and an emergency, the Prince and staff travelling in the middle one. The
New Zealand Government was represented by Sir William Fraser, Minister
of the Interior, a Highland Scotchman from the South Island. Official
appointments to accompany the tour were happily made throughout, but
never more than in this instance, where the extraordinary kindliness and
charm of the Minister of the Interior enhanced the great volume of his
experience, to the pleasure and profit of every member of the party.
Another of those present was General Sir Edward Chaytor, commanding the
forces in New Zealand, a soldier whose world reputation has not in any
way interfered with the simplest manner and the most delighted
directness of mind. It was his function to present to the Prince the
military side of New Zealand life, a side which was represented at every
centre visited, alike by surprisingly large numbers of returned soldiers
from the forces which gave such splendid account of themselves in the
great war, and by considerable bodies of smartly turned-out territorials
and cadets. Accompanying General Chaytor was Colonel Sleeman, also a
remarkable personality, to whose initiative is largely due the system of
cadet-training now in force in New Zealand, a system which is doing
wonders in the matter of infusing the best public-school spirit into
previously unkempt national schoolboys and larrikins, teaching them to
play the game, giving them a pride in themselves, and interesting them
in physical culture, and in the duties of citizenship, so that their
parents have become as keen as themselves that they should go through
the courses. Another of the party was Mr. James Hislop, Permanent
Under-Secretary of the Interior, one of the ablest members of that fine
body, the New Zealand civil service, who organized the arrangements of
the tour, and whose irrepressible humour, good fellowship, and infinity
of resource, in disposing of what seemed to most of us an utterly
overwhelming burden of work, were a continual wonder to everybody upon
the train. No less important amongst those outstanding figures of the
New Zealand party, was Mr. R. W. McVilly, General Manager of the
railways of the country, a man who with his predecessor, Mr. E. H.
Hiley, has succeeded in doing in New Zealand what proved impossible, in
England and in the United States. Under their direction the railway
system of the Dominion was carried on throughout the war without break
in management and without making any loss. It did not take travellers
long to discover the affection and respect in which the Director-General
was held, not only by his colleagues, but by all who came in contact
with him.
The British pressmen with the tour were particularly happy in their New
Zealand newspaper associates. Amongst these gentlemen were Professor Guy
Scholefield, who holds the chair of English Literature at the University
of Dunedin and who knows New Zealand inside and out, from the historic
as well as the modern point of view; and Mr. F. H. Morgan, representing
that business-like organization the New Zealand Press Association, a
practical journalist, a helpful colleague, and one of the best of good
fellows.
Although the main train journey was only decided upon a few hours before
a start was made from Auckland, all the arrangements worked with
extraordinary smoothness, and the number of people assembled at even the
smallest wayside stations to cheer the Prince was astonishing. At
Frankton, the first stopping-place after leaving Auckland, the gathering
around the station consisted largely of the very railway men who had
just been on strike. Their reception of the Prince had the special
cordiality that carries a hint of apology. One of their number indeed,
acting as spokesman, explained in a speech which could not be considered
inopportune, how much they all regretted having been the cause of delay
to the Royal tour. At Tekuiti, another small station, a more formal
reception took place, in which some five hundred children, collected
from the schools in the neighbourhood, participated with characteristic
fervour.
Through the night the Royal train traversed the red-pine Waimarino
forest, mounted two thousand feet up the Raurimu spiral, passed the
still smoking summit of the Ngauruhoe volcano, and emerged at daylight
upon the rolling plains of the rich Taranaki dairying country. Here
pastoral land, though still dotted with the blackened stumps of bygone
forest, is worth to-day anything up to one hundred and fifty pounds
sterling per acre. Thence, passing beneath the snow-streaked cone of the
extinct volcano Mount Egmont, the train rolled out upon the open western
coast, and entered the gorse-encircled city of New Plymouth. Here the
Prince was given a picturesque reception beneath spreading _Insignis_
pines, in a natural grass-covered amphitheatre, of beautiful Pukikura
park. Conducted by General Melville, commanding the district, he
inspected a large gathering of returned sailors, soldiers, nurses, and
cadets. He also went through the ranks of masses of school-children, who
waved long wands topped with white and red feathery _toi-toi_ grass, and
sang patriotic songs. In the course of a reply, later on, to a civic
address, read by Mr. F. Bellringer, General Manager of the Borough, the
Prince referred to the splendid prospects of the north-west coast, also
to its fine war record, adding: "When I look at the development of this
wonderful dairying country, I am amazed at the enterprise and energy
which have achieved so much in little more than two generations."
It is indeed amazing. Taranaki does much with butter, sending to such a
competitive country as Canada nearly 12,000 cwts. in 1918, and even more
with cheese, producing a particularly delectable Stilton. There are
fifty-seven butter factories and one hundred and eleven devoted to
cheese. To carve these conditions out of virgin forest in two
generations is a feat that well deserved its recognition.
The route thereafter lay through a land of spacious, green sheep-downs,
overlooking a blue, sun-lit sea, as idyllic as a pasture of the
Eclogues. On the way, at Stratford, Hawera and Patea, the Prince
received and replied to addresses and inspected gatherings of returned
soldiers, sailors, nurses, and cadets, besides incredible numbers of
fat, red-cheeked children, assembled with their teachers to do him
honour. Speaking at Hawera, the scene of fighting in days gone by,
between _Pakeha_--white strangers--and Maori natives, "Nothing," said
His Royal Highness, "has impressed me more in New Zealand than the
evidence I have found everywhere that Pakeha and Maori are now one
people in devotion to the Dominion, the Empire and the King."
[Illustration: WELLINGTON: A CANOE IN THE PETONE PAGEANT]
[Illustration: "THE MAORI PEOPLE WILL BE TRUE TILL DEATH"]
Proceeding afterwards to Wanganui, a more imposing welcome awaited him,
ten thousand enthusiastic people being found assembled in a big
grass-covered stadium. Here, some of the territorials he inspected
insisted upon drawing his motor-car round the grounds. In the course of
a reply to an address read by the Mayor, the Prince put into words what
was so plain in his actions. "I value," he said, "more than anything the
opportunity this journey gives me of making the acquaintance of the
people of New Zealand, many of whose gallant sons I knew on active
service in the great war." A visit followed to the Wanganui college, a
fine institution where three hundred of the sons of the settlers of the
Dominion are receiving up-to-date education upon British public-school
lines. Later in the evening the Prince attended a concert, also a
democratic supper-party of the heartiest description, held in enormous
marquees, at which three thousand people were present. The Prince and
his staff were served at a table on a raised platform in the middle of
the biggest of the marquees, so that as many people as possible might
see him, a distinction which apparently caused His Royal Highness no
loss of appetite.
From Wanganui the Prince motored twenty-five miles through undulating
fields of grass, turnips and rape, alternating with patches of yellow
gorse, the last introduced from the old country by sentimental but
ill-advised settlers, and now a most troublesome field-pest, special
legislation having had to be introduced requiring owners of land, under
penalty, to prevent its spreading. Crossing the wooded valleys of the
beautiful Wanganui and Turakina rivers, the Ruahine mountains shining
through the morning mists upon the left, while spacious sheep-farms
sloped seawards upon the right, the Prince reached the township of
Marton, where the usual inspections and addresses took place. Thence
the party started by train to cross the country to the east coast port
of Napier. Receptions were held, _en route_, at the townships of
Feilding and Palmerston-North. In the course of the day the Prince
received a number of presents, including, from Maori chiefs, an ancient
and possibly unique greenstone _mere_ or battle-axe, and a fine
_Wharikiwoka_--a mat-cloak lined with feathers. At Palmerston-North
there was handed into his keeping the shot-torn colours actually carried
by the third British Foot Guards at the battle of Alexandria as along
ago as 1801. These colours had been handed down, from generation to
generation, by New Zealand descendants of Colonel Samuel Dalrymple, who
commanded this distinguished regiment in that engagement. They were
presented to the Prince by Mrs. J. H. Hankins, _nee_ Dalrymple. The
colours were said to be the only ones, belonging to a Guards regiment,
hitherto preserved elsewhere than in the British islands.
Leaving Palmerston-North, the Prince proceeded through the gorge of the
rushing, turgid Manawatu river, alighting at the small wayside station
of Woodville, where a number of the inhabitants had assembled and where
he shook hands with a territorial officer, who, with the gay adventurous
spirit of the Dominion, had taken considerable risks in keeping pace
with the Royal train in a motor-car all the way from Marton, though part
of the route was along an unfenced winding mountain road on the side of
a cliff where the slightest obstruction or miscalculation might have
hurled the car and its occupants into the torrent below.
From Woodville the Prince went on, through wide grass-covered plains,
dotted with pleasant homesteads, standing amidst thousands of browsing
sheep, along the broad, shallow, shingly reaches of the Waipawa river,
and past sunny apple-orchards, and coppices of oak, poplar and pine, at
times skirting breezy uplands where he saw shepherds and their families,
often from long distances in the interior waiting to cheer the train.
The arrival at Napier, on the east coast of the island, was late in the
afternoon, in threatening weather. Yet the entire town of twelve
thousand inhabitants seemed to have assembled in the streets, and the
turn-out of returned sailors, soldiers, nurses, and cadets, at the
beautiful Nelson Park, on the seashore, where a reception was held and
an address presented by the Mayor, Mr. Vigor Brown, was most impressive.
In the course of his reply, in this centre, the Prince once more
referred to the quick coming prosperity of the land he had been
traversing. "It is amazing," he said, "to think that all the homely,
happy country I have seen on my journey here has been cleared,
cultivated and civilized in the life of two generations. The measure of
that splendid achievement is well reflected in this flourishing port and
town."
The following morning the Prince was early afoot, yet the inhabitants
made a fine showing in the streets, as the procession of motor-cars
passed through to the station, where the Royal train was waiting to
convey the party on the long run southwards to Wellington, the capital.
The weather had cleared in the night and it was a lovely autumn morning
as we skirted the waters of Hawkes Bay, which washed against the steep,
white cliffs of Kidnappers' Island, still the home of thousands of
strong-winged gannets the size of geese. Arrived at Hastings, a solid
market town of ten thousand inhabitants, the Prince was conducted,
through lanes of cheering people, to the racecourse. Here yet another
large gathering of returned men, also territorials, cadets, nurses, and
children, had assembled, and yet another civic address was presented and
replied to. Similar experiences awaited the party at further
stopping-places, including Waipukurau, Dannevirke, Woodville, and
Pahiatua--the "place of God"--the number of the motor-cars, drawn up in
the rear of the crowds, testifying to the prosperity of the farmer-folk,
many of whom had been making fortunes out of the high prices of the
mutton, wool and dairy-produce they raise. At Dannevirke--Dane
Church--the Scandinavian origin of the township was reflected, not only
in the name, but in the faces of whiskered vikings who were to be seen
amongst those who came forward to shake hands with the Prince. They
contrasted quite obviously with the conventional Anglo-Saxons around
them, and recalled in their persons the fact that the settlement of
Dannevirke was originally made by a ship-load of government-aided
immigrants from Schleswig, Holstein.
After leaving Dannevirke, the Prince took a turn on the foot-plate of
the engine of the train, which he drove at something like fifty miles an
hour to Woodville, where he had halted the day before. At Woodville the
track turned southwards through wilder country, including a certain
amount of still uncleared bush. Even here, however, the land is being
opened up, and I heard of farms changing hands at as much as seventy
pounds per acre. As the afternoon progressed halts were made at various
stations, including Featherston, where the Prince was received by
cheering crowds from a military training camp near by. At dusk the train
skirted the wide Wairarapa--lake of shining water--where wild swans
still breed in some numbers. Here we seemed to have reached the end of
the track, as high hills closed in on either side, and there was no sign
of a tunnel. The big single engine, however, was replaced by three
smaller ones of special make for mountain climbing, one of them being
attached at either end of the train and the third in the middle. A start
was then made up a zigzag track consisting of three rails, the third so
fixed in the middle, between the other two, that pulley wheels beneath
the body of the engines can get a purchase below it, thus completely
wedging the train and preventing its too sudden descent in case of
accident. Slowly then the train crawled up the gradient, which, in
places, is no less than one in fifteen. On the way we passed heavy
timber-fences erected to break the force of the wind, which has been
known so strong, at times on this part of the line, as to overturn a
train. In the darkness we crossed the Rimutaka--ridge of fallen
trees--and slid smoothly down to the other side into the rich Hutt
valley in which Wellington stands.
A fairy city of lights, outlining spires, roofs and street lines, lay by
reflection in the black water of a broad still harbour, as the train
skirted the low coast of Petone, landing-place of the first white
settlers, eventually passing through extensive suburbs and coming to a
standstill in the station of Wellington. Here the reception was a climax
to the demonstrations along the journey from Auckland. Mayor Luke,
supported by the city councillors, in ermine and gold chains, received
the Prince, as he alighted from the train. Mr. Massey, and other members
of the Dominion Government, were waiting at the entrance. Outside, one
of the smartest captain's guards-of-honour imaginable was standing to
attention, with band and colours. Beyond, restrained by a rope barrier,
an enormous crowd cheered and cheered. The eye travelled over the heads
of the nearer people, and then further away, and there was no thinning
off. One then began to realize that one was looking up a broad street
which climbed a hill, and that the entire hill was a palpitating mass of
shouting humanity, dimly seen in the half-light of the illuminations.
Eventually the Royal procession got off in motor-cars, which took an
hour to traverse the two miles of decorated route to Government House,
where the Prince was to stay, so dense was the crowd along the route, so
anxious were the people to get near him. There was no bad crushing,
however, and nothing could exceed the good temper of the shouting,
flag-flapping, clapping, laughing men, women and children, who pressed
upon the motor-cars, formed a solid mass to the walls of substantial
business houses on either hand, and crowded every window, balcony and
roof commanding a view from above.
Similar scenes marked subsequent days of the Prince's visit to
Wellington. Proceeding to Parliament buildings on the morning after he
arrived, the pressure along the route was extraordinary. The town hall,
where addresses were presented, on the way, was filled by all the most
distinguished people of the country. The platform was occupied by the
Members of the Legislature, headed by the Prime Minister, and including
the Leader of the Opposition, the Mayors of the principal cities, and
other representatives from all parts of New Zealand.
Proposing the Prince's health, at the official luncheon later in the
day, Mr. Massey, speaking in his capacity of Prime Minister, said
everybody in New Zealand took personal happiness and satisfaction in the
magnificent reception the Prince had had at all the centres in the North
Island. "And I want to tell him," he continued, "that his experiences in
the North Island will be repeated in the South."
One of the expeditions made from Wellington was across the harbour to
Petone, where a well-staged pageant was held representing the landing of
Captain Cook and his fellow adventurers from the barque _Endeavour_ in
1779, also that of the Reverend Samuel Marsden and other missionaries
from the merchant-ship _Tory_ thirty-five years later. Naked warriors in
war-canoes escorted each of the boat processions to the beach, and
painted Maori chiefs received the white strangers hospitably on the
sandy shore.
The occasion of the pageant was taken with happy appropriateness to
present the Prince with samples of the finished product of the great
industry with which the descendants of the early settlers have endowed
New Zealand. The articles selected were rugs of beautiful softness and
delightful warmth, made of wool grown in the interior, and carded, spun,
dyed, and woven in mills close to the beach where the original
missionaries landed. "A field which the Lord hath blessed" in every
sense of the term.
Petone is the parent of the capital city of Wellington where the
Governor, Legislative Council and elected House of Representatives
together make up the "General Assembly" which governs New Zealand.
X
SOUTH ISLAND
The still, crisp, autumn morning of the 22nd of May brought the _Renown_
into the silver inland sea of Charlotte Sound, with sunny hills sloping
to the water's edge on either side--a great grey bird she looked,
reflected in a jade-framed mirror. Rounding a steep guarding islet, the
big ship anchored in view of the inner harbour, the pleasant little
red-roofed whaling station of Picton climbing up the slope at the
further end, the houses gay with familiar flowers, and homely with
pecking fowls, amenities which one does not associate with the wild work
of the whaler. The industry as a matter of fact has declined from the
status of its early days, though last year the blubber of forty-eight
"humpbacks" was brought into port.
The entire population--typical British folk of any country town in
England--had assembled and gave the Prince a rousing welcome with the
usual address. From Picton the route was by train through a rich
pastoral plain, past Tuamarina, scene of a long-past tragedy in New
Zealand history, where a misunderstanding resulted in whites being
massacred by their Maori neighbours, one of those lamentable episodes
which the now united Dominion is advisedly engaged in forgetting.
At Blenheim, a prosperous township, eighteen miles from Picton, which
was the next stopping-place, the train was exchanged for motors, and a
visit was paid to the local racecourse, where the inhabitants of the
town of Blenheim and most of the surrounding country had come together.
Amongst them was a fine gathering of returned sailors, soldiers and
cadets, also some fifty Maoris with painted faces, dressed in
feather-covered mats, who gave one of their grave, shouting, stamping,
grimacing national _hakas_ in honour of the Royal guest.
From Blenheim the party started on a seventy-mile motor-drive to Nelson,
an expedition enlivened by similar scenes, though the solemn gaieties of
the Maoris did not occur again. The road, which was of macadam in
excellent repair, ran first through the green, open valley of the
Pelorus river, the fields dotted with sheep, with many a row of tall
poplar trees, yellowing in the still autumn air. Wooded hills closed in,
on either side, as the cars progressed, until we found ourselves
speeding along a winding, unfenced shelf on the side of a precipice,
primeval forest covering the sides of the gorge, to which the procession
clung, like a string of flies to a window-pane, as it swung round
corners, often with a wall of rock on one side and a sheer drop of
hundreds of feet upon the other, a few inches of macadamized shelf all
that interposed between the outer wheels and eternity.
The driver of the Prince's car, a grey-headed Anglo-Saxon, was descended
from men who had driven mail coaches along this road seventy years ago,
when the route was anything but the tourist trip it has become to-day.
The Prince was shown corner after corner where early settlers and their
vehicles had gone over the edge, to be gathered together at the bottom
in an advanced state of disunion. He heard also the oft-told tale of the
Maungatapu highwaymen, white desperadoes, who once made these Rai and
Wangamoa hills their home, until they were rounded up and hanged by
indignant gold-miners and settlers for iniquities which included the
murdering of a wayfarer, after stripping him of his purse, though all
that it contained was a solitary shilling. No allowance seemed to have
been made by his avengers for a certain natural disappointment. From the
Rai and Wangamoa highlands the road led downwards, through a gradually
flattening land of apple-trees, still laden with masses of enormous
yellow and red fruit, past hundreds of acres of bare poles, where hops
had recently been reaped, amongst fields of peach trees set in ordered
ranks, through villages of red-roofed, verandahed wooden houses, where
well-dressed women and extraordinarily chubby and sunburnt children
strewed the chrysanthemums of autumn as the Prince went by. The white
macadam of the country ultimately gave place to the dark asphalt of the
town. Tram-lines appeared in the track, and the procession found itself
amongst hurrahing crowds in Nelson city.
Nelson is built round a central hill. Driving up the main street, the
Prince was in a lane of people, a waving mass of union jacks extending
up the business street on either side, while in front was a natural
grand-stand surmounted by the Gothic windows of a pink, wooden structure
which rose out of the top of a variegated pyramid and was the
Cathedral. It looked as if balanced upon a hunched-up, gaily-coloured
Paisley shawl. As we approached, the base resolved itself into
school-children in white, soldiers and cadets in khaki, with a phalanx
of returned men in their habit as they lived. A grey stone platform,
with steps leading up to it, was occupied by Nelson's officials, one of
whom read an address of welcome. The remainder of the variegated colour
scheme seen from the bottom of the street was due to the costumes of
ladies who stood so close to one another that no peep of the green
background came through.
Here the Prince performed the usual ceremonies that awaited him. He
inspected guards-of-honour, clasped the hands of returned soldiers and
pinned on their coats decorations won at the front. He also expressed to
the Mayor and the crowd thanks for the reception and for the loyal
sentiments of the address, which would be communicated to His Majesty
the King, as well as hearty appreciation of the wonders of the country,
and of the good service of its people in the war, with sympathy for
those who had been disabled or had lost friends or relations. He
demanded a whole holiday for the school-children, with the immense
approval of the beneficiaries. The National Anthem was played and
everybody went off to dinner.
On the following and subsequent days very similar experiences were
encountered. The route from Nelson, after leaving the level country
where more receptions were held at wayside townships, was along the
steep rocky upper gorge of the Buller river, a clear stream which flows
in a series of cascades through a narrow winding cleft in the
mountains. The slope on either side is covered with dense forest of
tree ferns and birches, broken by areas where the undergrowth has been
cut down and fired. Quantities of blackened tree-trunks and half-burnt
logs, upon a carpet of newly sprouted grass, told of the conversion of
the impenetrable primeval forest into productive dairying
fields--grass-seed having only to be scattered broadcast over the ashes
after a shower to bring a quick and copious emerald crop.