauled down during my lifetime in any part of the Queen's dominions, as I am that the hours of "Mr. Mother-Country's" reign are numbered. The point, therefore, which I am most anxious to urge upon you, as upon all colonial reformers, is, that whereas they have hitherto pleaded in the interest, as they thought, of suffering colonies alone, they must now plead in the interests of British honour and British supremacy.... Many causes have contributed to this change in the aspect of the question; but the chief of them are these – first, the increased strength of the colonies, or, rather, perhaps, their increased consciousness of strength; and secondly, the growth in England of a political school holding the doctrine that the colonies ought to be abandoned....

The best argument perhaps against separation is to be found in the strength and prevalence of a moral instinct which separatists do not recognize, and which they hardly understand, though they bear a strong testimony to its truth in the remarkable reluctance which they manifest to avow their doctrine. A true patriot personifies and idealizes his country, and rejoices in her greatness, her glory, and her pre-eminence, as a loving son would exult in the triumphs of a parent. Doubtless such greatness and glory may be too dearly bought, but that is not the question. I say that, independently of reasoning, they are felt to possess a great and real although an immaterial value, and that they are the more keenly so felt in the most heroic periods of a nation's history, and by the best and noblest of its sons. Nay, I maintain that the love of empire, properly understood, – that is, the instinct of self-development and expansion, – is an unfailing symptom of lusty and vigorous life in a people; and that, subject to the conditions of justice and humanity, it is not only legitimate, but most laudable. Certain I am, that the decline of such a feeling is always the result, not of matured wisdom or enlarged philanthropy, but of luxurious imbecility and selfish sloth. When the Roman eagles retreated across the Danube, not the loss of Dacia, but the satisfaction of the Roman people at the loss, was the omen of the empire's fall. Or, to take an illustration nearer at home, it is unquestionable that notwithstanding the disgraceful circumstances under which America was torn from the grasp of England, we suffered less in prestige and in strength by that obstinate and disastrous struggle, than if, like the soft Triumvir, we had 'lost a world, and been content to lose it.' Depend upon it, the instinct of national pride is sound and true; and it is no foolish vanity which makes Englishmen shrink from the idea of seeing their country diminished and humbled in the eyes of the world.

But the case of those who defend the preservation of our colonies, does not rest on any such instance alone; it rests also on perfectly tangible and material grounds.... By making "foreign countries" of our colonies, we

should cut off on the one hand the best part of the British nation from colonization, and on the other we should abandon the plain duty of building up society in its best form, throughout those wide regions which are destined to be peopled by our descendants. We should deliberately provide for the construction of hostile democracies out of the worst materials which compose the British people.

Again, the union of the provinces which make up the British empire, constitutes a positive element of material strength. It is perhaps true, that now the value of our colonies may be counterbalanced by their cost; but such has been the case only since the invention of the Colonial Office, – that is, since we have made colonies effeminate by our protection, and disaffected by our tyranny....

I am not going to write arguments in support of the municipal system as applied to colonial government, because, in fact, everything has been said that can bo said on that side of the question, whilst, literally, nothing worth notice has been said on the other. Besides, we really have passed the argumentative stage in this part of the business. That the central system, whether right or wrong, will be speedily abolished, no man with a grain of political foresight can doubt. I repeat, that the only question which remains to be settled is, whether its abolition shall be the result of a dissolution of our colonial empire or not....

But it is necessary for me to state what I mean by local self-government; as the phrase, though hackneyed, has been much abused. I do not mean, then, mere powers of paving and lighting and road-making; nor the privilege of initiatory legislation; nor the liberty of making subordinate official appointments; I do not mean a regimen involving the reservation of civil lists, or the interposition of votes, or any other of those provisions in virtue of which ministers in Downing Street are in the habit of interfering with the internal concerns of colonies. I mean by local self-government, the right and power to do, within the limits of each colony respectively, without check, control, or intervention of any kind, everything that the Supreme Government of this country can do within the limits of the British Islands – with one exception. I allude to the prerogative of regulating relations with foreign powers. This one prerogative, the concentration of which is essential to imperial unity, the colonists themselves would gladly see reserved, in exchange for the privilege and security of being identified with the empire; but more than this it is neither beneficial nor possible for us to retain. I need hardly say that my idea of self-government includes the power of making and altering local constitutions. We ought not, I am sure, to impose upon the colonists any form of government whatever, even to start with. When we shall have duly authorized them to act for themselves, our function with regard to their internal affairs should end. Paper constitutions drawn up by amateurs without personal interest in the subject, never answer. All the best of the old colonial constitutions were framed by the colonists....

As a matter of course, colonies enjoying, as those of New England did, the perfect administration of their own affairs, ought not to cost the mother country a shilling for their government; and I am confident that, like Massachusetts and Pennsylvania of old, they would regard total pecuniary independence of the mother country as an important means of preserving their municipal privileges.

6 See "New Zealand Pilot," chap. ix.

INDEX.

INDEX.

Act of Parliament, under which, the colony was formed, 439
Adelaide capital of the colony, 447, 449, 451
Albert Lake, 437
Alexandrina Lake, 437
Angus, Mr., 442
Ballot, 494
Barker, Captain, Mountain named after him, 438
Burra Burra copper-mines, 480
Church of England, 451
Cockatoo farmers, 457
Constitution given to the colony, 446
Coorong River, 437
Copper, 478
Darling River, 436
Debates in Parliament, 496
Droughts, prevalent, 462, 468
Early history of the colony, 435
Farming badly done, 457
Gambier Town, 476
Gawler, Colonel, second Governor, 443
Gold, 479
Gordon, A. L., the poet, 478
Goyder's line of rainfall, 463
Great Northern Railway through the colony, 490
Grey, Captain, Governor, 443
Hindmarsh, Captain, first Governor, 442
Hutt, Sir William, 442
Kapunda copper-mines, 480
Kooringa-Town, 480
Land, price of, as regards the colonies generally, 461
Land, sale of, 461
Legislature, 492
Light, Colonel, Surveyor-General, 442
Mail Coach "Bushed" 486
Meat, price of, and exportation, 474
Moonta copper-mine, 480
Mount Gambier, 476
Murray River, 436
Murrumbidgee River, 436
Nepean Bay, 442
Nobs and Snobs, 480
Northern Territory, 487
Pastoral rents, 475
Population, 447
Portalloch cattle station, 476
Port Darwin, 492
Port Wallaroo, 482
Religious sects, 451
Revenue, 497
Robe, Colonel, Governor, 444
Salt-bush, pasture for sheep, 473
Sheep, loss of, for want of rain, 469
Sinnett, Mr., his account of the colony, 442
Smelting-works at Wallaroo, 485
Strathalbyn-Town, 477
Sturt, Captain, his discoveries, 436
Telegraph wire from Adelaide to Port Darwin, 488
Torrens, Colonel, 442
Torrens, River, 453
Victoria, re-emigration to, from South Australia, 443
Vineyards, 465
Wakefield, Mr. Gibbon, 439, 462
Wallaroo copper-mine, 481, 484
Water supply, 453
Wheat, staple of the colony, 456
Wine, 466
Wool, 467, 470

AUSTRALIAN INSTITUTIONS.

Armies, 504
Benevolent Asylums, 502
Churches, 505
Horse-racing, 522
Hospitals, 602
Hunting, 523
Kangaroo hunting, 527
Mechanics' Institutes, 502
Parliamentary practice, 513
Parliament, payment of members, 511
Poorhouse, 502
Public Libraries, 502
Schools, 500

NEW ZEALAND.

Adderley, Mr. Godley's letter to, 570
Arewa Tribe, 604, 644
Auckland, capital of the colony, 541
Auckland gold-fields, 632
Auckland Harbour, 638
Auckland, a province, 630
Baring, Francis, 534

Bay of Islands, 594
Blenheim, Town, 583
Bosby, Mr., 533
Cambridge, Town, 653
Cameron, General, 598
Cannibalism, 531
Canterbury, land, price of, 573
Canterbury, Parliament, 577
Canterbury Pilgrims, 572
Canterbury Plains, 573
Canterbury Provincial Council, 577
Canterbury Settlement, 563
Canterbury wheat, 575
Captain Cook, 531
Christchurch Cathedral, 570, 577
Christchurch Town, 576
Church of England, 635
Colonial expenditure, 620
Colonial National Debt,, 622
Confiscation cf land, 637
Constitution first declared, 541
Constitution of New Zealand, 615
Debates in Parliament, 626
De Thierry, Baron, 533
Dunedin, Bishop of, 556
Dunedin, capital of Otago, 553, 555
Durham, Lord, 534
Early history, 529
Earnshaw, Mount, 550
Education, 636
Ellice, Russell, 535
Fitzroy, Governor, 592, 594
Fox, Mr., his actions as Premier, 613, 625
Fox, Mr., his History of the War, 538, 591
General Assembly, 619
Gladstone, Mr. Godley's letter to, 568
Godley, John Robert, 502, 569
Grasses, English, 654
Grey, Sir George, Governor, 591, 594, 598
Guns and gunpowder, 593
Haast, Dr., Curator of the Museum, 579
Harper, Dr., Primate of New Zealand, 570
Hau-Haus, 636
Hawaiki, whence the New Zealanders came, 529
Hawke Bay, a province, 627
Hector, Dr., 550
Heke, Maori Chieftain, 594
Hobson, Captain, Lieutenant-Governor, 530
Hokitika, 581
Hongi's army, 531
Horokiwi Valley, 610
Hot wells and springs, 639
Hutt. Sir William, 535
Invercargill, capital of Southland, 543
Jewish Colony, suggestions of, 566
Kaiteriria, barracks for Maori soldiers, 644
Kauri forest, 634
Kauri gum, 633
Kawau, escape of Maori prisoners, 600
King chosen in New Zealand, 539, 593
Kingstown, 548
Kororeka flagstaff, 594
Land League, 539, 590
Land, price of, 573
Language, same as that spoken in the Sandwich Islands, 529
Legislative Council, 619
Lyttelton, Lord, 502, 571
Lyttelton, Port, 580
Maid-servants, 579
Maketu, 640
Manipori, Lake, 550
Maoris, 530, 589, 602.
Maoris, Members of Parliament, 627
Maori population, 608
Maori superstition, 006
Marlborough Province, 582
Marsden, Mr., 533
Martin's Bay, 550
Matutaera, King Tawhiao, 606
Missionaries, 533, 602
Moas, extinct birds, 543
Mokoia Island, 642
Molesworth, Sir William, 535
Morality of the Women, 608
Mount Cook, 581
Nelson, Bishop of, 585
Nelson, Province, 585
Nelson, Town, 588
New Plymouth, Town, 539, 592, 601, 628
New Zealand Association, 534, 562

New Zealand, first claimed by English, 532
New Zealand Land Company, 534, 592
New Zealanders, description of, 530
Ngatimaniapoto Tribe, 596, 654
Ngatihau Tribe, 603
Oamaru Town, 561
Ohinemutu Hot Baths, 642
Okaihau Pah, 594
Otago, Province, 541
Otago travelling, 545
Otago Settlement, 544
Pah, description of, 595
Pai Marire religion, 603
Pakeha Maoris, 590
Parliament, creation of, 540
Petre, Lord, 535
Picton, Town, 582
Provincial Assembly, 616
Provincial Government, 554
Provincial Legislators, payment made to them, 557
Queenstown gold-fields, 518
Queenstown, travelling from, to Dunedin, 551
Railways, 559, 575, 583, 610, 625
Rakaia River, 572
Rangariri Pah, 655, 600
Rangitata River, 572
Rauparaha, Maori Chieftain, 584, 610
Representation, system of, 618
Representative Government, 567
Revenue, 620
Roto Iti Lake, 642
Roto Kakika Lake, 644
Roto Mahana Hot Lake, 645
Roto Rua Lake, 642
Ruapekapeka Pah, 595
Selwyn, first Bishop, 537, 634
Selwyn, Town, 576
Simeon, Sir John, 562
Smith, John Abel, 535, 562
Soldiers, withdrawal of, 611
Southland, formerly a Province, 542
Stafford, Mr., 624
Stewart Island, 541
Supreme Court, 637
Taranaki Province, 539, 592, 597, 601, 628
Tarawera, Lake, 646
Tasman, Van, first discovery of New Zealand, 531
Taupo, Lake, 650
Tauranga-gate Pah, 600
Tauranga, starting point for the Hot Springs, 639
Teanau, Lake, 550
Te Kooti, rebel Maori, 604
Terraces under the Hot Lakes, 647
Te Whero Whero, King Potatau, 593
Thomson, Dr., his history, 585, 591
Tuapika Town, 552
Volkner, Mr., murdered, 604
Vogel, Mr., 576, 625
Waikato River, 598, 650
Waikato tribe, 596
Waikato Valley, 652
Waikonaite, coach breakfast, 560
Wairau massacre, 584, 591
Waitangi, Treaty of, 536
Waitaki River, 561, 572
Waitera lands, 598
Wakarewarewa Geysers, 644
Wakatip Lake, 544, 548
Wakefield, Edward Gibbon, 535, 562, 570
War of 1863, 599
War, beginning of, 592
Wellington, capital of the colony, 537, 609
Wellington, Province, 595
Woolner, his statue of Godley, 571
Wiramu, Maori ordained clergyman, 635

WALKER, MAY, & CO., Printers, Bourke Street West, Melbourne.

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