AUCKLAND.
Passing up Queen Street, after landing on the wharf, a party of us
notice--or fancy we notice--a rather singular feature in the Aucklanders
we meet. The men are grave and serious in deportment, and nearly all are
profusely bearded; but one of us draws attention to the fact that all
have strangely aquiline noses. Hebrews they are not--we know, they are
of the same nationality as ourselves--so we seek explanation from a
whimsical fellow-voyager, himself an old Aucklander.
"Ah!" says he, "that's a peculiarity of the climate. You'll have long
noses, too, after a year or so. There's an Auckland proverb, that a
new-chum never does any good until his nose has grown. You've got to
learn the truth of that pretty soon."
Following up these remarks, he proceeded to add--
"It's like the proverbial cutting of the wisdom-teeth. After inhaling
this magnificent air of ours for a year or two, your nose will grow
bigger to receive it; and about the same time you will have spent the
money you brought with you, gone in for hard work, learnt common-sense,
and become 'colonized.'"
The reader will understand that a new-chum is, throughout the colonies,
regarded as food for mirth. He is treated with good-humoured contempt
and kindly patronage. He is looked upon as a legitimate butt, and a sort
of grown-up and incapable infant. His doings are watched with interest,
to see what new eccentricities he will develop; and shouts of laughter
are raised at every fresh tale of some new-chum's inexperienced attempts
and failures. Half the stories that circulate in conversation have a
new-chum as the comic man of the piece; and if any unheard of
undertaking is noised about, "Oh, he's a new-chum!" is considered
sufficient explanation.
However, the new-chum is not supposed to be altogether a fool, since he
will sooner or later develop into the full-blown colonist, and since
sometimes it happens that one of his order will show colonists "a thing
or two." He is one of the recognized characters of colonial society, and
as he affords much material that seems infinitely ludicrous to the older
colonist, so his faults and failings meet with lenient condonation.
Even the law seems to feel that the new-chum is scarcely a responsible
being. At the time I write of, drunkenness was severely legislated
against in New Zealand. A man who was merely drunk, without being
actually incapable or riotous, was liable, if any constable saw fit, to
be haled before the magistrate and fined one pound; and, on a subsequent
conviction, might be sent to the Stockade (prison), without the option
of a fine at all. The law stood something like that, and was impartially
administered by the Auckland Dogberry. However, if an individual were
pulled up, charged with even the most excessive tipsiness, including
riot, assault, incapability, or what not, and could show that he was a
new-chum, the sacred folly attributed to that state of being was held
sufficient to bear him blameless, and he was always discharged on his
promise not to do it again. I do not know whether this was intended as a
sort of indulgence to newly-arrived voyagers, or whether, in the eye of
the law, a new-chum was held to be an irresponsible being, who had not
yet arrived at the moral manhood of a New Zealander. Certain it is, it
was fact, and was largely taken advantage of, too.
In order to bear out one of the received theories regarding new-chums,
namely, their utter want of frugality, we, some half-a-dozen young
"gentlemen," who have come out in the cabin, go to put up at one of the
leading hotels of the city. We have looked in at some of the minor
hotels and houses of accommodation, but are daunted by the rough, rude,
navvy-like men, who appear to chiefly frequent them; and we do not care
to go to any of the boarding-houses, where parsons, missionaries, and
people of that class mostly abound, and tincture the very air with a
savour of godliness and respectability that is, alas! repugnant to our
scapegrace youth.
We are young fellows with slender purses but boundless hopes, an immense
belief in ourselves and our golden prospects; but with the vaguest
possible idea of what manual labour, roughing it, and colonial work
really mean. Therefore, we have decided that there is no reason to
plunge at once into the middle of things, that we will look about a bit,
let ourselves down gently, and taste a little comfort before proceeding
further.
Our hotel is a solid, comfortable-looking edifice of stone, standing on
a wide street that traverses a high ridge, and commanding a fine view of
the harbour. It is well furnished throughout in English fashion,
resembling any first-class family and commercial hotel of the old
country. There is a long bar or saloon occupying the ground floor, with
a parlour behind it; there are also a spacious dining-room and
business-room. Upstairs there is a billiard-room, smoking-room, ladies'
drawing-room, and bedrooms capable of accommodating thirty or forty
guests. Behind the house is a large courtyard, round which are ranged
the bath-rooms, kitchens, offices, and stables; while further back is
the garden, principally used for strictly utilitarian purposes.
According to colonial custom there is little or no privacy, no private
sitting-rooms, and if a visitor have a bedroom to himself, it is not
quite such a sanctum as it would be in Britain. People stopping in the
house are free to permeate it from kitchen to attic, if so minded.
There are three common meals--breakfast, luncheon-dinner, and
dinner-supper--and any one who is not present at them, or who is hungry
between times, will have to go without in the interval, and wait till
the next regular meal-time comes round, unless he dare to invade the
kitchen and curry favour with the cook, or goes down to some restaurant
in the city.
Generally speaking, the table is furnished in a style most creditable as
to both quantity and quality of the viands. There may not be such a show
of plate and glass and ornament as there would be at a London hotel of
similar status, but there is a plenteous profusion of varied eatables,
fairly cooked and served up, to which profusion the home establishment
is an utter stranger. Fish, fowl, butcher's meat, vegetables, breads and
cakes, eggs, cream, and fruit, appear in such abundance that, when every
one is nearly gorged, we wonder what can possibly be done with the
overplus, especially since we are told that this is a city without
paupers, as yet.
Fresh from the crystallized decorum of English manners, we are
necessarily struck by the freedom of intercourse that prevails. Class
prejudices have certainly been imported here from Europe, and exist to a
small extent in Auckland society, but there is, withal, a nearer
approach to true liberty, equality, and fraternity, at any rate in the
manners and customs of colonists. The hotel servants show no symptoms of
servility, though in civility they are not lacking. Every one is
perfectly independent, and considers himself or herself on an equal
footing with every one else, no matter what differences may exist in
their present position--new-chums always excepted--while they ever bear
in mind that such differences are only temporary, and may disappear any
day in the chances and changes of life in a new country.
Our landlord and his wife preside at the meals, and, whoever may or
might be present, comport themselves as a host and hostess entertaining
a friendly party. In common with every one else, they take a lively
interest in our intentions and prospects, and we are bewildered with
conflicting advice and suggestions, some real and some jocular. They
make us feel at home in the house very speedily, and cause us to forget
that we are paying lodgers.
Not but what the bill will come up with due regularity, and will have to
be met as promptly. And the mention of it reminds me to state that the
tariff is eight shillings per day, inclusive of everything but liquors.
This would be moderate enough in all conscience, according to English
notions, but it is thought to be a luxurious price here. The minor
hotels and boarding-houses in Auckland charge from a pound to
thirty-five shillings per week. At present there is nothing higher than
the price we pay at our hotel.
Having hinted at the social relations that obtain here, there will seem
to be nothing outrageous in the following slight incident that
illustrates them. One morning, soon after our arrival, I get down to
breakfast rather late, after most of the guests have dispersed.
Something seems to have creased our landlady's temper, for she greets me
with--
"Look here, young man! I can't have people walking in to breakfast at
all hours of the day. If you don't come down at the proper time, you'll
have to go without in future--mind that!"
But at this juncture arrives the waiter, who is kind enough to favour me
with his friendship, bringing with him a dish he has been keeping hot,
and, as he slaps it down in front of me, he observes in a tone of mild
remonstrance--
"Leave the man alone. I'll look after him. Now just you walk into that,
my boy, and see if it won't suit your complaint!"
This is quite colonial style. But fancy an old-country landlady
venturing to remonstrate with her boarder in such terms; and imagine the
pitiable horror of a precise and formal Englishman, who might find
himself so addressed by a waiter, and in the presence of the latter's
mistress, too!
I am particular in styling Auckland a "city," and not a "town," for were
I to use the latter term I should expect to earn the undying hostility
of all true Aucklanders. It is a point they are excessively touchy upon,
and as the city and its suburbs contains a population of more than
twenty thousand--increasing annually at an almost alarming rate--it were
as well for me to be particular. We take a stroll or two about the city
in company with a colonial friend, who obligingly acts as our cicerone.
The wharf is naturally the first point of interest to new-comers. It
stretches continuously out into the river from the lower end of Queen
Street, and is over a quarter of a mile in length. It is built of wood,
and has several side-piers or "tees," whereat ships discharge and take
in cargo. The scene is always a busy one; and in the evening the wharf
is a favourite promenade with citizens.
Out in the river, lying at anchor, is the good ship that brought us
here, and not far from her are a couple of others, one of which will
shortly sail for England. Puffing its way between these vessels is a
little white cock-boat of a steamer, that seems tolerably well crowded
with men, whose white sun-helmets and yellow silk coats give quite an
Indian air to the scene. These persons are probably business men coming
over in the ferry-boat from North Shore, where we can see some of their
villas from the wharf.
Lying alongside the wharf are one or two vessels of considerable
tonnage, loading or discharging cargo, while at their respective tees,
whereon are offices and goods-sheds, are several fine steamers of
moderate size. These ply in various directions, taking passengers
chiefly, but also goods. Some go and come between Auckland and
Grahamstown, or Coromandel, in the Hauraki Gulf; others go to Tauranga,
the Bay of Plenty, Napier, Wellington, and the South Island; one or two
go northward to Mahurangi, Whangarei, the Bay of Islands, Whangaroa, and
Mongonui.
The splendid and sumptuously fitted-up Pacific liners that call here
once a month, on their way between "Frisco," Hawaii, Fiji, and Sydney,
are none of them in the harbour at present; but there, at the extreme
end of the wharf, lies _The Hero_, the Sydney packet, and a magnificent
steam-ship is she. All the schooners, cutters, and craft of small
tonnage that fill up the scene, and crowd alongside the wharf and its
tees, are coasting or Island traders.
There is one from the Fijis with cotton, coffee, and fresh tropical
fruits; there is another from the Friendlies with copra and cocoa-nut
fibre, which she will shortly transfer to some ship loading for England;
and there is the _Magellan Cloud_, fresh from a successful whaling
cruise in Antarctic Seas. There is a vessel from Kororareka with coal
and manganese, or kauri-gum; there are others from Mahurangi with lime,
from Whangarei with fat cattle, from Tauranga with potatoes, from
Poverty Bay with wool, from the Wairoa with butter and cheese, from Port
Lyttelton with flour, or raw-hides for the Panmure tannery, from Dunedin
with grain or colonial ale, and so on and so on.
Just off the wharf, and facing the river at either corner of Queen
Street, are two large and handsome hotels, while to right and left on
the river frontage are sundry important commercial edifices. Passing to
the left as we leave the wharf, we come to several extensive
timber-yards, and to a long jetty, used exclusively as a timber-wharf.
The immense piles of sawn timber lying here give to us new-chums some
notion of the vast timber-trade of Northern New Zealand, especially
since we learn that much which goes to the South Island and elsewhere is
shipped direct from Whangaroa, Hokianga, the Kaipara, and other ports in
the north. The road along the river front, here, is shortly brought up
abruptly at the base of a lofty bluff, whereon is a church and other
buildings, near the site of old Fort Britomart.
Retracing our steps, we enter Queen Street, the main street of the city.
All the lower portion of it abutting on to the wharf was, we are told,
reclaimed from swamp and mud only a very few years ago. The street is a
fine one, leading straight away from the river, curving imperceptibly to
the right, and gradually ascending for about a mile, until it branches
off into other streets and roads. Down at the lower end of the street
most of the buildings are of brick and stone; and some of them are of
tolerably fine architecture. There are banks and warehouses and
merchants' stores of all kinds, interspersed with hotels and public
buildings. Higher up Queen Street, and in the cross-streets, stone and
brick edifices are less numerous, and wooden houses more plentiful.
The broad, well-paved thoroughfare is crowded at certain times of the
day with carriages, cabs, buggies, omnibuses, equestrians,
express-carts, waggons, drays, and every species of vehicle. The
side-walks are thronged with passengers, who pass up and down under the
awnings that stretch from the houses across the wide pavement. Many of
the shop-windows would do no discredit to Oxford Street or the Strand,
either as respects their size or the goods displayed in them.
Some distance up Queen Street, and turning a little out of it, is the
Market House, where a very fine show of fruit, vegetables, and other
eatables is frequently to be seen; and then there is the United Service
Hotel, at the corner of Wellesley Street, which is a structure that
Aucklanders point to with pride, as evidence of their progress in street
architecture. At night, when the gas is lit in the streets, the shops,
and the saloons, and one mingles with the crowd that throngs them, or
pours into the theatre, the Choral Hall, the Mechanics' Institute, the
Oddfellows' Hall, or other places of amusement, instruction, or
dissipation, it is almost possible sometimes to imagine oneself back in
the old country, in the streets of some English town.
New-chums are able to notice some of the peculiarities of Auckland
street-life, wherein it most differs from an old-country town. These
arise principally from that absence of conventionality, which, certainly
in many external things, is the prerogative of colonists. There is a
mingling of people who seem on terms of perfect equality, and who yet
present the most extraordinary difference in appearance. The gentleman
and the roughest of roughs may happen to get together on the same piece
of work, and when their temporary chum-ship ends the one cannot entirely
cut the other, such being a course quite inadmissible with colonial
views of life. Only one man _may_ be scouted by any one, and that is the
loafer.
Of course there are good people here who would fain introduce all the
class barriers that exist in the old country; but they cannot do more
than form little cliques and coteries, which are constantly giving way
and being broken down under the amalgamating process of colonization.
Where these offer most resistance to the levelling influence is where
they are cemented by religious denominational spite, which is,
unhappily, very prevalent in Auckland.
This general fusion of all sorts of people together produces a very
amiable and friendly state of things. Etiquette is resolved into simple
courtesy, not very refined, perhaps, but which is sufficient "between
man and man," as Micawber would say. Prejudice must not be entertained
against any man on account of his birth, connections, education,
poverty, or manner of work; he is "a man for a' that," and entitled to
the same consideration as the more fortunate individual who possesses
what he lacks. Only if he be a loafer, or dishonest, or otherwise
positively objectionable, will any man find himself under the ban of
colonial society. And this society is not a mere set of wealthy
exclusives banded together against the rest of the world; it comprehends
everybody.
One sees in the streets abundant evidence of these conditions of social
relationship. In the first place, costume goes for little or nothing.
Men--I am coming to your sex presently, ladies!--men wear just what they
please at all times and in all places, and without remark from others.
One sees men apparelled in all sorts of ways; and it would be impossible
to guess at a man's condition from his coat, hereaway.
In Queen Street once, I saw a well-dressed and thriving store-keeper
touch his hat to a ragged, disreputable-looking individual, who was
carrying a hod full of bricks, where some building operations were going
on. It was a sudden impulse of old habit, I suppose, which had wrung
that very uncolonial salute from the sometime valet to his former
master, in whose service he had originally come out. I knew of one case
where master and servant actually came to change places, and I may add,
to their mutual advantage eventually.
A man would not be likely to receive an invitation to the governor's
ball unless he had some pretensions to gentility, or was locally
important. Yet, I suppose that the recipient of such an invite might
turn up at Government House in a grey jumper and moleskins, if he were
so minded, and would pass unquestioned. In such a case it would only be
surmised that Mr. So-and-so was "not doing very well at present."
Women, as a rule, dress "to death;" and the more gorgeous the toilette
the more likely is it that the wearer is unmarried, and a worker of some
sort. The merest Irish slut can earn her ten shillings a week as a
domestic, besides being found in everything; and better-class girls get
proportionately more; so it is not surprising that they can clothe
themselves in fine raiment. But there is no rule to go by--the
expensively dressed woman may be either mistress or maid, and the plain
cotton gown may clothe either as well. Only one thing is certain, the
Auckland woman of any class will dress as well as she knows how, on her
own earnings or her husband's.
We new-chums observe one or two peculiarities of this kind as we stroll
about the city, and they are explained to us by our colonial friend.
Some extremely dowdy females we see riding in a barouche are the wife
and daughters of a high official, who is stingy to his woman-kind, so
they say. Two youths we pass are in striking contrast, as they walk
along arm-in-arm. One is got up according to the fullest Auckland idea
of Bond Street foppery, while the other prefers to go about in very
"creeshy flannen;" yet the two sit at the same desk in one of the banks,
and earn the same salary; and neither they themselves, nor anyone else,
seems to notice any peculiarity in the costume of either.
Then comes along a more remarkable pair still: a "lady" and a "man"
apparently, or so they might be described at home. She is dressed in the
latest fashion and with killing effect--muslin, silk, embroidery,
chains, bracelets, laces, ribbons, the newest thing in bonnets, and the
last in parasols--and has quite the air of a fine lady. He is a burly
rough, bearded to the eyes, the shapeless remnant of a coarse
wide-awake covering a head of hair that has seemingly been long unknown
to the barber; his blue flannel shirt, ragged jacket, breeches, and long
riding-boots, are all crusted deep with mud, while a stock-whip is
coiled round his shoulders. They walk amicably along together,
conversing, though there is something of an air of constraint between
them. Our colonial friend nods to the man as they pass; and we ask him
who the strangely assorted couple may be.
"Oh! he's a well-to-do stock-farmer," is the reply, "and has just come
in with a herd of fat beasts."
"And the lady?" we ask.
"The lady! Ha! That's a new dairy-maid and house-servant my friend's
just engaged. Guess she'll have to leave her fine feathers in Auckland!
Precious little good they'd be to her at his place in the bush!"
And now for a sample of the native race, but very sparingly represented
in the city at any time. A dignified and portly gentleman is rolling
along, with an air as though the place belonged to him. He is a Maori,
as we plainly see; moreover, he is a chief, and is at present a member
of the House of Representatives. There is no trace of the savage about
him, as he struts along in his patent leather boots, shining broadcloth,
snowy shirt-front, massive watch-guard, and glossy silk hat, unless it
be in the richly decorative tattoo that adorns his brown face, and over
which a gold double-eyeglass has a somewhat incongruous effect
There is another Maori on the curbstone, looking a horrible
tatterdemalion as he stands there in the scantiest and wretchedest of
European rags, offering peaches and water-melons for sale. Him and his
proffered wares the chief waves off with aristocratic hauteur, until he
suddenly recollects that his humble countryman has a vote at the
elections; then he stops, enters into a brief conversation, examines the
kitful of fruit through his glasses with supercilious disdain, but
eventually purchases a chunk of melon, and goes on his way munching it.
In the shops the same sense of equality is noticeable. Shopkeepers and
their assistants are not the cringing, obsequious slaves that we know so
well in England. There is none of that bowing and smirking, superfluous
"sir"-ing and "ma'am"-ing, and elaborate deference to customers that
prevails at home. Here we are all freemen and equals; and the Auckland
shopman meets his customer with a shake of the hand, and a pleasant
hail-fellow-well-met style of manner. Not but what all the tricks of
trade are fully understood at the Antipodes, and the Aucklander can
chaffer and haggle, and drive as hard a bargain as his fellow across
the seas; only his way of doing it is different, that is all.
Auckland possesses a class whose members are akin to the street-arabs of
London and elsewhere, but differ from them in many respects. The
Auckland "larrikin" is a growing nuisance, but he is neither so numerous
nor so objectionable as yet as his fellow in Melbourne and Sydney.
Unlike the street-arab, he is either a school-boy, or earns his living
somehow, or he is a truant from work of either kind. He probably belongs
to some working family, whom he favours with his company only at such
times as pleases himself, for he is utterly unmanageable by his parents.
He has exuberant spirits and an inordinate love of mischief, which shows
itself in manifold ways. He has a sort of organization of his own, and
seems to revel in uncurbed liberty of action. Occasionally some wrathful
citizen executes summary justice upon him, in spite of the fear that
such an act may bring down the vengeance of the whole boyish gang; and
sometimes the youth finds himself in the police-court, charged with
"larrikinism," an offence that is sure to be severely punished. The
"larrikin" easily gets a job, and works by fits and starts when it suits
him, or when he wants money. He lives in the open air, sleeping
anywhere, and getting his food no one knows how. He is not altogether
bad--not so frequently thieving and breaking the law, as intent on
simple mischief and practical jokes of the coarsest and roughest
sort--still, he is a pest that Aucklanders inveigh heartily against, and
would gladly see extirpated by the strong arm of the law.
We turn out of Queen Street into Shortland Crescent. At the corner is a
large and handsome block of buildings constructed of brick, and having
an imposing frontage on the Crescent. This contains the General
Post-office and the Custom House. Not far distant, on the opposite side
of Queen Street, is the New Zealand Insurance Company's establishment,
more generally known as "The Exchange." It is the finest building in the
city, excepting the Supreme Court, perhaps, and has a tower, and a clock
which is the Big Ben of Auckland.
At the corner of Shortland Crescent and Queen Street, and just under the
front of the Post-office, is a kind of rendezvous that serves as a
_Petite Bourse_, or Cornhill, to those who go "on 'Change" in Auckland.
Here congregate little knots of eager-eyed men--stock-jobbers most of
them--waiting for news from the Thames gold field, perhaps, or for
telegrams from elsewhere. Ever and anon some report spreads among them,
there is an excited flutter, mysterious consultations and references to
note books, and scrip of the "Union Beach," the "Caledonian," or the
"Golden Crown," changes hands, and goes "up" or "down," as the case may
be, while fortunes--in a small way--are made or marred.
Toiling on up the steep ascent of the Crescent, we come out on a broad
road that runs along the summit of the range, and close to an ugly
church, St. Matthew's, that crowns the bluff looking over the harbour.
From various points here there are good views of the city obtainable;
and our guide is able to expatiate on most of its beauties and
characteristics. Down below us is the splendid and extensive harbour,
land-locked, and capable of containing the whole British navy. Right
opposite is the North Head, or North Shore, as it is usually termed, on
whose twin volcanic peaks is an Armstrong battery, to defend the harbour
entrance in case of need. There is also the signal station on Mount
Victoria, whence incoming vessels may be sighted outside of Tiri-tiri
and the Barrier Islands. There are the villages of Stokes' Point, West
Devonport, and East Devonport beyond, facing the open Pacific, and
renowned for its salubrious sea-breezes.
Just beneath us is the railway station, whence the line runs across the
isthmus, connecting Auckland with Onehunga on the Manukau Harbour,
where the West Coast traffic is carried on, and thus placing Auckland,
like Corinth, upon two seas. The railway also extends southwards to the
Waikato.[1] Onehunga is only some half-dozen miles from the outskirts of
the city, and the road to it lies between fields and meadows, bordered
with hedgerows, by villa and cottage and homestead, quite in English
rural style. The road also leads by Ellerslie race-course, and the
Ellerslie Gardens, the Auckland Rosherville.
The coastal traffic that is carried on in the Manukau is nearly equal in
extent to the similar trade done in the Waitemata, hence the commercial
importance of Auckland can hardly be rivalled by that of any other city
of New Zealand. Dunedin, in the far south, holds a similar status to
Auckland in the north, but the cities are too far distant (some eight
hundred nautical miles) to become rivals to the detriment of each other.
Beyond the railway, we look across the inland sweep of Mechanic's Bay to
the rising ground on its further side, crowned by the popular and
picturesque suburb of Parnell. On the river side the streets descend to
the shore; the houses, most of them pretty wooden villas, standing each
in its terraced garden grounds, embowered in rich foliage. On the land
side a gully divides Parnell from the Domain. This serves as a public
park and recreation ground for citizens of Auckland. It is a tract of
original forest or bush, through whose bosky glades winding walks have
been cut, leading up and down range and gully, furnished with seats and
arbours and artificial accessories. Conjoined to the Domain are the
gardens of the Acclimatization Society, which are beautiful and
interesting on account of their botanical and zoological contents.
Rising at some distance behind the Domain, we catch a glimpse of Mount
Hobson, upon whose sides nestles the suburb of the same name. To the
right of it lies the Great South Road, whereon is the village of
Newmarket, and beyond it again the scattered suburb of Epsom, and that
gem of lovely hamlets, Remuera.
Our eyes, slowly travelling round to take in all these points, are now
turned directly away from the harbour. Before us stretches a long road
named Symonds Street, leading past the Supreme Court--a brick and stone
building of considerable architectural pretension--past the wide
cemetery, and allowing beyond a sight of the hospital in the valley
below, on till the large suburb of Newton--hardly disconnected at all
from the city proper--is reached.
In this direction is situated Government House, a large mansion of wood,
standing in park-like grounds, where the English oak, the American
maple, the Australian blue-gum, the semi-tropical palm, and the New
Zealand kauri mingle their foliage together. Some distance further, and
to the left of the road, rises Mount Eden. On one side of it is the
gaol, a group of buildings surrounded by a wall and palisades, and
situated in a scoria quarry. Among the spurs and declivities of the
mount are many villas of the wealthier citizens, standing in well
laid-out grounds, and making a very pleasing picture.
We now look right across the densest part of the city, from our first
standpoint near St. Matthew's Church. Below is Queen Street, with the
roofs of the various buildings already noticed in it. Beyond it there is
a corresponding high ground to that on which we are, and behind that
again is Freeman's Bay. On the crest of the eminence is St. Paul's
"cathedral"--so styled; the principal Anglican church of the city. In
the distance the breezy suburb of Ponsonby is pointed out to us,
occupying high ground, from which is visible the winding valley of the
Waitemata, stretching away up into the hills. Here and there can be
seen the spires or belfries of numerous churches and chapels, for
Auckland is an eminently religious city, and has temples and tabernacles
for almost every Christian creed.
Our companion dilates upon the institutions of the city, which are
highly creditable to so young a community, and are in advance of those
of many European towns of equal population, that can trace back their
history considerably further than Auckland's thirty-and-odd years. In
matters ecclesiastical and educational the young city is indeed well
endowed. There are two bishops, Roman and Anglican, a Presbytery, and
governing bodies of other denominations. There is a College and Grammar
School of the New Zealand University, common schools in the city,
private schools of all sorts and sects, a training school and ship at
Kohimarama, an establishment for young clergymen, and convent schools.
There are asylums, orphanages, and refuges.
There are institutes and halls belonging to all kinds of societies:
Young Men's Christian Association, Mechanics, Good Templars, Freemasons,
Orangemen, Oddfellows, Foresters, etc. There is the Auckland Institute
and Museum, the Acclimatization Society, Agricultural Society,
Benevolent Societies, etc. There are Cricketing, Rowing, and Yachting
Clubs. There is a mayor and City Council, with Harbour Board, Highway
Board, Domain Board, and Improvement Commissions. There is the Supreme
Court, the District Court, the Resident Magistrate's Court, and the
Police Court. There are public and circulating libraries, two daily
morning newspapers, an evening newspaper, two weekly newspapers, two
weekly journals of fiction, and two monthly religious periodicals.
The city is lighted by gas supplied by a private company; and the
water-supply is under municipal control. It returns three members to the
House of Representatives, while Parnell and Newton each return one. So
much and more does our cicerone favour us with, until he has, as he
thinks, convinced us that Auckland is really the finest place of
residence in the world.
We now pass down into the city again, taking a new route past the
Northern Club, a lofty and unsightly building, whose members are
notoriously hospitable, and much given to whist and euchre. Downhill a
short distance, and we come to the Albert Barracks, where newly-arrived
immigrants are housed, and where most of our sometime shipmates now are.
They are comfortably quartered here for the present, but no incitement
is held out to them to remain long, and every inducement is given them
to get an engagement and quit as soon as may be. It seldom happens that
there is any difficulty in this; usually, indeed, there is a rush to
engage the new-comers, so much are servants and labourers, mechanics and
artizans in request.
There have been times when would-be employers would go off in
shore-boats to the immigrant ship in the harbour, and though not allowed
on board, would make efforts to hire domestics and labourers at the side
of the vessel. Again, when the government immigrants were landed, and
were marched up from the wharf to the barracks, a mob of employers would
escort the procession, endeavouring to hire helps, and with such success
that sometimes the barracks were hardly needed at all. But such scenes
are becoming rarer now, though there must continue, for many years to
come, to be a run upon certain classes of immigrants, notably single
girls for house-servants.[2]
Turning into the barrack-yard, round which are the various buildings
where the immigrants are temporarily housed, we find an animated scene
before us. Here are assembled most of our immigrant shipmates, some few
of whom have already got engagements and gone off. A considerable party
of settlers and agents are now busily at work trying to hire the people
they severally want; while the poor bewildered immigrants find
themselves treated as though they were goods in an auction-room, and
scarcely know whether they are standing on their heads or their heels.
It so happens that there is just now a great demand for agricultural and
domestics, so that settlers are actually bidding against each other for
the individuals they want to engage. Our ship-load was no special body
of people, but a motley collection of men, women, and children from all
parts of the old country. Among them are natives of Kent and of
Cornwall, of Yorkshire and of Wales, of Inverness and of Galway.
Here are a couple of brothers whom we made special friends with on the
voyage, young hardy Scots; let us see how they get on. We find them at a
premium, surrounded by a little crowd of farmers from the Waikato, who
each and all seem intent on hiring them. The lads do not wish to part if
they can help it; and so, as to get one means to get both, the farmers
are all the hotter in their pursuit of them. For these young men are
just the right sort that are most wanted, having the thews and sinews
and power of endurance so necessary for a rough life; having experience
of sheep and cattle and agricultural work from their earliest infancy;
having, in fact, all the qualities most essential and useful to the
pioneer farmer. They come of the right race, too, as all the world
knows--colonists especially--for honesty, sobriety, and patient
industry.
What a change for them--from the inclement sky, the hostile winter, the
rugged battle for life they have left behind them with their native
Grampians, to this bright clime of everlasting summer, of strange
fertility, to these sunshiny isles of beauty and plenty! Well, well, it
is not a land of indolence either; the work demanded here is stern and
hard and rough; but what a reward may be reaped in the end from earnest
and unshrinking toil! No wonder if, in a year or two's time, our friends
yonder will write to the dear ones they left at home, in the Perthshire
glen, such an account as shall bear witness that they, at least, have
found on earth the Peasant's Paradise!
There is hot and excited bargaining going on in the group of which the
brothers form the centre. They are a little dazed, and do not venture to
speak; but they are canny for all that, and bide their time. Amid the
babel of voices that surrounds us on all sides, we catch a few
utterances as follows:--
"Five shillings a day, and your tucker!"
"Five and threepence, lads!"
"He'll give you nothing but salt pork; try me at the same wage!"
"And you'll have to live on potatoes and pumpkins with him!"
"Five and six, and as much mutton as you want!"
"Too much, perhaps, and braxy at that!"
"Come, a cottage to yourselves, rations, and five and six a day!"
"Cottage! A tumble-down whare is what he means!"
"Fresh meat every day with me, boys--beef, mutton, and pork!"
"Yes; and he'll want you to work twelve hours!"
"Better engage with me at five and nine; I'll lodge you well, and feed
you first chop!"
And so on and so on, until at last the brothers pluck up determination,
and make choice of an employer. So our Caledonian friends begin to
gather together their traps and make preparations to accompany their
complaisant and well-satisfied boss to his farm on the banks of the
Waikato. And an indescribable joy is in their hearts, for they are to
receive six shillings and sixpence a day, and to be provided with
comfortable lodging and lavish "tucker" withal; and though, no doubt,
they will prove worthy of that high wage to their employer, yet what
marvellous wealth it is, compared to the most they could have earned had
they remained to toil upon the braes of Albyn!
Of course, very few of the other immigrants get such a wage as that. The
two young Scots are the picked men of the crowd. Five shillings a day
and "all found" is the ordinary wage for an agricultural, and though
some are worth more, new-chums are generally held to be worth a good
deal less for their first year. The distich--
"Eight hours' sleep and eight hours' play,
Eight hours' work and eight bob a day,"
has been, and is, verified literally over and over again in New Zealand;
but the "eight bob a day" cannot be called an ordinary wage. A man must
be worth his salt and something over to get it, and will not do so
unless labour is scarce and in much demand. Those who contract, or do
work by the piece, often make as much and more if they are first-rate
workers; and that kind of engagement is preferred by both employers and
employes, as a rule.
All sorts of skilled labourers get high wages. Carpenters and
blacksmiths will get ten and twelve shillings a day with their keep;
and when they have saved a little money, and can go on the job by
themselves, they may earn an advance on that.
I have already noticed the great demand that there is for female
house-servants, and the high wages they can get. Girls cannot be relied
on to stop in a situation very long, as they are sure to receive
numerous matrimonial offers; hence there is a perpetual seeking after
new domestics. Marriage is an institution that turns out uncommonly well
here. There is no such thing as a descent to pauperism for those who
will work. By little and little the working couple thrive and prosper,
and as their family--New Zealand families run large, by the
way--multiplies and grows up round them, they are able to enjoy the
comforts of a competence they could never have attained at home. Some
settlers, who originally came out, man and wife, as government
immigrants drawn from the peasant class, are now wealthy proprietors of
broad acres, flocks, and herds; and are able to send their sons to
college and their daughters to finishing-schools; the whilom humble
servant girl now riding in her carriage, and wearing silk and satin if
she list. Such are the rewards that may tempt the peasant here.
Difficulties there are in plenty, but they lessen year by year; while
comfort and competence are certain in the end, and wealth even is
possible to the industrious.
Occasionally it happens that among a body of immigrants are one or two
who are decidedly unsuitable. There is an example among our particular
ship-load. Here is a woman, purblind, decrepit, looking sixty years old
at least, and, by some incomprehensible series of mistakes, she has
found her way out here as a "single girl!" What was the Agent-General in
London about, and what could the Dispatching Officer have been thinking
of, when they let this ancient cripple pass them? Yet here she is, a
"single girl" in immigrant parlance; and work she must get somehow and
somewhere, for there are no poorhouses or paupers here as yet. But even
she, useless to all seeming as she is, and unable to bear her part in
the energetic industry of a new country, will find her billet. A
good-natured farmer takes her off, judging that she may earn her keep in
his kitchen, and if not--well! he is prosperous, and should be generous
too. And so old granny toddles away amid the friendly laughter of the
crowd, satisfied enough to find there is a niche even for her in our
Canaan.
The great question that of late years has been continually asked of old
colonials in England is, what are the prospects afforded by New Zealand
to men of the middle classes? The answer is usually unfavourable,
simply because many colonials cannot disassociate the idea of a
gentleman adventurer from that of a scapegrace or ne'er-do-well.
Secondly, they look at the questioner's present condition; and never
take into consideration the power he may have of adapting himself to
totally different circumstances. I think this view admits of
considerable enlargement, and my experience has led me to believe that
many a man, who struggles through life in the old country in some
exacting and ill-paid sedentary occupation, might have been benefited by
emigration. The colonies have been inundated with ruined spendthrifts,
gamblers, drunkards, idle good-for-nothings, who have been induced to
emigrate in the belief that that alone was a panacea for their moral
diseases. Very very few of them have reformed or done any good, so that
colonists are naturally prejudiced against their class, and look upon
gentleman-new-chums with great suspicion. Again, some go out who are too
delicate or sensitive to stand the roughnesses they are bound to
undergo, and these break down in their apprenticeship the first year or
two, and, if they can, go home again to speak evil of the colony ever
afterwards.
One thing is certain, the educated man has the advantage over the
uneducated, and his abler mind will sooner or later be of use to him,
although his physique may be weaker than the other's. The
gently-nurtured individual finds the preliminary trials of colonial life
very hard indeed--he is heavily handicapped at the start--but there is
no reason why he may not do well after a time. Gentlemen-immigrants
usually think they may find work of a congenial sort, such as clerking,
assisting in a store, or some occupation of the kind in the city. That
is a mistake; while yet they are new-chums there is but one thing for
them to do--to go away into the bush and labour with their hands. Of
new-chums, only artisans are absorbed into the city population as a
rule; all others have to look to manual labour of some kind, and
generally up-country, for a means of subsistence. All the clerks,
counter-jumpers, secretaries, and so on, are either old colonials, or
colonists' sons. Very rare is it for a gentleman new-chum to find a
berth of that sort, perhaps he may after he has become "colonized," but
at first he will have to go straight away and fell bush, chop firewood,
drive cattle, or tend pigs. About the best advice I ever heard given to
middle-class men, who thought of emigrating to New Zealand, was couched
in some such terms as these.
"What are your prospects here? If you have any, stop where you are. But
if you have no particular profession, nothing better before you than
laborious quill-driving and the like, at eighty pounds a year, and small
probability of ever rising so high as two hundred, however many years
you stick to the desk, or the yard-measure, then you may think of
emigrating. If you are strong and able-bodied, somewhere between sixteen
and twenty-six years of age--for over twenty-six men are generally too
old to emigrate, I think--I say, emigrate by all means, for you will
have a better chance of leading a healthy, happy, and fairly comfortable
life. But you must throw all ideas of gentility to the winds, banish the
thought of refinement, and prepare for a rough, hard struggle, and it
may be a long one, too. You may please yourselves with the prospect of
competence, comfort, and even luxury in the distance, but you must look
at it through a lengthy vista of real hard work, difficulty, and bodily
hardship. Success, in a greater or lesser degree, _always_ follows
patient industry at the Antipodes; it can scarcely be said to do so in
Britain.
"Now, _Il n'y a que le premier pas qui coute_, and the worst time you
will have is at the first; also, it is only for the start that you need
advice, after you become 'colonized' you can look out for yourselves. If
you have any particular acquaintance with a useful trade, so much the
better; if you have not, and can do so, learn one before you
go--carpentry, boat-building, blacksmithing, tinkering, cobbling; it
will help you through wonderfully. It doesn't matter twopence _how_ you
go out, whether saloon, intermediate, or steerage, so far as your future
prospects are concerned. If you can compass the means, go saloon--the
extra comfort on a long voyage is well worth the extra price; besides,
you might have some returning colonist as fellow-voyager, whose
friendship would prove useful. When you land, bank any money you may
have brought with you--whether it be ten pounds or ten thousand, I say
the same--and resolve not to touch it, however you may be tempted, for
two years at least. Then go about freely, get into the bush away from
the city, make friends with every one everywhere, and let it be known
that you are in search of work. Very soon you will hear of something or
other. Take the job, the first that comes in your way, and stick to it
till something better turns up. Don't be afraid of it whatever it is;
don't imagine anything will hurt you or lower your dignity in the
slightest so long as it is honest. Even if they make you a
street-scavenger, remember that is better than loafing. In one year, or
two, or three, you will be perfectly at home in the new life, and able
to see, according to your abilities, the path that offers you the best
prospect of the greatest success. During your new-chum days of
apprenticeship you must consider yourself as a common peasant, like the
men you will probably have to associate with; don't be disconcerted at
that, just work on, and by-and-by you will get ahead of them. You will
meet plenty of nice gentlemanly fellows in any part of New Zealand, and
they will think all the better of you if you are earnestly and
energetically industrious. Lastly, don't run away with the notion that
you are going to jump into luck directly you land. Wages are high to the
right people, but you are not among those at the outset. You may be
satisfied if you do anything more than just earn your keep, for the
first six or twelve months."
I think that that is, upon the whole, pretty sound advice for the class
of men to whom it is addressed; but I will go further, and point out
what advantages the average middle-class "young gentleman" may
reasonably look forward to from emigration to New Zealand. In the first
place, he may expect to enjoy robust health, more perfect and enjoyable
than he could hope for if tied down to a counting-house stool in the
dingy atmosphere of a city. He will exchange the dull monotony of a
sedentary occupation in the chill and varying climate of Britain, for a
life of vigorous action in a land whose climate is simply superb. When
he gets through the briars that must necessarily be traversed at the
outset, he will find himself happier, freer from anxiety, and, on the
whole, doing better than he would be if he had remained at the old life.
He will "feel his life in every limb," and, remote from the world, know
naught of its cares. If he be anything of a man, before ten or a dozen
years are gone he will find himself with a bit of land and a house of
his own; he will be married, or able to marry, his earnings will suffice
for existence, while every pound saved and invested in property will be
growing, doubling, and quadrupling itself for his age and his children.
There is something to work for and hope for here: independence,
contentment, and competence. It is not a stern struggle from year's end
to year's end, with naught at the finish but a paltry pension,
dependence on others, or the workhouse. The gentleman-colonist we are
talking of is working for a _home_, and, long before his term of life
draws to its close, he will find himself, if not rich, at any rate, in
the possession of more comfort and happiness than he could hope for in
the old country.
I am not an emigration-tout, and have no interest in painting my picture
in too vivid colours, and in these remarks I have transgressed against
some of the ordinary colonial views on the subject; but I have done so
with intention, because I consider them not entirely in the right. The
colonist says--we don't want gentlemen here, we want MEN! But he forgets
that the unfortunate individual he disparages has often more real
manhood at bottom than the class below him. Therefore, the middle-class
emigrant must remember the qualities most required in him--pluck,
energy, and resolution.
I have met many middle-class men in the colony, and all contrived to
bear out the view I have put forward by their own condition. Those who
come to grief do so from their own failings and deficiencies. Some growl
and grumble a little now and then, and think they would rather be back
in England; but, when they reflect upon the condition they would
probably be occupying at home in the ordinary course of things, they are
forced to admit that they are better off. At any rate, such bitter and
terrible distress as overtook so many thousands in Britain a year or two
ago, could scarcely fall to the lot of the same people under any
circumstances, if they were industrious colonists. But I have digressed
inordinately, and must get back to Auckland forthwith.
The barracks are empty at last, and all our fellow-voyagers have found
each his or her starting-point in the new life. Our own little party of
cuddy-passengers is dispersed as well. Some have gone off to join
friends in the country, some are gone on to distant parts of the colony,
some have gone this way or that, scattering to work in all directions;
only a couple of us are left, and it is time that we should begin to
follow the plan we have conceived for ourselves.
Parting with shipmates, with the faces that have been so long familiar
to us, seems to have severed the last link that bound us to the old
country, the old home, and the old ways. We shall meet with many of them
again, no doubt, but then the old "Englishness" will have disappeared,
and we shall be at one with those who now are strangers to us, we too
shall be New Zealanders. Henceforth all before us and around us is
strange and new, an untried, unknown world. We are about to enter on a
life totally different to that we have hitherto led, and it is a life
that we have got to make ours for the time to come; for there is no
thought in our minds of retreat, even if we find the unknown more
distasteful than we think. But, courage! "Hope points before to guide us
on our way," and, as yet, there is nothing in the prospect but what is
bright and inspiriting, surely; nothing to diminish our youthful energy,
nothing to daunt our British pluck! The past lies behind us, with its
sweet and tender recollections, and with a softened sense of
remembrance of those failures and sadnesses and bitternesses that are
linked with them. Now our cry must be "Forward!" for a page in the book
of our lives is completely turned down, and we may imagine there is
endorsed upon it, "Sacred to the memory of auld lang syne!"
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: 1882. The railway now runs northward to Helensville,
connecting Auckland with the Kaipara; and is being pushed on to
Whangarei. To the south, it penetrates far into the Waikato country, and
it is only a question of a few years before Auckland, New Plymouth,
Wellington, and Napier will be joined by rail.]
[Footnote 2: 1882. During the last year or two, there has been some
depression in New Zealand, and, for the first time in her history, many
labourers have had difficulty in getting work. But that crisis is now
past, and things are rapidly returning--as they were bound to do--to
former conditions, such as I have described.]