OUR HOME-LIFE.
Among the friends of colonists at home in Britain, among those who talk
most and know least of this land of the blest, I specify three classes.
First, there are the people who talk of "roughing it" with an air of
rapturous enjoyment, and a Micawber-like roll of the voice, as if that
were really something good, something both pleasant and praiseworthy in
itself. Again, there are those who shudder at the bare idea, and who
conceive it, perhaps, to be a good deal worse than it really is. Lastly,
there are some who are quite vacuous in the matter, either because the
term conveys no meaning to their minds, or because Nature has made them
indifferent to personal comfort and discomfort.
Now, in the first place, roughing it is not a nice process. There is
nothing at all delightful or charming about it. Plainly, it is
suffering. Suffering of numberless discomforts and privations, slight
in themselves as a rule, though not invariably so, but certainly a
serious matter in the aggregate. Nor is there anything grand or glorious
in the prospect of roughing it. Merely in itself it does not add to a
man's good in any particular way. It has to be got through in order that
certain ends may be achieved. That is about the sum of it.
On the other hand, there is nothing to daunt healthy young fellows in
the prospect of roughing it. Only those who are delicate, or who are of
sensitive nature, need turn back from the possibility of it. And it must
be remembered that, to succeed eventually in any path of life
whatsoever, some sort of hardship, toil, and self-sacrifice must be
undergone.
Of course, you cannot carry the drawing-room with you into the bush.
That side of life, with much of the refinement belonging to it, is swept
completely out of your reach. And what is of more importance still, your
existence is apt to grow somewhat unintellectual. Yet these are matters
that are already remedying themselves. As comfort and competence are
gradually achieved, and as society becomes large, so do the higher
results of civilization follow. And as pioneering progresses into the
more advanced stages of improvement, so do the opportunities and
possibilities for mental work and culture become more generally and
readily appreciable.
To us, when we first came out from England, the life here seemed utterly
delightful, because it was so fresh and novel. We were quite captivated
with it. Our existence was a perpetual holiday and picnic, to which the
various difficulties and discomforts that cropped up only seemed to add
more zest. But we soon got over that. We soon began to find that it did
not rain rosewater here. A rude picnic prolonged day after day, year
after year, soon lost its enchantment, and merged into something very
like suffering. We began to yearn after those flesh-pots of Egypt which
we had left behind us; and there were times when we have regretted that
we ever emigrated at all.
Now we have settled down to a calm and placid contentment with our lot.
We begin to see what results are possible to us, and there are signs
that our chrysalis condition is finite after all, and that some reward
for our toil will be ours ere long. The days of our worst poverty and
difficulty lie behind us, and better things are in store.
We have been thankful for one thing. Our society in this district is
limited; but it comprises persons of some small amount of cultivation
and intelligence. We appreciate this at its fullest, for most of us
have, at one time or other, had to work in other parts of the colony,
where our only associates were of the rudest and dullest mental
organization. We are kindred spirits, and are happy in our way, making
light of difficulties, laughing at hardships and privations, and mocking
at poverty and toil. By this means we believe that we enjoy to the
utmost all the good that there is in this life of ours, and that we
measurably lessen the struggles and troubles that have to be gone
through.
And now to revert more particularly to our home life in the shanty.
The insect world is a great feature in Northern New Zealand, both as to
variety, which is extensive, and as to quantity, which is illimitable.
Within our shanty there are certain species which make themselves felt,
smelt, or otherwise apparent to our annoyance, without taking into
consideration the hosts that, as far as we are concerned, are innocuous.
St. Patrick is reported to have driven all the snakes out of Ireland;
and, according to O'Gaygun, he afterwards journeyed over here, and
performed the same service in these islands. The deed was done, says my
informant, in order that this Canaan of the South Sea might be made
ready for descendants of Hibernian kings, when the proper time should
come; and that time, he continues, was when loyal and true sons of Erin
should be seeking afar for a home, where the Land League would cease
from troubling; and the landlord be at rest!
Well, we have no snakes, thanks to St. Patrick, but if that gentleman
had only continued and completed his work, so far as to have excluded
certain insect pests as well, we could have felt more beholden to him.
We have them both out of doors and indoors, but it is with the invaders
of our sanctuary that I have at present to deal.
First, there is the mosquito. We have them here of all sorts and sizes.
Sometimes they come by twos and threes, and sometimes they come in
swarms. They are a deadly nuisance anyway, and a most obnoxious addition
to the inhabitants of our shanty. The peculiar delight of a mosquito is
to arrive just at the moment when you are falling off to sleep, properly
fatigued with your day's work. You hear a long, threatening boom, which
finally ends with a sharp jerk, like buzz-z-z-z-z-z-zup. Then you wait
in anxious expectancy for what you well know will come next. It does
come, a sharp prick on some part where you least expected it. You slap
angrily at the place, and hurt yourself, but not the mosquito. O no! he
is gone before you can satisfy your just vengeance, and he leaves a mark
of his visit that will worry you for days after.
Wise people envelope themselves in gauze mosquito-bars, but we are not
wise, and we do not. Conceive the fury of O'Gaygun at such an
innovation, such pampering, effeminacy, luxury! Who would venture to
introduce a mosquito-bar into a community of which he is member? What
might not be expected from this most conservative of pioneers? Even Old
Colonial says it is better that we should "harden ourselves to it." But
occasionally, in the stilly watches of the night, I hear a hasty remark
from his corner of the shanty, which leads me to believe that, with all
the years of his mosquito experience, he is not wholly hardened yet.
Then there is the sandfly, another enemy of our peace. This creature is
not so bad as the first, though. It is true his sting is sharp, and
always draws a drop of blood, but there is no after irritation.
Sometimes, when sandflies abound about us, we make them contribute to
our amusement in moments of leisure. Bets are made, or a pool is formed,
and we stretch out our closed fists together and wait. By-and-by a
sandfly settles on the back of some one's hand, and proceeds to browse.
Once his proboscis is buried in the skin, the hand is opened, and he is
caught, for he cannot withdraw his weapon from the now contracted skin.
Then the capturer pockets the stakes, and executes the bloodsucker. Such
is one of our simple pastimes.
Another insect foe of ours is one not wholly unknown in other parts of
the world. It is the nimble flea. St. Patrick is not to blame for
leaving this reptile here. He is not indigenous. He was unknown to the
Maoris until the coming of the Pakeha; but he has naturalized himself
most thoroughly now. The "little stranger," as the natives playfully
term him, is to be found in abundance in every Maori whare. Excluded
with the greatest difficulty from the best appointed houses in the
colony, in the humbler residences of the bush, and in our shanty, for
example, his name is Legion. Why this should be so, we have never
troubled our heads to inquire; we simply accept the fact as it is.
Possibly our floor, that, in spite of a daily brooming and a weekly
sluicing, is ever well carpeted with dust and mud, is one source of
these pests. And, now I think of it, there is a nightly scuffling
underneath the boards, which leads to the conclusion that pigs, dogs,
and fowls, are harbouring among the piles beneath.
Every night, before turning in, we are accustomed to shake whole
regiments of fleas out of our blankets. Not infrequently we sprinkle the
blankets with kerosene oil; and, sometimes, in hot weather find it
necessary to anoint our bodies all over with the same thing. That keeps
off the crawling plagues until we have time to get to sleep, and then
we do not care for them. But I think we really have got hardened to the
fleas. We feel the annoyance of them but little now.
One of the chums, a harmless, peaceable fellow yclept "The Fiend"--I
know not for what particular reason--has lately invented a new game for
our evening's diversion. He calls it flea-loo. After supper it is our
usual custom to sit on the edge of the floor, where it abuts upon the
fireplace. That part of our domicile, it will be remembered, is paved
with a sort of gravel of loose stones, and, sooth to say, with a good
deal of _debris_ of every sort and kind. The stove stands in the middle.
As we sit there, the sensations in our legs remind us that fleas like
warmth too, and that the gravelly bottom of the chimney-place is a
favourite assembly-room of theirs. But they are of aspiring nature, and
this fact was known to the Fiend. Under his advice, each man plants a
stick upright in the gravel before him. Then we make a pool and await
the result. The fleas soon come out, and begin to crawl up the sticks;
and, by-and-by, some individual of the race reaches the top of the
stick. The owner of that stick takes the pool. Here is another gentle
and Arcadian sport.
And now, with considerable trepidation, and with something verging
upon veritable awe, I approach a subject that I feel myself scarcely
competent to handle. Fraught with the deepest interest to every
new-chum, and a matter of no light concern to even the oldest colonist,
it is one that demands an abler and more facile pen than mine to do full
justice to it. Some one has boldly asserted that, throughout the
infinite treasure-house of Nature, every separate and single thing has
its particular and well-defined purpose. Without attempting to dispute a
proposition so emphatically and dogmatically brought forward, it will be
sufficient for me to say that men have asked in shuddering horror, and
must still continue to ask, what part in the economy of creation is the
sphere of duty or usefulness of that malignant thing we call the
KAURI-BUG.[5]
We do not know whether this insect is known to naturalists or not. That
is a slight matter, and not particularly pertinent to the question of
its interest for us. We believe, however, that no naturalist has yet
been found of sufficiently ardent temperament, and of sufficiently hardy
nerves, to attempt to classify or examine this most infamous of bugs.
Appearances are deceptive very often; they are so in this instance.
Nothing could look more innocent and inoffensive than the kauri-bug, yet
few insects rival it in crime. It is an oval shape, anything under and
up to the size of a crown piece. It is flat, black, hard, and shiny, and
resembles a cross between the English black-beetle and the woodlouse or
slater. It stinks. That is all it does, but it is enough. Look at it,
and it is harmless enough. But tread on it, touch it, disturb it never
so slightly, and instantly the whole surrounding atmosphere is permeated
with a stench more infernally and awfully horrible than anything else
this side of the Styx!
The kauri-bug inhabits dead-wood of various kinds, but chiefly does it
love that of the tree from which it derives its name. It invades houses
built with open joints like ours in regiments and battalions, bringing
all its family and luggage with it. The best class of houses are here
built in a fashion styled bug-proof, but even they cannot wholly exclude
this fearful thing. It comes in hidden in the firewood, and once in the
house it stops there, since no one is courageous enough to turn it out.
It appears to be indifferent as to whether the house is new or old,
well-built or ruinous. If the structure is of kauri timber the kauri-bug
will be there, and it will put up with any other wood if kauri timber
is not available. It is one of the peculiar products indigenous to
Northern New Zealand, and it is the least attractive of all.
Dandy Jack, who has been in North America, is my authority for stating
that the celebrated odour of the skunk is mild and refreshing, compared
to the unutterable loathsomeness of that of the kauri-bug. I can well
believe it. How well I remember one of my first nights in the bush! It
appears that one of these diabolical insects had got into my blankets. I
rolled over and crushed it in my sleep. Inured as I had been by
circumstances to bad smells, this conquered me. I awoke perspiring from
a frightful nightmare. I rushed from my bed, from the room, from the
house, to escape the hideous effluvium; and--well, darkness veiled the
rest!
Nature has in this insect achieved the very acme and culmination of
repulsive villainy. Fortunately she has mitigated it in two ways. The
stench is volatile and soon disappears; while settler's noses get used
to it in a measure. Were it not for these merciful provisions,
colonization in this land would be an utter impossibility for people who
had olfactory nerves at all. The kauri-bug would have driven us back to
England long ago.
As an instance of an earnest but mistaken striving after the true
colonial fertility of invention and readiness of resource, I put on
record the following. The Fiend once evolved from the obscurest depths
of his inner consciousness a truly fearful and alarming plan. In this
gentleman's somewhat feeble intellect there floats a sort of hazy
reverence for a mysterious force denominated by him "kimustry." And to
this occult power he appears to ascribe a magical potency, that recalls
memories of the "Arabian Nights."
We conclude that, at some time or other, the Fiend had been told, or had
read, that a certain delightful perfume, _eau de millefleurs_ I think it
is called, was derived by chemical agency from sewage, or some equally
malodorous matter. He appears to have formed the idea that any
disgusting stink could be turned, by "kimustry," into a delicious
perfume; and, further, that the more horrible the original stink might
be, the more ravishingly delightful would be the perfume to be derived
from it.
One night, when the parliament of our shanty was assembled in full
conclave, the Fiend enunciated his views. Seriously and circumstantially
he put forward his proposition. This was that we were to form ourselves
into a joint-stock company; that we were to cultivate and make
collections of kauri-bugs; that we were to find a "kimust" who could "do
the trick," and employ him; and that we were to introduce to the world,
and grow rich by, the sale of a sort of celestialized essence of
kauri-bugs. In proof of good faith, the Fiend produced a box full of
kauri-bugs that he had collected for experiment, and handed them among
the midst of us.
Conceive our horror and consternation at this unnatural and appalling
proposal. Springing instantly to his feet, O'Gaygun demanded that the
Fiend be forthwith taken out and hung from the nearest tree. But the
Fiend saved his life by immediately withdrawing his proposition and his
bugs, humbly suing for mercy. It was then thought that our duty to
humanity would necessitate our sending the unhappy Fiend for
incarceration in the Whau Lunatic Asylum, where they were in want of
"subjects," as Old Colonial significantly remarked. That point is still
under debate. Meanwhile, the Fiend still lives, but is kept under strict
surveillance.
There is another of our insect enemies which must have special mention,
and that is the Maori blow-fly. We have flies of many sorts, house-flies
and blue-bottles among them. The latter, the blue-bottles, get very big,
and have an increased propensity for multiplying themselves, and that in
their usual unpleasant manner. But over all the blue-bottles'
old-fashioned systems the Maori blow-fly soars supreme. It is a
colonizer with a vengeance. It does not go to the trouble of laying
eggs or nits; it carries its family about ready hatched. The blow-fly is
always ready, at a moment's notice, to deposit an incredible number of
lively, hungry maggots upon any desirable surface.
The difficulty of keeping fresh or cooked meat, and various other
provisions, will be readily appreciated. The blow-fly will cause its
disagreeable offspring to take part in every meal. Maggots are showered
down on your very plate. A string of them may be deposited on the
mouthful on your fork. The blow-fly is not particular. If you have a
wound, cover it up, or the maggots will speedily be in it. The eyes of
cattle and sheep are often full of them. If blankets or clothes are hung
up to air in the sun, they will soon be white with living organisms;
though, for want of moisture, they cannot live more than a few minutes
in such a situation, luckily. There is little or nothing we can do
against these foes. We get used to them, and try to forget their
existence. We keep them out where possible. We salt our food, which they
do not like. But we are unable to keep them down, or fight with them.
Even argument with a blow-fly is inadmissible.
We have spiders as big as walnuts, with great hairy legs two or three
inches long. We would rather encourage them, as they help to keep down
the flies, and they do no harm, though not pretty to look at. There is
said to be a poisonous spider in the country, but no one in the North
seems to know anything about it. We regard it as a myth. Other insects
we have in profusion, but none that affect us like those I have
specially spoken of.
After all, we have no great cause for complaint. Some trivial annoyance
is the worst we have to suffer in this way. We have no scorpions,
snakes, poisonous centipedes, or any other vile thing of that sort. I
have told the worst of our indoor plagues. Rats and mice we have, of
course, as they swarm in the bush; but our dogs, and a cat or two, keep
the shanty fairly clear of them.
Our commissariat is plentiful and varied enough. With slight exception
we are our own providers, living almost entirely on our own produce, as
farmers should. Sometimes the pressure of work leads to carelessness in
catering and cooking, and we are consequently reduced to short commons,
for which there is no sort of need. In the worst times of poverty we
should not starve. The river is always full of fish; and things must be
more than bad if one could not get credit for a sack of flour or
potatoes with the Mayor, or with some other storekeeper on the rivers.
And, after the first year, the garden ought to produce enough
vegetables, potatoes, kumera, taro, pumpkins, and maize, to keep the
family going, even if everything else failed them.
Pig-meat, in its various forms, is our staple article of food. We breed
and fatten a large number of pigs on the clearings round the shanty.
These we butcher in batches of six or eight, as required, and turn into
salt pork, bacon, and ham. We have occasionally sent a cask or two of
pork, some flitches or hams, to market; but as a rule we consume our
pigs on the farm. Pig-meat is most reliable as a staple. One does not
tire of it so utterly as one does of either mutton or beef, if one of
these be the invariable daily food.
Beef we rarely see in our shanty. The steers we breed are too valuable
to be used by ourselves; they have to go to market. Only occasionally we
find it necessary to slaughter some unmanageable rusher, a cow, or
bullock, and then we have beef, fresh and salted down. Mutton was just
as scarce for several years, as we could not afford to kill out of our
small flock; and mutton is not good to salt down. Now, we kill a sheep
every week, sometimes a couple, as the township will take the surplus
meat, and so it pays us.
We keep a great number of turkeys on the clearings, as also a less
number of ducks and poultry, to diminish the crickets, caterpillars, and
other insect foes. These birds are now practically wild, and give us
something like sport to shoot them. There are hundreds of turkeys, as
they thrive amazingly, consequently we often have them at table. Eggs,
too, are plentiful enough, whenever any one takes the trouble to hunt up
some nests.
As to wild game of any sort, we get little enough of that; for we cannot
spare time to go after it. Sometimes we may shoot some of the splendid
wild pigeons, some kakas, parrots, tuis, wild duck, teal, or the
acclimatized pheasants. Wild pig is nauseous eating, so that is not
sought after.
Every now and then we go in for fish. There are schnapper, rock-cod,
mullet, mackerel, and herring, or species that answer to those, to be
had for very little trouble. There are also soles, which we catch on the
mud-banks and shallows at night, wading by torchlight, and spearing the
dazzled fish as they lie. When we make a great haul we salt, dry, or
smoke the capture for lasting use. The endless oyster-beds, and other
shell-fish, we rarely touch, they are not worth the time and trouble, we
consider.
Tea is the invariable beverage at every meal, and almost the only one,
too. Milk is generally available in our shanty as a substitute, but
somehow we stick to the tea. We drink quarts and quarts of it every
day, boiling hot, and not too weak. Throughout New Zealand and all the
Australian colonies this excessive tea-drinking is the universal
practice. Even the aboriginal races have taken to it just as kindly. It
is such a good thirst-quencher, every one says, so cooling in warm
weather, and so warming in cold seasons.
We had an earnest medico on a visit to us lately. He inveighs strongly
against tea-drinking, which he says is the curse of these countries. I
think he would preach a crusade against it if he dared; for, of course,
he would have to join issue with Good Templars, Sons of Temperance, and
all the fanatical anti-alcoholists. These zealous reformers are so
blindly infatuated with their hatred for alcohol, that tea seems to them
its natural antithesis, and they vaunt it as if it were a celestial
boon. And such people are a political power out here--worse luck!
The doctor declares--"Tea-drinking is one of the most serious mistakes
of our age and race in these new countries. It produces, first of all, a
low form of chronic dyspepsia, whose effect is immediately perceived in
early decay of the teeth. It often seriously affects the great
organs--the liver, kidneys, stomach, and heart--predisposing them to
derangement, and aiding the progress of organic mischief in them, should
that arise from other causes. It affects the nerves, causing
irritability and debility in them. Nervous power becomes impaired,
reacting with evil effect upon the ganglionic centres and the brain.
Hence the mind must become insidiously affected also. I am quite sure
that the character of our colonists is being modified by their practice
of excessive tea-drinking, and I cannot believe that the change will be
for the better. I believe that we may trace to tea, gloominess,
misanthropy, loss of cheerfulness, a restless energy without fixity of
purpose, a sour temper, a morbid and abnormal simplicity, leading to
intellectual retrogression instead of progress, and to a tendency to
yield to superstitious fancies, with loss of control over reason and its
advancement. What will be the future of these young tea-drowned
nations?"
Fortunately, we only understood a fraction of this tirade, yet we
trembled and shivered ever afterwards as we drank our tea.
Then the doctor showed us how to make sugar-beer, treacle-beer,
cabbage-tree-root-beer, honey-beer, peach-cider, corn-cider, and various
other drinks of a more or less unlicensed kind. So now we have usually
something else to quaff besides tea. Peaches we have in any quantity;
and the cider they make is capital stuff. Honey abounds in every hollow
tree; and the mead or metheglin we compound is a fine drink.
Flour and meal we have to buy. By-and-by there will be a flour-mill at
the township, for already some of the more forward settlers near are
growing wheat. Maize we do not use ourselves, except as a green
vegetable. Some people grind it and use the meal for cakes, but we
principally turn it into pig-meat or fowl-flesh.
Our garden department, though not always so well managed as it might be,
yet adds largely to our food supply. The principal crops are potatoes,
kumera (sweet potatoes), and pumpkins; good substantial food that will
keep, and, should we have a surplus, will sell. We don't bother with
green vegetables; they don't pay, we think, and boiled green maize-cobs
suffice us for that class of thing. But, in such seasons as it has
occurred to any one to go in for more extensive gardening, we rejoice in
a profusion of carrots, turnips, parsnips, onions, taro, beet-root, and
sundry other things.
Fruit can hardly be looked on as a food; it is merely an ornamental
accessory to it, in our opinion. We are great fruit-consumers, but we
look on such trifles as only refreshers for odd moments, and not as
having anything to do with the serious business of eating. We have
pretty well all the fruits that are seen in English gardens, and besides
them we have quantities of various sorts of melons and peaches, also
specimens of oranges, lemons, shaddocks, grapes, loquats, quinces,
pomegranates, guavas, Cape gooseberries, figs, almonds, and some others.
We have even bananas, which are a success in most seasons. The
marvellous profusion and richness of our fruit-crops, leads to the
belief that industries connected with fruit-growing will eventually be
found to succeed best in the North.
Of course, long practice in cooking has made us tolerably proficient in
the simpler processes of the art. Several of us are very fair all-round
cooks, but Old Colonial is supreme in this, as in most things. He is a
veritable Soyer of the bush. When he chooses to exert his skill he can
turn out the most wonderful dishes. Where he learnt, and how he learnt,
no one can tell; but he seems to be a perfect master of cookery in every
shape and form.
In spite of the peculiarities of our table-service, we fare sumptuously
often enough, much more so than many people who would disdain to feed
without linen and dishes and plates, forks, spoons, and other things
that we hold in slight regard. Old Colonial's name has gone abroad
through the country. When any one of our neighbours goes in for the
luxury of a wife, Old Colonial is not infrequently called in to educate
her in culinary matters. He is a past master in endless wrinkles,
dodges, makeshifts, and substitutes of all sorts; and has, besides, an
unbounded faculty of invention that is highly satisfactory to our little
commonwealth.
One hot and blazing Christmas-tide we invited all the married people,
who lived within anything like reasonable distance, to visit our
shanty--Bachelor's Hall, as the ladies termed it. Such an entirely novel
and unusual event as the visit of some of the gentler sex to our shanty
was an occasion of no light moment. Old Colonial determined to banquet
our visitors in the superbest possible style, and vast preparations were
at once undertaken.
Two days before the expected arrival, all hands set to work in the
arduous and unavailing endeavour to render the shanty approximately
clean and respectable. Such a turn out as that was! Such an unlooked
for bringing to light of things that must be nameless! We broomed and we
scrubbed, we washed and we sluiced, we even tinkered and mended, we
cleaned and we swore, and made our lives temporarily miserable; and yet,
with all this, how grimy, and dirty, and mean, and wretched, that shanty
of ours would continue to look!
Never had our household property been subjected to such a cleaning up as
that was. Gradually some order was introduced into the chaos, and at
last we began to think we should convey a favourable impression after
all. But our chief concern was in the matter of table equipage.
One of us was sent over to the township, with orders to beg, borrow, or
steal, all the crockery and table-cutlery in the place. Another was
dispatched on horseback through the bush somewhere else, and on the same
errand, that something like proper table furniture might grace the
feast. Then our wardrobe underwent inspection. Some one had to go over
to the township and buy new shirts for all of us, with several pairs of
trousers, and other things. O'Gaygun stormed and wept at this outrage;
but our boss was firm for the proprieties, as he estimated them. The
worst of it was, we had to contemplate frightful expenditure. And more,
it was humiliating that our previous condition should be made known to
the Mayor, who, with his wife, were to be among our guests. But, what
matter? The Mayor is a good fellow, and a friend; and what can be too
great a sacrifice to make for England, Home, and Beauty!--especially the
last.
We all had our tasks. There was the path between the shanty and the
landing-place to be put in proper condition; various muddy places in it
to be covered with fascines; a certain watercourse we were in the habit
of jumping to be newly-bridged, and so forth. Then there was the
catering. Two of us were out with guns, shooting turkeys, pheasants,
pigeons, fowls, and anything else that was eatable. Others were
butchering the fairest and fattest pig in our drove, and doing the same
by a lamb. Two were out on the river diligently fishing, or collecting
oysters and cockles. Some, too, were employed in the garden, picking
fruit, gathering vegetables, and so forth, and so on.
All day and all night the stove was redhot, while a supplementary fire
blazed outside the shanty. Between them oscillated Old Colonial, pipe in
mouth, hirsute and unkempt, grim, grimy, and naked to the waist. His two
aids, the Saint and the Fiend, had a bad time of it. They were his
scullions, marmitons, turnspits, or whatever you like to call it. They
had to keep up the supplies of firewood, to prepare the fowls and fish,
and generally to do all the dirty work; and the way that Old Colonial
"bossed" them round was an edifying sight to see.
The preparations were stupendous. Victuals enough had been laid in to
feed a regiment, and the variety of them was endless. But Old Colonial,
once having given way to the mania of extravagance, was determined to
lay under contribution every conceivable thing, and to turn out more
dishes than even an American palace hotel would put on its bill of
fare.
Finally, it was discovered that the shanty was far too small a place for
our banquet. So, on the appointed morning we were up at sunrise, and,
from then till noon, we laboured at the construction of a bower; while
Old Colonial was busy with his hot meats and confections. The bower was
an open shed, running all along the shadiest side of the shanty and
beyond. It was a rude erection of rough poles, latticed and
thatched--Maori fashion--with fern-fronds and flax. Under it was _the_
table, supplemented by another of loose boards on such supports as we
could fabricate; and round it planks resting on kegs and boxes made
sufficient seats.
Hardly were our preparations finished when the first boat was descried,
coming through the mangroves from the river down below, and a parasol
was visible in the stern. Then there was a hasty stampede down to the
gully to wash; an agonized scuttle into the new shirts; and a hot and
anxious assumption of restful calm. And so we welcomed the guests as
they came.
What a feast that was, and how it astonished everybody! And such a party
as our shanty had never witnessed before! For curiosity brought half a
dozen ladies--all there were in the district--and fully a score of
masculine friends honoured our establishment with their presence.
It is not to be supposed, of course, that all our neighbours inhabit
rude shanties like ours. Some are further forward, or had more capital
at the start; and men do not bring wives into the bush until they can
manage to furnish forth a decently comfortable house for them. Our
married friends live in respectable comfort. Still, the ladies, living
in the bush, get to know its more primitive ways, though they may not
experience them themselves. So, our domestic arrangements, though made
the occasion for a great deal of banter and fun, were neither unexpected
nor novel to our lady visitors. But the banquet that was provided for
them made them open their eyes indeed. It was something altogether new
to the bush. Such a miracle of catering! such marvellous unheard of
cookery! It surpassed anything any one of them had ever seen before,
anywhere.
The table was covered with white linen, borrowed at the township, and
all the equipage we could muster was displayed upon it. Plates, forks,
spoons, and knives, there were in plenty; but we had not been able to
collect enough dishes and bowls for the profusion of viands Old Colonial
had provided. Some parts of the service were therefore peculiar, and
caused much addition to the merriment. There was always such incongruity
between the excellence of the comestible and the barbaric quaintness of
the receptacle that happened to contain it. Soups in billies, turkeys
in milk-pans, salads in gourd-rinds, custards in cow-bells, jellies in
sardine-boxes, plum-pudding in a kerosene case, vegetables, fruits, and
cakes in kits of plaited flax; anything and everything was utilized that
possibly could be.
High enthroned upon a pile of potato sacks, Old Colonial presided over
the feast he had created; while, as vice, sat O'Gaygun, his barbaric
conservatism laid aside for the nonce in favour of grace and gallantry.
What glorious fun we had! What a flow of wit beneath the august
influence of ladies' smiles! And we were cool in our ferny bower, out of
the strong hot sunshine. And in the intervals of eating and drinking, we
could look about us on the splendid perspective of bush and river,
across the clearings, where the air shimmered in the heat, where the
crickets whistled and hummed, and where the cattle were lazily lying
among the stumps. It was a magnificent picnic, so everybody declared.
There never was anything to match it in all New Zealand!
I can fancy, that in days to come, when the full tide of civilization
has overtaken this fair country, some of those ladies will be sitting in
boudoirs and drawing-rooms talking to their children; and they will tell
them of the early pioneering days. And one of their best-remembered
stories will be that of the Christmas-time, when they were banqueted by
Old Colonial and his chums at our shanty in the bush.
To a certain extent we are of musical tastes, and, though our time for
practice is limited to an occasional half-hour of an evening, we
consider ourselves no mean instrumentalists, and sometimes give public
performances, as will appear hereafter. We have two flutes, a clarionet,
a cornet, and a French horn, often supplemented by two violins and a
concertina. Old Colonial does not play, neither does O'Gaygun. They
fiercely decline to add to what they term the beastly uproar.
If we have a failing, it is to be found in an inability to hang together
in our play, and an incapacity for comprehending the said fact. Set
either instrumentalist by himself, and he will manage to stumble through
a tune; but put the whole orchestra together, and the result usually
falls short of what should be harmony. The hornist is our feeblest
musician. He has not yet succeeded in eliciting more than two notes and
a half out of his instrument, and these he lets off in spasmodic puffs,
governed by a curious notion of the proper places for them to fit into
the general performance. The flutes are a little unsteady and
unreliable; the clarionet always squeaks in pathetic parts; and the
cornet imagines that loudness is the chief thing to be desired.
There was a newly-married couple recently established a few miles away
up the river. Of course, they were received in the district with great
acclamation, when they first came up here, after being tied up in
Auckland. Bonfires blazed on the ranges, guns were fired, and a
procession of boats escorted theirs home. As a strictly bachelor
community, we felt some hesitation about going to call and congratulate
the couple. This was owing to our own shyness and uncouthness, you
understand, not to any disfavour with which we looked upon matrimony as
an abstract thing. For we were previously unacquainted with the bride.
However, some demon prompted us to give them a midnight serenade.
By dint of tremendous practice, we had mastered, as we thought, those
three famous melodies, "Home, Sweet Home," "Juanita," and "God Save the
Queen." The orchestra was equal to _them_, anyhow, we considered.
Neither of our two unmusical associates cared to be left out of the
proposed excursion, so a drum was manufactured for Old Colonial, by
stretching a sheepskin over the open ends of a cask; O'Gaygun was found
incompetent to play on any other instrument but the ancient comb and
piece of paper of his happy youth. Then we started, rowing up the
river, and anchoring silently off the beach opposite our victim's
residence, one night soon after their arrival.
The moon was at the full, throwing sombre shadows down from the woods
upon the gleaming water, and making the splendid scenery of the river
mysterious and romantic. The husband and wife were out on their
verandah, enjoying the calm beauty of the night, and sentimentalizing,
as newly-married couples will.
Suddenly, from the river below them, rises the melancholy and discordant
clamour of our performance. Quickly, the voices of the night awake in
earnest protest against it. Roosting shags and waterfowl fly screaming
away. In the swamp a bittern booms; and strange wailing cries come from
the depths of the bush. On the farm dogs bark energetically, cattle
bellow, horses neigh, sheep bleat, pigs grunt, ducks quack, and turkeys
gobble. Frightful is the din that goes echoing among the woods. And then
the outraged bridegroom gets out his gun, and commences rapid
file-firing in our direction.
But nothing daunts us, or makes us flinch from our fell purpose.
Perspiring from every pore, we labour manfully on to the bitter end.
Cornet and clarionet strive for the mastery, the flutes tootle along in
the rear, the violins screech and squeal, the horn brays with force and
fury, and Old Colonial pounds at his drum as if he were driving piles.
Not until the last notes of "God Save the Queen" have been duly murdered
do we cease; then, breathless and exhausted, we row down river on our
homeward way, rejoicing in the performance of a meritorious deed.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 5: A species of _Blatta_, or cockroach, called by
entomologists _Polyzosteria Novae Zealandiae_.]