Forty Thousand Miles Over Land and Water

When you think that the waters at Ohinemutu and Wairakei are so strongly mineral and medicinal that they can be said to be an infallible cure, with sufficient patience, for rheumatism and all cutaneous diseases, how can they help becoming the great world-curing establishment? Think of the fortune that alone could be made from the bottling and exportation throughout the world of the water of the "Venus bath," a sure cure for blotches and freckles, or of that of "Kiriokinekai," the Maori for new skin, another of the hot streams at Wairakei, which has a wonderful effect in restoring the growth of the hair on bald heads!

C. was very much interested, in a conversation with Cullen, to find out that he had accompanied the Imperial Russian Survey of officers, as an engineer, in an expedition towards the Indian frontier. He affirms that there is no obstacle whatever to the advancement of an army from Merv to Herat; clearly showing that the difficulty of Russian aggression on India does not lie in natural barriers, as has been alleged.

Wednesday, October 1st.—We left Wairakei in the afternoon, to drive ten miles to Taupo. The rain came on and prevented our turning off the road, by an orchard which although but just planted is already blossoming, so great is the fertility of the soil, to see Pirorirori or the Blue Lake, a sheet of blue water lying amongst the white clay cliffs.

From a great distance we saw the steam of the great and awful "Karapiti" rising up on the flat plain, with the uncertain action of these volcanic blow-holes. We arrived early in Taupo, being anxious to secure the best seats in the mail coach for to-morrow's drive.

Taupo lies on the shore of the lake, and consists of the Telegraph station, the Lake House (the hotel), one general store, and the neat white buildings, surrounded by an earthen outwork of the Armed Constabulary Force. There are about fifteen of these "A. C." stationed here. They were formerly established in defence against the natives, and are now employed as police and in mending or making the roads. Those we have been travelling over are mostly made by the A. C., aided by contracts with Maori labourers.

On this afternoon "the" store was closed, the proprietor enjoying the weekly event of the arrival of the newspaper by the mail.

Whilst C. went to see the chief of the A. C., Major Scanlan, I wandered along the shore of Lake Taupo, with "Mac," picking up pieces of pumice stone of beautifully fine texture and light weight. Their colours were lovely salmon pink, ochre, pale green, or a silvery pearly grey.

We shall be leaving the King Country to-morrow, and I must here say a few words about the Maoris. There are altogether some 15,000 in the North Island, while in the South Island they only number 2000. The large tracts of bare pumice country which we have been passing through all belong to the Maoris. The land is utterly useless to them, as they attempt no kind of cultivation. As a race, the men have a fine physique; and although naturally lazy, they are capable of vigorous exertions, as was seen during the years of the war. The women are treated as slaves, and are, as a rule, small and ill-developed. All agree in saying that the Maoris are a gentle, harmless people, with few vices, but contact with the white man deteriorates them, and they become cunning and untruthful. The fusion of the Maori race with the whites is impossible. The half-castes are said never to live beyond the age of forty. The Maoris are dying out, particularly in the South Island, where contact with civilization induces them to adopt European habits and dress, and the latter is the cause of the consumption which carries off a large proportion of them. Their land is being gradually bought up by the government or by settlers, and the introduction of this system has been most baneful to them, inducing them to depend on the sale of their land, instead of their labour, for subsistence.

They seem to have little idea of religion, and that is, in its crudest form, mixed up with mythology and legendary heroes, handed down from generation to generation. Nor have they any particular reverence for the Tohunga or priest. They believe in immortality. "The road to their heaven is through Reinga, a cave in a cliff at the North Cape of the island, whence they think that the departed spirits pass to the realms above, using the roots of the Pohutukawa-tree as a ladder." They make the "tangi," or funeral, the occasion of a great feast. The mourners are wreathed with fern and lycopodium, and cry and wail for many hours, after which they begin on the enormous feast which has been prepared.

A tangi lasts for three days, during which all the kouru and riwai (potatoes) and poaka (pigs) collected in the neighbourhood are consumed, leaving them very short of provisions for some weeks afterwards.

Many of the natives acknowledge the Queen as their sovereign in preference to their own "King," who is only followed by certain tribes. They have a great reverence for the "paheka" (European), and English is taught in most of the Maori schools.

The tattooing common to all is done in imitation of the scales of a fish. The origin of the curious mythological sign of the three fingers which is found on all the carved wooden images in the temples is unknown. A vague theory exists which is as follows: These wooden figures, which generally have a smaller one inserted underneath, are supposed to represent an ancestor. At any time the chief might come and say it was "tapu" (belonged to him, or sacred), but the three fingers were a deformity; and nothing can be "tapu" that is deformed. The Maori language is sweet and soft-sounding. The alphabet consists of only fourteen letters. The consonants being G, H, K, M, N, P, R, T, and W; and the vowels are the same as ours. A characteristic feature of the language is their fondness for the double repetition of the syllable in words, such as, Ruru, an owl; Titi, the mutton bird; Wiwi, a swamp rush; and Toetoe, grass.

All Maori names are chosen on the sensible plan of describing the object they name, such as Rotomahana, the hot lake; the Huka Falls, snowy foam; Kiriokinekai, new skin, &c. Wai means water, and so Waiwera (the watering-place near Auckland) means hot water; Wairoa, long water; Waikato, drawn-out water, on account of the length of the river; Waitangi, weeping water; and Wairakei, water in motion, on account of the volcanic action about there.

Thursday, October 3rd.—We left Taupo in the coach at six the next morning, driving for some miles along the shore of the lake. To our right we saw the high, conical peak of Tongariro, from whose crater for ever issues a black cloud of smoke, and a little further on the mountain of Tauhara, the "Lone Lover" of the Maoris, and Mount Ruahepu. The whole range of mountains were covered with the purest snow, and so veiled in clouds, that the summits often peeped out from above or mingled with the low-lying clouds.

All through the morning we were driving through an intensely dreary stretch of pumice country, and on whichever side you looked there was nothing but the coarse, yellow grass tufted with raupo; nothing but wide expanses of Wiwi, or mata or toetoe grass, mingled with clumps of Phormium tenax, the flax-plant of New Zealand. This plant has a broad sword-like rush, and flowers either a dark red or pale yellow. It grows in swamps on marshy places to a height of from four to eight feet. The fibre is used for rope, but unfortunately it rots with damp; and experiments prove that it is only reliable when mixed with other fibres.

Every now and again we came upon a little stream forming a green strip amid the yellow desert by the hanea or watercress growing along its banks, but the dreariness of those endless miles of pumice country, only limited in their vastness by low mountain ranges, I shall never forget. The only object of interest was to watch and trace the windings of our road away among the yellow tufts.

The coach was miserably horsed. Two speckled horses, with a pony and a mule for the leaders, formed a very weedy team. At the first hill we came to they began jibbing, not from vice, but from sheer inability to drag the coach, with its heavy load of eight passengers, up the hill; and these were the horses that were to take us fifty miles before the day was over! We were terribly packed both inside and out, and were all glad to walk as much as possible. The coach was of a very ancient date, and swung on leathern straps in place of springs. There were no doors or windows, but old yellow leather curtains that rolled up. The top of the roof in front was ornamented with three black lanterns, resembling a Prince of Wales' feathers, that produced a most hearse-like effect from a distance.

The poles of the telegraph wires kept us company, disappearing occasionally to take some short cut. We saw no "pale-face" dwelling all day, and only passed three or four Maori settlements. It was pointed out to me how, for some unknown reason, the door in the "wharrie" is always back or front, and never at the side. At one of these settlements we saw a cart, with a man on horseback, in charge of the body of a dead chief, which was lying, wrapped in a piece of sacking, at the bottom. He was taking it thirty miles away, to be buried by the tribe of the deceased. We had luncheon, stopping for an hour in the middle of the pumice plain by a stream that watered the horses.

Late in the afternoon we found ourselves serpenting along the edge of a magnificent gorge. It was so deep and straightly precipitous that we could not see the stream, which we heard brawling at the bottom of the ravine. We were soon enjoying one of the downward rushes, so pleasant after the weary crawling up-hill, with the coach groaning, and creaking, and making but little progress. I think the team enjoyed it as much as we did, for they galloped away, with the coach at their heels, hardly slackening at the sharp curves in the zigzag roads. It was pleasurable excitement mingled with terror. We were getting impatient, and anxious to arrive at our night's shelter, for the sun had set, the air was growing chill around us, and the gorges darkening into impenetrable gloom.

Over the hill we saw the lurid light of a fire, with tongues of flame shooting up, and showing momentarily the darkened patches left by its devastating work. Rounding the corner, the beautiful vision of a golden zigzag of lines of flame met us, swept by the wind in ever-varying brightness up and down the hill-side.

The "only three miles more" of Griffith, the driver, were becoming six as we found ourselves in the dark, and about to ascend another long hill. The wheels locked at a sudden sharp turn, and we all bundled out of the coach, and then walked, taking short cuts up the winding road. The moon came up, and we ended by sliding down a bank of white sand, that glistened under the rays of the moon, on to the road, and walking on until Griffith overtook us, just in time to save his reputation and prevent our arriving on foot at the inn at Tarawera.

We were to sleep in this beautiful valley, hemmed in by mountains that would keep their watch over us through the long night hours. How romantic and charming it sounded, and what prosaic discomfort there was in the reality!

The inn consisted of one living room, where the village smoked and drank. A ladder staircase led to a loft roughly partitioned off into bedrooms, where every sound through the whole length of the passage could be heard. Seven men, with their colley dogs, driving sheep from Auckland to Napier, arrived after us, and had to be accommodated, so the gentlemen slept that night three in one room.

I am bound to say that these small inns are perfectly clean, and that the fare, if homely, is substantial. There is always a good joint of meat (and the beef in New Zealand is the best I have ever eaten), with vegetables and bread and cheese, or sometimes a more ambitious attempt in the way of jam tartlets or rice pudding. But it seems quite extraordinary that there should be no cows in villages where there is such abundance of rich pasture, and that we should find everywhere in use the "Anglo-Swiss Condensed," and tinned butter.

The next morning we were on the road again by 6 a.m., and in the midst of the grand mountain scenery of the previous night. It was one succession of toiling up mountains for three hours, to rush down on them on the other side in half an hour. In the course of the day we crossed no less than two distinct ranges—the Hukiuni, or Great Head, and the Maunyaharuru, or Rumbling Mountains. It was weary work this crawling up the side of these, each zigzag bringing us so many feet higher up, to lose again by the descent what we had but just so painfully gained.

One scene among many others impressed itself vividly on my mind that day. It was soon after we started, when we had climbed some height above Tarawera, that I looked back to a low range of pine-covered hills leading up to some rocky mountain tops. Immediately beneath there was a green common, with some white specks, that was the village of Tarawera. Some bare, stony headlands closed in this first gorge. Then looking from the mountain, on to the sides of which the coach was hanging, down the precipice below, the eye on the opposite side followed upwards, upwards from the dense, blue mist to the thick vegetation, and beyond to the grey, stony patches of the highest peaks, shot with a pinky grey.

A bit of bush, and flying down hill for eight miles, brought us on to the side of another mountain. We saw nothing from here but a sea of grey peaks stretching for miles, their outline marked by the deep shadows in their cleft and pointed sides.

Another three hours amid very bare mountain scenery, and the country opened out. We were shown the narrow fertile valley leading to the sea, while some white dots were pointed out as the houses of Napier. Very far away they looked, some thirty miles from where we were.

We had luncheon at Griffith's "Stables," in a one-roomed hut, that was entirely papered with pictures from the Illustrated and the Graphic. It formed a most interesting and thrilling wall-paper, choosing, as had been done, all the most telling national events of the years '81 to '83.

We passed the afternoon in fording a swift stream, called the Esk, crossing it from one bank to another no less than forty-five times in two hours. Then we hailed with delight the green, verdant pasture-lands, the thriving stock, and comfortable farm-houses, with their rows of willow-trees, that lay scattered through the valley; glad to see these homelike signs of cultivation after the wild, desolate scenes of the last seven days.

Six miles of galloping over a pretty beach road on a tongue of land, formed by the broad basin of Hawke's Bay on the one hand, and an arm of inland sea on the other, brought us to the V-shaped wooden bridge. This bridge of three-quarters of a mile, bridges over the gap formed by the sea running round the promontory on which Napier stands. We drove along the marshy bit of plain looking up at the white houses of the town above, and the horses had a long climb before pulling up at the "Criterion Hotel."

We were very, very tired after the week's coaching, but at the same time we enjoyed the feeling of satisfaction that we had accomplished a most successful expedition to the Hot Lakes, and had seen the greater part of the North Island by coaching 250 miles through it.

I sat down to dinner this evening, the only lady amongst some twenty men, come in from the town. It could not be helped, as there were no private sitting-rooms. Before we left England we had been told how rough we should find the hotels in New Zealand. Not only is there this difficulty about a private room, but the bar at all the hotels is placed at the entrance, so that on arriving you often think you have come to a public-house. The best of them are not better than our "commercial hotel" in England, and they will remain so until a greater influx of travellers calls for better accommodation. Much the same complaint may be made about the means of travelling in New Zealand, especially in the North Island. There are very few railways at present, and communication is maintained by coasting steamers and coaches at the rate of fifty miles per day. No through connection between these means, or choice of evils, is attempted.

Saturday, October 4th.—A lovely morning for a drive about the town. Napier is such a pretty place, with no level spot within the township; it is all up and down hill, with houses and gardens perched on the high ground. Placed on the promontory there is a view of the sea from all sides, and from one a glimpse of the distant range of low mountains, with Hawke's Bay and the harbour below. The white surf is for ever rolling heavily in along the beach road. On the low, marshy plain, which is being gradually reclaimed from the sea, lie the villages of Clive, Hastings, and Havelock, showing by their names the date of their foundation. The roads are hard and good, but made of limestone, and the glare and dazzling whiteness obliges many to wear blue spectacles. We drove about to see the view from all sides, and then home through the town, stopping at a shop to see some of the native woods when manufactured into furniture. There are so many different kinds of woods, some light and some dark, that a great variety in patterns can be obtained; but the mottled wood of the kauri pine is the prettiest, and it is curious to think that this wood is only mottled when diseased.

There was a repetition of "the ordinary" at the hotel at 1 p.m., clerks and business men coming in from the town, and directly afterwards we drove down to the wharf and embarked on the tender, that was to take us on board the Union Steamship Company's steamer Tarawera. The tender bobbed up and down, and shipped water freely. It was most alarming to see the huge billows bearing down on us, and it seemed as if we must be swamped by the surf, when going over the bar of the harbour. But when we came alongside the Tarawera, the proceedings to be gone through there were far worse. A gangway was lowered, but the swell carried the tender hither and thither. At one moment the plank touched the deck, and the next would be swinging far above us. The difficulty was for the passenger to hit the exact moment at which to rush on to the gangway, and then to cling on and struggle up it whilst left hanging in mid-air. It was a very laughable affair for those looking over the bulwarks, but not so for us in the tender, and there was a good deal of difficulty as to who would venture first.

The Tarawera, like all the Company's ships, is beautifully fitted with inlaid panels, stained glass skylights, and plush cushions. The social hall is a gallery with seats running round the saloon, containing an organ and piano at either end; but the cabins and saloon are aft, and the proximity of the screw terrible. The Union Steamship Company have a monopoly of the New Zealand ports, and own a large fleet of fair-sized steamers, all called by Maori names. We were coasting along the North Island during the night.

By ten o'clock the next morning we were alongside the wharf at Wellington, and drove to rooms at the "Empire Hotel," previously engaged for us. The outside was dingy and uninviting, and the inside not less so, though the people were most civil and anxious to please.

Mr. Tolhurst, the manager of the Bank of New Zealand, immediately called for us, and proposed taking us to the Cathedral Church for morning service, and afterwards to his house for luncheon.

Sunday is a particularly unfortunate day to arrive anywhere in the colonies, as it is a blank day as regards domestic service; our luggage, too, which had come from Auckland in the Southern Cross, was not obtainable. Sir William Drummond Jervois, the Governor, came and called during the afternoon, and very kindly insisted upon our removing the following day to Government House.

Monday, October 6th.—We were greeted by a typical Wellington day; a blowing and blustering wind raising clouds of dust in the streets. Wellington lies on a strip of land between the hills, which rise immediately behind the town, and the sea. For some reason it seems to be a funnel or trap-hole for the wind to blow through on all sides, and they say you can always "tell a Wellington man anywhere, by the way in which he clutches at his hat round the street corners." All the buildings and houses are of wood, on account of the frequent shocks of earthquake which visited Wellington at one time. Old inhabitants declare that they remember the time when the earthquakes were of weekly occurrence; and in the earlier days of the settlement they thought seriously of removing it elsewhere. The town has a busy, prosperous look in the principal street, called Lambton Quay, except on Saturday afternoon, when Wellington has a curiously deserted appearance, and every one goes out into the country.

Standing a little above the town are the cluster of Government buildings. The Government offices form the largest wooden building in the world, with the exception of the Sublime Porte at Stamboul. The Houses of Parliament are a Gothic structure, and Government House, with the garden, lies between. This is a large, comfortable house, surmounted by a wooden tower and flagstaff; and when inside it is almost impossible to believe that the large, lofty rooms, broad corridors, ball-room, and handsome staircase, belong to a wooden tenement.

We drove up there in the course of the afternoon, and Lady Jervois and Miss Jervois received us most kindly. We were introduced to the staff, who consisted of Mr. Pennefather, the private secretary, and Major Eccles, the aide-de-camp.

After dinner the governor went to a meeting for founding a Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. C. went with him, and made a short speech, being on the council of the Society in London.

Later, we all went to a masonic ball; the grandmaster of the lodge and other masons, in their full insignia, receiving the Governor at the entrance, when we formed into procession to enter the ball-room, under the arch of intertwined masonic wands. C. met the past deputy-grandmaster, who had been entertained at the lodge of which he was master the year before last in London—so small is the world.

Tuesday, October 7th.—A tremendous storm and peal of thunder woke me at 6 a.m. Rain, storm, and wind seem to be more excessive in their quantities in New Zealand than in England.

We went to see Dr. Buller's very perfect collection of Maori curiosities, at his house on the Terrace; it is one of the finest extant. Portraits of Maori chiefs are hung round the room; there were feather mantles and native mats, the orange-painted staff of a chieftain, fringed with the white hair of the native dog, the sharp instrument used for tatooing, and some very beautiful greenstone meri meris. This meri is formed of a piece of greenstone about a foot long, and fined down and broadened out to a flat, thin edge. The merit meri is used by the chiefs to split open the skull of a rebellious subject.

At Mr. Köhn's we found another collection of Maori South Sea curiosities. He is a German, and possesses within the recesses of his back premises on Lambton Quay some very wonderful South Sea curios, brought to him by German men-of-war. He has already sold one collection for 500l., and has sent some curiosities home to the museum at Berlin, against the authorities of which he has a righteous grievance, in that they were never even acknowledged! We saw battle-axes with red and yellow handles, spears, bows, and arrows barbed with poison from decomposed bodies, strings of white and black beads for money, war masks formed of skulls, made hideous with splashes of paint, and held inside the mouth by an iron bar, shells, and cocoa-nut matting, with fringes of the same worn round the waist, and considered "full dress" by the ladies of the South Sea Islands. But the most interesting thing of all was a rough coffin, covered with a strip of parchment, containing the burnt figure of a South Sea Islander. The skull had the most peculiar pointed formation, and was exactly an inch in thickness at the back of the head. The body had been stuffed and burnt, till the skin was black and hard as brick. On the face there was a ghastly grin. Another day we went to see the Museum, which Dr. Hector has been mainly instrumental in starting. The total absence of mammalia forms a remarkable feature of New Zealand, the only indigenous animals found being a bat and a small rat. There is a fine collection of native birds. Amongst them the kea, or green field parrot. This bird was formerly a vegetarian, but it now kills and eats sheep. Sitting on the back of the animal, it picks with his long beak till it pierces and reaches the kidney fat, which it eats, thus killing the sheep.