how the light is reflected from the snow on the summit of the
mighty range in front of us. Next we come on a sight peculiar to
the country; this is a boundary dog, a lonely sentry chained up 32
at a point where the boundary of a sheep run crosses the road and
there is no gate to prevent the sheep from straying. Around him
is a heap of bones, the remnants of many meals. Then we reach
another lake, Pukaki, with its chalky-looking water; and in the 33
distance up the lake we have a view of the great mass of Mount
Cook. We drive along the lake side right into the heart of the
mountains, and in the evening reach the Hermitage at the foot of
Mount Sefton. Here is a view of Mount Sefton and here are the 34
Hermitage and the mountain as we should see them in winter. 35
We sleep at the Hermitage, and in the morning start with a guide
and the usual equipment of the climber in Switzerland. We cross
the Hooker River by a suspended cage; the water looks quiet 36
enough now, but here it is in flood; a very different picture. 37
All along the west coast there are mountain streams of this kind;
and we can easily imagine what a serious barrier they offer to
movement from north to south across the line of their channels.
It would be impossible, without a large scale map and plenty of
space, to describe the wonders which we can see on a two days’
walk, sleeping at Ball Hut, a long way up the mountain slopes.
But we may gain some notion of the different kinds of scenery
to be found. All around us are snow-clad peaks, with great
glaciers flowing down the valleys between and ending in long
moraines--masses of rock and debris with chalk-white streams
flowing out from beneath them as in the picture before us. This
is the Mueller Glacier with Mount Sefton; and the river coming 38
out from the terminal face is the Hooker, which we crossed
earlier at a lower point in its course. Here again we are looking 39
up the famous Tasman Glacier, towards the Minarets, and here
is the wonderful scene at the head of the glacier. On the same 40
glacier we find a beautiful specimen of the ice river; and not 41
far away, on the great Hochstetter, we see some magnificent 42
ice falls. In the background is Mount Silberhorn. The picture
suggests the origin of the name. Finally we have a view of Mount 43
Cook, the Aorangi of the Maoris, with its topmost peaks rising
into the clouds. It is the highest mountain in Australasia, and
we have already seen it in various aspects from a distance. Here
is the summit, twelve thousand feet above the level of the sea, 44
or nearly three times the height of Ben Nevis. Mount Cook is
worthy to stand by the side of the giant peaks of the Alps, and
even in Switzerland it would be difficult to find scenery grander
than that of these southern mountains.
We must not spend too much time here, so we make our way back
to Timaru. Timaru is a small but busy town and port, with
flour mills, meat-freezing works, and steamers loading at its
wharves. We must pause here for a moment as we are entering on
a new region in South Island, very different from those which
we have visited. Timaru is the chief outlet for the centre and
south of the province of Canterbury. The eastern part of the
province consists of a strip of level or gently undulating
country, a hundred and fifty miles from north to south and from
thirty to forty from east to west. This plain slopes gently from
the foothills of the western mountains, and has been built up
largely of alluvium brought down by the rivers which now flow
across it in shifting channels through wide belts of shingle. It
is a sharp contrast to the forest regions of the west: a land
of comparatively small rainfall, with pastures, hedgerows, and
open cornlands; treeless except for scattered clumps, planted by
the settlers. Dropped suddenly in this district we might easily
imagine that we were somewhere in the Midlands of England.
On these treeless plains and the eastern slopes of the hills, 45
the early settlers found pasture ready-made for their flocks;
as there was no clearing of forest to be done. So, to-day, this
part of South Island has still the most important sheep-rearing
industry in New Zealand.
Here is a typical farm near the foothills, with cattle feeding 46
on the rich pasture. Again, we have a scene nearer Canterbury,
showing a great expanse of grain, with the reapers at work. The 47
rainfall is so small that in some parts of the plain there is
not enough water for the farmer, so that artificial irrigation
is necessary, and there are now many miles of water races 48
strung across the country. It seems strange to talk of drought
and irrigation after our experiences of the west coast, but we
may understand it better if we look at the figures of annual
rainfall. At Hokitika, and all along the west coast as far north
as Greymouth, the fall is a hundred inches or more; while in the
extreme south-west corner it is over two hundred. On the other
hand, all the low-lying parts of the Canterbury Plains have less
than thirty inches; in fact, we may compare them to the east and
south-east districts of England. In England, as in South Island,
we find heavy rains in the west, and the explanation is similar
in both cases. The prevailing moist winds are from the west, so
that the eastern plains lie under the lee of the mountains.
[Illustration: SOUTH ISLAND: RAINFALL.]
If we remember the latitude of South Island we might expect to
find it rather warm; but we must take account of other things
than latitude. It is true that there are occasional hot winds
blowing down from the mountains over the Canterbury Plains, but
the island as a whole is cool. The great mass of highland, with
its winter covering of snow, the perpetual moist winds and the
cool currents of the ocean all help to modify the heat of the
sun’s rays, and to give us a climate not in the least enervating
for English settlers.
As we approach Christchurch the farms are closer together and
the whole country is enclosed and cultivated. For mile after
mile we run past green hedgerows as in England; and in the
spring these are ablaze with the yellow of the gorse blossom,
while the scent hangs heavy in the air. Then, through suburbs
with villas and gardens, we reach the city itself. Christchurch
is as typically English as Dunedin is Scotch. It was founded
by an association of High Churchmen who bought land from the
New Zealand Land Company in 1850, and it still boasts the only
cathedral in the Dominion. Here is a general view of the city. 49
We shall find much to remind us of England in the social life,
the clubs and sports of the city, and its beautiful park planted
with English trees. The Avon flows through it, with its riverside
houses whose lawns slope down to the banks; there are willows 50
overhanging the water and swans swimming about, and the whole
scene might be taken for a quiet backwater on the Thames. It is 51
often said that emigrants from Britain carry a piece of their
homeland with them; there can be no better illustration of this
than Christchurch and Dunedin.
The cathedral, the parks and gardens and beautiful residences
show us one side of English life; but Christchurch has another
side. Its people are not idle. We see here warehouses, offices,
and busy factories, as befits the chief centre of the whole
Canterbury district. In one respect, however, it differs from
the other large cities of New Zealand; it is not on the sea.
We shall see its trade and shipping at Lyttelton, seven miles 52
away by rail. Lyttelton lies on an arm of the sea to the north
of the Banks Peninsula, a volcanic mass breaking the line of 53
the long smooth coast, just as the Otago Peninsula at Dunedin.
But the activities of the two cities are not the same: Dunedin,
the outlet of the coal and gold-mining area of Otago, has its
School of Mines, as well as of medicine and other subjects;
while Christchurch, the city of the fertile plain, in addition
to a great engineering department, has its Lincoln Agricultural
College. Here are the college buildings, and here we see some of 54
the students at practical work, threshing wheat in the fields. 55
Thus we see a contrast which is purely geographical reflected in
the world of education.
If we follow the great plain northwards from Christchurch, we
shall find that it narrows gradually and comes to an end at last,
against the seaward range of the Kaikoura Mountains. Our road
north is stopped, but we can follow the railway north-westward
to Springfield; thence we go by coach, over the Alps through
Arthur’s Pass and down the Otira Gorge, until we strike the short
railway which will take us to Greymouth and the west coast. This
is the only coach road over the Alps, and we can learn much in
the course of our exciting forty mile run.
We climb up, by a twisting road, over open slopes covered with
brown tussock grass. Here and there we pass a mountain tarn,
and all the time above us are purple mountains capped with 56
dazzling fields of snow. We cross the saddle at the summit of
the pass, 3000 feet above the sea, and then plunge down through
a deep cañon gorge, following the narrow bed of a mountain 57
stream. Instead of the open mountain side, all around us are
high fern-clad cliffs, steep slopes and dense forest, all ablaze
in summer with the scarlet rata blossom. We have seen, on our
short journey, the east and the west countries, in the sharpest
possible contrast. Soon, the rail-heads on either side will be
linked, and a rush through miles of dark tunnel will take the
place of the splendid drive on the coach, though doubtless many
will still prefer the road to the rail.
From Greymouth another line of rail and coach will take us
through another famous gorge on a zigzag course to Nelson on
Tasman Bay. We realise that communication in this part of the
island is very difficult, and we shall find that the isolation of
the different areas of settlement has been an important factor in
the political development of New Zealand.
Greymouth, on a small artificial harbour at the mouth of the
river, carries on a trade in gold, coal, and timber; Westport,
further north, owes its existence mainly to coal, though there
are also gold mines in the country behind it. Hokitika, which we
can reach by a short railway journey, southward from Greymouth,
is also the outlet of a gold district. The coal in this district
of Westland is of good quality, and some day may give rise to a
large industrial population; at present it is mined chiefly for
export. Here we see the little township of Brunner, with its 58
coal mines; notice the forest and mountain in the background.
Round Nelson there is a strip of sheltered lowland noted for its
agriculture and fruit growing; as it was easily reached, and near
the line of traffic through Cook Strait, the district with its
fertile soil and mild climate was one of the earliest to attract
settlers. Here is a view of Nelson on its little plain ringed in 59
by bare hills.
The mountainous north-east corner of the island, now the district
of Marlborough, was difficult of access; so for a long time it
had no separate existence, but was merely part of the larger 60
province of Nelson; but now we may reach it easily by steamer and
might spend many days exploring the inner coast and bays of the
Sounds which penetrate deeply into the land. These Sounds are
different from those which we visited in the south-west of the
island. They are broad, lake-like expanses of calm water, backed
by forested hill slopes, with here and there clearings and farms
near the water’s edge. The early whalers established themselves
here, and to-day it is a favourite haunt of the yachtsmen. Here
is a view of part of Pelorus Sound. 61
If we look at the structure of the island, we now see that there
were three detached areas favourable for early settlement; Nelson
in the north, Canterbury in the middle, and Otago in the south.
All these were occupied separately, between the years 1840 and
1850, and the only means of communication between them was by
sea. We can understand why at first these districts formed
independent Provinces, each with its own local Parliament.
Indeed, for a few years, even the southern part of Otago enjoyed
a separate existence as Southland. The provinces still remain as
provincial districts for certain purposes of local government,
though Westland, between the Alps and the sea, has been split off
from Canterbury, and Marlborough, as we have noted, from Nelson.
Among the cities Christchurch and Dunedin still stand alone with
over sixty thousand inhabitants and two of the colleges of the
University of New Zealand; while the greater part of the trade
of the island passes through their ports. The districts behind
them also contain the great majority of the sheep reared in the
island. Next in importance to these cities is Invercargill, with
less than twenty thousand inhabitants; while no other town has
more than ten thousand. These numbers may seem small to us, but
we must remember that they are large in proportion to the total
population of New Zealand, which, including the Maoris, was less
than a million in 1906. In Christchurch, in addition to the
Cathedral and University College, we find a Supreme Court of the
Dominion; and here we may see also the old Provincial Council
Buildings, a remnant of the former system of government.
Though these capital cities have attracted relatively large
populations, yet there is not that enormous concentration of
life and wealth in a single city which we noticed in some of
the Australian States. The sea is partly responsible for this.
The population tends to scatter in a fringe along the coasts,
since the natural means of access to the agricultural and
mining districts of the interior is from the nearest point on
the sea-board. There is no great concentration of routes at
any one point, and though Christchurch and Dunedin have a long
start, many of the smaller towns are growing rapidly, through
the development of the areas behind them. As we have seen, the
whole structure of the country is against concentration, and
the scattering of the population may become more rather than
less marked as the newer districts are opened up from the coast
inwards. The geographical conditions which controlled early
settlement are still operative to-day.
We have treated of the settlement of South Island as though
the first settlers found the country uninhabited and were
free to develop its resources as seemed best to them, with
no difficulties in the way except those due to climate and
structure. We have made no mention of the aborigines for the good
reason that less than five per cent. of them are to be found in
South Island; so that the native problem has never been of a
serious character. The chief attraction for the Maoris lay in
the greenstone for their weapons which the island provided; and
though they had a few settlements on the coast, their number was
too small to form any real obstacle to white occupation.
The character of the climate alone would give sufficient ground
for their avoidance of the island, as they were a race of
immigrants from the warmer regions to the north; also, as we
shall see later, the structure of the country was not well suited
to their habits of life. The case is very different when we come
to deal with North Island; we shall find the Maori there a very
important element in the history of its development. On our way
from Nelson we shall pass through the narrow channel between
Rangitoto Island and the mainland, where we shall probably meet
“Pelorus Jack,” the huge pilot fish, or rather dolphin, who
regularly escorts vessels through the strait. He is protected
by Act of Parliament, and is so well known that he has become 62
a subject of Maori legends. A short steam from Pelorus Sound
across Cook Strait brings us to North Island and within sight of
Wellington.
LECTURE VII
NEW ZEALAND--NORTH ISLAND
We may remember noticing, in our first survey, that Cook Strait
was much shallower than the surrounding seas, and that there
was an evident connexion between the North and South Islands 1
of New Zealand. The strait at one point is narrower than the
Strait of Dover, and the connexion between the two sides is
still more clear when we look at the structure of the land. The
parallel ranges of the Kaikoura Mountains, which we saw in the
north-east corner of South Island, reappear on the other side
of the strait. We can trace the continuation of the seaward
Kaikouras in detached fragments of highland along the east coast
of North Island; while inland there runs an unbroken range from
the coast at Wellington right up to Cape Runaway at the eastern
corner of the Bay of Plenty. So we have a backbone in North
Island as well as in South Island, but on the eastern instead of
the western side. The result is that the plains on the east are
smaller than those in South Island. There is one of these plains
behind Wellington and another south of Napier; the railway runs
through them and connects up a whole string of small agricultural
towns. North of Napier there is no railway, and the country is
hilly or mountainous with few settlements. The whole arrangement
is similar to that which we have seen in South Island, and is
equally dependent on the position and structure of the main
mountain backbone. Napier lies at the mouth of an estuary, while 2
Wellington, the only good port in the south of the island, is in
a drowned river valley, running up between the seaward spurs
of the hills and sheltered by them from the gusty winds of Cook
Strait.
As we steam in from the sea we might well imagine that we were
entering one of the fiords of South Island. The hills come down 3,4
to the water’s edge so that the city which they shelter is 5
somewhat crowded and cramped for space. The old settlement was
on a terrace up the hill; but a modern port must be close to the
water-level, so the wharves and warehouses are built largely on 6
land reclaimed from the foreshore. In fact, the foundations are
piles driven into the mud, and the buildings in the pictures
before us seem to be growing out of the water. Here is the
passenger wharf with our steamer, and beyond it the town in the 7
early morning haze. From the tower of the Customs House we can
obtain a good idea of the business part of the city. On one side
of us are tall buildings, offices, and warehouses; on the other 8
are factories, sheds, and railway sidings, with the harbour and 9
shipping beyond.
It would be a rather ugly city except for the terraced hill in
the background, where we find some of the finest buildings. If we
look closely at some of these, we may be struck by a remarkable
feature in their construction; many of them are made entirely of
wood. The chief reason for this was the fear of the earthquakes
to which the whole of this district is subject. Here is another
curious result of the same thing. We see a fine cricket-ground,
on which a match is in progress between Australian and New
Zealand teams: the ground is in the Basin Reserve, which was 10
originally intended for a dock but was raised in level during
the great earthquake of 1848. The Government offices are said to
be the largest wooden buildings in the world; notice the curious 11
style of the architecture and contrast it with some of the many
public buildings of stone which we saw in Australia. Even the
Houses of Parliament are of wood. Parliament meets here, since
Wellington is now the capital and seat of Government for the
whole Dominion. The present meeting place is the old Government 12
House, since the former Parliamentary Buildings were burnt down
in the summer of 1907. Only a fragment of them remains, chiefly
the library which we see in this picture; the marble statue in 13
front is that of John Ballance, a former Premier of New Zealand.
Wellington, by its position, is a natural centre for politics and
for trade, whether across the ocean or round the coasts; it is
the chief port of the island and the starting point of a whole
system of railways which has grown outward from it. As a trading
centre, Auckland comes a good second, and Lyttelton third.
We have noticed already the railway to Napier, which reminded us 14
somewhat of that in the Canterbury district. The lines running
to the north and north-west carry us into an entirely new type
of country, and before following them up we must look carefully
at the build of the island on the other side of the mountain
backbone. Here our experience of South Island will help us
little. Instead of a gentle uniform slope to the ocean, we find
a confused and bewildering structure. The mountain ranges in the
long northern neck and in the Coromandel Peninsula, with its
continuing islands, run from north-west to south-east, almost
at right angles to our main dividing range. In the broader part
of the island these ranges disappear, and we have a broken
plateau in the region round Lake Taupo with short ranges lying
on it in irregular fashion. We may notice that rivers radiate
from this centre in every direction except the east. Finally,
in the south-west corner, we see an isolated and symmetrical
mountain block. The forces at work here seem to have been very
different from those which shaped the long ridges of South
Island. The Taupo district will give us the key to the whole: it
is volcanic and contains active cones, geysers, and hot springs
in great number. There is another contrast: in the south and
west of the island we have no fiords or inlets, but long, smooth
coasts hollowed out into bights; whereas the north is made up of
islands, inlets, and peninsulas. We shall see later that these
differences in structure have more than a purely geographical
interest, since they have had a most marked influence on the
settlement and history of the island.
[Illustration: NORTH ISLAND: POLITICAL.]
Let us now start on our journey by rail and observe the country
as we pass rapidly through it. At first we travel through open
lands with many prosperous-looking farms. Then, as we turn
northward on the main trunk line, the scenery gradually changes;
there are rugged hills, plateaus with steep broken edges, and
rivers running at the bottom of narrow gorges. The whole face of
the country looks disturbed and unfinished, and becomes wilder
and more desolate as we approach the volcanic district in the
centre. At Waiouru, we leave the train and mount a coach which
jolts us sadly over the rough roads. From the station, looking
northward, we can see in the distance the great cone of Ruapehu,
with slopes of dark purple and a dazzling cap of snow upon the 15
summit. Beyond it are other cones, one of which, Ngauruhoe, we
see here; and below us, as we drive along, is the Wangaehu, a 16
narrow stream flowing in a dark grey bed, its waters heavily
charged with sulphur. Further on is the Waikiti, at the bottom of
a deep chasm.
As we draw near to Lake Taupo we notice here and there puffs of
steam rising from the scrub at the side of the road, and on the
roadway we meet Maoris, tattered and dirty looking. Here we see
two of them meeting and saluting one another by touching noses. 17
At last we drive on to the jetty at Tokaanu at the southern end
of the lake. There are more Maoris here and on the steam launch
which is to take us to the other end. Taupo lies right up on the
central volcanic plateau, and we are about to visit part of the
great geyser region a short distance from its northern end. It
is the largest of the lakes of New Zealand, and is interesting
not so much for its beauty, as it has little, but for its close
connexion with Maori history. Here is a view of the lake looking 18
back towards Tokaanu and the volcanic range of mountains.
A short drive from the landing place at the northern end brings
us to Wairakei, where we walk down a pleasant green valley to
view the geysers. First we visit the Champagne Pool, a little 19
lake with steep red walls and deposits of white silica on the
lower rocks. Here the water is always bubbling and spouting at
a temperature above boiling point. The deposits of silica often
form beautiful terraces: the most famous in the world were at
Rotomahana, not far from Lake Rotorua which lies at the north
end of our district. Here are two pictures of the Rotomahana 20
terraces; notice the people bathing in the hot pools. These great 21
terraces were destroyed by the eruption of Mount Tarawera in
1886, but there are many smaller formations of the same kind to
be seen in the district. Here, for instance, is one gradually 22
being built up round the Twin Geysers.