[Illustration: _Sir Frederick and Lady Broome with Monsieur Puppy_]
COLONIAL MEMORIES
COLONIAL
MEMORIES
BY
LADY BROOME
LONDON
SMITH, ELDER, & CO.
15 WATERLOO PLACE
1904
[All rights reserved]
Printed by Ballantyne, Hanson & Co.
At the Ballantyne Press
NOTE
My cordial thanks are due—and given—to the Editor of the _Cornhill
Magazine_, within whose pages some of these “Memories” have from time
to time appeared, for permission to republish them in this form. Also
to the Editor of the _Boudoir_, where my “Girls—Old and New” made their
_début_ last season.
M. A. B.
_October 1904_
CONTENTS
PAGE
A Personal Story ix
I. Old New Zealand 1
II. Old New Zealand—_Continued_ 21
III. Old New Zealand—_Continued_ 33
IV. A Modern New Zealand 40
V. Natal Memories 55
VI. “Stella Clavisque Maris Indici” 80
VII. General Charles Gordon 103
VIII. Western Australia 110
IX. Western Australia—_Continued_ 127
X. The Enrolled Guard 144
XI. Trinidad 149
XII. Trinidad—_Continued_ 169
XIII. Rodrigues 184
XIV. Colonial Servants 203
XV. Interviews 224
XVI. A Cooking Memory 240
XVII. Bird Notes 255
XVIII. Humours of Bird Life 275
XIX. Girls—Old and New 293
A PERSONAL STORY
Almost the first thing I can remember is listening with fascinated
interest to an old gipsy woman, who insisted on telling my fortune one
summer afternoon on Cannock Chase long, long ago. I was very reluctant
to undergo what seemed to me a terrible ordeal, but I was encouraged
to do so by my nurse, to whom she had just promised “a knight riding
over a plain.” However, my Sibyl only touched on two points. First,
she looked at my little hand and said: “I see a stream of gold flowing
through your palm. Sometimes it runs full and free, sometimes scant and
slow, but it is _never_ quite dry.” Then she doubled up my childish
fingers and went on, “But this hand cannot close on money: you’ll never
be rich”—an utterance which has come exactly and literally true, and
the remembrance of which has often been a comfort to me in hard times.
Then she insisted on looking at the sole of my foot, and pronounced
that it would “wander up and down the earth; north and south, east
and west, to countries not yet discovered.” She concluded by crying
dramatically: “Earth holds no home for you, earth holds no grave;
you’ll be drowned.” Now, as I must have made something like forty ocean
voyages in the course of my life, I may be said to have spent it in
tempting my Fate. However that may be, the old woman’s prophecy was
written down at the time, and, so far as the wandering part of it goes,
no one who reads these pages can question its truth.
Born in Jamaica, where my father was the last “Island Secretary,”—a
Patent Office, held in conjunction with the late Mr. Charles Greville
of Memoir fame, and long since divided into four parts—I began to
wander to and from England before I was two years old, and had crossed
the Atlantic five times by 1852 when I married Captain (afterwards Sir
George) Barker, K.C.B. I lived in England for the next eight years,
whilst he served all through the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny. I
joined him at the first possible moment after the Mutiny, and arrived
in India at the close of 1860. He was then commanding the Royal
Artillery in Bengal, with the rank of Brigadier-General, a position
held at this moment by our eldest son.
The tragic events of that terrible time were fresh in our minds,
the struggle having just closed; and as I was brought in contact
immediately with many of the principal actors, I naturally wished
to hear details of the thrilling scenes through which they had
just passed, but I found that no one wanted to talk about them. We
started directly after I arrived in Calcutta on a sort of Military
Promenade with the Commander-in-Chief, Sir Hugh Rose (afterwards Lord
Strathnairn), and joined his camp at Lucknow. We stayed with friends
there whilst our tents, &c., were being procured, and I remember that
the walls of my vast bedroom were riddled with shot! There I also met
ladies who had behaved in the most heroic and splendid way all through
the siege; but I found to my amazement that they wanted to hear any
little English chit-chat I might have to tell, instead of saying
one word about those historic days or their share in them. If this
reticence had arisen from any dread of re-awakening sleeping memories,
I could have understood and respected it, but it really seemed to me at
the time as if they had positively forgotten all they had just passed
through, or did not deem it of sufficient interest to talk about,
wanting only to hear what was going on “at home.” It must be remembered
how far away England was in those days—forty odd years ago. Few
newspapers, no telegraph, hardly an illustrated paper even—so it was
perhaps no wonder that they were all suffering from what Aytoun calls—
“The deep, unutterable woe
Which none save exiles feel,”
and always wanted to talk of the dear distant land of their birth.
My own stay in India hardly lasted eight months, but I saw a great deal
of the country in our four months marching through it. The camp broke
up in March at the foot of the Himalayas just as the hot winds were
beginning to make tent-life disagreeable. We then went up to Simla, and
“Peterhof”—afterwards greatly enlarged and made into the Vice-regal
residence—was taken as the headquarters of the R.A. staff.
In that beautiful spot the first great sorrow of my life came to me. I
lost my kind, good husband there; and returned to England after less
than a year’s absence.
For the next four years I lived quietly with my two little sons among
my own people, but in 1865 I met Mr. Napier Broome, a young and very
good-looking New Zealand sheep farmer, who persuaded me to change the
whole course of my life and go back to New Zealand with him! Certainly
the influence of that old gipsy woman must have been very strong just
then; and I often wonder how I could have had the courage to take
such a step, for it entailed leaving my boys behind as well as all my
friends and most of the comforts and conveniences of life. But at the
time it seemed the most natural thing in the world to do, and we sailed
merrily away directly after our marriage in the summer of that year.
I tell elsewhere,[1] as well as in the following pages, the story of
the three supremely happy years which followed this wild and really
almost wicked step on our parts. The life was full of charm and
novelty, though so venturesome; but at first it seemed as if love was
not to be allowed to “be lord of all,” for a crisis in the affairs of
the Colony came just after the great snowstorm, and from one cause and
another the value of real estate as well as of wool sank terribly. It
was, therefore, with sadly diminished means we returned to England
early in 1869, to be met by a chorus of “we told you so” from all our
friends! However, we felt full of hope and courage, and set about at
once seeking for some other means of livelihood.
My husband had always been very fond of literature, and had tried his
hand more or less successfully at poetry. Still it was with great
diffidence that he walked into Messrs. Macmillan’s office one fine June
morning in 1869 and asked to see the editor of _Macmillan’s Magazine_.
Mr. (afterwards Sir George) Grove received him at once and was both
kind and encouraging, promising to look at a little poem called “Sunset
off the Azores.” This interview, which resulted in the immediate
acceptance of the verses, three of which are given below,[2] led to a
life-long friendship, not only with dear Mr. Grove, whom to know was to
love, but also with Mr. Alexander Macmillan, who was always kindness
itself to both of us, and was responsible for putting the idea of
writing into my head. At his suggestion I inflicted “Station Life in
New Zealand,” as well as several story-books for children, on a patient
and long-suffering public.
Almost at the same time an introduction to Mr. Delane of the _Times_
led to Mr. Napier Broome’s being taken on the staff of that paper as
special correspondent and reviewer, in fact, a sort of general utility
man. How well I remember the anxiety and care with which my husband
wrote his first review, and the pride and joy with which he showed me
a charming little note from Mr. Delane, in which, referring to a hope
on Mr. Broome’s part of getting a clerkship in the House of Commons,
he said: “Do not take any definite post at present, for you have an
estate in your inkstand.” And indeed so it proved, for work flowed in
only too fast. As _Times_ Special Correspondent he had many interesting
experiences, amongst them being a visit to Petersburg to describe the
late Duke of Edinburgh’s marriage.
Perhaps the episode which stands out most clearly before me is a
certain _tour-de-force_, as Mr. Delane himself called it, springing
out of the Commune riots at the close of the siege of Paris. We had
been paying a visit in Staffordshire in the early autumn of that tragic
year, and reached home one Saturday evening just in time for dinner,
and to find the well-known _Times_ messenger seated in the hall with
three or four large blue bags around him. He handed my husband a
note from Mr. Delane, explaining that these bags contained a heap of
miscellaneous printed matter taken from the “Cabinet Noir” at the sack
of the Tuilleries, and requiring a series of articles to be made out of
them.
Well, it was already late, and the papers had to be sorted, translated,
and the first article written by Monday morning. So we set to work
directly after dinner. It took all that night merely to sort the
papers and reduce them to an orderly sequence. Much of the material
before us had to be rejected as being either uninteresting or of a
private and personal nature below the dignity of the _Times_ to notice.
The whole of the next day—with only pauses for our meals and hasty
toilets—was devoted to arranging the papers into separate parts for
three consecutive articles of three columns each which Mr. Delane
had asked for. Then came the work of translation, which I undertook,
supplying my husband with hastily scribbled sheets from which he wrote
his article. The printer’s boy appeared about midnight and dozed in the
hall, occasionally tapping at the door for the large envelope full of
MSS. which he sent off by cab. All Monday and Monday night as well as
all Tuesday did the work go on. It was too interesting and exciting to
think of sleep, and it was something like two o’clock on Tuesday night,
or rather Wednesday morning, when, the third and last article being
finished, my husband took it himself down to Printing House Square
for the sake of the drive, and I crawled up to bed! It was literally
crawling, for I remember I sat down on the stairs and had a good cry,
which I found most refreshing and comforting.
I too was asked to write many of the _Times_ reviews of novels, and as
I was invited the next year to be the first Lady Superintendent of the
National School of Cookery, and I became also the Editor of a Magazine,
we both had plenty of agreeable and congenial work, as well as the
satisfaction of earning between us a comfortable income.
This busy but very pleasant London life went smoothly on until 1875,
when the gipsy took us once more in hand I suppose, for, quite
unexpectedly, my husband received an offer from the then Secretary of
State for the Colonies, the late Lord Carnarvon, to go out with Sir
Garnet Wolseley[3] to Natal as his Colonial Secretary. It required a
good deal of courage to again suddenly and violently alter our mode of
life, especially as only a few hours could be allowed for decision,
but both Mr. Delane and the late Duke of Somerset[4] strongly advised
my husband to accept the offer. The Duke had been the Chairman of the
Royal Commission on Unseaworthy Ships, of which my husband was the
Secretary, and ever since they had been thus brought into contact the
Duke had honoured the clever young _Times_ writer with a steady and
delightful friendship, and had always shown the keenest interest in his
career.
So once more our pretty and pleasant home in Thurloe Square was broken
up, and my husband started before the week was out for Natal, with Sir
Garnet Wolseley and his brilliant staff. I could not break off the
threads of my own work so rapidly as all that, and I did not go out
to Natal until six months later. My stay there only lasted a little
over a year, and I brought my two small boys back again early in 1877,
settled them in England, and then joined my husband in Mauritius,
where he was Lieutenant-Governor, in 1880. My own happiness as well as
usefulness there was sadly marred by ill-health, which finally drove me
home in 1881, and I had to remain in England until Mr. Napier Broome
was appointed Governor of Western Australia in 1882. By that time I
had recovered sufficiently to go round by Mauritius in one of the fine
boats of the Messageries Maritimes, which then ran between Marseilles
and Australia, and pick him up and go on to South Australia, from
whence we had to retrace our steps across the Great Australian Bight
to King George Sound. That was in the first days of June 1883. The
next year he was made a K.C.M.G., and came to England in 1885, when he
gave a lecture at the Royal Colonial Institute on “Western Australia,”
at which H.R.H. the Prince of Wales graciously took, for the first
time in the history of the Institute, the chair. It is impossible to
estimate the good effect that lecture had in attracting attention to
the Cinderella of the Australian colonies, or the deep gratification
of the colonists themselves at His Royal Highness’ kindly interest. It
was quite the first step on Western Australia’s road to progress and
prosperity, and I do not believe that at least this generation will
ever cease to be grateful to their Sovereign for helping them by his
presence and patronage when they were indeed “poor and of no account.”
In 1890 we left Western Australia amid heart-breaking farewells, in
order to enable the Governor to see the Bill for giving Responsible
Government to the Colony (which had been thrown out the Session before)
through the House of Commons. That proved a most interesting and
exciting summer, necessitating Sir Frederick’s constant attendance
before the Select Committee. But his efforts, aided by those of two
other delegates,[5] were successful, and the Bill was triumphantly
carried through to the great advantage of the Colony.
I have often thought since, that those seven years were perhaps the
happiest part of my very happy life. The climate, except when a hot
wind was blowing in summer, was delightful, the Government House, an
excellent and comfortable one, stood in beautiful gardens, and the
life was simple and primitive, for no one was rich in those days, and
the society was small and friendly. Sir Frederick worked hard for
the development of the vast Colony, which held a million square but
sandy miles within its borders, finding his task congenial as well as
deeply interesting. I worked too in various little ways, and amongst
other plans I collected all the girls in Perth on Monday afternoons
and read aloud to them for a couple of hours whilst they worked. We
began with Green’s “Short History of the English People,” and went on
to Justin M‘Carthy’s “History of our own Times,” and then Motley’s
“Dutch Republic,” and “Thirty Years’ War.” It was only an experiment at
first, but it succeeded splendidly, thanks to the thirst for knowledge
which all these pretty and charming girls displayed. No weather ever
prevented their coming, and it would have been hard to decide who
enjoyed those afternoons most, the reader or her very attentive and
intelligent audience.
I can answer for myself that it was a terrible wrench to leave that
dear home to which we had both become so truly attached; however,
the gipsy’s weird utterances had to be carried out, and a fresh home
was soon started in Trinidad, to which part of the “Bow of Ulysses”
my husband was appointed Governor in 1891. There the life was, of
course, very different, and so was the climate and the surroundings.
Still the interesting work went on, but there had to be a brief visit
to England—often only lasting three weeks—every year. Unlike most
other Governments there was no rest or change of air possible in the
Colony itself, so the English visit became a necessity for health
besides affording an opportunity for settling many questions of local
importance.
Our time there was drawing to a close in 1896, and already a movement
was on foot (as had been the case in Western Australia) to petition the
Secretary of State for an extension of Sir Frederick’s term of office,
when, like a bolt out of the blue, came an illness full of suffering
which speedily put an end to a career of great promise, and to his life
three months later.
Since 1896 I have therefore ceased wandering up and down the face of
the globe, and, except for short trips abroad and a long and delightful
visit to America last summer, I may be said to have settled down to a
less roving life; but I feel the gipsy prophecy still holds good, and
that no doubt my present little home will one day change its ground.
As it is, I often wonder which is the dream—the shifting scenes of
former days, so full of interest as well as of everything which
could make life dear and precious, or these monotonous years when
I feel like a shipwrecked swimmer, cast up by a wave, out of reach
of immediate peril it is true, but far removed from all except the
commonplace of existence. Still it is much to have known the best and
highest of earthly happiness; to have “loved and been beloved,” and to
have found faithful friends who stood fast even in the darkest days.
Among these friends I would fain believe there are some unknown ones,
who have perhaps read my little books in their childhood, and to whom I
venture to address these lines explaining as it were my personal story,
with an entreaty for forgiveness if I have made it _too_ personal.
COLONIAL MEMORIES
I
OLD NEW ZEALAND
It has so chanced that quite lately I have heard a good deal of this
beautiful and flourishing portion of our “Britain-over-sea,” and these
reports have stirred the old memories of days gone by when it was
almost a _terra incognita_—as indeed were many of our splendid Colonial
possessions—to the home-dweller. But the home-dweller proper hardly
exists in this twentieth century, and the globe-trotter has taken his
place. Even the latter sobriquet was unknown in my day, and I was
regarded as quite going into exile when, some eight-and-thirty years
ago, I sailed with my husband for his sheep-station on the Canterbury
Plains. As far as I was concerned, the life there afforded the sharpest
of all sharp contrasts, but it was none the less happy and delightful
for that.
The direct line of passenger-ships only took us as far as Melbourne,
and then came a dismal ten or twelve days in a wretched little
steamer, struggling along a stormy coast before the flourishing Port
Lyttelton of the present day (a shabby village in 1865) was reached.
Yet the great tunnel through the Port Hills was well on its way even
then, and the railway to connect the port and the young town of
Christchurch was confidently talked of. Even in those early days, the
new-comer was struck by the familiar air of everything; and, so far
as my own experience goes, New Zealand is certainly the most English
colony I have seen. It never seems to have attracted the heterogeneous
races of which the population of other colonies is so largely composed.
For example, in Mauritius the Chinese and Arab element is almost
as numerous as the French and English. In Trinidad there are large
colonies of Spanish and German settlers, without counting in both these
islands the enormous Indian population which we have brought there to
cultivate the sugar-cane; and in all the principal towns of Australia
the “foreigner” thrives and flourishes. But New Zealand has always been
beautifully and distinctly English, and the grand Imperial idea has
there fallen on congenial soil and taken deep root.
Even in the days I speak of, Christchurch, though an infant town,
looked pretty on account of its picturesque situation on the banks
of the Avon. The surrounding country was a sort of rolling prairie,
ideally suitable for sheep, with the magnificent Southern Alps for
a background. And what a climate, and what a sky, and what an air!
The only fault I had to find with the atmospheric conditions was
the hot wind. But hot winds were new to me in those days, and I
rebelled against them accordingly. Now I begin to think hot winds blow
everywhere out of England. In South Africa, in Mauritius, in all parts
of Australia, one suffers from them, to say nothing of India, where
they are on the largest possible scale.
The first six months of my New Zealand life was spent in Christchurch,
waiting for the little wooden house to be cut out and sent up country
to our sheep-station in the Malvern Hills. How absurdly primitive
it all was, and yet how one delighted in it! I well remember the
“happy thought”—when the question arose of the size of drawing and
dining-rooms—of spreading our carpets out on the grass and planning the
house round them. And the joy of settling in, when the various portions
of the little dwelling had been conveyed some seventy-five miles inland
to our happy valley and fitted together. The doors and window-frames
had all come from America ready-made, but the rest of the house was cut
out of the kauri pine from the forests in the North Island.
The first thing I had to learn was that New Zealand meant really
_three_ islands—two big ones and a little one. Everybody knows about
the North and the Middle Islands, which are the big ones, but the
little Stewart Island often confused me by sometimes being called
the South Island, which it really is. A number of groups of small
islets have been added to the colony since then, such as the Cook and
Kermadec Islands, but I do not fancy they are inhabited. The colony was
really not a quarter of a century old when I knew it, as it had been a
dependency of New South Wales up to 1842, and it owes its separation
and rapid development to the New Zealand Company, which started with
a Royal charter. The Canterbury Association sent out four ships which
took four months to reach Port Cooper in the Middle Island (now the
flourishing seaport of Lyttelton), only sixteen years before I landed
there.
The cathedral had not risen above its foundations in 1865, but I was
struck with the well-paved streets, good “side-walks,” gas-lamps,
drinking-fountains, and even red pillar-boxes exactly like the one
round the corner to-day. And it seemed all the more marvellous to me,
who had just gone through the lengthy and costly experience of dragging
my own little possessions across those stormy seas round the Cape of
Good Hope, to think of all these aids to civilisation having come by
the same route. Now I am assured you can get anything and everything
you might possibly want, on the spot, but in those days one eagerly
watched a _déménagement_ as a good opportunity for furnishing.
We had brought all our goods and chattels out with us, and the wooden
house was soon turned into a very pretty comfortable little homestead.
The great trouble was getting the garden started. The soil was
magnificent, and everything in that Malvern Valley grew splendidly if
the north-west winds would only allow it. Hedges of cytisus were always
planted a month or so before sowing the dwarf green peas, in order that
they might have some shelter, and this plan answered very well. I could
not, however, start a hedge of cytisus all round my little lawn, and
the consequence was that the blades of grass on that spot could easily
be counted, and that I discovered a luxuriant patch of “English grass”
about a mile down the flat, where a little dip in the ground had made
a shelter for the flying seed. And the melancholy part of the story
was that English grass-seed cost a guinea a pound! I was quite able
to appreciate, three years later, the ecstasy of delight of a little
New Zealand girl, who, beholding the Isle of Wight for the first time,
exclaimed to me: “How rich they must be! Why, it’s all laid down in
English grass!”
Other flower-seeds, of course, shared the same fate, and it was indeed
gardening under difficulties. But in the vegetable-garden consolation
could be found in the potatoes, strawberries, and green peas, which
were huge in size and abundant in quantity.
Indoors all soon looked bright and cheery; and besides the books we
brought out, I started a magazine and book club in connection with a
London library, which answered very well, and gave great delight to our
neighbours, chiefly shepherds. These men were often of Scotch or north
of England birth, and of a very good type. Their lives, however, were
necessarily monotonous and lonely, and they were very glad of books. We
had a short Church service every Sunday afternoon, to which they gladly
came, and then they took new books back with them.
The only grudge I ever had against these men was that they all tried
to provide themselves with wives among my maids, and by so doing
greatly added to my difficulties with these damsels. Far from accepting
Strephon’s honourable proposals, Chloe would make these offers—which
apparently bored her—an excuse for giving up her place and returning to
the gay metropolis.
I honestly think those maids (I had but two of them at a time) were
the chief, if not the only, real worry of my happy New Zealand life.
Nothing would ever induce them to remain more than four months at the
station. In spite of the suitors, they found it “lonely,” and away
they went. Changing was such a troublesome business and always meant
a week without any servants at all, for the dray—their sole means of
conveyance—took two days on the road each way, and then there were
always stores to buy and bring back, and the driver declared his horses
needed a couple of days’ rest in town. Some of the various reasons
the maids gave for leaving were truly absurd. Once I came into the
kitchen on a bright winter’s morning to find them seated on a sort of
sofa (made of chintz-covered boxes), clasped in each other’s arms, and
weeping bitterly. With difficulty I got out of them that their sole
grievance was the sound of the bleating of the sheep, a “mob” of which
were feeding on the nearest hillside. It was “lonesome like,” and they
must return to town immediately.
These girls, as well as their predecessors and successors, were a
continual mystery to me, and I never could understand why they became
servants at all. Not one of them ever had the faintest idea of what
duties she had to perform or how to perform them. A cook had never,
apparently, been in a kitchen before, nor had the housemaid ever seen,
or at least handled, a broom or a duster. I was only an ignorant
beginner in those days, and yet found myself obliged to teach the most
elementary duties. They were nearly all factory-girls; and when I asked
“Who did these things for you at home?” always answered “Mother.” They
had never held a needle until I taught them how to do so; and as for
mending or darning, that was regarded as sheer waste of time. The first
thing they had to learn was to bake bread, and as, unfortunately, the
best teacher was our head shepherd—a good-looking, well-to-do young
man—the “courting” began very soon, though it never seemed successful,
and poor Ridge’s heart must have been torn to pieces during those three
years of obdurate pupils.
I must, however, say here that, ignorant to an incredible degree as
my various “helps” were, I found them perfectly honest and perfectly
respectable. I never had the slightest fault to find on either of these
counts. Sobriety went without saying, for it was compulsory, as the
nearest public-house was a dozen miles away across trackless hills.
It was a real tragic time, for me at least, that constantly recurring
week between the departure and arrival of my maids; but I am inclined
to think, on mature reflection, that my worst troubles arose from the
volunteers who insisted on helping me. These kindly A.D.C.’s,—owners
or pupils on neighbouring stations,—all professed to be quite familiar
with domestic matters. But I found a sad falling-off when it came to
putting their theories into practice in my kitchen. It generally turned
out that they had made a hasty study of various paragraphs in that
useful work “Inquire Within, &c.,” and then started forth to carry out
the directions they had mastered. For instance, one stalwart neighbour
presented a smiling face at our hall-door one morning and said:—
“I’ve come to wash up.”
“That is very kind of you,” I replied; “but are you sure you know how?”
“Oh yes—just try me, and you’ll see. Very hot water, you know: boiling,
in fact.”
Well, there was no difficulty about the hot water, which was poured
into a tub in which a good many of my pretty china plates and dishes
were standing. The next moment I heard a yell and a crash—and I am
very much afraid “a big, big D——”—and my “help” was jumping about the
kitchen wringing his hands and shouting for cotton-wool and salad-oil
and what not. It seemed a mere detail after this calamity to discover
that half-a-dozen plates were broken and as many more cracked. “The
beastly thing was so hot” being the excuse.
The first time the maids left I thought I would, so to speak, victual
the garrison beforehand, and I had quantities of bread baked and butter
churned and meat-pies made and joints roasted; but at the end of a
couple of days the larder was nearly empty, partly on account of the
gigantic appetites we all had, and partly because of the addition to
our home party of all these volunteers who always seized the excuse of
helping. As a matter of fact, my “helps” generally betook themselves
to a rifle-range F. had set up down the valley, or else they organised
athletic sports. I should not have minded their doing so, if it had
not, apparently, increased their appetites.
Never can I forget an awful experience I went through with one of my
earliest attempts at bread-making. I felt it was a serious matter, and
not to be lightly taken in hand, so I turned my helps, one and all, out
of the kitchen, and proceeded to carry out the directions as written
down. First the dough was to be “set.” That was an anxious business.
The prescribed quantity of flour had to be put in a milk-pan, the
orthodox hole in the centre of the white heap was duly made, and then
came the critical moment of adding the yeast. There was only one bottle
of this precious ingredient left, and it was evidently very much “up,”
as yeast ought to be. Under these circumstances, to take out the cork
of that bottle was exactly like firing a pistol, and I do not like
firing pistols. So I was obliged to call for an assistant. All rushed
in gleefully, declaring that opening yeast-bottles was their show
accomplishment, but F. was the first to seize it. He gave it a great
shake. Out flew the cork right up to the rafters, and after it flew
_all_ my beautiful yeast, leaving only dregs of hops and potatoes,
which F., turning the bottle upside down, emptied into the flour. Of
course it was all spoiled, though I tried hard to produce something of
the nature of bread out of it. But certainly it was horribly heavy and
damp.
One thing my New Zealand experiences taught me, and that was the skill
and patience and variety of knowledge required to produce the simple
things of our daily life—things which we accept as much as a matter of
course as the air we breathe. But if you have to attempt them yourself,
you end by having a great respect for those who do them apparently
without effort.
I have often been asked how we amused ourselves in that lonely
valley. There was not very much time for amusement, for we were all
very busy. There was mustering and drafting to be done, besides the
annual business of shearing, which was a tremendous affair. It is
true I developed quite a talent for grafting pleasure upon business;
and when a long boundary ride had to be taken, or a new length of
fencing inspected (in those days wire fences could not be put up even
at that comparatively short distance from a town under £100 a mile),
I contrived to make it a sort of picnic, and enjoyed it thoroughly.
The one drawback to my happiness was the dreadful track—it were gross
flattery to call it a road—over which our way generally led us. No
English horse would have attempted the break-neck places our nags took
us safely over. Up and down slippery steep stairs, where all four feet
had to be collected carefully on each step, before an attempt to reach
the next could be made; across swamps where there was no foothold
except on an occasional tussock; over creeks with crumbling banks. At
first I really could not believe that I was expected to follow over
such places, but I was only adjured to “sit tight and leave it all to
my horse,” and certainly I survived to tell the tale! The only fall I
had during all those three years of real rough-riding was cantering
over a perfectly smooth plain, when a little bag strapped to my saddle
slipped down and struck my very spirited mare beneath her body. She
bucked frantically, and I flew into space, alighting on the point of my
shoulder, which I broke. On that occasion I was the victim of a good
deal of amateur surgery, but it all came right eventually, though I
could not use my arm for a long time.
But to return to our amusements. Boar-hunting was perhaps the most
exciting; though I was not allowed to call that an amusement, for it
was absolutely necessary to keep down the wild pigs, which we owe to
Captain Cook. A sow will follow very young lambs until they drop,
separating them from their mothers and giving them no rest. When
the poor little things fall exhausted the sow then devours them,
but it is almost impossible to track and shoot these same sows, for
they hide themselves and their litters in the most marvellous way.
The shepherds occasionally come across them, and then have a great
orgy of sucking-pig. But the big boar whose shoulder-scales are like
plated armour and quite bullet-proof, and whose tusks are as sharp as
razors, gives really very good sport, and must be warily stalked. These
expeditions had always to be undertaken on foot, and I insisted on
going because I had heard gruesome stories of accidents to sportsmen,
who had perished of cold and hunger on desolate hillsides when out
after boars. So I always begged to be taken out stalking, and as I
carried a basket with sandwiches and cake and a bottle of cold tea, my
company was graciously accepted.
These expeditions always took place in the winter, for the affairs of
the sheep seemed to occupy most of the summer, and besides it would
have been too hot for climbing steep hillsides and exploring long
winding gullies in anything but cold May and June weather. The boars
gave excellent sport, and I well remember, after a long day’s stalk
up the gorge of the Selwyn River, our pride and triumph when F., who
had taken a careful aim at what looked exactly like one of the grey
boulders strewn about on the opposite hillside, fired his rifle, and a
huge boar leapt into the air, only to fall dead and come crashing down
the steep slope.
Then there were some glorious days after wild cattle, but that was a
long way off in the great Kowai Bush, and we had to camp out for nearly
a week. It was difficult work getting through the forest, as, although
there was a sort of track, it was often impassable by reason of fallen
trees. Of course we were on foot; but it greatly adds to one’s work to
have constantly to climb or scramble over a barrier of branches. All
the gentlemen carried compasses as the only means of steering through
the curious green gloom. Though it was the height of summer, we never
saw a ray of sunshine, and it was always delightfully cool. Every now
and then we came to a clearing, and so could see where we were. One of
these openings showed us the great Waimakariri River swirling beneath
its high wooded banks, and it was, just there, literally covered with
wild duck—grey, blue, and “Paradise”—all excellent eating, but I am
thankful to say that the sportsmen forbore to shoot, as it would have
been impossible to retrieve the birds. Some fine young bullocks fell
every day to their rifles; but although I heard the shots and the
ensuing shouts of joy, the thickness of the “bush” always prevented
(happily!) my seeing the victims.
The undergrowth of that “bush”—_Anglicè_, forest—was the most beautiful
thing imaginable, and the familiar stag’s-head and hart’s-tongue grew
side by side with exquisite forms quite unknown to me. Besides the
profusion of ferns, there was a wealth of delicate fairy-like foliage,
but never a flower to be seen on account of the want of sun.
In summer we sometimes went down to the nearest creek, about a mile
away, for eel-fishing, but I did not care much for that form of sport.
It meant sitting in star-light and solitude for many hours, and one
got drenched with dew into the bargain. The preparations were the most
amusing part, especially the making of balls of worsted-ends with lumps
of mutton tied craftily in the middle; the idea being that when the eel
snapped at the meat his teeth ought to stick in the worsted, and so he
would become an easy prey to the angler. This came off according to the
programme, and even I caught some; but they were far too heavy to lift
out of the water, as there was no “playing” an eel, and the dead weight
had to be raised by the flax-stick which was my only fishing-rod.
However, quite enough of the horrid slimy things were secured to make
succulent pies for those who liked them.
We once invented an amusement for ourselves by going up a mountain on
our station three thousand feet high, and sleeping there in order to
see the sunrise next morning. I ought, perhaps, to explain that these
Malvern Hills among which our sheep-station lay are really the lowest
spurs of the great Southern Alps, so that even on our run the hills
attained quite a respectable height. I had heard from those who had
gone up this hill—quite near our little house—how wide and beautiful
was the outlook from its summit, so I never rested until the expedition
was arranged. Of course, it was only possible in the height of summer,
and we chose an ideally beautiful afternoon for our start directly
after an early dinner. It was possible to ride a good way up the hill,
and then we dismounted (there were five of us), and took the saddles
and bridles off the horses, tied them to flax-bushes within easy reach
of good feed, and commenced the climb of the last and steepest bit of
the ascent.
It was rather amusing to find, as soon as it came to carrying them
up ourselves, how many things were suddenly pronounced to be quite
unnecessary. Food and drink had to be carried (the drink consisting
of water for tea) and a pair of red blankets for shelter, and just
one little extra blanket for me. My share of the porterage was only a
bottle of milk strapped to my back—for it took both hands to scramble
up, holding on to the long tussocks of grass—but I felt that I was
laden to the extent of my carrying capacity! The four gentlemen had
really heavy loads (“swags,” as they called all parcels or bundles),
under which, however, they gallantly struggled up. There was no time to
admire any view when at last we stood, breathless and panting, on the
little plateau at the very top, for the twilight was fast fading, and
there was the tent to be put up and wood to collect for the fire.
Fortunately, all those hillsides were more or less strewn with charred
logs of a splendid hard red wood, called “totara,” the last traces of
the forest or bush with which they were once covered. The shepherds
always pick up and bring down any of these logs which they come across
when mustering or boundary-keeping, for they find them a great prize
for their fires, burning slowly, and giving out a fine heat.
When we came to pitch the tent, there seemed such a draught through
it that I gave up my own particular blanket to block up one end, and
contented myself with a little jacket. But oh, how cold it was! We
did not find it out just at first, for we were all too busy settling
ourselves, lighting the fire, unpacking, and so forth. But after we
had eaten the pies and provisions, and drunk a quantity of tea, there
did not seem much to do except to turn in so as to be ready for the
sunrise. Some tussocks of coarse grass had been cut to make a sort of
bed for me, after the fashion of the wild-pigs, who, the shepherds
declare, “have clean sheets every night,” for they never use their lair
more than once, and always sleep on fresh bitten-off grass. In spite of
this luxury, however, I must say I found the ground _very_ hard, and
the wind, against which the blankets seemed absolutely no protection,
_very_ cold. Also the length of that night was something marvellous;
and when we looked down into the valley and saw the lights twinkling
in our own little homestead, and reflected that it could not be yet
ten o’clock, a sense of foolishness took possession of us. Every one
looked, as seen by the firelight, cold and miserable, but happily no
one was cross or reproachful. Three of the gentlemen sat round the fire
smoking all night, with occasional very weak “grogs” to cheer them. F.
shared the tent with me and Nettle, my little fox-terrier; but Nettle
showed himself a selfish doggie that night. I wanted him to sleep
curled up at my back for warmth, but he would insist on so arranging
himself that I was at _his_ back, which was not the same thing for me
at all.
We certainly verified the proverb of its being darkest before dawn,
for the stars seemed to fade quite out, and an inky blackness stole
over earth and sky an hour or so before a pale streak grew luminous in
the east. I fear I must confess to having by that time quite forgotten
my ardent desire to see the sunrise. All I thought of was the joy of
getting home, and being warm once more; and, as soon as it was light
enough to see anything, we began to strike the little tent and pack up
the empty dishes and pannikins. But long before we could have thought
it possible, and long before it could be seen from the deep valley
below us, the sun uprose, and one felt as if one was looking at the
majestic sight for the first time since the Creation. Nothing could
have been more magnificent than the sudden flood of light bursting over
the wide expanse. Fifty miles away, the glistening waves of the Pacific
showed quite clearly; below us spread the vast Canterbury Plains, with
the great Waimakariri River flowing through them like a tangle of
silver ribbons. To the west rose steep, forest-covered hills, still
dark and gloomy, with the eerie-looking outline of the snow-ranges
rising behind. A light mist marked where the great Ellesmere Lake lay,
the strange thing about which is that, although only a slight bar of
sand separates it from the sea, its waters are quite fresh. All we
could see of the River Rakaia were its steep banks, but beyond them
again shone the gleam of the Rangitata’s waters, whilst close under our
feet the Selwyn ran darkly through its narrow gorge. The little green
patches of cultivation—so few and far between in those days—each with
its tiny cottage, gave a little homelike touch which was delightful,
as did also the strings of sheep going noisily down from their high
camping-grounds to feed in the sheltered valleys or on the sunny
slopes. It was certainly a most beautiful panorama, and we all agreed
that it was well worth our long, cold night of waiting. Still, we got
home as quickly as we could, and I remember the day proved a very quiet
one. I suspect there were many surreptitious naps indulged in by us
poor “Watchers of the Night.”
II
OLD NEW ZEALAND—_Continued_
No wandering reminiscence of these distant days would be complete
without a brief mention of the famous snowstorm of 1867, at which I
assisted.
I must say a prefatory word or two about the climate—so far as my
three years’ experience went—in order to explain the full force of
the disaster that fall of snow wrought. The winters were short and
delicious, except for an occasional week of wet weather, which,
however, was always regarded by the sheep-farmer as excellent for
filling up the creeks, making the grass grow, and being everything
that was natural and desirable. When it did not rain, the winter
weather was simply enchanting, although one had to be prepared for its
sudden caprices, for weather is weather even at the antipodes, and
consequently unreliable. Sometimes we started on an ideally exquisite
morning for a long ride on some station business. The air would be
still and delicious, fresh and exhilarating to a degree hardly to be
understood; the sun brilliant and just sufficiently warming. All would
go well for four or five hours, until, perhaps, we had crossed a low
saddle in the mountains and were coming home by the gorge of a river.
In ten minutes everything might have changed. A sou’-wester would have
sprung up as though let out of a bag, heavy drops of rain would be
succeeded by a snow-flurry, in which it was not always easy to find
one’s way home across swamps and over creeks, and the riders who set
forth so gaily at ten of the clock that same morning would return in
the fast-gathering darkness wet to the skin, or rather frozen to the
bone. I have often found it difficult to get out of my habit, so stiff
with frozen snow was its bodice.
No one ever dreamed of catching cold, however, from the meteorological
changes and chances, an immunity which no doubt we owed to the fact
that we led, whether we liked it or not, an open-air life. The little
weather-boarded house, with its canvas-papered lining, did not offer
much protection from a hard frost, and I have often found a heap of
feathery snow on a chair near my closed bedroom window; the snow having
drifted in through the ill-fitting frame.
Still these snow-showers, and even hard frosts (which usually melted by
midday), did no harm to man or beast, and found us totally unprepared
for the fall in August 1867. Of course there were no meteorological
records kept in those days, for they had not long been started even in
England, and we had nothing to go by except the Maori traditions, which
held no record of anything the least like that snowstorm. Indeed, I had
seldom seen snow lie on the ground for more than an hour after the sun
rose, and it never was thought of as a danger in our comparatively low
hills.
I well remember that Monday morning and the strange restlessness which
seemed to extend to the sheep, for they must have felt the coming
trouble long before we thought of calamity. The weather during the last
week of July had been quite beautiful, our regular winter weather, and
we had taken advantage of it to send the dray down to Christchurch for
supplies. My store-room was all but empty, and the tea-chest, flour
and sugar bags, held hardly half-a-week’s consumption, so the drayman
was charged not to linger, but to turn round and come back directly he
got his load. When speaking of supplies it must be borne in mind that
tinned provisions were almost unknown in those days, and certainly
never found their way to a New Zealand sheep station. F. had also taken
advantage of the beautiful open weather to ride down to Christchurch
about wool matters, so I expected to be quite alone with a youth who
was learning sheep-farming under F.’s auspices, and my two servants.
But F. had hardly started before a cousin rode up the track and,
hearing I was feeling somewhat depressed and lonely, very kindly
volunteered to stay, and before the afternoon was over a neighbouring
young squatter also appeared, and asked (as was quite a common thing
in that hotel-less district) for shelter for the night. Nothing could
have been more unexpected—except that one’s station guests always were
unexpected—than these two visitors, but it proved a fortunate chance
for me that they appeared just then.