New Zealand, or Zealandia, the Britain of the South [Vol.I.]

Charles Hursthouse

First published by Edward Stanford in 1857

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

Epub © 2013 Early New Zealand Books Collection

ISBN 978-1-927288-17-7

[FRONTISPIECE]

"Okoaro", Cottage of J. Stephenson Smith Esqre. New Plymouth.
Vincent Brooks, Lith.

[TITLE PAGE]

NEW ZEALAND,

OR
ZEALANDIA,
THE BRITAIN OF THE SOUTH.
With Two Maps and Seven Coloured Views.

BY
CHARLES HURSTHOUSE,
A NEW ZEALAND COLONIST, AND FORMER VISITOR IN THE UNITED STATES, THE CANADAS, THE CAPE COLONY, AND AUSTRALIA.

IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. I.

LONDON:
EDWARD STANFORD, 6, CHARING CROSS.
1857.

[TITLE VERSO]

"For the Lord thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys and hills; a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of oil olive, and honey; a land wherein thou shalt eat bread without scarceness, thou shalt not lack any thing in it; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou mayest dig brass." – Deut. viii. 7-9.

LONDON: PRINTED BY WOODFALL AND KINDER,
ANGEL COURT, SKINNER STREET.

[DEDICATION]

INSCRIBED TO

SIR EDWARD BULWER LYTT0N, BART.,

IN ADMIRATION OF
HIS BEAUTIFUL VIEW OF COLONISATION PRESENTED IN

"THE CAXTONS."

[Page iv is blank]

[REVIEWS]

NOTICES OF THE PRESS

ON SOME FIRST WORKS AND LECTURES.

"The advice to emigrants and settlers is peculiarly valuable, from its sound, practical character." – Westminster and Foreign Quarterly Review.

"The work is written in a dashing, off-hand style, and contains an immense amount of valuable matter." – Colonial Magazine.

"The merit of this book consists in the full and impartial account it gives of the colony, and the sound advice which accompanies it. There is no attempt to paint anything in rose-colour." – Spectator.

"We cannot too warmly recommend Mr. Hursthouse's book to the intending emigrant and the general reader." – Critic.

"Mr. Hursthouse gives no exaggerated description of an emigrant's life, but states the case impartially." – Economist.

"Written in a vigorous and attractive style, and blends humour with earnestness, which latter quality it possesses in an eminent degree." – Weekly Dispatch.

"Written in a clear, candid, impartial spirit; every word bears the stamp and impress of truth." – Catholic Standard.

"Truthful, honest, and judicious." – Gardeners' Chronicle.

"One of the cheapest and best books on emigration." – Tallis's Weekly Paper.

"Every intending emigrant would do well by purchasing this little publication, and pondering seriously over its contents." – Mark Lane Express.

"Written in a style which combines vigour and ability, with a share of piquancy and vivacity which renders it very attractive." – Aberdeen Journal.

"A readable book, full fraught with useful information." – North of Scotland Gazette.

"We know not a better guide to the settler at our antipodes than is here afforded." – Norfolk News.

"The best work on the subject which has yet come under our notice." – Nottingham Guardian.

"Very cleverly written." – Rugby Advertiser.

"Replete with practical information." – Wigan Times.

"Evidently the production of one who has studied the subject 'au fond.'" – Durham Advertiser.

"A practised and practical writer on Emigration; here, in a few business-like pages, contrasts the various Emigration Fields." – Gateshead Observer.

"One of the most interesting and useful works we have perused for a long time past." – Somerset Herald.

"The subject is treated in a very masterly manner." – Southern Times.

"A cheap and excellent little manual." – Coventry Herald.

"No one who thinks of emigrating should be without this book." – Kentish Observer.

"There is much sound information in these pages, and at times not a little humorous description." – Liverpool Times.

"The author thoroughly understands his subject, and well he may, his work is characterized throughout by candour and moderation." – Leicester Mercury.

"Fraught with much valuable information, conveyed in a clear and amusing style." – Bath Herald.

"A perfect specimen of what a work on Emigration should be." – Herts Guardian.

&c. &.c. &c.

LECTURES.

"The author is a lecturer of acknowledged ability. His style is graphic and lively, his advice to Emigrants shrewd and sensible, and his general facts and observations are complete and reliable." – Sheffield Free Press.

"A very interesting lecture, at the Mechanics' Institute, was delivered here on Friday evening, by Mr. C. Hursthouse. J. S. Trelawney, Esq., M.P., occupied the chair. At the conclusion of the lecture further information was elicited; but the junior members giving vent to a round of applause now were the means of stopping further discussion." – Plymouth Journal.

"A Lecture, which excited very considerable attention, was delivered at the Literary Institution here, Friday evening, by Mr. C. Hursthouse. The president, A. Colliver, Esq., occupied the chair; and, although the evening was unfavourable, the hall was crowded, many persons being unable to obtain seats. * * * Mr. Hursthouse concluded his Lecture amidst much applause." – Penzance Gazette.

"On Thursday evening a lecture, on the advantages offered by New Zealand as a field for emigration, was delivered in the Town Hall, by Mr. C. Hursthouse, author of the excellent work on New Zealand, which we lately reviewed; and although the notice was very short, the audience was most numerous and highly respectable." – Leicester Mercury.

"Mr. Hursthouse, a gentleman who has spent several years in New Zealand and other colonies, and who appears to have availed himself of every opportunity thus afforded him of amassing a large amount of interesting and important information, gave a Lecture, on Friday evening, at the Assembly Rooms (Norwich), to a large and influential audience on the superior advantages of New Zealand as an emigration-field over every other colony." – Norfolk News.

"On Friday evening last, Mr. Charles Hursthouse delivered a very interesting Lecture on the above subject in the British Schoolroom. This gentleman is the author of several works on emigration, and has visited the United States of America, Canada, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand, which latter country he has selected as his future home. His Lecture was delivered in a very pleasing manner, and it contained a great deal of useful and instructive matter." – Banbury Guardian.

"We have deferred till our present Number our report on the very instructive and interesting Lecture on emigration, which was given by Mr. Hursthouse on Tuesday evening last, because we could not afford the time or space which we desired to devote to the subject, – alike for the purpose of doing some measure of justice to the Lecturer, and of conveying to our readers a useful summary of the valuable information he communicated." – Guernsey Star.

"At the Corn Exchange, on Wednesday evening, Mr. C. Hursthouse, a gentleman who has resided six years in New Zealand, and is the author of an interesting work on the settlement at New Plymouth, delivered a free Lecture on the advantages offered by New Zealand as a field of emigration. The chair was taken by the Mayor." – Southampton County Paper.

"To a perfect acquaintance with his subject, the Lecturer added a clear arrangement and enunciation; whilst the absence of everything like claptrap gained for him the confidence of his audience, which was both numerous and highly respectable." – Cambridge Independent.

"On Friday evening a very interesting Lecture was delivered here by Mr. Hursthouse. The Lecturer was warmly cheered during his Address, which was clear, elegant, and, above all, practical." – Boston Herald.

"On Thursday evening, a Lecture on 'Emigration, Emigration Fields, and who should Emigrate,' was delivered at the Institution, by Mr. Hursthouse, to a numerous audience. The Lecture was fraught with much valuable information, conveyed in a clear and amusing style, and kept the attention of the audience fixed on the Lecturer to the close, when he was greeted with much applause." – Bath Herald.

&c. &e. &c.

[CONTENTS]

CONTENTS AND INDEX.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY..........1
Author's Experience.......2
Interested Motives........4
Favourable Time for Emigration.....5
Private Information.....8 and 664

CHAPTER II.

HISTORICAL SKETCH.......9
Spanish Discovery........10
Dutch " ........11
Cook's "Visit.........12
De Surville's Visit...... . .13
Dawn of Australian Trade......15
The New Zealand Cannibal......17
Macaulay's Traveller . . . . . .20
Irregular Colonisation . . . . . . .31
Appointment of Consul.......34
The Missionary Confederacy......35
Missionary Designs........38
The New Zealand Company......39
The First Governor........40
The French Expedition.......42
The Colonial-Missionary Office . . . .43
Te Tamai's Fate........49
Missionary Anti-Colonisation......50
The Treaty of Waitangi . . . . . . .52
The Land Claims Court.......57
The Land Troubles...... . .60
The Wairau Massacre.......61
Governor Fitzroy..... . . .63

HISTORICAL SKETCH – continued. Page
The New Plymouth Land Case..... 64
Ruin of the Company....... 68
Heke's Rebellion........ 70
Parliamentary Interference...... 73
Governor Grey........ 74
Te Rauparaha's Chastisement..... 75
The Wanganui Example...... 75
Governor Grey's Civil Successes..... 76
The New Zealand Company's End..... 77
The Australian Gold Fields...... 78
Governors Wyward and Browne..... 79
All's Well that ends Well...... 81

CHAPTER III.

PHYSICAL FEATURES....... 82
Configuration........ 82
Position......... 83
Acreage Area........ 85
Geology and Earthquakes....... 86
Surface Character........ 95
Scenery .......... 97

CHAPTER IV.

CLIMATE........... 100
Importance of Good Climate . . . . .101
Climatic "Long-bows"....... 102
Character of New Zealand Climate . . . .104
Mean Temperature ....... 107
Rain and Moisture....... 108
General Remarks........ 109
Salubrity.......111 and 556
Climatic Calendar........ 114

CHAPTER V.

ANIMAL KINGDOM ........ 117
Absence of Quadrupeds and Reptiles .... 117
Ornithology......... 118
Fish .......... 121
Insects....... . . .123
Semi-Wild Domestic Animals..... 124
Introduction of Game, &c. . . . . . . 128

CHAPTER VI.

VEGETABLE KINGDOM ....... 133
New Zealand Forests....... 134
Small Bush and Shrubs....... 135
Fruits and Flowers....... 136
Fern, Flax, and Grasses...... 137
New Zealand Timber Trees...... 139

CHAPTER VII.

MINERAL KINGDOM . . . .. . .144
Coal.......... 146
Gold.......... 148
Copper.......... 150
Iron........ 151
Mineral Earths and Building Stone . . . .153

CHAPTER VIII.

NATIVES.......... 154
Origin . . ........ 154
Early Customs........ 155
Numbers and Decrease....... 158
Causes of Decrease....... 159
British Law.........162
Missionary Conversion....... 164
Language....... . . . 167
Physical Appearance....... 169
Domestic Habits........ 170
Dress....... . . . 172
Labour.......... 173
Amalgamation........ 174
Property and Possessions...... 176
Mode of Trade........ 178
Moral Character........ 181
Intellect and Education....... 182
Preservation of the Race...... 183

CHAPTER IX.

THE SIX PROVINCES....... 189
Views.......... 189
New Zealand Christening...... 191
Provincial Jealousies....... 193
Auckland......... 195
New Plymouth . . ...... 209
Wellington......... 218
Nelson.......... 221
Canterbury......... 226
Otago..........239
Stewart's Island........ 247
Choice of Province....... 247
Sea Roads......... 248
Land Roads.......250
Bush Travelling........ 251

CHAPTER X.

GOVERNMENT......... 252
The New Constitution....... 252
Veto.......... 258
Legislative Council....... 260
Vestry-Parliaments....... 262
The Imperium in Imperio...... 271
Amended Constitution....... 271
Queen's Speech (New Zealand)..... 275
"A Night in the House"...... 280
Prorogation......... 283
The New Zealand Ministry...... 287
The New Zealand House of Commons .... 288
The Seat of Government...... 289
Public Revenue . . . . . . 291
Public Expenditure.....293 and 297
Public Debt......... 294
Law Courts, Police, &c........ 300
Patronage...... . . 302
Religious Institutions....... 303
Bishops..........305
Church Ordinances, &c. . . . . . . . 306
Currency......... 311
Press.......... 311

CHAPTER XI.

EXPORTS AND MARKETS...... 314
Export Fallacy........ 314
Exports, present and to come..... 316
Hidden Exports........ 317
Exporting Power ........ 318
Markets.......... 318
Australian Markets....... 319
Rival Corn Growers....... 322
The Farmer's Sheet Anchor . . . . .327

CHAPTER XII.

AGRICULTURE AND HORTICULTURE . . . .329
Wild Lands and Mode of Clearing .... 329
Soils.......... 331
System of Farming....... 332
Farm Stock......... 335
Hand Labour......... 335
Implements......... 336
Wheat.......... 341
Barley.......... 342
Oats.......... 342
Maize.......... 343
Potatoes......... 343
Turnips and Root Crops . . . .. . 344
Hops......... . 345
Laying down Lands in Grass...... 345
Dairy Farming....... . 349
Fences.......... 350
Farm Houses and Buildings...... 353
Blights, Insect and Animal Pests..... 355
Purchase or Hire of Farm Lands .... 356
Profits of Farming....... 357
Horticulture . . ....... 360
Banana Blunder...... . . 361
Flowers – Bees – Shrubs....... 364
English Trees........ 366

CHAPTER XIII.

PASTORAL PURSUITS....... 368
The Home of the Golden Fleece..... 368
Australian Testimony....... 369
Numbers and Breed of Sheep..... 377

Xll CONTENTS AND INDEX. *•

PASTORAL PURSUITS – continued.
New Zealand Wool....... 379
The Wool to Grow . . . . . 382 and 394
The Negretti Breed....... 384
Getting up Wool........ 391
Exemption from Disease...... 395
Lambing......... 396
Sheep Farming – Squatting...... 397
Young Beginners........ 398
Profits of Squatting....... 399
Evils of the Squatting System..... 400
Cattle.......... 406
Horses.......... 408
Pigs.......... 410
Goats.......... 412
Taking out Choice Breeding Stock . . . .412
The Sturgeon Merinoes.....414 and 662
Dogs........... 416

CHAPTER XIV.

GENERAL INVESTMENTS AND PURSUITS . . 417
Capitalists and Capital ....... 417
Loan Company........ 420
Professional Men........ 421
Mercantile and Trading Pursuits..... 422
Retail Traders ....... 424
Manufacturing Industry...... 425
Whaling......... 427
The New Zealand Flax....... 429

CHAPTER XV.

OUTFIT AND DEPARTURE PREPARATIONS . . 445
Taking Goods for Sale....... 446
Domestic Outfit........ 446
Packing......... 449
Shipping Goods........ 450
Wardrobe......... 451
Ladies' Outfit........ 454
Miscellaneous Outfit ....... 455
Taking Money........ 459
Letters of Introduction....... 461
Taking Servants........ 462
A Labourer Partner....... 465
Life Insurance ........ 467

CHAPTER XVI.

SHIPS AND PASSAGE MATTERS...... 468
The New Overland Route...... 468
New Zealand via Australia...... 474
Transient Ships........ 475
The New Zealand Lines....... 476
Choice of Ship........ 477
A Bill of Fare........ 479
Proceeding Direct to the Settlement .... 482
Colonists' Rooms........ 483
Terms of Passage, &c........ 485
Engaging Passage........ 488
Cabins and Berths....... 489
Which to Choose . . . . . . .491
Fitting up Cabins........ 493
Insurance . . . . ..... 496
Time of Year for Sailing...... 497
Sea Sickness and General Health..... 498
The First Week at Sea....... 500
Occupations and Amusements ..... 501

CHAPTER XVII.

THE LAND REGULATIONS...... 504
The Pre-emptive Right....... 505
The Six Systems........ 507
Vestry Legislation...... . .511
The Auckland Regulations . . . (See Appendix) 513
New Plymouth " ...... 517
Wellington " ...... 518
Nelson " ...... 518
Canterbury " ...... 519
0tago " ...... 519
Remarks on the Six Systems..... 520
Selling on Credit........ 521
Selling by Auction . ..... 523
The Evils of the Six Systems..... 525
Colonisation Quackery....... 531
Suggested Uniform System...... 533
Selling Land in England ...... 539
Mr. Bridges' System....... 544

CHAPTER XVIII.

STATISTICS AND PRICES...... 553
Population Table ........ 555
Births and Deaths........ 556
Export and Import Tables...... 557
Cultivations and Stock....... 558
The Infant Marine . . . . 558
Shipping ... . . . . 561
The New Tariff . . . . . . . 561
Shop Prices......... 564
Commercial Imports....... 566
Price Currents........ 567
Agricultural Produce Prices, &c...... 573
Wages.......... 573
Value of Improved Properties..... 574
Postal Regulations....... 574
Distance Table........ 578
Directory........578
Current Books on New Zealand..... 580

CHAPTER XIX.

EMIGRATION......... 583
Emigration's Enemies....... 583
Emigration Truths....... 588
The National Benefits of Emigration . . . .589
The "Excess of Emigration" Cry..... 593
Waste Lands at Home....... 594
Cohesion of our Home and Colonial Empire . . . 596
A System of State Emigration..... 600
How to Agitate for it...... 607
Why and how Emigration is beneficial .... 608
Capitalisation of Profits...... 611
Increase of Social Rank....... 612
Settling Families........ 613
Rural Life......... 614
Less Care and Toil....... 615
Retrenchment and Reform...... 616
Emigrationary Qualifications ...... 617
Hint to Bachelors........ 621
The Dangers of Delay....... 621

CHAPTER XX.

EMIGRANTS, FIT AND UNFIT..... 624
Those who go to the Wrong Place..... 624
Canada and America ....... 625
American Liberty ........ 628
Those who should Stay at Home . . . . 630
Emigration Bugbears....... 633
Home and Friends....... 635
The Future ......... 637
The New Life........ 638
Society, Social Life, and Amusements . . . .640
Work and Play........ 645
Governesses......... 646
Retired Genteel Families...... 646
Brussels and Boulogne Emigration . . . . 649
Professional Men........ 650
Training Sons for Professions..... 653
Bachelor Heirs and their Careers..... 654
Invalids.......... 655
Tradesmen......... 657
Tenant Farmers........ 658
The Counter and the Desk...... 659

APPENDIX: –

The Auckland New Land Regulations .... 661
The Sturgeon Merinoes...... 662
Emigration from our North American Colonies to New Zealand.........663
The Author's Address....... 664

[Page xvi is blank]

[ERRATA]

ERRATA IN VOL. I.

Page 84, for from Southampton to New Zealand 15,000 miles, read 14,000 miles
" 84, for from Southampton to New Zealand, via Suez, 14,000 miles, read 13,000 miles
" 105, note, for see chapter 19 read see page 655
" 129, note, for New Road, read King's Road, Chelsea
" 136, last line but one, for eats like read tastes like
" 195, ninth line, for almost capable read partially capable
" 237, third line from bottom, after Britain insert of
" 269, nineteenth line, for England and Wales read England
" 280, twenty-fourth line, for would cover read would have covered

[MAP]

THE ISLANDS OF NEW ZEALAND

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY.

NEW ZEALAND,

THE BRITAIN OF THE SOUTH.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

THE character, credibility, and antecedents of an author must generally be matters of indifference to a reader; and any remarks on personal history or motives for writing, would generally be obtrusive. The philosopher, the historian, the novelist, seek to instruct or amuse us; but they do not ask us to risk life or fortune in any new pursuit. We read their works with profit and delight; but we still keep our money in the funds, open our shop, go round our farm, and pursue the even tenor of our way. But it is not so in emigration. Here, the object of the writer is to root us up and transplant us to a new land, perchance ten thousand miles away from the land of our birth. He who writes on such a subject incurs grave responsibility; and

AUTHOR'S PRACTICE AND EXPERIENCE.

would do well at the outset, to seek the confidence of his readers by showing them that he has had ample opportunities of acquiring a knowledge of his subject, that he is sincere in what he says on it, and practises what he would preach. To this end therefore, I shall take leave to mention so much of my personal history as may relate to emigration, and briefly state the circumstances under which this work appears.

Some years ago, a mixed expedition of pleasure and business led me to America; and foreseeing then that a decayed family like my own might eventually emigrate, I lost no opportunity of acquainting myself with the emigrational advantages of the various districts I traversed in journeying through Upper and Lower Canada and the United States. Soon after my return, an elder brother determined on bettering his fortunes in New Zealand; and I, disappointed with America, and having meanwhile graduated as a carpenter, determined to accompany him. Touching at the Cape of Good Hope to purchase horses, we were wrecked and detained there three months; when we made the acquaintance of various Cape settlers, and saw something of the emigrational prospects of this African colony. On arrival in New Zealand we bought wild land, and at once commenced the work of creating a little estate. After leading an active colonial life of this nature for four years, during which period I was twice over in Australia, private matters called me to England; when I induced my

SECOND EXPEDITION TO NEW ZEALAND.

father and various members of the family to emigrate and join our pioneer party in New Zealand. Compelled to remain in England for some time and not wishing to be idle, I partly employed myself in promoting New Zealand colonisation; and thus, brought into personal communication with numbers of emigrants of all grades and classes, acquired some further experience of the various requirements and details of emigration. Some little works on colonial and emigration subjects which I had written being rather favourably received by the press and the public, the "cacoethes scribendi" was inflamed; and having reason to believe that a practical work descriptive of the "New Zealand of to-day" might interest a portion of the reading world, I was induced to attempt the production of one. Feeling, however, that I could not satisfactorily perform the task without revisiting the colony and seeing for myself what progress had been made in my absence, I made a second trip to New Zealand, from which I have lately returned.

And, now, having compared notes with relatives settled in almost every colony of the empire – having read almost every modern work on colonies and emigration – having seen various emigration fields and arrived at the deliberate conclusion that New Zealand, as a "Home," is preferable to any – I intend returning thither, as soon as circumstances will permit, and settling down finally, for good.

In discussing the great question of emigration, sceptical advisers of the intending emigrant are apt

CRY OF INTERESTED MOTIVES.

to remark, "O, don't put faith in that book, the person who writes it is interested!" Of course he is; but does that make him unworthy of belief? The dentist advises a tooth out – are we to turn away in agony because he would be paid for drawing it? The family solicitor tells us of a ten per cent, landed investment – are we to distrust the bargain because he would pocket the conveyancing fees? Your wife's milliner displays a new bonnet – does your wife refuse it because Madame Crinoline would pocket a pound by selling it? I am interested in New Zealand; the population approaches 50,000; if it were 500,000, the value of any property I might have there would be quadrupled. But I hold the belief, and on no light grounds, that thousands of down-going people, clinging to ruin in this competition-stricken country, would be saved by timely emigration to New Zealand; and that, though their going thither might benefit me in common with every colonist, their going thither would most benefit themselves. In emigration, as in other things, there is a reciprocity of advantage; and this argument of the "stay-at-home-and-sink" wiseacres would have been worthy of the classic fool who refused to go into water until he had learned to swim.

I have remarked that any exaggeration of the advantages of an emigration field is sure to be followed by a most injurious reaction and recoil. Honesty is never better policy than when it is shown in making works on emigration speak

FAVOURABLE TIME FOR EMIGRATION.

the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. I have sought to keep this profitable maxim in view; and feel confident that three in four of those who might be partly induced to improve their fortunes in New Zealand through a perusal of this little work, would admit, after a year's residence in the colony, that I had understated rather than overstated the emigrational advantages of the New Life and the New Land.

Owing to fortuitous conjunction of external and internal circumstances, there has never been so favourable a time for emigrating to New Zealand as the present; and it is scarcely probable that there will ever be so favourable a time again. It is self-evident that Population is necessarily the first requirement, the "primum mobile," the great enriching power of all new countries and emigration fields. When the emigrant is once settled on his wild acres, the quicker population increases near his acres, the quicker and greater will be his gains. Now, population is increasing, and bids fair to continue increasing, near the New Zealand emigrant's acres at a rate that would once have been deemed incredible. In the five years prior to the last five, 180,000 more people went to Canada than to Australia; in the last five years 140,000 fewer people went to Canada than to Australia; and every emigrant who settles in Australia is near to, and increases the value of, every New Zealand emigrant's every acre. In fact, the monopoly of emigration which our American colonies long pos-

THE "AURI SACRA FAMES" RAIL.

sessed has been broken up by the poet's "auri sacra fames." The Diggings have bridged the ocean. The crowded millions of the Old World's cities may now travel to the marvellous gold plains of Australia, to the "fresh fields and pastures new" of New Zealand, in greater ease comfort and safety than our fathers travelled in from Jedburgh to Jersey, or from Limerick to the Land's End. A five months' pleasure trip to Australia and New Zealand and back, down the Mediterranean by Suez and Singapore through the summer seas of the Indian Archipelago and the South Pacific, will be an easy possibility of 1858. Some fifty millions sterling of gold have been shovelled up in Australia in the last five years; no man can say that she will not give forth as vast a treasure in the next five. Gold and a smooth highway to gold, dissipating old ideas old prejudices old fears, are virtually bringing the Antipodes to the doors of Europe; and many more seemingly improbable things may come to pass in the next ten years than that in 1867 Australia and New Zealand may count five millions of people, be within forty days' sail of London, and have an annual export of gold, wool, flax, and raw produce, of the value of thirty millions sterling.

Such are some of the external circumstances which make the present a most favourable era for New Zealand emigration. Glance a moment at the internal. The early struggles of New Zealand, the fatuous, flagitious Government, the long-lasting

"THE GOOD TIME COME."

insecurity of life and property, – all those hostile causes which annihilated New Zealand emigration, though they half ruined the pioneer colonists and terribly retarded the progress of the infant colony, have nevertheless had a counter beneficial effect on the prospects of those who may be going to New Zealand now. For if this sad anti-emigration state of things had never existed, the surpassing natural advantages of New Zealand would unquestionably by this time have drawn to her tens of thousands of people instead of a handful; when, necessarily, most of the finest sites and locations for settlement which the country affords would have been pounced on, occupied, and monopolised; and emigrants of 1857, instead of having, as they now have, first choice of many best locations, would have had only second choice of inferior locations.

Happily, these fatal emigration obstructions are removed; the road to New Zealand is at last open. The young colony has won for herself an admirable representative government. With the exception of a petty tribe in a corner of the North Island, the remnant of the native population is fast changing into an industrial, productive portion of the community. The marvellous advance of the sister colonies of Australia has wonderfully advanced New Zealand; a portion of the golden shower is falling on her shores. If there be a "tide in the affairs of colonies which taken at the turn leads on to fortune," such tide seems setting towards our youngest one; and, looking both

OFFER TO EMIGRANT READER.

at these external and internal circumstances, I state nothing more than a deliberate conviction, in saying that the present is a most favourable period for New Zealand emigration; and that those who profit by it would now purchase wild lands for shillings per acre which, five years hence, they could not purchase for pounds.

In conclusion, I have only to remark, that, should the reader desire to obtain any little special or personal information touching New Zealand emigration matters which these pages may not supply, I should have much pleasure in attempting to afford it by replying to any communication sent to my town address, 28, Thavies Inn, London.

RAMSGATE, Jan. 1,1857.

CHAPTER II. HISTORICAL SKETCH.

SPANISH CLAIMS TO DISCOVERY.

CHAPTER II.

HISTORICAL SKETCH.

BETWEEN 1520 and 1610 the Spaniards made several voyages from their South American possessions in search of a Great South Land, the Terra Australis Incognita, "an exceeding rich gold countrie and fair land of diamonds and precious stones," which the old explorers and ancient mariners of those times fondly hoped to light on some day in the South Pacific.

In 1605, Pedro Fernandez de Quiros and Luis Vaez de Torres started on one of these voyages and discovered the islands now known as the New Hebrides. Here, in a storm, they parted company. Torres sailed north-east, and coasting New Guinea, discovered and passed through those dreaded straits which still bear his name. Might not Quiros, holding on south in continued search of the gold land (the realised "Diggings" of two centuries later), have been the real discoverer of New Zealand? At least, it is something more than conjectural that New Zealand was first discovered by some early Spanish navigator, inasmuch as there

SPANISH CLAIMS TO DISCOVERY.

exists a remarkably correct Spanish chart of Dusky Bay, of very early date; and Dusky Bay was not a place which Tasman the recognised discoverer of New Zealand forty years later appears to have visited. Those who would here exalt the Spaniard and dethrone the Dutchman, may further urge, that some New Zealanders assert that the dog was not brought to the country by their ancestors; but was introduced by some strange ship which once visited their shores; and that as Perro is the Spanish, and Pero the New Zealand word for dog, there is some evidence that this strange ship was a Spanish ship. 1

Whoever though may have been the European navigator who first stumbled on New Zealand, the honour of the true authentic discovery is due to

DUTCH DISCOVERY.

the Dutch commander, Abel Jansz Tasman. Whilst the Spaniards were searching the South Seas for the great gold land, the Dutch were prosecuting voyages of discovery in the same quarter, and partly with the same views. In August, 1642, Antonio Van Dieman, governor of the Dutch East India Company, dispatched Tasman from Batavia with the yacht Hemskerk and the fly boat Zeechaan, on a voyage to the south.

This quaint little squadron, steered by dogged Dutch courage and, probably, well found in breeches pipes and Schiedam, achieved great things with small means. Some three months after its departure it leisurely discovered Van Dieman's Land; and then, steering due east, on the 13th of November again discovered land, which proved to be the south-west coast of the middle island of New Zealand. Tasman coasted northwards and on the 18th anchored in a small bay which he named Massacre Bay (Nelson), from an affray which he had there with the natives. He then proceeded along the northern coast until he arrived at the low promontory forming the north-western extremity of New Zealand, which he named Cape Maria Van Dieman, in honour of his patron's daughter the fair Vrow Maria Van Dieman, whose substantial charms seem to have touched the stout commander's heart. He then set sail for Batavia, quitting the new land without, as he says, having set foot on its shores, and naming it Nova Zealandia, after the Dutch province of Zealand.

CAPTAIN COOK'S RE-DISCOVERY.

In 1768, George the Third, at the instance of the Royal Society, dispatched Lieutenant Cook to Tahiti, for the purpose of observing the transit of Venus. From this service Cook proceeded on a voyage of exploration through the South Pacific; and on the 6th of October, 1769, descried land which proved to be the east coast, 38 deg. south, of the north island of that "Nova Zealandia" discovered by Abel Jansz Tasman more than a hundred years before. During this and three subsequent visits, Cook circumnavigated the islands, took possession of them in the name of the king, repeatedly anchored in Queen Charlotte's Sound, named many of the principal mountains bays and capes, and held a great deal of friendly intercourse with the natives.

Our illustrious circumnavigator was a signal benefactor to New Zealand. He introduced some of our domestic animals, the potato and various other vegetables and useful seeds. Up to his time New Zealand was but a semi-fabulous terra incognita; his excellent survey of the coasts and full description of the country gave it a local habitation and a name, fixed its place on the map, and paved the way for the merchant and the missionary. He formed a high and remarkably correct opinion of the capabilities of the country for European settlement. His reports of the genial climate, fertile soil, fine harbours and evergreen forests excited considerable interest in England; and so captivated the practical mind of Benjamin Franklin, that the Ame-

FIRST FRENCH VISIT.

rican philosopher published a proposal for the colonisation of New Zealand.

Shortly after Cook first arrived in New Zealand, coasting northwards, he one day passed a bay which he named Doubtless Bay. Singular to relate, a few hours afterwards, Captain de Surville, of the French exploring ship St. Jean Baptiste, ignorant of Cook's presence in these seas, anchored in this very bay, and named it Lauriston Bay. De Surville had been dispatched from the French possessions in India, in search of that rich gold land before alluded to; and which, as rumoured in India, the English explorers had at last discovered somewhere in the Great Pacific. De Surville was hospitably received by the natives; but, suspecting them of having stolen a skiff, he landed a force, burnt down the village, and carried the chief off to sea, where the poor prisoner pined away, and soon died. About three years after this, a similar French expedition, commanded by Marion du Fresne, touched at New Zealand and anchored in the Bay of Islands, hard by the scene of De Surville's violence. The natives received their visiters with apparent delight; but when, after some weeks' intercourse, Marion, four of his officers, and twelve men, had gone ashore on a fishing excursion, the natives fell on them, and murdered all but one man, who escaped to the ship. The French naturally avenged their comrades, landed in force, destroyed several of the inhabitants, burnt their villages, and departed. De Surville's painful mode of revenge, and the severe chastisement which

ESCAPE FROM CONVICTISM.

this retaliatory murder of Marion brought on the natives, rendered the Weewees (oui oui), or people of the tribe of Marion, hateful to the New Zealanders for the next half-century. Indeed, the semi-civilised descendants of the actors in these bloody scenes even now regard the French with aversion; and it is probably owing to this cause that the French Catholic missionaries are less successful among the New Zealanders than their Church of England and Wesleyan brethren.

Cook's fourth and last visit to New Zealand occurred in 1777. In the course of his explorations in these new Australian seas he had discovered a spot of the Australian continent, which he named Botany Bay; and it appears to have been partly through his official report of this locality that the government of the day were induced to commence the system of transportation. In 1788 it was debated in Parliament whether Cook's New Zealand or Cook's Botany Bay should be the site of our first experimental penal colony. New Zealand escaped the perilous distinction; possibly on account of fears entertained that the existence of her ferocious cannibal population might prove incompatible with the safe keeping and probationary discipline of the prisoners; and that in some fatal outburst of the cannibal passion, convict, governor, and guard might undergo the common lot, prematurely, in the native oven.

Though, however, New South Wales, and not New Zealand, was chosen for the penal colony, the fact of the discovery or re-discovery of the two

DAWN OF AUSTRALIAN TRADE.

countries and the taking possession of them by the same great explorer about the same time, the circumstance of their thus becoming known to the European world almost simultaneously, their position and proximity in the same seas, seem to have established a certain connection and intercourse between them, even from the earliest days. New South Wales was founded in 1788, and in 1800 we find the second governor, Captain King, visiting New Zealand for the purpose of procuring two or three natives to teach the convicts in Norfolk Island the mode of preparing the New Zealand flax which flourished there, and distributing presents of pigs, seed-maize, and potatoes, in return. Indeed, New Zealand, by virtue of Cook's discovery, surveys, and ceremony of taking possession, was long regarded as a quasi-possession of the Crown, a dependency of New South Wales; and was formally named as such in the commissions of the governors of that colony.

This geographical and official connection was soon cemented by commercial intercourse. It seems very early to have been discovered by the pioneer settlers of the convict colony that New Zealand was a much finer agricultural country than New South Wales. The domestic animals, the grain and vegetable seeds introduced by Cook and succeeding visitors had wonderfully thriven: it seemed probable that the meat, and maize, and potatoes of New Zealand might ere long relieve the penal colony from a recurrence of those partial famines

JOYS AND PERILS OF EARLY TRADE.

which had already been experienced. Spars and flax, "preserved human heads," and other native curiosities, were also to be procured in New Zealand. The cooler, moister, breezy climate was particularly grateful to the English settler, scorched up by sun and drought on the arid rocks of Sydney. A six weeks' trip to New Zealand and back was a twelve months' restorative, a welcome escape from the monotony of convict life and the clank of the chain-gang. The dusky daughters of the land were worthy of the Cytherian Isle; and forty years ago the bold Trading Adventurer (pioneer founder of that magnificent commercial emporium and queen city of the Pacific, which Sydney has become,) would set sail from Port Jackson, and square away for New Zealand, with high hopes of profit and of pleasure – of bartering his bale of blankets, case of trinkets, dozen muskets, or keg of tobacco, for twenty times its value in native produce; and of finding chiefs' daughters, slave girls, and all the beauty of the island, ready to compete, like those on Ida's piney top, for the "golden apple," in the shape of scarlet blanket, blue round-about, bead necklace, or bright shawl.

There was one drawback to this early intercourse between the two young countries: the trader who carried his wares to the New Zealand market might be eaten there. The Hesperides of the Pacific was guarded by no mythical monster – a real cannibal dragon, with good teeth and great swallow, kept watch and ward there. Cook, though he had pro-

CANNIBALISM – THE NEW ZEALANDER.

nounced the natives a fine race, had proclaimed them cannibals. Evidences of their ferocity and brutal appetite for human flesh had been terribly manifested. Captain Furneaux, Cook's consort, had rendezvoused in Queen Charlotte's Sound, had sent a boat ashore one morning as usual among the natives; some trifling quarrel had arisen, every man of the crew had been killed and eaten. Marion's provoked fate was known in Sydney. In 1807 a vessel had been taken by the east coast natives; the entire crew, with one exception, had been killed and eaten. In 1809 had occurred the "Boyd Massacre," when, in revenge for the flogging of a native sailor, some fifty Europeans, crew and passengers, had been murdered at Wangaroa. Indeed, the day the races met the Anglo-Saxon saw he had found a dark-skinned "Man" – no slave Negro, clumsy Kafir, pig-headed Hottentot, emasculate Hindoo, or soft Paphian islander nourished on bread-fruit pap; but a black Scandinavian of the south, a very clever and ferocious six-feet savage, who ate the dog and shark, drank blood, scoffed at death, and who any day in the year would fight his enemy to the death for the prize of the corpse to feast on: a fierce but shrewd pagan, wont to procure his food and enforce his rights by the "argumentum baculinum," the meri and the war-club. 2

CANNIBALISM. – PERILS OF TRADE.

Trading to New Zealand, therefore, in these early days, however profitable, was somewhat perilous; and was chiefly confined to those bold or amorous spirits of the young Australian community who would lead the "forlorn hope" of commerce, and beard the dragon in his den for the booty or the beauty which lay beyond.

By degrees, however, many of the perils which loomed round the New Zealand shores disappeared.

THE FIRST SETTLERS.

Familiarity with the Maori proved him to be less black than he had been painted. Cannibal savage as he was, it soon appeared that he had much in common with a nation of shopkeepers; that he was a keen trader, having a most lively appreciation of the advantages of commerce, and shrewd enough to see that the practice of eating his merchant would restrict trade, limit imports, and be a most witless killing of the goose for the golden egg.

Sydney's Knight-Pedlars, therefore, soon found that they were safe enough in New Zealand. Shielded by blankets and tobacco, they bore a charmed life. A few of them took up their residence in the country, embraced chiefs' daughters, gained a smattering of the language, stuck up rude trading huts, collected flax, maize, and native produce, for some partner or employer in Sydney; and became the pioneer bush merchants of the wilderness – each a herald of civilisation, each a small oasis in the desert of barbarism.

Ere long it appeared, too, that New Zealand was in the very centre of the finest sperm whale ground. As early as the year 1800 sperm whalers had begun to fish off the coasts, and enter the dock-like harbours for wood and water. In the course of a few years, shore-whaling parties were planted on various parts of the coasts by Sydney houses; and a considerable trade was created in supplying these stations with stores, and in shipping back the produce of the fisheries. In 1814 the Church Missionary

THE HERALD OF MACAULAY'S TRAVELLER.

appeared, and strengthened the feeling of security which had grown up through trade.

Thus, the terrors of New Zealand cannibalism, fears of wrecking, robbery, and murder, gradually died out. The natives were still ferocious cannibals, but they now practised only on each other, the trader was too valuable for the oven; and by 1820 little groups of white men (traders, whalers, sailors, sawyers, missionaries, and missionary retainers) had squatted down among the natives in the northern extremity of the North Island, and exhibited the first development of that irregular colonisation of the country which in a few years was to fester to a point at Kororareka.

The year 1820 is chiefly remarkable in the early annals of New Zealand history as being the year of the first visit of any distinguished New Zealand native to Great Britain. And to show what manner of men the fathers of our present natives really were, to show any fair Emigrante who may be longing for New Zealand in 1857 that she has no cause to regret that such manner of men, types of "old New Zealand," exist no longer, I shall venture to delay the reader a moment with a little episodical sketch of this first visit, and of the man who made it – the cannibal herald of that New Zealand traveller of Macaulay's, who is "to stand on the broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's."

In 1820, Hongi, chief of the Ngapuhi tribe, New

HONGI AND HIS MISSIONARY WANTS.

Zealand's cannibal Napoleon, accompanied Mr. Missionary Kendal to England. The purpose of his journey was thus written down at his dictation by Mr. Kendal: – "I wish to see King George, the multitude of his people, what they are doing, and the goodness of the land. My desire is to stay one month in England, and then to come back. I wish for 100 people to return with me. I want a party to dig for iron, a number of blacksmiths, a number of carpenters, and a number of preachers who will try to speak in the New Zealand tongue, so that I way understand them. I want twenty soldiers to protect the settlers, and three officers to keep the soldiers in order. The settlers are to take cattle over with them. There is plenty of spare land in New Zealand, which will be readily granted to the settlers. These are the words of Hongi."

This was Hongi's missionary expressed wish – it seems to have been somewhat a cloak to his real wish. This converted sheep, which brother Kendal was leading about in missionary strings, was slightly the wolf in sheep's clothing.

On arrival, Hongi became a lion. His fine port, tatooed face, and conversion, created a sensation in a hundred drawing-rooms. George the Fourth gave him a suit of armour, and various admirers presented him with guns and other gifts. The soldiers, the royal coat of mail, and a certain great elephant seem to have pleased him most. He resided some time at Cambridge to assist Professor Lee in drawing up a New Zealand grammar. He ever

HONGI AND THE LADIES.

preserved his dignity as a great chief of the highest "moko," but was always courteous and affable to the Howards and the Veres who entertained him. Like Caesar, Antony, Alexander, and other regal "dogs of war," he seems to have been rather a ladies' man: and was so sensitive of female criticism, that at a party once, when some fair critics were making merry at his tatoo, he threw himself across three chairs, buried his head, and remained shut up, till the company had departed.

On leaving England, Government provided him with a passage to Sydney on his way home. The men to dig iron, the smiths and carpenters, all the pleasant words which Mr. Kendal had put down, seem to have been forgotten when the ship sailed; but the powder and the double guns were carefully packed up and carried off. On reaching Sydney he took up his residence with his friend, Mr. Marsden, the venerable founder of the New Zealand mission; and here he met Hinaki, a neighbour chief, ou a visit to Sydney. It seems that whilst Hongi was in England, one of his Ngapuhi had been knocked on the head by some connections of Hinaki's tribe. Welcome "casus belli!" – -here was a chance of finding food for the new powder, of testing the virtues of the double guns and the royal suit of armour. Poor Hinaki sued for peace; but he was the lamb in the fable, the wolf meant to eat him. Hongi wanted war, and how great Hongi now went to war, and how he sped in war, shall be told in the words of the Rev. Mr. Taylor. For

BLANKET CHRISTIANITY.

this gentleman's account of a distinguished missionary savage is substantially correct, and it affords unwitting evidence of a fact, which Exeter Hall and missionary societies have long refused to see – namely, that our vaunted conversion of the heathen is often a conversion of the flesh, rather than of the spirit; an awakening to the merits of blankets and tobacco, rather than to the merits of Timothy and St. Paul.

Hongi was always a warm friend to the missionaries: missionaries brought him to England, missionaries welcomed him on his return from England; we may imagine with what pride missionaries exhibited him in their circles, how he would draw at subscription sermons. He knew that missionaries brought trade to his country; no man dare molest missionaries while he lived – yet how little he was a converted heathen; how little, or, as some would say, how much he was a true missionary Christian, may be gathered from the following portrait of him, painted at page 312 of "Te Ika a Maui." 3

"In vain did Hinaki try to persuade him to make peace; they sat at the same table, slept under the same roof, and sailed in the same ship, and

NEW ZEALAND'S CANNIBAL NAPOLEON.

no one would have supposed they were enemies. Hinaki, finding that Hongi was in earnest, and that there was no prospect of his making peace, hastened home, and assembled all his forces to resist the invader; who, having given his enemy time to prepare, soon made his appearance at the head of three thousand men, determined to turn the deadly gifts he had received to account, without loss of time. Although the tribe he went to attack was related to his own, still the pleasure of trying the efficacy of his military stores prevailed over every other feeling. The battle, however, was for a long time doubtful. Hinaki was a man of noble form, and determined courage, and, though fighting on unequal terms, he still maintained the combat, until Hongi, arranging his men in the form of a cuneus, or wedge, and placing himself at the apex, directed his men to wheel round to the right or left according to circumstances: at last he shot Hinaki, who did not fall until he had received four balls. His savage conqueror rushed forward, and with his English clasp-knife he scooped out the eye of his expiring enemy, and instantly swallowed it. He then stabbed him in the neck, and drank his warm blood, as it gushed forth from the wound.

"Hinaki had two brothers, who were likewise killed, one being nearly as noble a looking person as himself; the other a youth of about twenty. Their bodies were eaten, and their heads embalmed as trophies of victory. About one thousand men were slain, and three hundred more were cooked

HONGI'S DAUGHTER.

and eaten on the battle-field. So complete was the victory, that the place has never since been inhabited. It now belongs to the Bishop's college, being part of its endowment. Hongi returned to the Bay. Each canoe was filled with his captives, and had several heads of his enemies placed at their stems and sterns by way of ornament. Hongi had twenty prisoners on board his canoe, whom he intended to retain as slaves. But his daughter, who had lost her husband in the fight, with dishevelled locks rushed down to the water's edge as the canoe touched the shore, and seizing the sword presented to her father by the King's own hand, jumped on board, and smote off sixteen heads of the poor captives, who, without a murmur, placed their necks over the side-board of the canoe. 4 Twenty more were also killed and eaten; yet the frantic woman, not thinking that the shade of her husband was sufficiently appeased with this sacrifice, went into the bush with a loaded musket, and there shot herself. The ball, however, only passing through her arm instead of her head, she was still alive when found; but determined to accompany her husband to the Reinga, she afterwards strangled herself.

"Hongi had no sooner finished one expedition than he prepared for another. He quickly assembled a thousand men, and proceeded with them to Mercury Bay, to make war upon the tribes of that district; ordering another army of two thou-

ATTACK ON ROTORUA.

sand more to be raised, and to follow him. Success again attended his arms; and, flushed with victory, be next attacked Kaipara, where he made a great slaughter. In 1822, he again visited the Thames and the Waikato, and ascended the Waipa, where he took several large pas; thence he nearly penetrated as far as the Wanganui – in this expedition he slew fifteen hundred of his enemies.

"In 1823, he attacked Rotorua, conveying his canoes by water, as far as possible, and then dragging them by a road be had cut through the forest, to the lake. Here again he was victorious, and slew many. He continued every year his hostile raids, first to one part and then to another, always with success. His name spread terror wherever he went. In fact, he became the Napoleon of New Zealand, and declared when remonstrated with by the missionaries, that he should not desist until he had subjected the entire island to his control; that as England had but one King, so likewise there should only be one in New Zealand. But as there is a bound to all human glory, 'Hither shalt thou go and no further,' so it was with Hongi. He fulfilled the Scripture: 'He that taketh the sword, shall perish by the sword.'

"In 1827, he declared war against Tara, and the tribe which massacred the crew of the Boyd; making that an excuse for his ambitious designs. In the beginning of 1827 his men plundered and burned the Wesleyan Missionary Station, which had been commenced at Wangaroa a year or two

A SPECIAL JUDGMENT.

before. They told the missionaries, 'Your chiefs have fled; all the people have left the place, and you will be stripped of all your property before noon; therefore, instantly begone!'

"It appears, however, as if this was to be the termination of his success. His only redeeming act had been the preservation of those who came to raise his countrymen; – immediately he put forth his hand to injure them, he fell! He killed or dispersed 'the man-eating tribes,' as he termed those who cut off the Boyd, although the epithet was, perhaps, far more applicable to himself; for he appears to have surpassed all who had gone before him in the number of victims he and his followers had consumed. Twenty only of these man-eaters escaped; – they glutted themselves with the slain, sparing neither woman, nor even suckling child. The remnant of his enemies fled to Hunahuna, a village near the Maungamuka, where they made a stand. Hongi, who had ensconced himself behind a tree, stepped forward to take aim, when a ball struck him: it broke his collar-bone, passed in an oblique direction through his right breast, and came out a little below his shoulder-blade, close to the spine. This terminated his fearful career; for though he lingered a full year, the wound never healed. When he breathed, the air escaped through the orifice with a hissing sound, which he made a subject of merriment.

"He received his wound in January, 1827. On the 6th of March, 1828, the life of this remarkable

"THE RULING PASSION

savage terminated. In his last hours, so far from attending to the words of the missionaries, he urged his followers to prosecute the war, and exterminate his enemies. When Patuone visited him, a day or two before his death, and told him he was dying, he said, 'No, I am not dying: my heart is quite light. I am not dying.' The next day he fainted, and was supposed to be dead. When he revived, he said, he should die, but not until the morrow. He ordered his powder to be brought to him, and when he saw it, he said to his children, Ka ora koutou, – you will be safe; intimating the powder would be their protection. He then summoned his sons, and gave the coat of mail he had received from the King of England to one of them; and then divided his battle-axes and fire-arms amongst them – sternly demanding, 'Who will dare to attack my followers after I am gone?'

"Early next morning, though evidently sinking fast, he continued to rally his friends, and said, 'No matter from what quarter your enemies come, let their numbers be ever so great, should they come here hungry for you, kia toa, kia toa, be brave, be brave! Thus will you revenge my death, and thus only do I wish to be revenged.' He continued repeating these words until he expired.

"Patuone, as soon as he heard that Hongi was dead, bid his followers sit still, whilst he and a few of his friends went to see the corpse; lest Hongi's people should be alarmed, as they had blockaded all the entrances to the pa. At first he was refused

STRONG IN DEATH."

permission to enter, until Hunaroa interfered; he found one of his sons binding him up, his head still reclining on his breast. When the body was fully dressed, and the head richly ornamented with feathers, all the obsequies due to so great a chief were performed. His family, fearing an attack, wished to bury him at once, but Patuone said, 'Why all this haste? You will be the first to bury your father alive: let him smell before you bury him: what if he does smell?' Yielding to this advice, he laid in state for two more days, which were spent in repeating the piki, or funeral ode, in cutting themselves, in crying, and firing off guns. In the meantime, Hongi's friends arrived from the Bay of Islands, who, with the Hokianga natives, formed a large procession, when this savage warrior's remains were carried to the wahi tapu – sacred place – amidst the mingled din of the maemae, or funeral dance, the dismal tangi, or wail for the dead, and peals of musketry; an apt termination for the life of one whose supreme delight was war, and to whose ear the dying groans of his enemies were the sweetest music." 5

During the ten years in which Hongi and his northern raids were thus the chief features of the History of New Zealand, trade and intercourse with New South Wales materially increased. The Church missionaries extended their establishments, the Wesleyans commenced operations at Hokianga,

INCREASE OF TRADE.

shore whaling stations were planted in Foveaux Straits, sealers sought their spoil in Dusky Bay and along the rugged coasts of the south-west, the sperm whale fishery had become a vast trade employing hundreds of ships cruising in New Zealand waters; and the visits of American British French Bremen and colonial whalers to New Zealand harbours for the purposes of recruiting and refreshing had become so considerable a business that as many as fifty sail have been counted at one time in the Bay of Islands – busy bartering oil tobacco spirits arms and powder with traders and natives, for spars wood water pigs onions and potatoes.

The reports carried home by many of these whaling visitors as to the fine harbours and forests of magnificent kauri spars and ship timber, the glowing accounts of the fertility of the soil spread about by the trading squatters and passing visitors from Australia, the uniform testimony of the missionaries as to the bracing salubrity of the climate, seem now to have revived in England that desire for the regular settlement of the country which Cook and Franklin had excited half a century before. In 1825, a company, including among its members the late Lord Durham, was formed in London for colonising portions of New Zealand; and tracts of land for this purpose were partially purchased at Hokianga and the river Thames. This company, however, seems to have been a company in little more than name; some difficulties were anticipated, no real

KORORAREKA – ITS PEOPLE.

emigrants were sent out, and the scheme fell to the ground.

Though, however, the regular settlement of New Zealand by emigration from the mother country was still to be deferred for a season, that irregular colonisation alluded to as having commenced about 1820, had attained such dimensions and displayed such repulsive features by 1831, that some governmental measures were deemed necessary for its repression.

Kororareka a fine harbour in the Bay of Islands in the midst of a large native population and the missionary stations, the favourite rendezvous of the whalers and Sydney traders, had from the first been the chief seat of this irregular colonisation; and a more lawless little Pandemonium than this village port of Kororareka had grown up to be by 1831, neither old nor new world had probably ever seen. The most reputable of its denizens were trading adventurers from a convict colony; the bulk consisted of runaway sailors "Lags" petty swindlers gaol birds, scoundrels of every mark and brand from Sydney and Van Dieman's Land. The numerous visitors, the floating population, was worthy of the resident: – nautical chips of the convict block, ticket-of-leave mates and skippers of Sydney traders, rude embruted crews of whalers – all rushing ashore for a spree and running ferociously festive "mucks" until they fell. Ragged grog-shops flourished; the population might have been divided into those who sold rum and those

"ALSATIA" OF THE PACIFIC.

who drank it. Sterne's Uncle Toby says our army swore terribly in Flanders. But the common conversation of Kororareka displayed a substantial permanency of swearing, a boldness and originality of figure drawn from the whaler's forecastle and the chain-gang, a malicious heartiness of ribald damning, infinitely beyond the powers of our army in Flanders. Convict training and antecedents, blasphemy and the debauchery of drunkenness, were all intensified by debauchery in women. Dark Helens, aboriginal Messelinas, swarmed in Kororareka. Every resident kept a mistress, every visitor came for one. Native women were as common an article of barter between chiefs and whalers as native pigs; and to the daily fights and quarrels which arose in such a community through rum and whiskey were to be added those which arose through the passion of jealousy and the disputed possession of the slave girl. There was neither magistrate 6 nor policemen at Kororareka, neither law nor order nor gospel; every ruffian, and there were many, did what seemed good to him; and in 1831, this New Zealand village port was the veritable "Alsatia" of the Pacific, dashed with a "Convict Wapping." 7

BRITISH PROTECTION.

The Missionaries utterly powerless to turn or stem this flood of vice and violence which had flowed into Kororareka and which bade fair to spread and desolate the entire country, induced, in 1832, various chiefs of the neighbourhood to petition the British Government for some protection and repressive aid.

Bearing in mind that New Zealand for a quarter of a century had been a recognised dependency of the Crown where the Crown had exercised acts of sovereignty; that a large amount of British property was at stake, the whale fishery increasing, and ships of various nations constantly visiting the ports; that the Government professed vast sympathy for the natives and must have seen that if Kororareka were not reduced to order fifty Kororarekas would grow up, exterminate the natives with powder fire-water and disease and convert New Zealand into the semi-piratical pest of the Pacific; bearing all this in mind, the answer which the Colonial Office made to this appeal, affords an amusing instance of that ludicrous stupidity which this department of State had ever been remarkable for exhibiting.

All that New Zealand wanted at this epoch, was a sloop of war for Kororareka with a good magisterial commander (some Yardley in epaulettes), and a hundred marines; with a brig tender to look

CURIOUS CONSUL.

round monthly among the coast whaling stations. Such a force would have been at once a powerful government and police, would have reduced Kororareka to instant order, repressed any budding lawlessness in the little coast communities, and scared the "convict element" out of the country by the mere display of the cat and the hand-cuff.

All that the Colonial Office sent, was a pleasant gentleman named Busby; who was to enforce the discontinuance of murder rape rapine manslaughter and the like pursuits of Kororareka by residing there and calling himself Consul – accredited to the Missionaries! 8

Happily, poor Mr. Busby's life was not taken by the marine desperadoes and turbulent outcasts to whom the Colonial Office had offered his throat. Indeed his office and appointment seem to have provoked the felon humour. He became a public joke. The very natives whom he came to save likened him to "a man of war without guns;" and Kororareka, with its paper consul, remained exactly what Kororareka had been without him. 9

MISSIONARY DIPLOMACY.

Mr. Busby's anomalous office proving an idle sinecure, he turned his attention to diplomacy.

Though New Zealand had been a recognised dependency of the British Crown for nearly half a century, it was abundantly clear to Mr. Busby that the sovereignty of New Zealand was a gem in the British crown which the Colonial Office did not care to keep. In alliance therefore with the Missionaries he brought about what between them they called "The Confederacy of the thirteen northern chiefs;" and then coolly asked the Colonial Office to abandon all British claim to New Zealand and to recognise such Missionary-Confederacy as the sovereign power.

It was about this time that the Colonial Office, seized with what has been termed its "pious fit," commenced that anti-emigration alliance with Missionary societies, Aborigines-protection societies, and Exeter Hall, which it maintained for so many years; and which proved so disastrous to both races in New Zealand. Indeed, from 1830 up to

CONFEDERATE CHIEFS.

1845, the Colonial Office received its inspirations from these bodies, and its true designative style and title during this period was the "Colonial-Missionary Office."

Recollecting that New Zealand was a country larger than Great Britain and Ireland inhabited by numerous distinct independent and for the most part hostile tribes, this missionary confederacy of a few chiefs in one corner of the North Island no more represented New Zealand or the sovereignty of New Zealand, than a confederacy of the people of Cornwall would have represented Great Britain. But a missionary body having prayed our Colonial Missionary Office to abandon New Zealand to this Missionary Confederacy of thirteen chiefs, the Colonial-Missionary Office at once complied; and even sent Her Majesty's ship Alligator to the Bay of Islands in 1835 to endow such confederacy with a flag and to salute such flag as a national emblem. 10

Thus, New Zealand became a Kingdom; or, rather, a "no-man's land." Convict colonists and the sweepings of Sydney had colonised Kororareka; a dozen little communities were growing up to the south on the model of Kororareka; in the north there were the thirteen sovereign chiefs, so sovereign that had one of them ventured fifty miles

THE BARON DE THIERRY.

south of his village he would at once have been eaten by some repudiating subject; and in the north there was Mr. Consul Busby and the missionary court – and New Zealand was now prepared to become the splendid prize of any power which wanted a colony; or of any adventurer who needed a country and would found a kingdom. 11

What was the real motive of the Missionaries in setting up this curious "confederacy," is impossible to say – but the position in which they had by this time placed themselves, and their subsequent proceedings, have enabled the world to guess.

It appears that the Church missionary gentlemen, who now numbered some thirty members, had come to like New Zealand. Kororareka was a black spot, but Kororareka was not New Zealand. The natives were still addicted to cannibalism and to preserving each others' heads; but the natives were missionary Christians, attentive in chapel and not bad workmen in the glebe. The climate was delightful, the soil rich, native labour cheap, Sydney a cash market. Their lines had fallen in pleasant places. Liberal of their Society's converting blankets and tobacco, they had already acquired from their thirteen confederated chiefs some 300,000 acres of land – 12,000 acres as a little preliminary foun-

LOAVES AND FISHES.

dation for the Society at home, and the remainder for themselves. One gentleman of the fraternity had a loaf of 11,000 acres; another a fish of 50,000 acres; another a slice of 40,000 acres; their able ally, Mr. Consul Busby, 50,000 acres. If the "Colonial-Missionary Office" would only recognise this snug little confederacy of thirteen converted land-endowing chiefs as the sovereign power of the country; take it under protection and occasionally send a frigate to menace Kororareka and hang up two or three of the confederacy's white desperadoes as a warning to the rest – what might not the missionary ministers and advisers of the confederacy and all their kith and kin do and become in New Zealand? New Zealand might become a noble field for missionary enterprise, the exclusive paradise of a family party, the Canaan of every pious bankrupt armed with passport from Mr. Danderson Coates and the Missionary Society. Godless storekeepers might be weeded out of Kororareka; the power of trade, key of native obedience, placed in the hands of elect teachers of Sunday schools; and Exeter Hall boast a model colony where a "Missionocracy" gave both the law and the gospel, and waxed fat in the process; and where the heathen, true labourer in the field, supplied both converts for the next world, and exports for this. But

"The best laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft a-gley" –

An event was at hand destined to shatter all

AN ADVERSE STAR.

hopes of tabooing New Zealand for a missionary preserve.

In 1837, an association of gentlemen, including among its members the late Lord Durham and others who had been connected with the company of 1825, was formed in London for the purpose of colonising a portion of New Zealand with chosen emigrants from the mother country. This association submitted its plans to the Colonial Office and duly sought the favour of the Crown – but the Colonial Office had just committed itself to the confederacy of the thirteen chiefs and the missionary designs. Here was a rival body which might throw New Zealand open to tens of thousands of British emigrants, break up narrow monopolies, pull down the missionary dynasty! Such a body could but become instantly obnoxious to the Colonial Office; and after many fruitless attempts to enlist this Department in their favour, Lord Durham and his associates were driven to act independently of it.

New Zealand had been formally proclaimed an independent sovereign State. Sydney traders and adventurers, missionaries and missionary traders had procured lands from the natives and commenced a lawless colonisation of the north – an association of British emigrants had surely as good a right to purchase lands of the natives and commence a regular colonisation of the south.

In 1839, therefore, the Association dispatched its pioneer expedition to New Zealand under the

FRENCH DESIGNS.

late Colonel Wakefield. He succeeded in acquiring large cessions of waste land from the Cook's Straits natives, who were delighted at the idea that the lucrative trade which had long been confined to the hostile tribes in the north was now to be enjoyed in the south; and by the end of 1839, the Association's first settlement was successfully planted at Wellington.

British colonisation having thus taken root at Wellington despite the "Colonial-Missionary Office," it appears to have struck this baffled institution that in surrendering the sovereignty of the islands to Mr. Busby's thirteen confederate chiefs, it had cast away a weapon which would have proved singularly useful in the work of subverting Wellington. And as it was now also discovered that France (utterly regardless of the thirteen sovereign natives) was actually planning an expedition to seize New Zealand for a penal colony; as Lord Palmerston at the Foreign Office who seems to have had a slight contempt for missionary diplomacy was asking certain ugly questions as to Mr. Busby's feat and this French consequence; the Colonial Office now determined to try and get back that which it had just got rid of; and dispatched a second "consul" in the person of Captain Hobson R.N., to procure from the natives the formal cession of the sovereignty of the country – with a contingent commission as Governor in his pocket in case he succeeded.

Captain Hobson, accredited by the Colonial

BRITISH SOVEREIGNTY.

Office to its old allies Mr. Busby the missionary landowners and their confederate chiefs, experienced no difficulty in accomplishing his mission. A treaty called the "Treaty of Waitangi," drawn up by the missionary brotherhood, was signed by various sovereign natives (a blanket was sometimes given for a signature and it was not every day that a native could get a blanket for making his X), under which, in consideration of being guaranteed their "possessions," various very independent natives transferred the sovereignty of the country to Queen Victoria; and declared themselves, and their absent friends or enemies, British subjects and black John Bulls. Captain Hobson then read his commission; took Auckland for his capital; the British flag was hoisted; and in 1840, just seventy years after Captain Cook had gone through a like ceremony, short of the "Blanket Treaty," New Zealand again became a British possession, and this time a set pearl of the British crown. 12

Meanwhile the affairs of the Association had advanced: the bankers and merchants of London had urged the Government in its favour. Lord John Russell was in power; and Lord John seems to have viewed the Association body which

DEFEAT OF THE TRICOLOUR.

might be made nationally useful in promoting a wholesome emigration from the mother country, and in turning to account the barren wilds and wastes of the new colony the empire had now acquired. The Association received a royal charter of incorporation, became a joint-stock body with a capital of £300,000 under the name of the New Zealand Company; and in consideration of its surrendering to the Crown every pretension of right and title to all New Zealand lands acquired under Colonel Wakefield's negotiations with the natives

NEW ZEALAND COMPANY.

the Crown agreed to make over to it 700,000 acres of such lands for the purposes of colonisation. 13

Thus constituted and encouraged in a moment of official sunshine, the New Zealand Company prosecuted their enterprise with extraordinary vigour and success. Before the ink was well dry on their charter of incorporation they had extended the settlement of Wellington, planted the settlements of Wanganui New Plymouth and Nelson, and safely landed on the shores of Cook's Straits five thousand emigrants of a stamp better fitted to subdue the wilderness and rough-hew the foundations of an infant State than any who had left the mother country since the days of the cavalier emigrants of Delaware or the Pilgrim Fathers of Massachusetts.

Two elements of order and civilisation were thus at last introduced into the beautiful wilderness where nature had done so much and man so little – the Colonial Office missionary-government in the north, the Colonising-Company in the south; and the sad history of New Zealand for the next five years is but the history of the successful intrigues of the former institution to destroy the latter.

The Colonial Office of 1840 was a despotic

COLONIAL OFFICE.

power ruling colonies through governors and small officials, its obsequious tools pocketing handsome salaries whilst they bowed to its every caprice; and the heading of its every despatch might well have been the "Sic volo, sic jubeo, stat pro ratione voluntas." We have seen that in these days the Colonial Office was entirely under missionary influence. Its mere political head for a few months might sometimes be a man like Lord John Russell, deaf to the bray of Exeter Hall and a friend to emigration. But the Under Secretary, the permanent man who pulled the strings, was an all-powerful official deeply imbued with the anti-emigration fallacies of aborigines-protection societies and a violent missionary partisan. The New Zealand Company had snapped red tape; had forced this despotic missionary institution to undo a policy; to open New Zealand to British emigrants; to abandon the cherished hope of making New Zealand a missionary preserve. The New Zealand Company must receive a retaliatory lesson, and be put down. Indeed, if it were allowed to flourish, official pride might be wounded official slumbers broken by a dozen other companies knocking and demanding permission to colonise a dozen other wastes in a dozen other colonies. Traditions of office, official routine, the policy of "how not to do it" might be rudely disturbed; and the Colonial Circumlocution Office be reduced either to the vulgarity of activity and usefulness, or to extinction, like the Inquisition. The executive instruments of

MISSIONARY-OFFICIALS.

this institution which had so much to avenge on the New Zealand Company, were the Missionary-officials 14 at Auckland! – the very gentlemen who had built up the snug little confederacy which this New Zealand Company had pulled down; and who, in avenging the injuries of their employers would also avenge their own. These gentlemen, too, had a private pecuniary inducement for opposing the Company. They were land speculators – the auriferous stream of capital and labour was beginning to flow into New Zealand but it was flowing to the Company's young settlements in the distant south – if the Company's young settlements could be swamped, emigration-Patroclus diverted to the north – missionary lands Auckland Town lots might become diggings of the rarest yield! 15

LIVE AND LET LIVE.

Here, then, it would seem that there was sufficient of "animus" and "motive" to explain to us the cause of that fatal opposition which the New Zealand Company was now to experience from the Colonial Office and the missionary executive.

It is not charged on the Colonial Office and the Missionary party that when they commenced to hunt and to harry the Company they foresaw the fatal end of the chase; for huntsmen and quarry alike bit the dust, and self-preservation if no better motive would have induced them to draw rein sooner. Neither is it charged on them that in ruining the Company's enterprise they wished to ruin the Company's emigrants. In fierce pursuit of the culprit Company they trampled down the Company's settlers as unconsidered emmets. Herodotus tells us of a people who put out the eyes of their slaves that nothing might distract them when

THE STALKING HORSE.

churning butter. But these people did not practise such custom because they hated slaves, but because they loved butter – and the Missionary-government did not desolate the emigrant's little field because it hated him, but because it loved revenge on those who sent him.

Every oppression and tyranny is carried on under some cloak-cry, or mask. Why the ferocious cruelties practised by the missionary on the hapless natives of Mexico and Peru? – the glory of God. Why Bomba's chains and stripes? – constitutional government. Why negro slavery? – a necessity. Why skin the eel? – he likes it. Why the missionary-ruin of the New Zealand Company? – the good of the natives!

The cry of the Colonial Office and its missionary officials in their work of ruining the New Zealand Company, was that they feared that the Company's colonisation of a portion of the wilderness would ruin the natives!

Now if there had been no colonisation of any sort; if New Zealand had been a virgin field untouched by the European; the natives an innocent race having had no contact with the white man; there would have been less of flimsiness in this plea. But even then it might have been urged with truth, that if the real object was to civilise and preserve a race like the New Zealanders, such object would be best attained by bringing the New Zealanders into harmonious intercourse with an interspersed industrial population of orderly British emigrants –

NON-COLONISING FALLACIES.

who would practically teach them the arts of civilisation, introduce the plough and the loom; and by smooth example, wean them from their exterminating internecine feuds and the cannibal barbarities of their savage life. 16

But New Zealand was not a virgin field untouched by the white man: there was the Pandemonium of Kororareka, there were a dozen rising Kororarekas. True, now that the British flag was hoisted, the more repulsive features of this lawless colonisation might disappear. We might hear no more of corrosive sublimate, of cannibal feasts cooked in ships' coppers; 17 many a "Lag" might fly

TE TAMAI'S FATE.

and the blasphemous debauchery of Kororareka might be checked. But could the Colonial Office, could the missionary officials, could any reasonable

THE PRICE OF BLOOD.

human being, expect that this irregular colonisation would cease now that New Zealand had become a British colony? The natives, whose dominant passion next to war and cannibalism was trade, were everywhere encouraging such colonisation – giving their daughters to the white man, building him houses, dressing him flax, growing him corn, collecting him produce, helping him in the fishery, selling him millions of acres of land. Trade and intercourse between the two races, Australian immigration, "squatting," had been steadily growing up for thirty years. The proclamation of British Government in New Zealand gave an instant stimulus to this sort of colonisation. The harbours of Auckland and Kororareka and Wellington and Nelson were thronged with colonial shipping; and every vessel brought speculators, adventurers, land-sharks, eager to buy up wild lands and settle in a country long the wild Eden of the Pacific, and where now there was to be law order and government expenditure. Who with 100,000 warlike

STOPPING THE ATLANTIC.

natives bent on swelling this rising torrent of Australian colonisation, was to stop it? – the Missionaries! Mrs. Partlington stopping the Atlantic with her mop! Surely it passes the bounds of human credulity to suppose that the Colonial Office and its missionary allies could believe that a magnificent country larger than Great Britain and Ireland, when once proclaimed a British colony, could be closed to the million, tabooed to the empire, and locked up as a select preserve for a handful of missionaries and missionary emigrants licensed to plant a home in New Zealand by Mr. Danderson Coates and the Church Missionary Society!

The missionary party must have seen that this irregular colonisation of the country could not be stopped – and seeing this, it appears incredible that they did not see that the only mode of moderating the evils of this irregular colonisation from the convict colonies, was to encourage some regular colonisation from the mother country. They asserted that the bane of the native was that his civilisation model (his trainer) was the Sydney pedlar, the lawless land-shark, the drunken forecastle bully, the embruted whaler. Such "trainers" could not be got rid of – the antidote then would have been to have placed before the native other models to have made his "trainer," the industrious emigrant family, the steady mechanic, the English gentleman: to have done and introduced precisely what the Company wanted to do and introduce.

I cannot but think that the Colonial Office and

ANIMUS OF OPPOSITION.

the missionary gentlemen must have seen all these things; and that their opposition to the Company's scheme of colonisation was, in truth, a retaliatory opposition. Yet an opposition so intensified by certain pecuniary considerations, that if the Company had held out the "olive branch" by turning their emigrant capital and labour into the northern neighbourhood of Auckland town lots and missionary glebes, it would have been extinguished; and the Wairoa massacre and the train of disasters which such opposition entailed would never have occurred.

The peculiar means which the Missionary Government hit on for working out its designs on the Company, the modus operandi, was a very simple but very effective one. It was to assume the illegality of the Company's title to the waste lands in Cook's Straits where they had planted their little settlements, and to call on the Company to prove their title good, as against the natives, before a legal tribunal specially constituted for the purpose. And they pleaded that they were morally bound to set up such tribunal by their Blanket Treaty of Waitangi.

The second article of this missionary "coup diplomatique," guaranteed to the natives the lands estates forests fisheries and other properties which they might possess; and Lord John Russell describing this treaty some while after in the House says, "it asserts the rights of the natives to the property of which they are possessed."

Now what did possess mean here? – what was

THE BLANKET TREATY.

the true honest construction of the word? Did not possession of land here mean some beneficial occupancy and enjoyment of land? Surely yes. The New Zealanders were not a hunting people of nomad tribes roaming over the country in quest of game food. They were a village-dwelling, man-eating, farmer-fisher people; subsisting on the produce of cultivated patches of kumera taro and potato, and on eels dog-fish and fern root taken in the near vicinity of their villages. New Zealand was larger than Great Britain and Ireland. The entire population did not exceed 100,000. Immense districts of teeming fertility, literally without an inhabitant, did not produce a mouthful of food for a single human being. They were not an increasing people. For a century they had been a fast decreasing people. When they made their marks to the Blanket Treaty, there were seventy-five millions of waste acres in the country which they did not use and which, humanly speaking, it was certain they never would use.

Their "possessions," then, should, I think, have been construed to mean all their villages fortifications fisheries and cultivations; together with a block of land near every village (say 10,000 acres for every acre they had in crop) as a noble demesne for their possible posterity. And the remainder of the available country (some three-fourths) should have been deemed the estate of the Crown partly as an equivalent for the law order and security which the Crown would introduce; and

NATIVE LAND TITLES.

partly as an equivalent for that lucrative trade which Crown colonisation would create, and for the immense pecuniary value which Crown emigrants arts and civilisation would in a few years confer on the native demesne.

Even if the New Zealanders had been one united people with one custom of inheritance and one defined common law of property, this would have been the best the most humane construction of the treaty. But the New Zealanders were twenty independent hostile tribes who had waged ferocious wars with each other for centuries; who had chased each other from village to village, now advancing conquerors, now retreating fugitives; and whose "titles" to lands, to use an expression, were derived or lost through conquest, reconquest, occupancy, non-occupancy, slavery, accidental spilling of blood – through a dozen clashing customs. 18

MAORI CONVEYANCING.

Here it would have been doubly prudent and humane to have interpreted possessions in the sense of some "present occupancy." For to tell the slender remnants of the twenty tribes that all New Zealand was theirs to sell, was instantly to revive among them the bitter memory of those title-giving ferocities which had all but extinguished their race. 19

THE COMPANY'S CASE.

But no, The Colonial Office and its missionary officials gravely asserted that every one of the eighty millions of waste acres in New Zealand belonged to the handful of natives; and declared (despite the agreement with Lord John Russell, page 43) that as the New Zealand Company claimed a strip of the waste they would set up a tribunal 'to try whether such claim could be proved good at law!

The New Zealand Company's negotiations with the Cook's Straits natives for this strip of the desert had been carried on publicly with the full knowledge and consent of all tribes interested therein. Complying with the savage's idea of purchase, the Company had made the natives satisfactory presents for this strip, and thus had purchased it. But the solid requital they made was the setting apart for the natives an equal-value tenth of all the acquired land – an estate which in a few years might well have been worth half a million sterling. 20 The little portion of the wilderness which the Company asked for, was not to be kept a barren monopoly until created a marketable prize

THE LAND COURT.

by the enterprise and industry of others. It was for the busy field of fruitful colonisation; for the village, the school, the church, the plough, the fleece. The company had planted four flourishing settlements, and to crown this brilliant commencement of colonisation, "to make the desert blossom like the rose," they asked for 700,000 acres of the waste. The five-and-twenty missionary gentlemen alone claimed nearly half this quantity from their confederate chiefs – but the Company was a hostile interloper, a vessel of wrath; and the Missionary government humorously referred the Company to the "little tribunal" which it had set up to try the case.

This tribunal was called "The New Zealand Land Claims Court." An able and as it afterwards proved much to the disgust of his employers, a very independent lawyer, Mr. Commissioner Spain, was to preside, hear evidence, and adjudicate on the legality of the Company's Cook's Straits purchases. And if the reader should think that no lawyer of ancient or modern days bad ever a more hopeless task, set him than that which here fell to the lot of Mr. Commissioner Spain, it is extremely probable that the reader would not be wrong.

The Gordian knot which the learned commissioner had to unravel was simply this: – First, he had to define a New Zealand law of real property. To lay down for the New Zealanders what constituted their legal right to sell out of the many rights they set up. Whether the right were de-

CASE FOR LORD ELDON.

rived from partial occupancy of a district since the Hawaiian migration. If so, whether such right had not been lost by the circumstance of some of the members of such occupant tribe having once been eaten by invaders from a hostile tribe. Whether, if such invaders did thus extinguish and gain a right, they had not in turn lost it to some third tribe who had submitted some of them to a similar process. Whether, if tribe A had eaten most of tribe B fifty years ago, tribe A had or had not lost their right to such district because they had never occupied it; and whether, if they had lost it, the right lay with the remnant of tribe B, or with some members of tribe C, who had once caught eels there. Secondly – having settled the principle of inheritance and determined whether occupancy, conquest, re-conquest, cannibalism, or slavery, gave the legal right to sell, he had to discover in whom this "legal right" vested – to ascertain which of the half-dozen parties who claimed it, had it. Thirdly – having accomplished this, the learned commissioner had to frame a principle of "adequate payment;" to lay down whether the payment was to be goods or money – and whether £10, £100, £l,000, or £10,000. Three-fourths of the witnesses would be excited savages giving contradictory evidence in an unknown tongue; and when the learned commissioner had struggled through the maze and pronounced judgment, it was infinitely less probable that the pack of disputants would bow to his decision, than that they would proceed to

THE MAORI WELCOME.

tomahawk each other before his face, and practically renew in court those slumbering ferocities which the court's inquiries had aroused.

Such were some of the duties and responsibilities of the learned Land Commissioner, and his temper and judgment were soon to be sorely tried.

We have seen that when Colonel Wakefield and the Company's pioneers appeared in Cook's Straits as the heralds of English trade and intercourse they were warmly welcomed by the natives. The settlements of Wellington Wanganui New Plymouth Nelson had been planted amid the acclamations of the Maori. The admirable plan of the "reserved tenths" gave general satisfaction. The natives flocked to the village-towns to barter their pigs and potatoes for the useful novelties of the stores; became amusing "helps" and odd-job workmen, took agricultural contract work, and presented every indication of settling down into a thriving portion of a civilised community.

But the "apple of discord" was ripening hard by.

When, the missionary gentlemen were seeking marks and crosses to the "Blanket Treaty" their emissaries were sent round the country to procure them, and to interpret the document to which such signatures were to be affixed.

These emissaries came to Wellington and held long and semi-secret interviews with the natives. Soon after their departure a marked change came stealing over the demeanour of the natives. Now,

ENEMIES IN THE CAMP.

were first heard among them sneering expressions to the effect that the Cook's Straits white men were not the Queen's people, but, "cookies." 21 Natives, never heard of before, now began to come forward as owners of lands bought of others. Natives who could not deny the sale of land now murmured that in their private subdivision of the "utu" some had taken the lion's share – one family had marched off with the silver meant for two; A, wanting a dozen red blankets had got six blue; C had carried off all the collar-shirts; D coming for tobacco, had been gratified with frying-pan and jews-harp; B had lost his boots. Natives who had never been near a district for years now travelled back and demanded lands on which they found the settler. The Waitangi Treaty and their "possessions" were ever in their mouths – and hundreds of them were now only waiting Mr. Spain's arrival to start up with denials of the Company's purchases, with revivals of old claims, and with every device which the inflamed cupidity of the savage could suggest as likely to serve his great purpose of getting more gold and blankets from the white man who had plenty in the bank and the store, and who might bear considerable squeezing under the sanction of the Law.

Mr. Spain soon appeared, accompanied by certain missionary officials anxious to see justice done – his chief interpreter, general adviser, and the attorney-general for the natives being the son of the

NATIVE CUPIDITY.

most active missionary-official in New Zealand. Under these auspices and recollecting the general preparedness of the natives to play their part, it is not necessary to say that the learned commissioner's court was instantly besieged by bands of defrauded natives vociferating for more "utu;" 22 and threatening the settler with the tomahawk if more utu were not instantly accorded. Almost every acre of land where the settlements of Wellington Wanganui New Plymouth and Nelson had been founded was now claimed back; and it seemed probable that the Company and the Company's emigrants after expending thousands in the work of colonisation would now be stripped of every waste acre of the wilderness which they had cleared and planted.

It would be tedious and repulsive to pursue the missionary and the savage through every barbarous maze and greedy wile displayed in Mr. Spain's court. Indeed an event now occurred, the direct fruit of this court, so tragic in its nature so pregnant with disaster, that the mere court during the remainder of its farciful existence becomes a mere shadow on the wall; and may be dismissed here with the glance of contempt and indignation it provokes.

One of the districts which Colonel Wakefield had purchased from the natives was the (Nelson) Wairau Plains. The seller was Te Rauparaha, an expelled outcast from a northern tribe who get-

LAND COURT FRUITS.

ting together a band of desperadoes had destroyed various of the Cook's Straits tribes and planted himself on their lands. His title to Wairau, was the massacre of the few Wairau families he had found there. But he never occupied the waste he made; he lived on the other island at the missionary station of Waikanae; so that when Colonel Wakefield bought Wairau it did not contain an inhabitant. 23 When Te Rauparaha heard of the coming Land Court he like others began to devise means of getting more payment. He decided to dispute the sale of Wairau. The Nelson surveyors were at work on the plain – he crossed the straits with an armed band, burnt down their huts and drove them off. They carried the news to Nelson. The Queen's magistrate issued a warrant for his apprehension on a charge of arson; and went himself, with Captain Arthur Wakefield two or three other gentlemen and some special constables, to execute it. A collision took place. Six-and-twenty white men were slain. The Queen's magistrate and Captain Wakefield were murdered in cold blood after the affray was over. Te Rauparaha took to his canoes and fled back to Waikanae. The settlers at once armed to march on Waikanae and seize the murderer. The authorities at Wellington imperatively forbade the expedition. Missionary officials hinted that missionary law would

WAIRAU MASSACRE.

support Te Rauparaha: and as Captain Fitzroy, the new governor, was hourly expected on the spot, the friends of the murdered were coerced to wait. 24 Captain Fitzroy, the missionary tool of Lord Stanley's missionary Colonial Office, 25 arrived in New Zealand – received the missionary-official version of the Wairau massacre – came down to Wellington – proceeded to Waikanae – begged an interview with Te Rauparaha, which that worthy was good enough to grant – told him that he had done wrong in killing twenty-six emigrants and in murdering

SOLOMON'S JUDGMENT.

the Queen's magistrate and a Queen's officer in cold blood – but that under the circumstances of the case he (British governor) would look the matter over, and only caution Te Rauparaha (missionary convert and British subject) never to do the like again! 26

Captain Fitzroy's next act of administrative justice was performed at New Plymouth. Here, despite much hard swearing on the part of the natives and the legal aid of their Attorney-General, the learned commissioner of the Land Court decided against the natives, and awarded the Company and their settlers some 70,000 acres of land. Governor Fitzroy instantly reversed the court's award, gave back the whole district to the natives; and after trying to break up the settlement and move the people to Auckland, moved them into a patch of a few acres round the village, – abandoned their cultivations to the natives, – and left the settlers stripped of their lands – a further warning to the white man, a further signal to the black, 27

A NEW ZEALAND LAND CASE.

28

These proceedings stopped all further emigration from the mother country – every Cook's Straits

THE EMIGRANT MAORI.

settler warned his friends from a land where there was no law, where life and property were insecure.

THE DOG IN THE MANGER.

The natives, triumphant from the murder of Wairau and the land victory their governor had won them at New Plymouth, grew daily more insolent and exacting; and unquestionably at this period, nothing but the knowledge that they might proceed too far, that they might so disgust the white man as to drive him away altogether never to return except as a conqueror and thus deprive themselves of that trade which gave them so many luxuries, prevented them from doing that which would have led to open collision between the races and probably to the

WRECK OF THE COLONY.

utter destruction of every young settlement the Company had planted. Many southern colonists now abandoned New Zealand; whilst the majority stopped all cultivation of lands from which they might any day be driven; and hoarding the remnants of their little means kept themselves ready, to re-emigrate to Australia, South America, or some foreign colony of the Pacific, where missionary misrule might no longer imperil their children's lives, or the crazed crochets of aborigines-protection societies make the settler the serf of the savage.

– – – – – – – –

The New Zealand Company, then, were virtually ruined – their scheme of independent colonisation was a wreck – the retaliatory policy of the aggrieved Colonial Office was a victory – missionary-officials might sing "Io triumphe."

But the triumph was short. The train had been carefully laid, the match applied; a great explosion had shattered the enemy – but a spark had lit another train, and now the engineer was "to hoist with his own petard."

Colonial Office and missionary policy had insisted that the remnant of New Zealanders should claim every waste acre of the immense New Zealand wilderness – it had set up the Land Court, a revival of slumbering feuds and old ferocities – it had winked at the slaughter of twenty-six white men by natives who were trespassers on the spot where the deed was done – in mockery of its own Land Court

MISSIONARY POLICY.

it had surrendered to the natives the garden of New Zealand; a waste Eden where the native had used no acre, where the native has used no acre to this day. There was one speck of gold in the dross of the Waitangi treaty – the agreement of the natives to kill the land-shark by selling lands only to the Crown. The natives demanded that this agreement should be cancelled – Captain Fitzroy assented; and the speculator was again free to acquire disputed rights to millions of disputed acres. The Colonial Office proposed raising a small militia force among the hardy pioneer settlers and backwoodsmen of the bush – missionary-officials replied that such a measure might be disagreeable to the natives – it was instantly abandoned. Petty robberies, acts of violence, trespasses, stoppages of roads had been committed with impunity; for the magistrate could seldom see a native culprit – and one member of the Bench had already been murdered with impunity – -"pour encourager les autres." A succession of public measures of this nature, the similar tenor of all private intercourse between the Missionary Government and the aborigines, had given the latter such an idea of their rights and privileges, had so puffed up and incited them, that they had come to regard themselves as the superior race and to sneer at the white man as an emigrant slave. They took all the advantages of trade and civilisation – but would part with no custom of barbarism. They would have the profit of law, but they would be above the law. The more

THE NEW ZEALAND "CHILD."

yielded to them, the more they demanded. And history affords no instance of the character of a barbarous people being so changed and vitiated by the unwise policy of a superior race, as the New Zealander's character was changed and vitiated by the ten years' coddling and petting which he received at the hands of his missionary protectors.

It was a favourite expression of these gentlemen to term the New Zealander a "child." Perhaps he was; and to pursue the cradle image, he proved a child so long humoured in every whim by fond and fatuous parents that he would now smash the mirror, brain the cat, and stab the nurse. Or, to change the figure, Captain Fitzroy and his conjurers having raised the native devil in the south had now to lay him in the north; and were to eat in their own fields, bitter fruits of the harvest they had sown broadcast in the Company's.

Hone Heke, a distinguished missionary chief of the Bay of Islands, had long driven a thriving trade amid the lawless colonisers of Kororareka – bartering his pigs potatoes peaches, slave-girls, and native produce, with whalers and traders for powder guns blankets knicknacks and tobacco. The hoisting of the British flag at Kororareka, the introduction of some law, the imposition of customs duties, had sadly crippled this barter trade; and driven to other shores many of the fishing freebooters who had long revelled on the beach. With the ships, went Heke's income. His mark to this Waitangi

HEKE AND THE FLAG STAFF.

Treaty had created him a British subject – but it had created customs, stopped the pig trade, and made beauty a drug. The British flag-staff symbolized the customs. He cut it down. Smitten on the one cheek, Governor Fitzroy turned the other. By stroke of pen he abolished customs throughout New-Zealand; 29 when Heke, at the entreaty of his spiritual advisers, sent a note of apology. But whalers did not instantly come back; they had not heard of customs' sudden death. Heke was impatient; he cut the flag-staff down a second time. Missionary authorities remonstrated and set it up once more, this time as they tell us, "sheathed with iron" – but not with majesty. Heke cut it down a third time; then burnt down the town and drove the inhabitants to Auckland. Heke, almost an elder of the church, a chief, as a missionary author tells us, "distinguished for his knowledge of the Scriptures," actually burning down his Queen's towns! slaying and harrying Her Majesty's white subjects! Well might the missionary officials of the Privy Council exclaim, "et tu brute!" They offered £100 for his head. Heke at once replied by offering 1000 acres of land for the governor's head; a high price; but Heke was always a liberal savage. Soldiers

PRICE OF HEADS.

were got from Sydney; natives, old tribe foes of the missionary rebel delighted to cross tomahawks with him once more, were enlisted as allies, and war burst out. Having long coddled our pervert; we had now to thrash him.

The state of things thus brought about in New Zealand, here began to provoke considerable indignation at home. This non-colonising, aborigines-protecting policy of the Colonial-Missionary Office had been tried for seven years – what were its fruits? The New Zealand Company was virtually ruined – the young settlements it had planted were in process of abandonment, grass was growing in the newly-cleared streets and the little fields won from the wilderness were being given up to the dock and the thistle – many of the pioneer colonists were ruined, many had fled to Australia – trade, agriculture, emigration had ceased – the public revenue of the young colony had been lost – a tax on farm stock, a tax on rooms of houses, the old Spanish alcabala tax had been resorted to – a host of idle officials were clamorous for unpaid salaries – two shilling "assignats" had been issued – a wholesale murder had been passed over without even judicial enquiry – native acts of plunder, trespass, exasperating bravado, had been almost laughed at by the wretched authorities who disgraced the bench – the life and property of the white man were nowhere safe – the law was a mockery, – and the missionary savages, the perverted heathen, for whom all this had been done and suffered, for whom all this dirt

PARLIAMENTARY INTERFERENCE.

had been eaten, had just offered a tempting reward for their missionary governor's head, and had struck the first blow of what might well become a merciless and exterminating war of races!

A grave petition from the Cook's Straits settlers and Company's colonists was laid before Parliament; a Select Committee of the House condemned Lord Stanley's missionary policy; and in the session of 1845, the whole case of the "colonisation and misgovernment of New Zealand" was brought before the House of Commons in a three nights' debate. The lamented late Charles Buller member for Liskeard stated the case of the Company and the colonists, as against the Colonial Office and the missionary policy, in a searching and luminous argument, and was ably followed by Lord John Russell, Lord Howick, Mr. Aglionby, Mr. Hawes, Mr. Barkly, Mr. Mangles, the Right Honourable Edward Ellice and Richard Lalor Shiel. To shelter their colleague Lord Stanley, Sir Robert Peel's Ministry made it a Government question, and thus defeated Mr. Buller's motion – but only by a majority of 50 in a house of 400.

Though however the Colonial Minister was saved, his missionary policy was doomed.

Governor Fitzroy was recalled, Governor Grey from South Australia was appointed. Troops and a war steamer were sent out. And the long-suffering colonists were given to understand that missionary councils would be dispensed with; that though the treaty of Waitangi would be respected, Governor

GOVERNOR GREY'S ARRIVAL.

Grey would make every effort to procure waste lands and promote colonisation; and that even-handed justice would be dealt out to both races, and the native made amenable to the law.

Governor Grey arrived in New Zealand in 1845. Mr. Protector Clark and the missionary gentlemen who had played so distinguished a role in the wrecking of the colony under the patronage of Governors Hobson and Fitzroy, now shook the dust off their feet and departed to the farming of their fields and converts; and from this "dies faustus," New Zealand began slowly to emerge from her seven years' "slough of despond."

Governor Grey's first task was the due chastisement of the Flag-staff rebel. Fresh troops were sent to the scene of action, some vigour was infused into the military operations which had slightly languished under missionary generalship, and Heke, besieged in his last stronghold, his erie of Ruapekapeka, was driven into the wilderness and compelled to sue for peace; which, under guarantees for future good behaviour, was clemently granted him. 30

Te Rauparaha and his principal bully or fighting general, Rangihaeata, since Governor Fitzroy's friendly visit to them on the subject of the Wairau massacre, had openly avowed their contempt both for the white man and the white man's law; and

TE RAUPARAHA'S CHASTISEMENT.

in hopes of being bought off, had proceeded to disturb the settlers, fire on the troops, and commit various acts of violence, in a new district on the Wellington river Hutt, to which they never even professed to have any claim, and which had already been twice bought and paid for.

But these worthies had now to learn that all British governors were not missionary governors.

Governor Grey, fresh from Heke's rout, came to the spot; proclaimed these murderers rebels to the Queen; proclaimed martial law; organised a mixed military force of soldiers, settlers and friendly natives; made prisoner of Te Rauparaha; 31 hung, shot and dispersed his band of desperadoes; and drove Rangihaeata to a distant country.

A dastardly murder of a white woman and two children was committed at Wanganui by five up-river natives on the evening of April 18, 1846. A friendly tribe pursued and took them. The officer in command at Wanganui tried them by court-martial on the 24th, and hung them on the 26th. The up-river tribe came down to demand satisfaction. But after several skirmishes in which more powder was burnt than blood spilled, their leading chief Mamaku was slain, and they retired in discomfiture.

This Wanganui affair was the third and last occasion on which any of the New Zealand tribes

GOVERNOR'S GREY'S POLICY.

ever appeared in arms against the Queen. And from the time of Governor Grey's reduction of Heke, capture of Te Rauparaha, dispersion of Rangihaeata and execution of these Wanganui murderers, up to the present day (a period of ten years) life and property have probably been as secure in New Zealand as in any county of Great Britain.

Having thus chastised and educated the natives, and made himself at once respected and popular among them, Governor Grey turned his attention to civil matters.

During his administration the whole of the South or Middle Island, and several valuable districts in the North, were effectually purchased of the tribes by Messrs. McLean, Mantell, and other valuable officers of the Crown, and thrown open for settlement. The natives were largely employed in Government works, road-making, barrack-building, and engineering. Hospitals were erected for them. Some were enrolled as policemen, others appointed native magistrates. The payments they received for land were frequently made in instalments of stock, and every encouragement was given them in the pursuits of industry and peace. Emigration began slowly to revive. The Company's settlements of Wellington Wanganui New Plymouth and Nelson which had drooped so low, now began to expand and take firmer root. Otago, founded by an offshoot of the Company in 1846, slowly advanced; Canterbury, founded by another offshoot of the Company in 1848 though

THE COMPANY'S END.

planted on a false system which entailed many early difficulties, nevertheless proved a successful effort of colonisation which drew much profitable attention to New Zealand. Trade agriculture, and the public revenue of the colony improved. Confidence was restored. And though Governor, now Sir George Grey, K.C.B., was somewhat wedded to that old "despotic sway" to which the Colonial Office had long accustomed colonies and colonial governors, he was unquestionably a wise and able ruler under whose judicious policy New Zealand shook off the "missionary incubus," and commenced a career of slow but solid progress which has never since received a check.

The New Zealand Company, to whose parliamentary exertions the downfall of the Colonial Office missionary policy was mainly due; the Company which had preserved New Zealand from becoming the penal colony of France and the foreign mistress of the Pacific, was not destined to share in the improved fortunes of the beautiful land for which it had done so much. Its public repute and efficiency as a great commercial organ of systematic colonisation was fatally damaged by the "seven years' insecurity of life and property" which missionary policy had inflicted on its early colonists. The emigrant world heard that emigrants who had bought lands of the New Zealand Company had often lost such lands, sometimes life and lands too. This was a death-blow to the Company's colonising power the effects of which

THE NEW CONSTITUTION.

no after expedients could avert; and it would have been well if, when it had won for its colonists the great parliamentary victory of 1845, it had closed its labors and entrusted the further colonisation of New Zealand to new and undamaged hands. But it attempted to proceed; and after entering into some pecuniary negotiations with the Government which have resulted in saddling the colony with a serious debt, it found that the consequences of early misfortunes were too serious to be overcome, and in 1851 it resigned its functions to the Government, and made over its various settlements to the Crown.

In 1851 the Australian gold discoveries took place, and gave a marked impetus to trade, agriculture and every branch of industry in New Zealand.

In 1853, the new constitution, described hereafter, was proclaimed, and the real government of the colony entrusted to the colonists. And in 1853, Sir George Grey after a brilliant career of several years in South Australia and New Zealand proceeded home and received the governorship of the Cape Colony; where he may find ample field for the display of his peculiar tact in the management and civilisation of savage tribes.

Lieutenant-Colonel Wynyard, commander of the forces, became Governor pro tem, on Sir George Grey's departure, and brought the New Zealand constitution into practical operation. Colonel Wynyard's rule of two years exhibited a period of quiet

MISSIONARY MERITS AND MISDEEDS.

progress; and in 1855 this gallant officer was relieved by Colonel Thomas Gore Browne K.C.B. – a gentleman who appears to win golden opinions from all parties; and under whose responsible rule we may hope to see the youngest but finest colony of our empire enjoy a long career of tranquil prosperity and become a popular emigration field and happy home for thousands of our countrymen.

– – – – – – – –

Such, I think, is a correct sketch of the leading features of the history of New Zealand from Tasman's discovery down to the present day.

The remarks on "missionary-policy" are dictated by no rancour against missionaries – by no contempt for a savage race. The New Zealand missionary body of the present day, though slightly mistaken in its views and doing good in a manner somewhat different from that which it believes in, nevertheless constitutes a decided element of advance; and boasts men like Bishop Selwyn and various others both of the Church and Wesleyan Missions, who are an honour to their holy cause – whilst as to the Maori, I yield to no man in desire to preserve his race and to improve his lot.

But I hold that that early Church Missionary and consular party which "got up" the Sovereign confederacy of thirteen land-endowing chiefs from whom it obtained tens of thousands of acres of land – that party which threw away the public revenue of the colony to conciliate a missionary savage at Kororareka; which in very mockery of justice aban-

SAINTS AND SINNERS.

doned the garden of New Zealand to the dozen dogs in the manger incited to claim it at New Plymouth; which gave the right hand of fellowship to the murderers of six-and-twenty of our countrymen at Wairau – I hold that that party strayed, from the right path; that it brought reproach on its cloth; and that the policy it pursued in alliance with Lord Stanley's Colonial Office was a selfish, bigoted, revengeful policy – a policy not dictated by the purest motives.

But the early ruin and misery inflicted on New Zealand, the near destruction of both races, must not be charged only on this party. The gentlemen who composed it were more or less the "executive instruments" of a policy, and thus, as most prominent, have been unduly blamed. But these gentlemen were at least in and of the country; they took their share of the perils of the murderous spirit they called forth. If they provoked the battle, they were at least in the battle. Amongst much evil, too, they did some good; and as repentant sinners they may live to do more. Those who most deserved the pillory were angry colonial ministers, pious bureaucrats, missionary bigots, Exeter-Hall Pharisees, the professional and unprofessional philanthropist –

– – – – -"Whose boundless mind
Glow'd with the common love of black mankind."

Salaried secretaries of aborigines-destructive societies, id genus omne, – smooth men who sat at home at ease, and who in revenge of wounded dignity and the snapping of red tape, in dilettante

ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.

or professional pursuit of an idle theory – "cried havoc, let slip the dogs of war;" prayed; and went to bed.

These things are no more. Confederate chief, Exeter-Hall-Proconsul, Magistrate-missionary, Moa, Mastodon, are alike extinct. New Zealand has cast off her long incubus; has free Parliament, rules herself: –

"Now her task is smoothly done,
She can fly, or she can run."

She has been nursed in storms – but the storm-tossed plant grows into the hardiest tree – the hotbed spawns the mushroom. Partial evil, too, has been partial good – the battles of her early colonists have opened a rich and clear field for those who would follow now and renew life in the "Britain of the South."

1 Too much weight, however, has been given to this evidence of words. It is said that perro or pero is a word evidently foreign to the Maori language. Now one Maori word for dog is kuri, the other pero, or peropero. But there are many words like pero, such as the verb pera, to be like that; peraro, a shellfish; pere, a sling; perepere, to clear away weeds. Ka tuku nga peru a to kotiro, the girl pouts with anger. At the same time it is only fair to Columbus' countrymen to add that the word pero, peropero, is generally applied to a hungry-looking half-starved dog, a little fact which favours the assumption of a Spanish-introduced dog. For it is reasonable to suppose that a runaway dog or dog sent adrift from any of the old ill-found exploring tubs of the Spaniards would not be a fat dog in easy circumstances, but a stunted dirty ill-fed cur; and as such animal was called perro by the strange men who left it, the natives took the new word and applied it to all thin dogs in future. Further, the New Zealand dog bears a closer resemblance to some degenerate European mongrel than it does to the dingo of Australia, or to any native dog of the Polynesian group whence it is supposed the New Zealanders migrated.

2 "Cannibalism" is not an agreeable feature in the customs of a savage people. But cannibalism was by no means an unique New Zealand peculiarity. It was, and in certain corners still is, a characteristic of that great race of men, scattered over the Indian Archipelago, Madagascar, the South Sea Islands, and parts of the American continent; whilst Stedman relates that, among certain tribes in the interior of the African continent human limbs are hung up in the shambles for sale like butchers' meat in Leadenhall. If we say these are filthy savages, suppose, before we cast stones at the ancestors of the New Zealanders, we glance at our own. Mr. Donovan, in "Lardner's Cyclopaedia," observes that "Our own ancestors were of the number of these horrible epicures. Diodorus Siculus charges the Britons with being anthropophagi; and Saint Jerome, who lived so late as the fifth century of the Christian era, accuses a British tribe, from his own personal knowledge, not only with a partiality for human flesh, but a fastidious taste for certain delicate parts of it." Gibbon, in his "Decline and Pall of the Roman Empire," states that a valiant tribe of Caledonia, the Attacotti, the enemies and afterwards the soldiers of Valentian, were accused of delighting in the taste of human flesh. When they hunted in the woods for prey, they attacked the shepherd rather than the flock; and selected the most delicate and brawny parts both of males and females for their horrid repasts.
If in the neighbourhood of the commercial and literary town of Glasgow, a race of cannibals has really existed, we may contemplate in the period of the Scottish history the extremes of savage and civilized life. Such reflections tend to enlarge the circle of our ideas, and to encourage the pleasing hope that New Zealand may produce, in some future age, the Hume and Macaulay of the southern hemisphere.

3 "Te Ika a Maui" – the native name of the North Island of New Zealand; literally, the Fish of Maui – Maui being the mythological fisherman who caught the island on his hook, and drew it up from ocean's depths. The title too of Mr. Taylor's book – a work exhibiting some few missionary mists and mirages, but a very valuable contribution to New Zealand literature in the departments of the aboriginal race, natural history and geology of the country. (Price 14s.)

4 "An eye-witness related this horrid butchery to me, – Mr. Puckey, of Kaitara, one of our Catechists."

5 See "Life of Rev. S. Leigh," page 408.

6 The men occasionally empowered by the New South Wales governors to write J.P. to their names in New Zealand were, for the most part, rude squatters or trading adventurers themselves – mere Justice Shallows, without a constable to execute a warrant; and who, for all purposes of enforcing law and order, might as well have written themselves P.P. Indeed J.P. in New Zealand was generally read Judge of Pigs.

7 This lawless colonisation of the country was spreading: many of the little coast whaling and trading stations in Cook's Straits, on the east coast, and about Foveaux Straits in the extreme south, were little other than budding Kororarekas coming into bloom.

8 British governors of New South Wales had, I think, appointed magistrates in New Zealand up to 1825, if not up to 1830; and this appointment of Mr. Busby as "consul" appears to have been the first overt official act by which the Colonial Office disclaimed the British sovereignty of the country, which had been assumed and acted on in virtue of Cook's discovery, surveys, and act of taking possession.

9 Indeed, to give the reader some idea of the state of the country at this period, as an instance of that "love of trade" which has ever distinguished the native race, and as some proof that almost twenty years of missionary teaching whatever it had done to convert, had not done much to christianize the natives, it should be stated that in 1832 it became necessary to prohibit the importation into this country of "preserved human heads" – evidence having reached the Colonial Office that the New Zealanders frequently murdered their countrymen in order to get their heads to cure and preserve as an article of barter export with the Sydney traders.
One of these heads may be seen at the Polytechnic, Regent Street. It is so admirably prepared that it is generally passed by as a piece of wax-work. But it is far more life-like than anything at Madame Tussaud's; and is a genuine New Zealand head, cured probably thirty years ago, and quite a pretty object to look at.

10 I never saw this flag, and never met a man who had seen it. But there was such a flag; and a missionary in a mask, a man roasting, with a "confederated chief" turning the spit, might well have been its emblem.

11 The loose hold which the Colonial Office had kept on New Zealand, this appointment of "consul," and repudiation of sovereignty, did in fact tempt a very worthy and amusing French gentleman adventurer, Mons. the Baron de Thierry, to invade New Zealand in a friendly manner and proclaim himself king of the North Island.

12 Russel (Bay of Islands) was first fixed on as the seat of government; but the government residence was accidentally burnt down, when the young capital was planted on the shores of the noble waters of Waitemata and called Auckland.
We so nearly lost New Zealand to the French through this missionary "coup" of the thirteen sovereign natives that Captain Hobson had but arrived at the Bay of Islands when the French corvette came in to take possession. Finding the British flag planted in the North Island, the French commander determined to try for the South, and hoist the tricolour at Akaroa. His design however was betrayed; when Governor Hobson – who whatever may have been his faults as a civil administrator was an able and quick-witted naval officer – hurried off the English sloop to Akaroa. The sloop arrived first, but so little first that I have somewhere read that she was only saluting the British ensign as the corvette dashed in. The French commander then abandoned the design of seizing New Zealand as a French possession, and landed the nucleus of his pioneer colony at Akaroa – as a friendly French settlement in British dominions. Akaroa remained a small French settlement for many years; numbering at one time some 200 settlers. Most of them have since been removed to the French Marquesas; but Akaroa still exhibits pleasing traces of its founders in gardens famous for pear, and plum, and peach.
If France had been a month sooner she would have gained a colony worth a hundred Algerias. A colony which would have made her mistress of the Pacific; a colony standing so before the doors of Australia that every wool and gold ship would have had to pass almost within sight of fifty French New Zealand privateer ports, amply large enough for the reception of the James Baines, Lightning, Marco Polo, and a dozen sister galleons.

13 Lord John Russell's agreement with the Company was to allow them four acres of wild land for every pound (5s. an acre), which, before an appointed government accountant, they could prove they had expended in purchasing the land from the natives, and in the various expenses of sending out emigrants and founding their settlements. And their proved expenditure, on this scale, entitled them to receive about 700,000 acres.

14 This term is used to signify, generally, the gentlemen who as advising-amateurs or actual salary-receiving officers, constituted the executive governments of Captains Hobson and Fitzroy. Every missionary was not an official, and every official was not a missionary. But they all echoed and typified the missionary policy of the Colonial Office, and were all ostensibly imbued with the "missionary spirit." This spirit notoriously ruled the councils of the two early governors. Captain Hobson had been accredited to the missionaries; missionaries framed the Blanket Treaty; the original draft is in the handwriting of a missionary; and Governor Fitzroy was far more a missionary ruler than even poor Governor Hobson: indeed, his chief adviser and bosom counsellor was a missionary catechist, the chief protector of the aborigines, a Mr. Clark – to whom he once paid the dubious compliment of publicly declaring that he, Mr. Protector Clark, was worth any six of his other officers put together.

15 The officers of Governor Hobson's administration drawn chiefly from Sydney, had monopolised so many of the best town sites in the new capital that Lord Stanley had to administer to them an official rebuke. But far too much has been said and sung on this subject. Missionaries and Officials had families; and were colonists quite as well entitled to acquire property in the new country where they had cast their lot, as the Company or the Company's settlers. They helped themselves with a liberal hand; but the grievance is, not that they got some half-million acres for themselves, but that they would not suffer the Company to get any. This fear, too, that the Company's southern scheme would reduce the value of their northern lands, was a ridiculous fear. There could not have been a man of business among them – otherwise they must have seen that if the Company succeeded, New Zealand would become a "popular British emigration field;" when capital and labour would find its way to the north, and in a few years make all northern properties worth more pounds per acre than perhaps even yet they are worth shillings.

16 It would not, I think, be difficult to show that the extinction or partial extinction of an aboriginal savage people has often been owing, not to the coming of the white man, but to the delay of the coming of the white man: "barbarism," not "civilisation," has frequently been the annihilating power.

17 Some of the captains of the Sydney schooners which traded to Kororareka and round among the flax and whaling stations of the south were brutal scoundrels whose place on board should have been the yard-arm. One fellow boasted of having cut off the natives with corrosive sublimate; another had experimented with laudanum; a third – his name should be handed down – Captain Stewart, in conjunction with a native chief whom we shall meet again, perpetrated the act described in the following episode.
"On the arrival of a vessel called the 'Elizabeth,' commanded by a fellow named Stewart who came to trade for flax, Te Rauparaha offered to give him a full cargo, provided he would convey him with a hundred of his followers to Waharaupo. Influenced by the hope of gain, Stewart lent himself as an instrument to accomplish the will of these savages. They embarked, and he sailed direct to the abode of Tamai. Stewart sent a youth named Cowell in the boat to invite Tamai to come on board and see the cargo. He asked had they got any natives in the ship, and was answered, "No" – they had come direct from the Bay of Islands. But he remarked a small burr (pirikahu) sticking to a sailor's jacket, and said, How came it there, if you have been at sea so long? At last, however, he went on board, and was taken down into the cabin. The natives had concealed themselves in the hold. When Te Hiko entered the cabin, he stared fixedly at Tamai for nearly half-an-hour without saying a word. He then approached, drew back Tamai's upper lip, and said, 'Those are the teeth which ate my father.' When Tamai found he had fallen into the hands of his enemies, he sent for his wife and daughter; that, as he said, he might not go to Hades alone. They came at once.
"During the night, he strangled his daughter, a very beautiful girl, that she might not be a slave; when Stewart, horrified at this unnatural crime without perceiving his own greater one, ordered him to be tied up and flogged; an act which offended even his savage captors, who said he was still a chief and not to be treated as a slave.
"The following day, Raupahara landed his men, and after a brave resistance the pa was taken; and a great number of Tamai's people slaughtered. The victors returned to the vessel laden with 500 baskets of human flesh. Some say, that the flesh was cooked in the ship's coppers; and it is not improbable, as the vessel was completely in the hands of the natives. On reaching Kapiti, Tamai was given up to the widow of Pehi, who took him, with his wife and sister, to her own house; giving up half to their use. They talked so friendly to one another, and she behaved so kindly to him, that a stranger would have taken them for man and wife rather than for a doomed captive with his deadly foe. She used even to clothe him in her finest garments, and to deck his head with choice feathers. This continued for about two weeks, until either she had assembled her friends, or thought her victim sufficiently fat for killing. She then suddenly caused him to be seized and bound, with his arms stretched to a tree; and whilst in this position, she took a spear, a long narrow rod of iron, with which she stabbed him in the jugular artery, and drank his warm blood as it gushed forth, placing her mouth to the orifice. He was afterwards cooked and eaten.
"Stewart received twenty-five tons of flax for this infamous service, the price of blood; and might have had more, but he would not stay for it. A captain of some vessel, then also at Kapiti, who is said to have been but little better, sailed before him, and carried the news to Sydney; so that on his arrival there, he was shunned, and styled by all – 'the Captain of the bloody Elizabeth.' He was even taken up and tried, but from want of evidence escaped. But though human vengeance did not reach him, Divine justice did. Nothing was ever heard of him afterwards. The vessel foundered on the way to Valparaiso, and all on board perished."

18 Take this as an instance of one custom, say the "Blood Title."
"Blood. – The shedding of blood was always considered a most serious thing, although but a drop were shed, and that too of a person in the wrong; from being before the aggressor he became the aggrieved, and required an atonement. As an example, if a man caught a person in his karaka grove stealing the fruit, he could demand compensation for the theft; but were he to strike the offender, and cause a single drop of blood to flow from a scratch, native law would adjudge the karaka grove to the thief, as a payment for the drop of blood. And were not the owner to resign the land to him, the tribe of the thief would feel itself called upon to maintain his right to it. A gentleman entering my house, knocked his head against a beam and cut his eyebrow, so that blood flowed. The natives present deplored the accident, and said that according to their law, the house would have been forfeited to him; and that as they were of his party, it would have been their duty to have seen it given up to him; as every one present was affected by his blood being shed. In the same way, even if a canoe should be dashed on shore in a storm, and the owner's life endangered, he thereby acquires a title to the spot he is thrown on. When blood is shed, it is the duty of every one related to the person who has suffered, to seek revenge. It does not matter whether it be the individual who drew it or any one else belonging to his tribe; but blood must be shed as an atonement for blood. This was one of the most fertile causes of war in former days. There were then no cities of refuge for the man-slayer to flee to for safety, and his act endangered the lives of every one in his tribe."

19 The missionary gentlemen who penned the "Waitangi Treaty," always triumphantly told us that every acre of the millions of wild acres in New Zealand had its native owner. Alas! yes, when anything was to be got by owning it, it had its dozen native owners. This was the difficulty. A, B, C, D, would often own the acre: buy it of A, and out came B's tomahawk; buy it of B, C called him the son of a slave, who had lost his rights; C swore he was never a slave; D flourished his hatchet, and defied the three as lying cookies. Owners! Why, hint a suspicion that the New Zealanders had any marketable title to foreign parts, and bold genealogists and oral conveyancers among them would come forward and own the Chatham Islands, where some fugitives of their Ngatiawa tribe landed once and cooked some hundreds of the inhabitants; or Norfolk Island, where half a century ago Governor King carried two of them to teach the convicts flax dressing; or Hawaii, from which the forefathers migrated 500 years ago. If, on the title of Norman William's having conquered England, a Norman peasant now claimed Dartmoor, his title in justice and in reason, would be quite as grave and good as many which the missionary gentlemen instigated the natives to set up when they interpreted the treaty, and beckoned them on with the Land Claims Court.

20 This plan of interspersed native reserves in lots of 50 and 100 acres, was an admirable one. The system which the Government adopts is to make the "native reserve" a large separate block apart from the Europeans. But for all purposes of civilisation, experience has shown that the Company's plan was, or rather would have been, far the best.

21 Slaves, a Pariah race.

22 Payment.

23 In fine weather, a canoe of Rauparaha's would occasionally cross the straits to Wairau; and I have somewhere read that he had a potato patch in one of the bays of the plain.

24 After a lapse of some years and speaking as one of the settlers (though a New Plymouth one virtually, 500 miles from the spot), I still think that the Wellington pioneers would have deserved well both of the colonists and the Crown if they had locked up their missionary-officials, marched on Waikanae, seized Te Rauparaha, and hung him on the spot. They were well able. They numbered hundreds of bold spirits and crack shots, there was no lack of fighting leaders; and, as Mr. Jerningham Wakefield shows in his "New Zealand Adventures" and as every old settler of these days knows, hundreds of Te Rauparaha's native enemies would gladly have joined them. If this course had been adopted, missionary policy and converted natives would have received a "warning" which would have spared many of the troubles which afterwards occurred.

25 Lord Stanley (now the Earl of Derby) appears to have been a Colonial Minister peculiarly under those non-colonising, aborigines-protecting, Exeter Hall, and missionary influences to which we have alluded; and at the same time to have been a minister who took a sort of pleasure in battling with the Company, and in firing at them smart and jaunty despatches. Poor Captain Hobson arriving in New Zealand a worn-out, broken man, died in Auckland soon after his arrival; and was succeeded by Captain Fitzroy, R.N. – than whom a fitter instrument for wrecking the colony by carrying out Lord Stanley's orders and the missionary policy could not probably have been selected from either service.

26 Te Rauparaha and all the natives expected that the governor would at least demand the Wairau, in conformity with the native usage of "blood title." Te Rauparaha is reported to have said of him, after this pacific interview, "He paukena, te pakeha" – He is soft; he is a pumpkin.

27 It was here, and the reader will probably think it was high time, that Mr. Spain virtually resigned his office, closed his court, and soon after re-emigrated to Australia. An idea of his judicial opinion of the character of these incited native claims may be gleaned from the following passage in one of his official reports: –
"One fact, however, that has every day forced itself upon my observation, I think applicable to my present argument. I have travelled over a country where I found millions of acres of first-rate available land, upon which the human foot had scarcely ever trod, showing the capability of this country for maintaining a very large population; and it does appear truly lamentable that the present few inhabitants should be differing on the subject of land, where there is so much more of that commodity available for every purpose than can be required for centuries to come. I am clearly of opinion that, at the Hutt, Wanganui, Taranaki, and other places, the natives, attracted by European settlements, and feeling the advantages of bartering with the settlers, have come and cultivated land in the immediate neighbourhood of those places, which they would not otherwise have thought of taking possession of. Again, at Taranaki I found the natives little disposed to abide by my award, and offering various obstructions to the settlers, not because they wanted the land themselves, but merely to prevent the Europeans from making use of it."

28 The New Plymouth "land case" is so glaring – almost so ludicrous – an instance of missionary and aborigines-protecting policy in the department of native titles to waste lands, that I will briefly state it.
A portion of the beautiful district of New Plymouth (Taranaki) was originally inhabited by the Ngatiawa. In 1833, in revenge of murder, the Waikato tribe residing a hundred miles to the north made a fell swoop on Taranaki. They stormed Ngatiawa's fortress at Pukerangiora on the crags of Waitera; pitched over the cliff, tomahawked and slew some thousand men women and children; chased away five hundred fugitives; picked out some two hundred of the thinnest prisoners for slaves; ate the rest; marched back glutted with flesh and blood; and never again set foot in the solitude they had made.
The band of fugitive Ngatiawa under the leadership of an English whaler who had married a Ngatiawa beauty, fought their path three hundred miles along the coast through a dozen hostile tribes down to Port Nicholson. From which place the majority sailed off to the Chatham Islands, famous for eels; where they landed, gave battle to the islanders, slew and cooked a portion on the spot, reduced the remnant to slavery, and planted themselves down as emigrant victors.
Thus when Colonel Wakefield, looking round for sites of settlements, was directed to Taranaki in 1840 (seven years after the Waikato raid) he found in the whole of the magnificent wilderness only a handful of wretched root-diggers – stray Ngatiawa who had fled to the mountains and stolen back in twos and threes when they found the Waikato did not return. Another fragment of the broken tribe had never left Port Nicholson; and as both these fugitive bodies hailed with delight the coming of the white men who would make their old country safe and habitable against the dreaded Waikato, Colonel Wakefield purchased a portion of it from them for the site of New Plymouth. But the missionary-officials at Auckland hearing of this, insisted that the legal owners of New Plymouth were the Waikato, by title of their bloody raid of 1833; and poor Colonel Wakefield anxious if possible, to satisfy the New Zealand laws of real property, paid these gentlemen as agents for Waikato a further sum of money for the site of New Plymouth; and the settlement was planted and all went right until native cupidity was inflamed by rumours of the coming "Land Court."
The Waikato had liberated some of their Pukerangiora slaves, who, finding that New Plymouth (thanks to the white man, had become a safe dwelling-place and fine trading post, returned thither under the conduct of a wily desperado named Katatore; and when the Land Court beckoned them on, these men started up and boldly claimed the district to which they had dared to venture back.
The court, taking the missionary-officials as the exponents of New Zealand "land law," decreed that the Waikato were the owners of New Plymouth; that the Company had paid the Waikato through the missionary-officials; and that, therefore, New Plymouth was the Company's.
But now, "Credat Judaeus Apella," missionary-officials turned round and actually declared that the Waikato were not the owners of New Plymouth; that there were exceptions to all rules, &c., &c.; and that the Company must buy the district a third time. On this, Captain Fitzroy instantly reversed the court's award, abandoned every acre of the waste to the handful of natives, and drove the settlers into a strip round the village.
The reader should distinctly understand that the Company, here as everywhere, had made ample reserves of the finest lands for every native family; and that these natives, truly and literally, no more wanted these wastes of New Plymouth than they wanted the wastes of Siberia.
But pass over the "animus" and character of this act of missionary policy and justice, pass over the virtual extinction of the settlement and the ruined prospects of the settlers, and glance at the results of the policy for the natives. The New Plymouth natives, though they dwell in the garden of New Zealand, are notoriously the poorest least civilised and most turbulent natives now in the country. It is ten years since the district was abandoned to them; yet they have scarce cultivated ten acres. Ever since they had it, they have been quarrelling and fighting among themselves as to who should own it. In 1853, one band claiming a portion proceeded to exercise some preliminary rights of ownership; a rival band stole on them, and shot down seven. Fifty retaliatory murders have since taken place. Troops are stationed at New Plymouth to prevent the quarrel spreading into the town; and there is now great probability of the New Plymouth district being acquired – through the mutual massacre and self-extinction of the very natives for whom missionary policy has done so little in doing so much!

29 Customs duties formed nine-tenths of the whole public revenue of the colony. Governor Fitzroy sought to replace them by a property-tax, and by taxes on stock and rooms of houses. But the colonists said, and truly, that they had no property. A considerable portion of their property in Cook's Straits had literally been destroyed by the governor's missionary policy. They pleaded, "no effects," – and customs had soon to be resorted to again.

30 Poor Heke's was not a warrior's end. One of his wives, a lady who, like her lord, seems to have been a missionary convert, and to have been christened "Harriet," is said to have given him a severe thrashing with a stake or pole, from which he never recovered.

31 He was imprisoned for two years, and then released at the intercession of some friendly chiefs. He remained a peaceable well-conducted man ever after, and died among bis people in 1849.

CHAPTER III. POSITION. – SIZE. – PHYSICAL FEATURES. – GEOLOGY, &c.

"INSULAR CONFIGURATION."

CHAPTER III.

POSITION. – SIZE. – PHYSICAL FEATURES. – GEOLOGY, &c. &c.

CONFIGURATION. – New Zealand consists of two large islands the North and the South, parted by Cook's Strait a noble channel 160 miles in length by 20 in breadth; 32 and of a small island called Stewart's Island half the size of Perthshire, parted from the main by Foveaux Strait a clear deep channel 50 miles in length by 20 in breadth. 33 The tripartite group extends from 34 deg. to 48 deg. south latitude, and spreads from 166 deg. to 179 deg. east longitude. The length of the country from Cape

COMMANDING POSITION.

Maria Van Dieman to the South Cape exceeds 1000 miles. The greatest breadth from Cape Egmont to the east coast, or from Dusky Bay to Otago, is about 200 miles; whilst the sweep of the coast line embraces full 3000 miles.

POSITION. – New Zealand is popularly styled the antipodes of England; but the true geographical antipodes of Great Britain, the veritable "Ultima Thule," is an island called Antipodes' 700 miles to the south-east. 34

The happy size of New Zealand, her defiant insular position, naval stores and harbours, fertile soil and bracing breezy climate, may well crown her Island Queen of the Pacific and future Britain of the South. Close to on the west, she has the busy marts and markets of Australia. Close to on the north, the thousand Polynesian Islands slumbering in their summer seas and needing but the magic touch of steam to open new worlds to our commerce. She stands on the great Panama highway from Europe to the southern gold-fields. Within easy sail on the one side she reaches the Dutch and Spanish colonies, China and our Indian possessions; on the other, California, Mexico, Chili and Peru. She stands in the centre of the Austral Ocean midway between ocean's greatest capes, Cape Horn and Good Hope; and so before the doors

POSITIONAL DISTANCE TABLE.

of Australia, that every wool and gold ship has to pass within sight of her southern shores. 35

COMPUTED DISTANCES.

Countries.

Miles.

Practicable voyage by
crew Steamer.
Days.

Southampton to New Zealand, via Cape of Good Hope

15,000

70

Do. do. via Panama ....

11,000

50

Do. do. via Suez, Point de Galle, and Sydney, the route of the Royal Mail Company

14,000

60

New Zealand to Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart Town, say...

1300

6

Do. to Singapore, Batavia, Borneo, Madras, Hong Kong, Manila...

5000 to 6000

20 to 25

Do. to Tahiti....

2400

10

Do. to Sandwich Islands ....

4700

20

Do. to Valparaiso...

5500

24

Do. to Panama and California, say

6000

25

Do. to Mauritius...

5500

25

ACREAGE AREA AND VALUE.

ACREAGE AREA. – New Zealand contains about 80 millions of acres of land, or nearly two millions more than Great Britain and Ireland. A conjectural apportionment of this area has been made as follows: –

Waste mountain ranges, broken forest tracts, coast-sand-hills, lakes and rivers – - One third.

Cultivable forest and "light bush" lands – One-third.

Cultivable or pastoral open country; chiefly fern flax and grass plains, valleys and dales – One-third. 36

From the experience which has been gained in the working of a small portion of it, this 54,000,000 acres of available wild land would probably be reduced to cultivation at a "clearing-cost" of from £1 to £5 per acre; and its mean productive capability, under even the rudest makeshift farming, might be taken as equal to the permanent grazing of four sheep, or to the growth of 25 bushels of wheat per imperial acre.

GEOLOGY. – The formation of New Zealand appears to have been volcanic. Mount Egmont 9000 feet high, and many of the small mounts and conical hills in the north and near Auckland are extinct craters. Sulphur Island, Mount Erebus,

VOLCANIC ACTION.

tall Tongariro, and occasionally one of the Kaikora peaks, are still lively enough to smoke and occasionally to flame; whilst volcanic action displays itself in the North Island in a chain of hot springs, bubbling mud pools, and solfatara, extending from Roturua to Taupo and the sources of the Waikato.

Shocks of earthquake are occasionally felt in New Zealand; but are confined chiefly to the Wellington corner of Cook's Straits. New Zealand being unassailable in climate soil size position and other natural gifts, the monopolising advocates of rival emigration fields, have seized on her little "volcanic eccentricities," and gravely bid the emigrant – pause and remember Lisbon and Pompeii!. Tastes, antipathies differ; but speaking from personal experience, I for one would rather encounter two New Zealand earthquakes than one African puff-adder or half a Canadian winter.

The following sketch of the geology of the country shows that New Zealand is "rising in the world" by her volcanic action; and though we could prefer "rising in the world" by other process, still if we are to be occasionally affected by a disturbance of the earth's bowels, it is better that such disturbance should lift us up – than swallow us down.

"NOTES on the GEOLOGY OF NEW ZEALAND, especially in reference to the Province of Wellington. By Charles Forbes, M.D., R.N., late of H.M.S. "Acheron."

"The islands of New Zealand present a very

GEOLOGICAL SKETCH.

simple geological formation; the rocks entering into the formation of the country being primary, metamorphic, volcanic, trappeau, and sedimentary; the last of a very recent date. It is remarkable that nowhere have any sedimentary rocks of the secondary period been discovered, and it is not probable that they anywhere exist, in so far as the country has at present been elevated above the surface of the sea; those sedimentary rocks which do exist, carry evidence in their imbedded fossils of their tertiary origin.

"At no very distant period, geologically speaking, New Zealand presented the appearance of a group of rocky islets, precipitous and barren, except in the ravines and gullies of the mountains; and this assumed fact must ever be kept in view in the endeavour to ascertain and understand clearly the geological history of these islands. It will much facilitate this clear understanding if, without confining our view to the New Zealand group alone, we look in a north-east direction through Norfolk Island to New Caledonia; both of which islands show a distinct geological and geographical connection with the New Zealand group, and present the same phenomena of the action of elevatory forces. That there is at present a general elevatory movement, extending from the southern pole over the whole southern hemisphere, is now a well-established fact. In this general movement New Zealand undoubtedly partakes, and has moreover her own special elevatory forces continually going on.

GEOLOGICAL SKETCH.

The action of these combined has been the chief if not the sole cause of the present physical aspect of these islands of New Zealand. The Three Kings, a small group of islands, are at present separated from the North Cape by but a narrow strait; just as at no very great time ago the primary and metamorphic rocks forming the bold headlands and mountains to the north of Auckland, were themselves a group of islands; separated by a strait from the lofty chain of rocks of the same character which stretch from Cape Colville southwards towards the East Cape, and another range of the same south of Manakau harbour towards Waikato. This strait was obliterated and the island made continuous from the North Cape to Cape Palliser, by the volcanic action which occurred where Auckland now stands; and where from the number of volcanoes the elevation must have been rapid. From the wide dispersion of the volcanic vents, however, there has been no disturbance or tilting of the strata; it lays a soft argillaceous sandstone in horizontal strata. It is impossible to say whether or not the volcanic forces which at present slumber at Sulphur Island and at Tongariro, were contemporaneous in their primary action with those to the north. It is probable they were; but at all events it is certain that they have continued after the others have become extinct. And to the local elevatory force of the volcanic action as developed at Tongariro, superadded to the general elevatory forces already alluded to, must the present aspect

ELEVATORY FORCES.

of the province of Wellington, especially as regards its usefulness to man, be ascribed.

"In the middle and southern islands, where there are no evidences of any other than submarine volcanic action, and that of a very ancient date, the same phenomena of elevation present themselves in a marked manner; and in all cases as before remarked this elevation alone has made the country available to man.

"These elevatory forces, where they have been slow gradual but continuous, have raised the precipitous chains of mountains from the deep; carrying up with them as it were in their arms, those extensive plains destined to become the sources of wealth to a new colony. In the same way also, where there were shallow arms of the sea, and deep winding bays, the former by the elevation of a few feet have become fertile valleys, and the latter have had their dimensions contracted by the narrowing of the gorges at their extremities. In this way I have the extensive plains of the middle island been formed, and that too at a period geologically speaking very recent. In this way also have the circular plains to the immediate south of Otago been formed – the first glance of them giving the idea of a bay just dried up.

"These general remarks apply in every way to the province of Wellington. Here all the proofs of recent elevation are very evident! They are to be recognised in the terraces so well defined on the flanks of the hills from Baring Head round the

ELEVATORY FORCES.

whole coast northwards to Hawke's Bay; and in the formation of the Waidrop Valley – which is but an arm of the sea emptied by elevation of the country generally, and so made dry land, in the same manner as would the harbour of Wellington become a grassy plain were an elevation of but fifty feet to take place. In Wellington Harbour indeed the elevation that has already taken place has formed, (assisted by the debris from the mountains) the fertile valley of the Hutt; where each successive upheaval can be recognised at once by the consecutive layers of pumice-stone; which, erupted from Tongariro during the paroxysm, were floated down to the sea, and thus reached Cook's Straits.

"It is no very great period of time since the sea had a passage through Evan's Bay; the elevation of the sand-hills being very trifling between it and Lyall's Bay. The evident proofs which exist of this, are strengthened by a native tradition to the same effect, which says that the communication was within the memory of man. But the most striking and convincing proofs of recent, and in some eases great elevation, are to be found in the fossil conchology of the Wellington district; proofs however by no means confined to it alone, but equally perceptible in other parts.

"At Wanganui (in the cliffs to the northward of the mouth of the river) there is a deposit of blue clay containing shells identical with those of the present day. Some of them are varieties of the species now existing – there are a few of different species, but

FOSSIL CONCHOLOGY.

in general they are identical. At Shakespeare's Cliff four miles inland, and a considerable height above the sea, the same deposit again occurs. On the flanks of the Rua Hine and Taurarua ranges, fossiliferous rocks again occur; somewhat different from local causes, but still of the most recent tertiary period. Again at the head of the valley of the Waidrop, the same shells appear. And again near Cape Palliser they have been found imbedded in hardened blue clay, 200 feet above the level of the sea. The same formation exists in the middle island. At Motunau it is to be found forming cliffs on the sea beach. On the flanks of Mount Grey 300 feet above the present sea level and ten miles inland is to be found in successive layers eighteen inches to two feet (five or six in succession) on the banks of the watercourses near the mountains, blue clay, hardened and then converted into limestone by the destruction of the shells of innumerable mollusca of the Mytillus Cardium Ostra and other families still abounding in the neighbouring seas. Here is a direct proof of a contemporaneous deposit being elevated over an area of between 300 and 400 miles in length. The province of Wellington, which lays between 39 deg. and 41 deg. 30' south latitude, near its northern boundary contains the great vent of volcanic action, Tongariro. From it, descends in an almost due south direction, the Rua Hine range lying almost in the very centre of the province; and from it again comes off the Taurarua range which strikes off more westerly

MOUNTAIN RANGES.

to terminate at the Hutt Valley, and the Remutaka a smaller range which separates this from the Waidrop valley, terminating at Baring Head. Beginning at Tongariro, and regarding these ranges as the backbone of the province, a general idea of its formation may be readily obtained. The separation of these two ranges gives the peculiar character to the landscape about Wellington. The geological formation of these ranges may be simply stated as volcanic and trappeau with some altered rocks. Those again which lay on their flanks, and have been elevated by a secondary volcanic action, (as those in the neighbourhood of Wellington) are metamorphic clay slate, traversed here and there by dykes of trap; and this formation obtains universally. The same formation exists on the opposite side of Cook's Strait. Metamorphic clay slate, with bands of quartz permeating it, and in some places erupted masses of serpentine, being the universal formation.

"It has been already stated that elevation of the land has taken place to a considerable extent, and is still going on in the neighbourhood of Wellington. Thorndon and Te Aro flats are but elevations of what was once the sea bottom. Proofs of the same will be found on examining the coast line to Wanganui. All along the Porirua road the rock is yellow clay slate. Through the Honokini Valley it is the same. In the hollows and lower grounds near Porirua Harbour, a deposit of gravel, composed of fragments of the same rock, has taken

RISING IN THE WORLD.

place; but in no other rock or soil are clay slate, clay and alluvium visible. On gaining the sea beach at Pukirua, a range of spurs of the Taurarua range stretches along to the northward at various but short distances from the shore; gradually receding towards Otaki Manawatu and Rangitikei sweeping round towards the north of Wanganui, forming an approach to a semicircle, and leaving an extensive tract of fine country for the enterprising settler. That the sea once washed the foot of these hills there can be no reason to doubt. When we take the proofs already given of general and local elevation into account, we can easily see how these fine tracts of land have been formed. A small elevation of the hilly ridge which formed the sea coast would elevate the neighbouring sea bottom; the surge would throw up with the westerly winds, a line of sand-hills; the elevation still continuing, the sea would still retire to again form another ridge of sand-hills; and so on, while the elevatory action lasted. And that in fact this did take place may be seen in the formation of the land in the neighbourhood of the mouth of the Rangitikei River, where one land ridge after another succeeds in regular succession; but with this remarkable fact, that they are nearly at right angles to the present sea beach. This is to be accounted for by remembering that the hilly range which formed the coast line at Pukarua, is close to the present beach, receding and forming a curve, which formed the head of a

SUBMERGED CONTINENT.

deep bight extending from Cape Egmont to Pukarua. The prevailing winds being north-west, this bight would most rapidly fill up on the commencement of the elevatory action at its narrowest most southern part; and the sea beach would gradually form according to the disposition of the sand ridges, they being dependent on the prevailing winds. And this is the exact state of the case; for the sand ridges which are so evident at Rangitikei as having once formed the sea face, are at right angles with the prevailing winds, or at any rate with the winds which exercised most force, viz. the north-west. To these causes, viz., gradual elevation and the force of wind and sea, is due the fine tract extending from Porirua to the northward of Wanganui.

"On the eastern coast from Hawkes' Bay, the same proofs of elevation exist. The table lands and grassy plains are of the same origin as in other parts of the country, and the rocks of the same mineralogical character. It will be remarked that this general view of the geology of New Zealand adopts the theory, that New Zealand is but a part of a great continent which has been submerged; that an elevatory movement has been going on for some long time past, the effects of which are very apparent in the elevation and formation of the tertiary sedimentary deposits into dry land; and that although rocks of the secondary epoch have not yet been found, that there is no reason to doubt but that they may exist at considerable depths,

SEALERS' GEOLOGY.

and may yet be found cropping out near the sea coast." 37

SURFACE CHARACTER. – New Zealand may I think be called a "wooded-highland" country, displaying some half dozen noble plains; and thousands of brook-watered valleys, dells, and dales.

But New Zealand differs from a highland country in one remarkable feature – that of natural clothing.

WILDERNESS OF VEGETATION.

The common, and indeed the correct idea of a highland country, is that of a naked, bare-looking country of mountain, lake, and stream; where the soil is poor, and the vegetation scant. But in New Zealand the soil though light is often rich; and the fertility of the earth, quadrupled by the genial climate, literally produces a "wilderness of vegetation." Sea-spray crags, shore-margins, plains, valleys, hill-sides, mountain-steeps, are alike clothed with perpetual verdure; and the expression "smothered in vegetation," is not a mere figure of speech when applied to New Zealand but a term truly descriptive of the country.

Owing to the coast line of 3000 miles, the division of the country into three portions by the fine channels of Cook's and Foveaux Straits, New Zealand exhibits a multitude of bays, creeks, coves, estuaries and anchorages; and possesses some of the finest naval and commercial harbours in the world; though these latter are found rather in partial and widely-separated groups, than in equally dispersed order along the coasts.

Numerous wooded ranges of moderate elevation, and two snow-capped giants, Tongariro and Mount Egmont, 7000 and 9000 feet high, are found in the North Island; whilst a chain of rugged forest ranges, displaying mountain peaks 10,000 feet high white with perpetual snow, extends along the en-

RIVERS BURNS AND SCENERY.

tire coast of the South Island 500 miles, from Cape Farewell to Dusky Bay.

One of the most striking natural features of New Zealand is the abundance of water, the blood of the earth; and water power. Taupo is the only large lake, and New River in Foveaux Strait, the Clutha, Thames, Hokianga, Wanganui, Waikato, and Manawatu, are perhaps the only rivers navigable twenty miles up for anything larger than a canoe. But there are several smaller lakes and lakelets; and the country from north to south is profusely studded with rivers, rivulets, brooks, and burns of the softest, purest water; running over pebbly beds, and bearing a close resemblance to many of our trout and salmon streams, such as the Dove, Tamar, Tweed, Don, and Dee.

Scenery. – The natural scenery of New Zealand is both bold and beautiful; though to an English eye, accustomed to trim fields, clipped hedges, and to the smooth-rolled, finished look of every acre in England, it would frequently appear more bold than beautiful. Indeed many a district would strike the Norfolk farmer, or the Cockney sketcher, whose ideal of beauty was the Holkham turnip field or the Highlands of Hampstead, with far more of amazement than delight. The scenery we admire in England is often the costly coat of art, rather than the primeval dress of nature. As regards polish of cultivation, the garden's glories, the plough's court robes, New Zealand is much in the state that Britain was when Caesar landed;

SCENERY.

and if Caesar's Britain could now be shown us, many a bright champaign country which we call beautiful, would vanish, to reveal the gloomy forest and repulsive rugged waste.

Bearing in mind the extent of the country; that the land is equally verdant and leafy through summer and winter; that the bright breezy light-and-shadow-casting character of the climate is peculiarly favourable both to the display and to the enjoyment of scenery; I think we may say that in combination of those great natural features which constitute the foundation of fine scenery, New Zealand is unsurpassed by any country in the world. She displays noble forests, snow-capped mountains shooting up 10,000 feet from a sea of green and wooded up to the line of snow, tracts of rolling champaign country, dells valleys rivers and rivulets innumerable, and 3000 miles of bay and ocean coast.

New Zealand, too, with all these elements of fine scenery, this stock of "raw beauty," is a fertile cultivable country; where plough sickle and mill would singularly enrich and brighten the landscape. The plough could not improve the natural beauty of a country like the Scotch highlands, because the Scotch highlands are not pecuniarily ploughable; and the plough, if every ploughman were a Mechi, could not create the "beautiful" in a country like the Lincolnshire fens, or the plains of Belgium. But in a wild, fertile, woody country, more resembling a combination of Derbyshire and

LADIES' LANDSCAPES.

Devonshire, it is evident that cultivation would singularly improve the beauty of the scenery.

Picturesque sites and sheltered nooks for hamlet tower and town, homestead cottage and castle, are multitudinous in New Zealand; and when cultivation has given colour to the landscape, and contrast to the universal background of green; when the hills are more dotted with sheep, and the valleys more golden with corn; when the pheasant whirs from the brake, and the fox bursts from the cover, New Zealand will offer a thousand views which even a Turner might cross the seas to paint. 38

32 The Strait for half its length is 100 miles broad, but at the eastern end, opposite Wellington, it narrows to twenty miles.

33 I think a glance at the map shows that this is the best geographical definition of New Zealand. As compared with the two great North and South Islands, the third island is of such insignificant extent as to be but a mere Isle of Man appendage. Geographically, we do not define this country as Great Britain and Ireland and the Orkneys and the Isle of Wight; but as Great Britain and Ireland. Again, the fashion of speaking of New Zealand as consisting of three islands, makes the large or true South Island appear the middle island; and thus invests it with certain attributes of centrality and superiority of position to which it is not fairly entitled.

34 Portugal occupies the geographical position in the Northern hemisphere which corresponds best with that of New Zealand in the Southern.

35 The islets 60 miles south of Stewart's Islands (the Snares) belong geographically to New Zealand; and these form the land-mark which Australian homeward-bounders commonly sight in running past New Zealand. The reader should understand that vessels bound to Australia and New Zealand go out by the Cape of Good Hope, and return by Cape Horn. This is mainly owing to the prevalence of westerly winds which are so strong and constant between Australia and Cape Horn that no vessel could force a passage this way to Australia against them. In going out, a vessel passes Australia to get to New Zealand, which lies 1200 miles nearer the Horn; and of course, Australian vessels coming home have to pass New Zealand to get to the Horn. Thus, virtually, in going out, New Zealand is 1200 miles further off than Australia, and in coming back, 1200 miles nearer. The Panama route, however, would make New Zealand some 1200 miles the nearest each way.

36 The reader will please to understand, that as the greater portion of New Zealand is an unsurveyed unpeopled wilderness, this estimate is only a conjectural one. It is not I think though an estimate sufficiently favourable. Considering the genial "manure-acting" climate of New Zealand, I believe that nearly one half of this conjectural "waste third" will prove fit for profitable cultivation.

37 The shock at Wellington, in 1855, is said to have elevated the surrounding country three to five feet, and to have made one of the rough beach roads considerably better. Whilst the following extract from a Nelson paper affords further evidence that New Zealand is gaining on the sea.
"The party which left Nelson last summer for the west coast of this island in search of seals, returned here a few weeks ago. At a place known as the Black Reef, or Three Steeples, near the mouth of the Buller river, nearly sixty seals were taken. But between that and Open Bay, which was the farthest point they reached to the southward, only a few were caught; as two boats, with fourteen hands, from the neighbourhood of Otakou had preceded them, and had sealed up the coast from Foveaux Strait to near the Black Reef, which a northerly gale prevented them from gaining. The number of skins obtained by the Nelson boat was sixty-five. During the expedition the men at times suffered greatly from want of provisions, as their principal stock at starting was only 100lbs. of bad flour. The entire distance sailed by them in an open boat, on the most stormy and iron-bound coast in New Zealand, was little short of 800 miles. A little to the southward of Bluff Point (which was the extremity of Messrs. Brunner and Heaphy's journey last winter), the sealers found the hull of a brig, surrounded by bushes, with a small tree growing through a hole in her bottom, and lying nearly 200 yards above high-water mark. They supposed it to be the wreck of the "Active," a brig which left Sydney for the coast of this island in 1814, and was never afterwards heard of. Whatever was the name of the vessel, or the period of her wreck, it is evident that great changes have since taken place on the coast, and that the land has gained on the sea considerably. The vessel, to judge from her position, was run ashore with all sails set, probably in the night, and her crew, it is likely fell victims to the natives." – Nelson Examiner.

38 Extract from a Canterbury letter – probably a lady's: – "It is this fact that for me gives the country such a charm, the charm of our home beauties stealing over the wild grandeur of this favoured land, and heightened by a climate, of which the most lovely of English days can scarcely convey an idea. When Christchurch has grown to a pretty town, when the young oak of England stands by the side of the giant trees indigenous to New Zealand, when the avenues to houses are lined by the graceful and beautiful shrubs, when the green grass of England is sprouting in her meadows, fenced by hawthorn hedges, when daisies and butter-cups flower over the land, when the timid hare springs across the field, and the coveys of partridges break from their cover, and the sun of heaven shines brightly through the pure atmosphere, tempered by breezes from the Pacific and the Alpine range, then there will be but one thing wanting to make New Zealand the Eden of the world – the charm of age, the vestiges of the past, the spot endeared by old associations and traditions."

CHAPTER IV. CLIMATE

CLIMATE.

CHAPTER IV.

CLIMATE.

FERTILE soil and fine climate are the two choicest gifts which a country can receive from nature. But the latter is the most precious gift; for art, which can create a good soil, cannot create a good climate. Earth, fire, and water we have subdued: we make desert earth our cornucopia, fire our menial servant, ocean our smooth highway – but climate eludes our grasp, and bows to no human laws.

In old countries like England, art may certainly lessen our dependence on climate. If we are to dine with a friend three counties off, snow sleet or rain, we step into a flying parlour and are borne to the feast without a feather ruffled. If, instead of flowers, spring bring us weeks of bitter east blasts, we pile up the fire and hibernate in warm snuggeries through a vernal winter; whilst for coughs, colds, ague, and bronchitis "M.D." is round the corner.

In England, too, half the people have no climate. They pass their lives in shops, offices, mines, mills, and manufactories; where science has taken hot air and cold air, and cooked-up an artificial substitute for climate.

IMPORTANCE OF GOOD CLIMATE.

But in new emigration countries where we lead a wholesome out-door life and face the weather in the fields; where instead of brick and slate it may be weather-board and shingle; where we have to rough it more; and where the doctor is not round the corner, our dependence on climate is almost absolute. And in making choice of any new land, "good climate" should unquestionably rank as our first requirement; for on this will depend our health and strength, and on the continued enjoyment of health and strength will mainly depend our happiness and success.

By good climate, I mean a bracing, temperate climate. A climate may be too fine. Where there is perpetual sunshine and serenity, man degenerates into an emasculated idler. The Hindoo is a woman, the Neapolitan's "summum bonum," is basking in the sun and swallowing maccaroni; in Tahiti and the Paphian coral isles of the South, the soft islanders are scarce equal to greater labours than plucking fruit and eating it: –

"The bread-fruit ripens while they lie beneath
Its shadow in luxurious indolence:
The cocoa fills its nut with milk and kernel,
While they are sauntering on the shores and mountains;
And while they slumber from their plenteous meals
In dead forgetfulness of life itself,
The fish are spawning in unsounded depths,
The birds are breeding in adjacent trees,
The game is fattening in delicious pastures,
Unplanted roots are thriving underground –
To spread the tables of their future banquets."

What I conceive to be a truly good climate.

CLIMATIC LONG-BOWS.

especially for the British emigrant, is a climate assimilating to but better than his own; a climate which endowing him with full powers of body and mind, shall require and call forth the fruitful exercise of such powers; and thus create for him the "mens sana in corpore sano."

In works on emigration, Climate appears to be the favourite subject for the "long-bow."

Of the United States, where hale old age is rarely seen, where at thirty, women are grey; where a glance at the children reveals a physically degenerating race; where consumption and virulent periodical fevers are the scourge of regions; where nearly one-third of the emigrants from Europe die within three years of their arrival – we are told that the climate is fine, bright, and dry! Of Canada, which might be described as two months an oven and four months an ice-house; where in winter rivers become ice-roads, and meat has to be split up like firewood – of Canada, we are told (in Canadian "Prize Assays") that the climate is perfection; that though it is cold you don't feel it; and that if you live, you grow to like it! Of Nova Scotia, where if the ice be a foot or two thinner the fogs are a foot or two thicker, it has been hinted that the climate cannot be bad, because an old settler once lived to be 103 there without possessing a great coat! Of Natal, an African colony lying within 27 deg. of the line, where sheep don't live, but where lions do; where serpent, centipede, scorpion, and divers torrid and horrid reptiles abound; where

INJURIOUS PRAISE.

sugar and cotton are looked to as staple exports, and where wheat won't grow, we are told by an emigration writer – "There can be no hesitation in characterising it as the healthiest region under the dominion of Great Britain!" These are the gentleman's words; and I think after this, we may rest satisfied that if the pleasant salubrity of Hong Kong and Sierra Leone have never been sung, it is only because these "coffin colonies" have not yet ventured to appear in the market as emigration fields: –

"The shivering tenant of the frozen zone,
Boldly proclaims the happiest clime his own;
The naked negro, panting at the Line,
Will boast his golden sands and palmy wine."

No such ludicrous distortion has been practised in speaking of the climate of New Zealand. But the climate of New Zealand, even, has suffered from indiscriminate laudation. Feminine superlatives, such as "nicest," "finest," "loveliest," "sweetest," have been so lavished on it as to have obscured its true character, and its real unquestionable merits. In the sense in which we use such terms as fine serene climate, there are many climates equal to that of New Zealand. Nay, if we limit the comparison to any one special month or season, we may perhaps find climates which, partially, are even finer. I have never experienced any month in New Zealand equal in settled splendour, and sunny serenity, to the Indian summer of America. I should fancy there is no entire season in New

TRUE MERITS OF CLIMATE.

Zealand equal to the luxurious softness and young brilliancy of an Italian spring; and perhaps no whole month equal to a fine old English June. There is too much cloudy windy weather in New Zealand to entitle us to say that it has a sunny, serene climate; and the southern coasts are subject to storms of cold rain and furious wind ("Southerly Bursters"), which are probably equal in their way to anything in the world.

Nevertheless, the climate of New Zealand is substantially a good climate; and has been not so much over praised as badly praised. More frost, less wind and rain, would make it perfection; but, as it is, all this may truly be said of it: – That it is a climate favourable alike to the preservation of robust health and to the improvement of weak health; a climate most congenial to all pastoral and agricultural pursuits; one in which every English domestic animal thrives and fattens; and in which every English grain, grass, fruit and flower attains full development and perfection.

An impartial writer, the late attorney-general of the colony, the Honourable William Swainson, says: –

"Compared with the summer of England, the summer of New Zealand is but little warmer, though considerably longer. New Zealand is also much milder than England, both in winter, spring, and autumn. Indeed, the winter weather of England, from the middle of November to the middle of March, with its parching easterly winds, cold, fog, and snow, is altogether unknown. In the winter season, the growth of grass is scarcely checked by the winter

NEW ZEALAND AND MADEIRA.

cold. Geraniums, stocks, wallflowers, scarlet verbenas, daisies, Indian may, and other flowers, blossom throughout the coldest season; and the face of the cultivated country, with its ever-springing pastures and ever-green trees, looks as bright and cheerful (between the rains), on a sunny winter's day, as an English summer landscape.

"The salubrity of New Zealand has been established by the experience of years. For persons of delicate constitution it is probably unequalled, save by Madeira. 39 Compared with the climate of Nice, the climate of the northern province of New Zealand is more temperate in summer, milder in winter, equally mild in the spring, and a little cooler in the autumn. And it has this advantage over the boasted Continental climates, that it is not so liable to the great variations of temperature common to them all, from sudden shifts of wind. It may be less charming than the climate of Italy and the south of France; but it is more salubrious, and better suited to the English constitution. For it has the advantage over Italy and the south of France in being more limited in range of temperature, in embracing a less oppressive summer heat, and in displaying less sudden changes of temperature during the twenty-four hours, and a more gradual change of temperature from month to month."

Mr. Fox, a travelled southern colonist, says: – -

"The range of the thermometer shows perhaps the smallest variation of any in the world. In a register kept at Wellington, the highest mean in the shade, for the summer month of January, was 67 deg. Fahr.; the lowest mean, in July (midwinter), only 51 deg.. In England, the highest in the corresponding months was 62 deg., the lowest 36 deg.; the difference in New Zealand being 16 deg., in England 26 deg.. The highest degree which I have known it attain,

MR. FOX ON CLIMATE.

was 84 deg. in the shade; the lowest was one or two degrees below freezing point; which happens very seldom, and only for a few hours at a time. In Cook's Strait, and to the north, snow has only once in ten years been seen on the level ground; and it did not then lie two hours. At Otago the coldest Province, it has only been known to lie for three days in the whole of the severest winter yet experienced. The foliage, with the exception of one tree is all evergreen; and the green parroquet, a very delicate bird, is found winter and summer in Stewart's Island.

"Nevertheless, with all these facts in its favour, some persons may not think it an extraordinarily pleasant climate. It wants the balminess of the Italian air. Its summer evenings are inferior even to the English, when the English do get a fine one. In some places there is more wind at times than is altogether agreeable. But any one who rejoices in sunshine – who likes a clear elastic air in which blue devils and dyspepsia cannot exist – or who wishes for a climate in which all sorts of European produce flourish, and all sorts of live stock thrive to an amazing degree – will certainly be satisfied with it.

"There are no diseases peculiar to it; while many English ones either do not exist at all (as small pox), or they exist with less of frequency and virulence, as colds and consumption. No climate will cure the latter when far advanced, but none probably affords a better chance of recovery if the patient be taken there in the earliest stages than the New Zealand climate. I could mention more than one instance of recovery, in cases which would certainly have ended fatally in England."

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –

In glancing at the following climatic tables, the reader will bear in mind that as New Zealand is our Antipodes, the seasons are reversed, – New Zealand July standing for English January. The indigenous plants and trees being evergreens, there

is no autumnal fall. The leaves drop one by one and are renewed; but there is no difference in the appearance of the trees; and vegetation is never dormant. The country is always verdant, and as the months succeed each other in an almost inappreciable gradation, it is somewhat difficult to divide the year into four distinct seasons as we do in England. Some nomenclatural division, however, being necessary for agricultural purposes, the old familiar division is adopted. Thus, June, July, and August are styled winter – September, October, November, spring – December, January, February, summer – March, April, and May, autumn. The natives, however, consider August the first spring month, May the first winter month; and their division, for the North island, is unquestionably the best.

MEAN TEMPERATURE OR THE FOUR SEASONS IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES.

Country.

Spring.

Summer.

Autumn.

Winter.

Mean
of Year.

Mean
difference
between
Summer
and Winter.

London

49

62

52

40

51

22

New Zealand 1

56

66

58

52

58

14

Madeira

63

70

68

60

65

10

Nice

56

73

62

48

60

25

Naples

59

71

65

49

61

22

Sydney

64

71

64

55

63

16

1   This may be taken as about the mean for the central parts of New Zealand. Otago in the south would be about thre degrees cooler; whilst Auckland in the north, and Nelson, which enjoys a semi-artifical climate, would be about five degrees warmer.

RAIN AND MOISTURE

RAIN AND DAMPNESS. – Though there are more fine days in New Zealand than in England, yet when it does rain, it rains harder; and the annual fall of rain is somewhat greater. But there is no tropical "rainy-season" in New Zealand ; and there is probably no country where those "golden showers," which Loudon describes as so favourable to agriculture, are so common; and where even moderate droughts are so rare. Rain generally falls at or about the full and new moon; particularly about the latter. New Zealand cannot, I think, be called a damp country, in any injurious sense. Rains and heavy dews are frequent, and there is considerable moisture. But New Zealand is an upland hilly country, thoroughly drained by rapid streams. There are no fens. Both surface and subsoil are generally light and porous. Wet rapidly drains and percolates away; and moisture is quickly dried up by the combined influence of sun and breeze.

NUMBER OF DRY DAYS IN EACH SEASON IN ENGLAND AND NEW ZEALAND.

Average of United Kingdom.

Average of New Zealand.

Winter

50

60

Spring

50

59

Summer

57

63

Autumn

46

58

Total

203

230

Wind. – The climate on the coasts of New Zealand is unquestionably boisterous. The wind may

WINDS, FROST, SNOW.

not blow furiously so often as it does on the English coasts, but it blows "stiff," oftener: there are fewer "tempests," but more "half gales." There is, however, the same relative difference, as to wind, between the coasts and the interior in New Zealand, as there is in England. Taupo is calmer than Wellington, just in the degree that Bath is calmer than Beechy Head. The coldest and most unpleasant winds are the wet southerly and south-west gales most common in Wellington and Canterbury. Early winter is perhaps the calmest season; spring and early summer the most breezy.

General remarks. South of Auckland, I never felt it hotter in New Zealand than in England; and everywhere on the coast a summer sea breeze sets in about ten in the forenoon. In fine winter mornings, a crust of ice is occasionally seen on pools and road-side splashes. Snow is never seen in the North Island except on the mountain tops; but slight falls occasionally sprinkle the southern plains of Canterbury and Otago. 40 Fogs and mists are rare, and thunder storms are less frequent than even in England. There is but little twilight; in summer it is dark about an hour earlier than in England, in winter about an hour later. The nights are always proportionately cooler than the days: when a warm coat would be oppressive in the fields by day, a blazing log would be cozy in the house at night.

Our experience of the New Zealand climate is,

VARIATION OF CLIMATE.

however, at present, chiefly confined to the coasts. In the interior, the climate is more settled and serene, the winters a little colder, the summers a little warmer, the seasons more advanced; and it seems probable that semi-tropical fruits, orange citron olive loquat and pomegranate, might be cultivated with success in sheltered valleys of the northern inland districts.

It should be observed that there is less difference between the climate of the north and south of New Zealand than we might expect to find from the difference of latitude. But the delicate invalid-emigrant should not, I think, go further south than Nelson: a locality which enjoys the finest dryest and warmest climate of any part of New Zealand at present known and settled.

In drawing any comparison between the New Zealand and the English climate, two considerations must be borne in mind: – the first, that all which is bad and disagreeable in the one is felt; whereas, owing to the appliances and contrivances of high civilisation, half which is bad and disagreeable in the other is not felt: the second, that we are speaking of the New Zealand climate in its "rude-primeval state," not in its "art-improved" state. No art can make a bad climate good; but art can make any climate better. The cultivation of a new country materially improves its climate. Damp and dripping forests, exhaling pestilent vapours from rank and rotten vegetation, fall before the axe; and light and air get in and sunshine, ripening goodly plants. Fen and marsh and

IMPROVEMENT OF CLIMATE.

swamp, the bittern's dank domains, fertile only in miasma, are drained; and the plough converts them into wholesome plains of fruit and grass and grain. When Caesar's legions chased the painted savages along the shores of Kent, many a deadly Pontine marsh held the place of what is now a salubrious champaign country of orchards corn and cattle; and the primeval climate of Albion probably mowed down more of the invaders than did the scythed chariots of her woad-stained warriors. A few years since the ague was the scourge of my native swamps in Lincolnshire; and fen infants, like myself, were only preserved by copious cups of bark and wine. But now, reed and rush and snake and buzzard rat and eel have vanished before the plough; the "reek o' the rotten fen" is gone; and the ague a tradition of the past. It is difficult to credit that the climate of Canada could ever have been more inclement than it is now; yet old greybeards of the bush tell us that sixty years ago Canadian winters were winters worthy of the Arctic zone. Settlement and cultivation will produce like effects in New Zealand; so that we may plume ourselves on the thought that if the climate be good now, it will be better ere long, and perfect for our posterity.

SALUBRITY. – Tables compiled from Dr. Thompson's "Official Sanatory Report" of the health of the troops stationed in New Zealand. 41

SANATORY TABLES

NUMBER OF BRITISH SOLDIERS IN 1000 ANNUALLY Attacked BY DIFFERENT DISEASES ON VARIOUS STATIONS.

New Zealand.

Great Britain.

Australia.

Canada.

Cape
of Good
Hope.

Malta.

Consumption

60

148

133

148

98

120

Fevers

14

78

65

–

88

173

Diseases of
stomach and
bowels

60

94

153

–

126

155

Liver complaints

7

8

15

–

22

21

Total

141

328

366

–

334

469

NUMBER OF BRITISH SOLDIERS IN 1000 WHO ANNUALLY Die FROM DIFFERENT DISEASES ON VARIOUS STATIONS

New Zealand

8 1/4

Canada

20

Great Britain

14

Cape of Good Hope

15

Australia

11

Malta

18

CONSUMPTION

NUMBER OF BRISITH SOLDIERS IN 1000 ANNUALLY ATTACKED AND CAARRIDE OFF BY "PECTORAL DISEASES" AT VARIOUS STATIONS.

Attacked.

Deaths.

New Zealand

60

2.7

Cape of Good Hope

98

3.0

Malta

120

6.0

Australia

133

5.8

Canada

148

6.7

Great Britain

148

8.0

Extracts from Dr. Thompson's "Report:" –

"The North Island of New Zealand will be found a more favourable residence for Europeans who have lost their health in India, than the Cape of Good Hope, Medi-

MEDICAL TESTIMONY.

terranean, Australia, or Great Britain. Its superiority over Great Britain, consists in the more genial climate, the absence of that intense cold, and of those sudden vicissitudes of temperature which are found unpleasant, and often injurious to men long inured to tropical countries. Its superiority over the Cape and Mediterranean, consists in the less frequent occurrence of those diseases which are common to India. To the Indian who has suffered from no disease, but whose mind and body are exhausted and ennervated, New Zealand will be found a peculiarly agreeable residence. I speak of this from my own personal experience, and that of one or two others who have suffered from the exhaustion of an Indian life. 42

"From the moisture of the climate, it might be supposed that New Zealand was a country which would produce ague; but this is not the case. During the year 1849, a detachment of recruits joined the 58th Regiment. Previous to their embarcation, they had been quartered for several months at Tilbury Fort, Essex. During the voyage out, and shortly after their arrival, several of the men were attacked with ague. The disease went on for four months; every seizure, however, being less severe. At last it wore itself out, and the men completely regained their health.

"Seeing that diseases and deaths are less frequent in New Zealand than in England, the question naturally arises – is the duration of life more extended? I should certainly say it was, not only from the results as advanced in this paper, but also from the circumstance that the mortality among children under five years of age has been found very low; and from the general nature of the climate, giving old men an ease and comfort which no wealth nor artifice can secure in England." 43

Another medical authority, Dr. Shortland (a civilian), after much personal experience of the climate of New Zealand and the Continent, says: –

MEDICAL TESTIMONY.

"New Zealand being an island at a distance from any continent, enjoys a remarkably equable temperament, as the wind may vary many points without its quality being at the same time sensibly changed. In this, it is vastly superior to the south of France and Italy, where the full enjoyment of a delicious climate is constantly interrupted by the chill of the piercing Mistral, or by the scorching blast of the Sirocco, which causes variations of temperature both sudden and excessive. On this account especially, New Zealand is for the phthisical patient a most desirable residence. There is not certainly, I will venture to say, amongst all the coveted climates of the northern hemisphere, one, except Madeira, which will bear comparison with it in this respect."

CLIMATIC CALENDAR.

"Showery," means days when there were even any sunshine showers – "Wet," means heavy rain, preventing out-door labour. The table is the mean of meteorological observations for three consecutive years, made with scrupulous exactitude by my brother, at New Plymouth.

AUGUST. – Mean temperature 49 deg. (The English February, mean temperature 39 deg.) Spring commences about the end of this month; though September is generally called the first spring month. 16 dry days, 11 showery, 4 wet. Often coarse, disagreeable weather; but sensibly warmer towards the end. Garden potatoes planted; peaches blossom; karaka flowers; and warauroa, the first cuckoo, arrives.

SEPTEMBER. – Mean temperature 51 deg. (The English March, mean temperature 42 deg.) 15 dry days, 11 showery, 4 wet. A wet, rainy, windy, breezy, month; but the sun gains power, and roads dry sooner. Perhaps the best general lambing month. Fruit trees blossom; kowai flowers, and early asparagus may be cut; young wheat is green and strong; nature becomes more lively; birds pair, and fill the woods with song.

CLIMATIC CALENDAR.

OCTOBER. – Mean temperature 55 deg. (English April, mean temperature 47 deg.) Dry days, 18; showery, 11; wet, 2. More like boisterous March than the preceding month; and called by the natives "te ra kihi" – the windy, noisy period. Barley and turnips sown; native kumera planted; peoni and tulip flower; apple blossoms; vine and mulberry show fruit; tawara ripe; and the koekoea, second cuckoo, arrives.

NOVEMBER. – Mean temperature 60 deg. (English May, mean temperature 56 deg.) Dry days, 19; showery, 10; wet, 1. Calmer, and less variable; sensibly warmer, and more pleasant. Towards the end, early meadows may be cut; roses bloom; tree-honeysuckle flowers; new potatoes and peas are fit; strawberries and cream come in, and sheep-shearing should end.

DECEMBER. – Mean temperature 64 deg. (English June, mean temperature 60 deg.) Dry days, 21; showery, 10. First true summer month. Sunny and breezy – best haymaking time. Scarlet rata flowers; cherries and garden berries ripen. Pine season for bush travelling and excursions among the natives.

JANUARY. – Mean temperature 66 deg. (English July, mean temperature 63 deg.) Dry days, 25; showery, 5; wet 1. Harvest month in the north. Native karaka ripens.

FEBRUARY. – Mean temperature 66 deg. (English August, mean temperature 63 deg.) Dry days, 20; showery, 5; wet, 3. Generally the driest month. Harvest finished everywhere, and wall-fruits and apples gathered.

MARCH. – Mean temperature 62 deg. (English September, mean temperature 5S deg..) Dry days, 24; showery, 6; wet, 1. First autumnal month; fine brilliant breezy weather. Native kumera (sweet potato) gathered; and pasture-grass seeds sown.

APRIL. – Mean temperature 59 deg. (English October, mean temperature 51 deg.) Dry days, 19; showery, 10; wet, 2. Weather has a more autumnal feel. Musquitoes and flies

CLIMATIC CALENDAR.

disappear, and last cuckoo departs. Grapes ripe; potato crop taken up, and stubbles ploughed. Best autumnal lambing month. 44

MAY. – Mean temperature 52 deg. (English November, mean temperature 42 deg.) Dry days, 17; showery, 11; wet, 3. Natives' first winter month. Sensibly colder; rain much heavier; and, perhaps, the most unpleasant month in the year; though there are frequently some exquisite days about the end. Best general month for wheat sowing.

JUNE. – Mean temperature 49 deg. (English December, mean temperature 38 deg.) Dry days, 14; showery, 14; wet, 2. Bright, light, frosty mornings are more common; and generally a more pleasant month than the preceding. Winter wheat sowing finished, and fruit and other trees transplanted.

JULY. – Mean temperature 48 deg. (English January, mean temperature 36 deg.) Dry days, 18; showery, 9; wet, 4. Much like June and early August; but rather colder, and sometimes wetter. The bad weather of these New Zealand winter months is like wet English March weather; the fine like the brilliant weather of a balmy English October, with hoar-frost mornings.

39 Families have left Madeira to settle in New Zealand: one, if not more, of Messrs. Willis' ships having called there to take on passengers. (See Invalid-Emigrants, chapter 19.)

40 The mountain snow line in the North Island, is about 7000 feet above the sea level.

41 Dr. Thompson, surgeon of the forces in New Zealand – the 58th and 65th Regiments, which have been stationed there some years. His report appears in the Parliamentary Blue Book on New Zealand, of August 7, 1851. It is a very able paper, and has been the means of directing numerous invalid-emigrants to New Zealand.

42 The italics are the author's.

43 The italics are the author's.

44 Some advocate spring lambing, others autumnal. I regard the former as the preferable season.

CHAPTER V. ANIMAL KINGDOM

ABSENCE OF ANIMALS.

CHAPTER V.

ANIMAL KINGDOM.

IT is a remarkable fact that New Zealand, a country larger than the United Kingdom, possessing a genial climate and abundance of food and covert for all the Herbivora, should not possess a single indigenous wild animal. 45 With the exception of two or three small lizards, the kiore (a mouse-rat) is the only four-footed native creature which exists; and even this little king-quadruped of the country is fast disappearing before his alien congener from Norway. 46

Happily, New Zealand is equally destitute of reptiles and venomous insects. St. Patrick must

ABSENCE OF REPTILES.

have resided there before he discovered Ireland: there is not a snake or venomous reptile of any description whatever; and no insect is found so dangerous as our common wasp. 47

The black whale frequents the coast from June to October; and seals are still found and were formerly abundant on the more remote southern shores.

ORNITHOLOGY. – -There are about fifty varieties of land birds; and, as some are free and fine songsters and as others indulge in great cry and clamour, they impart considerable liveliness and animation to the outskirts of the woods. The most common and certainly the most facetious individual of the ornithology, is the Tui (Parson-Bird). Larger than the blackbird and more elegant in shape, his plumage is lustrous black irradiated with green hues and pencilled with silver grey, and he displays a white throat-tuft for his clerical bands. Parson bird though he be, the Tui is no sullen anchorite mortifying the flesh. He is a bird of the convivial rector order, fond of honey; and taking tythe of all the fruits his rich living affords. Joyous Punchinello of the bush, he is perpetual fun, in motion. He can sing, but seldom will; and preserves his voice for mocking others. Darting from some low shrub to the topmost twig of the tallest tree, he commences roaring forth such

PARSON-BIRD, PARROTS, QUAILS.

a variety of strange noises with such changes of voice and volume of tone, as to claim the instant attention of the forest. Should another Tui chance to be near, he at once flits down for a sham fight; throws a somerset or two, and then darts into his bush, only to come forth the next minute with exhibition number two. Caught and caged, he is still the merry ventriloquist, mocks cocks and cats, attempts the baby, and has been known to frighten a nervous little dog off the premises. To add to his merits, he becomes such fine eating in the season of poroporo berries, that an alderman might quit turtle and dare the seas to eat a tui stew.

There are four varieties of parrots. The kakapo, a large owl-like ground-hopping parrot, now chiefly confined to the remote western forests of the South Island; the kaka, a brown hawk-parrot; and two beautiful green parroquets. A fine wood-pigeon is common in the forests; and nearly a dozen varieties of wild fowl, including the splendid Paradise duck, are plentiful in spots about the river mouths. A small grass quail now becoming scarce, was once abundant on the Canterbury and Nelson plains; the weka (wood-hen), a fine rail, is common in some localities; and the true snipe has at last been met with; though it is so exceedingly scarce as to be quite the "rara avis in terris."

The pukeko, a beautiful bird of the rail family, of brilliant purple plumage, haunts the old native gardens; the elegant Uia, a bird the

ORNITHOLOGICAL HEDGEHOG.

size of a magpie, with long tail feathers, much prized by the natives, is found in the more remote districts; and the kingfisher, the chiming bell-bird, black robin, flycatcher, and various small songsters of the finch and linnet family, are common round every homestead.

The kiwi (Apterix Australis), a grotesque-looking creature of the Struthionidae family, is still found in the recesses of the forest; and if the reader will only picture a hairy hedgehog on stilts with a long beak much too heavy for him, moping in a corner, and kicking viciously when excited, he will have a rude idea of what the kiwi is like. 48

There are two beautiful cuckoo birds of passage, arriving in the spring and remaining about six weeks; a small scarce crow; a little owl called "more pork" from its peculiar cry; and two birds of prey – one an elegant sparrow-hawk; the other a kite, bold enough to pounce on a full-grown Hokoara duck, and a frequent but very wary visitor round the poultry yard.

The "booming bittern," shunning all trace of man, haunts the distant rushy swamps; a small blue-crested crane is occasionally seen about the coasts; and a beautiful, snow-white heron is sometimes met with on the high cliffs of the remote southern rivers. The feathers of this latter bird are much prized for native hair ornaments; but it is so scarce as to give rise to

COAST BIRDS.

the proverb "Kotahi te rerenga o te Kotuku rerenga tahi" – Once is the flight of the rare Kotoku – applied in flattery to any great chief who makes a short first visit and then departs for ever.

COAST BIRDS. – The coast birds comprise two species of albatross, four of gulls, three or four of petrels, and several varieties of the cormorant and petrel. Albatross have been caught measuring nineteen feet between the tips of the wings. The young Titi (mutton-bird), a species of puffin, is caught by the Southern natives in great quantities at the breeding season, potted in its own fat, and sent as a sort of "pate- de foie gras," to inland friends. The Korora, a small green penguin, is the craftiest little fisherman of all coast birds: his favourite morsel is the Pipi, a shell fish addicted to the fatal practice of basking on the beach with its mouth open; Korora drops a small stone in to prevent Pipi closing his shell, feasts away on him at leisure; and then proceeds pebble in mouth to surprise Pipi No. 2. 49

Just as the New Zealand forests are destitute of game, so are its rivers destitute of fish; and just as the sporting visitor would fancy that the one must abound with wild turkey and deer, so would he fancy that the other must abound with salmon and trout. The streams –

"Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full,"

are the very streams for fish and anglers; yet, though stored with those nice spots –

FISH AND ANGLING.

" – – – Where with the pool is mixed the trembling stream,
Or where it boils around the stone, or from hollowed bank
Reverted plays in undulating flow –
You throw, nice judging, the delusive fly " –

they boast no single fish worth the angler's catching.

Silver eels attaining a goodly size are found in every stream; a sort of grayling is taken in a few of the clearest rivers; and the spotted Kokopu, called trout, but which Soyer himself could not make palatable, abounds in every brook. These, with the smelt, lamprey, whitebait, and some sprat-like lake and tidal varieties, are all the fish which the thousand-and-one rivers of New Zealand afford; and with the exception of the eel, grayling, and the whitebait, which are excellent, not one of them is worth hook or net.

Sea fish are more plentiful: the best are the Hapuka (a superior sort of cod), the Moki, the Wharehou, the Patiki (a small plaice), the Kawai, (a coarse common fish rising at the fly in tidal waters and sometimes dubbed the salmon) a sort of mackerel, and some mullet, rock-cod, bastard-skate, and snapper.

I consider that Billingsgate could show a dozen good table fish for New Zealand's one. Some colonists, however, might differ from me here: one gentleman, writing from Wellington, says: – "The books may well tell us that the harbours abound with fish; abound is a poor word – they are literally alive with fish. Mr. – – – – – - and myself now almost live on them; they are deli-

SEA-FISH AND INSECTS.

cious, and in great variety. We have one like salmon, and quite as fine in flavour. 50 On a sunny morning the surface of the harbour is a complete mass of fishy life."

Crayfish, rock-oysters, fine cockles and muscles are abundant; but shrimps and crabs are small and worthless.

Two or three varieties of sharks are common on the coast; they occasionally enter the harbours, and render swimming, far out in deep water, rather hazardous.

INSECTS. – The birds and fish of New Zealand differ widely from those of England; but the common insects of the two countries are very similar. House-flies, butterflies, dragon-flies, spiders, moths, caterpillars, beetles, slugs, snails, grasshoppers and glowworms, are, many of them, almost identical with those of England. There are a few ants; but no earwigs, wasps or hornets. The principal indigenous insects not found in England are the Koeke, a large locust-grasshopper (flying like a jack-snipe), the Weta, a suspicious-looking scorpion-like creature, apparently replete with "high concocted venom," but perfectly harmless; and the Cicada, a locust-like insect, a most noisy chirper during the summer weeks; and the insect to which Cook probably

WILD PIGS.

alluded as the "scorpion-fly with whose chirping the woods resound."

SEMI-WILD DOMESTIC ANIMALS. – Pig (Poaka Kuhukuhu). The pig was introduced into New Zealand by Captain Cook and Governor King. In the old "war-times," when the Tribes were constantly besieging and destroying each other's village strong-holds, slaves and pigs formed the conquerors' chief booty – many of each were killed and eaten at the victors' feasts; but, during the siege and melee, some of the pigs would escape into the forests. Here, they ran wild and bred; and having a fine climate, abundance of fern root and other food, millions of acres of close covert, and no animal enemies to molest them, they spread over both islands, and may now be numbered by thousands. They roam about in little herds of a dozen or so; but, keeping in the deepest recesses of the forest, are seldom or ever seen except by bush travellers or pig-hunters. They are small fleet animals, with coarse skins, weighing about 100 lbs. The young pork is excellent; 51 but it is a costly

WILD CATTLE.

mistake to put one of these forest rangers into the sty: evidently ignorant that the duty of a good pig is to get fat and be killed, they chafe and fret in their prison, invariably catch and devour any intrusive duck which may chance to look in, slight barley meal, and grow thinner on every meal.

New Zealand "pig-hunting," pastime for pork butchers, is thus performed. The sportsmen get together two or three mongrel curs, take hatchet and musket, and proceed to beat the woods in some remote locality: pig started, the curs worry him for half a mile through the thicket till they bring him to bay when the ragged Nimrods labour up, despatch the poor brute, and bag him for the pot.

It is much to be regretted that a few calves were not among Cook's gifts. If two or three couple of young stock had been landed with the pigs, and had thriven in like manner during the half century which elapsed between our great circumnavigator's visit and the colonisation of 1840, the pioneer settlers would have found herds of wild cattle roaming over the country; and whole tracts of fern and thicket would have been browsed down into noble pastures fit for the depasturing of millions of sheep.

A young bull and a couple of heifers were once turned loose on the island of Kapiti by a Sydney trader – the result, in a few years, was a fine herd of wild cattle. The late chief Te Rauparaha, as lord of the manor, would occasionally sell per-

NATIVE DOG.

mission to some sporting visitor to stalk this herd, and try a rifle shot. They were very shy and wild, scudding off like buffaloes, and dangerous to approach when wounded. The beef was delicious; and the whalers generally contrived to shoot a fat heifer for Christmas cheer. 52

Dog (Kuri Peropero). – Some assert that the native dog is indigenous; others that it accompanied the natives in their first migration; others that it was introduced by some early Spanish ship. It is however such an utterly worthless cur that the question of origin is not worth raising. It is a small lurcher-like animal, black red or dirty yellow; and its look, gait, and general deportment, are decidedly hang-dog and vulpine. The low character of the animals is evidenced by their having no names. Like the "masterless dogs" of Constantinople, they seem to belong to nobody in particular, but to be waste chattel, common to the village. In former times the natives prized both flesh and skin; and a dog-skin mat was a robe of state. They are cherished now chiefly by the women: the native girls alternately thrash and pet them – displaying, like young ladies, in society, a capricious tenderness for puppies.

The New Zealand dog is not a wild dog though, not "ferae naturae" like the ravaging dingo of

DOMESTIC WILD CAT.

Australia. Wherever a Maori cur may be by night he is always at home by day; basking in the sun yelping at every visitor, and officiously present at every meal. He is ugly and worthless rather than mischievous; his sins are sins of omission; and save an occasional onslaught on some housewife's turkeys, he has probably less to answer for than many a dog of more demure looks.

Common cat (Ngeru, Tori). – -The cat probably introduced itself from some early ship. Like every other alien animal introduced into this teeming country, it has taken full possession of the soil; and, like the dog, has multiplied beyond due limits. Ages of domesticity have failed to eradicate the native wildness of the cat: opportunity serving, puss soon relapses into feline barbarism, and forsakes the hearth to prowl the forest. When the New Zealand settler moves deeper into the Bush, the cat usually accompanies his Lares and Penates: the first bush-born cats are always shy, the second are more so, and will prowl about the near woods; here, they meet neighbour cats similarly inclined to forest life; and, thus, in three generations, a cat race is produced which is so far wild as to shun the house, to have its lair about the farm buildings and to subsist itself on birds, lizards and rats; and which would show small respect to any pullet straying beyond the sanctuary of the homestead.

INTRODUCTION OF GAME.

ANIMALS AND BIRDS which might be advantageously introduced into New Zealand.

New Zealand should swarm with game. There is no destructive animal 53 or reptile; the climate and soil are perfection; water flows everywhere in profusion; and there is the finest cover and perpetual profusion of the finest food for everything from jack-snipe up to elephant.

There would be no game laws in New Zealand; but the common law of trespass would protect the young game on a man's estate from any aggressive "pot-shot;" and in New Zealand, where peasants are farmers, peasant-poaching would be an offence unknown.

Pheasants have been introduced with success in the extreme north; and pheasants as wood-cover birds, and as game requiring less corn and stubble land, would be rather more at home in New Zealand, as yet, than partridges. Partridges, however, – especially the French variety – and quails, would even now find ample breadth of corn-land among the farms round every settlement, and might all be introduced with success.

All stock-game of this description, hares and even wild rabbits, should be the finest young birds

ROOKERIES AND RED DEER.

and animals procurable of a Breeder; as those which have been reared in the domesticated state, stand the voyage and the gradual "turning-off," on arrival, far better than wild-bred ones. 54

Rook and Wood-pigeon might also be introduced with advantage. A Rookery would be a most cheerful addition to the New Zealand country house. The bird is a "black coat" who for one tythe he takes of the farmer's crop, takes fifty tythes of the "insect pests" which injure the farmer's crop; and there are worse things in the world than cold squab-pie. Wood-pigeons would find New Zealand a paradise; and breeding with the native bird, would probably tempt this forest recluse to sun his beauty more in the open country, where men could see and shoot him.

Indeed, there can be no reason why emigrant enthusiasts in Birds should not introduce all their feathered favourites. Jay, magpie, and starling, thrush, blackbird, and goldfinch, bullfinch, sparrow, and linnet, are all easily procured; would all bear the voyage; would all thrive and multiply in New Zealand; would all form pleasant surroundings and associations; and would all be useful as well as ornamental.

Thoroughly adapted for all our common birds and for small game, New Zealand, if possible, is even better adapted for our large game. Red roe, and fallow deer, once introduced into feeding grounds

UTILITY OF GAME.

and noble coverts like Mount Egmont's ranges and the "Black Forest" territory, described in the article on Nelson, would never be exterminated; not even if hunted, "war-to-the-knife," by the Red Indians led on by Scrope and Cumming. 55

A serious proposal for the introduction of game into New Zealand, may be derided by some as a speculation bordering on the aesthetics of emigration. But, in truth, the introduction of game into a country like New Zealand might well be attended with social and even pecuniary benefits which would have tickled a calculator like the late Joseph Hume. We don't go to New Zealand with pick and pan, to snatch dear-won nuggets, gulp gallons of rum, and then, rich or ragged, hurry home. We go to the "Britain of the South" to create an estate – to raise a "home" wherein to anchor fast and plant our household gods; and all we can do to make this "home" a glad and happy home, is money, made and saved. No man can better deserve, no man can better afford, a day's pastime, than a New Zealand colonist. His bow even, must sometimes be unbent; and surely 'tis better that he should nerve himself in rural sports, "chasing the red deer and following the roe," than relax himself in city dissipations and the laps of ballet girls.

GRILSE AND SALMON.

Some day, too, New Zealand may have to "set her squadrons in the tented field," say to resist the Russian or chastise Australia: she may need good soldiers – good soldiers must be good shots – good shots are made by good shooting – and America has raw materials for the finest soldiers in the world, because her abundance of game, her good shooting, makes every man a deadly rifle shot.

Might we not reasonably say, then, that families of the "estate-creating" capitalist order, who may now contemplate planting new homes in "Austral-Britain," would deserve well of the land of their adoption if each would devote £5 or £10, and a little trouble, to the gradual work of stocking its fields and forests with our common birds and game?

In making these remarks on the introduction of divers birds and beasts into New Zealand, it has struck me that the king of fishes, Salmon, might possibly be added to the game imports. If young Par, just when about to leave the Perthshire breeding ponds for the sea, were put into a wooden tank on the deck of a vessel, fed and daily supplied with fresh sea-water, would they not live through the voyage? A Frenchman has lately discovered that fish may be carried a long distance if the water be kept in motion. Now there would surely be motion enough on the deck of a ship to gratify the most lively Par; and it seems to me that if Salmo junior did not die of sea-sickness, he would probably live to arrive a piscine emigrant. I would fain write to some of the Perthshire breeding ex-

WILD TURKEYS.

perimentalists and consult their Wisdoms on the point; but as that exacting functionary, the printer's devil, is waiting for more "copy," I must e'en leave the inquiry to some brother of the angle who may look forward to catching grilse and salmon in the Dees and Tweeds of the Antipodes.

Reverting a moment to Birds, I see that the Rev. Thomas Fellows, Beighton Rectory, Norfolk, gained a prize at the late Crystal Palace Poultry Show for the domesticated American Wild Turkey. This noble bird would prove an excellent introduction into New Zealand; and "turned-off" into the Bush would, I think, soon resume its wild habits, and become the goodliest of winged game.

The common Turkey thrives well in the colony; whilst, if I may so express it, the "wild-going" attractions are so great in New Zealand, that even the common fowl about the bush-farm clearings, has sometimes to be flushed from cover by dogs, and shot flying like a pheasant.

45 Emigrants of sporting tastes have urged this as a serious objection to the country; probably overlooking the fact that in new countries abounding with natural game, and where the rifle will stock the larder, deadly reptiles or ferocious animals always emperil the chase. The hunting-grounds of our American and African emigration fields supply deer, buffalo, wild turkey, elephant, antelope, and a rich variety of smaller game; but they also supply rattle-snake and mocassin-snake, scorpion, centipede, puff-adder, lion, and leopard. Harmless game may be introduced into New Zealand; but deadly reptiles will hardly be extirpated from America Africa and Australia.

46 An animal resembling the beaver has once or twice been seen in the remote rivers of the South Island. But this may have been some enterprising seal, fishing higher up-stream than usual.

47 New Zealand musquitoes and sand-flies (in the clearings and settled parts) are certainly not worse than English gnats and Highland midges – if so bad.

48 This kiwi is believed to be the only living representative of the Moa – an extinct ostrich-like giant, some twelve feet tall, which might have proved a fit steed for Lord Cardigan and the Lights.

49 Shortland's "Southern Districts of New Zealand."

50 This gentleman must have lived on salt ship-meat, for four months, and lost his palate. There are not, in my opinion, six good table fish to be found in all the seas south of the Equator.

51 In returning, we came upon several wild pigs, one of which the chief singled out. We both had an excellent chase; the horses keeping a few yards behind, fairly ran him down, as he was fat, weighing about 100 lbs. The pork of such a pig is very fine eating; more like fowl, perhaps, than any other meat. Sometimes they will stand a good hunt, and will charge anything that comes in their way. The old boars often kill the dogs. One of my sons has killed as many as nine or ten pigs in a day. – Journal of a Somersetshire Farmer.

52 My friend Mr. Nayler, in his explorations of the wild country around New River in Foveaux Strait, discovered one morning through the glass, some wild cattle grazing on a distant plain.

53 There is the domestic wild cat; but this is not a common animal, prowling over the country – it is confined to the homesteads, and could easily be kept down. There are only two hawks. Thus, game in New Zealand would not suffer from those felons of the preserves – fox, polecat, weasel, stoat, marten, magpie, carrion-crow, eagle, buzzard, and falcon.

54 Baker, Game and Fancy-Fowl Breeder, I think, of the New Road, London, is an eminent man in this department.

55 The fallow deer could unquestionably be introduced; and from information gained this season in Aberdeenshire from Lord Panmure's Glenmark foresters, I think, that with care and management, the young half-tame red deer would make the voyage.

CHAPTER VI. VEGETABLE KINGDOM

VEGETABLE KINGDOM.

CHAPTER VI.

VEGETABLE KINGDOM.

NEW ZEALAND is the land of greenwood. Vegetation runs riot. The teeming growth, perpetual verdure, and vigorous freshness of her forests, have been the admiration of every visitor since the days of Cook. Of plants, from humble shrub and creeping daisy up to the king of trees, the noble Kauri, there are nearly 650 distinct species. Of these 650 indigenous plants there are scarcely twenty, which bear even a general resemblance to any of our English plants. The four great characteristic differences between the Flora of New Zealand and that of any European country are these: 1, that in New Zealand every plant is evergreen; 56 2, the existence in New Zealand of a

NEW ZEALAND FORESTS.

far smaller proportion of annuals and flower-bearing plants; 3, the existence of a much larger proportion of trees and shrubs, and of tree-creeping parasitical plants; 4, the existence of numerous plants of the beautiful fern and palm-tree family.

The mode of growth too, the general appearance of a New Zealand forest, is different from anything in the old world. Thousands of tall columnar trees of fifty different species, one to two hundred feet high, struggle up through a wilderness of underwood – their leafy heads so loaded with tufts of rushy parasites that the true foliage is almost lost in the rank vegetation of the alien polypiae; whilst innumerable creepers, from the ropelike supple-jack up to the gigantic Rata (a vegetable boa constrictor) coil round every stem, run up every limb, glide from head to head, and entwine the topmost branches of a dozen trees in fifty Gordian knots. The Underwood, consists of these creepers and of an equally dense growth of young saplings, mixed with forest shrubs; such as the delicate lady's hair, the Kopakopa, an elegant plumy fern, the Nikau and many others. And such is the closeness of the growth, the luxuriance of the vegetation in a New Zealand forest, that sun and air scarce can penetrate, glimpses only of the sky are caught through the leafy canopy above, and at high noonday in the fields it is always green twilight in the woods.

If this Underwood-thicket contained any prickly plants like our briars and brambles, or the African

WILD SHRUBBERIES.

wait-a-bit thorn, the New Zealand forest (or Bush as it is called) would be a jungle physically impenetrable; and even as it is, it presents so many obstacles to free step and movement, that none but a patient and accomplished pedestrian, experienced in supple-jack snares, root-traps and other parasitical impediments, would struggle through it at a greater rate of progress than a mile an hour (with three falls) at most.

In England, there are not, I think, 40 varieties of indigenous trees – in New Zealand, including shrubs over twenty feet high, there are 120; and of these, probably half, are trees attaining a size large enough to entitle them to rank as "Timber Trees."

The smaller trees and tree-shrubs, ("light bush,") growing about the edges of the great forests, or clothing the dells and valleys of the open country, are so numerous, that a mere enumeration of them would exceed the space I can devote to the Vegetable Kingdom. Among the commonest, we find three varieties of that forest Houri, the Fern tree, fifty feet high with coronals of palmy leaves fluttering in the breeze like forest fans; the Nikau, more rare but less beautiful than the fern tree; the Fuchsia, thirty feet high; the fruity Poroporo, the sweet-scented Manuka, the tree-myrtle and fragrant Veronica, the Ngaio, the elegant Titoki, and the laurel-like Karaka with its glossy foliage and clusters of golden fruit – the only tree which the Maori-AEneis brought with

FLOWERS AND FRUITS.

him in his migration from the sunny shores of Hawaii.

Flora and Pomona have dealt most niggardly with New Zealand. There is no indigenous flower equal to England's dog-rose; 57 no indigenous fruit equal to Scotland's cranberry.

Arriving in New Zealand from Africa where the flowers are as fine as the foliage is mean, and where, in pheasant-shooting, we flushed the hummingbird through crimsoned acres of geraniums, we were all forcibly struck with the universal greenness of the New Land.

The Forests are green, green everywhere and always, green of all hues, nothing but green; and the woodland scenery of New Zealand though chaste and beautiful, needs fifty more gaudy flower-bearing trees like the scarlet Rata; and a hundred peony, tulip, dahlia, ranunculus, and rhododendron shrubs, to give it deeper colours and more varied brilliancy.

Poor in wild flowers, New Zealand is even poorer in wild fruit. The Kiekie (New Zealand's pine-apple), which one author calls "a vegetable luxury like a juicy pear flavoured with vanilla" – is a vegetable impostor, like a sweet artichoke flavoured with turpentine. The Tawa (New Zealand's damson) eats like a sloe steeped in tar. The Poroporo, the nicest or least nasty of the wild

TASTE AND TRY.

fruits, is a sodden strawberry flavoured with apple peel; but if rashly tasted an hour before it is ripe, the Poroporo is an alum pill flavoured with strychnine. Whilst the only taste which the golden Karaka has at all, is a slight taste of wizened quince. 58

– – – – – – – – –

The two most common and important plants of the open country are the Raorao (Pteris esculenta), the common fern plant of the plains; and the Phormium tenax, the New Zealand flax plant.

There are probably ten to fifteen millions of acres in New Zealand where the common Fern, intermixed more or less with Ti tree, Toetoe and Tutu, 59 is the principal vegetation. It generally attains a height of about four feet; but on rich light soil like that of New Plymouth, it grows almost six feet high, with cane-like stalks thick man's finger, and forms a dense covert impenetrable to sheep, and one through which no man can walk. Before the introduction of the potato, the root

THE WILD FLAX PLANT.

of this plant was the chief vegetable food of the natives; it is now occasionally eaten by them, and has always been one of the chief articles of support for their herds of swine.

Phormium tenax is called New Zealand flax from the flax-like properties of its fibre; not from any, resemblance it bears to the insignificant-looking plant of Europe. Phormium tenax is a splendid flag-like plant, throwing out fifty drooping leaves some of them three inches broad and six feet long; and displaying a bunch of tall flower-stalks, bearing pink blossoms, charged with limpid sweets, freely pilfered by the bee. This is the plant which supplied the New Zealander with the material for all his mats and woven garments, fishing-lines, cord and nets. It abounds in both islands. From north to south, there are spots and patches of hundreds of acres almost entirely covered with it; and the preparation, manufacture, and export of the fibre, may eventually become leading industrial pursuits.

Raupo and Toetoe, useful thatching and hut-building plants, fringe every little swamp; cresses mantle the brooks; mushrooms are gathered on the pastures; and truffles wait but for the truffle-dog. There are nearly twenty varieties of wild grazing-grasses; and sowthistle, white-clover, turnip, cabbage, carrot, aniseed, spinach, mint, thyme, and various stray vegetables and garden plants (spreading themselves over the country in some unaccountable manner), are found in many dis-

THE FOREST KINGS.

tricts mixed up with the indigenous vegetation of the country, and almost threatening to displace even the vigorous natives of the soil.

In introducing the following "Timber-table," I would remark that, though the preponderance of certain trees in Canada and other wild wooded countries is a good agricultural index as to soil, it is not so, or not so much so, in New Zealand; and some writers have generalised on this point on very insufficient data. Thus, a Mr. Tuckett, a surveyor, somewhere asserts, that the Rimu is indicative of a poor soil – -whereas the finest Rimu, and some of the finest soil in New Zealand, happen to be in one and the same place, namely at New Plymouth. All that present observations warrant us in saying is, I think, this – that Kauri and Taua forests indicate a poor soil and a rugged non-agricultural country; that a comparative abundance of Kahikatea indicates a good but moist soil, and low-lying or swampy ground; and that a comparative abundance of Mai, Rimu, Pukatea, and Karaka, indicates a rich dry soil, and an upland or undulating country. With the exception of the Kauri 60 which grows separately and forms a forest by itself, the New Zealand timber trees mostly grow so intermixed, that a dozen varieties may frequently be found in the same acre.

NEW ZEALAND TIMBER TREES

DIMENSIONS, PROPERTIES, AND USES OF THE TWELVE CHIEF NEW ZEALAND TIMBER TREES.

Puriri (Iron Wood), equal in strength and durability to English Oak, is made the standard of comparison. Dimensions means the length of clear branchless stem from the ground up to the first limb, and the diameter of such stem half way up; it thus represents the "size of centre plank " which an average tree of each variety would cut. The entire height of some of these trees (trunk and head) such as the Kauri and Kahikatea, is sometimes 150 to 200 feet; and giants of each variety are occasionally met with double the diameter which is here taken as the average.

Names.

Dimensions in Feet.

Locality of Growth, Sort of Wood, and Uses.

Strength

Toughness

Stiffness

1. Kauri.-Yellow Pine

70 X 5

The most valuable Tree in New Zealand. Common in the Coromandel, Hokianga, Kaipara,and other northern coast districts; but not found south of Auckland. Produces large quantities of resinous gum, an article of export. The only cone-bearing tree in New Zealand. Wood, durable and moderately light; grain, close and straight; colour, brownish-yellow; works smooth and satin-like. Supplies splendid ship spars (exported to England for naval purposes) and first-rate wood for inside and outside house work; painted furniture,ship-planking,decks and fittings.

99

102

90

2. Rimu. – Red Pine.

60 X 4

A most graceful Pine, best and commonest in the mid-northern forests. Heavier and harder than Kauri, and perhaps more durable; grain close and partially curled; works moderately well, but has resinous veins; takes a good oil polish. Colour, between coarse mahogany and rosewood, red with dark lines. Best general house wood next to Kauri; and best general furniture wood in the mid-north. Bark used for tanning.

81

95

90

NEW ZEALAND TIMBER TREES.

Names.

Dimensions in Feet.

Locality of Growth, Sort of Wood, and Uses.

Strength

Toughness

Stiffness

Totara.
(Mahogany Pine.)

50 X 4

A fine Pine, most common in the south. Colour, brownish-red; works well, and splits freely. The single trunks of this tree, hollowed out, form the largest native canoes. Principal inner house and furniture wood in the south; and good stuff for shingles.

61

57

49

4. Kahikatea
(White Pine.)

70 x 4

A tall, but rather ugly tree; best and most common in the south. Softest and lightest of the pines, but not durable; grain straight; works well, but at times rather woolly. Colour, white. Commonest house stuff in the south, where Red Pine is scarce; and has been used with success for boat-planking and shingles. A yellow variety, found at the south, is a much finer timber; and this sort may perhaps be as durable as Kauri.

68

85

54

5. Tanekaha
(say Pitch Pine.)

40 x 2

A handsome small Pine, common in the north. In quality of timber it may be termed a superior dwarf Kauri. It may be used for all Kauri purposes where fine quality rather than large size of plank or scantling is needed; and lighter and tougher than Kauri, it is admirably adapted for spars and yards of smaller vessels.

103

134

98

NEW ZEALAND TIMBER TREES.

Names.

Dimension in Feet.

Locality of Growth, Sort of Wood, and Uses.

Strength

Toughness

Stiffness

6. Matai, or Mai.
(Black Pine.)

50 x 3

A common Pine in the interior forests, with a dark, yew-like leaf and aromatic resin. The wood very fragrant when burnt; close-grained and brittle; colour reddish, with deep shades; works easily, takes a polish, and is likely to become a good furniture and in-door wood.

96

99

93

7. Puriri
(Iron-wood.)

30 x 3

New Zealand Teak, less common in the south. Heavy, hard, close, and greasy-grained; but easy working when green. Colour dark greenish-brown. Indestructible for gates, fence-posts and house-piles, &c, and a most valuable timber where combined strength and durability are required in moist situations. The wood is much drilled by a large grub.

100

100

100

8. Rata

40 x 3

A giant, scarlet-flowering, boa constrictor – gradually killing the tree it fastens on, and becoming an immense tree itself. Common everywhere. Wood remarkably strong and tough, close-grained, moderately heavy and easy working. An excellent wheelwright's wood; and affords good curves for shipwork.

103

138

89

NEW ZEALAND TIMBER TREES.

Names.

Dimensions in Feet.

Locality of Growth, Sort of Wood, and Uses.

Strength

Toughness

Stiffness

9. Pohutukawa

30 X 2

A flowering tree, growing on the cliffs of the northern bays and coasts. Trunk gnarled and twisted, with heavy crooked limbs. Wood hard and heavy like the Rata; excellent for ship-timbers boat-knees, &c, and, like the Rata, very useful where curved timber is required.

109

94

126

10. Maire

40 x 3

Less common than most species. Wood very heavy hard and close-grained; valuable for machinery work, and may be used for turning and Box-wood purposes. A dark variety is suitable for furniture.

–

–

–

11. Kohekohe

30 X 2

One of the commonest but not least useful trees of the forest. Its red wood rather like Cedar; splits freely, and is chiefly used as split-stuff for shingles, fence-bars, and paling.

–

–

–

12. Rewarewa
(Honey-suckle.)

30 X 2

A handsome flowering tree, common on the outskirts of the forests. Wood light and free-working; the grain handsomely flowered like the Baltic Oak. Used as split-stuff, and for coopers' work, and suitable for small common furniture.

92

103

78

NOTE. – These, I think, may be called the dozen timber trees which have come into the most general use at present; but some half-dozen others are used more or less for various purposes in different parts of the colony; and the forests contain several other species of timber size which have not yet been fully tried.

56 The Fuchsia tree (Fuchsia excorticata) is the only exception. The trees shed their leaves and renew them – as one leaf drops, another comes. But there is no autumnal fall, no spring re-clothing; and though the foliage is the brightest and most blossom-chequered in spring it appears equally thick and luxuriant at all seasons. The timber trees have intertwined surface roots, not tap roots; and never exhibit a lateral growth like our larch and firs. They display straight, columnar, branchless, stems; surmounted by circular or conical heads of heavy boughs and leafy branches.

57 Not in combined beauty and fragrance.

58 Mr. Nayler and his famous Bush aide-de-camp, "John Bull," found an excellent mountain berry (not unlike pinkish hail-stones in appearance) in great profusion on the mountain ranges of the southern Otago country.

59 Tutu (Coriaria ruscifolia) is a small hush with a berry like the elder. It produces a sort of "hoven" or narcotic effect on sheep and cattle, when too greedily eaten; and the berry, from which the natives express an agreeable juice (carefully avoiding the seed), should never be eaten. With this solitary exception, the vegetable kingdom is as harmless as the animal; it is believed there is no other wild berry or root injurious either to man or beast.

60 The Taua, Totara, and Kahikatea (each) is occasionally found in the South, forming small forests chiefly by itself.

CHAPTER VII. MINERAL KINGDOM

MINERAL KINGDOM.

CHAPTER VII.

MINERAL KINGDOM.

THE Rev. Richard Taylor, in his able treatise on the "Geology of New Zealand," states, that from the peculiar formation of the country, coal, copper gold and the precious metals, will probably be found in abundance; whilst his late Excellency Captain Fitzroy, second governor of New Zealand, in one of his despatches to the then colonial minister, Lord Stanley, says: –

"Beneath the productive surface of these teeming islands are mineral stores as yet hardly known. If from merely scratching some projecting corners of the land, some twenty valuable minerals have been discovered, (coal, iron, silver, lead, copper, tin, nickel, manganese, alum, sulphur, cerium, bismuth, cobalt, and asphaltum,) what may not be anticipated after a few years of research in the interior?"

It is certainly true that various ores and mineral substances have already been discovered in New Zealand; and quite probable that others will be discovered as the country becomes more opened up by settlement. The slight search hitherto made has been confined to three or four spots; and most

MINERAL WEALTH.

assuredly in regard to what her Mineral Kingdom may give forth, New Zealand, even yet, is little more than the "terra incognita" of Tasman and Cook.

Accidental discovery, rather than settled search, seems ever to have revealed the world's precious ores and metals; and they have sometimes lain, almost under our very eyes, undetected for years. It has been so in America, in Africa, in Australia. After twenty years' unsuspecting occupation of the country, the upsetting of a dray revealed the copper lodes, and created Adelaide's "Burraburra," Hundreds of shepherds roamed the plains of Victoria for a quarter of a century little dreaming that they walked on gold. And though no country has less need of mineral wealth than New Zealand, a few years may prove her as rich below the surface, as she is above and on it.

With the exception of coal and copper, however, none of the discovered New Zealand minerals have been worked. Nor can I regard this as matter for regret. It seems to me that with millions of arable acres equal to the production of forty bushels of wheat per acre, and with millions of pastoral acres equal to the support of millions of fine wool sheep – all lying waste and wild – New Zealand's true pursuits, in these her early days, are the "Plough" and the "Golden-fleece." And that when the waste has become the farm, when hill and valley are dotted with merino and short horn, it will be time enough to take the "pick," and leave the certain surface to ad-

STEAM COAL.

venture with colonial "Dousterswivels" into the dark and dangerous traps of mines and mining.

Coal, the most valuable mineral which New Zealand could possess (not for house-fuel, for with the exception of one or two treeless plains there is firewood enough in New Zealand to supply fuel for twenty generations; but for Steam-purposes), has been found in the North Island, at Parengarenga near the North Cape, on the banks of the Waikato, and at Mokau; and on the South Island, at Massacre Bay (Nelson), at Canterbury, and lately at Otago. The small quantity which has yet been needed for the forge and for the two or three coasting steamers has been procured from Nelson.

The following despatches relate to the quality of the Massacre Bay (Nelson) coal.

"Government House, Auckland,
March 29th, 1847.
MY LORD,"
"I have the honour to enclose a copy of a report from Captain Hoseason, R.N., of Her Majesty's steam sloop 'Inflexible,' upon the nature and quality of New Zealand coal, and upon its fitness for the use of steam-vessels. I am happy to state that this report is of a very favourable nature; and there can, I think, be no doubt that these islands (coal being abundant in many parts of them) will afford great facilities for the employment of steam-vessels in this part of the world, and that the expense of the war steamer stationed here will shortly be materially lessened, from the comparatively low prices at which coals now ought to be supplied.
"I have, &c,
(Signed) "G. GREY,"
The Rt. Hon. Earl Grey, &c."

NAVAL REPORT ON COAL.

"H.M.S. 'Castor,' Auckland, New Zealand,
"March 27th, 1847.
"SIR,
"In accordance with the wish conveyed in your Excellency's letter of the 24th instant, I directed Commander Hoseason to report on the nature and quality of the New Zealand coal put on board Her Majesty's steam-sloop 'Inflexible' for trial, on that vessel's recent visit to Nelson; and I have now the honour to enclose a copy of that officer's letter to me on the subject.
" I have, &c,
(Signed) "C. GRAHAM,"
Captain and Senior Naval Officer at New Zealand,
"His Excellency Governor Grey."

– – – –

"H.M.'s Steam Sloop ' Inflexible at
"Auckland, March 27th, 1847.
"SIR,
"In compliance with the request contained in your letter of the 24th instant, that I should report on the nature and quality of the coal put on board Her Majesty's steam sloop under my command (at the colonial expense, by his Excellency Governor Grey) at Port Nelson, with a view to try its fitness for the use of steam-vessels, I have the honour to inform you that I have taken the opinion of Mr. Tucker, the first engineer, on the subject, and have received a most favourable report on the same.

"I am enabled, moreover, to prove this by the duty done by the coal; for we find by a comparison with the best Newcastle (Australia) coal, obtained at Sydney, the following to be the result: – Newcastle (Australia) coal, 14 1/2 revolutions on third step of expansion, 24 cwt. per hour. Nelson coal, 15 1/2 revolutions on third step of expansion, 25 cwt. per hour.

"Thus it will be seen that from about equal quantities of fuel, equal work has been obtained. But there is one

NELSON COAL.

peculiarity in the Nelson coal, which is, being much slower in combustion than the Newcastle coal. It would not, therefore, furnish steam for the cylinders with equal rapidity so as to enable the vessel to go at her greatest speed in smooth water; but it is far more economical when all weathers are considered. This would make it highly advantageous when mixed with Newcastle (Australia) coal: as the bad qualities of both would be counteracted.

"In justice, however, to the Nelson coal, I ought to observe that it is mere surface coal: not coal obtained from a pit like the coal of Newcastle, and has been for more than six months lying on the open beach; where it was placed for the use of the 'Driver' had she touched at Nelson.

"As only 33 tons were received for trial (that being all on the spot), I am not able to make so full a report as I could wish. Should you therefore be pleased to order a larger quantity to be placed at the depot at Wellington (I would advise not less than 100 tons) obtained, if possible, from a little below the surface, and subject to rejection, if, on inspection, it be deemed not equal to that already received on board, I do not doubt but that I shall, then, be able to make a full and satisfactory report.
"I have, &c,
(Signed) " J. G. HOSEASON, Commander.
"Captain Graham, C.B.
H. M. S. Castor."

GOLD. – When Victoria's diggings blazed on the world, the "auri sacra fames" fever infected even New Zealand: rewards were offered for the discovery of the root of evil; and divers sanguine citizens shut up shop, took prospecting-pan and pick, and wandered a mile or two in search of gold. Diggings, to use an expression, were soon announced at Coromandel, near Auckland.

GOLD-TOADS.

Governor Wynyard crossed the bay in the State boat, and entered into a gold-digging treaty with the native owners of the soil: picks and spades rose a hundred per cent., and full twenty of Auckland's cits blistered their hands for a week in search of nuggets. A few specks were obtained; but each speck cost double its value in the labour necessary to obtain it. Indeed the most remarkable fruit of the Coromandel diggings was a "toad" – an animal which we believed did not exist in New Zealand; and which the natives derisively stirred-up as the ugly "God of the Gold." 61

Some while after the great "toad-yield," a second discovery was announced at Coromandel; and pale ale and pipes were again forwarded to the spot by speculative publicans, who knew that grief was dry. Again, the mountain produced the mouse: again, twenty ragged diggers crept back to Auckland, thinner but wiser men. The latest gold discovery in New Zealand has been announced, by Nelson, at Motueka; and Motueka (so far) has proved another Coromandel.

New Zealand may be as rich in gold as Victoria; but present discoveries prove her no richer than Great Britain – specks and particles of gold are found in both countries, but they are too few

NEW ZEALAND DIGGINGS.

and far between to pay for the skill, art, and labour, necessary to extract and obtain them.

"And Lucifer laugh'd and shook his head:
A happy thought now strikes my brain!
I must give to men more sorrow and pain;
More vice, more slaughter, more strife, more blood;
So I 'll give them gold till it runs a flood."

Now, this poetic denunciation of gold must be taken cum grano salis: from Virgil downwards, poets have borne hard on gold – perhaps, because they get so little of it.

Nevertheless, as to New Zealand Diggings, if the possession of Bendigo and Ballarat were to necessitate the possession of such a population as that of Bendigo and Ballarat, I, for one, should regard New Zealand Diggings as a public nuisance, and a national misfortune. Manchester cotton-spinners, and London money-brokers might think differently; but these gentlemen don't live in the countries they trade with. And speaking as a New Zealand colonist, I must say that though Ballarat and Bendigo create noble markets for New Zealand produce, and benefit and enrich New Zealand in many ways, I sincerely trust that Ballarat and Bendigo will remain exactly where they are, and never approach New Zealand nearer by a mile.

COPPER. – Copper has been found on the extreme north-east coast near Monganui, and in the Great Barrier Island; and has been worked for some years (on a small scale), at the island of Kawau, near

NELSON COPPER – IRON.

Auckland. Owing partly to the ore being impregnated with sulphur, and partly to the high price of labour, the Kawau (so far) has not proved a very successful speculation; and the most promising copper works in New Zealand appear to be those in course of formation at the Dun Mountain, near Nelson.

A company has been formed to work a mine there; and particulars as to shares, &c, may be learned by applying to Stephen Curtis, Esq., 20, Finsbury Street, London. A slip from a late Nelson paper gives the following information: –

"A very fine specimen of native copper, weighing upwards of sixteen ounces, has been brought down from the Dun Mountain Mine by one of the miners. This beautiful piece of metal has all the appearance of pure copper, and was cut by a chisel into four parts as easily as if it had been smelted metal. Although small specimens of pure metal are occasionally found in copper mines, we believe a lump of the magnitude of the one we refer to, is very unusual, if not altogether unprecedented. We learn that six or eight tons of ore, brought down from the mine with great labour, are ready for shipment by the 'Spray,' via Sydney, for England; and that the quality of this sample is such as cannot fail to encourage the parties at home to proceed with the formation of a company to work the mine on a proper scale. From the progress now making with the road up the Maitai line, pack beasts will shortly be able to travel the whole distance between the mine and the town of Nelson."

IRON. – Iron is common in various localities in the form of pyrites, or sulphuret of iron, and magnetic

IRON – LEAD – SULPHUR.

iron sand. Some of the rocks are powerfully magnetic. Dr. Shortland, speaking of a point near the Bluff in Foveaux Strait, says: –

"I seated myself on a rock to take some angles with the pocket compass, but was obliged to desist, owing to my seat being so powerfully magnetic. This treacherous influence is observable in so many parts of New Zealand that the compass, instead of being a trustworthy travelling guide, is often likely to lead one astray."

At New Plymouth, "iron-sand" is the common sand of the beach; and covers the shore for miles. It consists of the peroxyde and protoxyde of iron mixed, and yields about fifty per cent, of iron of the finest quality. An imperial pint of this sand, washed and dried, weighs four pounds. A sixpenny magnet dropped on the beach, is taken up covered and almost hidden with metallic crystals. Messrs. Willis and Co., Crosby Square, London, with that judicious enterprise they display in promoting the young interests of New Zealand, have had some tons of this iron-sand sent home for Messrs. Stenson and Co. of the Northampton Iron Works; and it seems possible that it may eventually become an article of some export value.

"DEAR SIR,
"I have, during this week, carefully noted the assay, and find the lowest yield of steel-iron 38 1/2 per cent, and the highest 59. I have forwarded to Mr. Carrington a piece, one side of which is polished, and exhibits a

MINERAL EARTHS AND STONE.

silvery brilliancy, equal to the finest steel: though only just smelted in the crucible, this piece was of a yield equal to precisely 50 per cent.
"Yours truly,

"J. STENSON,
"Iron Works, Northampton.
"C. Hursthouse, Esq."

Lead and Manganese have been met with near Auckland. The purest Sulphur is abundant; Alum and Nitre have been discovered at Wanganui and near the medicinal springs of the Roturua lakes; Rock-salt near Mercury Bay; and it is not unlikely that that valuable article of commerce Boracic acid may be found about some of the inland Solfatara or mineral pools of Taupo. Various useful earths, fire-clay, pipe-clay, ochre, &c, are common; slate, marble, granite, sandstone, and freestone are found in various parts; and Limestone, though not so generally spread as would be desirable for agricultural and building purposes, exists in many localities in great quantity and of singular purify and strength.

61 I believe two toads wero discovered. The oldest natives knew of no such animal, and I am inclined to think that these were "alien toads:" probably introduced in the discharge of some vessel's ballast.

CHAPTER VIII. NATIVES

ORIGIN OF NATIVES.

CHAPTER VIII.

NATIVES.

ORIGIN. – Strong personal resemblance, certain affinities of language and customs, and positive traditional history, may satisfy us that the ancestors of the "Maori" 62 originally emigrated to New Zealand from Hawaii, one of the Sandwich Islands, a group of the North Pacific, distant about 4,000 miles; and it seems probable that this emigration took place some 500 years ago.

It is conjectured that over-population led to a considerable early migration from Hawaii; and that under various leaders, numerous canoe parties, from time to time, put off from the parent swarm. Some of the emigrant-adventurers settled in the nearer islands of the Southern Polynesia; others, bolder navigators with better-provisioned canoes, pursued their way from island to island, through the summer seas of the Pacific, in search of a larger kingdom, until at last, by accident or design, they reached New Zealand.

Some native indigenous race probably existed in

ADMIXTURE OF RACE.

New Zealand when the Hawiian emigrants arrived. But if so, these ancient New Zealanders were either eaten by the new coiners, were amalgamated with them, or were, in some way, blotted out as a distinct race, quite as effectually as the ancient Britons were blotted out by their Roman and Saxon conquerors.

The present New Zealanders are a mixed race. Either their emigrant ancestors did not arrive a pure race from Hawaii; or, after arrival, they amalgamated with some indigenous race; or they afterwards intermixed with later emigrant-adventurers, arriving from Tahiti, Waiho, or other overpeopled islands of the South Pacific. The majority, allowing for differences of food and climate acting on twenty generations, resemble the good-looking Sandwich Islanders, the parent stock; but some, much darker, have woolly hair; others have a look of the Tartar with a dash of negro blood; and a few are startlingly like Jews.

EARLY CUSTOMS. – Cannibalism was common among the New Zealanders up to thirty years ago; but the custom is now quite extinct, and any allusions to it are received by the natives of 1857, much as we should receive allusions to any family faux pas, bankruptcy, or break down, which might once have sullied our escutcheon. Tattooing, Tapu, 63 Slavery and Polygamy were all common

MYTHOLOGY – PRIESTHOOD.

customs among the New Zealanders of the last generation, and are not yet extinct. They possessed a mythology rudely resembling the classic heathen. Gods and goddesses, benign and malignant deities, ruled over elemental kingdoms; whilst gods and demi-gods, Jove-like, seduced the fairest daughters of men and peopled the elements with Heroes. They offered no human sacrifices; but possessed a savage priesthood who propitiated the Deities with rites and ceremonies; and who were the prophet oracles of the people, both in war and peace. They seem to have had no very distinct ideas as to existence in a future state, but to have believed that the spirits of the departed went to a sort of Hades, where the most wicked were finally annihilated. Firm believers in sorcery witchcraft and incantations, they held that not only wicked deities and priests, but that every person could bewitch; and that sickness was the effect of witchcraft. Infanticide of female children was common, but age was respected, and adultery was death; though then, as now, girlhood chastity was little valued, and virgin brides were rare.

Split into numerous tribes and sub-tribes, ruled with patriarchal despotism by hereditary chiefs, they seem ever to have lived with each other in a state of "chronic hostility" – periodically bursting out into the acute form of internecine massacre. Tribe-feuds and bloody wars did not, however, arise among the New Zealanders as they arose among the

PUGNACIOUS FEROCITY.

Australian aborigines and the American red men. The Maori had no wild larder of possum and kangaroo to defend against hungry marauders; no Sioux or Black Feet rovers poached his hunting-grounds, trapped his beaver, or harried his deer and buffalo. The Maori was a stationary, man-eating, fisher-farmer – not a hunter living by the chase, and forced to fight to obtain or to preserve his daily food. The Maori fought because blood for blood was the one law which he ever obeyed; because revenge was the precious heir-loom bequeathed by ferocious father to ferocious son; because victorious war gave him wives and slaves; and because, like the Irishman, he loved fighting for fighting's sake. In the year 1600, some Waikato native might slay a Ngapuhi; Ngapuhi would know no rest till a dozen Waikato were cut off in return; a counter retaliation would ensue; some of the victims would be distantly related to other tribes; these would take the war path; idle tribes would rush in to join the fray as amateurs; the bloody circle would go on widening and widening; until at last, in three generations, the one murder would be forgotten in the thousand, and none of the belligerents would know, or care to know, the original cause of quarrel.

Thus the Temple of Janus was scarcely ever closed in New Zealand. Two neighbour tribes might patch up a month's truce and club tomahawks for the slaughter of a third – but the

DECREASED NUMBERS.

pastime over, slaves divided, convivial ferocity duly displayed in the cannibal feast and the war dance, they would straight revive their feud; or "step on the trailed coat" to begin a new one; and would fight with such exterminating fury as, sadly enough, to remind one of nothing so much as of the old story of the "Kilkenny cats."

NUMBERS AND DECREASE. – It is somewhat remarkable that neither the Missionary body nor the New Zealand Government, which for many years was little other than a professed "Aborigines Protection Society," ever attempted to take any native census. There is, however, good reason for believing that the present Maori population of New Zealand does not exceed 70,000.

It is strange that a missionary author so well informed as the Rev. Mr. Taylor, should appear blind to the fact that the New Zealanders were once a far more numerous people. It may be that their former numbers were over-rated, and from the cause which Mr. Taylor assigns. But after making ample allowance for this; there would still remain anew deserted gardens, villages, strongholds, and fortifications, to prove the former existence of a much larger population. Such exterminating internecine wars as the New Zealanders long waged with each other, coupled with their short-sighted policy of destroying female infants as incumbrances in war, must, in a few generations, have thinned the ranks of even a populous nation. Old whalers point to

CAUSES OF DECREASE.

bays and creeks once alive with native settlements where, now, no canoe is to be seen; and patriarchal Maories show the localities of Tribes whose very names are becoming extinct. Indeed, nothing is more freely admitted among the natives themselves than this fact of decrease of numbers; and without troubling ourselves with speculations as to what (and when) was the "maximum" of the Maori population; or as to what (and when) was its greatest ratio of decrease, we may safely conclude that if it be 70,000 now, it was full thrice this number sixty years ago.

CAUSES OF DECREASE. – Such decrease has been attributed to the following causes: – -1st, to some ethnological law of nature that the black savage shall disappear before the white settler; 2nd, to a change of dress and diet; 3rd, to European-introduced diseases and intemperance; 4th, to a blighting sense of inferiority and degradation in the presence of the white man.

Now it is not a law of nature that the black man shall die out where the white man comes. The two live and flourish together in Asia Africa and India. Where the white settler comes, rum in one hand, rifle in the other, to seize the hunting-grounds of a chase-subsisting people, as in America and Van Diemen's Land, there he will drive back, reduce, or even extirpate either red or black man. But this fact no more proves the existence of any ethnological law of nature that Whites must con-

DEPOPULATION FALLACIES.

sume Blacks, than the fact of one man's getting drunk on gin, proves the existence of any teetotal law of nature that no man shall taste port.

No life-supporting hunting grounds have been wrested from the Maori. He cultivated "garden-spots" out of millions of fertile acres when the white man came; he did so ever after, and he does so now.

The change of diet and dress has been an improvement: physiologists hold that variety of food is best for man. Formerly, the Maori had but fish and potatoes; now, in addition, he has bread and meat. And considering the sudden artificial changes of temperature to which he exposes himself, the new blanket is a more life-preserving garment than the old mat. Scrofulous diathesis may be somewhat prevalent among the natives; but no proof exists that this is either a new or an introduced disease. They have never been swept off by small-pox or by fever epidemics; whilst as to intemperance, they are so sober a people that in five years I saw but six in a state of intoxication. The fourth assigned cause savours of the joke. The Maori ungrudgingly admits our superiority in the soft arts; he regards us as the expertest of traders and tailors; but still holds, despite Heke's rout and Te Rauperaha's capture, that in the noble art of war, or in any work of manhood, the Maori is quite equal to the Englishman. 64

TRUE CAUSE OF DECREASE.

The true cause of decrease is – the small proportion of women and the sterility of such small proportion. And a minor cause may be, neglect of sick children, occasionally amounting to unwitting infanticide, and some slight prevalence of scrofulous diathesis.

Certain local statistics, corroborated by the reports of colonists familiar with the native life, may convince us that to every 100 adult males there are not more than 75 adult females and 4-5 children. 65 Statists familiar with the laws of population will instantly see that such a monstrous disproportion is, alone, sufficient to account for a rapidly-decreased and decreasing population. This "fewness-of-women-state" has gradually been brought about by the infanticide of female children in war; by the lesser care which seems to have been bestowed on the rearing of female children in peace; and by certain life-shortening sexual and hard-labor evils to which female children are exposed when arrived at girlhood and womanhood. The still more remarkable "fewness-of-children-state" may be attributable, to some slight extent, to the cir-

LOCALITIES OF RESIDENCE.

cumstance of a few of the women being monopolized by native polygamists and by white men; but it arises mainly from a fact to which missionaries are, or affect to be, somewhat blind – namely, the common want of chastity among the girls, and the promiscuous intercourse of the sexes before marriage, resulting in barrenness and wide-spread infertility. 66

LOCALITIES. – The 70,000 semi-civilized natives now in New Zealand are divided into some dozen chief tribes, and into numerous sub-tribes and "Harpu;" and are almost entirely located in the North Island – 1st, in a chain of Cook's Strait and west-coast villages, extending 400 miles from Wellington to Waikato; 2nd, in a chain of east-coast villages extending 300 miles from Ahuriri to the Bay of Plenty; 3rd, in inland villages planted round the hot springs of Taupo and Rotorua, and along the banks of the Wanganui and Waikato; and 4th, in various villages scattered through the long peninsula north of Auckland and about the Bay of Islands.

GOVERNMENT – BRITISH LAW. – They are still ruled, or rather led, by hereditary or self-created chiefs; for under injudicious missionary guidance, and in the presence of a greater power, the old

GOVERNMENT – BRITISH LAW.

sway and rule of their great hereditary Chiefs has been considerably weakened and impaired. They are supposed to be under British law; but this, to some extent, is a mere Colonial-Office and Exeter-Hall fiction. The town-resident natives are made amenable to British tribunals; but in the "Bush" many Maori laws and customs still prevail. If a dozen natives were shot in some native quarrel, Government would scarcely think of interfering; or would do no more than think. If a settler were robbed or maltreated by a bush-native, his chief would sometimes deliver him up to a native policeman, and sometimes not; in which latter case he might himself either inflict some pecuniary punishment on the culprit, or pass him over with only a reprimand. However, though there are some turbulent exceptions, the present Maories, as a people, are orderly and well-behaved; they are every year becoming more so; and, glancing at Burglar and Garotte, life and property are probably safer in New Zealand than in England. 67

CHRISTIANITY.

CONVERSION. – Quite three-fourths of the New Zealanders are now missionary converts: perhaps in the proportion of one Roman Catholic to four Wesleyans and eight Churchmen. Many undergo the ceremony of baptism and re-naming, regularly attend church or chapel, pay a somewhat Scotch or Pharisaical observance to the Sabbath, and discuss polemics and the merits of their rival churches with considerable gusto and astuteness. How much, or how little, of this conversion may be Christianity; how much, or how little, of it may arise from the circumstance of the new reli-

MISSIONARY CONVERSION.

gion being the fashion, and a passport to the rich missionary countries of blankets and tobacco, is impossible to say – nor should we care too closely to inquire. Whites as well as Blacks may pray because it pays to pray; and if, by calling himself Peter and going to chapel in a beaver hat, the Maori is likely (as is the case) to become a better customer and a better man, surely his doing so is a gain to the community and no loss to himself. A gentleman from whom, in a following chapter, I shall be sorry to differ; but with whom, here, I am sorry, in part, to agree, expresses the following opinion on this subject of conversion: –

"What has been the effect of the religious teaching of the missionaries on the native character? I am afraid that it is little more than skin-deep. No doubt there are instances in which individuals have been brought actually under the influence of religious principle; but I speak of the bulk of the natives who profess Christianity. With most of them it is a mere name, entirely inoperative in practice. They will exhibit an attention to forms which would, and often does, mislead a stranger; but the next hour they will exhibit all the habits of the unconverted savage. Thus, when travelling, about four years ago, in the Wiararapa, I came upon a native encampment one Sunday evening. It rained, and we required some assistance towards building a hut, and wished to purchase some potatoes. Not a finger would the natives move because it was the sacred day. The next morning the same individuals attempted most deliberately to cheat us; and one of them, who had undertaken to guide us, for hire, to a river about ten miles off, attempted to trick us by declaring one we came to, at half the distance, to be the one we sought; and he endeavoured to force us to pay and dismiss him, by

MISSIONARY MERITS.

seizing a gun which one of us had carelessly laid down. 68 They will also exhibit smatterings of Scripture, which would lead one to believe them better informed than they are; though their applications of it are often sufficiently ludicrous. One of them, whom the governor was upbraiding with having sold his land three or four times over to different parties, justified himself by quoting the passage, 'After thou hadst sold it, was it not thine own?' Another, a very intelligent native too, to whom I was pointing out the impropriety of his having three wives, replied, 'Oh, never mind; all the same as Solomon.' A much more serious misapplication of the Scriptures occurred during the late war, when many of them tore up their Bibles to make wadding for their guns." – Fox's Six Colonies of New Zealand.

I am not a colonist, though, who regards the missionary body as an obstructive incumbrance idly living on the fat of the land. On the contrary, I would endow every married missionary with a 500-acre freehold; and vote a grant of public money to every denomination of English Christians who would found a missionary establishment. But saying this, I would also say that though the missionaries have done much good in New Zealand, they have not done all the good which their indiscreet partizans insist on our believing. Little more than quarter of a century ago, the New Zealanders were ferocious cannibals,

MAORI LANGUAGE.

gorging at bloody feasts on slaves and war victims, and the terror of every shipwrecked mariner cast on their fatal shores – now, they are professing Christians, pursuing the arts of peace hand in band with the white man, and owners of corn fields flocks and herds. Unquestionably, this mighty stride in civilisation is partly attributable to the missionaries. But there are two sorts of missionaries – religious and civil – and the latter, the Emigrant, bringing the plough, the ship, the mill, the shop, food, clothes, the industrial arts, and the practical example, has probably done as much in converting and civilizing the New Zealand heathen as the former, armed even with the Bible. Further, it seems to me that in the work of converting the heathen, Christianity and Civilization should go together: the plough with the prayer-book, the carpenter's shop with the chapel; and I cannot but think, that if the missionaries had proselytized more in the spirit of this doctrine, and had sought rather to show the native how to live than to teach him how to die, they would now have numbered more sincere converts to Christianity, and been supported by more rich and powerful aboriginal sons of the church.

LANGUAGE. – The New Zealanders possessed no written language; but the missionaries gave them one, and reduced the language to grammatical rules. The alphabet is formed by eight of our consonants and our five vowels; the latter, with the exception of the U (oo), pronounced like the French. Simple in

MAORI PROVERBS.

construction and pleasing in sound, the language is not difficult to acquire; and all Settlers' intercourse with the natives is carried on in the Maori tongue. Natives often slily understand a little English when they will not essay to speak it. Our harsh pronunciation stops them at the threshold: their nearest approach to sheep being, hepee; to pussy, potee; to Governor, Karwarnar; to Bishop, Peehope. A Maori grammar, dictionary, and vocabulary, by Archdeacon Williams, price 7s. 6d. (studied with advantage on the voyage out), may be procured at Stanford's, 6, Charing Cross.

PROVERB SPECIMENS OF THE LANGUAGE. 69

He pai tangata ekore e reia; he kino wahine ka reia.

Who looks at a handsome man? but let a woman be ever so ugly, men will still run off with her.
(This proverb certainly proves the scarcity of the ladies.)

Tenei ano a mutu, kei roto i tona ware pungawerewere.

The spider is not seen when hid in his web – and a man's real meaning lies hid in the recess of his heart.

Kotahi te koura a wetaweta, tutakina te hiku.

Don't halve the cray-fish – give it whole.
(Don't make two bites at a cherry.)

He kuku ki te kainga, he kaka ki te haere.

A muscle at home, a parrot abroad.
(A man of no consequence at home sometimes makes himself of great consequence abroad.)

MAORI BEAUTY.

He iti, he iti kahikatoa.

Though little, he is still a kahikatoa.
(You must not despise a little man; for, though little, he is still a kahikatoa – a small tree remarkable for its strength.)

Ka kotia te taitapu ki Hawaiki.

The road to Hawaii is cut off. (An expression used by a desperate character who braves the laws. He has passed the Rubicon.)

PHYSICAL APPEARANCE. – The men (straight, well-limbed, muscular fellows, five feet ten high, weighing eleven to twelve stone) are not unlike burly, well-bronzed, Gypsies. Tattooing is no longer the fashion; and many a youth might stand for a dark, but dirty, Apollo. In sustained strength and powers of endurance they are scarcely equal to the robust race of white settlers; but, in sporting phraseology, they have plenty of pluck and bottom, and are ugly customers either to row, race, wrestle, or fight.

The ladies, somewhat "petite," are by no means so good-looking as the men. Highly precocious, often leading a sexually dissolute life from childhood, marrying early, and then performing a large share of field labour, they soon become bent and broken, are old at forty, and repulsively-weird and witch-like at sixty. A few of the high-born (Rangatira) girls, however, are richly beautiful – displaying the lithe elastic figure, soft brilliant eye, Grecian face and rosy brown complexion, set off

THE NEW ZEALANDER'S VILLAGE.

by glossy black hair falling to the knees, and a free Diana step, that would create a crowd in Regent Street, and drive Parisian beauties to despair – or paint.

MODE OF LIFE. – DOMESTIC HABITS. – DRESS, &c. – A tribe generally lives together in little communities of from 50 to 200 individuals in various villages (pas) scattered over their district. These villages planted on some hill or precipice near the coast, or perched on some river's cliff, cover half an acre to two or three acres of ground. A common Pa consists of two or three rows (two or three feet apart) of stout split paling ten to twelve feet high, lashed with flax and creepers to posts and cross rails: entered by two or three narrow posterns, and divided by similar paling into numerous little labyrinth-like passages, courts, and squares.

Here we find built the houses – little rush-and-pole verandah-huts, devoid of window door or chimney, and displaying the firebrands smoking on the floor. Here too are stacks of fuel, the Warepuni, some chief's or rich man's better house, and perchance a bell-decked wooden chapel. Here too is the larder – kits of kumera and potatoes, maize and wheat, dried-eels, roots and berries, stowed aloft on shelves or poles away from rat and dog. Here too will congregate the hundred pests of the village: yelping curs and shrillest cocks, monstrous cats, fleas by bushels, a goat or two, pet calves and foals, intrusive pigs, the mocking tui caged but clamorous,

HIS BILL OF FARE.

and the gloomy kaka, tied to his pole and bewailing his fate in indignant screams like Hiawatha's felon raven.

In eating, the New Zealanders follow the Continental, rather than the English fashion – having two meals a day, "le dejeuner aux doigts" about ten; and the "undress" dinner at sunset. Their simple steam-cooking would make Soyer or the toughest Artiste edible and tender: smooth round stones are heated, rolled in a shallow pit and covered with green leaves; a little water is then poured in, and the food (potatoes, fish, birds, or pig – no man now) – is placed on the stones, packed up with leaves and flax baskets, and then covered in with a layer of clean earth. In an hour or so, the earth is carefully removed, the oven unpacked and the food taken out, put into little fresh-plaited flax baskets, and set before the people; who squat down in little groups in the verandahs, and straight fall to with tooth and finger.

Though our Maori friends seldom go near soap and water, and look on washing as waste of time, they are clean in their eating, if not nice as to what they eat; and though they have no knife napkin or finger-glass, they provide a new plate for every meal.

The potato is still their staple vegetable; and wild ducks, pigeons, parrots, wekas, tuis, and titis; eels, lampreys, sea-fish, crawfish, and shell fish, still form the greater portion of their animal food. But they

DRESS AND DEPORTMENT.

grow the kumera, taro, hue (a gourd which forms their crockery ware), carrot, turnip, cabbage, pumpkin, and water melon; the Plain supplies them with fern root and the Forest furnishes the pitau, nikau, karaka, and kiekie. Bread and pork, too, are becoming more regular articles of diet; and tea, sugar, and various shop articles, are frequently purchased during their trading visits to the Settlements. In fact, the Maori now lives more generously than some of our Scotch or Irish peasantry; and has not only enough for himself, but can afford to feast and entertain his friends. They have not yet acquired a general taste for spirits, and the law forbids their buying it; but they like beer, and would, I think, seldom refuse to get tipsy on sweet wines, such as sack, champagne, or metheglin. Men women and children, however, are inveterate smokers of short pipes and negrohead; and just as you present an English Belle with Jouvin's gloves, you present a Maori miss with pipe and pound of tobacco.

DRESS. – The usual and the sole apparel of the men, the year through, night and day, is our common white or red blanket fastened at the neck, and worn like the Roman toga. Shirts and trousers, however, are now frequently worn; and near the towns, on high days and holidays, some Exquisite will array himself in dress coat or surtout, and ogle the girls in tall hat, stiff collar, and tight boots. The ladies (simplex munditiis) are chiefly arrayed in

"DINING OUT."

pink and blue cotton "roundabouts" (a bed-gown sort of garment, cut short) with a blanket for a mantle; but they often have silks and satins in the "kist" at home; and gay damsels, at feast and races, will take the saddle with gauntlets and silver whip, habit, hat, and plume. The Maori likes to partake of the amusements of the settlers; is a bold rider at races; and enjoys himself at regattas, anniversary-fetes and merry-makings, with something of that cheerful vivacity and good-humour which delight us in the French. A Chief, asked to dine with the Governor, will acquit himself with a grave elegance worthy of Belgravia; and on his return, relate to his listening village the minutest features of the feast: what he had to eat and drink, what the Governor said to him, and what he said to the Governor, how the lady who sat next him was not so pretty as the Governor's wife, but wore more rings; and how another fair creature pestered him with silly questions, and even asked him to dance.

LABOUR. – They will occasionally take a contract from the settlers for clearing timber land, or for harvest work or road work; and, round the towns will sometimes work at fencing, firewood-splitting, or other little jobs, by the day. Now and then, too, a girl or lad may serve in some missionary's or old settler's house, as a sort of "American help;" but they do not perform much labour for the Europeans, and are chiefly, perhaps better,

NATIVE WIVES.

employed, in working for themselves in their own fields.

AMALGAMATION. – The early New Zealand whalers, sealers, and squatters, generally took Maori mistresses; and the progeny of this intercourse, is a handsome race of half-castes, perhaps numbering 500. Some connections of this nature still exist, and a few marriages have taken place even between educated European settlers and native girls. Personally, I should have no objection to espousing a Maori belle with a handsome dowry of wild pigs, stream, and forest; but tastes differ, and for the benefit of any bachelor reader who might think of trying for some ex-cannibal chiefs daughter, I am bound to say that although he might do worse, it is just possible that he might do better. The lady herself might be "black perfection," and with shoes and stockings on, (and the pipe hidden,) might bring him credit or notoriety anywhere. But unfortunately, in marrying the lady, you marry her Tribe. Little free-and-easy parties of fifty or a hundred of your kinsmen keep dropping in on you, for a week or two, in a friendly way, during your lifetime, with such regularity, that you may be said to pass a large portion of your existence in an exasperating state of chronic hospitality; and may chance to find that your Princess has endowed you with a little army of black satellites and blood retainers who much prefer carousing in your halls to labouring in your fields; and who, though eager

AMALGAMATION.

enough to fight your enemies, might now and then display no great reluctance to fighting you or your friends.

I think that only three or four marriages have taken place between white women and Maori men; and looking at the very small proportion of Maori women, their habits, their inferiority in civilization, low domestic qualities, fee, I conceive it to be highly improbable, if not impossible, that there should be any general intermixture of races; and hold that if amalgamation is ever to do anything to save or change the Maori, it will do nothing till the Maori has very considerably changed himself. 70

PROPERTY AND POSSESSIONS.

PROPERTY AND INHERITANCE. – As explained in Chapter II. all the wild lands in New Zealand, or to speak more closely, all the unbought wild lands of the North Island, some thirty millions of acres, with the timber and all which is on and under it, belong to the natives. But in addition to this fine estate, and to their villages, gardens, pigs, guns and personal chattels, they have created and acquired (mainly with monies received for wild land, for market-produce, and for labour) a considerable

COMMERCIAL ASTUTENESS.

property in European wealth. In the absence of statistics, any estimate as to the amount of this property would be a mere conjecture; but we know that it comprises hundreds of acres of wheat and potatoes, hundreds of horses and cattle, some fifty coasting vessels (chiefly sailed by themselves) a few little flour mills, and a few thrashing machines (worked mainly by themselves) carts and ploughs, and a considerable sum, (say £100,000), in silver and gold.

They are exceedingly fond of money, knowing its value to a penny; but they are keen traders rather than hoarding misers; and are shrewd natural lawyers, bringing to business a cleverness and dexterity of practice that might extort the admiration of Westminster-Hall. A few of them run bills at the shop, and keep an account at the bank; and some of the northern chiefs are, I think, to be found among the shareholders of the Auckland and Sydney Steam Company.

They are, however, rich as tribes rather than as individuals: most of their natural and much of their acquired property being owned, or at least enjoyed, by a group of families in common, rather than by any one exclusive member in particular. Thus, there is neither great individual wealth nor poverty among them. Even the chiefs are richer than common men more in power than in wealth, and seem to be the recipients and dividers of land-sales monies and other property, rather than the keepers or consumers of it. When a man dies he

INTERCOURSE AND TRADE.

may, perhaps, make a verbal will bequeathing his property to his male relations, but never to his daughters; it being gallantly held that a lady is sufficiently valuable in herself to need no bait of fortune to enable her to hook a husband: a practice and a theory which, I regret to say, have not been favourably received by certain enterprising colonists who have looked on chiefs' daughters and sighed for amalgamation.

INTERCOURSE AND MODE OF TRADE. – Several natives live in or round the northern towns, and form a portion of the regular urban and suburban population. These, hawk about their fruits and garden produce, firewood and pigs; employ themselves as carters, boatmen, coast-sailors, policemen, postmen, inland-guides, and messengers; or, if lazy and unambitious, smoke about from house to house and make a round of morning calls. Further intercourse takes place through white men (those settled among the natives) visiting the towns with their Maori friends and relatives; and through town dwellers and settlers, stopping at the native villages when on their pleasure trips or business journeys through the interior. But trade does most to unite the races and to cement the union. Once a month, or oftener, some tribe or Harpu 71 will decide to visit one of the Settlements on a trading expedition. Contributing and collecting their produce, they cram one or two canoes with kits

SELLING AND SHOPPING.

of wheat, maize, potatoes, kauri-gum, cape-goose-berries, peaches, melons, apples, bundles of flax, fodder and firewood, perchance a tui or two, a kaka, pigeons, poultry, pigs, dogs, and cats; when a dozen men women and children creep in, and gently paddle the lively freight to market. Safe arrived, they put up a rush hut, or proceed to the Maori hostelry (public store and rough lodging-rooms erected for them) squat and smoke a few hours, and then leisurely proceed to hawk about their goods. Rather than accept sixpence less for a pig than some friend once got before, they will drive it to a dozen houses, with amusing remarks on the instability of trade and the fall of pork. The cargo sold, they commence their purchases of blankets, clothes, groceries, crockery, ironmongery, and tobacco. Slow sellers, they are even slower buyers; insisting always on having the best article at the lowest price. An old chief will minutely examine a dozen caps for an hour before he can fix on the best, and will then go to another shop to look for a better, before he buys it; whilst an urchin of five summers, will turn over every pipe in the box to make sure of getting the biggest. Shopping finished, they load their canoes and paddle slowly back; halting at every friendly village on the route, to discuss the news and impart the market prices. 72

APATHY IN POLITICS.

POLITICAL STATUS. – Many of the natives have property sufficient to entitle them to the suffrage. They are excellent public speakers; and some of the leading chiefs might, I think, be stimulated to take a useful part in public affairs. Hitherto, however, they have been utterly regardless of provincial politics, and have been known to sit and smoke unmoved under the most rousing orations of the provincial hustings. The only instance on record of their having attempted to possess themselves of any political power, is that afforded by a southern native who, at election time, travelled some distance to the abode of the respected Super-

MORAL CHARACTER.

intendent of Otago, to ask that functionary what he would give him for his vote.

MORAL CHARACTER, INTELLECT, EDUCATION. – By superficial observers who have had only slight means of judging, the New Zealanders have been both overrated and underrated. The enthusiastic "missionary-smitten" visitor has entered a picked village, and boldly proclaimed them a noble people, equal to the highest career; the "anti-aborigines" visitor has entered another village, and denounced them as greedy savages, fit only for extirpation. The good qualities of the Maori have, however, been far more overrated than underrated. Captivated by his bravery, we have forgotten his ferocity; charmed with his missionary conversion, we have excused his mercenary cunning; and dazzled with his aptitude for civilisation, have not cared to see his lingering inherent fondness for barbarism. Towards him it has not been "nothing extenuate nor aught set down in malice," – but, "be to his virtues very kind, and to his failings very blind."

In their present state of semi-civilisation (but assuming that further civilisation will educe more good than bad qualities) I should call the Maori race artful, overreaching, suspicious and designing; singularly mercenary 73 and ungrateful; and still

HOLDING A HORSE.

somewhat passionate, capricious, and revengeful. But not dishonest, 74 generally merry and good-humoured, high-spirited and (to each other) neither ungenerous nor unkind; sensitive of ridicule but fond of a joke, inquisitive, and so femininely communicative as to be incapable of keeping even a life secret.

In natural intellect they are undoubtedly quite equal to any European race. Indeed, I think (with a good teacher) a Maori child would learn to read and write more quickly than an English child; and if an average Maori boy and an average English boy of 15 were apprenticed to a carpenter, both having equally good masters, and both equally fond of their pursuit, I think the young New Zealander would turn out his sash or panel-door sooner than the young Anglo-Saxon. The missionary schools in the settlements and the branch native-conducted schools in the interior, have been very successful in teaching the rudiments of knowledge. The Bible has long been a familiar book among the natives; Robinson Crusoe and one or two other little works have been translated; a Maori periodical and a Maori newspaper circulate

READING AND WRITING.

among them; and geography, simple and even fractional arithmetic, are becoming rather popular studies.

Of 104 Maori labourers once employed by the Royal Engineer Department at Auckland, it was found that all were able to read the New Testament (in Maori), and that 102 could write: a statement which, as Mr. Swainson justly observes, could probably not be made of an equal number of common labourers in any country in Europe.

HEADS OF SUGGESTED MEASURES FOR PRESERVING AND INCREASING THE NATIVE POPULATION, AND FURTHER RAISING IT IN CIVILISATION.

If we be sincere in our desire to civilise the Maori Race, it is plain that our first care should be some earnest practical attempt to arrest its rapid decrease. To do nothing but preach and pray to a people who are fast passing away, is to exhibit as much practical philanthropy as we should display, in seeking to restore a half-drowned man by reading over him the twenty-second chapter of the Book of Job.

Some dozen years ago, Her Majesty's Colonial Office, Her Majesty's Ministers, both Houses of Parliament, Exeter Hall, the Aborigines Protection Society, and divers professional philanthropists, told the world what they had done, and what they were going to do, to save the godly Aborigines of New Zealand from the grasping Settlers, who meant to bury the entire race and their traditions under the plough and to grow better crops on their remains; and from the noise made about the "converted Maori," one might have thought that it was some rare exotic fox or pheasant, which a considerable portion of the

PRESERVATION OF THE RACE.

British nobility and priesthood were sworn to cherish and protect. The Colonial Office and the New Zealand Missionary-government were the special instruments of grace appointed to carry out this great national policy of preserving the Maori and repressing the settler – and what would the reader imagine the Colonial Office and the Missionary-government did for their Maori subjects – I don't say wrote about them, blue books show that – but did for them, in the ten years they ruled the colony, and in which period their Maori subjects contributed thousands of pounds to the public revenue? – they shot some 200 of them in two rebellions; and built for them six wooden huts.

It is perhaps not remarkable that such a government no longer exists. A colonist's government has been raised on its ruins; and a colonist's government would now do well to join the missionaries in making some earnest, practical, attempt to preserve, increase, and civilise, that remnant of the Aboriginal population which still exists.

Even if the Maori did not decrease, no reason would exist why we should not aid him to increase. New Zealand's want of wants is Population; and if she counted 200,000 industrious natives instead of 70,000, she would be all the richer and more powerful.

The continued decrease of the native population, leading to its virtual extinction in twenty years, may be an evil which it is now, too late to arrest. The following suggestions, therefore, are not offered as specifics for a curable malady. They are but hints of practical measures which (among others) might prove useful if any attempt were made to arrest the evil: hints for the Reader who, emigrating to New Zealand, and becoming a member of the Legislature, may espouse this "Native Cause," and press the Executive to adopt some policy of Maori preservation and increase.

Fewness of women, and the sterility of the few, is the great first cause of decrease. But certain pernicious domestic habits unquestionably form a minor but serious cause. There are no people in the world whom "a know-

"KNOWLEDGE OF COMMON THINGS."

ledge of common things" would benefit more than the New Zealanders. The Maori will gorge on grease, oil, eels, and rancid fish, till he has induced or aggravated scrofula; 75 or will hold fierce night arguments in hia foul Warepuni about the "immaculate conception," and then rush out and sit in the damp night blast to check perspiration and cool himself, till he has induced consumption. And with habits like these, giving him hospitals, the whole Pharmacopoeia, and Holloway's Pills to boot, is mere idle quackery. Prevention is the thing for him – not cure.

(A.) Let the General Assembly at once appoint a "Native-affairs Commission" composed say of such men, as Bishop Selwyn and the Rev. Missionaries Taylor, Whiteley, and Turton, His Honor Charles Brown, Mr. MacLean, Dr. Thompson, and Dillon Bell. Let such Commission ask the Missionaries and the Colonists, generally, to send in short "prize essays," familiarly addressed to the natives, showing (in familiar, easy, style):

1st. That the Maori race is rapidly decreasing; and that the Queen, the Governor, the Bishop, the Missionaries, and the Colonists, all desire to see it increasing.

2nd. Pointing out the causes of decrease; showing that the fearful revelations of old-world cities prove that prostitution and promiscuous intercourse result in barrenness and sterility; that girlhood-marriage produces sickly death-

PRESERVATION OF THE RACE.

born infants, and that the white females who have large robust families don't marry till they are full grown. Showing that to have plenty of men and women we must take good care of infants; and how the best white mothers manage their children. That woman is the "weaker vessel" and should only do the indoor work; and that the sight of a girl staggering along for a dozen miles under a 60 lb. potato-kit would be disgusting among the wretched black fellows of Australia, but is both disgusting and disgraceful among the educated Christian Maories of New Zealand.

3rd. That many of their habits of life are destructive of life; that their huts are too close and ill-ventilated; that now they have no enemies to fear, there is no excuse for fencing themselves up in a Pa like stupid Kakas in a cage; that it would be worth many thousand pounds to them if they would burn down every Warepuni in the island, and take a plunge in the river in the morning instead of a foul-air sweat at night; that three light meals a day are better than two heavy; that as no sane white man sleeps in his coat, the Maori should have a blanket for day and a blanket for night; that frequent soap and water makes man, woman, and child, not only clean but strong; that if (like the silly drunkard) they must have their poisons – rancid-eel, shark, dog-fish, putrid-maize, raw-roots, berries, and other dog and pig food – they should take them only as occasional zests: that bread and meat, milk, potatoes, and eggs, are the things to fight and multiply on; and that it would pay them far better to raise and eat these things, themselves, than to raise and sell them to the white man.

4th. That for many years in England, the white men lived foolishly and piggishly as the Maori does now: killed themselves with bad food and bad air; and then asked quacks and doctors to make them live again; but that white men having been taught better, now live better and longer than they did, and multiply faster.

(B.) Let the Commissioners select the best two of such Essays, and award the writers £100 each. Then let them

PRESERVATION OF THE RACE.

cull the best parts of the two essays, and translate them into one. Print this in the form of a neat dozen-page book, and send a score copies to the chief of every village in the north island. We know that the natives would at least read and discuss this "Book of Life;" and we might hope that they would make it one of those books, which, Lord Bacon says, are to be "chewed and digested."

This I would make the Missionary, or spiritual half, of the attempt – and this Governmental, or physical half.

(C.) To allow the natives of any village who might desire to do so, to sell (at any price) six, 100-acre, lots of land to any six government or missionary approved married settlers (white wives) on condition of their cultivating it, building a house on it (as near the village as possible) and regularly residing there as "Training-exemplars." 76

(D.) Where the natives might be induced to desire it, to send some intelligent, married, carpenter to every village; to allow him (in any way) to acquire 100 acres of village land; to build him thereon a small model-house and shop; and to allow him, say £25 a year – on condition of his devoting three days a week to teaching and helping the natives to build similar houses for themselves; and to make common articles of furniture, &c, &c.

(E.) To appoint a leading native chief, as Magistrate and Assessor, to about every 2000 natives: allowing him £25 a year with a civil uniform. And to take stimulative measures to have one or two Maori members in every northern Provincial Council; and three or four principal chiefs in the General Assembly – giving the South Island one or two more white members in the House of Representatives, as a counterpoise.

(F.) And further, to petition the Crown to raise and pay (say from the Ngapuhi and Waikato Tribes) 300 picked Natives as a sort of rifle-armed, Irish Constabulary Force – one company for Auckland, one for New Plymouth, one for

PRESERVATION OF THE RACE.

Wellington: – inasmuch as it is believed, by the humble author of this Work, that such a Force would prove an admirable Military Police, one capable, too, of acting most efficiently with the Queen's Troops in the Field; and that such a Force would beneficially flatter the Native Race, and (indirectly) propagate, among the whole body of the Aborigines, those personal habits of cleanliness, domestic economy, order, and self-respect, which would conduce to longevity and increase of population. 77

To professional philanthropists who give away no money, on principle, I would hint that philanthropy which shuts the purse, should shut the mouth; and to colonial economists who do the state cheese-paring, that the whole expense of these measures (excluding F.) would not exceed some £4000 a-year; that £7000 a year is set aside for "Native Purposes" by the Civil List; that the Maori already contributes probably a tenth of the colony's annual revenue, and produces a tenth of the colony's annual exports; and that the Maori is perhaps as profitable an article to invest a little money in as short-horn or merino.

To those who say you cannot change the leopard's spots or wash the negro white, I reply that I am aware of the fact; but recollecting what the Maori was a few years since, and what by example he has become, I say that if we could only preserve him a while longer, we might reasonably hope to give him a fresh lease of life, to increase his numbers, and to see him become a robust cottager and a hardy yeoman – the colony's wealth in peace, the colony's strength in war.

62 The word "Maori," which they apply to themselves as their peculiar name, signifies anything that is native or indigenous, and has precisely the same meaning as the word "Moor," applied to the Moorish race.

63 The ceremony of making some person or thing sacred and untouchable; or some spot, path, or river, impassable, for a time.

64 The Natives well know that in our "brush" with Heke, Rangihaeata and Mamaku, we were always aided by friendly, loyal, tribes. Indeed the New Zealander, though now a farmer, is still a natural soldier with an inherent liking for the noble art of war; and in regard to bravery, physical, and intellectual endowments, the Race could still give the Queen two or three Regiments whose "rush" might discomfit even the Russian Guards; and whose very look, as "slipped Dogs of War," might well scare the embroidered Persian off the field.

65 In Ireland and America the proportions are about 100 men, 150 women, and 100 children.

66 I never met with a native couple having more than four children alive. One, two, and three, are the common numbers; and nothing surprises the native women more than the large families of the colonists' wives.

67 I do not know the preceding circumstances of the following case, but presume it was a case of "wrecking." Be this as it may, however, it would appear that the Tribe of the delinquents made graceful amends.
"Interview between his Excellency and Native Tribes. – In our last, we mentioned the arrival of the Ngatipaoa and Ngatitamatera tribes, in considerable numbers, having in their possession eight kegs of the stolen powder, which, with their own two vessels which had been employed in the robbery, they were prepared to give up to the Government. Being desirous that this property should be given up in due form, a deputation of chiefs waited upon his Excellency on Friday afternoon, with a request that he would visit their encampment, near Oraki, for that purpose. Accordingly, about three in the afternoon, his Excellency, accompanied by Mr. M'Lean and the Rev. Mr. Lanfear, proceeded to the locality indicated. When at a short distance from the native encampment, he was met by a large number of well-dressed native chiefs, accompanied by the native interpreters, who had left town before his Excellency to intimate the intended visit. The chiefs, having saluted his Excellency, followed him into the encampment; where he was received by the whole of the two tribes, numbering about 500, drawn up in two ranks. His Excellency was received between these ranks, the natives saluting him by waving their clothes and chanting a song of welcome. At the same instant three Union Jacks, brought from their vessels for the purpose, were hoisted on the top of three temporary masts. After some complimentary speeches, the kegs of powder were placed before his Excellency, and the two vessels formally given up. His Excellency thanked them for their loyalty, and the desire they had displayed to see the laws maintained; he accepted the powder; but, on behalf of Her Majesty, returned the vessels. The interview lasted about one hour and a half, and, with the exception we have mentioned, was confined to mutual expressions of friendship. His Excellency was conveyed to Judge's Bay in a decorated war canoe, and on leaving the encampment the natives gave him three hearty English cheers." – Southern Cross.

68 The Native guides of Mr. Nayler (a gentleman alluded to hereafter) entrapped him in the wilderness at Mokau, and refused to budge a step further on the journey to Auckland until he doubled the money they had agreed to take on starting. And when he appealed to their resident missionary, the reverend gentleman declared that his interference would not produce the slightest effect.

69 From Rev. Mr. Taylor's work referred to, page 23.

70 "The great excess of males over females among the native tribes will of itself prevent in a great measure intermarriage between white men and native women. In addition to which, it may be mentioned, that until lately, at least, the missionaries encouraged marriages among the natives at an injuriously premature age of the females to prevent their being sold to white men for illicit purposes; a practice now suppressed by the tone of society which exists in this colony. These early marriages have become habitual among the natives, and it is painful to witness its result upon the diseased and feeble generation which is now growing up.
"An educated European who marries a native woman, must give up all idea of peace and domestic comfort. His wife can never be his friend and companion; she may be his servant, for to serve somebody she has always believed to be her destiny in life. The natives are worse than the Scotch for tracing kindred; and his wife's relations are in his house morning noon and night, eating, smoking, talking and sleeping at his expense; angry if he attempts to turn them out, and seriously draining his pocket; for he can scarcely refuse them anything with safety, or at least with any prospect of peace.
"A Maori will never marry a white woman, because he feels her superiority, and he cannot make a slave of her as a native woman. A white woman, not even the most degraded, could be induced to unite herself with a Maori – to herd native fashion in a pa, amid dirt, vermin, and discomfort, in every conceivable form – to carry enormous burdens, such as faggots of firewood, heavy kits of potatoes maize or wheat, weighing generally fifty or sixty pounds – and to perform other laborious work exacted from their women by barbarous races wherever they may exist.
"Another obstacle to the amalgamation which our home legislators hope to effect, is the apparently indomitable preference of the natives for the 'Pa.' This was unfortunately fostered in former times for purposes we need not here allude to. It seems almost an impossibility to persuade the natives to live in separate families after the European fashion. They like to herd together at night to talk. Their fear of evil spirits who are then abroad, as they think, deters many from stirring beyond the precincts of their pas. They like the stifling heat of their huts impervious to air, and as long as their tobacco, or a bit of wood ember remains, there they will squat on their haunches and smoke and prate about – land – their eternal topic. Let any one who has been in the pas at night give an insight into what an Englishwoman would suffer if condemned to take part in these nightly conclaves. Let him describe the figures of dirty unwashed men, women, and children of all ages, squatting or lying about, accompanied by pigs and dogs; some wrapped in dirty blankets or ragged mats, augmenting the unwholesome effluvia of the place. Let him paint the natives 'at home,' and our readers will perceive that one means of amalgamation is impossible." – Taranaki Herald.

71 A sort of sub-tribe, or group of families.

72 In three months, in 1853, there visited Auckland alone (but Auckland is the chief seat of the native trade) 442 canoes, navigated by 1592 men and 590 women, bringing produce to the value of nearly £4000; namely –
15 bags and 1/2 ton. of Wheat.
10 1/2 tons of............... Flour.
711 kits ** ............... Maize.
1478 " .................. Potatoes.
38 " .................. Sweet ditto.
16 " .................. Onions.
186 " .................. Cabbages.
13 " .................. Melons and pumpkins.
657 " .................. Fodder-grass.
1 ton .................. Flax.
570 tons.................. Firewood.
128 1/2 " .................. Kauri Gum.
270 ........................ Pigs.
90 ........................ Ducks and fowls.
5 1/2 tons of............... Fish.
18 kits.................. Oysters.
The average annual value of these "canoe-borne" imports into Auckland is about £10,000 a year.
** The kit is a large plaited green-flax basket.

73 I trust the reader will not think I relate the following anecdote as any proof of the mercenary disposition of the Race – it is merely an amusing individual instance of the "no pay no work." A gentleman, riding near Auckland, suffered his horse to escape. A Maori approaching on the road, caught the beast, and shouted out to the pursuer to know how much he would give him not to let it go again!

74 I mean in the sense of not being thieves or pilferers. Sovereigns might lie about your floor, and the native would not steal one; but if he could "do" you in any bargain, I think he generally would.

75 "The country abounds with eels of immense size and fatness. These are considered great delicacies, but I have noticed that natives who freely eat them are generally ill afterwards; whilst deaths from feasting on the pihapiharau (an oily lamprey) are by no means uncommon. Egypt is also a country abounding in eels, yet Herodotus states that they were forbidden as food. So also in the Mosaic law we find the same prohibition. The translator of Herodotus states that the probable cause was their having a tendency to produce scrofula: it is very remarkable that this is the prevailing disease of the Maori, and that they are great eaters of eels." – Rev. R. Taylor's " New Zealanders," (see page 23).

76 By law the Natives can only sell land to the Government (see chapter on Land Regulations).

77 The Crown might certainly be asked to pay such a force for such a purpose, and such a force would eventually allow of some reduction in the New Zealand troops (see note, page 161), whilst, as to the social influence of such a body, I think we may fairly suppose that a smart young rifleman, going to his village on "furlough," would materially aid our "prize-essay missive" in pelting the pigs out of the house, and in introducing his brothers and sisters to soap and water, &c. (See note, page 176.)

CHAPTER IX. VIEWS

VIEWS.

CHAPTER IX.

VIEWS. – In justice to New Zealand, and I may add in justice to artist publisher and author, a few remarks are necessary on the Views which illustrate this chapter. New Zealand abounds in beautiful scenery (page 98), but as yet insuperable difficulties prevent its full and effective transference to a book. At present, there are no artists in New-Zealand, and however desirous the tourist may be to carry home sketches of some "gem-bit" of mountain coast or forest scenery; or of some rising town, smart villa, yeoman's homestead, or myrtle-covered cottage, no money will enable him to gratify his wish. In my late tour among the settlements, Canterbury and New Plymouth were the only places which offered me even the semblance of an artist. But it is not only that great difficulty exists in obtaining the original sketches – when they are obtained, the scenery cannot be transfered effectively to a book, save by some costly artistic process, which (if many views are given) will confine the book to the hands of the few who may buy rich picture books for the drawing-room or boudoir. The microscopical scale, too, to which the view has to be reduced to meet the requirements of an octavo page, sadly impairs any beauty it may possess, and mere tinted lithography is manifestly unequal to the glowing and effective representation of natural scenery like that of New Zealand. A marked feature in the real New Zealand landscape, is the sunny verdancy, the quick-fleeting lights and shadows, the warmth and brilliancy of the three prevailing tints – the golden sky, the blue sea, the green forest, – whereas tinted lithography paints the whole in hard

THE SIX PROVINCES.

metallic hues the very reverse of natural. The artist who executes these views, stands deservedly high in his profession – yet the first glance at them struck me much as a painting of Niagara did, seen in New York the day of my arrival there, from a month's sojourn at the falls.

These "view difficulties" were partly foreseen: but as no late works on New Zealand had been illustrated, and as even a moderately good pictorial representation of a place imparts a more lively idea of it than even the most graphic pen portraiture, it was deemed best, by publisher and author, to call in the artist, and to ally ourselves to lithography; and I would only advise any future New Zealand Author who may take the pen which I now renounce, and who would illustrate his book, to give fewer views, but to present the few he does give, in the richest style of coloured lithography.

The critic, therefore, must please extenuate a little in passing judgment on the pictorial part of "Britain of the South;" whilst, without the slightest desire to paint New Zealand one hair's breadth better than she is even in the comparatively trivial matter of scenery, I feel bound to ask any fair emigrante reader, led by the eye, and who would do justice to all men and all countries, to try and picture the real originals of these six views, quite twice as pretty as they may appear to be, in these their tinted lithographic coats.

THE SIX PROVINCES.

This chapter is purposely confined to a sketch of the chief "local features" of the Six Provinces. Viewing New Zealand as one great whole, and not as a disjointed land of six independent parts, I have deemed it best to describe the great natural and artificial features of the country (climate, natives, natural-history, government, agriculture,

IRISH CHRISTENING.

trade, industrial-pursuits, &c, &c.) in special chapters pertinent to the colony, generally. Provincial statistics are placed together in the last chapter: a comparative glance at them will probably be the most useful; and by reserving them for the end, they have been made to embrace the latest in formation received in London up to the hour of going to press.

Under one of those happy inspirations which long distinguished the "how-not-to-do-it" policy of the Colonial Office, the three Islands of New Zealand were officially christened New Ulster, New Munster, and New Leinster. The only reasonable suggestion ever offered as to the cause of this queer nomenclature, is, that some patriotic young Irish clerk of the Colonial Office sought to create an antipodal Emerald Isle by stroke of official pen. Save that New Zealand produces a glorious potato and does not produce a "snake," New Zealand bears little more resemblance to Ireland, than to Crim Tartary or to Lilliput. Whilst as to her being the Irish emigration field which these names would imply, I regret to say that the "Lads of the Shamrock" are seldom heard in New Zealand. No land would suit them better; but Paddy still persists in being frost-bitten and liberty-bitten in the Land of stars and stripes.

This Colonial Office christening, however, is becoming a tradition of the past. By the New Zealand Constitution Act, the colony of New Zealand,

NEW ZEALAND RE-NAMING.

for purposes of legislation, was divided into six Provinces – Auckland, New Plymouth, and Wellington, in the North Island – Nelson, Canterbury, and Otago, in the South Island. And as New Zealand delights to style herself the "Britain of the South," she will, probably, as her population increases, subdivide these provinces into Kents, Norfolks, Devonshires, Derbyshires, Cumberlands, Ayrshires, Perthshires, Dublins, and Counties Clare.

It appears to me, too, that the national name which New Zealand bears is a very mean and sorry name. No man ever did less for any country he discovered, than the Dutchman Tasman did for New Zealand. He came, saw, and left it. He never even set foot on its shores. It is doubtful whether he was even the first discoverer; and Cook, by virtue of his explorations, surveys, and descriptions, had far more right to name New Zealand than Tasman, even if Tasman and not the Spaniard was the true discoverer. The name, moreover, which Tasman gave, is the name of a flat little province of Holland; no more resembling New Zealand, than a jelly-fish resembles a sperm whale.

Three fresh names have been proposed for New Zealand: Austral-Britain, South-Britain, and Britannia. I prefer the second, and would call New Zealand South Britain: Port Philip has been officially re-christened Victoria; why should not New Zealand be re-christened South Britain or Britannia?

If Her Majesty's various sons are ever to reign

LOCAL JEALOUSIES.

over Her Majesty's various colonies (a dynastic arrangement worthy of statesmen who study the "picturesque," surely King of South Britain would sound better at a St. James's Congress of British Sovereigns, than King of New Zealand – a title which might well incite maids of honour, to regale his Majesty with the song of the "King of the Cannibal Islands."

In sketching even the mere leading natural features of the six: New Zealand Settlements, I feel, as a New Zealand colonist, that I am on delicate ground. Owing partly to the early isolation of these little communities, and partly to the rivalrous action of their six independent little Parliaments, so much unnatural jealousy has been engendered among them, that you can hardly admit the merits of any one, without being accused of partiality by another. I once wrote a little book on New Plymouth; and at the risk of provoking the reader's smile, I shall say that this was a truthful little book; naturally written about New Plymouth, because New Plymouth happened to be the settlement I was then best acquainted with. In consequence of this "deed of publication," gentlemen who represented or misrepresented other settlements, were wont to denounce me as a blind worshipper who made every New Plymouth goose, a swan. Now the residence of many friends in New Plymouth, the pleasant memories of a thousand fresh and happy days spent there: Mount Elliott's and Glenavon's hearty hospitalities, the

REMINISCENCES.

slab-hut and the happy family, Brookland's beauties, the midnight march on the phantom foe, Dorset's "Waikato-Medea," Barret's exhaust-less "croc," Webster's welcomes, Standish's merry "evenings-at-home;" Secombe's "remarkable," Thor-Broadmore's conquering axe, Turner's "table-talk," Titus and the sailor boy before the laughing Bench, Cooke, the "Devon," Apollo Bell, Halse and the "Hermitage," Norris' nectar, Okoaro's "Fine Old English Gentleman," the harvest fields, the prize pigs, and peaches; even the hard work, the rough hands, the honourable toil, together with the handsome "testimonial" presented me by a grateful settlement – must always make me take a lively interest in the young fortunes of the little community and rejoice in its prosperity. But if I were now wived, armed, and prepared to re-emigrate finally and for good, New Plymouth might not be the settlement I should choose. The aim of this book is to induce all fit and proper people who leave the mother country in search of a new home, to plant such home in New Zealand; and if they do this, it is to me, personally, a matter of equal interest, whether they take the field in Auckland, New Plymouth, Wellington, Nelson, Canterbury, or Otago.

[Inserted unpaginated illustration]

Auckland
Vincent Brooks, Lith.

PROVINCE OF AUCKLAND.

AUCKLAND. 78

Auckland, the northern province of New Zealand, 400 miles in length, from north-east to southwest, and nearly 200 miles in breadth, at the broadest part, has a coast line of 800 miles; and an area of seventeen millions of acres – of which about one-twelfth has been acquired by purchase from the natives.

The chief local characteristics of this noble province are these: – a warmer climate, almost capable of ripening maize and a few semi-tropical fruits; great area and coast line; the possession of Lakes Taupo, Rotorua and innumerable hot springs and chalybeate waters; numerous fine harbours and facilities of coast and inland water carriage; the exclusive possession of the Kauri forests; the presence of nearly two-thirds of the native population, and the absence of great pastoral plains.

Auckland (south lat. 36 deg. 50', east long. 174 deg. 50') the flourishing capital of the province, containing about 7,000 inhabitants, was founded by Governor Hobson and a body of pioneer colonists in 1840. One of the finest commercial sites in the world is that of Auckland. Planted in the centre of her Province, she stands Corinth-like on a narrow

NOBLE SITE OF TOWN.

isthmus between her two noble harbours and outlets to the ocean, Waitemate and Manakau. An easy canalisation of four miles would unite these waters; when, through gay villas and suburban gardens, a line of battle-ship might glide from sea to sea. Indeed, Auckland is the centre of a net-work of marine highways – a young antipodal Venice, surrounded by natural canals. Close to her, on the east, she has the Wairoa, the Thames, and the deep and placid Tamaki; close to, on the west, the great estuary of Kaipara, pushing its arms up to the head waters of the Waitemata; whilst on the south, she has the beautiful Waikato, meandering a hundred miles through the valleys of the interior, and floating the rich harvests of Taupo and the Waipa down to her very wharfs. 79

A chain of military pensioner villages, Panmure Howick Onehunga and Otahu, surround Auckland to the south at a distance of from six to ten miles; and are connected with each other and with the agricultural suburbs of the town by excellent roads, displaying a continuous line of beautiful road-side cultivations. The town itself is gaily painted in the following lady's letter, which appeared some time since in "Household Words."

"It was an early December's morning when our ship entered the harbour, and the dawn of such a day as wel-

LADY'S LETTER.

comes one only in the southern seas. Rounding a little cape, our home lay before us – we saw Auckland! Excellently situated, between two seas, and possessing a magnificent harbour, one could already descry in its scarcely-defined streets, in its half-erected buildings, ever in progress, the childhood of one of those princely commercial cities whose names reach to the end of the earth. Even as we entered, the harbour was alive with ships – American whalers, brigantines from California, merchantmen from Sydney and Hobart Town, schooners from the south, several English vessels, and innumerable coasters – studded the unruffled waters, which, twenty years ago, were almost unknown to Europeans. Several shore boats came out to meet us, gaily decorated with flags in their sterns. We had, on landing, but a damp reception. There is no wharf; nothing but a jetty, thrown out by one of the principal hotels. 80 It was low water, and we could not land at this, so we were obliged to disembark at a reef; in which adventure I nearly took "seisin" of my new country, as William the Norman did of England, by measuring my length upon it. Bands of Sappers and Miners are now driving piles for a wharf; and emigrants next year will have a drier reception. Going to one of the inns, we had breakfast of pork chops, coffee, and other delicacies, for eighteenpence each. We then sallied forth, and hired a small house, containing three rooms, at five shillings a-week; to be paid, the landlady emphatically said, 'every Saturday night.' The lodgings were furnished, and our first meal was a farce, at which, although we were the actors in it, we laughed heartily. Our tea equipage con-

THE RIGHT WOMAN IN THE RIGHT PLACE.

sisted of an inverted tub, with a towel over the bottom for a table, a couple of basins and a 'hook pot,' with plenty of new bread and fresh butter; the unimaginable deliciousness of which none but long sea-voyagers wot of. A rocking chair fell to my lot, and a crazy box supported my spouse; yet I doubt if ever tea were more thoroughly enjoyed than ours was that night.

"In a few days, when we became a little more settled, my husband was out from morning to night, walking the country in search of land; for although he is an attorney, and has now good hopes of a moderate practice here, we thought it advisable, as we were not rich, to put ourselves out of the reach of want by undertaking the tillage of a little land. It was some time before he could find any that exactly suited us. At last he hit upon five acres, with a small house on it, two miles from town, for which we gave forty pounds. It is partially inclosed, and consists of rich scoriae soil. The house is built of the rough unhewn sconce stone, plastered and whitewashed within; the roof is thatched with raupo, a kind of reed, of which the natives form their huts. The flooring is sound and the roof not low. The interior area of the entire mansion measures exactly twenty feet by ten; but by means of a curtain, is divided into an eating and sleeping apartment: these, in their time, play many parts; dining-room, drawing-room, boudoir, kitchen, nursery, library, and study. I – brought up an idle English lady, accustomed to pass my time as I pleased, to divide it between books and amusements, but giving much more of it to pleasure than to study – am the household goddess of this paradise; here I wash and cook, feed my goats and dress my baby, or when the little gentleman sleeps, endeavour to give you some faint idea of the toils and pleasures of an emigrant's life. But rude as our home is, we love and enjoy it more than I can describe, for it has the inexpressible charm of being – our own.

"Labour is anxiously demanded here. The meanest carpenter gets eight shillings a-day. We could not, for love or money, procure one to floor our house, so trifling

AN EMIGRANT'S "BEST HALF."

a job being deemed quite unworthy his attention. Labourers get four shillings and sixpence a-day – some more; and one told me to-day that he was wanted in four places at once. Whoever, therefore, comes out above this class, must make up his mind to work (unless he bring capital with him) or he had better stay at home. I have been a hewer of wood and a drawer of water. But in New Zealand all this is done in hope – in the steadfast and sure hope – of every day improving our condition; of being able to rest in our old days; and of leaving to our children (be they ever so many) an ample provision.

But, because I dwell so much upon the labours we have to perform, you must not suppose that we are without amusements. We have races and regattas, and own an Epsom, if we cannot boast a Derby. At the races I was not present; but the regatta was a sight almost worth the voyage from England. I mean on account of the Maori race, which was the ninth of the day. Three large canoes – their bows fantastically carved and decorated with feathers, and manned by powerful native crews – started to contest for the prize. At the stern, and amid-ship, (their dark tall figures naked to the waist) stood two chiefs, with frantic gestures and wild gesticulations, animating their men to victory. They almost flew over the course; and, as returning, they neared the flag-ship, it was a neck-and-neck contest between the two leading canoes. But Te Whero Whero one of the most powerful chiefs of the north, with unearthly yells, urged on his men. Fast flew his canoe beneath the powerful strokes of its crew, and darting forwards by a length, Te Whero Whero gained the honours of the day. Then the savages gave themselves up to all the excitement of victory. They shouted, they danced; and dashing, reeking, into the water, raised loud and long their cry of victory, and triumph.

"The climate is beautiful. I dress every morning with the door open (it is an outer door). Such are among the things we do with impunity. I am become robust and strong. My hair, from being weak and thin, is now so

TOWN OF AUCKLAND.

thick that I can scarcely hear its weight. Standing upon Mount Eden, as you look down upon the city and the sea, you can discern no smoke or impurity hanging over it, as over our English towns. The atmosphere is pure and balmy. Poverty hides not here in crowded and filthy dwellings. The children are chubby and clean; the women generally well-dressed and healthy. At a distance from the town, on the road to Mount Eden, lie the cemetries, one for every religious denomination. A large cross marks the Roman Catholic burial-ground. Each grave is railed in, and flowers and shrubs are coming up around. Slaughter-houses are not suffered to pollute our air. No meat of any description is allowed to be killed within three miles of the town. My husband walks from our suburban residence into town every day. Auckland being built upon hills has scarcely a level street. Most of the houses are detached; sometimes unappropriated allotments lie between them. There are no pavements, and grass grows in the middle of many of the half-formed streets. Nevertheless everything has a thriving look. New houses are being constantly erected; new shops daily opened; everything advances. From Freeman's Bay, passing by the Roman Catholic Chapel – a handsome stone edifice, with a large floriated cross – you descend West-Queen Street into Queen Street, the business quarter of the young metropolis. Here commences the great fuse. Here are the principal merchants' stores; and here sit the Maories, under little tents of white calico, their goods spread out in kits on the ground round them. In this street also stands the prison; the resident magistrate's court (similar to the English County Court), held every day, and in which much business is done; and the Supreme Court of Judicature. The last criminal sittings in this, were held on the first of this month. There were six cases for trial: one, that of a Maori for the murder of a fellow-native; he was only convicted of manslaughter. Leaving this, and parallel to West Queen Street, you ascend Shortland Street, in which is the principal inn, called

TOWN OF AUCKLAND.

the Exchange Hotel; and several shops, which would not disgrace any European town. On a line with this is the crescent, at the top of which is the church, neatly built of white stone, in the early English style of architecture. The arrangements of the inside are admirable; most of the seats are free. Two lecterns supply the place of the pompous reading-desk and pulpit of our English churches; and two clergymen of capability assist the bishop.

"Below the church is Cooper's Bay, then Mechanics' Bay, and, last of all, Official Bay; where are the residences of the Judge and the Colonial Secretary. Beyond the church is the 'west end' of the town, and the road leading to Epsom. The officers live here; and the men under Government. Here are the barracks and the gardens of old Government House; burned down some time since, and not yet restored. The present residence of his Excellency is a place of the most unpretending character, distinguished only by the soldiers on guard. It is situated at a little distance from the town, on the road to Mount Eden. 81

"Two newspapers are published, each twice a week, in Auckland, the 'New Zealander' and the 'Southern Cross;' the former the Government, the latter the Opposition paper. Sales at auction-marts take place every day in the week, Sundays excepted, at which every variety of goods are to be purchased at cheap rates; and auctioneers appear to do a thriving business here. There are daily schools for children, one for every sect. The Protestant, the Roman Catholic, and the Scotch churches, each have their own, and the Wesleyans possess a large college. At the Roman Catholic School, which is conducted by a Sister of Mercy, a number of Maori children attend very regularly.

"The country round Auckland is undulating: hill and dale, with small mountains interspersed. There are three different kinds of soil – scoriae land, fern land, and 'tea-

HOUSEKEEPING.

tree' land. The last is poor; the other two are good: but the scoriae is by far the best; although it involves considerable labour and expense in clearing. The uncultivated country scenery bears an air of gloomy and solitary grandeur; but on a highway, which I traversed the other day, hedge-rows, as in England, extended for miles; singing-birds cheered us, and charming cottages, embowered in trees, stood on the hill brows, and dotted the edges of the plain.

"The greatest, in fact the only, drawback of the country round Auckland, is the almost total absence of trees, except such as are planted by the settlers; yet within eight miles of Auckland the vast forests begin. Firewood is, consequently, six shillings a ton in the place where I had fondly hoped to eat strawberries of my own planting under Kauri trees two hundred feet high. There is but one decent macadamised road in the whole district, the road to Epsom. This is a good, firm road, in the worst weather, for upwards of ten miles. The Eden, Tamaka, and Onehunga roads scarcely deserve the name; in the winter the mud upon them is up to the axle-trees of carts. 82 At the village of Onehunga is situated the Pensioners' Settlement; it is a flourishing and populous little place, on the opposite side of the island. An omnibus runs to and fro between it and Auckland every Sunday during the summer.

"The prices of provision here differ considerably from those of the mother country. Bread, when we first landed, was fourpence-halfpenny the two-pound loaf; but tea both black and green, can be procured, of excellent quality, for eighteenpence per pound. By taking a quarter-chest, you can get it at fifteenpence. Coffee, when there is a good supply in the market, is eightpence a pound; when scarce, it rises as high as eighteenpence. Butter, when we came, was a shilling; it is now fifteenpence. The prime cuts of

SMALL INCOMES.

beef and mutton are sixpence a pound: of pork, fourpence. You can buy, for sixpence, as much delicious fish as will serve an ordinary family for two days' dinner. 83 The kinds of fish most commonly brought about, are the snapper, the mullet, and a fish like our sole in look and taste, but rather smaller. Oysters are sixpence a kit. A kit is a native basket, made of the plaited flax of the country; one may contain from four hundred to five hundred oysters. Cockles, called here pipis, fetch about the same price. Potatoes are generally about three shillings the hundredweight. Peaches and melons are plentiful, and fine. Oranges and cocoa-nuts we get fresh from Tahiti. One may live well here on a small income. The lowest rate of interest for money lent is ten per cent. Twelve and fifteen per cent. are commonly asked and given; so that a person coming here with a thousand pounds might really live very comfortably on the interest of the money; for a hundred pounds here will go as far as two hundred pounds in England. 84

"To the tenant farmers of England New Zealand offers a tempting home. No taxes, no tithes, no rent! There is good land for their seeds, and a good market for their produce. The farmer's wife may sell her cheese at one shilling a pound, her butter sometimes at two shillings a pound; while cattle and stock of every description are becoming cheap. The emigrants most welcome in New Zealand are small capitalists and labourers.

"Let me put in a good word for my colony to any one who thinks of emigration. If you are not doing well in the old country, and you feel it; if you can discern no sunshine in the darkness around you; above all, if you are industrious and enduring, then emigrate. And though it may be only because I myself have emigrated thither, and

LADY'S SKETCH.

am happy, that I would recommend for the field of your emigration New Zealand, yet I think that its own natural advantages speak for the place. Its climate is one of the healthiest in the world; far before that of Australia. There is not a single venomous reptile. The natives are superior to the aborigines of any other colony. The colony is yet in its first infancy, and therefore offers you, perhaps, the greater chance of making yourself rich with a small capital. At the same time, it bids fair eventually to equal any colony in commerce, as it already does in natural advantages. I would not willingly deceive any one. I conscientiously believe what I write, and I have written nothing which I have not either seen with my own eyes, heard with my own ears, or received from the most undoubted authority."

The following quotations from a little pamphlet by W. Swainson, Esq., late Attorney-General for New Zealand, will give the reader an idea of the appearance and social features of the young metropolis of the North.

"Considering its size, Auckland possesses the elements of a considerable society. The officers of the civil government are themselves a numerous body. Being the head-quarters of the bishopric of New Zealand and of the Church of Rome, the centre of the Church Missionary Society's operations in New Zealand, and of the Wesleyan mission for the South Seas, Auckland has an advantage over most small colonial communities in the number of its ministers of religion. It is also the head-quarters of a regiment; and has representatives from the brigade, commissariat, artillery, and engineer departments. Two battalions of military pensioners, enrolled for service in New Zealand, with their officers, are located in the neighbourhood; and a ship of war frequently lies at anchor in the port. A banking establishment connected with the Union Rank of Australia has also been established here. The

LAWYER'S SKETCH.

officers and others connected with these various establishments, and their families, with a number of professional and mercantile men, together form materials for a very considerable society. In what may be termed its fashionable phase, the military element predominates.

"In Auckland there are two newspapers, both published twice a week, which afford abundant facilities for those who love to see themselves in print. For real grievances, for wounded vanity, for disappointed ambition, and for injured innocence – a vacant column is ever ready.

"In so small a community many public amusements cannot of course be expected. Once a week during the summer a regimental band plays for a couple of hours on the well-kept lawn in the government grounds. With the lovers of music and with those who are fond of 'seeing and being seen,' the band is a favourite lounge. Three or four balls in the course of the year, a concert or two, an occasional pic-nic or water party, a visit to the island of Kauwau, a trip to the Waikato, or the Lakes of Roturua, are among the amusements which aid in beguiling the lives of the Auckland fashionable world. While dissipation in. the milder form of temperance and tea-meetings, school feasts, 'stitcheries,' and lectures, suffices for the recreation of the graver portion of the Auckland world. To sportsmen the place offers few attractions: the annual race meeting is the great event of their year. Of hunting there is none: and wild ducks, pigeons, and curlew, afford but indifferent sport for the gun. Riding, boating, cricket, and bush excursions are the favourite out-door amusements. Once in the year, nearly the whole of the ball-going portion of the community are brought together at a ball given by the Queen's representative on the anniversary of Her Majesty's birthday. Invitations are issued to about two hundred: each successive governor taking for his guidance the list of the last preceding reign, and making such additions to it, as his judgment, taste, or fancy may suggest. As a general rule, strangers are well received; but a false step at starting is not easily recovered; and those who care for social position

AUCKLAND'S MIRROR.

would do well to provide themselves with a suitable introduction.

"But perhaps no picture of the business and amusements of a people can be given, so faithful and life-like, as the one to be gathered from the pages of their local newspapers. Take as an illustration a single copy of the 'New Zealander.' The 'New Zealander' is published at Auckland twice a week. The number before me chronicles the sayings and doings of the Auckland public for the four preceding days. The shipping intelligence informs us that, during that time, ten small coasting vessels had arrived from the neighbouring ports, with their various cargoes of pork, apples, onions, pigs, peaches, maize, flax, and firewood. That there were at Monganui twenty-seven whaling ships, chiefly American. That H. M. S. 'Calliope' had arrived at that port, and sailed again for Wellington. That H. M. brigantine 'Pandora' and schooner tender 'Bramble' had also touched at Monganui.

"The 'Governor Wynyard' steamer is advertised to sail between Auckland and Otahuhu (on the Tamaki). Another advertisement informs the public that 'this new steamer is open for engagement for excursions, pic-nics, &c, on reasonable terms.' The brig 'Emma' is advertised to sail for Sydney, the schooner 'Julia' for Canterbury, the clipper schooner 'Cicely' for New Plymouth, and the Baltimore clipper schooner 'Falmouth' for San Francisco. The master of the 'Auckland Academy' intimates that his academy will be re-opened on Monday next. 'Branches taught, English reading and grammar, writing, arithmetic, geography, mathematics, Latin, Greek, &c.' The public are also informed that the grammar school, Victoria Cottage, will also re-open on Monday, January 26. Tenders for the annual army contracts are called for by the Commissariat Office; and under the head of 'Onions,' we are informed that 'the undersigned are purchasers of onions in quantities of one ton and upwards.' The announcement of £100 reward next attracts the eye. Under this title we find that £100 has been subscribed as a reward to any one

MUSIC – BOOKS – WINE.

who shall first discover an available gold field in the province of New Ulster (New Zealand). A column and a half is occupied with a list of books to be sold by auction; and an advertiser makes it known that 'twenty-five tons good potatoes are wanted by Saturday next.' A goodly portion of space is taken up with a report of the proceedings of the Auckland Municipal Council; of motions made and withdrawn, amendments proposed, reports presented, and of matters referred to select committees.

"So much for business. Now for amusement. Under the title of 'Cricket,' we find that the concluding and decisive match was played on Friday; when the Aucklanders proved victorious over the military, 'the Auckland Club winning with three wickets to go down.' 'The band of the 58th Regiment will perform in the grounds in front of the old Government House, to-morrow (Thursday) afternoon, from four to six o'clock,' is the next announcement. Then follows the 'Programme,' containing a selection from the music of Donizetti, Strauss, Jullien, Balfe, &c. The sporting world are informed that 'Mr. J. Codlin's bay gelding Jack is open to run any horse, mare, or gelding in the country, &c, for £100 a side;' and the 'Auckland Regatta' is announced to take place on Thursday the 29th. Eleven prizes are offered to be contested for by boats of every description of shapes, names, and size. 'For small canoes, not to be manned by more than twelve natives,' and for 'canoes manned by an unlimited number of natives.'

"The literary world, too, makes sign of life. 'Now published, price one shilling, Two Lectures on the Aborigines of New Zealand, &c.,' and 'Just published, price one shilling, Why and Because, an essay on the strange infatuation that stimulates individuals to the practice of Intemperance.'

"Nor are the wants of the epicure overlooked; various advertisements inform him where Burgundy, claret, champagne, white hermitage, hock, and Moselle, Yarmouth bloaters, kippered salmon, pickled oysters, hare soup, &c, can be procured at a moment's notice. Of some forty

SMALL SETTLEMENTS.

other advertisements, one may be cited for the purpose of piquing the reader's curiosity, 'On sale, Three bales of Gunny Bags!'

"The editorial column is occupied with the great event of the preceding day, 'The launching, and now the actual plying,' says the editor, 'upon our waters, of a steam-vessel, in all its parts constructed by the skill and industry of Auckland artificers, as well as owned by Auckland proprietors (Messrs. Stone, Gardiner, and Langford, of Auckland), may without exaggeration be regarded as an event in the history of our settlement and colony.' We are then told that the ceremony of naming was performed in the usual manner by the mayor; that, after receiving the name of the 'Governor Wynyard,' she proceeded on her trip, gallantly buffetting winds and waves, and that all things considered, this, her first excursion, passed off in as satisfactory a manner as could have been anticipated."

At present, four-fifths of the colonist population of the province are centered in the Town and in the Suburban districts surrounding Auckland. Russel (Bay of Islands), 150 miles to the north, is the only place besides the capital which affects the dignity of a Town; but there are various little coast settlements scattered along the shores, such as Coromandel, Otea, Wangari, Wangaroa, Monganui (the favourite recruiting resort of the American whalers), Hokianga, Kaipara, Whaingaroa, Kawhia, and Tauranga, counting from 50 to 100 pioneer settlers, which will grow into considerable importance as the extraordinary natural resources of the province become developed under the magic touch of capital and labour.

[Inserted unpaginated illustration]

Cottage of a small Farmer, New Plymouth
Vincent Brooks, Lith.

PROVINCE OF NEW PLYMOUTH.

NEW PLYMOUTH.

New Plymouth, the western province of the north island, about 100 miles in length by 50 in breadth, has a coast line of 150 miles, and an area of three millions of acres – not more than the fiftieth part of which has yet been acquired from the natives.

The chief local characteristics of the province are these: – small area, 85 and small portion of purchase-acquired area, moderate native population, utter absence of harbours, and absence of lakes or large rivers; but profusion of small streams and water power, possession of Mount Egmont, the "Apollo of Mountains," and large proportion of the finest available land.

Taranaki, or New Plymouth (south lat. 39 deg. 3', east long. 174 deg. 5', 130 sea miles from Auckland),

NEW PLYMOUTH.

the village capital of the province containing about 2000 people, was founded by the Plymouth Company of New Zealand: an association of Cornish and Devonshire gentlemen (Courtenays, Molesworths, Bullers, Trelawneys, &c.,) which afterwards merged into the great London Company. The settlement was planted by Frederick Carrington, Esq., and a body of pioneer colonists in 1841.

There are no "outlying" little settlements in this Province. The inhabitants are concentrated in the village-capital, and in a belt of farms and clearings, lying around within a radius of ten miles. Of the three million acres which the Province contains, about one-third (the back or inland portion) consists of forest tracts of excellent timber; and the remainder (the open, undulating, country along the coast) consists mainly of agricultural and pastoral tracts of the finest character; watered by a hundred Tamars, Doves, Dees, and Deverons.

New Plymouth has long called herself the "Garden of New Zealand;" and in soil, scenery, and climate, combined, she well merits the title. Her rivals, however, jocosely assert, that she is a "Garden guarded by a flaming – "surf." In truth her roadstead, however good, is not a harbour; and getting to the Garden, is now and then a wet, and occasionally an exciting, operation.

The want of a port is the only, but the great, natural deficiency of this Province; and with all deference to the lady who asserts that Mount Eg-

HARBOUR AND ROADSTEAD.

mont is worth £100 a year to every soul in the settlement, I cannot but think that if the brilliant beauty could be exchanged for the muddiest little haven of that "waste of harbours" which indent Nelson's coast, it would be an engineering arrangement particularly grateful to the commanders of Messrs. Willis' ships, and one which would put tens of thousands in New Plymouth's pocket. 86

ROADSTEAD.

The appearance of New Plymouth, in fine weather, from sea, is generally considered beautiful.

ROADSTEAD.

The taste for sylvan scenery, and quiet rustic beauty, is gratified by the combination of stream

TARANAKI SCENERY.

and forest, glade and valley, pastures and trim fields dotted with cattle, or yellow with corn;

"HURSTHOUSE'S NEW PLYMOUTH."

whilst for the Salvator Rosa eye, there is the giant snow-capped mountain towering up from a sea of lustrous foliage 8000 feet in the golden sky.

THE VILLAGE OF TARANAKI.

The settlement, snugly planted on the margin of the beach, embosomed amid gentle hills, and watered by the Huatoki, Mangotuku, and tributary Burns, displays its granite church and chapels, its little mills and breweries, snug hostelries, Customs, Post-office, stores and primitive shops; but affecting no "town airs," stands out before the world a robust, hearty-looking village – famed throughout the land for troops of rosy children, pretty women, fat meat, and rivers of Devonshire cream.

New Plymouth being the only settlement which has produced a "national song," it is due to the

TARANAKI'S SONG.

poetic genius of her people to give it a place in these pages. The rural Maro, too, from whose lyre it fell, is my brother; and should the reader ever assist at any public convivialities in New Plymouth, he may hear it sung, con spirito, over the parting magnum. It was written during the "panic" days of Governor Fitzroy's rule, described in the Historical Sketch; and slightly altered (by poetical licence) it is this: –

AIR – Malbrook.

"The passing moments to beguile,
To cheer our spirits, raise a smile,
Though rude the verse and rough the lays,
We'll sing in Taranaki's praise –
And soon we '11 prove in doggrel rhymes,
Despite the dulness of the times,
That of all places on the coast,
We surely have most cause to boast.

CHORUS.

"So banish care and don't despair,
Of fortune in this place so rare;
But in a bumper pledge the toast:
New Plymouth fair – New Zealand's boast.

"We've famous land for him who tills;
To grind our corn we've four good mills;
We've churches for the orthodox,
And for the sinners, gaols and stocks;
Lowing herds on every side,
Hapuka in every tide;
And as for fruit, the place is full
Of that delicious bull-a-bull.

"We've coal, jet black, on yonder hill, 87
Manganese close by the mill;
Sulphur near Old Egmont's base,
Ironsand all o'er the place;

PROVINCE OF WELLINGTON.

Nickel, too, if we are right,
Signs of silver, rich and bright;
And where's the man will dare to tell,
But that a gold mine's there as well?

"A noble steed we have to ride:
'Scrutator' – ass in lion's hide.
To strike the whale with harpoon true,
We've Barrett and his hardy crew;
Our flagging spirits soon we cheer,
With Secombe's stout, and George's beer;
Nor fetch tobacco from afar,
Whilst Nairn can twist the mild cigar.

"We've gallant hearts and maidens fair;
A climate that's beyond compare;
Crystal waters, noble wood;
In truth – we've everything that's good.
So nothing more we need to add,
To prove the sin of being sad;
But gaily here through life we'll rub,
And merrily meet at the Farmer's Club.

CHORUS.

"Then banish care and don't despair
Of fortune in this place so rare;
But in a bumper pledge the toast:
New Plymouth fair – New Zealand's boast.

WELLINGTON.

Wellington, the southern province of the North Island, 200 miles in length from north to south, by 100 in breadth, near the parallel of 40 deg., has a coast line of 500 miles, and an area of some twelve millions of acres – about one-third, of which has been acquired from the natives.

[Inserted unpaginated illustration]

Distant view of Port Nicholson. – Wellington
Vincent Brooks. Lith.

WELLINGTON TOWN.

The chief local characteristics of the Province are these: – Greater liability to volcanic action, moderate native population, centrality of position on the marine highway of Cook's Strait, possession of one splendid harbour, but only one; possession of two semi-navigable rivers, Wanganui and Manawatu; and a considerable quantity both of agricultural and pastoral land.

Wellington (south lat. 41 deg. 16', east long. 174 deg. 47'; 180 sea miles from New Plymouth), the capital of the Province, containing about 6000 inhabitants, and the first settlement founded by the New Zealand Company, was planted by Colonel Wakefield, and a body of pioneer colonists, in 1840. Built on the shores of a fine bay-harbour, at the entrance of Cook's Strait, mid-way between the northern and southern extremities of the two islands, Wellington unquestionably occupies the most central intercolonial site in New Zealand.

In commercial activity, town-like character, social and industrial features, Wellington bears considerable resemblance to Auckland; and (comparing rude beginnings, to grand completions) holds about the same relative position to the northern metropolis, as Liverpool may hold to London.

In bay-site and scenery, Wellington is said to bear some resemblance to Naples; and from a sketch of Bomba's capital which I have purposely consulted, there is, I think, that degree of resemblance between them which may exist between the rough-hewn figure and the polished statue.

SHOPPING AGAINST THE WIND.

The two most disagreeable peculiarities of the place, are the boisterous climate, and the occurrence of a sort of quinquennial "volcanic fit." No climate can be healthier for the strong and robust. Indeed, that admirable bishop, Dr. Selwyn, says, with much graphic truth, that "no one can speak of the healthfulness of New Zealand, till he has been ventilated by the breezes of Wellington, where malaria is no more to be feared than on the top of 'Chimborazo' – where active habits of industry and enterprise are evidently favoured by the elastic tone and perpetual motion of the atmosphere – and where no fog can ever linger long to deaden the intellectual faculties of the inhabitants." But, standing on the edge of the funnel of Cook's Strait, and surrounded by steep hills, pierced by a hundred deep ravines and draught holes, Wellington for six months enjoys an almost continual gale of wind, bursting out into occasional "typhoons" – fierce enough to topple boats along the beach, or even to hurl home the strongest-minded woman bent on shop and bonnet.

Nine-tenths of all the damage ever done in New Zealand by earthquakes, has been done in the town and immediate neighbourhood of Wellington; and though Wellington earthquakes may be trifles compared with those of other countries, they have, I think, been quite sufficient to warn the citizens against high buildings of brick or stone.

With the exception of the Hutt, a market-garden valley eight miles distant up the bay, there is no

[Inserted unpaginated illustration]

Residences of the Revd. C. L. Reay, and the Revd. H. F. Butt,
near Nelson
Vincent Brooks. Lith.

WELLINGTON'S OUT-SETTLEMENTS.

cultivable land near the town. Picturesque wooded steeps rise, almost perpendicular from the water's edge; and the country, for a radius of twenty miles around, consists of densely-timbered mountain ranges, cut up by innumerable ravines.

By means however of a good military road, winding through this rugged suburban belt, Wellington has been brought into communication with some fine districts lying along the northern shores of Cook's Straits; and here, for a hundred miles in an almost continuous chain of cultivation, she has planted the little settlements of Porirua, Kapiti, Otaki, Rangitiki, Manawatu, and the larger one of Wanganui.

On her north-eastern side she has ready access to the fine pastoral plains of Wairarapa; and has now commenced, in Hawkes' Bay, her latest settlement Ahuriri – a place possessing a fair coasting harbour, a central position, much good land, fine climate, and communication with Wairarapa and Manawatu; and which promises to become a considerable producer of wheat and wool, and one of the most thriving localities of the entire Province.

NELSON.

Nelson, the northern province of the South Island, 150 miles in length by 140 in breadth, has a coast line of 500 miles; and an area of

PROVINCE OF NELSON.

some fifteen millions of acres – all of which, virtually, has been acquired from the natives.

The chief local characteristics of the Province are these: – Smaller proportion of cultivable land, very small native population, mineral wealth of coal and copper, profusion of deep-sea harbours, and comparative serenity and dryness of climate.

Nelson (south lat. 41 deg. 15', east long 173 deg. 16'; 130 sea miles from Wellington), the capital of the Province, and the second settlement founded by the New Zealand Company, contains about 4,000 inhabitants, and was planted by Captain Arthur Wakefield and a body of pioneer colonists in 1842.

Standing on the margin of a snug but somewhat confined harbour, at the bottom of Blind Bay, 50 miles away from the funnel of Cook's Straits; and nestling from cold south blasts under a wall-like circle of precipitous hills, Nelson enjoys a climate of brilliant serenity well fitting her to become New Zealand's bay-side Brighton.

Nelson, like Wellington, surrounded by a belt of hills and broken country (one of the hills is the copper-mine Dun Mountain, from which so much is expected) possesses but little available land in immediate connection with the town. The chief agricultural districts in the neighbourhood are the fine valley of the Waimea, a tract under high and prolific cultivation; and the Motueka, a pleasant district lying across the bay, which has lately presented indications of gold.

LABYRINTH OF HARBOURS.

Massacre Bay (the scene of Tasman's affray with the natives), a small outlying settlement at the entrance of Blind Bay, is the principal discovered coal field in the country; and despite its unpleasant name, will probably become the Newcastle of New Zealand as her infant steam service grows up and expands to full dimensions. 88

The northern end of the Nelson province, washed by Cook's Strait, is a rugged, densely-wooded country; indented with a perfect labyrinth of coves, bays, creeks, havens, and harbours, of every size, sort, and capacity. Queen Charlotte's Sound in the centre of the group, 25 miles long, with one entrance three, and the other six miles broad, is a gigantic ocean-dock, capable of berthing the whole British navy and all Russian prizes to boot; and Pelorus Sound, a little to the north, is a similar group of harbours, embracing 250 miles of shore and beach. But the wooded hills rise so abruptly from the margins of these 101 harbours, that the whole of them, put together, scarce offer 1000 ploughable acres; and until New Zealand is equipping an armament for the conquest of China, or the expulsion of the "Bear" from Japan's honeypots, this waste of (harbour) waters will be ornamental rather than useful to Nelson.

The principal pastoral district in the province, and one of the finest in either island, is the Wairau Plains: a tract about 70 miles in length opening

THE BLACK FOREST.

out into Cook's Straits at Cloudy Bay; but distant from Nelson, overland, by the circuitous route which the rugged intervening country renders necessary, nearly 100 miles.

Wairau, and a line of coast and inland plains and downs, running back to the boundaries of the Canterbury province, but broken up by the Kaikoras and other ranges, constitute what may be termed the eastern, or "Cornucopias" half of the Nelson Province. 89

The greater portion of the western half appears to be a densely-timbered Alpine wilderness – a "Black-forest" region, unfit for man or domestic beast. Indeed, though running less into the heart of the country in its course through the provinces of Canterbury and Otago, this rugged region (including in its Alpine ranges the highest peak in New Zealand, Mount Cook, 13,200 feet high) extends along the entire western coast of the South Island, 500 miles from Cape Farewell to Dusky Bay. It is a savage, gloomy, country: silent, deso-

THE LAND OF THE "MOA."

late, and dreary. Here and there, in some secluded nook, two or three miserable natives (lone remnants of early fugitives from the massacres of the eastern side), true "children of the mist" and "wild men of the woods," have raised their little huts to snare the Kiwi and the Weka unmolested and unseen. 90 But this vast tract is unpeopled; millions of acres have never been trodden by human foot since their first upheavement from the sea. It is a country fresh from nature's rudest mint, untouched by hand of man – a region where, if anywhere, Audubon would meet the Moa on the mountain top; and Owen stumble over the Ichthyosaurus basking on the banks of the lagoon.

Some idea of the wild and savage scenery of this "Black Forest" region may be gathered from the following extracts from the "Journal of Captain Richards, H.M.S. 'Acheron,'" who surveyed the coast in 1851: –

"A view of the surrounding country, from the summit of one of the mountains bordering the coast of from 4000 to 5000 feet 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

PROVINCE OF CANTERBURY.

forcibly recalled to mind. 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 floated far beneath us, and the harbour appeared no more than an insignificant stream.

"A remarkable scene occurred during our stay in Dusky Bay. Our anchorage was at the head of the northern arm of Dagg's Sound, a cable's length from the shore, in twelve fathoms: the change of the moon brought a N.W. gale, with heavy rain, and in the course of a few hours no less than fourteen magnificent cascades were pouring down the steep sides of the mountains (upwards of 3000 feet high) by which we were surrounded, bringing with them trees of considerable size, and all other obstructions met with in their passage. The effect was as if a heavy surf were breaking round the vessel; the mist, floating as low as our mast heads, occasionally obscured everything but the summit of the mountains and the foam below, and produced altogether a scene as grand as it is possible to conceive, which lasted, without abating in any degree, for two days, when the water alongside, which had been as salt as the ocean, was for a considerable depth below the surface perfectly fresh." – Remark book of Commander G. H. Richards – H.M.S. Acheron.

CANTERBURY.

Canterbury, the noble centre province of the South Island, 200 miles in length, from north-east to south-west, by 100 miles in breadth, has a coast line of some 400 miles: and an area of fifteen

[Inserted unpaginated illustration]

Port Lyttleton, Canterbury.
Vincent Brooks Lith.

LYTTELTON AND THE PORT.

millions of acres – all of which, virtually, has been acquired from the natives.

The chief local characteristics of the Province are these: – Small, all but non-existent, native population; cooler climate; possession of that curious harbour-stored projection Banks' Peninsula; and possession of immense pastoral plains.

Canterbury was founded by a brilliant association of peers, bishops, and commoners, patriotically interested in improving the character of British colonisation; and Lyttelton, its port-town (south lat. 43 deg. 36', east long. 172 deg. 44:'; 180 sea miles from Wellington), together with Christchurch, its young city of the plains, may be said to have been officially planted by John Robert Godley and a body of pioneer colonists in 1850. 91

Port Victoria (old Port Cooper), the harbour of Lyttelton, though inferior in some respects to the Cook's Strait, and northern harbours, is a fine land-locked, ocean-inlet; and its duplicate, planted at Deal, would be a cheap bargain to British commerce at the price of ten millions sterling.

Lyttelton, counting some 2000 inhabitants, is a neat, infant, town, laid out with mathematical precision; and presenting an air of substantial finish seldom seen in the young settlements of a new Land.

To the sea-approaching emigrant, however, who has pictured the pastoral prairies and boundless

THE GREAT PLAINS.

downs of Canterbury, but forgotten to image the mountain curtain by which they are concealed, the first glimpse of Lyttelton might well prove calculated to excite feelings of astonishment rather than of delight. If at breakfast time, the curious reader will take the shallowest cup and chip out a half-inch cleft, from brim to centre of bottom, he will have a rough model of the site of Lyttelton. The cleft is the ocean-harbour inlet; the remaining bottom of the cup (raised above high-water mark by the coffee grounds) is the level land on which the town stands; and the shallow sides are the surrounding hills – climbing which, by zigzag path, and peeping over the brim, the modelist will have before him, that great land of the "golden fleece," which Jason failed to find: – a noble plain of four millions of acres, watered by twenty rivers, rolling back in gentle rise 40 miles to the foot of the central highlands, and spreading north and south further than the eye can reach.

A deep fringe of fine cattle-grazing, and loamy agricultural land, 92 extends along the entire seaboard of the Plain. But the great inland portion of it, is a true pastoral country; composed for the most part of tracts of light loam on a porous sub-

SHELTER AND SCENERY.

soil, intermixed with pebbly tracts: all covered with perpetual herbage of grasses and dwarf shrubs; and admirably suited for the breeding and depasturing of sheep, horses, or cattle.

The two marked features of this great Plain, are the absence of wood, and the profusion of water. The 4,000,000 acres scarce boast a tree. But jealousy has talked a considerable amount of nonsense as to the "treeless plains of Canterbury." Perhaps Wellington has heard of such a thing as "too much wood." There is timber enough on or near Banks' Peninsula, and at the foot of the highlands, to supply the Plains with fences, fuel, and building stuff, for five centuries to come. I grant that in certain, bleakest, spots during a "southerly burster," the position of the newly-imported merino is occasionally embarrassing: if he does not get up to feed he starves; and if he does, the blast may shear him clean. But quick-hedges, Osage-orange hedges, hedges of furze, mixed fancy-hedges of broom, bramble, geranium, and dog-rose (stronger even than "southerly bursters"); thick break-winds of Phormium tenax; together with belts, clumps and hedge-rows of blue gum, karaka, ngio, acacia, ash, elm, and other Australian New Zealand and English trees, are easily reared in Canterbury; and colonists like hers, in five years more, may make their naked plains woody and sheltered enough for fox and pheasant; and as pleasing to the eye, as they are profitable to the pocket. 93

RIVER RAPIDS.

Profusion of rivers, not absence of forests, seems to me to be the true and the sole natural defect of the Canterbury province. In her 200 miles of eastern coast some 50 streams discharge themselves into the sea. The character of these vicious torrents, the contempt of utility they display is posi-

CROSSING THE "STYX."

tively exasperating. The river gods who rule their floods must take a heathen pleasure in thwarting Christian colonisation. On the coast, scarce one of them forms a cove fit for a bumboat; inland, each at seasons, would hurl an elephant off his legs and roll the carcase to the sea. And when Canterbury becomes peopled, when free path is more necessary, her provincial chest will unquestionably have to disburse most freely for ford and ferry service, and for repair and renewal of bridge and boat. 94

THE CITY OF THE PLAINS.

Christchurch, the rural capital of the plains, about ten miles from Lyttelton, over the harbour hills, containing some 2000 people, is a considerable village pleasantly situated on the river Avon. The country around is dotted with corn-fields, pastures, orchards, and dairy farms; and the luxuriance of crop, the sleek full-fed look of all domestic animals which these cultivations exhibit, prove that the ragged-looking tracts of similar soil which surround them, need but the magic touch of plough and spade to be clothed with a like mantle of blooming fertility. The physical "difficulty," if I may so express it, of the Canterbury province has been the connecting of the port with the plains; and the character of this difficulty, and the manner in which it will be overcome, cannot be more clearly

CONNECTION OF PORT WITH PLAINS.

stated than in Mr. Hodgkinson's business-like pamphlet: –

THE PORT AND ITS CONNECTION WITH THE PLAINS.

"The harbour of Lyttelton, in Banks' Peninsula, is distant about two miles from the plain, from which it is separated by a ridge of hills about 1100 feet high; over which there is at present only a bridle-path. Heavy goods are conveyed by water up the river Heathcote to within two miles of Christchurch. This river opens into the sea about four miles north of the entrance to Port Lyttelton; but has a dangerous bar at the mouth, upon which several small vessels have been wrecked. This difficulty of communication between the port and the plains has hitherto been a great drawback to the prosperity of the province, and a cause of much expense to newly-arrived emigrants; but it is likely to be soon remedied by a road over the hills, which is now in progress. A sum of £12,000 has been voted by the Provincial Council for the formation of this road. Instead of following the direct line to the plains by the present bridle-path (the highest part of which is 1100 feet above the level of the sea) the road is to take a somewhat circuitous course, by way of Sumner, where the ridge is not so high. A short tunnel is to be made through the hill, about 150 feet from its top, by means of which the highest part of the road will not be more than about 600 feet above the level of the harbour; the ascent from which will be sufficiently gradual to admit of heavily-laden drays and carriages being taken over."

The small settlements of the Canterbury province consist of Kaipoi, 95 a pleasant inland village, a few

THE PENINSULA SETTLEMENTS.

miles from Christchurch, on the banks of the Cam; and of Akaroa, Port Levy, and Pigeon Bay, in Banks' Peninsula. Akaroa is one of the finest harbours in New Zealand; and these little peninsulated settlements, all possessing excellent ports, and lying within three or four hours' run of the provincial metropolis, will probably become the seat of a large industrial population: supplying fish, fruits, vegetables, and firewood for the shipping and town of Lyttelton; and fence-stuff and building-timber for the Shepherd Princes of the Plains.

The noble Association which founded Canterbury, commenced their enterprise under a scheme of colonisation which failed to become popular among the emigrant masses of the mother country; and after they had successfully planted the two infant settlements of Lyttelton and Christchurch, they closed their labours and ceased their corporate existence as a colonising body. Some pecuniary differences arose between the Association and its Pioneer-colonists; but the following farewell message from the noble members of the Association to the Pilgrims at Canterbury, shows that all these differences have been gracefully healed; and that the colonising parent in the mother country and

THE CANTERBURY ASSOCIATION.

the vigorous progeny she has planted at the antipodes, now officially part with mutual good wishes to remain the best of friends.

"LYTTELTON TIMES."

"The following interesting letter has been addressed by the members of the Canterbury Association in England to his Honour the Superintendent of the province, on the final severance of the connection between the association and the promising colony which it has succeeded in establishing, although the original scheme, from a series of misfortunes, altogether unexpected and unavoidable, has fallen through. Its publication has been received with the best feeling amongst the settlers, who will continue to regard with respect and affection the noble and disinterested labours of the association on their behalf: –

"TO HIS HONOUR THE SUPERINTENDENT OF CANTERBURY.

"SIR, – Copies of the ordinance for the settlement of the affairs of the Canterbury Association, as passed by the Legislature of the province, have lately reached England, accompanied by reports of some of the debates during its progress, and by some account of the feeling in the colony on the subject.

"Though these accounts are not yet very full, we cannot but take the first opportunity of expressing to the Legislature and the people of Canterbury, the feeling of gratitude and pleasure with which this intelligence has filled us.

"When we undertook, now several years ago, the enterprise of founding the colony of Canterbury, none of us could doubt the probability that a work of such magnitude and uncertainty might be attended, at some stage of its progress, with difficulty, mortification, obloquy, or loss; possibly with all of these.

"That in some degree such has been its course is well

THE CANTERBURY ASSOCIATION.

known; whether it has been so to a greater or less extent than might have been anticipated, we need not consider. But what has been altogether unexpected, is this – not merely that we should be assured by the general voice of the colony that whatever labour and anxiety have been undergone have not been fruitless, but have met with their abundant reward in the existence of a happy and well-conditioned community – but that our exertions, such as they were, should be acknowledged in so generous a manner, and that that community should be both able and willing to exonerate us from pecuniary obligations which we incurred in their service.

"What you have done, and the way in which you have done it, furnish the best reply to the charges which have been made, both as to the conduct and the results of our enterprise. Upon both these points your verdict is decisive.

"We are sensible that the course pursued by you entails upon you burdens which, in proportion to your numbers and resources, are very heavy; so heavy, indeed, that they could not be borne, unless the colony had made, and was making, the most rapid advance in material prosperity.

"But it gives us far more satisfaction to observe that this material prosperity has been accompanied by the fullest retention and development of those principles of social order and moral well-being which, from the very outset, it has been our most cherished hope to see realised among you. We see proofs of this in every account that reaches us from Canterbury.

"The existence of the association, long scarcely more than a nominal one, has now terminated by an euthanasia such as we could not venture to hope for. But there is not one of us, who will not retain for the whole of his life the most lively interest in the fortunes of the colony of Canterbury, and the most affectionate regard for its inhabitants.

"We venture to suggest that, if it is usual and proper to do so, you will communicate this address to your Legis-

THE "HEROIC WORK."

lative Council, and take such steps as you may think fit to make its contents generally known in the colony.

"January, 1856.

"(Signed) –
"Lyttelton. Edward Hulse.
Newcastle. F. Alleyne M'Geachy.
Buccleuch. Charles Wynne.
Manchester. T. S. Cocks, jun.
S. Oxon. George K. Rickards.
S. Norwich. Walter Farquhar.
C. T. Ripon. Henry Selfe Selfe.
John Manners. J. T. Coleridge.
Sidney Herbert. J. D. Coleridge.
W. C. James. Wm. Forsyth.
C. B. Adderley. Wm. S. W. Vaux.
J. Cecil Wynter. Nugent Wade.
C. M. Torlesse. Cornwall Simeon.
John R. Godley.

"The 'Canterbury Standard' has the following acknowledgement of the above communication: –

"We beg to direct the attention of our readers to a letter addressed to the Superintendent of thi3 province by Lord Lyttelton and other leading members of the Canterbury Association, which has been furnished us by the Provincial Secretary for publication. We need not say one word on the excellent spirit which the document evinces. It speaks for itself, and is a most graceful termination of the connection which existed between the noblemen and gentlemen whose names are attached to it and the inhabitants of Canterbury."

The mere tittle-tattle of one Australian or New Zealand settlement about another, is not matter for the pages of a book affecting the title of "The Britain the South;" but Australia and indeed New Zealand are (or were) so fond of fooling themselves with a

CANTERBURY'S "KID GLOVES."

little bit of nonsense about Canterbury, that I will e'en devote a line to the task of brushing it away. Sydney, Melbourne, Van Diemen's Land, nay even Auckland and Wellington have affected to think that Canterbury, too fine a gentleman to work, would fain clip his sheep in kid gloves. Now, doubtless, there is an unusually large proportion of gentlemen in the Canterbury community, many of whom, I dare say, do actually wear gloves; and there may be certain fair ladies there, who, when they emigrated, dreamt they were going

"To happy convents, bosom'd deep in vines,
Where slumber'd abbots, purple as their wines,
To isles of fragrance, lily-silvered vales,
Diffusing languor in the panting gales,
To lands of singing and of dancing birds, 96
Love-whisp'ring woods, and hills alive with herds."

But so far is it from being true that Canterbury is "too fine" to work, that I fancy her annual exports of wool and wheat, and of all which brings grist to the mill and money to the chest, will prove that she works even harder than her ruder rivals.

Indeed, if we have any lurking notion that an accomplished mind and intellectual refinements are mere cumbersome finery in the "Bush," the sooner we disabuse ourselves of such notion the better. In fact those temporary privations, those occasional stoppages of "creature-comforts," that "roughing," which generally attends the Emigrant's first cam-

[Inserted unpaginated illustration]

A "Bush" Section on Green Island, Otago. (Fox Lodge)
Vincent Brooks Lith.

THE PROVINCE OF OTAGO.

paign or two, are not so well borne by the unlettered peasant, or my lady's maid, as by the scholar, the gentleman, or by the lady herself. As to mere "creature-comforts," I recollect, that in early days, in New Plymouth, there was a frequent scarcity of fresh butter: this privation shook many a labourer's family to the centre, and when it happened to be followed up by a cruel cutting-off of "Devonshire cream," the Cornish miners all but flew to arms. Now in these "dairy-dearths," the more intellectual portion of the little community, could conceal the poverty of the butterless board with the noble "Masque of Comus;" or go with Addison to the country and milk "Sir Roger's" cows.

Mind triumphs over matter, even in New Zealand; and gentle blood is good even in the "Bush."

OTAGO.

Otago, the southern province of the South Island, 150 miles in length by 200 in breadth, has a coast line of some 500 miles; and an area of about eighteen millions of acres – all of which, virtually, has been acquired from the natives.

The chief local characteristics of this fine Province are these: – Great area and coast line; small, all but non-existent native population; possession of Foveaux' Strait; proximity to the track of the Australian "Homeward-bounders;" and possession

DUNEDIN'S "LITTLE NONSENSE."

of large districts both of pastoral and agricultural land.

Dunedin 97 (south lat. 45 deg. 46', east long. 170 deg. 44'),

DUNEDIN.

230 sea miles from Port Lyttelton, is the village capital of the Province, containing about 2000 inhabitants. It was founded by an association of members of the Free Kirk of Scotland; and the settlement was planted by Captain Cargill and a body of Scotch colonists in 1848.

Dunedin stands at the head of a fine loch, thirteen miles in length, which may be said to form two harbours: the deep or seaward half running up to Port Chalmers, beyond which large ships do not come; and the shallow, inland, half, extending to Dunedin; and accessible only for small craft and light steamers. 98

In combined merits of moderately good harbour, fine town site, contiguity of good land, open back ground, and beauty of (harbour and town-site) scenery, Auckland is, I think, the only provincial capital which can compete with Dunedin.

The agricultural operations of the handful of colonists are at present confined chiefly to the beautiful valleys of the Taieri and Tokomoriro, a few miles south of the town; and to the banks of the Clutha, a fine semi-navigable river, some fifty miles distant. But perhaps three-fourths of the Otago province consist of interspersed pastoral and wooded agricultural districts of great fertility; and there is probably no Province in New Zealand,

INVERCARGILL.

capable of producing a greater annual export of wool and meat and corn.

A young settlement, Invercargill (well named after the respected Superintendent of the Province, the veteran Captain Cargill), has lately been formed some 140 sea miles from Dunedin, at the bluff, in Foveaux Strait; and in combination of natural advantages, it is questionable whether there be any finer site for a large settlement in the whole of New Zealand. The position of the place is almost central, between two harbours the Bluff and New River – -a fine stream, navigable for twenty miles. These harbours are practically nearer to the Australian ports, and a week's sail nearer England, than any settlement-harbours in New Zealand. There is no large native population in the country to impede colonisation, but there is a scattered population of old squatters civilized natives and intelligent half-castes, which may materially strengthen the first efforts of colonisation; whilst as to land, there is probably no part of New Zealand where so great an extent of agricultural country could be found lying in open communication with a seaport and shipping harbour. 99

Some idea of the character of the little communities scattered about the neighbourhood of

NAYLER ON NEW RIVER.

Invercargill, and of the description of the country which it commands, may be gleaned from the following short extracts from "Notes of a Journey from Otago to New River:" presented to me by my friend Mr. Nayler, an old "compagnon de voyage," whose graphic recital of his explorations in both islands of New Zealand, I should place, "in ex tenso," before the Reader, did not publishers' restrictions compel me to compress my matter and economise my space.

"24th. This morning we started for Jacob's River, and after a walk of twenty-two miles over a splendid beach, we came to the native settlement. Men, women, and children, poured out to meet us; some ran forward to apprize the whalers of our arrival – five strangers at once was an event unheard of. Jacob's River has long been celebrated as a whaling station; but now little is done in that line. The singular social position of this place is one of those which travellers meet with but once in their lives. There had been some sickness amongst them; and a surgeon was their greatest desire. Some junior Sawbones might do worse than cast his lot in this little Ultima Thule. Next to a doctor, a clergyman was spoken of as the most desirable importation: not exactly for the benefit of his ministry; they would be content to bury their own dead, but they did wish to be married by the Church. The surplus of female children born over males was most remarkable; about one boy to ten girls. 100 The river, with its well-wooded banks, is very picturesque; and the clearings, dotted around, formed a pleasing landscape.

"The whalers were evidently anxious that a regular government settlement should be formed hereabout (Inver-

DUSKY BAY.

cargill has since been formed); for they were quite aware, as a well-conducted community, of the many advantages which a regular Settlement would confer upon them.

"New River. – Hauled the boat up high and dry, and having "backed" our blankets and provisions, we turned our faces inland. The appearance of the country delighted me. Here were thousands of acres of beautiful undulating land, with natural grasses, studded with large masses of bush, containing excellent timber – reminding one of a gentleman's park on a scale 'magnifique.' Small streams of excellent water are interspersed throughout the country. To the westward, appeared a range of wooded hills, and beyond them the snowy Southern Alps. We left 'John Bull' at a clump of bush, to erect a hut, whilst Prince and myself walked on to view the land. A stock farmer could not desire a better country, a sheep farmer would perhaps like something higher, but the general agriculturist would be admirably suited. I had no implement to turn up the soil, but from the appearance of the vegetation, I judged it excellent; and in New Zealand it is rare to find a bad soil. I was grieved to turn my back on this splendid district; but night was closing on us, and we returned to see what cheer our trusty guide and forester bluff 'John Bull,' had provided for the bivouac."

About 100 miles eastward of Invercargill we find Dusky Bay, that remarkable group of harbours forming the extreme, south eastern, Ocean-Docks of New Zealand; and which are well described in the following extract from the Admiralty Blue Book: –

"The only places of shelter for shipping along the whole extent of the west coast of the Middle Island, a distance of 500 miles, are those singular, and truly remarkable Sounds or inlets, which penetrate its southwestern shores between the parallels of 44 deg. and 46 deg. south latitude.

DUSKY BAY DOCKS.

"The precipitous and iron-bound coast line which forms the sea-wall, as it were, in which these extraordinary inlets may be almost likened to so many breaches, runs in a N.N.E, and S.S.W, direction; and the whole, thirteen in number, are included within a space of little more than one hundred miles.

"With the exception of Cook's excellent description of Dusky Bay (explored during bis second voyage in 1773), nothing has been recorded of this remarkable region; nor until an examination by H.M.S. 'Acheron' in 1851, was it known to any but a few adventurous whalers, whom stress of weather alone had compelled to seek shelter on its desolate and silent shores. The character and features of these sounds so much resemble each other, that it seems desirable to offer a description of them generally, before entering into any detailed account of their capabilities individually.

"In approaching from seaward, there is so much sameness in the appearance of the land, that unless a vessel knows her position accurately, it is not easy at a distance to distinguish the entrance of one sound from another; and the smaller inlets, at a distance of four or five miles, have more the appearance of ravines between the high and rugged mountains, than the entrances of harbours. In moderately clear weather, the coast can be made with confidence; and as the entrances are generally equidistant from each other (about eight miles), and all running in an easterly direction, there would be little danger to be apprehended from a lee shore. It must be remarked, however, that a fresh or even strong westerly wind in the offing frequently dies away within a mile of the coast, leaving a vessel at the mercy of a calm and a swell, when recourse must be had to towing, which probably, in any vessel but a whale ship, would be impracticable; moreover, in consequence of the enormous quantity of fresh water, which falls in cascades from the steep mountain ridges, there is always an outset, particularly from the smaller sounds, and frequently a draft of wind down their narrow arms, so

DUSKY BAY SPARS AND FISH.

that unless with a fresh fair gale, which blows right home and up the sounds, sailing vessels will generally find it a difficult and tedious operation to fetch inside their entrances.

"The larger of the sounds are in some measure exempt from these inconveniences; they are generally divided into several arms, penetrating the coast, in some instances for a distance of twenty miles, with a breadth rarely exceeding a mile, and studded with numerous islets. The smaller sounds generally run in for a distance of from six to eight miles, with a width of about half a mile, and anchorage is seldom to be found except at their inner extremes.

"The shores, which rise almost perpendicularly from the water's edge, are, in the immediate neighbourhood of the sounds, covered with trees suitable for all purposes; among them the red pine, which, although heavier and inferior to the kauri, is well adapted for masts, and a vessel requiring spars could procure them of any size, up to a sloop of war's lower mast, with little difficulty; for this purpose the southern inlets are preferable.

"The most remarkable feature common to the whole, is their great depth of water. Soundings can rarely be obtained under eighty or one hundred fathoms, and frequently at much greater depths; and the shores, within a few yards, are quite steep-to. Vessels may frequently with advantage warp up by laying out lines to the shore; and when a cove is reached where an anchor may be dropped, it will generally be necessary to secure to the trees also, to prevent being drifted off from the steep bank by a flaw of wind. These flaws, or squalls, frequently blow with great violence off the high land, or down the gullies, during heavy gales outside.

"Excellent fish of several kinds are abundant, and may be caught with hook and line close to the rocks at the entrances, or wherever there is a shoal patch; crayfish abound in the southern ports, aho several species of ducks, pigeon, and the weka or wood-hen. Those rare birds, the ka-ka-po

STEWART'S ISLAND – NEW ABERDEEN.

and kiwi, so eagerly sought after by naturalists, and peculiar only to New Zealand, were found here in considerable numbers. No inhabitants have been met with since the few stragglers seen by Cook."

Stewart's Island, just opposite Invercargill, across the Strait, though not officially included in the Province, may be regarded as an island-county of Otago. Various little mixed communities of tens and twenties, composed of old whalers, natives, and half-castes, are scattered about the bays of the island. It is well wooded, possesses many fertile little valleys, and a dozen excellent harbours.

Port Pergasus (60 miles south of Invercargill, south lat. 47 deg. 11', east long. 167 deg. 41'), one of the finest harbours in New Zealand, may eventually become the site of a settlement. Some "New Aberdeen" planted here, would embrace many advantages as a whaling port; and lying close on the track of the Australian, homeward, fleets, would be the only civilised spot a ship would approach in traversing the desolate waste of waters between Australia and Cape Horn. 101

CHOICE OF PROVINCE.

At the risk of exciting the pity of hostile critics, I shall assert that, everything considered,

CHOICE OF PROVINCE.

a British family, emigrating to plant a Home in the New Land, would now do better to plant such Home in the least favoured locality of New Zealand than in the most favoured locality of America, Canada, or Africa; and that if such family only chose New Zealand, the particular locality of New Zealand which they chose, would be a matter of comparative unimportance.

The natural advantages of the six Provinces, though somewhat different, are nearly equal. And this sketch of them, together with the special chapters on climate, land-regulations, and statistics, will, I trust, enable the reader to see their little local peculiarities, and to draw his own conclusions as to which would suit him best. Whilst if certain fastidiousness should create the "embarrassment of choice," the reader should remember that on landing at the settlement which he thinks he would prefer, he would now find it practicable to see one or two other settlements before he invested his money and took the field – "to work and win."

MEANS OF "INTERCOMMUNICATION" BETWEEN THE PROVINCES.

SEA ROADS. – The Zingaree (coast-steamer) leaves Manakau (Auckland's western harbour) about every fortnight, for New Plymouth, Nelson, Wellington, and Canterbury. Her run from place to place may average twenty-four hours; her stay in each

SEA ROADS.

place (save at New Plymouth, where it is only a call in fine weather) is about the same; and the fare from place to place some £4.

Messrs. Willis', and other English vessels, and the numerous Australian traders, commonly visit two settlements, and generally carry on a few New Zealand passengers from one to the other; whilst a fleet of small craft is continually plying round the coasts from Province to Province, and from trading post to station. Thus (save at Otago and New Plymouth, where the sea-journeying facilities are fewer) the New Zealand visitor, or tourist, has seldom to wait above a day or two in any one settlement without finding some sea-means of prosecuting his journey to another.

A powerful mail steamer, the "William Denny," runs fortnightly between Sydney and Auckland, and thus links New Zealand to the London of the Pacific. The run across occupies about a week; the fares, however, are high – £8 fore cabin; £13 and £15 saloon.

New Zealand and Australian traders (mostly smart brigs and schooners of about 200 tons) sail every week from Auckland and Wellington (say once in three weeks from the other settlements) for Sydney or Melbourne. Their run across may average about ten days, and their charge for cabin passage is about £10.

The General Assembly have it in contemplation to put on a fortnightly mail-steamer between Sydney and Wellington; and to place two powerful

LAND ROADS.

screw-boats on the coast to complete an almost weekly service between Auckland, New Plymouth, Nelson, Wellington, Canterbury, and Otago. Some arrangement of this nature will unquestionably be carried out ere long; for no enterprise would be more beneficial to the colony, or more profitable to the undertakers. 102

LAND ROADS. – As yet, New Zealand's artificial, made, roads, are confined to mere circles of country surrounding the settlements. But by beach, or by inland paths, plains, and passes, the country is traversable from north to south. From Auckland to New Plymouth it is a rough, seven days', foot coast-road by the native villages and Squatters' stations along the beach and cliffs; and from New Plymouth to Wellington, through Wanganui, it is a similar but better, ten days', road – practicable both for horse and foot. 103 There is also an inland, and an east coast, foot-road, by native paths and villages, from Auckland, by lake Taupo, or by Ahuriri, to Wellington.

"BUSH TRAVELLING."

Visitors and colonists "bush travelling" in New Zealand, generally provide themselves with a native attendant, as guide, caterer, ferryman, and companion; carry a couple of blankets, some tobacco and a little tea, trust to native villages for pork and potatoes; and bivouac at night round a mighty forest fire of a dozen trees. Twenty miles a day is fair progress; and with a comrade, a smattering of the native tongue, and a couple of guides, New Zealand "bush-travelling," (in variety of adventure, in scenery, in ludicrous mishaps, and robust enjoyment alternated by fits of intense disgust,) beats a Highland tour by a hundred per cent., and dwarfs the ascent of Mont Blanc to the dimensions of Cockney sparrow-shooting.

Land travelling, in the South Island, is generally done on horseback. A visitor or exploring emigrant would now ride from Nelson to Canterbury in about eight, and from Canterbury to Otago in about twelve days: stopping at some sheep or cattle station almost every night. Stock, even now, is occasionally driven from Province to Province; and in another year or two "bush hostelries" (the nuclei of little villages) will probably spring up by ferry, plain, and pass, along the entire line of ride 700 miles, from Nelson and Wairau to Invercargill and the Bluff.

78 An Admiralty "Blue Book, price 3s. 6d., sold by Stanford, 6, Charing Cross, called "The New Zealand Pilot," gives an admirable description of every bay harbour and anchorage in New Zealand; and should be in the possession of every commander of a vessel visiting New Zealand.

79 The projected "Waiuku cut" will unite the Waikato and the Manakau, and bear inland canoes and small craft up to Onehunga, – the western port-town of Auckland.

80 (Explanatory Note.) – An excellent jetty, substantial wharfs, and many harbour improvements have been made since this was written. Rents would now be much higher; and the "five acre lot" which her lord bought, would be more likely now to fetch £400. The preliminary "roughings" alluded to in this letter were, in part, the necessary consequence of those "evils of delay" pointed out in the chapter on the Philosophy of Emigration.

81 A handsome new Government house has since been erected near the old site.

82 A metalled road, equal to any English turnpike road, has since been made to Onehunga.

83 The fair housekeeper's provision, "price current," is correct enough even for the present time, but she is certainly no judge of fish. (See page 122.)

84 I mark this passage in italics because of its importance and general truth.

85 Owing to the exertions of the New Plymouth members in the House of Representatives, a Bill is likely to pass the General Assembly for the enlargement of the New Plymouth Province. It is proposed to extend the northern boundary so as to include the small port of Kawhia and the intermediate coast country. I trust that in a few years provincial boundaries will be things virtually forgotten and inoperative; but meanwhile, it seems only reasonable that the limited area of New Plymouth should at least be so far enlarged as to give her one harbour – even if that one be only a third-class harbour. Indeed without Sir George Grey, in dividing New Zealand into provinces, was influenced by a sort of facetious recollection, that the most valuable articles were generally done up in the smallest parcels, it is difficult to imagine on what principle of partition or spoliation, he gave Auckland seventeen millions of acres, Wellington twelve, and New Plymouth only three.

86 It should be remarked, however, that the absence of a harbour is a cause of delay and anxiety rather than of actual loss or danger. Of the hundreds of ships of all sizes which have discharged and loaded at New Plymouth during the course of fifteen years, there has only been one wrecked. There has never been a single loss of life in landing passengers or in any other way; and in the fine weather which prevails, cargoe is probably shipped or discharged by the (now) fine boat service of New Plymouth, as safely and expeditiously as it is in any port of New Zealand.
Extract from Admiralty "Blue Book," mentioned page 195.
"Nine miles southward of Cape Egmont the cliffs terminate, and the coast from thence round to the Sugar Loaf of New Plymouth is low and rocky, with sandy or shingle beaches. Cape Egmont itself has no distinguishing feature, being a slight projection from the general curve: it bears from the summit of the mountain W. by S. distant 15 miles. 3 1/4 miles south of the Cape is Harriet Bay, a sandy beach two miles in extent, where the vessel before mentioned ran on shore and was lost; her anchor may still be seen buried in the sand, flukes uppermost; this bay is about the only spot on the coast where a vessel could beach herself, as from all other parts rocky ledges extend for some distance from the shore.
"MOUNT EGMONT, standing alone as it does, and rising from a plain of inconsiderable elevation, is although not the highest, certainly the most strikingly remarkable mountain in New Zealand, and may be seen from a vessel's deck in clear weather distinctly from a distance of more than a hundred miles. It rises in a perfect cone from a base of thirty miles in diameter, to a height of 8,270 feet above the sea, and presents nearly the same appearance, viewed from every point; its summit, which is an extinct crater, is flattened, and is covered with perpetual snow for nearly a quarter of its entire elevation. A saddle-shaped eminence rises to the N.W. of the mountain to a height of 4600 feet, as a kind of off-shoot; and in the same direction, three miles from the coast, is another range of a similar character, but much lower.
"The approaches to the coast between Wanganui River and New Plymouth have not yet been extensively sounded; in a line parallel with, and 15 miles off shore, there are from 35 to 45 fathoms, dark sand; when Mount Egmont bears N.N.E, the water deepens, and abreast Cape Egmont, at the distance of nine miles, there are 37 fathoms mud; to the northward of the Cape there are 35 and 38 fathoms sand and stones, 2 1/2 miles from the shore; but vessels rounding this Cape are recommended to give it a berth of five miles, as outlying shoal spots are reported to exist.
"NEW PLYMOUTH, or TARANAKI. ** – This settlement and roadstead is nearly 20 miles north-eastward of Cape Egmont; it is well marked from seaward by the Sugar Loaf Islands, and by the still more remarkable dome-shaped hill Paretutu, or main Sugar Loaf, as also by its proximity to Mount Egmont.
"The settlement flagstaff is immediately above the landing-place, and close to the occupied portion of the town site; from it Mount Egmont bears S. 1 deg. 12' W. {true) 14-45 miles, and Moturoa, the highest of the Sugar Loaf Islands, N. 77 deg. 43' W. {true) 2.05 miles.
"The roadstead extends from the Sugar Loaf Islands to a line north of the flagstaff. At an average distance of 1 1/4 mile from the shore there is an uniform depth of from 10 to 12 fathoms. It is, however, not prudent for vessels of any size beyond coasting craft to come within this depth; as the bottom becomes very foul, with a reef and an irregularly attached rocky ledge extending out a long half mile from the shore, a short distance westward of the flagstaff. The reef and ledge breaks in moderate weather, and shelter the landing-place from the prevalent S.W. winds and swell.
"ANCHORAGE. – The best anchorage is in 12 fathoms at low water, with the Wesleyan Mission school, a remarkable building standing on elevated ground midway between the town and Sugar Loaf Islands, in a line with Mount Egmont bearing S. by E. 3/4 E.; and the Seal Rock, midway between the two large Sugar Loaf Islands, bearing S.W. 1/2 S. The flagstaff will then bear S.E. by E. 1/2 E. distant 1 3/4 mile.
"The roadstead is open to all winds from S.W. round by North to E.N.E. (18 points of the compass).
"The general nature of the bottom appears to be rocky ledges, covered with a thin coating of dark coloured sand, but north of the settlement it is strewed with large boulders and shingle. Vessels often experience a difficulty in weighing from the foul ground below the sand; a stout crown rope to insure canting the anchor should always be employed. *** There is at all times a swell in the roads, and a vessel must be prepared to leave with the first symptom of a N.W. wind.
SUGAR LOAF ISLANDS (Nga-motu) are a remarkable and appropriately-named group; the most lofty and striking of these Sugar Loaves (Paratutu) rises from a low point of the adjacent main land as a sharp cone to an elevation of 503 feet. The inner islet (Motu-roa) is similar in character and 266 feet high, whilst the outer (Motu-mahanga) is saddle-backed, with a conical summit 190 feet high.
"There is a deep passage between these islands, avoiding Barret reef a half tide rock, lying half a mile westward of Motu-roa, and passing on either hand of the Seal Rocks, a cluster of some extent, the highest part having 35 feet elevation.
"WINDS AND WEATHER. – During the summer months (from November to February) there are generally regular land and sea breezes, the latter from S.W., and light winds off the land during the night.
"In the winter season the weather is variable, but the spring and fall of the year bring the strongest gales. S.W. or W.S.W. is the prevailing quarter; these winds throw a heavy swell round the Sugar Loaf Islands into the anchorage. S.E. is the fine weather quarter, and with this wind Mount Egmont is usually clear. N.W. winds, which blow directly on shore, seldom blow home, and are generally preceded by a swell from that direction; they do not come on suddenly, but back round from N.E. and north.
"TIDES. – It is high water on full and change days at 9h 30m, when the range of tide is 12 feet. In the offing strong currents are experienced, influenced by the winds: after S.W. gales or N.E. current has been experienced, the rate of which along the land was fully 1 1/2 knot.
From "Hursthouse's New Plymouth."
"'North-westers' raise a heavy sea and surf; but these are of comparatively rare occurrence. South east, off the land, south-west, to west-south-west along the land, broken by the Sugar Loaves, are the prevailing winds. With the first, the roadstead is as smooth as many harbours; with the others, ships can generally ride with ease; and, from the observations of seven years, it may be safely said, that there are certainly not more than 100 days in the year when vessels could not discharge in perfect safety. The weather here has one almost invariable course; for instance, with the wind from the usual quarter, south-east to west-south-west, it is generally bright and fine; when a change occurs, the mountain becomes hidden, and the wind shifts gradually by east, north-east, and northwest, round to its old quarter, – squally at first, then lighter, and fine weather again sets in. It should be well noted that in this change, the wind moves steadily on from the fine-weather quarter round to the north-west, and thus gives ample warning.
"On the approach of a 'north-wester,' a ship, to avoid the risk of losing an anchor, should stand out a few miles, steering about west by south, so as to make a fair wind of the southwest breeze, which invariably soon follows; and she might generally return to her anchorage the following evening.
"Mount Egmont, usually clear, and the Sugar Loaves, always to be seen fifteen miles off, are such excellent landmarks, that a strange vessel could not mistake the place. The Sugar Loaves are three rocky pinnacles two and a half miles southwest of the town; the first, about 400 feet high, is on the main land; the second rises from the sea, nearly three quarters of a mile off; and the third is about the same distance still further out. There is a good deep passage between the outer ones. With the exception of a small reef, about a quarter of a mile south of the flag-staff, running out half a mile in a northerly direction, and the one as shown in the present map, but which is out of the way of shipping, there is not a single obstruction in the roadstead. Neither is the place embayed, but stands boldly out, so that any vessel anchored in the right position, yet, by gross negligence, caught in a 'north-wester,' would clear the outer Sugar Loaf, and, if necessary, weather Cape Egmont, twenty-five miles distant, bearing by compass from the anchorage south-west by south; when, of course, she could either lie-to, or, if bad weather were likely to continue, in ten hours fetch Port Hardy. If, while a vessel was discharging here, the wind veered suddenly from any smooth-water point to west, and blew a gale, this would then be a bad lee-shore, and the ship, (if a dull sailer) would probably not succeed in beating off; but as, for a dozen years, no instance of such a shift has occurred, it is reasonable to suppose that it never will occur."

** "See Admiralty plan No. 1995, by Captain Stokes, R.N. Scale, m=3.0 inches.
*** "Formerly a set of moorings, capable of holding a ship of the line, were laid down by the New Zealand Company to show the best anchorage. From the constant friction of a portion of the bridle chains (2 1/4 inch iron) on the hard bottom, and possibly a chemical action from the peculiar volcanic character of the district, the links were worn to one half their original stoutness in two years, and parted while a ship of 500 tons was riding by them. A duplicate set of moorings and two buoys are now lying at the landing-place; but the original mooring anchors, of about 70 cwt., and ground chains, have never been weighed.
"These moorings were far too large, and in the event of its being found expedient to lay down others, anchors of 35 cwt. with proportionate chains would suffice. The present trade of New Plymouth scarcely warrants this outlay, neither can it support the constant expense and attention that moorings thus situated demand. It must also be observed that the settlement offers no resources for any repair of iron work, in the event of the moorings requiring it; and that for their examination, a large sailing vessel must be especially equipped for the service; this vessel while so engaged would have no harbour of refuge within 115 miles.
"The advantages to be derived from moorings in so exposed a situation are very problematical; an organised boat establishment (now in existence) would prevent the necessity of large vessels risking their ground tackle by anchoring at all, and prove vastly beneficial to the general trade of the settlement, at a comparatively trifling expense.
"In general, landing can only be effected in a whale boat, or surf boat for general purposes, and under the guidance of an experienced resident boatman. The government establishment consists of a beach master and pilot, and a coxswain to take charge of the cargo boats (capable of carrying about three tons each) with a whale boat for general purposes, and these boats perform all the duties of the settlement, both public and private. From the beach master's report of several years' experience, he considers that a boat may be launched from the beach six days out of the seven, and the cargo boats worked five days out of seven on an average." – Extract from a Report on the Anchorage, by Mr. F. J. Evans, Master, and Assistant Surveyor, H.M.S. Acheron, made in 1849.

87 Where? 0, Brother!

88 An official naval report of this coal is given in the "Mineral chapter."

89 The present capital of the province in Blind Bay, however great its local advantages of site, is not the natural or accessible outlet-harbour for this noble granary and wool store of the Nelson country. If at an outlay of £100,000 it were practicable to connect a new port-town on any of the noble harbours of Queen Charlotte's Sound with the Wairau, and the Wairau with this line of interior districts and the frontiers of Canterbury, such outlay would be amply justified by the result.
For a good port-town in Queen Charlotte's Sound, commanding such a cornucopia as this eastern portion of the province would then prove (climate, centrality of position, and all advantage considered) would, I think, unquestionably become the real capital of New Zealand.

90 "Owing to rapids and scattered fragments of rock, it was not possible to examine this river (Bligh Sound, Bounty Cove, south lat. 44 deg. 52', east long. 167 deg. 32') beyond two miles from its mouth, when the Acheron's party came on the fresh foot-marks of some natives, who were heard making their escape through the thick underwood: – these people, as far as we could learn, belong to a small isolated and almost unknown tribe, rarely seen even by their own countrymen, by whom they are called wild men of the mountains." – {From the Notes of Captain Stokes, H.M.S. Acheron)

91 Lyttelton is named after Lord Lyttelton, a noble pillar of that English association which created Canterbury.

92 The pastoral merits of Canterbury have somewhat obscured her agricultural capabilities. The heaviest crops of wheat I ever saw in New Zealand, or in any part of the world, I saw on the Canterbury plains; and should wheat ever pay better than wool in New Zealand, and become the leading export, no two provinces will, I think, produce more of such export than Canterbury and Otago.

93 NATURAL SCENERY. – "With regard to the natural scenery of the province, some settlers who came out with very romantic expectations, have expressed considerable disappointment. Banks' Peninsula with its mountains, forests, and deep inlets of the sea, presents many beautiful landscapes. The northern and southern portions of the province consisting of open downs and ranges of hills of moderate height, also afford much picturesque scenery. The great Canterbury plain itself, about a hundred miles long and fifteen to fifty wide, being nearly flat and devoid of trees, has a somewhat dreary and monotonous appearance; which will, however, be to a great extent removed when the orchards and ornamental trees, planted around the homesteads, have had time to grow up. The want of variety in the foreground is, however, much relieved by the fine mountain range which bounds the horizon to the westward; and also by the smaller hills of Banks' Peninsula to the eastward. The great western range is distant about forty miles from Christchurch, but in certain states of the atmosphere is so clearly seen that a stranger to the country would suppose it to be within twenty. From the town in clear weather the mountains can be seen over a length of two hundred miles; some of the highest peaks in sight being upwards of 9000 feet above the level of the sea. In winter when the peaks are clothed with snow, from crest more than half way down, these southern Alps assume an aspect of grandeur and sublimity which can be equalled in but few parts of the world. The Canterbury plain being bare and exposed to winds, shelter is required for gardens and orchards, and can be obtained in about five years' time by planting Australian forest trees, which grow more rapidly than either English or New Zealand trees. Some seeds of the Blue Gum or Eucalyptus, of Van Diemen's Land, one of the most valuable timber trees of Australia, brought over by the writer and sown in a garden at Christchurch, have within four years grown into saplings above twenty feet high." – Hodgkinson's Canterbury.

94 Let us mount behind an old Canterbury colonist, Sir Thomas Tancred, and ford a frantic Canterbury "Styx."
"No more desolate scene can be easily witnessed than is presented to the solitary horseman who has to ford one of the wider of these streams, such as the Waimakariri or the Rakaia. After descending from one or two high terraces by very steep slopes, which appear to have been ancient banks to the river, you come to the present bank, from which you behold a wilderness of shingle and sand of perhaps a mile wide, with separate streams meandering through it. It is necessary to be very cautious in determining whether the river is sufficiently low to be crossed, or whether, from the melting of snow in the mountains, it is swollen; for such is the rapidity of the streams, and such their icy coldness, that if of above a certain depth, the horse would be swept off his feet, and the rider probably be benumbed and perish. They thus become impassable, except at a ferry, for weeks together at certain times of the year. On descending into the shingly bed, as the horse plods his way slowly over the boulders, or through sand-drifts, the stranger is struck with the utter desolation of the scene – appearing as if just left by an infuriated torrent, which has swept down and half buried the trees; whose bleached and withered arms appear here and there sticking out of the shingle, amidst a mass of reeds or withered grass. The wailing of the sea birds which soar about, adds to the impression: they seem to be anticipating a feast on the adventurous traveller; and the peculiar cry of the Paradise duck, as he rises from a pool, seems to show how seldom a traveller disturbs the solitude; and sometimes a strong wind, rushing down the river bed, carries with it such a cloud of sand, that objects are invisible beyond a short distance.
"Arriving now at the brink of the first stream, into which the river is divided, the experienced eye will determine by the water being clear or discoloured, whether it is in a state to be crossed; or whether the snow-water makes it white and turbid. In the former case, he proceeds to ride slowly up the stream, avoiding the still current, where it is deep, and selecting a place where the water ripples over a shallow bed. Having entered the stream, the swiftness with which it dashes past, roaring over the stony bottom and splashing against the horse, is apt to make the rider giddy; and, except by keeping the eyes fixed on the opposite bank, it is very difficult at first to know whether the horse is advancing or going backwards, or sideways: so that altogether the sensation is by no means agreeable, and it is a considerable relief to gain the opposite side."

95 "As a proof of the fertility of the soil of Canterbury, with regard to potatoes, perhaps the following is without a parallel: Mr. George Weston, of Kaiapoi, last week dug from one root, to the amount of forty-two; the two largest weighing nearly three pounds; and the whole weighing sixteen pounds, – this was a first crop on land newly broken up." – Standard, April 17, 1856.

96 The Tui can sing like Fanny Hayes, and dance like Gruubine. (See p. 119.)

97 Dunedin (the ancient name of Edinburgh) has preserved more traits of its peculiar origin than any of the settlements. Auckland, New Plymouth, Wellington, Nelson, and Canterbury, are cosmopolite Free-traders. Dunedin is not only Scotch, but even provincially Scotch, and protective.
Here, I think, Dunedin is behind the times. When six little settlements were planted in the New Zealand wilderness by different bodies, it might be well that during their tender infancy, and whilst they remained mere local villages, they should retain certain distinctive features of their early origin. But surely, when such infant settlements have gained years and strength; and have been raised, by other powers, into capitals of vast territories – embracing the whole of New Zealand – they should throw off bib and tucker, and dress and demean themselves fittingly to the high rank to which they have been called. Whilst Otago was a "clachan," and a dozen cabbage plots in the South Pacific, Free Kirk might suffice to nourish her; but now Otago is an unpeopled Province of New Zealand, virtually as large as Scotland, she must draw support from other sources – or die of atrophy or inanition.
The Free Kirk of Scotland, were it twice as numerous and twice as "emigrationary" as it is, could no more colonise and fructify the noble province of Otago, than the "Three Tailors of Tooley Street" could represent the people of England.
I respect the virtuous sorrows of the Scotch Lion; admire Burns where I understand him; have encountered Haggis; and regard Highland regiments, Highland lassies, and Highland hills, as three of the best things in Britain. But I would respectfully observe to the handful of "Kindly Scots," who (as yet) rule the young state of Otago, that they should scowl less at sight of "Southron Loon;" and would hint that though the puritanical Covenanter of Old Mortality is a picturesque personage enough in a book, yet, revivified and planted in the flesh at Dunedin in 1857, he would be a human hedgehog of the sourest mien, a public nuisance, and a social pest.
English emigrants, don't journey to Otago to pull down Free Kirk – but to make the desert flow with milk and honey; and (indirectly) to make the Free Kirk flourish; and there is ample room in Otago's broad domains for shamrock, rose, and thistle; Free Kirk, Chapel, and Church.

98 An Australian trader of nearly 200 tons now manages to ascend this inner water, and loads at Dunedin.

99 Otago Witness. – By the arrival of the "Star" from the Bluffs, we learn that the "William Hyde" was at Invercargill, landing her cargo of 2000 sheep from Sydney. The "Star" ascended New River 17 miles, thus saving the settlers a considerable sum in land carriage.

100 Is not this a remarkable physiological fact? Jacob's River, it is to be recollected, is a mixed community: Whalers and Natives, and the progeny of these, half-castes.

101 The Snares, a group of Islets sixty miles S.S.W, of Port Pergasus, form the land-mark and point of departure which the Australian Homeward-bounders generally sight, in running past the south end of New Zealand.

102 The whole distance from Manakau to Otago and back, calling at Taranaki, Nelson, Wellington, and Canterbury, both going and returning, is in round figures 1700 miles; which would give altogether about nine days' steaming to a person making the entire round of the Provinces.

103 Cattle and sheep are driven from Wellington to New Plymouth. I was one of the expedition which first opened this route. Many of the coast natives had, then, never seen a "cow-cow;" and in rushing our cattle at the Waitotara river, some of the native ladies, who were watching the operation from the other bank, caught up the children and took to flight.

CHAPTER X. GOVERNMENT – REVENUE – PATRONAGE....

THE NEW CONSTITUTION.

CHAPTER X.

GOVERNMENT. – REVENUE. – PATRONAGE. – CIVIL, RELIGIOUS, AND EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS.

GOVERNMENT. – The Bill creating the New Zealand Constitution was carried through the British Parliament by Sir John Pakington, the Colonial Secretary of Lord Derby's Administration, in 1853. It confers representative institutions and ample powers of self-government on the 50,000 colonists of New Zealand; and never before, probably, were the destinies of so fine and so large a country entrusted to the guidance of so small a body of people.

The Act consists of 82 sections; and the following is a short summary of its leading provisions: –

1. The Queen appoints the governor of the colony and its two judges, and takes from the colony's public revenue £16,000 a year for a civil list; being £2500 for the governor's salary, £1800 for the judges, £4700 for the establishment of the general government, and £7000 for native purposes; and the Queen (as yet) provides all military and naval forces, consisting at present of two regiments and a sloop of war.

2. The general government of the colony is vested in a tripartite body, styled the "General Assembly:" composed

THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.

of a governor, a legislative council, and a house of representatives, meeting in annual session (at present) at Auckland; and which makes all laws for the colony, save the local laws, made by the provincial councils.

3. The legislative council (the upper house), consisting at present of some fifteen members, is chosen and created for life by the governor; the house of representatives (the lower house), consisting at present of thirty-six members, is elected by the colonists every five years; but may be dissolved sooner by the governor, and is annually summoned and prorogued by the governor at pleasure.

4. Every adult colonist or native, owner of a freehold worth £50, or leaseholder of an estate at £10 per year; or town tenant householder at £10 a year; or country tenant householder at £5 a year, – is qualified both to vote for, and to be, a member of the house of representatives.

5. Bills for the making of laws may originate with either house or be recommended by the governor. After a bill has passed both houses by a majority, it is laid before the governor for his assent. If he refuse his assent, the bill is lost; if he give his assent, the bill becomes law. But it is sent home, and may be disallowed by the Queen at any time within two years from the date of its receipt in England; and if it be thus disallowed, all acts done under it in the colony, after the date of such receipt in England, are illegal, null and void. 104

VESTRY-PARLIAMENTS.

6. The colony' is divided into six provinces – Auckland, New Plymouth, Wellington, Nelson, Canterbury, and Otago. Each province is locally governed by a "Provincial Council" – a sort of Vestry-Parliament, composed of an officer called a superintendent, and certain provincial councillors, elected by the provincial colonists – the qualification for voter, member, and superintendent, being the same as for the house of representatives.

THE NEW CONSTITUTION.

7. Superintendent and provincial council (not consisting of fewer members than nine, but enlargeable at the governor's pleasure) to be elected every four years by the electors of the province; but the governor may disallow the superintendent's election within three months; or remove him at any time on an address from a majority of the council; and may dissolve the council at pleasure.

8. Superintendent may summon and prorogue his provincial council at pleasure; but there must be a session at least once a year. Superintendent and provincial council may make laws for their respective provinces save and except as by the following Clause of the Act: –

"XIX. It shall not be lawful for the superintendent and provincial council to make or ordain any law or ordinance for any of the purposes hereinafter mentioned; (that is to say)

"1. The imposition or regulation of duties of customs to be imposed on the importation or exportation of any goods at any port or place in the province.

"2. The establishment or abolition of any court of judicature of civil or criminal jurisdiction, except courts for trying and punishing such offences as by the law of New Zealand are or may be made punishable in a summary way, or altering the constitution jurisdiction or practice of any such court, except as aforesaid.

"3. Regulating any of the current coin, or the issue of any bills notes or other paper currency.

"4. Regulating the weights and measures to be used in the province or in any part thereof.

"5. Regulating the post-offices and the carriage of letters within the province.

"6. Establishing, altering, or repealing laws relating to bankruptcy or insolvency.

"7. The erection and maintenance of beacons and lighthouses on the coast.

THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

"8. The imposition of any dues or other charges on shipping at any port or harbour in the province.

"9. Regulating marriages.

"10. Affecting lands of the crown, or lands to which the title of the aboriginal native owners has never been extinguished.

"11. Inflicting any disabilities or restrictions on persons of the native race to which persons of European birth or descent would not also be subjected.

"12. Altering in any way the criminal law of New Zealand, except so far as relates to the trial and punishment of such offences as are now or may by the criminal law of New Zealand be punishable in a summary way as aforesaid.

"13. Regulating the course of inheritance of real or personal property, or affecting the law relating to wills."

9. Any provincial bill passed by a majority of the provincial council, and assented to by the superintendent, is submitted by the superintendent to the "governor for his approval. The governor may refuse his approval or assent any time within three months; but if he once give his assent, the bill becomes provincial law, and is not subject to any after " veto " of governor or Queen.

10. The General Assembly (with the consent of the Queen) may create new provinces, increase the number of members of the house of representatives and of the provincial councils, alter the electoral qualification, and alter and increase the powers of the provincial councils – which latter it has already done to a most suicidal extent in empowering the six provincial councils to make laws for the sale and disposal of the wild lands of the colony; thus setting aside the wise original restrictive clause No. 10, in italics as above.

11. The Queen may establish municipal corporations to

POPULAR MINISTRY.

be subject to the provincial councils; and may proclaim certain districts to be exceptional districts where the natives shall not be held as subject to British law.

12. No private individual to purchase or lease any of the wild lands of the colony from the natives. The right and power of buying wild land from the natives to belong strictly to the Queen, and only to be delegated to the governor of the colony or superintendent of a province.

13. Though such essence of good government is not provided for by the letter of the constitution, the governor is advised and chiefly guided by an executive ministry: consisting of the colonial treasurer, the colonial secretary, and the attorney-general; and of gentlemen without office – all members of the General Assembly, and commanding a majority in the lower house. And the superintendents of provinces are also advised by local executives, consisting of similar local officers, and of other members of the provincial councils.

REMARKS ON THE CONSTITUTION.

The reader will perceive by this elementary abstract that, setting aside the provincial councils, which we may term "rural municipalities," the constitution of New Zealand bears a strong infantile resemblance to that of the mother country. The governor is the Queen, taking a more personal part in public affairs; the legislative councillors are the created (life) peers, and the house of representatives is the elected House of Commons; whilst in each constitution, we find the executive ministry of the country leaning on the people's representatives for support.

Taking the New Zealand Constitution as a whole;

DEFECTS OF THE CONSTITUTION.

looking at principle, at detail, at the peculiar self-amending elements which enrich it; casting a retrospective glance at the form of government which it has supplanted, – we must certainly esteem it a good measure, creditable to imperial legislation.

Like all human measures, however, it exhibits serious defects and great capabilities of amendment; and, to me, it seems that its serious defects are these: –

1. The semi-retention of the power of "Veto."

2. The non-elective constitution of the legislative council.

3. The creation of the six provincial councils. 105

Veto. – Blooming daughter as New Zealand is at "sweet fifteen," it may be well that a prudent mother, however distant, should retain the power of correcting youth's mistakes till the young queen of the Pacific is twenty-one. But the Constitution has preserved the power of Veto in so partial a form, that the tendency of it, is to build up one power of the legislature on the ruins of another. The acts of the General Assembly are, the acts of the Provincial Councils are not subject to the Veto. Now the retention of the Veto is popularly regarded

"VETO" PARTIALITY.

in the colony as a remnant of tyranny, a thing to be got rid of. The means of getting rid of it are patent – the General Assembly has only to delegate its legislative functions to the Provincial Councils, and the veto-tyranny is evaded. Infinitely the most valuable power which the Constitution conferred on the colonists was the power of dealing with the "wild lands" (the true exchequer) of the colony – a power forming the golden lever whereby population, that want of wants, could alone be moved into the colony. This pearl of powers, the General Assembly made over to the Provincial Councils: instigated to such fatuous impolicy, partly by the consideration that, thus, Veto would be evaded. Two evils presented themselves: if the General Assembly set up any one general system of land and emigration policy, such system (under the Veto power) might be pulled down any day by a gentleman sitting in Downing Street – if they gave the work to the Provincial Councils to do, the result would be the evil of six clashing local systems; but these Veto and Downing Street could not pull down again. Smitten by momentary blindness, the General Assembly deemed the latter the least evil, and chose it; and thus, by one act, surrendered up the brightest jewel of the Constitution, the true key of government, to half a dozen "vestry-parliaments." I am aware that other considerations moved the General Assembly to this transference of its powers. But even if the Veto had no weight in influencing this particular case, the

THE LIFE PEERS.

general argument against the partial operation, of the Veto would in nowise be impaired. These propositions are undeniable: the colonists govern themselves by two legislative organs – they regard Veto as an abuse – one of their legislative organs is subject to this abuse, the other is not – therefore they will naturally seek to govern themselves by the latter. Under such pressure, the General Assembly, stripping itself of power after power, committing political felo de se, might die of inanition in pampering the Provincial Councils.

It seems to me, therefore, that the Crown should either renounce the power of Veto, or make each of our semi-rival organs of Government, subject to its operation.

NON-ELECTIVE CONSTITUTION OF THE "LEGISLATIVE Council." – Bearing in mind that New Zealand does not yet contain a larger population than a second-class English town, I think that this extra machinery of Legislative Council and Double Chamber might, at present, have been well dispensed with. Having put it in the Constitution, however, its admirers should unquestionably have made it elective; required a six-fold property qualification; and sent every man to the hustings. The Legislative Council, in its present form, is a mere plated House of Peers: emasculating representative government, impeding public business, tripling circumlocution. A glaring instance of its vicious operation has lately been exhibited. Auckland, the little metropolis of

LONDON AT THE ORKNEYS.

New Zealand, is situated much as London would be were London planted at the Orkneys. The House of Representatives (the House of Commons) has just voted for removing the seat of legislation to Wellington, a port-town in the very centre of the island group. The Legislative Council (the House of Peers) nearly half of whom are Auckland merchants and landowners, 106 of course votes for retaining the Court at Auckland; the Governor sides with the Peers, and London (for the day) remains at the Orkneys. If 200 Liverpool merchants were raised to the peerage – if the question arose of removing the British metropolis to Liverpool – if the Commons voted that it should remain in London – if the Peers voted that it should be removed to Liverpool – -if the Queen backed the Peers, the Commons yielded, and London did go to Liverpool – what would my indignant Cockney reader say as to the political state of the country? Would he not embrace Chartism and cool himself with Frost? Yet, comparing small things to great, this, virtually, is the present political "difficulty" of New Zealand. The Constitution empowers the Governor to create as many of these Plated-Peers as he pleases; 107 their property qualification is ridi-

THE PROVINCIAL COUNCILS.

culously low, and when any obnoxious "People's measure" was passing the House of Commons, he might create as many more of these tools as were needed to defeat such measure in the House of Peers. I am aware that the whole spirit of the Constitution is opposed to any such stretch of prerogative; the colonists would instantly rebel against it, and it may never be attempted. But this Legislative Council, even in the subdued sphere of its functions, can only be regarded as an obstruction; and Conservative Sir John Pakington should either not have created it, or, creating it, should have made it a popular high-qualification Double Chamber, triennially elected by the people.

Creation of the Six Provincial Councils. – I regard this as the great blunder of the Constitution. Auckland, New Plymouth, Wellington, Nelson, Canterbury, and Otago, are six little settlements planted on the New Zealand coasts, some 200 miles apart, with average populations of less than 10,000 each. These parish-populations may truly be termed model populations: they consist of educated, well-to-do pioneer colonists, requiring so little rule and guidance that a magistrate-mayor, half a dozen councillors, and two policemen would amply suffice to administer the local affairs of each.

VESTRY "SILVER STICKS."

Stripped of verbiage and figures of speech, two and two make four in New Zealand precisely as they do in England; and political quacks and constitution-mongers alone excepted, we must all see, that as simple municipalities are sufficient to administer the local affairs of communities of 100,000 Englishmen in England, simple municipalities would have been amply sufficient to administer the local affairs of communities of 10,000 Englishmen in New Zealand

But, here, the bounteous framers of the Constitution appearing to think that as New Zealand was the "antipodal-opposite" of England, any governmental machinery constructed for New Zealand must be the "antipodal-opposite" of the common sense of England, have virtually given each of these six parish-populations a Lieutenant-governor, an Executive Ministry, a Local Parliament, an Attorney-General, and a Secretary of State – and if "silver-stick," and "gold-stick," and "groom of the posset," had been added, the parochial foolery would have been complete. Surely this is busking the baby in jack boots and chain mail at the imminent risk of losing the infant in his armour. But the admirers of the Imperium in imperio, the blind Fox, 108 and divers very provincial councillors, plead that the

FORTY ENGLISH KINGS

baby will grow. He will, and when grown to giant manhood the snug municipal garment would be amply equal to his dimensions.

We call New Zealand the Britain of the South; we plant the rose, the shamrock, and the thistle there; we give freely to the patriotic fund; we get loyally drunk on the Queen's birthday; we consume vast quantities of roast beef; and emigrants though we are, we delight to be John Bulls. Why, then, should we make so monstrous a departure from anything English or British as to set up these half-dozen bastard little parliaments! Why should we not tumble this foreign frippery of "gold-stick," and "silver-stick," and "wooden-stick," and "His Honor the Superintendent," into our lumber-room; give every little town, present and to come, its honest mayor and aldermen; give each its members to the New Zealand House of Commons; and attempt to govern New Zealand as the wisdom of twenty generations has elected to govern England: namely, by a strong, central, general Government, springing from and representing the people? Mr. Fox (with parliamentary eloquence) "we pause for a reply!"

Had our ancestors given each English county a local king and parliament, what would local kings and parliaments have brought us to by this time? Should we not have illustrated the "house divided against itself," and the fable of the "bundle of sticks"? Might not the British lion have been dwarfed to the proportions of the Kilkenny cat,

PROVINCIAL COUNCILS.

Russian have been the law language of Scotland, Devonshire a province of France, and Derby a conquest of York? – Mr. Fox, again we pause for a reply!

The excuse made for setting up these Provincial Councils was worthy of the stolidity which conceived them. It was gravely alleged that our six New Zealand parishes had such different ailments wants and origins, and were so far apart, that no single "General (medicinal) Government," could possibly cure and embrace them. Now the idea of any one of our little settlements affecting any peculiar ailment and demanding a special treatment, may well remind us of the hypochondriacal fine lady who was instantly cured by a bucket of water and a good shaking. Doubtless each might have different little wants: Auckland a quay, New Plymouth a jetty, Wellington a water-cart, Nelson a pump, Canterbury a stained window, Otago a new, brick kirk. But we take a fan, not a handspike, to knock down a gnat, and a quick-acting municipality would have supplied all these little local wants, far better than a lumbering tripartite machine of local governor, local ministry, and local parliament; each costing its unfortunate 8000 subjects an average of £12,000 109 a year to keep it in motion. Each settlement or province had (and has) the one great overriding want of getting peopled – a want, compared to which, all its

PROVINCIAL COUNCILS.

other wants, united, are but as leather and prunella; and this "king-want" it would get supplied infinitely better under some sensible policy of general government and general emigration system, than under any little mosaic quack policy of its own.

As to Origin, – if each infant settlement had a different father, each had a common mother. Traces even of their semi-distinctive origin are fast wearing away, each (except Otago) is becoming cosmopolitan in character; and if Norfolk and Suffolk were now to remove themselves from the government of Westminster because their origin was East Anglian, they would exhibit nothing more than the provincial stupidity which New Plymouth or Otago might exhibit in refusing allegiance to a general New Zealand Government, because their origin was Devonian and Caledonian.

The argument that the six infant settlements were too distant from each other to be governed from a common centre, is the argument that Perthshire, Tyrone, Cornwall, and Cumberland, could not be governed from London. The six settlements, or Provinces, join each other; as population spreads, as infant towns arise, and the beautiful wilderness becomes dotted with spires and villages, the very boundaries of the Provinces will be socially obliterated; and if the seat of government were removed to Nelson, and two weekly screw-steamers plied up and down the coast, the capital of New Zealand (far more centrally fixed than the capital of Great Britain) would be reached from any one of the

PROVINCIAL COUNCILS.

other five settlements more easily than Westminster was reached a few years ago by half the country members. And if this were done, and if each town or settlement had its mayor-magistrate and municipality for the conduct of local affairs, it is not the slightest exaggeration to say, that a General Central-Government could legislate for all parts of New Zealand quite as befittingly and effectively as a General Central-Government legislates for all parts of Great Britain.

The creation of these pretentious Provincial Councils, in the room of modest municipalities with town and rural-belt jurisdictions, was unquestionably a blunder; and the inherent evils of the blunder have been aggravated by the legislative "exemptions" and "privileges" with which the Constitution has endowed such Councils. We have seen that they are exempt from the Veto – they have, too, the privilege, of personally representing themselves in the General Assembly : every Superintendent of the Provincial Councils is a member of the House of Representatives. 110 Now at the passing of our New Zealand Reform Bill, we heard a great deal from Mr. Fox and Mr. Wakefield about "balance of power," and how beautifully one branch

ENEMIES IN THE HOUSE.

of the New Zealand Constitution was to check and regulate the other, as in the English Constitution. But, if a large proportion of the House of Commons was allowed seats and votes in the House of Peers, what sort of check or "balance of power" would be maintained between the two branches of our imperial Legislature! Surely, if we must suffer such an institution as the Superintendent of a Provincial Council, we might with great propriety request his "Honour" to keep at home with his Council, and not to come into our General Assembly, sapping the foundations of our General Government. If a bill were before the House of Representatives repressing the powers of Provincial Councils, would not every Superintendent be likely to vote against it; and if a bill were before the House extending the powers of Provincial Councils to the gradual destruction of the House of Representatives, would not every Superintendent be likely to vote in favour of it? The more legislative power he could help to strip from the General Government, the more legislative power he and his satellites the local councillors would have to divide among themselves. Indeed I can only regard their "Honours" in the House of Representatives as enemies in the camp; and should "greatness be thrust upon me," and I ever be thrust into the New Zealand House of Commons (the author of the "Lily and the Bee" has been thrust into the British Commons), I should esteem it a public duty to make any Provincial Superintendent I

SUPERINTENDENTS AT HOME.

found there as uncomfortable as possible; and, despite "Punch," should conclude a weekly philippic at him with the "Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes" – a course of persecution which we might hope would eventually drive him to accept the Chiltern Hundreds, and to hurry back to the obscurity of his provincial parish, considerably enlightened as to the fact, that among the Commons of New Zealand he, at least, was not "the right man in the right place;" and that for the future it would be advisible to confine himself to local pumps and paving, and to write up in his Council Chamber, directly over his Speaker's chair, "Ne sutor ultra crepidam."

Mr. Fox writes an excellent little book on New Zealand, and then calls it "The Six Colonies of New Zealand." Does he know the meaning of the word? Does Bath consist of eight cities? England and Wales of forty countries? New Zealand is one colony, at present consisting of six parish-settlements, and to call her anything else is a misnomer. Build New Zealand up as one united colony, under a strong General Representative Government, and her natural gifts will create her the home of "thousands," and she may well become Britain of the South and Island Queen of the Pacific. Yield to the insensate cry of her "Ultra-Provincialists;" allow their half-dozen little vestry-parliaments to destroy her General Assembly, and to dominate the State; split her up thus into half-a-dozen rival little communities, with half-a-dozen

UNION AND STRENGTH.

clashing codes of laws; – do this, and we open a true Pandora's box, cast in the apple of discord, sow broadcast the seeds of jealousies and animosities, and create such elements of strife that, as Italian history may show us, stranger sights might come to pass in the next century, than the sight of Great Britain, in the year 1900, landing an army in New Zealand to repress the fury of an internecine war. 111

If union be strength anywhere, it is strength and life too in a young country like New Zealand. The Provincial Councils are in their very nature

CONSTITUTION RECAST.

opposed to union. As yet, they are only ambitious municipalities – but look to the chance of their rampant growth, and to the inevitable consequences of their rampant growth! Look to the possibility of their rending New Zealand into Mr. Fox's six petty, independent, colonies, to their pouring out on us the evils of the "Imperium in imperio" in a six-fold form! They are young now: fang and poison bag are not developed – but it is easier to crush the adder's egg than to crush the adder; 112 and he who could sweep Provincial Councils from the New Zealand Constitution, would do the State good service, and merit a people's crown.

Mindful of Phaeton's fate, recalling the "Cobbler and his last," aware that "Fools rush in where angels fear to tread," I would nevertheless venture to recast our New Zealand Constitution in manner following; and would respectfully recommend my proposal to the serious consideration of Messrs. Fox and Featherston, and the inflated "provincialists" of obstreperous Wellington.

1. Retain the imperial " Veto" (at present); but limit the period for its exercise to one year.

2. Lop off the two excrescences of the Constitution: the plated House of Peers and the Provincial Councils; and retain only its soul and substance, the House of Representatives.

3. Re-christen this body the House of Commons, enlarge it one-fourth, and make it a triennial Parliament. 113

CONSTITUTION RECAST.

4. Create Nelson the permanent central seat of government; and summons the Commons to hold an annual winter session there, of three months. 114

5. Constitute Russel, Auckland, New Plymouth, Wanganui, Wellington, Ahuriri, Nelson, Lyttleton, Christchurch, Dunedin, and Invercargill, municipalities, with full municipal powers, and wide "rural-belt" jurisdictions; and give each a mayor and civic councilmen. When any new settlement contained a thousand European inhabitants, create it a Municipality.

6. All public offices (other than municipal) to be in the gift of the executive ministry. Such ministry, as at present, to consist of members of the House of Commons, and to hold office only while they can command a majority there.

Such I think are the defects, and such the capabilities of amendment, exhibited by our New-Zealand Constitution. The manner, too, in which the Constitution was inaugurated has tended to aggravate the inherent evils of these defects. Governor Sir George Grey unfortunately called the Provincial Councils into existence before the General Assembly: the subordinate element of the Consti-

CHARONDAS, THE LOCRIAN.

tution thus obtained a certain unfair start and prominence which has created great bickering and confusion, especially in the financial department of legislation. Smitten by momentary blindness, the General Assembly, (as if the Provincial Councils had not already power enough to nullify the very spirit of the Constitution,) actually altered the Constitution, in order to strip themselves and heap on their subversive provincial rivals the one most valuable power which the Constitution had specially entrusted to their hands – the power of dealing with the wild lands. The first three sessions of the General Assembly were chiefly wasted in political splits and personal dissensions: none would "serve in heaven," all would "reign in hell;" and a "ministerial crisis" stopped the wheels of government about every second week. So many laws were discussed, so few passed, so great was the cry so little the wool, that it is well for honourable members that His Excellency Governor Wynward was not "Charondas," the Locrian; 115 and the Provincial Councils stimulated by the acquisition of the imperial power of the "Wild Lands Purse," have displayed symptoms of desire to grasp at universal dominion, by making the House

THE NEW CONSTITUTION.

of Representatives (the true House of Commons of the country) a subordinate element of the Constitution, and the tool of six insignificant municipalities. Nevertheless, when we cast a retrospective glance at the sort of government which formerly existed in New Zealand, and which has been feebly stigmatised in my "Historical Sketch;" when we look at the peculiar self-emendative nature of our new Constitution; and at the free spirit which it breathes, we must, I think, despite its present failures and defects, gratefully admit that it is, substantially, both a great and a good measure. And if Provincial Councils will only abate their high pretensions, take "vis unita fortior" for their public seal, and ever remember that for New Zealand "Union is life as well as strength;" and if every New Zealand colonist in exercising his political functions will bear in mind, that in these early "unpeopled-wilderness" days, the true end and aim of all our legislation should be the attraction of Population to the country; we may reasonably hope, now that our true legislative leaders are revealing themselves in the crowd, and are becoming more practised in the new art, that New Zealand under her new Constitution will work out for herself a vigorous Representative Government worthy of her position as the young Britain of the South.

I must apologise to the reader for these long and dry remarks on a very prosaic subject. I am no politician; and should deem the arrival of a

NEW ZEALAND QUEEN'S SPEECH.

1000 pure merinos or 100 good family emigrants in New Zealand, a far more momentous affair than the arrival of a ministerial crisis or the suspension of a provincial superintendent. But in a work even of this unpretending character, it has seemed to me impossible to pass the Constitution over without one word; and the one word has led to many. I will close the subject by presenting the reader with the New Zealand "Queen's speech," the Address in reply, a glimpse of the "House at night;" and the "Prorogation," together with the names of the honourable members of the New Zealand House of Commons (the New Zealand peers are not sufficiently important to merit the like distinction), and if the reader should ever help to guide the State in New Zealand, I trust his political cry will be – repression of "provincial council vestries," and sovereign power to a Central Parliament.

GOVERNOR'S (QUEEN'S) SPEECH ON OPENING THE FOURTH SESSION OF THE NEW ZEALAND PARLIAMENT AT AUCKLAND, APRIL 15, 1856.

"Honourable Gentlemen of the Legislative Council, and Gentlemen of the House of Representatives, –

"Various causes prevented the last assembly from legislating on many subjects materially affecting the welfare of the colony, and it has been reserved for you to undertake that important duty.

"Questions involving numerous conflicting interests remain for your consideration and adjustment, and in the solution of these difficulties an arduous task awaits you.

"To enable me to call to my councils advisers possessing

THE QUEEN'S SPEECH.

the confidence of the General Assembly, is naturally a subject which will engage your earliest attention. This may be considered the corner-stone on which all other legislation should be built; and I now repeat, in the most explicit terms, the assurance which I gave on the prorogation of the last Assembly: that I would give my confidence to the gentlemen who possess the confidence of the Legislature; and that whenever changes became necessary, I would allow no personal feelings to influence my public conduct.

"I doubt not that the gentlemen who accept from you a responsibility conferring such an honourable distinction on themselves, will consign to forgetfulness all of the past which has no reference to the future; that they will arm themselves with a determination to disregard all private interests; and that devoting themselves heart and soul to those of New Zealand, they will declare what ought to be enacted for the welfare of the colony at large.

"Such conduct will insure the respect of opponents, and the esteem of Englishmen, not only in this colony but throughout the empire; not only at the present time but in the future, when party feelings and local interests have been obliterated and forgotten, and history records the strength or weakness of those who guided the infant steps of a great country.

"If, on the contrary, the men chosen for this honourable trust should prove unequal to it, looking for the applause and preferring the interests of a party or a province to that of the colony at large, then will the power they are unable to wield remain but a moment in their nerveless grasp; and, once released, it will oscillate backward and forward until seized on by statesmen worthy of their adopted country: statesmen strong in the rectitude and integrity of their intentions, and regardless of all considerations which can in any way hinder the progress of the public weal.

"Such are the men whose counsel I desire, and by whose advice I hope to be guided.

"I rely entirely on your patriotic aid, and feel assured

THE QUEEN'S SPEECH.

that, however divided you may be by political or party feelings, your best efforts will always be directed to secure the interests of the inhabitants of this country, mindful that their welfare depends on our efficient and faithful exercise of the powers vested in us by the Imperial Government.

"My recent visit to the different provinces has enabled me to bear testimony to their general prosperity, and to the evident signs of progress and improvement in each and all of them.

"I have witnessed with great satisfaction the strong feelings of loyalty and attachment entertained throughout the colony to the throne and person of our gracious Sovereign; and I feel deeply grateful for the cordial reception everywhere accorded to myself as Her Majesty's representative.

"Information has been prepared on various subjects, with a view to enable the gentlemen honoured by your confidence to lay before you certain measures of importance: among them I may mention a proposal to extinguish the claim of the New Zealand Company, on terms which are therein explained; another for a uniform postal communication with the mother country; the improvement and extension of our own overland posts; and an alteration in the custom laws; and I trust you will lose no time in authorising the formation of a commission, with full powers to settle the many vexed questions connected with land claims, and for the quieting of disputed titles.

"Another subject will, I trust, engage your early attention, namely, the propriety of adopting some plan of final audit for the accounts of the general government, which will be more satisfactory than the one at present in force.

"Gentlemen of the House of Representatives, –

"The utmost economy has been practised in the expenditure of the funds placed at my disposal by the late House of Representatives. The fullest accounts shall be sub-

THE QUEEN'S SPEECH.

mitted for your approval, and the most complete information afforded to your inquiries.

"I have to request you to make an early provision for the repayment of £14,086 11s. 5d. advanced by the Union Bank of Australia, being part of a sum of thirty thousand pounds obtained under sanction of a resolution of the late House of Representatives.

"Gentlemen of the Assembly, –

"Your deliberations will be viewed with interest in the mother country; for whether in Great Britain or the colonies, Englishmen watch the proceedings of their legislative bodies with the greatest attention.

"But the Legislature of this colony has no reason to shrink from such a scrutiny; for while adopting all that is good in the laws and usages of our native land, it has a cause for congratulation of which few other lands colonised by Europeans can boast.

"In order to form this flourishing and rapidly-increasing colony, no property has been wrested from its native owners; no hospitality has been violated; no laws of humanity or justice have been trampled under foot. The land, enriched by the sweat of our brows, has been honestly acquired, and is rightfully enjoyed. Nor, when we consider that, in place of a dreadful form of idolatry, we have communicated to the natives a knowledge of the blessings of Christianity, and of the arts and appliances of civilisation, can it be urged that the advantages of colonisation have been exclusively on the side of those who gave money and received wild land in exchange.

"These are considerations which make England proud of her youngest colony – and she has reason to be so. Situated in the same relative position in the southern hemisphere; similar in size to Great Britain; like her, separated from other lands by broad seas; possessing the same natural advantages and colonised by the same hardy race – New Zealand cannot fail to become the Britain of Australasia.

THE "ADDRESS" IN REPLY.

"Free institutions, deeply graven in the hearts of Englishmen, the glory of the British nation, framed, amended, and maintained by the wisdom and perseverance of successive generations, have devolved on you as an inheritance. To them we owe much of that enterprise and independence which have been and are the characteristics of our nation in all parts of the world. They have been transplanted for you in their maturity, and their broad shadow spreads already over this favoured land.

"The history of the growth of these institutions during a thousand years in our native country would be but a tale that is told, and the retrospect of the past but an idle dream, if they teach us no lessons of wisdom. May we profit by them; and when time has consigned all who now hear me to the stillness of the grave, and children's children have succeeded to the inheritance of their fathers, may those who will then review the acts of this Assembly feel for you that admiration and esteem which we cannot withhold from the time-honoured men to whom we owe our origin and our laws.

"THOMAS GORE BROWNE.
"Auckland, April 15, 1856."

COMMONS' "ADDRESS" IN REPLY.

"We, the Commons of New Zealand, assembled in our House of Representatives, acknowledge, with sentiments of deep respect, the address delivered by your Excellency at the opening of the present session.

"We desire to convey to your Excellency the expression of our gratitude for the prompt manner in which you have given effect to the principle of ministerial responsibility in the conduct of the executive affairs of government.

"We entertain no doubt that the relations proposed to be established between your Excellency and your responsible advisers will secure the efficient carrying out of that principle.

"Fully sensible of the duty which devolves upon the

THE COMMONS' ADDRESS.

General Legislature of the colony, of maintaining unimpaired the authority and functions which are reserved to the General Government by the Constitution, it will be our earnest endeavour, as one of the branches of that Legislature, to join in exercising those functions in cordial co-operation with the provincial authorities, and with as little interference as possible in all matters within their own municipal sphere.

"Whatever measures may he submitted to us through your Excellency's responsible advisers, shall receive our best consideration. And we pray you to accept this assurance of our desire to co-operate with your Excellency in whatever may promote the welfare of the colony and maintain the public credit."

"A NIGHT IN 'THE HOUSE.'

"To the Editor of the 'New Zealander.'

"Sir, – As few of our country electors may have the opportunity which I had last night, in the House of Representatives, of witnessing the tournament between the 'Fox opposition' and the Ministry you will oblige me by giving insertion to this letter: emanating, as it does, from one unaccustomed to sights so new and so attractive.

"Though my politics are such as would cover me with infamy at Athens (I am a scrupulous adherent to the maxims of neutrality), and notwithstanding that many of my friends and neighbours have endeavoured to convince me of the dangerous tendency of my opinions – I still persist in my indifference to the 'party cries' of the commonwealth.

"But, Sir, to use the language of the honourable and learned gentleman whom I am about to name, and whose talents I admire, a few more nights' attendance in the "gallery" would, I fear, be the means of causing me to 'abnegate' (this word I have learned in

A NIGHT IN THE HOUSE.

the House) the dictates of prudence to which I have clung so long.

"Yesterday evening, about six o'clock, I observed an unusual haste in the pace of every pedestrian whom I saw marching through Princes Street. I inquired of one, a 'progress man,' if there was a review or a sham battle at the Barracks? 'Na, na,' said he, ' but there is to be a real battle in some ither ilk. Ye hae read i' the papers o' what the Highland Brigade did at the battle o' the Alma – and to-nicht ye sail see what they can do in Auckland. The Ministry is aboot to be ow'rthrown and turn'd oot.'

"Well, I joined the 'progress' man, and arrived at the House, happily before all the seats in the gallery were occupied; sat down, and contemplated with pride the scene before me – the General Assembly of New Zealand – the miniature of England's glory, her Imperial Parliament. The Speaker in the chair, grave, sedate, and impartial – the descendant of a race coeval with the Norman dynasty, and the professor of a faith which, like the descendants of his race, survives the war of minds as they have withstood the shock of matter. With the glance of a phrenologist, I scrutinised the head of every member who sat within range of my view; and, like many phrenologists, drew conclusions which the subsequent debate proved to be utterly fallacious. After the usual formula of parliamentary practice, appeared the champion of the night, the redoubtable Mr. Fox – unpopular in this province for having stigmatized the Auckland citizens in his Book; and (as they hint) verifying in himself the epigram: –

"'Says Maria, though tears it may cost,
It is time we should part, my dear Sue,
For your character's totally lost,
And I haven't sufficient for two.'

But notwithstanding the prejudice entertained against him here, he made a bold commencement; and followed up the assault with the skill and energy of a practised debater.

FOX, PITT, AND CANNING.

His arguments reminded me of the wars of the Goths: the triumphant barbarians demolished the finest temples of Grecian and Etruscan art, but Gothic skill was too rude to raise up any fabric so elegant in their place. What magnificent promises are made by statesmen out of office! And, as I am fond of classic reminiscences, I was pleased when Mr. Fox re-enacted the part of the Greek candidate – who having promised his supporters privileges before unheard of in the republic, his modest opponent gained the election by simply saying, 'What my rival has promised, that I will do.'

"Mr. Fox is an astute sophist, endued with all the resources of forensic strife; but he failed in the demonstration of a most important problem – one, alone, which would have established his character as a financier, namely, that one-third of the revenue and a half-crown per acre from the land fund, would be sufficient for the maintenance of the General Government.

"In his eagerness to succeed Mr. Sewell, he seems not even to possess the justice of Pilate – he has not the patience to ask 'What evil hath he done?' No! he and the 'Progress faction' would hurl the hon. member for Christchurch from the Tarpeian rock, without a trial, and without a hearing. The attempt of the opposition to dislodge the ministry, however, succeeded about as well as the efforts of the Russians to expel our Grenadiers from the rifle pits before Sebastopol: they were met at every point, foiled in every attack.

"As it is an opinion sometimes entertained in the country by those who have no opportunity of hearing the debates of the General Assembly, that the speeches therein delivered are like those of our "Provincial Council" orators (the mumbling of a few disjointed sentences, to be arranged by the reporters), I take this opportunity of recording my opinion, that many of the speeches which I heard last night would have done credit to any legislative body in the world.

"Mr. Stafford of Nelson, and Mr. Featherstone of

PROROGATION OF PARLIAMENT.

Wellington, are the Pitt and Canning of our little Senate; and Mr. Fitzherbert, from the South, is also an able and emphatic speaker. As few of the Auckland representatives lay any claim to the rank of orators, except the Provincial Secretary, we expected, when he rose, to hear something – but the mountain laboured, and the Cicero of 'Progress' stammered out five minutes' incoherent verbiage, and finished off with a Latin quotation, which ought to have been –

"'Risum teneatis, amici?'

"Many of my 'bush friends' who have had the honour of making their occasional salaams to his worship, the Resident Magistrate, may be anxious to know how he comports himself when he aspires to make the laws, instead of administering them. Well, – he sits as mute as a statue! Whoever has read Homer's description of the Grecian chiefs sitting round, deliberating for their country's safety, may fancy he beholds Ajax, 'huge, sullen, and silent,' and he will realise the beau ideal of the gentleman at whose bar misdoers tremble."

PROROGATION.

On Saturday, August 16 (1856), his Excellency the Governor, accompanied by the Commander of the Forces, the members of the Ministry, his Excellency's Aide-de-Camp and Private Secretary; attended at the Chamber of the Legislative Council for the purpose of proroguing the General Assembly: The Speakers and Members of both Houses being present, his Excellency took his seat in the Speaker's chair, and proceeded to read the following address: –

"Honourable Gentlemen of the Legislative Council and Gentlemen of the House of Representatives, –

"I am happy to be able to release you from the duties of a protracted and laborious session.

BILLS OF THE SESSION.

"The zeal and assiduity which you have displayed in the consideration of the various questions of importance which have come before you deserve, and will, I feel assured, obtain, the approbation of the colony.

"The measures which you have passed relate to important questions which have for some time past engaged the attention of the colony, and with respect to which legislation could not have been deferred without detriment to the public service. 116

PROROGUING PARLIAMENT.

"Amongst the most important measures of the session, are those financial arrangements by which it is proposed to provide for the debts and liabilities of the colony, and equitably to apportion the public burdens. The confirmation of these measures by the Imperial Government will, it may be expected, wholly remove a most serious cause of discontent and mutual jealousy amongst the provinces.

"Measures passed during the present session have vested in the provincial authorities the administration of the waste lands and land revenue. It cannot be doubted that a judicious and economical application of the territorial revenue to works of public utility in the districts where it arises, and under the supervision of those most interested in its proper application, must tend to accelerate the settlement of the country. Such will, I trust, be the result of the prudent exercise by local bodies of these large powers.

"The nature of the customs tariff had long given rise to general complaint. Amongst other grounds of objection, its minute enumeration of articles subject to duty, was vexatious alike to the revenue officer and the importer; occasioning great loss of time, expense, and other inconvenience. The alteration now made will, I hope, be received with general satisfaction: based as it is on a recognition of the principle, that revenue should be raised in the most simple and inexpensive manner; and, so far as possible, raised from those articles of luxury which are the most legitimate subjects of taxation. In dealing with this most important branch of revenue, it was an obvious duty to avoid impairing the public income. The new tariff secures this object without curtailing the comforts of the people.

"During the present session, the Assembly has given legislative sanction to a body of rules respecting the pleading and practice of the Supreme Court, which constitute a complete code of procedure in civil cases. For

PROROGUING PARLIAMENT.

this valuable accession to the laws, the colony is mainly indebted to the labours of Chief Justice Martin, who, aided by the present Acting Chief Justice, has devoted several years to the completion of this important work.

"Gentlemen of the House of Representatives, –

"I thank you for the liberal provision which you have made for the public service, and especially I have to acknowledge the additional provision for the maintenance of the office I have the honour to hold. The supplies which you have granted will be applied with a due regard to economy in the public expenditure.

"The sums voted for steam communication will not only effect the establishment of a rapid and regular postal service in this colony; but, in connection with the recent arrangements entered into by the Imperial Government and the Australian colonies, will probably secure communication by steam between Great Britain and New Zealand.

"Honourable Gentlemen of the Legislative Council and Gentlemen of the House of Representatives, –

"The relations established at the commencement of the session between my responsible advisers and myself, with reference to the government of the aborigines, still subsist. It is my intention, however, to refer this important question for Her Majesty's consideration and decision: meantime, those relations will continue unaltered.

"The session now about to close furnishes an additional instance of the vigour and success with which a free Legislature is enabled to act, when assisted in its deliberations by Ministers of the Crown possessing the confidence of the people; and gives earnest of the good results to be expected in this colony from a popular form of government.

"I do now prorogue the General Assembly of New

THE NEW ZEALAND MINISTRY.

Zealand to Wednesday, the 1st day of July, 1857, and it is hereby prorogued accordingly.

"THOMAS GORE BROWNE.
"Auckland, 16th August, 1856."

THE NEW ZEALAND MINISTRY. 117

Name.

Member for.

Office.

Salary.

Henry Sewell, Esq.

Canterbury.

Colonial Treasurer.

£700

C. W. Richmond, Esq.

New Plymouth.

Colonial Secretary.

£700

Hon. F. Whitaker

(In the Peers.)

Attorney-General.

£600

E.W. Stafford, Esq.

Nelson.

Without office.

There is, I think, another without-office member of the ministry; and the commander of the forces is (ex officio) a member of the Cabinet, the secretary of war.

MEMBERS OF THE HOUSE.

THE NEW ZEALAND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES.

(THE HOUSE OR COMMONS.)

Note. – The six names in italics indicate the Superintendents of the Provinces. The List is as accurate as it has been possible to make it, and will be found substantially correct.

Name.

Member for.

Occupation.

Charles Clifford (Speaker)

Wellington

Squatter. 1

J. E. Featherstone, Esq.

"

Physician.

W. Fox, Esq.

"

Barrister.

J. Fitzherbet, Esq.

"

Merchant.

F. D. Bell, Esq.

"

Land Commissioner.

C. D. R. Ward, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

V. Smith, Esq.

"

Squatter.

A. Ludlum, Esq.

"

Editor and Proprietor.

Charles Brown, Esq.

New Plymouth

Landed Proprietor.

C. W. Richmond, Esq.

"

Barrister and Proprietor

A. W. East, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

J. L. Campbell, Esq.

Auckland

Merchant.

Major Greenwood

"

Landed Proprietor.

T. Beckham, Esq.

"

Police Magistrate.

J. Henderson, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

W. Lee, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

G. Graham, Esq.

"

Merchant.

C. J. Taylor, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

J. Williamson, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

J. W. Merriman, Esq.

"

Solicitor.

W. Brodie, Esq.

"

Merchant.

H. Carleton, Esq.

"

Editor and Proprietor.

W. C. Daldy, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

E. W. Stafford, Esq.

Nelson

Landed Proprietor.

W. T. L. Travers, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

W. Wells, Esq.

"

Squatter.

A. Domett, Esq.

"

Barrister.

R. Curtis, Esq.

"

Merchant.

C. Elliot, Esq.

"

Editor and Proprietor.

J. E. Fitzgerald, Esq.

Canterbury

Landed Proprietor.

D. A. Brittin, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

J. Hall, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

J. Cuff, Esq.

"

Surveyor.

Henry Sewell, Esq.

"

Solicitor and Proprietor.

Captain Cargill

Otago

Landed Proprietor.

J. Macandrew, Esq.

"

Merchant.

J. Cargill, Esq.

"

Agriculturist.

1   As some fair reader may have misgivings as to what a " Squatter" is, I may explain that a "Squatter" is one of those shepherd princes or pastoral aristocrats clipped in chap. 14. This gentleman, Speaker of the New Zealand Commons, and worthy scion of one of our oldest historical English families, is I believe, brother to the present peer, Lord Clifford.

Clerk to the House, F. E. Campbell, Esq.

THE RIVAL CAPITALS.

THE QUESTION OF THE SITE OF THE PARLIAMENTARY' METROPOLIS OF NEW ZEALAND.

The supposition that the central parliamentary government of New Zealand will long be carried on from a remote corner seat of government like Auckland, would be a supposition revolting to the common sense of the colony; and the cits and shopkeepers of Auckland would do well to cast off their huxter selfishness, and to begin to regard the government of New Zealand in some other light than in that of a means of "filling the till." Their argument, to use an expression, that the seat of government could not be removed from Auckland without endangering peaceful relations with the Auckland natives, if I may be pardoned the use of a vulgar, but fit word, is "bosh." If the Auckland natives were multiplied by twenty, they could not be allowed to obstruct the good government of the entire colony of New Zealand – but the truth is, that if the seat of government were removed from Auckland to-morrow, the Auckland natives would scarcely care to inquire whither it was gone. Make the Colonel of the Regiment, the Lieutenant-Governor of New Zealand, and leave the troops, the parades, drums, and trumpets, for the natives to admire; and they would still bring their pigs and produce to Auckland, and carry back their blankets and tobacco, precisely as they do now.

Indeed, although the Auckland burgesses may persist in kicking against the pricks and in hugging the delusion that their city is to remain the Parliamentary Metropolis of New Zealand, the question is already virtually decided the other way; and the Parliamentary Metropolis of New Zealand will, ere long, be permanently fixed at Wellington or at Nelson.

It appears to me that Nelson, on the whole, would be

THE RIVAL CAPITALS.

the better place of the two. In centrality of position, Nelson is so nearly equal to Wellington that, for all practical purposes, we may say she is quite equal; whilst she possesses certain climatic advantages and "volcanic immunities" which unquestionably endow her with a superiority over Wellington.

I have somewhere read (I think in the Rev. Mr. Taylor's excellent work on the New Zealand aborigines) that what has been spoken of as the "boisterous irritability" of the Wellington people, is occasioned by the boisterous, irritative, character of their peculiar climate. 118 The annual parliamentary session of New Zealand will unquestionably be held in what we call our winter months: members can then be better spared from their (general) rural pursuits; and winter nights, with lights, fires, curtains, and "dined" members of the hungry opposition, make up the most genial time for the in-door work of legislation. How far Mr. Taylor's curious theory may be correct, I cannot say; but this I think we may say – that the difference between the winter climate of Wellington and Nelson is such, that nearly as much legislation would be got through in two months in the latter place, as in three months in the former; whilst Nelson, in all seasons, would certainly be a more pleasant residence for the Queen's Representative and his little Court than boisterous Wellington.

But it is a more serious matter than mere boisterousness of climate which damages Wellington's metropolitan claims. The experience of fifteen years shows, that whilst volcanic action has virtually subsided, both in the north and south of New Zealand, and is seldom perceptible at Nelson, shocks of earthquake are somewhat severe in the immediate town and neighbourhood of Wellington.

Wherever the permanent parliamentary metropolis of New Zealand is placed, certain good and substantial buildings must be erected. Now I would ask any provincial councillor of the good city of Wellington whether, as a private speculation, he would lay out £5000 of his own

PUBLIC REVENUE.

money in building a stone or brick mansion there? I would not; and I should regard a £25,000 set of public offices in Wellington as the very reverse of permanent public property. It certainly would not conduce to the domestic comfort of the Governor to know that, any night, some little "volcanic eccentricity" might reverse his sleeping position; ministries shaken by earthquakes could never be stable ministries; and the spectacle of the Speaker toppled from his chair, would not promote the course of smooth and tranquil legislation.

These combined considerations induce me to believe that Nelson is the most fit and proper place for the Legislative Capital of New Zealand; and before the General Assembly actually removes from Auckland, I conceive they would do well and wisely to consider this point; so that when they do remove, they may remove, once for all, to the best place.

Public Revenue and Expenditure, and Financial Position. – New Zealand's annual Public Revenue is made up by two great branches: "Territorial Revenue," being the annual proceeds of the sales and leases of wild lands; and "Ordinary Revenue," being the annual proceeds of customs duties and petty items.

The gross revenue for the year 1857 may be roughly estimated as follows: –

£

Territorial 2

150,000

Customs

140,000

Post-office, Fees, Fines, and Licences

10,000

£300,000

2   The average territorial revenue for the last three years has been about £140,000 per annum. Of course, the more emigration, the more land-buyers, and if New Zealand should now become a popular emigration field, the annual territorial revenue of the colony might easily be raised to half a million, and the ordinary revenue to as much more. With respect to the customs branch, it should be observed, that the colonial treasurer does not estimate it at more than £100,000 for 1857. In making his calculation, however, he seems to have overlooked the fact that New Zealand even now is rising in estimation as an emigration field; that the reaction of peace may produce a great revival of emigration; and that thus, the arrival of emigrants, and consequently of duty-paying imports in New Zealand, for the present year may be considerably greater than it was in 1856.

LIGHT TAXATION.

The reader will thus perceive that "Customs Duties" (see Tariff, chap. XX.) is the sole public tax in New Zealand. I regard it as the best and simplest tax by which the public revenue of a young country like New Zealand could possibly be raised. The philosophical author of "Ultima Thule" 119 would, however, abolish customs and substitute a property tax. He intimates that customs is an unfair tax; because it charges the poor man a halfpenny on his pound of tea, and charges the rich man no more. Now there is no "poor man" in New Zealand; and Mr. Cholmondeley, if he be a practical man, well knows that the labourer in New Zealand can afford to drink "orange pekoe" tea, as well as his employer can afford to drink "common hyson." Again, if customs were abolished in favour of a property tax, the natives, who, as consumers of imports, now contribute largely to the revenue, would very unfairly

PUBLIC EXPENDITURE.

escape all taxation – for I apprehend that even "Ultima Thule" would not dream of catching the Maori for the property tax. Next to a Wat Tyler poll-tax, no species of tax is so odious and inquisitorial as a "property-and-income tax;" whilst as to its peculiar fitness for New Zealand, it may be sufficient, here, to remind "Ultima Thule," that to please the fiscal fancies of the northern rebel, Hone Heke, Governor Fitzroy (one 1st of April) abolished all customs duties in New Zealand, substituted a property tax; and, in three months, became bankrupt, and went back to customs, a poorer, perhaps even a wiser, man.

EXPENDITURE OF ANNUAL PUBLIC REVENUE. –

Having (at present) no fewer than seven public exchequers in New Zealand, viz. the one of the General Government and the six of the Provincial Councils – these latter having no good system of accounts, and exhibiting a slight disposition to scramble for the revenue and lay hands on all public monies coming within their reach – it is impossible to do more than to present the reader (in a following page) with a few semi-conjectural figures showing how the whole of the, estimated, public revenue was, probably, expended in the year 1856. The Stafford-Sewell Ministry, however, has shown a desire to reduce order out of chaos, and to lay down some clear financial policy for the entire colony; and the coming session of the General Assembly will, I think, define and adopt

PUBLIC DEBT.

some financial policy, of which the leading features will resemble these: –

1. The territorial revenue of each Province to be provincial revenue, expended by its Provincial Council.

2. The ordinary (customs) revenue of the six Provinces to be general revenue, expended by the General Assembly.

3. The New Zealand Company's debt, £200,000, and a loan (to be borrowed) of £300,000 to be capitalised as a public debt of half a million. The Imperial Government to be solicited to guarantee annual interest on this debt at £4 per cent, (a sinking fund of £2 per cent, being provided for the redemption of the whole in thirty years), and such annual interest to be paid partly by the Provincial Councils from the provincial chests, and partly by the General Assembly from the general chest. 120

The reader who owes no man a penny, will, I fear, be disgusted to learn, that young New Zealand, not yet of age, actually owes nearly quarter of a million. She did not get into debt, though, she was put into debt: strong A lost B's money, and then forced weak C to make good B's loss. In other words, Lord Stanley's Colonial Office of 1843 lost the New Zealand Company's capital, and Sir John Pakington's Colonial Office of 1853 ("might and right," "monkey and cat") made the unfortunate Pioneer Colonists, pay it back!

THE COMPANY'S DEBT.

Mr. Fox was instrumental in drawing up the Act of our New Zealand Constitution – I believe Mr. Fox is a great admirer of American history. Did it never strike the honourable member for Wanganui that if this New Zealand Constitution, carrying such a "black-mail" rider as this Company's "debt-clause," had been offered to the American colonists, they would have pitched it into the sea, along with Boston's tea chests? Logically and equitably, the colonists of New Zealand have no more business to pay this debt, than the colonists of Nova Scotia. Neither ought the New Zealand Company to lose a penny of the money. Their enterprise of colonising New Zealand was unquestionably a commercial enterprise, but it "was unquestionably a national enterprise; and an enterprise which would have been crowned with brilliant success save for the blighting opposition it experienced from the Missionary-Colonial Office. The New Zealand Company prevented New Zealand from becoming a French possession and the foreign mistress of the Pacific – the New Zealand Company are entitled to receive back every penny they lost; and if the Crown raised the chairman to the peerage, and presented the shareholders with £100,000 as a sort of "expiation-present," the Crown would fitly bestow both its honours and its money. If the "Lex talionis" were enforced, this debt would be liquidated in this wise: – Lord Stanley, of the Colonial Office of 1843, would be mulcted one-third; the Aborigines Protection Society, one-

THE LEX TALIONIS.

third; and Mr. Danderson Coates and the Church Missionary Society, one-third.

Great criminals, however, generally escape: we can touch neither the Knowsley rents, nor the Mission-box. Indeed, New Zealand colonists do not ask for retaliation – they ask but for common justice. The British public suffered a despotic public institution, a Colonial Office, to lose this money – in equity, the British public should make the loss good. Policy, too, as well as equity, might dictate this arrangement. It is essential to British prosperity that she should have good and prosperous emigration fields; it is better for British manufacturers, and for Britain, that our emigrants should go to New Zealand, a loyal British colony, and become consumers of British imports to the amount of £10 per head per annum, than that they should go to people a rival State, and consume British imports to the amount of only £3 per head per annum. This £200,000 given to New Zealand would do something to make her a more attractive Emigration Field; and whilst it would be a great sum for the daughter to receive, it would be a mere trifle for the mother to give. In short, I conceive that the General Assembly of New Zealand, before they assume this "black mail" debt to be a fixed imposition; and before, in their new financial policy, they seek to provide for it, would do well to appeal, finally, to the British Commons with a petition signed by 20,000 colonists praying the Honourable House to relieve the infant

GOVERNMENTAL EXPENDITURE.

colony from a burden, which it is nationally disgraceful that an infant colony should ever have been called on to support.

ROUGH ESTIMATE OF THE ASSUMED PUBLIC EXPENDITURE OF THE COLONY OF NEW ZEALAND FOR THE TEAR 1856.

GENERAL GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURE.

GENERAL GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURE.

GOVERNMENTAL EXPENDITURE

GOVERNMENTAL EXPENDITURE

COST OF PROVINCIAL COUNCILS.

PROVINCIAL EXPENDITURE. 121

PROVINCIAL COUNCIL EXTRAVAGANCE

PROVINCIAL COUNCIL EXTRAVAGANCE.

ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. – Except in some petty differences of detail, the civil and criminal law of New Zealand, trial by jury, &c, is exactly

LAW-COURTS AND JUDGES.

the same, and is administered the same, as in England. Two Crown-appointed judges, one residing at Auckland, the other at Wellington, constitute a northern and a southern supreme court, holding regular terms in the two capitals for the trial of civil and criminal cases, and occasionally holding a short assize in the other settlements. Mr. Attorney-General, Mr. Provincial-Solicitor, Serjeant Buzfuz and his brother spiders, may be seen catching flies here, just as in England. Flies, though, are fewer and less fat; and learned gentlemen, probably as unable to afford it, do not, I think, wear the "wig" in New Zealand. Intestate estates are vested in the Registrar of the Supreme Court. In each settlement there is a resident magistrate's court (answering to county courts) for the recovery of £20 debts or damages between Europeans, and &pound;100 between natives and Europeans. When adjudicating in any native case, the resident magistrate is generally assisted by a native assessor – a sort of native (civil) magis-

POLICE – PATRONAGE.

trate. Courts of this description, for the trial of such limited civil cases, and for the trial of common police cases, sit daily or weekly in every settlement. "Resident magistrates" are our only paid magistrates; but so many of the "great unpaid" have been created by different governors in New Zealand, that the initial J. P. is sometimes irreverently read as "judge of pigs." Auckland and Wellington have each a smart Police Force (about twenty men) composed chiefly of young natives, who make excellent constables. But theft and violence are exceedingly rare in New Zealand; and save for the occasional capture and incarceration of tipsy sailors, sawyers, or bush-settlers, even the Auckland police might sit in the watch-house and smoke quietly with Dogberry and Verges through the night.

PATRONAGE. – Virtually, New Zealand patronage is vested in the Governor, the House of Representatives, and the Superintendents of Provinces. The non-legislative officers of the General Government (consisting of about a dozen resident-magistrates, a dozen customs'-collectors, half-a-dozen land-purchase commissioners, and twenty to thirty survey, post-office, government, bank and treasury officers, at salaries varying from £150 to £500 a year, and as many more subordinate officers at £60 to £120 a year) would be appointed, chiefly, by the Governor – though strong private recommendation to any office by two or three members of the

PROVINCIAL PATRONAGE.

House of Representatives would probably have considerable weight with him.

Under the new principle of "Ministerial responsibility," our three or four legislative officers forming the public "Ministry" of the colony are virtually named by the Governor at the instance of a "majority" in the General Assembly – such Ministry being all members of the General Assembly, and for the most part members of that popular branch of it called the House of Representatives (the House of Commons).

The six Superintendents (salaries £600 to £800) sometimes at the recommendation and with the approval of their Provincial Councils (and ostensibly with the sanction and confirmation of the Governor,) 122 appoint some half-dozen provincial secretaries, treasurers and attorneys, and some half-dozen harbour-masters, police-superintendents, surveyors, land officers, inspectors, road-surveyors, surgeons and coroners, at salaries varying from £200 to £300 a-year; together with various petty officers at salaries varying from £50 to £100 a year.

RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS. – There is no "State religion" in New Zealand. There is a church

CHURCH AND STATE.

establishment of Bishop, Archdeacons and regular clergy; but it is an establishment supported by the voluntary contributions of its members, by certain endowments of the late New Zealand Company, by gifts and bequests of wealthy churchmen; and by pecuniary assistance furnished by societies existing in England for the extension of the Church abroad.

Canterbury, founded by members of the Church of England, and where, in the original scheme of the settlement, a considerable endowment of wild land was set apart for the Church, has lately had a provincial Bishop appointed to its See; and it is probable that, at Canterbury, the Church will receive certain recognition and support from the Provincial Legislature, and become the quasi state church of the Province, just as the Free Kirk (though in a less degree) may become the quasi state church in the Scotch, Free-kirk-founded settlement of Otago. But this is a mere exceptional instance, and the Church of England exists in New Zealand just as the Roman Catholic, the Wesleyan, or any other dissenting church exists – self-supporting and independent of State.

Six hundred pounds per annum formerly stood on the New Zealand estimates as the Bishop's salary: I think it would have been good economy to have continued this sum, in the civil list of the New Zealand Constitution. Whenever this "New Zealand Bishop's salary question" has been alluded to in the House of Commons, that

BISHOPS AND EXPORTS.

dapper draper, Mr. Williams, has started up and implored the House, in figurative blunders, to pause ere they fastened a state church on New Zealand.

"There be more things in the world than are dreamt of in thy philosophy," 0 "figure" of Lambeth! a New Zealand bishop is one of the most useful civil officers of State – he is both a producer of Emigrants, and a producer of Exports. With numbers of excellent people (Churchmen and Dissenters) the very sound of the words "the Bishop of New Zealand," his "Lordship of Canterbury," sheds an air of security, civilisation, polish and refinement over our long reputed, cannibal, wilderness of the Antipodes, which practically benefits and pays us. I have probably been brought into communication with more people who have emigrated to New Zealand, than any one individual who has ever taken part in the colonisation of the country; and I assert that, among secondary causes of attraction, the existence of a real Bishop or two in New Zealand, has done more in enlisting us emigrant recruits than the existence of a Constitution giving household suffrage. Whilst as real civilisers, as inciters to work, as theoretical teachers of the natives in the industrial arts, the Bishop and his staff (though they might make themselves much more useful in this way) do unquestionably help to produce a considerable portion of the colony's £ s. d. exports.

I would, therefore, pooh-pooh Mr. Williams' little bit of nonsense, and place £600 or £1000

BISHOP SELWYN.

a-year on the colonial estimates, as the salary of a Bishop, to be appointed by the General Assembly. Such a sum would not lure any sleek and slothful son of the church to "Ultima Thule," – but such a sum would materially increase the strength and usefulness of a New Zealand bishop, increase the profit of keeping one, and the General Assembly might always provide that he should be a man of the St. Paul and Selwyn stamp.

REGULATIONS FOR THE MANAGEMENT OF CHURCH PROPERTY IN NEW ZEALAND.

"LAND. – All Church lands and buildings are vested in the Bishop of New Zealand for the time being, in trust, for the purposes specified on the deed of conveyance.

"GENERAL CHURCH FUND. – The Bishop will publish from time to time an abstract of the account of the fund placed at his disposal for the general benefit of the Church in New Zealand. The details of this, and of all other Church accounts, will be open to public inspection on application to the deputy registrar, by payment of a donation of one shilling to the Church fund.

"ARCHDEACONRY FUNDS. – The Church funds in the different archdeaconries are managed by a board of five trustees; namely, the Bishop, the archdeacon, the senior clergyman of the chief town, and two laymen, appointed annually by the bishop, one on the recommendation of the clergy, and the other of the communicants. The Bishop may refuse his sanction to any recommendation of which he does not approve. An abstract of the account of the archdeaconry fund will be published, and the details of the account will be open to inspection on the terms above mentioned, at the office of the archdeacon.

"COLLECTIONS. – Collections for all religious and charitable purposes may be made at the Offertory, whether the

CHURCH PROPERTY.

Holy Communion be administered or not. Subscriptions of all kinds will be received and accounted for by the Bishop, clergy, and other trustees of the Church funds. The list of subscribers will be open to public inspection, as before, but will not be generally circulated.

"BUILDING OF CHURCHES AND SCHOOLS. – Contributions of land, money, labour, building materials, &c, for the building of churches and schools, will be met by a proportionate grant from the Bishop's general church fund, and by another from the archdeaconry fund. The amount of the grants will vary according to the state of those funds. The plans of the buildings must be approved by the Bishop, or by some person appointed by him. No endowments will be accepted subject to the condition of private patronage. Vacancies will be filled up by the ordination of those deacons whom the Bishop shall judge to be most qualified for the particular stations. As a general principle, the income of the clergy will depend on their length of service, their location upon their personal qualifications. Thus the Bishop will not exercise the right of pecuniary patronage himself, nor allow that power to others.

"ORDINATION.

"The bishop of New Zealand's Ordinations are usually held on Trinity Sunday, and the Sunday after Sept. 14.

"Candidates for holy orders are required to reside at least two terms in St. John's College, and bring with them –

"1. Letters testimonial from three clergymen in the diocese, or from three beneficed clergymen in England, countersigned by the Bishop of their diocese.

"2. Certificate of baptism.

"Before ordination, in addition to the usual subscriptions, they are required to sign a declaration, by which they pledge themselves –

"1. To go to any station to which the Bishop may appoint them.

CHURCH ENDOWMENTS.

"2. Not to acquire landed property, nor to engage in trade or agriculture, without his written consent.

"3. Not to leave the diocese before the end of seven years, without his written consent.

"4. To administer to all classes of persons within their districts, whether settlers or natives.

"EDUCATION.

"The following is the general plan of education proposed for the diocese of New Zealand, and already partially in progress.

"DEACONS. – The order of deacons is held officially responsible for the management of the schools and public charities of the diocese, under the immediate direction of the priests, and subject to the periodical inspection of the archdeacons. The religious instruction of the schools is especially under the charge of the deacons, who are required to attend for that purpose every day from 9 to 12, when at home and not otherwise reasonably hindered.

"MAINTENANCE OF CLERGYMEN AND SCHOOLMASTERS.

"An equivalent from the Church fund will be granted in money, for contributions in money, produce, or labour, made by the inhabitants of any district towards the support of a clergyman or schoolmaster. The Bishop will not pledge himself to maintain a clergyman or schoolmaster permanently in any place upon other terms. The Bishop recommends the adoption of the old practice of Easter offerings, which, in this country, will have the advantage of being made at the time of harvest.

"Endowment. – The endowment of the Church in New-Zealand will be conducted, as much as possible, on the following principles: –

"1. That all deserving persons shall be duly promoted after stated periods of service.

"2. That all similarly-situated persons shall receive the like emoluments.

"3. That an increase of income shall be secured to

CHURCH ENDOWMENTS.

every clergyman after stated periods of service, without the necessity of removal to another station.

"All contributions for endowment are therefore recommended to be made to the archdeaconry endowment fund, the income of which will be divided among all the clergy of the archdeaconry upon the above principles. The Bishop's general endowment fund will be applied to regulate the inequalities of the archdeaconry funds.

"Endowments restricted to particular places will be accepted, subject to the condition that the surplus income, beyond the proportion payable to the incumbent according to his standing, shall be added to the endowment fund of the archdeaconry.

"The following is the scale of incomes at present adopted: –

"1. Deacons and priests, £100 from 1st January following ordination as deacons. To increase £10 every year to the maximum of £300.

"2. Archdeacons, not exceeding £400 per annum.

"3. Bishops, not exceeding £500 per annum.

"The income of any clergyman coming to New Zealand from another diocese to be computed in the same manner from his ordination as deacon.

"The diocesan scale of salary will not be guaranteed to any clergyman who obtains an augmentation of income by engaging in any other duties than those which have been assigned to him in the Church.

"All Church dues and surplice fees are to be brought to the account of the archdeaconry fund.

"The deacons are allowed to take private pupils to be educated during the hours not occupied in the school. The archdeacons and senior clergy upon recommendation of the deacons are at liberty to recommend scholars from the parochial schools to be received by the deacons into their class of private pupils, from which the candidates for scholarships at the diocesan colleges will be selected by the bishop or examiners appointed by him. It is hoped that the direct way to the ministry of the Church will

CHURCH ORDINANCES.

thus be opened to every young man of piety and worth, in whatever rank of life he may have been born.

"The great importance of the diocesan system of education, in its bearing upon all the highest interests of the country, requires that it should be clearly understood from the first, that no deacon can be admitted to the order of the priesthood, whatever may be his qualifications, who shall have neglected the schools committed to his charge.

"PROBATIONERS. – For the same reason, the surest way by which a candidate for holy orders can recommend himself to the notice of the Bishop, will be by diligence and skill in the management of a school. So far as it may be found to be possible, no permanent distinction will be drawn between the offices of clergyman and schoolmaster. The great point to be kept steadily in view, is, to sanctify the work of teaching, by connecting it, in act or in hope, with the ministry of the Church of Christ.

"Candidates for holy orders are required to place themselves under the direction of the parochial clergy in the management of schools and public charities, till they are invited by the Bishop to keep their terms at the diocesan college. In return for their assistance, the parochial clergy are expected to direct them in their preparation for holy orders, and to exercise a fatherly care over their character and habits. Where a candidate has no near relations with whom he can reside, he will be required to live in the clergyman's house, and to conform to the regulations of the family. No candidate can be accepted by the Bishop without a full and particular testimonial from the clergyman under whom he has served.

"INDUSTRIAL TEACHERS. – It will often be open to those candidates who have been found ineligible for holy orders, to continue their connection with the Church as teachers of useful arts. For this reason, every scholar and student in the diocesan institutions, is required to practise some useful art, that he may be able to gain his livelihood, if he should not be admitted to the ministry."

COLLEGES – CURRENCY.

EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS. – No general state educational institutions have yet been provided in New Zealand; but from the peculiar bent and high intellectual character of the community, and from certain legislative indications, it would appear to be not improbable, that some state educational system will be organised, ere long, after the American models. In the meantime, the Bishop's college at Auckland, the grammar schools of Wellington and Canterbury, the Wesleyan training college, various private commercial academies, ladies' seminaries and the flourishing Sunday schools established by the various religious bodies, afford ample means of secular and religious training; and no Emigrant now going to New Zealand would be left without the means of giving his children that best of gifts – a sound classical and general education.

CURRENCY. – The currency is exactly the same as in England: each coin bears the same positive and relative value. The Government Bank and, at present, I think, the Union Bank of Australia issue notes; but notes are seen less seldom than in England; and three-fourths of our common everyday payments are made in gold and silver.

PRESS. – The "fourth estate" is well represented in New Zealand, the 50,000 colonists supporting four bi-weekly and five weekly papers. Differing, again, from our Banana friend, the "Englishman," I think that the New Zealand Press is con-

THE NEW ZEALAND PRESS.

ducted both with spirit and ability; and save at provincial elections, when it espouses opposite sides and certainly assimilates for a week or two to Dickens's "Eatanswill Independent," it is fair in style and moderate in tone. Indeed, we boast that our New Zealand papers, like Thackeray's "Pall Mall Gazette," are written by gentlemen for gentlemen; and fancy that the licence and vulgar personalities of the American press would scarcely sell in Zealandia.

Our New Zealand journals, however, would much extend their emigrationary usefulness, if they would make themselves less exclusively political. They plead that their subscribers are electors, keen local politicians, and that they must write to please these, the hundreds, who pay. But there are thousands at home who may pay some day: thousands who want to know what a man can do in New Zealand with £500, what progress is making in exports, what a fat sheep or a hapuka weighed, whose reaping machine made best work, what fruit appeared at the Horticultural Show, who grew the monster cabbage, &c., who would not care twopence to know about a "ministerial crisis," a Superintendent's speech, or the ratting of a provincial councillor. The editor of a London paper is sometimes unable to find in a whole batch of New Zealand journals, matter for a single column which would interest his emigrant readers! and I cannot but think that the New Zealand Press would materially help the colony abroad, and not hurt it much at home,

HINTS FOR THE PRESS.

if it would pitch half the anonymous balderdash received from "Indignant Electors," "Britons," "Baffled Beadles," "Provincial Councillors," "My-eye-is-on-hims," &c, &c, into the fire, and devote the columns so saved to "chips for home readers," and to "facts" for the Emigrant.

104 Mr. Fox, a leading colonist, who (in England) represented the political interests of the colony at the time of the passing of our Constitution Act, seems to have thought that the Crown had for the first time relinquished this "power of veto" in favour of New Zealand. Writing to his constituents in explanation of the Act, he says: –
"In the other Australian colonies all ordinances passed by the Legislature, even though assented to by the governor, are still open to disallowance by the Home Government. This in our Constitution is abandoned. The Governor may reserve laws passed by the general Legislature, for the consideration of the Home Government; but if he chooses to give his assent, that assent will be final, and they can never afterwards be referred home. And the Secretary for the Colonies expressly stated in Parliament that he should instruct the governor of New Zealand, never, unless in the most extreme cases, to refer any ordinances to the Home Government, but to give or withhold his assent at once, on his own responsibility. Laws enacted by the Provincial Councils cannot be referred home in any case."
Now as a private, non-political, colonist who, were he another Cincinnatus and even equal to the "Purple," would far rather guide the plough in New Zealand than help to guide the State, it is with considerable trepidation that I venture to differ from Mr. Fox on any such question as veto: I may illustrate Fox and Goose – still either the learned senator is wrong, here, or my copy of the Act is wrong. The Act runs thus: –
"`LVIII. Whenever any Bill which shall have been presented for Her Majesty's assent to the governor shall by such governor have been assented to in Her Majesty's name, he shall by the first convenient opportunity transmit to one of Her Majesty's principal Secretaries of State an authentic copy of such Bill so assented to; and it shall be lawful, at any time within two years after such bill shall have been received by the Secretary of State, for Her Majesty, by order in council, to declare her disallowance of such Bill; and such disallowance, together with a certificate under the hand and seal of the Secretary of State, certifying the day on which such Bill was received as aforesaid, being signified by the governor to the said legislative council and house of representatives by speech or message, or by proclamation in the Government Gazette, shall make void and annul the same from and after the day of such signification."

105 Some, perhaps rather inclined to paint the lily and perfume the rose, object that the taking of £16,000 a year for a Civil List is an arbitrary diminution of the people's "power of the purse." I don't defend the principle of this Civil List; but just as I would make the minister of a small congregation pecuniarily independent of his hearers, so would I make present governors and judges of New Zealand pecuniarily independent of her handful of people – educated, intelligent, excellent as that handful is.

106 The (present) created, legislative council appears to number some fifteen members. Six or seven are more or less Auckland or northern gentlemen; and these often form a majority; because a legislative council held at Auckland (hundreds of miles from Canterbury and Otago) is so distant, that the southern peers scarcely care to journey up to take their seats.

107 Here, I speak from memory. I believe the Act imposes no limitation; and that the governor has power to gratify any number of New Zealand gentlemen anxious to obtain the "garter" of Honourable prefixed to their public names, as Legislative Councillors.

108 A leading political colonist and a most able and excellent man who represents "ultra-provincialism" in New Zealand as opposed to "centralization" and strong general government. That such a man should believe in such a policy, tends sadly to prove the truth of the dictum, that on some point everybody is more or less mad.

109 Page 299.

110 I have not the Act before me; but I do not think there is anything in it preventing even the inferior members of the Provincial Councils from being at the same time, members of the House of Representatives. If so, three-fourths of the General Assembly might actually and personally be the Provincial Councils meeting together in the capital, instead of separately, in the provinces.

111 "An impartial observer, removed from the atmosphere of local jealousies and distrusts, cannot but arrive at the conclusion that the real prosperity of New Zealand will be best promoted by the discouragement of provincialism and the development of a more national and catholic feeling. Whilst the settlements remain isolated as they are, with a wretchedly deficient postal communication, with conflicting land laws and upset prices differing so widely as two pounds and five shillings an acre, and with distinct assemblies and distinct governors left entirely to themselves, there can be no reasonable hope of such a feeling growing up. But the days of steam communication are at hand, and it is certain that the various settlements will soon be connected by a regular and constant steam service by sea; and, as they have not, and cannot have, any really opposite interests – as, on the contrary, the true prosperity of the colony is involved in the principle of union – it is in the central legislature, and not in the provincial councils, that the real power of government must ultimately reside. At present, the object of the Imperial Parliament in the Act for conferring a constitution on New Zealand, appears to us to have been practically set aside; and the superintendents and local councils have assumed an amount of power and influence quite inconsistent with the spirit and intent of the constitution." – Sydney Morning Herald.

112 I forget for the moment whether the adder is oviparous or viviparous – but egg or no egg, the figure may serve.

113 Five years in a young growing colony like New Zealand, is a period of time equal to twenty years in an old grown country; and triennial Parliaments would harmonise far better with the ratio of progress of the colony than quinquennial. In 1857, say there are 100 fit men for legislators in New Zealand – in 1860, through immigration, there might be 200; and in 1863, 400. Thus, by shortening the duration of Parliaments, the colony would get the benefit of the new-arrived legislative talent, so much the sooner.

114 As there would be no House of Peers to obstruct public business, two months would suffice. But New Zealand legislators both can and will talk, and we give them three – ample time for oratory, if they would only conduct it on the principle of that immortal despatch, the "veni, vidi, vici."

115 Washington Irving in one of his veracious histories relates that Charondas the Locrian, "anxious to preserve the code of laws from the cumbersome additions of mere seekers of popularity, ordained that any legislator proposing a new law should do it with a halter round his neck; wherewith in case his measure was rejected they straightway hung him up; and there the matter ended."

116 "His Excellency the Governor, on behalf of Her Majesty, assented to the following Acts passed by the General Assembly during the session of 1856: –
The Pensions' Act.
The Law Amendment Act.
The Naturalisation Act.
The Bank Paper Currency Act.
The Nelson Trust Fund Amendment Act.
The English Acts' Act.
The New Zealand Debenture Act.
The New Zealand Colonial Bank of Issue Winding-up Act.
The Marriage Act Amendment Act.
The Magistrates' Indemnity Act.
The Building Societies' Amendment Act.
The Bills of Sale Registration Act.
The Nelson Wesleyan Chapel Sale Act.
The Religious, Charitable, and Educational Trusts' Act.
The Savings' Bank Ordinance Amendment Act.
The Superintendents' Deputy Act.
The New Zealand Native Reserves Act.
The Resident Magistrates' Courts' Ordinance Amendment Act.
The Counties' Act.
The New Zealand Loan Act.
The Supreme Court Procedure Act.
The Public Offices' Act.
The Privileges' Act.
The Customs' Duties' Act.
The Auckland Hospital and Grammar School Reserves' Act."

117 Popularly called the "Stafford-Sewell" Ministry; and far the ablest Ministry which has yet been formed. It is reported that Mr. Sewell is about to return on a visit to England, and that Mr. Stafford will resign the Superintendency of Nelson and become colonial treasurer. Mr. Sewell is a most able man, whose presence can ill be spared; but Mr. Stafford may worthily supply his place. Indeed this gentleman is far too good a man for a mere provincial superintendent. He is capable of looking at New Zealand, as a whole; and does not regard her as a grotesque assemblage of six parish-settlements to be misgoverned by six provincial vestries. We may describe New Zealand's two political parties thus – Stafford and Sewell for central government and sovereign parliament – Fox and Featherstone for provincial dominion and "vestry-parliaments."

118 See article on Wellington, chap. IX.

119 "Ultima Thule," a somewhat speculative, but an able and very interesting work on New Zealand, by Thomas Cholmondeley, 1854, price 2s. 6d.: John Chapman, 142, Strand.

120 One proposal is, that the Company's debt of £200,000 shall be liquidated by Nelson, Canterbury and Otago; that £200,000 of the loan (required mainly for purchasing wild lands from the natives in the North Island) shall be liquidated by Auckland, New Plymouth and Wellington; and that the remainder of the loan, £100,000, shall be liquidated by the General Assembly from the ordinary revenue.

121 The way in which these Provincial Council "Vestry Parliaments" promise to economise the colonists' public monies, may be gleaned from the following extract from a late Auckland paper (the New Zealander): showing that the cost of the maintenance of this one of the six Provincial Councils (chiefly officers' salaries, &c.,) which was £16,000 in 1854, has actually crept up to £30,000 in 1856. 0 hon. member for Wanganui, recollect King Log and King Stork; and take care that your imperium in imperio in its six-fold form, does not some day pauperise the colony, and lead to the issue of Provincial Council Bank Paper current at a discount of £75 per cent.!
PROVINCIAL COUNCIL EXTRAVAGANCE.
"In the year 1854, the total amount voted for the provincial establishments' expenditure, exclusive of the sum voted for special works, was £16,862 1s. 9d.; inclusive of £15,400 for such works, £32,262 1s. 2d. In the year 1856, the voted provincial expenditure, exclusive of extraordinary expenditure, is £28,342 3s. 9d. and, inclusive of £68,671 18s. 6d. for such extraordinary expenditure, £97,012 3s. 3d. For the present, however, we may put the special and extraordinary expenditure wholly on one fide. The two totals we have to do with here are those of £16,862 1s. 9d. in 1854, as compared with £28,342 3s. 9d. in 1856 – being an increase of £11,480 2s., or some 70per cent., for which the province can show – what?
"We are quite ready to admit that under several heads there has been a considerable addition made in consequence of the higher rates of labour that have prevailed for some time; that an increase has been made in the harbour departments and police of the colony; that the establishment charges of the hospital, lunatic asylum, and gaol, are rendered higher by the increased prices of provisions, &c.; that some new offices have been created. But those facts will not account for the whole enormous increase we have pointed to, and the necessity for some of those new offices is more than doubted.
"The salary of Superintendent being fixed by act is the same in both estimates, viz., £800 – a sum which we think sufficient for the duties and responsibilities of that office, even when its holder shall become, as we trust he soon will be, the virtual as well as nominal head of the United Provincial Departments. Under 'Provincial Council,' we find that in 1854, the Speaker had £250; in 1856, £300; Clerk of Council, in 1854, £50; in 1856, £250 (of this £100 was added for the new and at present nominal office of 'Librarian.') Contingencies, in 1854, £500; in 1856, £600. Library, in 1854, £100; in 1856, £150. Total in 1854, £900; in 1856 (including £50 for one member for Bay of Islands), £1350. Under 'Superintendent's Office,' in 1854, Chief Clerk, £300. Under 'Superintendent's Department,' in 1856, Provincial Secretary, £400. So with other officers in this then 'office,' now 'department,' the change of name not being without a marked significance when taken in connection with the accompanying increase of salary and relief from immediate subordinance and responsibility to the Superintendent. Thus, in 1854, Treasury Clerk, £300; in 1856, Provincial Treasurer, £400. In 1854, we find an audit and second clerk at £250 each, and a third clerk at £180; in 1856, two clerks, at £250 each, and an assistant Provisional Treasurer at £250. Total in 1854, £1358 ; in 1856 (including £100 for contingencies, not specified in 1854) £1730. 'Public Works,' in 1854, one provincial engineer, £400; in 1856, two engineers, at £100 each, – £800; half of Provincial Surveyor, £200; draughtsman and clerk, £250; assistant draughtsman, £75; clerk, £200; inspector of city works (not in progress), £250; showing an increase in salaries alone between 1854 and 1856 of from £400 to £1775."
* * * * * *

122 "Before giving his assent to Acts passed by Provincial Councils, and other matters of a legal nature, the Governor will require the specified certificate from the colonial secretary and attorney-general: and in approving appointments to vacant (provincial) offices, he will require to be assured that the gentlemen recommended are fit and eligible for their respective situations." (Late Message from his Excellency.)

CHAPTER XI. EXPORTS AND MARKETS.

EXPORT ERRORS.

CHAPTER XI.

EXPORTS AND MARKETS.

SOME misconception exists on the subject of a young colony's exports. It seems to be held that a young colony is like a man – the first duty and necessity of each being to produce something, to have means of living. But, in truth, a young colony is like a child – each being a consumer, growing-up to the producing state.

Except there be "Diggings," a young emigration field cannot, for many years, produce exports. The Pioneers who first venture thither, have to house and feed themselves, to clear patches of the stubborn forest and smooth them into corn-fields, to make roads and bridges, to lay out villages, and to rough-hew the infant colony out of the rugged wilderness. By the time the new land has thus been made to feed its first pioneers, others have arrived, to eat up all surplus. Emigrants of 1840 sell their surplus to emigrants of 1842, and both do the same by the emigrants of 1844. The young colony has no export, and needs no export; because all surplus produce is consumed by good customers at home. And it is only when Population has settled in the wilderness, and caused home-production to increase

EXPORT POWERS.

faster than home-consumption, that a young colony can have, or can need, foreign markets. A British colony's "manhood-exporting" state has seldom been attained under a quarter of a century. Zealandia, by the registrar, is "sweet fifteen;" but, owing to the stunting disasters of her infant days, she is virtually no more than a "miss of ten." The pioneer settlers who were risking their lives in New Zealand from 1840 to 1846, were not producers of anything. They were a handful of half-ruined men tilling patches of soil round their dwellings for necessary food; but wisely forbearing to cultivate those fertile lands from which a fatuous Government banded with a lawless savage might any day eject them. Virtually, therefore, New Zealand's age is ten; so that looking at the past progress of other colonies, a dozen years may well elapse before she becomes a great exporting colony.

But the artificial attainment of the "exporting age," and the natural "power of exporting," are two distinctly different things. In the latter, New Zealand may rank with any country in the world. She is by nature the granary, dairy-farm, brewery, and orchard of the South Pacific; and, unquestionably, is capable of producing for old-world markets an annual export of wool and tallow, alone, 123

The present chief exports of the colony are wool

PRESENT EXPORTS.

(with a little copper, oil, flax, and timber,) shipped to England; and agricultural exports (with a little kauri-gum and timber) shipped chiefly to Australia.

The four articles which I think will eventually figure in New Zealand exports, after wool, corn, and general agricultural exports (and perhaps ores) are these: ship provisions, cured-beef and pork; fine ales; spars and pine timber; and flax, or hemp. New Zealand is close to the Australian marine, not remote from the Indian marine, and central amid the whaling fleet; whilst, thanks to soil and climate combined, there is probably no country south of the equator where prime mess beef and pork could be produced so cheaply and so well. 124 worth four to five millions sterling.

As to Ale, there is an immense consumption of ale in Australia; and nature has fitted New Zealand for a brewery by giving her cool, or cold, nights, a profusion of the finest soft-water streams, and a soil and climate suited alike to barley and to hop. As to Woods, the woods of Australia, and indeed of almost every country south of the Line, are for the most part hard, heavy, brittle, and bad to work; whilst New Zealand possesses the noble kauri and

HIDDEN EXPORTS.

three other pines, and abundant water-power for the cheap production of "sawn-stuff." With regard to Flax or Hemp, it is true that the process for the marketable preparation of New Zealand flax has yet to be discovered; but without being over sanguine, we may reasonably hope that the value of the stake will stimulate genius to win it, and that, eventually, some antipodal Arkwright will succeed in freeing Phormium tenax from that gummous parasite which alone prevents it from becoming King of Textiles.

But, recollecting that, as yet, we have set foot on but some half-dozen spots of New Zealand, it would be a most rash assumption, were we now to assume that wool and corn, and meat and ale, and flax and timber (sufficient as such exports would be to make her rich) will be her only exports, or even her chief exports. The history of commerce shows that the spread of population in a new country ultimately reveals many articles of export which its pioneer settlers overlooked. Years elapsed ere America discovered wealth in cotton, South Australia in copper, New South Wales in wool, Victoria in gold. And the spread of population in New Zealand, the magic touch of capital and labour, may reveal gums, barks, dyes, fibres, oils, ores, a dozen articles of export, as yet, undreamt of or unseen.

On data furnished by the statistics of the last two years, we may I think estimate the gross value of all New Zealand exports for the year 1857 at

COLONIAL EXPORTING POWERS.

about £500,000. And a comparative glance at the "exporting power" of old countries and old colonies shows that infant New Zealand gives fair promise of strong arms and full pockets when arrived at man's estate.

ANNUAL VALUE OF THE EXPORTS PER HEAD OF THE POPULATIONS OF DIFFERENT COUNTRIES. 125

£

Holland

8

Great Britain

5

France

2

United States

3

New South Wales (50 years old)

16

Victoria (the Diggings)

50 1

Tasmania (50 years old, vast amount of convict labour)

20

Zealandia (10 years old)

10

1   Sailors are said to earn their money like "horses" and to spend it like "asses." Might not the compliment be extended to the diggers? A recent work shows that whilst Victoria exports to the enormous annual amount of £50 per head (for men, women and children) she imports, hear it, teetotallers! to the still more enormous amount of £10 per head in spirits and tobacco alone. A similar expenditure in England on grog and smoke would amount to one hundred millions sterling per annum.

MARKETS. – In all human probability, Wool will become the great staple export of New Zealand; and staples like wool and tallow, together with oil,

MARKETS.

ores and flax, would find an excellent, a permanent, and an unlimited market in the mother country. The production of some of these things may be doubtful; but once produced, it is clear that the sale, the market, would be good and certain.

The important question of "Markets," then, has only to be raised with respect to a portion of New Zealand's exports – namely, agricultural produce for Australia. In the last five years, Australia (New South Wales and Victoria) has imported food articles from New Zealand to the amount of nearly half a million sterling, and the question is – will Australia, for the future, feed herself – or, remaining chiefly a wool and gold country, will she continue to import a portion of her food? I conceive that the latter will be the case; and that, although as her population increases, and as blank gold weeks intervene, she may considerably increase her production of home-grown food under improved agriculture and a system of small-farm cultivation, yet that whilst she remains "a great gold country," she will remain a considerable importer of food; and will find that she can supply herself with breadstuffs and dairy produce from New Zealand, and other countries, cheaper, on an average of seasons, than she can grow them for herself.

There are fertile districts in New South Wales and Victoria capable, in favourable seasons, of producing quite as fine crops of corn and vegetables as can be produced in New Zealand. But favourable seasons are not the rule in Australia. The

AUSTRALIAN MARKET

experience of half a century shows that Australia is subject to seasons of torrid heat and drought, which bake-up the land and reduce vegetation to a brown powder. 126 The mean average yield of

AUSTRALIAN AGRICULTURE

wheat in New South Wales and Victoria, for a period of ten years, has been found to be only thirteen bushels an acre, of potatoes three tons! And this ten years' "average yield" has been reduced to this sorry mean not because there were no fine crops in the ten years, when the yield was double – but because, during the ten years, there were droughts and climatic blights which nearly annihilated the crops altogether.

Now, in New Zealand the climate, if we may so express it, is even more agricultural than the soil; and the two, combined, create both a "certainty" and a "fulness" of crop which, I think, is scarcely to be found in any other country in the world.

Assuming, therefore, that the cost of producing an acre of wheat, were even the same in Australia as in New Zealand, the nearly double average yield

WHEAT MARKET.

of the New Zealand acre, 127 would enable the New Zealand farmer to place his sea-borne agricultural produce in the Australian market, at a lower price, than agricultural produce could be profitably grown at in Australia. But we may fairly assume that the cost of production will be less in New Zealand, less owing to two causes – the first, the singular "easiness of cultivation" created by the friendly soil and climate; and the second, "cheaper labour." It is fairly conjectural that the gold mines of New South Wales and Victoria are tapped rather than drained, and that "Diggings" and Digging pursuits will be permanent, and spread over the land. If so, labour will unquestionably rule higher there than in New Zealand. 128

With regard to the countries which might compete with New Zealand in partly feeding Australia – the United States, South America, South Australia, and Tasmania – I think we may fairly reason as follows: – Labour is at present much

RIVAL GROWERS.

dearer in New Zealand than in either North or South America; but here again, the large and certain yield of crop tends to compensate for this deficiency. As emigrant population flows in, too, labour will become cheaper in New Zealand, when a ton of fine flour would be produced there as cheaply as in any country. But though the advantages of producing the export for the Australian market, may, as yet, rest with the two Americas, the advantages of getting the export to the market are all with New Zealand – for whilst she has only 1000, South America has 7000, and North America 14,000 miles of sea carriage. With regard to South Australia, no country produces a finer quality of wheat; but South Australia's "combined yield and certainty of crop" is scarcely equal to New Zealand's; and I do not imagine that she is capable of sending breadstuff's, and certainly not dairy produce, to Sydney and Melbourne at lower prices than New Zealand could supply them; whilst, as to Van Dieman's Land, however fertile and productive she may be, she is but small; and in the question of supplying future millions in Australia with food, Van Dieman's Land must be regarded as the orchard and kitchen-garden, rather than as the farm.

A late South Australian paper concludes an excellent article on the subject of the Victoria and South American flour markets, with these remarks: –

"The sum of the evidence given there by our practical

SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

agricultural witnesses is that 5s. a bushel for wheat would be a remunerative price for our South Australian farmers. 5s. per bushel for wheat would average £14 per ton for flour, at which price we need never despair of a market for any quantity. With wheat at 5s. per bushel, bread could be sold at 3 1/2d. the 2lb. loaf – a price quite low enough to satisfy the utmost craving for cheapness. So that, if the evidence quoted may be relied upon, it is perfectly clear that wheat in this colony may be cultivated to any extent with profit to the farmer, and at a price which no working man can have occasion to complain of.

"But the question is whether, as the land is now cultivated, wheat can be profitably sold at 5s. per bushel? Farmers say it is a paying price, and that even less would do; but it may be that a considerable portion of the land in crop would need greatly superior cultivation to that now bestowed before wheat, with present prices of labour, could be sold at a profit for 5s. per bushel. But, at the same time, it must be evident that an enhanced price can never be justified in order that inferior modes of cultivation may be protected. Better for the farmer to get a fair profit out of 5s. with good cultivation, than to get the same profit out of 7s. with bad cultivation.

"The price of wheat, however, will depend not only upon the supply and demand of South Australia, but with the demand of Victoria superadded. For years to come, Victoria must be a bread-importing country. The extent of her importations may vary, and a feeling in favour of raising supplies within the province may influence the markets in a slight degree; but it is as impossible to persuade the working men of the Victorian gold fields to follow the plough's tail as it would be to persuade the farmers of Mount Barker and Macclesfield to devote their energies to mining at Echunga. In Victoria, gold-digging pays better than wheat-growing, therefore they dig for gold. In South Australia wheat-growing pays better than gold-seeking, therefore they grow wheat. And as long as the Victorian gold fields are profitable, so

FLOUR PROSPECTS.

long will the South Australian corn fields be profitable too.

"The wheat and flour market of Victoria is, of course, intimately affected by the importations from Chili. In the vast tracts of country at the foot of the Cordillera mountains an almost unlimited quantity of wheat can be grown; but it is quite an error to suppose that Chilian wheat and flour can be had at nominal prices. Nearly all the business at Valparaiso is transacted through merchants, who will not reduce the market to an unprofitable point. It must also be remembered that although there is plenty of wheat land in Chili, and notwithstanding that labour is cheap, the system of farming pursued is of the most rude and ineffective character. We are not to reason as if the Chilian farmers combined the advantages of high farming and improved implements with cheap land and cheap labour. They have the latter, but not the former; and are consequently placed so far at a disadvantage. The price of Chilian flour never ranges so low as to compete with South Australian wheat at 5s. per bushel. The minimum price of Chilian flour on board at Valparaiso is £10 per ton; but no dependence can ever be placed by importers on getting it at so low a figure. The Chilian market supplies not only the Australian colonies, but to some extent, the English market; and prices at Valparaiso are ruled by prices at Liverpool and London. The charge for freight between Valparaiso and Port Adelaide is about £5 per ton, to which must be added £3 more for commission, insurance, risk of damage, warehouse expenses, &c., making £8 per ton expenses of bringing the flour from South America to this port. Under the most favourable circumstances, therefore, Chilian flour could not be sold in the colonies under £18 per ton; but the average would probably be £20 per ton – equal to 7s. 6d. a bushel. The last cargo cost £25 per ton on landing; and the whole history of the flour trade between the South American coast and these colonies proves beyond a doubt that there is no competition from that quarter which can give the South

AUSTRALIA'S SICILY.

Australian farmer cause to fear. If £20 a ton, or even if £15 a ton, is a paying price for flour here, with a natural protection of £8 resulting from proximity of the market, we must be unsuccessful indeed to be beaten."

The reader, however, must not suppose from these remarks on "Agricultural Markets" that New Zealand aspires to become the Sicily of Australia – she boasts far higher industrial aims. She merely believes that when her colonists send a portion of their corn and esculents, butter and cheese, ham and bacon, fruits and honey of Hybla, to Australia – Australia's port and city populations, her voracious diggers, and drought-smitten "Knights of the pick," will be happy to buy such produce at good prices, and to pay for it in their brightest gold. 129

I would conclude these remarks on "Exports and Markets" with a cautionary hint to all New Zealand farmers, present or to come. Those semi-famine, "rush-to-the-diggings," prices, which put so much gold in our pockets in 1852, 1853 and 1854. are gone never, I think, to return. Seven to eight shillings a bushel for wheat, and five pounds per ton for picked potatoes, are probably the highest average prices (say

FARMER'S SHEET ANCHOR.

for periods of five years) which for the future the Australian markets are likely to offer us. If the New Zealand farmer will only open one eye, keep the weed down, plough without his pipe, use a little less tobacco, a little more manure, and get to work before noon, these prices (free of rent, tax, and tythe) will richly pay him. But wheat and potatoes are bulky damageable articles; his Australian market is both a limited and a capricious market; and he and his fellows may produce far too much of these A's and B's of New Zealand agriculture. New Zealand dairy produce (firkins of fine butter, rich cheeses, noble hams and flitches of bacon), less bulky and less perishable than wheat and potatoes, would sell at high prices in twenty markets in the Australian and Indian Seas, where potatoes could not be carried, and where wheat would scarce command a bid. But the production of less corn and more dairy produce, though it would make the New Zealand farmer safer, would still not be sufficient to make him safe, and defiant alike of storms and times. The great, safe-and-certain, marketable export of New Zealand, one which can never be overdone, is Wool – -fine combing wool for Leeds, Bradford, and France – not wheat and potatoes, butter and bacon, for Sydney and Melbourne.

In short, the New Zealand farmer should have three strings to his bow, of which the strongest should be the pastoral string; and that "use of the soil," that description of agriculture, which would prove

ZEALANDIA.

both the most beneficial to the colony, and the safest and most lucrative to the agriculturist, would unquestionably lead to some such an apportionment of every 100 acres of farmed land as this: –

Fine wool-growing and sheep-breeding department (pasture)......50 acres.

Dairy-farm, and cattle-breeding and feeding department (pasture and roots).......25 acres

Arable department (grain, fruits and vegetables)......25 acres

[Total].......100

NOTE. – Since the remarks, page 192, on the "re-naming" of New Zealand passed through the press, Mr. Hodgkinson, the writer of a good pamphlet on Canterbury, has suggested to me a new name for New Zealand – Zealandia. He observes that whilst this new name would not be an absolute departure from the old name, it would be a much more euphonious name, and one which would harmonize well with Australia, Tasmania, and Victoria: thus, Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, Zealandia.

He remarks, too, that if precedents for "name changing" be wanted, they are close at hand: –

New Holland has been changed to Australia.
Van Dieman's Land " " Tasmania.
Port Philip " " Victoria.
Swan River " " West Australia.

123 Tallow will unquestionably become a considerable export as flocks and herds increase; and will bear a larger relative value to the wool export in New Zealand than it does in Australia. New Zealand sheep and cattle are said to carry fifty per cent, more of fat and tallow than the thin, short-pastured, dried-up animals of Australia. (See Pastoral chapter.)

124 Owing probably to the arid climate and the scanty pasture, Australian meat lacks juice, fatness and flavour; and if the meat were better, the heat of the climate would be injurious to the "curing process." Beef, pork, and mutton, in New Zealand are (or perhaps we should say would be if a little more attention were paid to breed, feed, and butchering) quite equal to English meat.

125 "Notes" showing the exact amount of the exports per head of the populations of various old-world countries, have been mislaid: these European and American figures, therefore – though it is believed they are correct enough – are given from memory.

126 "Of all the features of Australian climatology, drought is the most prominent and forbidding. I find in my diaries, periods of four and five months without one drop of rain: live stock and grain crops ruined; and the country like tinder, susceptible to the smallest spark.
"In April, 1849, the sun set at Sydney for several weeks successively in a lurid haze of smoke. During his last two hours above the horizon, the weakest eye might gaze unwinking at his rayless disk. The whole west was either in flames or smouldering. In January, 1850, during a lengthened drought the north shore of the harbour was on fire for ten or twelve days. At night it looked like a line of twenty or thirty huge furnaces, extending over some fifteen miles. The city was shrouded in smoke, and the air was pervaded with the aromatic odour of the burning gum-trees. Many poor settlers would have been ruined but for a liberal subscription raised for the sufferers. In 1851, hundreds of miles of country in the district of Port Philip were included in one vast conflagration, and as many families were brought to destitution by the destruction of their property. The heavens were obscured for a long period by a canopy of smoke, the soot falling on board vessels at sea one hundred and fifty miles distant from the land. When the rain does come it comes with a vengeance, sometimes carrying away, in its torrents, roads, gardens, walls, palings, and bridges, which had proved invulnerable to the preceding bush-fires. Every highway becomes a river, every by-way a brook, every bank a cataract. The thunder cracks right over head like the report of a gun. Hailstones come rattling down an inch long,, knocking over young live-stock and domestic poultry, levelling orange orchards and vineyards, breaking windows and human heads; still, in twenty-four hours, or less, the dust is blowing about as bad as ever. No one who has not lived in a country liable to drought can appreciate the eagerness with which every assemblage of clouds is watched; with what feelings of disappointment their breaking up without yielding a drop is accompanied; with what thankfulness the boon of moderate rain and showers is received when it does come. 'My word,' cries the inland squatter, 'this will fill the water-holes rarely, and save me a thousand or two head of stock, which would otherwise have died for want of water.' He is delighted with the gift, though he may possibly lose two or three horses, if not his own life, in attempting to cross the bottom, where yesterday there was nothing to be seen moister than a glaring white sand, hot enough to boil a retort.
"But the long droughts, excessive heat, hot winds, bush-fires, &c, which are peculiar to Australia, are more serious and destructive to the agricultural interests and squatter's stock and have a more injurious effect on the landed proprietor's purse than his person. Although attended with considerable personal inconvenience and occasional injury, these atmospheric excesses and transitions tend rather to cripple or retard the progress of agriculture than to inflict any serious or immediate danger on the human frame." – A Colonist's Letter in "Rise and Progress of Australia"

127 The average yield of wheat in New Zealand, even under the present "no-farming" system, cannot be taken at less than twenty-five bushels per acre; and improved farming, the introduction even of a little manure, might nearly double this average. But Mechi himself could not battle against a torrid season in Australia, and improve crops despite the climate.

128 The subject of wheat-growing has lately occupied much attention in Victoria, and several gentlemen engaged in agricultural pursuits have expressed their opinions in the public papers. Mr. C. J. Dennys, of Mount Moriac, near Geelong, estimates the cost of growing and harvesting wheat at £11 16s. 6d. per acre, and shows the cost per bushel to be 9s. 3 1/4d. Another gentleman states that with wheat at 10s. per bushel its growth would be attended with loss to the farmer.

129 As to the prices of New Zealand produce, to be looked for in the Australian markets, looking at the probability of a largely-increased, digging population, and at the average prices which prevailed at Sydney and Melbourne years before gold was discovered, I am inclined to think that any future terms of five years would show an average standard price for wheat of not less than 7s. 6d. a bushel; with potatoes, onions and dairy-farm produce something higher in proportion.

Conditions of Use

By their use of these ebooks, texts and images, users agree to follow these conditions of use:

These ebooks, texts and images may not be used for any commercial purpose without permission from the University of Auckland Library.

These ebooks, texts and images may not be re-published in print or electronic form without permission from the University of Auckland Library. However, educators are welcome to print out items and hand them to their students.

Users are not permitted to download our ebooks, texts, and images in order to mount them on their own servers for public use or for use by a set of subscribers. Individuals and institutions can, of course, make a link to the copies at ENZB, subject to our conditions of use. It is not in our interest or that of our users to have uncontrolled subsets of our holdings available elsewhere on the Internet. We make corrections, add tags, add images, etc. on a continual basis, and we want the most current text to be the only one generally available to all Internet users.

These texts can potentially be used as the basis for additional TEI tagging or for some other etext or ebook project, but we ask that you let us know before you start, so that we can coordinate work on that text and make sure that we are not working on it simultaneously. We would like a copy of the improved text for our collections.

Request for permission form