Leading New Zealand Newspapers.
Contents
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25/3/35.
(Photo., courtesy Auckland “Star.”)(photo, courtesy auckland “star”)
Engine-cleaning apparatus in operation at the locomotive depot, at Auckland. A stream of hot water, at high pressure, is applied to the wheels and motion gear of the locomotive, the action of the hot water cleaning the parts thoroughly in a fraction of the time formerly required for this work.
One of the caves on the upper reaches of the Wanganui River, North Island, New Zealand.
(Govt. Publicity photo.
Here, where the uncut hair of the grass grows deep,
The summer light falls solemn and subdued,
While entering the mouldering roofless walls
Pencilled with golden moss and lichens grey.
Robert Buchanan.
The New Zealand
Railways
Magazine
Railways
Magazine
“For Better Service”
Published by the
New Zealand Government Railways Department
Vol. X. No. 6.
Wellington,
New Zealand
September2, 1935
For any story to be worth-while it must have an elemental background of facts based on the country or subject to which it is related. Hence the richest literature has been drawn from those countries where the life of the people is most diversified both in daily routine and in the larger movements and tendencies of economic and political conditions. Even such purely imaginative works as Pilgrim's Progress and Alice in Wonderland depend for their power on a very thorough knowledge of biblical teaching in the one case and physical laws in the other. Shakespeare's power lies in his presentation of the English life and philosophy of his own day, whether the stage be set in England, France or Padua. He lived in a period rich with opportunity and development.
New Zealand, the country of all the world richest in natural resources, has all the qualities which go to form the background of a great literature. Here education to a reasonably high standard is universal, with ample opportunities for extension to the higher branches. Here a favourable climate not only brings great returns from the soil but encourages physical activity, so that health and long life are the common lot. In productive capacity the country is unexcelled, and the individual output of work, in any line of endeavour where comparisons under equal conditions with other countries can be made, is proof of the high standard of industry and intelligence of its people. Freedom is here, too, and opportunity for enterprise in any desirable direction.
New Zealand writers should read the books of other lands not to be able to write similarly, but to know what has already been done and to ensure that any efforts they make may work a new ore of more precious metal than is to be found among the tailings of other countries. There is a wealth of materials to work on. In this country more worth recording happens in a year than in any two centuries of Britain's earlier history. No country has seen such development at any time in the world's history as has New Zealand in the last ninety years.
The New Zealand Authors' Week, decided on for about March next, should show New Zealanders how much has already been done to lay the foundation of that great literature which this country is destined to produce, and the efforts of the promoters are worthy of all commendation and support.
The worth of the work of some contemporary New Zealand authors has been undervalued by their own people and the movement to draw pointed attention to the already great achievements of the principal New Zealand writers should do much to bring their work into true perspective in the eyes of their fellow countrymen. Some of the best work has been done by authors who have seen clearly and applied their genius to the facts supplied by their own country's history, its resources, life and manifold activities and the varied and changing outlook of its people. It should also be an encouragement to the younger generation of writers, most of whom (and there is a large army of them) can write well and some of whom have already shown that spark of genius which should be fanned into flame by the necessary encouragement of practical support for their efforts.
General Manager's Message
The Silver Jubilee Gift.
The response by members of the Railway Service towards the gift in honour of His Majesty's Silver Jubilee has resulted in £401/5/7 being collected amongst them, and receipt of this amount has been gratefully acknowledged by. The New Zealand Branch of the British Empire Cancer Campaign Society, Inc. It has been explained that, in accordance with His Majesty's pleasure, all moneys so collected in the Dominion are to be devoted towards the object of Cancer Research in New Zealand for the relief of the many sufferers from this scourge.
Undoubtedly this amount represents the highest individual contribution to the Fund by any commercial undertaking in the country, and it is typical of the efforts of New Zealand railwaymen, not only in national but also in district campaigns, to help financially when the objective is a cause which deserves their sympathy and support.
Perhaps the public at large do not always realise the value of the Railway industry through the spending power of its sixteen thousand employees, and the generally beneficial results from the dissemination of these railway earnings in all the communities where railways operate, hence an occasion such as this may reasonably be regarded as drawing pointed attention to the important part played by the Railways even in subsidiary ways.
Loyalty to the Throne is a cherished tradition of the Railway Service, and this loyalty cannot fail to be still further strengthened and enriched by His Majesty's magnanimous conception of how a loyal gift by the people of his realm in commemoration of his 25 years of Royal devotion to their interests could best be made to serve the welfare of the Empire and at the same time contribute towards the betterment of the whole world.
General Manager.
The Parade at the Manawatu A. and P. Association's Show.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
Gillespie
New Zealanders have made a new thing of the Agricultural and Pastoral Society idea, and in this article I propose to show exactly how proud we should be, and what a great work has been achieved in this regard.
No grown-up amongst us can fail to remember “Show Day.” Our memories are compounded of fleeting visions of long rows of pens of cows and sheep; stock parades; hunters doing miracles over fences; snow-white tents in dozens that held all sorts of wonders; the “Fat Woman”; “Performing Seals”; “The Twelve Midgets”; the “Hoop-La”; the wheezing, noise-making roundabouts, and a wandering, sauntering, cheery, copious, and apparently endless procession of human beings.
No matter where a New Zealander lives, there is an A. and P. Show within a few miles of him. This country has no less than ninety-nine various shows in a year, and over two hundred separate show-days.
This is in line with the settled facts that in most branches of human endeavour, our million and half folks do things on the scale of ten millions in any other part of the world. But, more important than the mere numbers, and the imposing array of figures, is the genuine phenomenon that New Zealand leads the world in making the best cultural and educational use of the A. and P. idea.
The manufacturer of a new implement, the inventor of a new machine, the courageous importer of a new line of bloodstock, be it horse, cattle, pig, or dog; the innovator in transport mechanism, be it motor-car, tractor or steam hauler; the author of sound doctrine in cultivation, care of stock or any branch of farm technique, or the purveyor of the latest fashion fad from London, finds here his best medium.
I will confine this article to the “Spring Show” for many of our carnivals are held after Christmas mainly for the purposes of exhibition of fat stock. Those which are dated before Christmas are essentially typical of this great development in farming science, and the creation of the connecting link between farmer and business man.
The A. and P. Show which was in its beginnings, a sort of picnic holiday, a cheery country carnival, has in the hands of our countrymen, become
A corner of the spacious grounds.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
Naturally, in this article, I have not time nor space to deal with the ninety-nine shows of New Zealand. As is our special habit, so distinctive of our country, this great movement is not confined to our cities. It cannot be said too often, that the Dominion stands alone in one outstanding peculiarity. Our country towns, and more particularly, our provincial capitals, rival our metropolitan centres, and leave the rest of the world far behind, in their general standard of amenities. Every district has a carnival, and splendid and impressive shows are held in centres that in older lands would simply be regarded as a “gap in the hedge.” Ashburton, a town of four or five thousand souls, has a tremendous festival. It has twenty-eight acres of show grounds, vast modern exhibition buildings, and last year had 3,037 entries, coming in close behind the great movable Royal Show. Each district specialises in some way, and Ashburton is particularly strong in horses, its enormous agricultural areas providing unexampled excellence in the whiskery Clydesdale and other equine types suitable for farm work.
A peep at the Australian Court.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
The Bay of Islands Show at Waimate North started in a frame covered with nikau palms, with an open centre to admit the light. The next step was a hall 44 × 32ft. with two ante-rooms, which cost altogether $58, the kauri timber and the labour being contributed by the executive and their mates. To-day it is a modern exhibition worthy of any capital.
I am taking one society as an example to give readers the right impression of what we have to boast about in the growth of this great institution. Once more, I pause to suggest that we cultivate the habit of mentioning, not loudly, necessarily, but very often and with great firmness the good things of our lovable, beautiful, and progressive paradise of the British Empire.
This year of grace marks the Golden Jubilee of the Manawatu and West Coast Agricultural and Pastoral Association. This titanic exhibition takes place in a New Zealand country city, Palmerston North, which has a population of twenty thousand. Owing to its unique centrality, however, it operates as a centre for five times that number, and is in fact, within easy reach of any part of the North Island. The rise and growth of the Association is, of itself, a panorama of the development of the whole district, and has, moreover, its own essentially New Zealand atmosphere.
The Association began its activities, half a century ago in a log-strewn paddock, in the midst of a great forested plain, ringed and guarded by the lofty Tararua and Ruahine Ranges. Inroads into the dense bush had been made by courageous settlers, and sweet English grasses were taking the place of the tall trees. Wekas, kiwis, fern-birds and makomakos would be heard in the country roads which are now the elegant suburban streets of the City of Palmerston North. The settlers were, however, of the type that fashion new worlds, selected Anglo Saxons, with a sprinkling of Norsemen. They had courage and imagination, and behind them the tradition that farming was a science, a profession with a heritage that needed cherishing. A railway system was in course of completion and those dreamers of high dreams, were certain that their town was to be in the future, a great and important railway centre. The Association was formed, Mr. David Buick presiding at the first meeting, where Mr. J. C. Sly made an impressive speech in the role of prophet. The committee started to function immediately, taking off their coats to start the job of clearing away the stumps,
Giants among the vegetables.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
In November, 1886, the first show was held, and it was conservatively estimated (turnstiles were not “within the sphere of practical politics” in those days) that the attendance was in the vicinity of the colossal total of 1,200. The membership was sixty. Today it is over 2,000 and modern turnstiles click to 50,000.
It is not the province of this article to go into historical detail. The first President was Sir James Prendergast, succeeded by Sir James Wilson (for six years) and thereafter came a long procession of distinguished gentlemen who laboured loyally, zealously and unselfishly for the advancement of the institution. It is invidious to mention names for, in the accident of circumstance, many a great worker, many a valiant enthusiast, did his task without figuring in the official honours list.
It has been said that pioneering in the Dominion was comparatively easy. The attainment of a high standard of comfort was reached very early in our history. This may be so, and, assuming that it is, the achievement was only made so speedily because of the high calibre and the specially selected material of which our pioneers consisted.
Our duty now is to appreciate, understand, and estimate at its real worth, and to look upon, with proper pride, the tremendous result of the work of those mighty men of the early days of our country.
The Manawatu Agricultural and Pastoral Association is, of its kind, one of
The Motor Olympia.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
Let us make the tour, on an “off-day.” It is only a trifle easier than on “People's Day” when the crowds are reminiscent of Epsom on Derby Day, and all roads radiating out from the town are black with traffic. We enter through the turnstiles situate under the imposing administration buildings. We take a ramble through the industrial exhibition. Everybody in the world that has anything to sell to New Zealanders seems to be represented, and every stall has its knot of folks inspecting the display. Things on show range from ribboned sticks and candy floss, to milking machines, and the latest electrical devices for comfort in the home. At the Show you could buy a large farm, stock it under the best auspices, build and furnish a modern home complete with the latest comfort-bringing “gadget” from London, and live for six months.
The motor display is lavish and impressive, and we pass through the stadium with its ingeniously arranged seating to the poultry exhibits. This is where one begins to see life. Ducks, and fowls take on sizes, shapes and varieties of such a number and bewildering maze of colour and form that it stuns the imagination. All these differing species have some particular and worthwhile value.
Then we pass to the open air. Our picture shows the imposing stands, the grandstand seating over three thousand people. The parade-ground is a sports centre for the city, and is a well-kept recreation field suitable for all games.
To-day will be the maiden jumpers' competition and the steer-riding, and every day there will be interesting events. The jumping events have become classics, and where they talk “horse” there are still memories of the deeds of Pickpocket, Tomtit, and Duchess which rival those of Carbine and Desert Gold.
The picturesque Apple Pyramid.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
The practical side of the Show now comes in evidence. Commodious and well-built pavilions house the cattle and sheep, the latter being the fine memorial to that great pioneer, Mr. G. C. Wheeler. For auction sales there is a covered in Sale Ring and Buyers' Gallery. There are many other temples to the science of agriculture and its brother arts. The Breeders' Club, Plunket Rest Rooms, caretaker's house and workshop, committee building lecture hall make up with the six great exhibition edifices, a set of general equipment second to none in the Dominion, and able to claim parity with most in the world.
On Peoples' Day with its surging crowds thronging the endless side shows, streaming through the industry exhibits, and massing to see the Grand Parade, one might very easily forget the high purpose which dominates the whole conception. It is never lost sight of and is working all the time, even when the carnival is apparently a mighty entertainment, a mixture of circus, gymkhana, world's fair, and sports' meeting.
No one can come away without learning something new, but to those engaged in any branch of farming, the Show acts as an excellent post-graduate course. Great skill and ingenuity are exercised in maintaining the interest of the younger generation in all the arts of homecraft, farming and its kindred industries and occupations. Classes of entries are open for scholars of primary and secondary schools, and every device is used for encouraging the progress of the Boys' and Girls' Agricultural Clubs and Gardening Circles.
(Rly. Publicity photo.)
A Pyramid of competing New Zealand Cheeses.
The competition created in the blood stock arena is the healthiest and surest method of improving our standard strains, and maintaining their excellence.
In Palmerston North, the Show also acts as a conference centre. Here sit the little parliaments who administer the affairs of the many breeds of cattle, sheep and pigs, where the discussions are handled by men who are the best in the land on each subject.
The Show does not only function as the shop window of the Manawatu. It acts as a University College where assemble all the finest experts of our rural industries, to instruct, mark progress, and search for means of improving still more the great original science on which New Zealand depends for its very existence.
The A. and P. Association movement is largely responsible for the position we hold in the world in the standard of our livestock, for our leadership in the technique of farming, and in the unsurpassed excellence of the wide range of our primary production. The Royal Show development was a step forward in this direction, intensifying the competition between breeders, and assisting to raise the already high standards. Palmerston North, by the way, was selected as the venue for the first Royal Show.
All of us who are able, should see the Jubilee Show at Palmerston North. It promises to be a peak achievement, and will be the Mecca to which tens of thousands will proceed, with a hundred and one objectives in their minds. I noticed with interest in one old report that 14,500 people went on one day by rail to the city. On that day also, every road for miles round would be a packed procession of vehicles.
What an imposing instrument such a carnival is! Its power for good or ill is almost illimitable.
However, here in this Dominion we can rest assured that the wisest possible use is being made of it.
Aerial panorama of Showgrounds.
And in conclusion may I say that this is to be expected. We are simply maintaining the great tradition of which we are the natural heirs, and by doing so are taking the proper advantage of those beneficent gifts of climate, terrain, and surroundings which our lovely land affords.
“Tobacco has been one of the greatest blessings of my life,” declared Geo. R. Sims, the well-known journalist and dramatist, on one occasion, and he went on to say that although cigarette and cigar had their attraction for him he found that “after all there's nothing like a briar.” Judging by the popularity of the pipe countless smokers agree with him. Here in New Zealand, despite the rivalry of the cigarette, the pipe still holds its own. As for the weed the demand for “toasted” points conclusively to the almost universal preference for these beautiful tobaccos, the most delicious, the most soothing and the least harmful of any. Why “the least harmful?” Simply because they are practically free from nicotine, removed by toasting. Thus their purity is assured. There are only five brands of the original “toasted.” Three —Cavendish, Navy Cut No. 3 (Bulldog) and Cut Plug No. 10 (Bullshead) —are unequalled for the pipe, while the other two, Riverhead Gold and Desert Gold, make the choicest of all cigarettes, as those who roll their own long since discovered.*
James Cowan
Many explorers and men of science have left their mark on New Zealand. The master hand of all, the foremost and most persistent and enthusiastic in the pursuit of knowledge of the country and its hidden wonders and treasures was that distinguished German-born colonist Sir Julius von Haast. Not only was he a courageous and persevering explorer, who specialised in geology, but he became a leader in the cause of higher education. He was the first advocate of the study of physical science as an indispensable part of advanced education in New Zealand. He founded, and for many years presided over the Canterbury Philosophical Institute, and with Bishop Harper founded the Christchurch Collegiate Union, which developed into Canterbury University College. Christchurch was his home and the Canterbury Museum, which he founded and enriched, is a noble monument to his career and achievements. He was an eloquent speaker and as eloquent a writer, and his reports on the geology and landscapes of the South Island are admirable for their scientific thoroughness and for their graphic and vivid descriptions of the alpine and forest country which he explored under the most arduous conditions.
Sir Julius Von Haast, K.C.M.G., Ph.D., F.R.S., F.G.S. (Horn 1st May, 1822; died 16th August, 1887).
Two great names of foreign-born scientists are linked together in an early-days' exploring association in New Zealand. Science knows no frontiers, and it is to learned men of the Continent of Europe that we have reason to be grateful for much pioneering data concerning this British Colony. One man of note whose observations on the physical characteristics and the people of New Zealand nearly three-quarters of a century ago still stand as reliable and authoritative was Dr. Ferdinand von Hochstetter, the geologist. A friend and professional colleague of Hochstetter was Julius von Haast. Hochstetter soon returned to Europe; von Haast remained to become a naturalised British citizen, a valuable settler, and a great scientific benefactor of his fellow-colonists.
It was within a day of each other, in December, 1858, that Hochstetter and Haast set foot on New Zealand's shores. They were then unknown to one another, but they soon met and became friends and travelling comrades, and their friendship lasted until death. Dr. von Hochstetter had come out as geologist in the Austrian warship “Novara,” cruising round the world, an expedition which led to the formation of many links of interest between the colony and Vienna.
Julius von Haast was born on May 1, 1822, at Bonn, in Germany. His father was for many years Burgomaster of that city. When young Julius entered the University of Bonn he developed a taste for geological and mineralogical studies, which decided his life's bent and purpose. He travelled about his native mountains, and soon formed a large mineralogical collection. After leaving the University he spent several years in France, and for eight years before coming to New Zealand he travelled about Europe, visiting Russia, Austria and Italy, occupying himself with scientific research, and also with the study of art and music. In 1852 he made an ascent of Mt. Etna while the volcano was in eruption. In 1858 he was sent out to New Zealand by a firm of London shipowners to report on the suitability of this country as a field for German settlement. The result of his report was the emigration of many German people to the colony.
It was in the British ship “Evening Star” that the gifted son of the Bonn Burgomaster reached Auckland; and it was on board the hospitable “Novara” that he began his acquaintance with the young geologist from Vienna, who was considerably his junior. The pair of scientists soon found themselves associated in an exploring journey through the greater part of the North Island.
Here it is convenient to explain that von Haast's career may be divided into three periods. First, there was his life in Europe, up to the age of 36; then his coming to New Zealand and his era of many scientific explorations in this country in the prime of his life, 36 to 48. Next, from 1870 onward for some fifteen years, came his development of a Canterbury Museum and preparation and publication of his geological writings and descriptions of his explorations. Lastly, in 1886, his official visit to Europe and London as Exhibition Commissioner.
In 1859, Dr. Hochstetter having been commissioned by the Government in Auckland, with the consent of the Austrian Government, to carry out a geological examination of the interior of the province, the two new friends, with a large party, set out up the
The late Mr. L. M. Grace, the Taupo missionary's son, told me that one Sunday morning the family were at prayers in the mission home at Pukawa, at the south end of Lake Taupo, when he saw as he looked up a line of men with packs on their backs approaching the house. The strangers halted when they heard the voice of the missionary, the Rev. Thomas Samuel Grace, and stood there in silence near the porch until the devotions were over.
Then they introduced themselves—Hochstetter and Haast and their party. The scientists were most hospitably received and made free of Pukawa while they remained; educated Europeans were too seldom seen in that remote part of the country.
The geologists examined the country and particularly the thermal springs region extending to Rotomahana and Rotorua. Dr. Hochstetter's description in his large book on New Zealand is of special interest in this section for purposes of comparison with present conditions in the Geyserland country.
The Maori War in Taranaki and the looming war in Waikato checked for a time European immigration to the colony. Haast had sent reports to the leading German periodicals on his explorations. Dr. Hochstetter returned to Europe, taking with him as guests of the Austrian Government two Waikato Maori chiefs, who returned with many gifts, and then cheerfully took up gun and tomahawk with their tribesfolk in the Waikato War. By the time of their return Haast was established in the South as Canterbury Provincial Geologist.
At the end of 1860, after the North Island journey, Haast was requested by the Nelson Provincial Government to carry out an exploration of the West Coast district of the province. He spent several months on this arduous mission and carried it through with great success and with profit to the province, especially in the revelation of South Nelson's vast mineral resources. He produced a report which to-day reads like a wonderful story of adventure in no wise less absorbing than Thomas Brunner's account of his famous journey to the West Coast many years before Haast. Mr. James Burnett, surveyor, had been engaged as his topographical assistant. For a considerable part of the explorations von Haast was in company, at various times with James Mackay and Alexander Mackay. He also met and camped with occasionally that skilful explorer and surveyor John Rochfort. After exploring thoroughly the headwaters of the Buller, he prospected the Lower Grey Valley, where coal measures had been reported.
He found the main seam, which he followed up to the bed of a small rivulet, where it was lying exposed to a depth of 12ft. 6in. “I must confess,”
Dr. Ferdinand Ritter von Hochstetter. (Born 30th April, 1829; died 20th July, 1884).
in situ, it was clear to me that I had to do with a real coal, its compactness, specific gravity, lustre and combustibility leaving nothing to be desired. As the seam struck in a regular way across the river, whilst at the same time I was able to trace it towards the north I had no difficulty in concluding that the spot upon which I was standing would prove a source of great wealth, not only to this district but to the colony at large.”
That discovery meant a great deal for the West Coast and New Zealand. More valuable still, if possible, was his exploration on the high forested range near Westport, where John Rochfort had reported coal some time previously. He climbed Mt. Rochfort, and on descending to the plateau below—where Denniston, the alpine town of coal-miners now is—he found pieces of coal everywhere among the creeks and gullies. At one place he found a large seam of good coal in a creek, and on removing the moss and ice that encumbered a small waterfall he found 8 ft. 2 inches of pure coal. He named the valley Coalbrook Dale. That is not the only treasure-trove in coal that a waterfall has revealed to New Zealand geologists.
This report of Haast's covering those great coal-finds abounds in eloquent descriptive passages and quite thrilling adventures and narrow escapes and the inevitable spells of hunger in an all but foodless land. The geologist was also a good deal of an artist and a poet. Up in those wild ranges, where it was so cold that it was difficult to hold a pencil to sketch or write, he could not resist setting down this evening vignette:
“… It was wonderful and beautiful to see the valleys below us in deep shades, while the summits of the mountains around glowed in the rich red tints of the declining sun. As the night advanced, the stars shone with extreme brilliancy, the splendid constellations of the Southern hemisphere rising one after the other above the sharp serrated outline of the eastern mountain chain, and the dazzling snowfield around us, illuminated by the flames of our campfire, imparted additional grandeur to the scene.”
Haast's next appointment, which proved to be his life work, was that of Geologist to the Province of Canterbury. The many and great duties of technical skill and arduous exploration which he carried out from 1860 to 1870 are detailed in his work, “The Geology of the Provinces of Canterbury and Westland, New Zealand,” published in Christchurch in 1879. His narrations combine graphic accounts of “the difficulties, dangers and joys of an explorer's life,” with a great mass of detailed information on the geography and geology of this very beautiful and wonderful region of New Zealand.
The Superintendent of Canterbury, Mr. W. Sefton Moorhouse, after whom Haast named the Moorhouse Range and Mount Sefton, sent a special urgent summons to Haast to examine the extinct volcano through which it was proposed to pierce the Lyttelton-Christchurch railway tunnel. The first contractor had abandoned the work on account of the hardness of the basalt lava rock met with. The geologist explained the sequence of the lava streams and ancient crater walls that would be encountered, and the small proportion of hard rock. In consequence of his report the contract was re-let and the
A memorable, and tragic expedition, undertaken in 1861, soon after von Haast's appointment as Provincial Geologist, was the exploration of the Rangitata and Ashburton Rivers up to their alpine sources. The geologist was accompanied by his friend Dr. Andrew Sinclair, who went to assist him with the botanical researches. Their headquarters were fixed at Mesopotamia, where Samuel Butler, presently to become famous as the author of “Erewhon,” had a few months previously established himself as a sheep-farmer. The scientists explored the glacial heads of the Rangitata — space prevents Haast's eloquent description of those scenes of alpine gloom and glory — and returned to Mesopotamia to rest their horses and obtain food. A few days later, when crossing one of the deep main streams of the Rangitata, Dr. Sinclair was washed away and drowned. His body was found next day 300 yards below, where he entered the river; the riderless horse had arrived at the Mesopotamia Station the previous night. It was a sad blow to Haast.
“We brought the body of my lamented friend to Mesopotamia and buried him on March 29. Near the banks of the river, just where it emerges from the Alps, with their perpetual snowfields glistening in the sun, amidst veronicas and senecios and covered with celmisias and gentians, there lies his lonely grave. With almost juvenile alacrity he had climbed and searched the mountain sides, showing that notwithstanding his advanced age his love for his cherished science had supplied him with strength for his pursuits, until at last, over-rating his powers and not sufficiently aware of the treacherous nature of alpine torrents he fell a victim to his zeal. Great and deep was my sorrow, and with a saddened heart I had to continue alone the work upon which we had set out together.”
The Provincial Geologist's next scene of exploration was the head-waters of the Waitaki and the glaciated Tasman country. In this duty, which occupied four months in 1862, the late Sir Arthur Dudley Dobson (then a youthful cadet surveyor) was Haast's assistant in the topographical work. It was the first exploration and mapping of a country that is now a famous pleasure-ground for tourists, “the very centre of the Southern Alps, which,” Haast wrote, “in grandeur and beauty are worthy rivals of their European namesakes.” The excellent descriptions in the geologist's report are the first ever written of the Aorangi region. Haast named the chief peaks and glaciers and rivers of the region, and measured the terminals of the Great Tasman and other iceflows, and with his assistant set down a vast amount of data about this glorious centre of Alpland. He examined the lakes, traced the courses of the rivers, noted the vast eroding powers of the glaciers; pioneered the way for the surveyors and route-makers and squatter-station owners of far-out.
The next important exploration of Canterbury's geologist was a journey south to the Lake Wanaka region and thence through the unknown country at the head of Wanaka across the
(E. T. Robson, photo.)
The Canterbury Museum (founded by Sir Julius von Haast), Christchurch, New Zealand.Willington's new station in course of construction.
The above illustrations give a good impression of the imposing dimensions of the new railway station at Wellington and of the progress being made with the building operations. The top view shows the main entrance to the station (facing Bunny Street) and the view below shows the Featherston Street elevation and the arrangement of the passenger platforms, The present Lambton Station is shown in the left foreground of the picture,
On January 2 he started from Makarore to find a practicable way; his companions were William Young (Assistant Surveyor for Canterbury, as topographical assistant), R. L. Holmes, F. Warner (later on proprietor of Warner's Hotel), and Charles Haring. The party carried very heavy swags; they took provisions for four weeks. About twenty-five miles from the Lake, following up a tributary of the Makarore through wild country, the travellers came to a place where the level of the swampy open forest had a slight fall to the north. Soon the small waterholes between the swamp moss increased, a watercourse was formed, which was running in a northerly direction. Thus a most remarkable pass was discovered, which has no equal in the whole range of the Southern Alps.
From these observations on this watershed, Haast found that its altitude was only 1,716 feet above sea-level, or 724 feet above the surface of Lake Wanaka. The mountains on both sides rose into great glaciated heights. This is the place now known as the Haast Pass. A horseback track has been made through the forest and ranges following closely the way pioneered by our explorer and his party. Some day it will be roaded for motor traffic and thus form a wonderful highway to the West Coast, linking up with the South Westland main road. An amazingly rugged route of sublime scenery, it is a difficult track to-day; the great snow-fed rivers are the obstacles. We may imagine, therefore, the formidable character of this wilderness of mountains and forests and roaring rivers through which Haast's party, laden heavily, toiled in 1863.
There is a high icy mountain, just on the northern side of the pass, which Haast and Young ascended, in order to use it as a central topographical station and examine it for its geology. Haast named it Mount Brewster. Its glaciers give rise to the main head-waters of the river flowing to the West Coast, which the Maoris called the Awarua in its lower parts.
“From the slopes of this grand mountain, from an altitude of about 6,500 feet,” the explorer wrote, “we had a most magnificent view over the Alps. Lake Wanaka appeared far in the South, its blue mirror-like surface set among wild rugged mountains. All around us rose peak above peak, their rocky pinnacles towering in grand majesty above the snow and ice upon their flanks, while deep below us, in narrow gorges, we could look upon the foaming waters of the torrents almost at our feet.”
Tramping and clambering westward, making for the sea, the explorers encountered the most difficult part of the journey. It was a gorgeous savage country, with its lofty mountains, its precipices, tangled bush, snowy torrents and cataracts. “Among other curious places,” wrote Haast, “we were camped for several days under an enormous overhanging rock, with a vertical precipice of 150 feet near us, and the thundering and deafening roar of the swollen main river, forming here a large waterfall as its companion.” The Burke, Clarke and other rivers were named. Often the travellers had to scramble for hundreds of feet above the river, in making their way along the jungle-choked cliffs. It rained as it only can rain in the Westland country. At last, following down the wide many-branched river they reached the beach, and “stood in the surf, giving three hearty cheers.” The journey from Wanaka had taken them thirty days. It can be done now on horseback in two days, provided the rivers are not in flood.
It was March 2 before they completed their return journey, continually through the rain, emerging at Mr.
In 1865, at the height of the great gold rush that made Westland famous, Haast made another journey across the Alps, this time by way of the Hurunui Pass, to examine and report on the new goldfields. For several years he had pointed out in his official reports that without doubt there were rich gold-bearing areas south of the Grey River. His views were more than confirmed by the results when thousands of eager diggers worked the fields as far south as Bruce Bay and the mouth of the Haast. The Geologist's report, as was always the way with his writings, covered a far wider field than the scientific aspect. He gave a vivid description of the huge bustle and feverish activity of the population so quickly attracted to a vast silent wilderness. In this expedi-
(Continued on page 46.)
byArthur L. Stead
The Railways and Holiday Travel.
The Booking Office at King's Cross Station, London.
Exceptionally heavy passenger bookings have been recorded on the Home railways during the holiday season. Summer vacation travel by rail has exceeded all expectations, and the railways have reaped a rich reward for their enterprise in providing unique facilities for the holiday-maker, such as additional fast services, cheap fares, combined rail and road travel, “all-in” home and continental tours, camping coaches, and “land cruises” by specially equipped express trains. Railway-owned hotels and guest-houses have been filled almost to overflowing; cross-Channel steamships have daily been booked to capacity; accommodation in railway-operated aeroplanes has been reserved weeks in advance, and in every phase of railway activity there has been recorded the same pleasing story of bumper summer business.
Because of the welcome improvement in passenger traffics, many additions have recently been made to the passenger carriage stocks of the group lines. Especially interesting are new vehicles put into service on the Great Western and London and North Eastern systems.
The Great Western have recently turned out of the Swindon shops two new ten-car trains for long-distance excursion working. Each carriage in these trains is 60 ft. long, and designed on the most modern lines. The vehicles are of the saloon type, with seats arranged on either side of a central gangway. The total seating capacity of the two trains is 416 and 384 passengers respectively. Two kitchencars are included in the composition of each train, these being panelled throughout with stainless steel. More spectacular still are the new carriages built by the L. & N.E. Company. These are first-class all-electric restaurant cars for service between King's Cross Station, London, and Scotland. Some 63 ft. 6in. long, each car consists of a dining saloon to seat eighteen persons, a pantry, kitchen, attendants' compartment, and toilet section. In the kitchen, all cooking is carried out electrically. The main cooking-range comprises a roasting oven, steaming oven, grill and hot-water boiler. In addition, there is a boiling-range with six hot-plates for frying and boiling, and a 10-gallon capacity boiling-pan for cooking vegetables.
Special fare facilities have been a feature of the summer programme on the Home lines. Enormous crowds have thereby been drawn to seaside and country holiday resorts, while record passenger movements have been registered in connection with many outstanding events of the season. A few of the Jubilee year gatherings that have brought big business were the
Interior of the Main Lounge at the L.M. and S. “Welcombe Hotel” at Stratford-on-Avon.
Among special fare arrangements there may be noted the innovation known as “Inclusive Holidays,” introduced this season by the L.M. & S. and L. & N.E. lines. These inclusive holiday tickets provide full accommodation for a week at a hotel or boarding-house, day and half-day sight-seeing trips by rail, road and water, and rail travel to and from the selected resort. A weekly “inclusive holiday” ticket may be purchased for as little as $3/13/-, and a fortnightly ticket for $8/10/-, the charge, of course, varying according to the distance covered and the accommodation selected.
Interior of the Main Lounge at the L.M. and S. “Welcombe Hotel” at Stratford-on-Avon.
Mechanical equipment of various types is constantly being introduced to aid the railway traveller. Two recent interesting developments take the form of the provision of a quick-service ticket-issuing machine at Liverpool Street Station, London, and a new electric train departure indicator at Paddington Station, London.
The Liverpool Street machine speeds up ticket-issuing enormously, and what is better still from the railway point of view immensely simplifies operations in the booking-office. Not only does the machine print and issue tickets, but it also actually counts up the day's takings. By the pressure of a button the machine prints, dates and issues a ticket selected from 3,040 different types, and simultaneously records the amount of money involved. The consecutive amounts are automatically added together, so that the booking-clerk can tell at any moment what are the total receipts.
The Paddington train indicator is an equally ingenius contrivance. It is an electrical indicator (installed on the concourse) which not only tells passengers the time, destination, and platform of departure trains, but changes its face throughout the twenty-four hours without any human aid. The machine is enclosed in a glass-fronted case ten feet high by six feet wide. To look at, it is like a large venetian blind with twenty-nine metal slats, on each of which is painted the time of a train and the principal stations served. The slats run on endless belts, in groups of ten, only one slat in each group being displayed at one time. An electric motor sets in motion, at intervals during the twenty-four hours, the twenty-nine endless belts, thus erasing the one setting and bringing into view the next set of trains. Altogether, this is one of the most ingenious train-departure indicators we have seen.
Aeroplanes named after famous cities on the line of route have been introduced by Railway Air Services on the Liverpool-Brighton and Plymouth-Nottingham services this season. The machines on the former service are called “City of Birmingham” and “City of Bristol.” Plymouth and Cardiff are the two cities honoured in naming the ‘planes in the other service.
The new railway-operated air-links connect Liverpool, Cardiff, Bristol, Plymouth and Southampton with each other, and the industrial Midlands with popular holiday resorts, by means of a rapid morning and afternoon service in each direction on each route. Multi-engined air liners, seating eight passengers, are employed. They are equipped with wireless, and have a cruising speed of 100 to 130 m.p.h. At Southampton the Liverpool-Brighton ‘planes make connection with other’ Railway Air Services' ‘planes for the Isle of Wight and the Channel Islands. At Liverpool there is a link with the morning air service to Blackpool and the Isle of Man. In many cases, the fares are lower than those of last year.
Important schemes of development and modernisation have for some time been in progress at the South Wales docks of the Great Western Railway. As a result, the shipping facilities in this corner of Britain have been brought right up-to-date, and increased freight handlings may be anticipated in the future. One interesting improvement is the introduction of special appliances for the prevention of the breakage of coal during shipment. These consist of an escalator comprising a number of trays worked on an endless belt. Each tray as it is filled lowers the coal without breakage, and thirty-four of these machines have so far been installed. The “Norfolk” spade, or mechanical digger, has also been introduced successfully, to clear wet coal from wagons. Fifteen of these machines are in service, and they clean a wagon in a few minutes, as against manual labour of more than half-an-hour.
The Great Western Company have completed a scheme of enlargement of
Beautiful Ventnor, Isle of Wight—on the route of Railway Airways.
Cinema cars have from time to time been tried out on many of the world's railways, but no particular success seems to have marked the experiment. The cars hitherto utilised have been devoted to the exhibition of silent films, but now the London and North Eastern Railway has launched out with regular “talkie” shows on certain of its express trains between London and Leeds. The “talkie” coach accommodates 44 passengers, tip-up seats being provided, these being raised towards the back of the car, so that everyone may see the films in comfort. A six-foot screen is utilised, and most of the films are of “news” interest. A small charge is made for admission. Whether or not the show becomes a permanent feature remains to be seen. In any case, we may certainly congratulate the King's Cross authorities on their enterprise in introducing the world's first railway “talkie.”
Leading HotelsA reliable Travellers' Guide.
Willington's new station in course of construction.
The above illustrations give a good impression of the imposing dimensions of the new railway station at Wellington and of the progress being made with the building operations. The top view shows the main entrance to the station (facing Bunny Street) and the view below shows the Featherston Street elevation and the arrangement of the passenger platforms, The present Lambton Station is shown in the left foreground of the picture,
By.
Tangiwai
An old friend, a pioneer settler, and I were talking of the past conditions on far-back farms and the present day conditions of the husbandman—Viscount Bledisloe's favourite term. The frontier settler in the Waikato was in mind. We both recalled the fact that the farmer and his family did a great deal for themselves fifty or sixty years ago that they send to the township shops for now. The farming then was mixed, that is, root and grain crops of many kinds were grown, and there were sheep as well as cattle on every farm of any size. Candles were made by the farmer's wife from tallow; I remember the old candle moulds. Smelly candles they were, but better than nothing, especially when kerosene was hard to get. Peaches and apples were cut up and sun-dried and made into pies and preserves, and fruit wines were made. There were no orchard pests in those days.
The flax-bush was all important. No farmer could have done without it, for a score of purposes. The down or pollen (hunehune) of the raupo-flower-head was a capital substitute for feathers or kapok in filling pillows and cushions.
Harness, my friend recalled, was made, in his first farming days, from green cowhide, prepared with salt and alum. Plough and bridle reins and stirrup-leathers were manufactured in this way. Floor mats and carpets were made by Maori neighbours, and on these were often laid dressed and dyed sheepskins. The old-fashioned flail was used for threshing grain. Home-made wooden harrows did useful work on many a farm.
We have travelled far since those days of the semi-primitive life. But I question whether the excessive specialisation of the farming industry in dairying has been altogether a change for the better. The dairy-farm nowadays is often a bare comfortless-looking place.
The ground for plantations is begrudged; most of the trees are felled; there are fewer orchards. A farm in the old days was self-contained; nearly everything that the family needed except clothes and a few groceries was produced there. Intensive dairy farming means that some of the amenities that make country life pleasant and happy are sacrificed. Machinery saves labour and time; but a farmer and his family are too often slaves to machinery and cows.
I know if I were a boy again I would sooner be a youngster on a far-back Waikato farm of that era than on one of these down-to-date places where they put through a hundred cows twice daily. That, too, in spite of the speeding-up devices and wondrous inventions of this age. We were not all standardised then by radio and cinema and motor-car. But now happily there are indications that the mechanisation of rural life has reached its crest, and that the inevitable reaction has set in in many places.
Some literary folk in our midst and out of it are periodically concerned about the future of our writers and their work. “New Zealand,” said one, “may never have a distinctive atmosphere so as to give a particular character to our literature, because actually we differ so little from England.” That is essentially a narrow and ill-informed view. No country can differ from England more greatly than New Zealand in its physical character and tradition. One town is very like another, and townspeople are as alike as Chinamen. But it is the romantic frontier character, the infinitely coloured, thrilling past of New Zealand compressed into say a little more than a century that gives it its background that competent writers can use to the advantage of their work. There are distinctive types of character in the backblocks and in such a land as the long woody West Coast that the town-dwelling critic does not know. The native-born reared on the frontiers of civilisation where wild history was made has a character and outlook differing vastly from that of the English immigrant of to-day who never strays far from the city lights. Our tradition is as distinctive as our landscape. There is nothing wrong with our atmosphere. But fiction-writers who have to hunt up “local colour” will never find the real thing. It is forever far beyond their skyline.
I have remarked on the tendency to standardisation of type in the farming business, due to excessive specialisation. But there are many, many places to which this does not apply. And there is our heroic tradition, the like of which no other country has known; it is sui generis.
There was a certain hard-case old scout and bush-fighter, of whom I have heard many an anecdote from his comrades. Tom Adamson was one of three stalwart Wanganui brothers—I knew two of them well—who took to the war-path, in the ‘sixties; he wore the Maori shawl-kilt and marched barefooted. In his old age, when he was sheepfarming at Urukehu, on his Maori wife's land, he became “as bald as a billiard-ball,” as one of my friends described it. “Tom asked me, when I called at his place one day, what he should do for that pakira, or baldness. I advised him to use sheep-dip, to rub a dose of it into his scalp daily. I did not see him again for some months. When I rode up to his home next time I asked him how the sheep-dip had acted. ‘Look and see for yourself,’ he said, taking off his hat. Sure enough, his head was covered with a fine downy growth. ‘Stick to it, old man,’ I said. ‘I will that,’ Tom replied; ‘if I go on like this I'll have enough wool on top by Christmas to give a shearer a job'.”
I have not heard of any one else who experimented with that heroic hair-restorer, but I pass on the tip to my many pakira acquaintances, and eke our “tonsorial artists.”
ByD. G. .)
Dyne
How pleasant it is when reading some English or American book, often on subjects far removed from our own sphere of life, to come across those two words “New Zealand.” I think most New Zealand readers can glance from top to bottom of a page of print and, if those words are there, pick them out instantly, chiefly of course by the uncommon letter Z.
It is surprising how many books, novels and other volumes, on every imaginable subject contain these allusions to New Zealand. Take the immortal Dickens. In his “Bleak House” we read of someone going to “Australy or New Zealand” and in a chapter on Arcadian London in his less well-known volume “The Uncommercial Traveller,” he likens himself to Macauley's New Zealander, while in “Reprinted Pieces” he mentions an old school-fellow who “Built mills and bridges in New Zealand.”
The once popular Jules Verne not only mentioned New Zealand in several of his famous novels but also wrote a tale in the Swiss Family Robinson style of a party of boys from a school “half way up Queen Street,” Auckland, who were wrecked on a South Sea island after being wafted out of the Auckland harbour on a yacht. He named his tale “Adrift in the Pacific.”
Robert Browning's friendship with Alfred Domett, the early New Zealand politician and author of the poem “Ranolf and Amohia,” is well-known, but few people know that he wrote a poem from Italy addressed to his friend, entitled “The Guardian Angel” and ending:—
“My love is here! Where are you dear old friend?
How rolls the Wairoa at your world's end?
This is Ancona, yonder lies the sea.”
In “Pride of Palomar,” Peter B. Kyne makes an outburst against Japanese penetration of California and ends with the words: “If only we had the courage and the foresight and the firmness of the Australians and the New Zealanders! Why, Kay, those sane people will not even permit an Indian Prince—a British subject, forsooth!—to enter their country, except under bond, and then for six months only.”
Artemus Ward, the once famous American humourist who achieved his ambition of writing for “Punch” and then died in England, wrote an article in that magazine about an imaginary side-show he ran in London when he hired a “young man of dissypated habits” and disguised him as “A Real Cannibal from New Zeelan.”
In the works of Australia's Henry Lawson we find several New Zealand tales, which is not surprising considering that Lawson once lived here for a while, working some of the time for a Pahiatua newspaper. One of his tales is about a schoolteacher and a recalcitrant Maori schoolgirl, and in “Joe Wilson and His Mates,” he wrote a tale of the West Coast diggings, and
(Photo., G. H. Davies.)
Sylvan Lake, Paradise, South Island, New Zealand.
The great Sherlock Holmes once deduced that a man had worked in the New Zealand goldfields and his creator once wrote a short story of a place many miles north of Nelson, and someone pointed out to him that the specified locality was well out at sea.
To come to a more modern novel, Francis Brett Young's “Portrait of Claire,” whose heroine drives through the New Zealand camp at Sling during the War. “Close by the roadway some New Zealanders of the Auckland battalion were busy with bayonet practice, plunging their steel into straw stuffed Germans, whose heads some fanciful Maori must have painted with features that resembled those of South Sea gods or devils.” Later they drive past again, when the New Zealanders are “dying like flies” of influenza.
In Lowell Thomas's biography of the much discussed Colonel T. E. Lawrence, “With Lawrence in Arabia,” is a chapter on the rock-hewn “rose-red city half as old as time,” Petra, in Arabia, the American chronicler quotes six stanzas of a poem on this mysterious city by “Mona Mackay, Christ-church, New Zealand.” “Old Fire-proof,” a Boer War novel by one Vaughan, describes how a New Zealand soldier is heard singing “The Holy City” at night on the African veldt.
Even in the exclusively Wessex tales of Thomas Hardy, we meet the
E. Phillips Oppenheim in his “Simple Peter Chadd” settles his hero in the manner of many another English writer of fiction by providing him with a small fortune left by “an uncle in the colonies,” in this case by an uncle from Christchurch, New Zealand.
Arnold Bennett in one of his stories describes a solid, respectable type of hotel as one “such as visitors from New Zealand” patronise.
In a recent number of the “Wide World Magazine” was a New Zealand tale introducing a mounted policeman, and the accompanying illustration depicted a policeman wearing the cap and uniform of the U.S. police, with a big revolver slung around his waist. Perhaps the illustrator believes New Zealand to be a New York suburb bordering on New Jersey.
To conclude on a more cheerful and flattering note, let us quote the passage in praise of New Zealand from “My Life of Adventure,” the autobiography of A. G. Hales, traveller, adventurer, and author of the famous McClusky novels: “I had hoped to say something concerning a country I love and a people I honour in this book of my knock-about life, but New Zealand is a land that needs a book in itself, and a passing mention is in a sense an insult. Only a small spot, but the home of heroes, a land where democracy has reached the highest level the followers of Demos have ever attained, a dream of beauty and a joy forever. That is a thumbnail sketch of New Zealand. The land never bred a snake, nor the women a sneak. Some day I am going back to the ‘King Country’ to see if any of my old Maori friends are still alive; to live for a few months in a
(Photo., Thima R. Kent.)
Architects Bridge, over the Copeland River, West Coast, South Island, New Zealand.
Somebody has been writing to an Auckland paper to complain bitterly of the invasion by smokers of the non-smoking tram-cars. “Just fancy!” as the ladies say. But this disgruntled correspondent said never a word about the invasion of smoke-cars by non-smokers. These passengers (mostly ladies) sometimes crowd the smokers clean out! As a matter of fact the ancient objection to tobacco-smoke is fast dying out. This is undoubtedly due to the growing demand for tobacco of better quality. Most of the old-fashioned tobaccos, so hot, acrid and poisonous with nicotine are giving place to purer and less harmful brands—more especially the five toasted varieties, so pure, fragrant and alluring—and so harmless, because, owing to the toasting, they contain so little nicotine. Five brands: Navy Cut No. 3 (Building), Cut Plug No. 10 (Bulls-head), Cavendish, Riverhead Gold and Desert Gold. But these comprise a brand for every smoker—including the cigarette smoker. You can get them anywhere and everywhere. They are on sale throughout the Dominion.*
New Zealand Verse
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By)
Margaret Macpherson
The finest thing in Nelson (and indeed one of the finest things in New Zealand) is the Cawthron Institute. This is a cluster of buildings containing laboratories for the purpose of research into the primary industries of this country. With that essentially scientific patience which attracts no limelight and calls for no applause, the specialists of the Cawthron quietly pursue the tasks of ridding the land of blights and pests, bringing barren country to fruitfulness, advising and helping farmers in all their problems.
I met most of the experts of the Cawthron Institute and learned a little of what they are achieving. The Director of the Institute, Mr. Theodore Rigg, very kindly showed me round. Tall, thin, roughly hewn as to countenance, this man has always been a servant of humanity in one capacity or another. During Russia's worst years of agony—1918 to 1921—Mr. Rigg, as secretary of the Friends' Relief Party, worked amongst the sick and starving peasants of the Soviet Union.
But his real life-work is that of an agricultural chemist—a soil chemist. He devotes his time to the manurial problems of the orchardist and farmer. One of his outstanding successful experiments was that in connection with the Moutere Hills apple orchard soil. The soil was deficient—not sufficiently productive—and Mr. Rigg undertook to diagnose and cure the trouble. He succeeded so brilliantly that comparison now shows that blocks of land brought under his treatment yield 200 bushels of apples more per acre, than blocks not so treated.
This, of course, does not solve all the difficulties of the apple-grower. One Nelson lady invited me to come and see her “orchards.” When I got there, after a long drive in her car, I found, to my surprise, that the “orchards” consisted of hundreds of acres of young pine trees.
“All this used to be apple-trees,” she said, “but the bottom fell out of the fruit market, so I had a forest planted instead.”
Nevertheless, Mr. Rigg's attempts to make the wilderness blossom as the rose are worth examining. His conversion of the pakihi wilderness, on the barren West Coast, into fine agricultural land was something I felt ought to be explained, and I asked him to tell me how it was done.
“When I first took it in hand,” he said, “I thought it the most formidable and depressing task I had ever been given. I don't know if you ever saw the land, but it was simply a barren wilderness covered with umbrella-fern and ti-tree; hardly a blade of grass to be seen.”
“But you knew you could change it,” I said, thrilled.
“Not at all,” he returned. “I thought I never would. It seemed hopeless. I had over two hundred small plots laid out for experiment. Surface weeds were burned off. Then some sections were ploughed deep and some were ploughed shallow; and some were not ploughed at all. But the worst and most forbidding feature of it was the land's natural resistance to percolation of water. It had a hard pan, past which the water could not sink.”
“Now I can guess how you won through,” I said. “You had it ploughed very very deep, with one of those swamp ploughs.”
“Wrong again,” smiled Mr. Rigg. “In the end I abandoned ploughing altogether.”
“But if the soil would not let the water through—“
“Then manuring processes, which alter the nature of the soil, must be devised. This was done. Then I tried all sorts of grasses and clovers until I found the most suitable crop. That was three years ago. Now the experimental stage is over. See these photographs. There you see a six-acre field of pakihi land carrying fourteen cows, and even then there was difficulty in keeping the growth down. Pastures established three years ago now yield three tons of hay to the acre.”
But this is only the beginning of what the Cawthron does for farmers. Let me now introduce the reader to Dr. Kathleen Curtis, quiet, modest, slender and brown-eyed, whose task is investigating the fungus diseases which attack our commercial plants. Black spot in apples, brown rot in peaches, virus in tobacco, tomatoes, hops, tulips and sweetpeas; these are the enemies against which Dr. Kathleen wages unremitting warfare. Most of these blights are attacked by means of spraying, but the sprays have to be carefully prescribed and applied at the right time.
“How do the farmers know when it is the right time to spray?” I enquired of her.
“Well, we tell them.”
“And how do you know?”
“By keeping specimens of the diseased plants growing in the gardens here. When the dangerous spores are being liberated by the plants, we put an advertisement in the papers telling the farmers it is time to spray.”
He was no insect-eater, he told them.”
“And may any farmer, any farmer at all, come to you for advice?”
“Yes, indeed. We get letters and specimens from all over the Dominion.”
“And is the advice given free?”
“Quite free.”
Dr. Kathleen is a very distinguished scientist. She is an M.A., D.I.C., D.Sc. To me she seemed totally absorbed in her work, upon which she speaks with authority and complete assurance. On other subjects, however, she was diffident and did not readily express an opinion. She is one of those rare persons who insist on thinking before they speak.
Leaving Dr. Kathleen in her laboratory I made a trip across the road to interview the chief entomologist, Dr. David Miller. Dr. Miller talks with a birl; that is to say he is Scotch—Scotch as Hamish, Scotch as porridge. I asked him to tell me all about his work.
“Well, I must explain,” he said, “that these laboratories are devoted to the extermination of insect pests. We breed parasites to kill pests.”
Dr. Miller went on to tell me of some of his experiments. The most spectacular success he has had in this line has been the extermination of woolly aphis, that sinister white parasite that spreads a leprosy of white wool all over the apple trees. Another parasite, named aphelinus, was bred in the laboratories and sent out in test tubes to the affected farms. All the farmer had to do was uncork the test-tube and hang it up in his tree. And, Hey Presto! In a few short months the aphelinus had eaten up the white woolly horror and the trees were clean once more.
Another successful experiment was the attack on the blow-fly maggot which affects our sheep. To combat this dreadful creature, which costs New Zealand sheep farmers many thousands of pounds per annum, a parasite was introduced which would attack the maggot of the blow-fly. I saw this little warrior in the laboratory. He looks rather like a flying ant.
“What I don't understand,” I said, “is how you get him to attack the maggot. Do you take him and put him on the sheep's back, or what?”
Dr. Miller laughed at this naive idea.
“No, we send them out in the crystalis stage,” he said. “Then the farmer has to scatter them on the grass where the sheep are. Soon the parasite emerges from the crysalis and settles on the sheep.”
“But why does he? Has he the intelligence to do that?”
“Well, you see, he is a blow-fly maggot parasite. He must live on the blow-fly. That is all he can do if he is to survive.”
One of Dr. Miller's most diverting stories was about his search for an insect which would destroy the biddy-bid, one of our worst weed pests. To find this useful beastie, Dr. Miller journeyed to South America and took a pioneer's march inland to where the fierce Auracanian Indians live in their primitive savagery. In approaching them he was certainly risking his life.
“However did you manage to survive your first meeting with them?” I asked him. “Did you threaten them with a gun, or impress them with conjuring tricks?”
“Neither,” he replied. “I have a theory and it always works. I believe that if you treat a man as you would like him to treat you you will be safe anywhere. As a matter of fact they were awfully nice to me.”
When the savages saw Dr. Miller grubbing about in the hills for insects, they concluded that he wanted them to eat. He rejected this suggestion. He was no insect-eater, he told them.
“He will make ointment out of them,” suggested a big chief.
“No, no. I just keep them in these little boxes,” said he, showing them his neat Cawthron cases.
The big chief wagged his head sadly, and drew the others aside. “Poor fellow, he is mad,” he said. “We must take care of him.”
From this time on they were most solicitous of their protége, “the Mad Stranger,” as they called him.
But we have already lingered too long in beautiful Nelson. The West Coast awaits us, and we must push on. We take a service car—a luxurious seven-seater — and leaving the charming little township behind we thread through the beautiful orchard lands of the province. The apples are ripe and the trees are heavy with their decorative burden. But soon we run out of this domain of genus homo and come to long stretches of native bush where nature reigns in all her pristine beauty.
At the top of the Hope Saddle we exclaim with delight as the magnificent panorama bursts upon us. We see the distant ocean, the mountains surrounding the Sounds, the forest-clad hills behind Nelson, and tier on tier of green and blue hills rising up to the distant snow-clad peaks of the Spencer Range.
From the Hope Saddle the car curves and zigzags down again until we reach the Hope Valley, with its pellucid waters singing their everlasting song as they rush to join the Buller River. We pass through the little town of Murchison and enter the famous Buller Gorge. From now on the scenery ascends a scale of increasing grandeur, rugged forest lands succeeding to the sparse bush of the first few miles. The road twists and turns, dives into unexpected tunnels, skirts along precipices, winds beneath overhanging cliffs. At last we enter Westport, a little town huddled close to the sea as though the mountains were pushing it into the water. These mountains are the reason Westport stands there, for they are full of coal. It is here that we spend the night.
Our landlady had a little boy of three summers. An adorable child with the funniest little face, he in
Margaret Macpherson.
“Well, we call him ‘Ugly Mug’,” he said. “But his mother doesn't like it, so you'd better call him Herbert, that's his real name.”
“Ugly Mug” came sidling up to me.
“Can ‘oo smell cat?” he asked.
I sniffed the air, horrified.
“No, son; I can't.”
“I can,” he squeaked triumphantly.
“C.A.T. smells cat.”
The next day we made the 68-mile journey to Greymouth. This road provides some of the weirdest and most impressive scenery in the Southern Hampshire. After a twenty-mile run we come to the Fox River, and from thence to Punakaiki. For many miles now we strike patches of glorious bush which gives a semi-tropical effect, the principal trees being nikau palms and tree-ferns. Punakaiki itself is a geologist's paradise. We stop here and make a little trip up Dead Man's Creek to inspect the famous Blow Hole. This roaring blow hole appears at first to be a geyser. Every now and again a column of water shoots up into the air to a great height. Upon closer inspection, however, we find that it is caused by the sea running with great force into an underground cave and thus forcing the water up through the cavity. On stormy days, our driver tells us, the Blow Hole booms like a cannon.
At Punakaiki, too, we saw the curious Pancake Rocks with their horizontal layer formation exactly like a giant's batch of newly-baked pancakes piled up in heaps. A very queer geological phenomenon, this; I would like to have heard some scientist explain it. But there was no time for explanations or conjectures. We had to rush on. From time to time we passed little ghost townships, deserted villages which were once booming with the prosperity brought by the gold-rush of last century. A few ramshackle tumbledown buildings mark their decease; kindly nature has thrown a winding-sheet of ti-tree across the scarred earth. Birds build in the old saloons. Such places are Lyell and Charleston, pathetically clinging to the mountain side and appearing to dream of happier days. At last we reached Greymouth, another coalmining place of the “Wild West Coast.”
From Greymouth we journeyed on to visit the famous Franz Josef Glacier. This is, without exception, the most wonderful and beautiful thing I have ever seen. The glacier, the ice-river, flows majestically down from the eternal mountains and penetrates right through the forest, so that one sees ice and semi-tropical vegetation side by side. The fairy greens and blues of the glacier, the swaying fronds of the nikaus and tree-ferns, the glowing ratas, make a memory picture that remains in the heart and mind for ever. We now climb towards Waiho and the country unfolds an ever spreading vista of loveliness until we emerge upon the “Roof-garden of New Zealand” and see the shimmering peaks of the Southern Alps before us. There is Mt. Cook, 12,349 feet high; there is Mt. Tasman, 11,467 feet, and there is Mt. de la Beche, over 10,000 feet. Below these glistening turrets and towers the Franz Josef gleams like a broad silver ribbon. It commences at over 9,000 feet, and runs right down within a few hundred feet of sea-level. We had to stop for a few moments at the St. James ‘Anglican Church in the Waiho George. Here the altar has the most beautiful reredos in the whole world. It is neither of wood nor marble, nor of stained glass nor of gold. No, my reader, it is just a piece of transparent glass which shows the natural splendour of hill and glacier to the kneeling congregation. More eloquent than words to illustrate the awesome and eternal Mystery, the Franz Josef preaches its sermon to mankind.
There is a very fine hotel at Waiho Gorge and the glacier itself is about three miles away, an easy walk by a good path. The end of the glacier is about half a mile wide, and breaks off
(H. C. Peart, photo.)
A scene on the Main South Road, Westland, New Zealand.
(To be continued.)
Women smokers are becoming as plentiful as house-flies in summer in Maoriland, and, what is more, many of them now roll their own instead of buying factory-made—always liable to go stale and flavourless owing to being kept so long in stock. In Sydney, according to the “own correspondent” of an Auckland daily, the girls not only prefer to make their own cigarettes but lots of them are taking to pipes!—pretty little things specially manufactured for ladies' use. “I haven't heard of women smoking pipes in public—as yet,” naively adds the correspondent. Our New Zealand damsels are, so far, sticking to cigarettes, and show a marked preference for toasted Riverhead Gold and Desert Gold, two of the very finest cigarette tobaccos on the market. Other famous brands of toasted are Cavendish, Navy Cut No. 3 (Bulldog), and Cut Plug No. 10 (Bullshead). These latter are chiefly flavoured by the pipe smokers. All five brands are practically free from nicotine. Hence their harmlessness, their beautiful fragrance and incomparable bouquet. But look out for worthless imitations!*
(ByC. H. .)
Fortune
The name, Mackenzie Country, is synonymous with sheep: it is undoubtedly the largest sheep district in New Zealand. Commencing about 20 miles inland from Timaru (where Levels County merges into it), it sweeps from the latter county across vast glacial plains, over high mountains, to pull up suddenly against the formidable barrier of the Southern Alps. Southward it is bounded by the great Waitaki River and Lake Ohau: northward it merges rather uninterestingly into the Ashburton County. In this great area we find Lakes Ohau, Tekapo, and Pukaki: the largest glacier in temperate zones, the Tasman; and the great mountain peaks of Cook, Sefton, Tasman, Malte Brun, De La Beche, and scores of other notable peaks.
Mackenzie Country — rugged and rough as the old Ross-shire shepherd who discovered it.
When James (“Jock”) Mackenzie first saw the light of day, in 1825, in a little cottage in Ross-shire in the Scottish Highlands, no one could have dreamt that his name would live forever in a strange new land, 11,000 miles away. Yet such proved to be the case. The wanderlust entered Mackenzie's soul at an early age: he decided to try his fortunes in Australia and landed there in 1845. From Australia it was but a short jump to New Zealand, and two years later “Jock” was in the Dominion. He wandered about from station to station doing odd jobs, mostly droving. He had with him a Scottish collie, an outstandingly sagacious animal, about which many strange stories have been told. That the dog was possessed of amazing intelligence there is no gainsaying, and dog and master were devoted to each other. Stories have been told that Mackenzie's dog was so trained that at a sign from her master she would not recognise him. Moreover, if her master wished her to remember anyone as an enemy, a sign on the occasion of the first meeting was all that was necessary, and this person, no matter how slight the meeting was tabulated forever in the dog's brain as a foe. Neither of these stories, however, appears to have any substantiation in fact.
Mackenzie was droving sheep round about Mataura for some time when the wanderlust entered him once again. He had done a little roaming about Otago, and now decided to go further afield. So with only his dog and a pack-bullock as companions, he set off. Where he was going he didn't know, nor did he know where he intended finishing. His wanderings, of which there appears to be no record, must have taken him over an enormous area; in time they led him to a pass in the hills that overlooked the mighty Mackenzie Country. This pass was known to, and had been traversed by, Maori tribes in South Canterbury, and was known to them as Manahune. None of the white settlers in the Levels district had gone beyond the hills rising at the back of Fairlie, so when Mackenzie stood looking down on the stretches of tussocky and shingly country, he was the first white man to do so. Mackenzie, the shepherd, realised that here was ideal sheep country, and determined to make use of it. He visited the Commissioner of Lands at Oamaru and obtained a Government license to occupy this new territory. But Mackenzie wasn't a rich man and couldn't afford to buy his sheep, so he adopted methods not entirely legal.
The Rhodes Brothers were the biggest runholders in the Levels County at this time, and their sheep were scattered over extensive areas. Early in March, 1855, it was discovered that a mob of 1,000 sheep had mysteriously disappeared from the “Levels Run.” John Sidebottom, manager for the Rhodes, immediately gathered one or two Maori hands and set off on the trail of the missing sheep. The trail was easily followed, for there had been rain, and 1,000 sheep cannot be moved without signs. Sidebottom was surprised when he discovered where the trail was leading him, for he was entirely ignorant that a route through the hills had been discovered. It was not long before he was looking down
Sidebottom accused Mackenzie of stealing the sheep, and immediately the men came to blows. It was a man's fight that, fought in a lonely, inhospitable region: a fight that could finish only with the defeat of one or the other. And Mackenzie, huge and muscular though he was, went under to the superior strength of Side-bottom.
It was now evening, and too late to think of moving the sheep, especially over a district that Sidebottom did not know well. During the night, mists descended on the party, and Sidebottom became obsessed with strange fancies. He though he heard sounds indicating the approach of Mackenzie's accomplices, the existence of whom, be it noted, was never proved. Sidebottom there and then made up his mind to attempt a return. Mackenzie went quietly with the party until he suddenly attacked his captors, knocking over the Maori boys, and fled into the mists.
Mackenzie headed north after his escape from Sidebottom, finally reaching Lyttelton. He made an astonishingly quick trip, so quick that when he was captured in the Canterbury port the Rhodes would not believe it was the same man, declaring he could never have covered the ground in the time. Mackenzie's intentions were to flee the country, leaving for Australia by the little steamer “Zingari.” The vessel was not due to leave for a day or two, so Mackenzie went into hiding.
Immediately the Rhodes knew of the existence of Mackenzie they offered a reward of $250 for any information that would lead to the capture of the sheep-stealer and his accomplices. It seemed certain he had accomplices for surely one man and one dog couldn't move a mob of 1,000 sheep as easily as he had done; but there they under-estimated the capabilities of both man and dog. In addition to the reward of $250 a special reward of $100 was offered for the apprehension of Mackenzie himself. With this reward—a huge sum in those days—in the offing, everyone was naturally on the alert for the marauder. Inspector E. W. Seager, in charge of the Lyttelton gaol, disguised as a country ruffian, affected a neat arrest in the room where “Jock” was sleeping. Mackenzie was brought up for trial shortly afterwards.
He maintained a stubborn silence in court, attempting to convey the impression that he could not speak English — only Gaelic. His dog was brought in and she immediately recognised her master, going into transports of delight. Mackenzie himself broke down, crying bitterly. It will here be noticed that the two stories, related earlier, concerning the dog's superintelligence, are discounted, for the dog recognised her master at a time when, if he had been able, he would surely have signed to her not to recognise him. Moreover, John Sidebottom was in court and she made no display against the man who had attacked her master in the Mackenzie Country.
His identity now proved beyond doubt, Mackenzie was sentenced to five years' penal servitude. Sentence announced, Mackenzie broke into impassioned speech, demanding—in English, not Gaelic—if he were to go to gaol, that the dog be allowed to go with him; but this was not permitted.
A man like Mackenzie could not stay five years in one place. He broke gaol on three separate occasions; at least twice getting well away. Each time he was recaptured he was placed in irons.
The frequent escapes and the expenses incurred in recaptures (on one occasion a reward of $10 was offered for his capture, claimed by Rapaki Maoris), decided the authorities that something must be done. In January, 1856, the Governor (Colonel Gore-Browne) granted Mackenzie a pardon provided he left the country. He was warned he would serve his sentence if ever he returned. Some years later he did set foot on New Zealand shores again, but a polite hint from the authorities sent him hurrying back to Australia where at last he appears to have settled down.
There is little doubt that Mackenzie stole other sheep before this big theft. Sidebottom, when tracking the big mob, discovered. old trails leading into the Mackenzie Country, and only Mackenzie could have been responsible. In May, 1853, the Rhodes Brothers lost 500 ewes, and there were other suspected reavings. It was suspected, but never proved, that “Jock” took these sheep through the back country and brought them out on the Taieri Plains where he sold them.
Mackenzie's name will live forever in those vast tracts of prosperous sheep country. He discovered it years before it would have been discovered in ordinary circumstances, for settlers were too intent on establishing themselves to devote any time to exploring, especially when the mountainous nature of the country gave no indication that it was suddenly to open out into large plains. On July 16th, 1856, Watson and Gladstone opened the first run in the Mackenzie Country. This was situated at the south end of Lake Pukaki, and occupied some 10,000 acres. On 4th December, 1894, the area was officially designated, Mackenzie Country.
Where Sidebottom captured Mackenzie at the foot of the Mackenzie Pass is a plain grey stone monument: a dual reminder of a man who is famous for discovering the Pass, and of a man who is infamous as a sheep-stealer.
(By
Tohunga
In continuation of the series of New Zealand railway station Maori names and their origin and meanings, I give the remaining names on the section north of Auckland city, carrying it on then into the South Auckland district.
Ranganui:
Great parade; long line of warriors or charging party.
Kaiwaka:
To hollow out, like a canoe, or like
a kaka parrot pecking a hole in a tree.
Töpuni:
A dogskin mat or cloak.
Kaipara:
To eat frost fish; also a meal of the para fern-root (Marattia Fraxinea).
Tanigo-wähine:
Seizing or abducting a woman. Sometimes given as tangi-wahine, meaning woman's lament or weeping.
Kiri-köpuni:
Dark skin; also a black-skinned eel.
Rötu:
A magic spell which produces sleep; a mesmeric incantation.
Parore:
This station was named after the celebrated old chief Parore te Awha, who lived on the northern Wairoa and died in 1887, aged nearly a hundred years. He was always very friendly to the Europeans. One meaning of the word is gentle, soft, agreeable; it is also the name of a fish, bream, black perch.
Whātoro:
To stretch out; thrust forward.
Maropiu:
A swinging or swaying loin-mat; the swing of the kilt.
Aranga:
The act of rising.
Ahikiwi:
Fire to cook the kiwi bird.
Hōteo:
One of several names for a calabash.
Ahuroa:
Long mound or hillock.
Tähekeroa:
Long rapid in a river, or a long cataract.
Kanohi:
Eye; also face.
Kaukapakapa:
Swimming with much splashing; flapping wings.
Punganui:
Probably a misspelling of ponganui, meaning a large fern tree.
Wharepapa:
A house built of planks or boards.
Rewiti
Named after a chief of the Ngatiwhatua tribe, Rewiti (called after the missionary family Davis).
Waimauku:
Stream of the small ground ferns, maidenhair fern, etc.
Huapai:
Modern coined name, meaning the place of excellent fruit.
Kümeü:
Pulling or stretching the breasts.
Taupaki:
A kilt or loin-mat (rapaki) also fine-weather season.
Ranui:
Abundant sunshine; modern coined name.
Waitākere:
River-bed; also cascade stream.
Orakei:
The place of adorning, beautifying.
Pūrewa:
To float, be buoyant. Tokapurewha, the eastern head of Okahu Bay, Orakei, means mussel rock.
Tamaki:
Ancient Polynesian word for battle. Also a sudden nervous start or twitch, regarded as an omen. Tamaki-makaurau is the classic name of the Auckland isthmus, the land over which the city and suburbs extend, and the country generally known as the Tamaki Plains. It means “Tamaki of a hundred lovers,” referring figuratively to the many battles of tribes on north and south for the possession of this desirable region.
Remuera:
Properly Remu-wera, the burnt hem or edge of a flax garment. Named after an incident of ancient times.
Te Pāpapa:
A small plant, the soft leaf of which was used as a dressing for wounds and sores.
Onehunga:
A term applied to the soil, signifying rich arable land; alluvial and volcanic soil.
Otāhuhu:
The home of Tahuhu, a chief of olden times, whose pa was on the volcanic hill on the north of the present town.
Māngere:
Lazy.
Papatoetoe:
Level area of land covered with the toetoe swamp-rush, with its tall feathery-topped stalks (Arundo conspicua), much used in house thatching. (Often incorrectly spelled toitoi.)
Puhinui:
A word with many meanings. One is a very large variety of eel; another, a large bunch of feathers, as an ornament—in particular, the plumes decorating a canoe.
Wiri:
To shiver, tremble; also to bore or twist; and a lock in wrestling. But this “wiri” is, I believe, a contraction of the pakeha-Maori name “Wirihana,” or Wilson; named after a chief, known as Takanini Wilson, who lived in this district. (See Takanini.)
Homai:
Give to the person speaking.
Manurewa:
The soaring bird.
Mahia:
Sound, resound; also the passive and imperative forms of the verb mahi, to work.
Takanini:
Named after the Takanini family. The old chief Ihaka Takanini, a great friend of the early colonists, lived near Papakura. In 1863, he was made prisoner by the Government under the impression that he was an enemy. It was shown that this was a mistake, nevertheless he was kept a prisoner of war on one of the small islands in the Hauraki until he died in 1864. His tribe was the Akitai.
Tironui:
Great view, or long view.
Papakura:
Level land of red soil.
Pukekohe:
Hill of the tree kohekohe, which grew abundantly here.
Paerata:
Rata ridge or hill. On this conspicuous hill, which descends steeply to the plain, a very large and lofty rata tree grew, towering above the other timber. The historic Burt's Farm homestead, the scene of an attack by Maoris in 1863, stands on this long hill, about half a mile from the celebrated tree. The timber here is chiefly puriri.
As the barrister had predicted, the train presently gained the top of the rise, and the beat of the wheels quickened until it attained its familiar galloping rhythm of speed and power.
The barrister flicked the ash from his cigarette—and began his story in the following manner:
A taxi of magpie hue was conspicuous for the manner in which it threaded its way through the traffic, that, towards seven o'clock of a summer evening, flowed in the direction of the railway station. It was driven with great skill and rapidity, but as it neared its destination it was inevitably slowed by the increasing crush of trams, carts, and lorries, which, laden with passengers and freight, converged from all parts of the city upon the Main Trunk terminus.
It contained but one occupant beside the driver—a young man of perhaps thirty years of age, who appeared to be somewhat ill at ease. His teeth were clamped tightly upon the stem of an empty pipe, his hat was pulled low over his forehead, and from the depths of shadow cast by its brim his eyes glanced anxiously from side to side.
It was patent, however, that he took little stock of the animated scene about him. The hurrying foot passengers, the shop fronts already aglow with light, even the news bills which proclaimed in six inch letters: “Escape of Dangerous Criminal — Desperate Man Hunt Through the Suburbs,” failed to rouse in him any emotion save perhaps that of an added irritation. For Richard Kemp was at the moment that most self-centred and irrational of mortals—a rejected lover!
From the welter of thoughts, angry, bitter and sentimental, which whirled about inside his head like a swarm of angry bees, there emerged at painfully clear intervals the recollection of a voice, Daphne's voice, very cold and matter of fact, as it issued from the receiver of a telephone.
“Don't bother to make any excuses,” she had said, “it would be unnecessary and embarrassing. I'm afraid we were both a little—shall we say—emotional, last night; so I am returning you your ring by registered post, and am going home by to-night's train.”
“Going home”!—and only last night she had told him that for her the word “home” had acquired a new meaning. “This is home now,” she had said softly, as they stood on a balcony looking down at a myriad of lights reflecting themselves in the waters of the harbour. “Because—well—they say that home is where the heart is, don't they—and you have my heart in your keeping, Dicky!”
And “Dicky” had slipped a very expensive diamond ring on the third finger of her left hand and promised that on the morrow he would take the day off from the office. They would inspect flats, they would select furnishings, poke their fingers into the stodgy bosoms of armchairs, and pretend they knew a lot about the pile of a carpet. They would lunch at the Van Dieman, and have tea in the most expensive place they could find; they would, in fact, spend one of those Elysian days that are the strict prerogative of the newly betrothed.
That was how they had planned it, but how differently it had turned out!
It seemed to Richard that he had hardly fallen asleep when his bedside telephone woke him with its hideous insistence. It was broad daylight, and from the other end of the wire came the voice of one Cockerell who played second to Richard's lead in the management of the advertising department of the importing firm of Murgatroyd and Co.
“Great news,” this mean bird crowed into Richard's sleepy ear, “The Old Man's arriving by the boat this morning—“
“So what?” growled Richard although he already sensed the dire import of the news.
“It's your turn to do poojah—You know what I mean.”
“Me? I can't—I've got to—“Richard's voice tailed away feebly.
“Exactly,” said Cockerell, “You've got to meet him and keep him suitably entertained till the office opens, and keep him from doing any serious damage when it does. Hard on you, I know, but a telegram came after you'd left last night. We couldn't get you at home, so Parker told me to ring you first thing this morning. Gather strength, my lad, from the thought of how grateful the staff will be—cheerio!”
For some moments after his friend had rung off Richard remained staring dejectedly at the counterpane of his bed and saw his plans for this day which was to have been devoted to Daphne scattered like chaff before the dreary blast of duty.
“The Old Man,” Mr. Murgatroyd junior (the sub-title was rigidly preserved although senior had been dead for a quarter of a century) was the head of the firm which provided Richard with his daily bread.
For the most part he was content to remain in his palatial office on the third floor of the Phoenix Building in Dunedin, but occasionally he would make a round of the branch offices for the purpose of what he called “gingering up those slackers.”
Undertaken in this spirit, of course, these “rounds” were vastly unpopular with the staffs concerned, but with a cunning born of the bitter memory of past visitations, they had contrived a system by which the Old Man could be rendered comparatively harmless. This consisted of providing him with a shock absorber. A departmental manager was selected for his tact and reliability—and it became his duty for as long as the visitation should last, to meet the Old Man's most exacting demands; be deferential to his bombast, and listen politely to the windy speeches which he was in the habit of making “in the interests of the firm's business.”
Richard leaned over and looked at his watch which lay beside the telephone, and immediately leapt out of bed. Already the southern steamer would be backing into her berth and the Old Man, a gloomy figure which no beauty of sunflecked water or green hills could lighten, would be making his way down the gangway.
“This is home now,” she said.
They met, Richard and Mr. Murgatroyd, in the lounge of the Van Dieman Hotel, a little before eight, and Mr. Murgatroyd, who always invested himself with a wholly fictitious atmosphere of bustle, announced that they must work fast because he wished to catch the express north that evening. Already they had lost forty minutes because Richard had not been at the boat; they would breakfast immediately.
Richard had a momentary impulse to telephone Daphne, it was clear that he was in for a bad day, but decided that it was too early, and Mr. Murgatroyd was in no mood to brook further delay.
After breakfast, which had been eaten to the accompaniment of a dissertation by Mr. Murgatroyd on the shortcomings of the younger generation, Richard had had a brief respite while Mr. Murgatroyd sent off a telegram. The Van Diemen had six telephone boxes in the hall, and five of them were engaged. Richard made a dash for the sixth, only to discover when he had dialled Daphne's number, that he had no pennies.
From then on it would seem that the stars in their courses fought against him. By the time he got change from the cash desk all the six boxes were not only engaged, but carrying at least one customer in reserve. Mr. Murgatroyd reappeared, and they went down to the office. It was five minutes to nine when they arrived and Richard excused himself and dialled Daphne's number again from the outer office. The only answer was that intermittent squawking which indicates a line engaged. He was to have met her at nine thirty at the Post Office and in desperation he rang at nine fifteen under Mr. Murgatroyd's basilisk stare—only to be told that she had already left the house!
And so it went on. Richard listened mechanically to Mr. Murgatroyd's heavy platitudes, and occasional outbursts of righteous indignation, as they went through the farcical routine of examining account sales and checking balance sheets which had already been audited by a competent firm of accountants, until the howl of the midday siren rose above the roar of traffic and Richard murmured something about lunch.
“No time,” said Mr. Murgatroyd, “we'll have some sandwiches sent in.”
“I'll go and order them,” said Richard eagerly.
“My dear Mr. Kemp,” Mr. Murgatroyd regarded him sourly, “you hold a position of trust and responsibility with the firm for which you draw a comfortable salary; I do not consider the expense entailed, were you to undertake such duties as running out for sandwiches, to be justified. Please be seated and ring for a junior.”
Richard slumped back in his chair, and the interminable day wore on.
The sun passed overhead and dust motes swam in the glare from the western windows.
Once more the siren howled, this time for five o'clock and the outer office staff discreetly closed their ledgers and went home. The Old Man seemed oblivious to the flight of time; precious moments which he squandered in a homily on the lack of esprit de corps amongst the staffs spread themselves into an hour and a half until at twenty minutes to seven the telephone bell rang sharply.
Mr. Murgatroyd frowned and lifted the receiver; he listened a moment, then “for you, I fancy,” he said, and handed it with a pout of disapproval, to Richard.
It was Daphne! But as we have already seen not the tender melting girl of the night before, but a Daphne who had waited at the Post Office from nine thirty till ten fifteen, a Daphne who had returned to the house and found all her friends gone out and had spent a thoroughly miserable day. A Daphne, in short, who was prepared to give no quarter.
As Richard listened, and attempted to give what was under the circumstances a somewhat feeble account of himself, his nerves, which all day had been stretching until they had reached an unbearable tension, seemed to snap, and he changed from a bedevilled, sweating underling, into a reckless young man with homicidal inclinations. He put the receiver down gently—and turned to Mr. Murgatroyd.
“You were saying, Sir?” he asked coldly.
“I was not saying anything at the moment of interruption,” replied Mr. Murtgatroyd, “but I was about to say—“
“A whole lot of rubbish about Miss Potter powdering her nose at seven minutes to five,” said Richard coolly.
Mr. Murgatroyd reddened. “Mr. Kemp—“he exploded—“have you taken leave of your senses?”
“Not at all,” said Richard. “I've just found them.”
“Mr. Kemp!” thundered Mr. Murgatroyd again.
“Shut up!” snapped Richard, “you've been talking for eleven hours, almost without intermission—and now it's my turn.”
“Eleven hours,” he repeated, shaking his head sadly, “eleven irretrievable hours I have had to listen to you. Eleven hours I have had to play up to your conceit—be the dutiful slave—the perfect ‘yes-man’—and with what result?”
“You have lost a very good job,” retorted Mr. Murgatroyd maliciously.
“I've lost more than that,” replied Richard savagely. “Do you know who that was that rang me up just now?”
“No—and I'm not in the least interested,” Mr. Murgatroyd started to rise. But Richard was too quick for him—he towered over the old man and pushed him back into his chair with a hand on each shoulder. “Suppose you were to die suddenly,” he said dispassionately, “the firm would still carry on, wouldn't it?”
“Take your hands off me!” blustered the old man in tones that were not quite steady, since he realised that he was alone in the building with this maniac.
“Answer my question!” repeated Richard grimly.
“Well—yes—“Mr. Murgatroyd answered in mollifying tones. “My
“Very well,” Richard interjected, “I asked you that because I want, if possible, to impress upon you the falseness of your position. On your own admission the firm would not cease if you died, but would be carried on as usual by its faithful staff. That means that you are of no more individual use than any of the rest of us since it would make no ultimate difference if any one of us died, and yet you assume the right to stamp up and down the country calling honest people idlers and slackers—finding fault where none exists, and generally making a nuisance of yourself.”
“How dare you talk to me in this manner?” Mr. Murgatroyd returned to his bluster—he was on his feet now and felt more sure of himself.
“I dare,” replied Richard without heat, “because I feel that I have nothing more to lose—that telephone call in which you were ‘not in the least interested,’ was from the girl I was going to marry. By a train of unfortunate incidents, of which the principal cause was the subservience
Suppose you were to die suddenly,” he said, “the firm would still carry on, wouldn't it?”
“Which brings us back to the point where he sat in his taxi,” said the barrister, “and took no interest in all that went on about him, not even the newspaper headlines with their hue and cry of a desperate man at large.”
But the driver of the taxi did, and being for the moment disengaged from his duties he made to enter into conversation with his fare.
“Pretty game that convict-bloke,” he observed, “to make a break for it in broad daylight, with the warders taking pot shots at him through the scrub.”
Richard appeared to be listening, but uncommunicative.
“All that about a man-hunt in the suburbs is a lot of skite,” the man continued. “Somebody saw a wild man up in the Town Belt and called a couple of policemen. They pounced on him from behind a tree and found he was some poor old hobo in the dingbats. I reckon there'll be man-hunts all over the town for the next day or two.”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” said Richard shortly, “but I wish you'd get a move on—we've only got seven minutes in which to catch that train.”
That was his one thought now, to get to the train before it should carry Daphne away. The idea of her leaving in her present unforgiving mood goaded him to a state of mind bordering on frenzy. It was so damned unfair! How could he have explained the unhappy sequence of events which had led to their misunderstanding with the Old Man sitting over him, glaring and blowing out his cheeks? If he could only get her alone for five minutes!
“Look here,” he cried suddenly to the taxi-man, “you're not trying—you could quite easily have dodged round the back of that tram,” and without more ado he opened the door and sprang into the roadway.
It was a bare three hundred yards to the station and he took it at a run, oblivious to the frenzied blowing of horns and the shouts of the taxi-driver, whose fare he had forgotten to pay. There was something exciting about his headlong flight, people stopped and stared, one or two cried “stop him,” a man attempted to collar him and was expertly and painfully handed off for his trouble.
At the station he dodged through the crowd like a hunted hare. The porter at the barrier demanded a ticket, but Richard never heard him, before his eyes was the long line of gleaming cars and somewhere amongst them—Daphne.
The station clock showed only three minutes to departure time, and Richard paused a moment at the step of the rearmost sleeper to see if by any chance he could catch sight of Daphne upon the platform.
In that moment there burst from behind the barrier his late taxi-driver and a citizen with a swollen eye who flourished a copy of the evening paper.
“There he is,” cried the former, and the pair bore down upon him.
“Oh! hullo!” said Richard to the taxi-driver. “I'd forgotten about you for the moment.”
“I bet you did!” cried the man with the swollen eye, “and you'd forgotten me, too, eh!”
“I don't think I've ever seen you before,” said Richard impatiently. “Wait for me here,” he added to the taxi-driver—“I've to find somebody on the train.”
“Not much,” retorted the taxi man. “I've heard that yarn before—besides we know who you are, mister,” he laid a hand on Richard's arm and the man with the swollen eye closed in on the other side.
Without knowing or caring what their motive might be, Richard was conscious only of a sudden flare of rage at this further delay. He flung off the taxi man's arm and planted a stinging right on his nose. The man with a swollen eye dived at his knees and the three of them rolled in the dust of the platform.
From the undignified melee that ensued he was presently hauled by the powerful arm of the policeman on platform duty and thrust against the side of the sleeping car—while two porters did likewise with the other combatants.
“Now,” said the policeman, “what's all this about?”
The man with the swollen eye had managed to retain his newspaper in the scuffle, and he thrust it under the policeman's nose. “Ere,” he cried, “that's ‘im.”
The paper was folded at the photographic page and displayed amongst other things a fairly presentable likeness of Richard Kemp—beneath which read the now familiar caption, “Desperate Criminal at Large.”
“Ah!” said the policeman, “well, you'd better all come along to the stationmaster's office.”
Up to this point a pretty girl who occupied a corner seat in the sleeping car had done her best to ignore the unpleasant happenings which were going on outside the corridor windows—but now, the voices growing louder, she glanced up and was horrified to see, dishevelled and escorted by a policeman—the man who last night had promised to marry her.
A bell clanged loudly—the engine answered with a hoarse scream and all down the train went the sighing of released brakes. Almost imperceptibly the station buildings began to move backward. By the time the girl reached the end of the corridor they were slipping past at a steadily increasing speed, and an old gentleman who sprinted alongside was reaching for the handrail in a belated effort to board the train.
The girl jumped from the step and spoilt his chances and for a few moments they stood glaring breathlessly at each other while the sleeping car and the guard's van swept past them.
“Young woman,” gasped Mr. Murgatroyd, mopping his scarlet face, “you've made me miss my train.”
“Well, you nearly made me stay in it,” retorted Daphne, half laughing, half crying, “which would have been far more serious—imagine a maiden all forlorn prevented from changing her mind for a hundred miles at least and an innocent man sent to gaol in consequence. “Oh! forgive me,” she rallied a little, “I'm sorry about your train—was it very important?”
“Not so important,” Mr. Murgatroyd said gallantly, “as Beauty in distress.”
“That's nice of you,” said Daphne—“and I really am in distress. Do you see that man with the policeman and the other two—we've got to rescue him.”
“We?” queried Mr. Murgatroyd.
Daphne nodded and hurried him off in the direction of the stationmaster's office.
“God bless my soul,” said Mr. Murgatroyd when they arrived, “Mr. Kemp again—in custody too—no more than you deserve.”
Richard grinned. “Daphne!” he cried.
“Oh! Dicky!”—
Mr. Murgatroyd turned his head in embarrassment. “What's the charge, officer?” he asked the policeman.
The policeman produced the newspaper. “Did you say his name is Kemp, Sir? Because, if so, then I don't see as there is rightly any charge—but he looks enough like that photograph to need identifying as you might say.”
Later that evening Mr. Murgatroyd, Daphne and Richard sat over liqueur glasses in the lounge of the Van Die-man and looked shyly at each other. Presently, Mr. Murgatroyd cleared his throat noisily.
“Mr. Kemp,” he said, “has it ever occurred to you that men grow old, and that when they do—they appear to the younger generation to stamp up and down the country calling honest people slackers, finding fault where none exists and generally making nuisances of themselves?”
“Yes,” replies Richard, “or rather no.”
“Ah!” I see you answer from both points of view, which increases, my opinion of your nerve. It requires nerve to be a branch inspector, Mr. Kemp—in twenty-five years I don't
(H. C. Peart, photo.)
Reflections in Lake Kanieri, West Coast, South Island, New Zealand.
Ere the barrister had fully finished his story the train had come to rest at twenty-two minutes after midnight, in Taumarunui station.
In the keen night air the little township, ringed about with bush-clad hills, presented a scene of bustling activity. Engines whistled and belched steam, baggage trucks rumbled, a wheel tapper went past with his cheery clangour, and all down the train passengers were bundling out of the cars in answer to the summons of the refreshment room bell.
Our four friends of the smoking car joined the throng and in the cheery atmosphere of coffee and sandwiches lose their identity as individual story tellers, and become one with the great brotherhood of travellers who nightly forgather in that most romantic of caravanserai the “Limited.” But every night their place is taken by other story tellers;—and all through the year—in winter and summer, from sun-set to dawn, in fair weather or foul, the great trains speed north and south, and the Limited Night Entertainments go on!
Famous New Zealanders.
(Continued from page 21.)
tion he travelled as far south as Okarito, and he was the first to explore the great glacier at the head of the Waiau River, which he named after the Emperor Franz Josef of Austria, in recognition of that Monarch's interest in New Zealand. It is to be noted that Haast placed on record the correct Maori name of the river and the glacier, Waiau, which in these days has been corrupted officially to “Waiho.” Waiau is descriptively appropriate; it means “Swirling Waters” or “River of (Strong) Currents,” which, as anyone knows who has ever forded that ice-born torrent, fits it very well.
Many another rough and toilsome journey was undertaken. The most adventurous of all was a cruise in an open boat for two hundred miles along the surf-beaten coast, landing here and there to make a geological examination of the Westland rocks and ranges. More than once disaster all but overtook Haast and his companions, in launching their small craft, which was nothing more than a dinghy, from the roller - pounded beaches, or running before the strong winds under a rag of sail.
No part of the Coast and mountains and plains in the Canterbury Geologist's district was left unexamined. Never in the history of New Zealand exploration was duty more thoroughly carried out regardless of discomfort, toil and danger.
Turn now to the Geologist's assiduous search for buried treasure—for treasure indeed those moa bones of Glenmark were to Haast and his beloved adopted country. No adventurers hunting for pirates' buried gold and jewel hoards ever unearthed their finds more joyfully than did Haast those huge prehistoric bones first revealed by drainage works on the Glenmark station in Canterbury. It was at the invitation of Mr. G. H. Moore, the New Zealand partner of Messrs. Kermode and Co., that he went in December, 1866, to excavate that last home of the moa. Mr. Moore presented most generously the large collection of remains of the great bird to the Museum in connection with the Geological Survey. The result of excavations carried out by the Geologist surpassed the highest expectations, and he returned to Christchurch with a waggon-load of bones, the most delighted of men. The taxidermist to the Museum, the late Mr. F. R. Fuller, articulated under Haast's direction from the collections the first seven moa skeletons which made a wonderful display in the Canterbury Museum. By exchange with other great museums, the skeletons not required in the Canterbury Museum procured for Haast's institution valuable general collections which enabled Canterbury to build up and fill its great treasure-house. Haast was the founder and the maker and finisher of that home of science and antiquities.
In 1863, Julius Haast was linked more intimately still with the land of his choice, for he was married in that year to Mary Dobson, the daughter of Edward Dobson, the Canterbury Provincial Engineer, and sister of his young surveyor associate, Arthur Dudley Dobson, the discoverer of the Arthur's Pass-Otira route. Miss Dobson was nineteen years old, Haast was forty-one. Notwithstanding, or perhaps because of, that difference in ages, it was an ideal happy union. In 1864 there arrived on the scene what Sir James Hector, a great friend of the two families, called “the little stone-breaker,” from the fact that the newly-made father placed in the cradle of the first-born a miniature geological hammer, in the hope that the boy would follow in his footsteps. Von Haast, junior, however travelled in another direction; law and literature claimed him, and we know him as one of New Zealand's leading barristers, writers and publicists, Mr. H. F. von Haast. Following little Heinrich Ferdinand (the second name in honour of Hochstetter) came four more young Haasts and anchored the Provincial Geologist for good and all to Canterbury.
For a quarter of a century the scientific pioneer of Canterbury toiled for his province and city and the many-sided cause of knowledge. In 1886 he was appointed by the New Zealand Government with the consent and approval of the Canterbury authorities, to go to London as the Colony's Commissioner to the Colonial and Indian Exhibition. There, following upon his knighthood (at the instance of the Prince of Wales)—he had been knighted in 1876 by the Emperor of Austria and thus became von Haast—other honours came to the veteran scientist. The University of Cambridge conferred upon him the honorary degree of Doctor of Science, and the French Government made him an Officer d'Instructions Publique. Shortly after the opening of the Exhibition, Sir Julius urged the conversion of the collection into a permanent institution. From this appeal the Imperial Institute came into existence; but it soon assumed a very different form from that originally contemplated.
Sir Julius was suggested as the first Director of the Institute, but he declined the post; his heart was in New Zealand. He returned with his wife and his daughter who had accompanied him to Europe. Now ill-health had him in its grip; and he died in Christ-church on August 16, 1887, in the midst of his plans for the expansion of his beloved Museum.
In the last period of his life he came into personal contact in Europe with many of the great Continental scientists with whom he had been in constant correspondence from his earliest days in Canterbury. His career was fittingly crowned in the two years preceding his death not only by the honours that he received, but by the high appreciation of his labours expressed by the great men with whom he associated, and who, like many discerning fellow colonists admired and honoured his ability and revered his character. After all the years that have passed since his death in 1887, and, despite the developments in science, his reputation as a scientist stands to-day as high as ever it did. Time proved the substantial accuracy of his professional observations.
The great founder of the true science of education in Canterbury was, from the accounts that have come to me, the pleasantest and most vivacious as well as one of the wisest of men. He must have been a splendid travelling comrade, the best of companions under the most dismal of camping conditions in the wet and dripping Westland bush, in a mountain-side cave, or in the sandfly-infested country where explorers' tempers were frayed by the tiny torturers. He was a great and cultivated musician, a robust and artistic singer of great feeling, as well as an accomplished violinist. His fine stalwart figure, his kindly jolly air that came of a sanguine and generous temperament and his many accomplishments made him a leader in culture in the colonial community.
In a recent book on New Zealand and its people, the writer remarked that few biographies of eminent colonists had yet been written, and he suggested that memoirs of some of our great New Zealanders were overdue. This is particularly applicable to the useful life of such a man as Sir Julius von Haast, with his so-greatly varied career. There is, I think, only one man who could write it satisfactorily, and that is his son, Mr. H. F. von Haast. I hope his busy life will yet allow him time to tell the story of his father's life which he has long contemplated.
Wit
and Humour
“A man should always learn his station in life,” said the pompous gentleman in the carriage.
“So he should,” agreed his fellow passenger. “There's nothing so annoying as being carried on to the next one and having to take the train back.”
* * *
Visitor: I can't tell you how delighted I am, Mrs. Giles. My son Reggie has won a scholarshipt
Farmer's Wife: I can understand your feelings, ma'am. I felt just the same when our pig won a medal at the agricultural show.
* * *
The Vicar: And so your daughter is about to marry. Do you really feel that she is ready for the battle of life?
Mrs. Jones: She should be ready. She's been in four engagements already.
* * *
Bob was unable, through illness, to go to work on pay-day, so asked his work-mate, Mick, to get his wages and bring them along to his house. Late that night Mick arrived at Bob's house, looking rather serious.
“I've lost yer wages, Bob!” he said.
“Lost my wages?” began Bob.
But Mick interrupted him.
“Aye,” he blurted, “and I believe if I had gone on playing I should have lost my own.”
* * *
First Castaway: “Good Heaven's, Cannibals!”
Second Castaway: “Now, now, don't get in a stew.”
* * *
“Wull ye hae a drink?” inquired the Scot.
“Thanks,” replied his English acquaintance, “I think I will.”
The Scot turned a disgusted eye on him. “Aye,” he said, “I thocht ye looked that sort.”
Sandy MacDonald and Maggie, his wife, stopped in front of a restaurant window in which was hung a card bearing the words: “Luncheon from 12 to 2 p.m., 1s. 6d.”
“We'll have our lunch here, Maggie,” said Sandy. “Two hours steady eating for one and sixpence is no sae bad.”
* * *
The young bride said sadly: “Men are too mean for anything.”
“What's the trouble now?” asked her best friend.
“Why, I asked John for a car today, and he said that I must be content with the splendid carriage that Nature had given me.”
* * *
Insurance Agent: Would you mind telling me if there is any insanity in your family, madam?
Wife (a policy seeker): Well, not exactly. Only my husband thinks he's boss at home.
* * *
Mistress (indicating cobweb): “Haven't you seen this?”
New Maid: “Yes'm; somefink to do wiv' your wireless, ain't it?”
Every little helps. “Got y'r weight down nicely, Herb?” “Yes; had me appendix out.”
Landlady: “What do you think the poet meant when he said, ‘The substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen’?”
Boarder: “Hash, probably.”
* * *
Doctor: “What is indigestion?”
Medical Student: “The result of trying to get a square meal into a round stomach.”
* * *
Neighbour: “Where's your brother Freddie?”
Boy: “He's in the house playing a duet. I finished first.”
* * *
A wealthy Irishman, who wanted to “show off” before one of his less fortunate countrymen, invited him to dinner at a fashionable hotel in London.
“Now, Paddy, my bhoy,” he said, “I'm going to order everything of the best. You follow my lead.” The waiter arrived.
“We'll have a couple of cocktails to start with,” ordered the wealthy one.
A look of disappointment came over Paddy's face.
“Hi, waiter,” he said, “I won't have that! Bring me a wing and a bit of breast instead.”
Modern Rail-Cars Ordered.
New Fast Services for the Wellington-Palmerston North Route via the Wairarapa, and Night Services between Wellington and New Plymouth.
Early in 1934 great interest was created by an unusual type of vehicle on the railway-lines at Wellington. This was a sedan-type rail-motor with flanged steel wheels, built to meet the requirements of the General Manager of Railways, Mr. G. H. Mackley, as an inspection car by means of which the administrative staff might carry out the work of railway inspection all over the Dominion with greater economy and efficiency than was possible previously.
The inspection car was also intended for use in major emergencies affecting the operation of the line to enable executive officers to reach the place affected with the utmost expedition at any hour of the day or night.
After completing 7,000 miles with the car over all the principal lines of the Dominion, Mr. Mackley found that the car, besides creating the keenest interest wherever it went, had more than met all expectations as an operating unit. It was proved to be capable of high speeds with complete safety, and gave a maximum of comfort to passengers, with comparatively low petrol consumption.
Amongst its major achievements was the demonstration that it could operate over the Rimutaka Incline without the use of “Fell” engines or centre rail at a speed which greatly minimized the disadvantages of that difficult stretch of country.
Although built with space to carry luggage and seated for a total of seven passengers in addition to the driver, this petrol-driven unit was not intended as a passenger-carrying car for commercial purposes, and consequently it was limited in size and other respects, to the immediate purposes for which it was required. However, sufficient experience of its utility under all conditions has been gained to prove its comfort, economy, and flexibility as a type of car well suited to replace passenger and light goods services in appropriate localities.
Following the successful introduction of this inspection rail-car, the Government Railways Board has now decided to have large passenger-carrying rail-cars built upon the same principle, but with special adaptations to meet the most exacting requirements of modern passenger transport, for use on the Wellington - Wairarapa - Palmerston North route, and also for night services between Wellington and New Plymouth.
In making this announcement on behalf of the Government Railways Board recently, Mr. G. H. Mackley, General Manager of Railways, said that the present decision was regarded by the Board as a very important development in the transport of the Dominion, and he had no doubt that it would be so regarded by the public.
“After very complete investigations,” said Mr. Mackley, “both with the inspection rail-car and also regarding the use of rail-cars in other countries and the possibility of the economic adaptation of these units to the requirements of traffic on certain lines of our own system, the Board has decided to introduce petrol-driven rail-cars on the Wellington - Rimutaka - Palmerston North route for day service, and between]
Artist's impression of the type of petrol-driven rail-car which is to be used on the Wellington-Wairarapa Line, North Island, New Zealand.
“Six rail-cars are to be used for the Wellington - Masterton - Palmerston North passenger service,” continued Mr. Mackley. “These cars will be of the most modern type, and will each seat 49 passengers. They will have lavatory accommodation and can each carry 1 ton of small parcels and luggage. The power will be provided by a 130 h.p. Leyland petrol-engine with torque converter driving on to the pair of rear wheels. The cars are of the sixwheeled type built for running in one direction only, with reverse gear for shunting en route and at terminals. They will be fitted with the very latest comfort-giving devices.”
“The manufacture of the cars is now in hand, but, of course, some time will elapse before they will be ready for service. Meantime suitable schedules of running are being worked out to give a fast, comfortable service. The bodies will be built in the Hutt Workshops and Leyland Motors, Ltd., will supply the engines. The new cars are designed to travel at a rate of 50 to 60 miles per hour on the flat. They will negotiate the Rimutaka Incline (with its grade of about 1 in 15) fully loaded at a speed of from 15 to 17 miles per hour. The adhesion and braking-power of the cars is such that no centre rail is required for their operation on the Incline.
“Not only will travel over this section of country be very much faster than at present, but there will be a much more frequent service.
“These new factors are expected to change the whole aspect of travel on the line between Wellington and Palmerston North via the Wairarapa.
“Time is one of the most important factors to consider in modern transport,” said Mr. Mackley. “It is therefore interesting to note that the introduction of these cars will reduce the time between Wellington and Master-ton from about 3 hours 40 minutes to about 2 hours 15 minutes, a saving of 1 hour 25 minutes. Between Masterton and Palmerston North by through service the time will be reduced from about 3 ¼ hours to about 2 hours, a saving of 1 ½ hours.
“The tentative schedule for running the rail-cars provides four passenger services in each direction between Masterton and Wellington (instead of the present two). It also provides three passenger services in each direction between Masterton and Palmers-ton North (instead of the present two).”
“Although it has been the Department's desire to improve the time between Wellington and Upper Hutt, the present is the first opportunity to do much in this respect. The time by rail-car on six services in each direction between Wellington and Upper Hutt will average approximately 37 minutes. The time by the principal rail-car services between these stations will be 32 minutes. The fastest present steam service is 48 minutes and the average time by rail is 59 minutes.”
“The working of trains over the Rimutaka Incline between Wellington and Masterton (66 miles) under the present system is very costly and slow, due to the necessity of working by ‘Fell’ engine and special brake-vans. This section of the line is therefore especially suitable, from all points of view, for operation by rail-car.
“At the present time a minimum of four engines is required on each trip—viz., one engine between Wellington and Summit (34 miles), two ‘Fell’ engines between Summit and Cross Creek (3 miles) and one engine between Cross Creek and Masterton (29 miles). A certain amount of ‘light’ or ‘solo’ engine running between the locomotive depots at Upper Hutt and Cross Creek and the Summit, and ‘standing time’ waiting for connections at either Summit or Cross Creek is unavoidable. The time taken in changing over from the ‘Fell’ to the ordinary engines and vice versa at Summit and Cross Creek, also in negotiating the heavy grade on the Incline, makes the over-all time, under present conditions, for the journey between Wellington and Master-ton, very slow.
“The demand to-day,” said Mr. Mackley, “is undoubtedly for fast, light, and comfortable services at frequent intervals, rather than for trains of large capacity running infrequently, and probably, to a large number of people, at inconvenient times. The Board feels that light rail-units will do a great deal to meet this demand, and very careful calculation shows that this can be done, on the route chosen, at a cost substantially less than the cost of steam services worked by costly and heavy engines.
“The rail-car services have been planned to give comfort, cleanliness, frequency and speed. The accommodation will be equal to the best of the present first-class railway carriages, yet only second-class fares are to be charged for travel by these rail-cars which will be all of one class.”
“Besides giving faster and more frequent services, the rail-cars will make better connections between the Wairarapa and the Main Trunk services at both Palmerston North and Wellington.
“There will be a prompt connection in the morning at Palmerston North for the Wairarapa passengers ex the Limited from Auckland. Passengers from North of Masterton will be able to visit Wellington and after spending over 4 hours there return home by rail-car the same evening. Connections for passengers ex the New Plymouth line to the Wairarapa will also be improved. Wellington passengers for Masterton will be able to travel out in the morning and have over 6 hours at Masterton before returning in the afternoon.
“Another rail-car service has been arranged which will enable Woodville residents to spend the evening in Palmerston North and return home the same night.
“The Palmerston North residents will have rail-car services available which they may use for spending the day or the afternoon in the Wairarapa.
“On special occasions (for holidays, race-meetings, etc.) the rail-car services will be supplemented as required by steam trains.”
“A petrol-driven rail-unit with a body designed for goods traffic will be run on a special schedule between Cross Creek and Woodville. This service will also convey about 20 school children to and from Masterton, for whom collapsible or removable seats will be provided.”
“The whole of the costs in connection with the rail-car service and the steam service which it replaces have been very carefully analysed, and a balance is shown in favour of rail-car operation.
“The use of rail-car units will ultimately have some influence on the locomotive construction programme and will enable a more profitable use to be made of the steam locomotives at present in service. The ‘Fell’ engines due for replacement will, with the introduction of petrol rail-cars, probably be reduced in numbers.”
“The Board has also decided,” said Mr. Mackley, “to use rail-cars for a night service between Wellington and New Plymouth. Three cars are required for this service. They will be heavier and of greater capacity than the rail-cars on the Wairarapa line, as their construction is not subject to factors which have to be considered in operating traffic over the Rimutaka Incline
“Each car will weigh 28 tons, fully loaded (as compared with the 15 tons of the Rimutaka type rail-car), and will carry 56 passengers and up to 1 ton of luggage. Worked by two 10-litre engines the car will be capable of 70 miles per hour.
“These cars will have smoking and non-smoking compartments, but otherwise, so far as the passengers are concerned, the equipment will be similar to that arranged for the Wairarapa rail-cars. The cars for the Wellington-New Plymouth run will, however, have four-wheeled bogies at each end, and two pairs of driving wheels.
“When a tri-weekly express-train service was tried out between Wellington and New Plymouth for a few months in 1930, although the service had to be discontinued (along with many other services) owing to the financial position, the trains had been fairly well patronized and it was considered that the service might well be reinstated when the general position improved.
“With the general advantages in the quality of service and economy of operation to be secured by rail-cars, of the type described, in the matter of comfort, speed, cleanliness, and general attractiveness, the Board feels confident that the service will be popular and quite self-supporting. It has therefore been decided to run rail-cars
“The rail-cars will run to leave Wellington at 11 p.m. and arrive New Plymouth at 6.32 a.m. (a total of 7 ½ hours for the journey), and from New Plymouth leaving at 10.48 p.m. and arriving Wellington 6.30 a.m. (approximately 7 ¾ hours for the journey). The present time by the day expresses averages 9 3/4 hours.”
“The decision of the Railways Board to adopt this modern method of transport in the localities mentioned,” continued Mr. Mackley, “is based on a very strong belief that public support will be given in full measure to the new services provided. The Board therefore asks that the public interested in the Wellington - Wairarapa-Palmerston North area and in the Wellington-New Plymouth route will make the fullest possible use of the new services now being introduced for their benefit. Upon such support the success of the undertaking is dependent.”
Asked regarding the latest rail-car developments in other countries, Mr. Mackley said that he found in Queensland petrol rail-units in service all over that State, there being in use at the time of his visit 54 power units and 94 trailers, ranging in passenger-carrying capacity from 26 to 57 passengers, and with from 45 to 150 horse-power. Several additional units were also under construction in the railway shops at Ipswich.
“It was the experience of the Queensland railway administration,” said Mr. Mackley, “that in every district where these rail-cars were installed they became most popular with the travelling public, who were enthusiastic in their appreciation of the quick, clean, and comfortable transit provided. More particularly was this so on the branch lines on which the passenger traffic had of necessity been catered for previously by slow mixed trains, due to the business being insufficient to warrant the provisions of a steam passenger service.
“As a result of experience with the Department's own rail-car and from the appeal this unit made to the large body of railwaymen and outside people who inspected it, the Board is convinced that the same satisfactory results will be obtained by the introduction of petrol rail-units into this country as has been experienced in Queens-land, and that the bulk of the passenger business will be encouraged to utilize the more comfortable, cleaner, faster, and more frequent passenger services offered by this latest method of transport by rail-car.”
Mr. Mackley also referred to the success of rail-cars in other countries, mentioning particularly Great Britain and Italy.
Asked whether the Government Railways Board had in mind the extension of rail-car services to other districts, Mr. Mackley said that the Board had certain other lines under consideration, more particularly in the South Island, and was awaiting with interest the public reaction to the operation of the new rail-car services on the Wairarapa and New Plymouth routes. Judged by the experience of other countries and the special advantages this particular type of vehicle would appear to have as a passenger unit in this country, the Board has good reason to anticipate a substantial increase in its passenger business.
As will be seen by the illustrations, the new rail-cars have a most attractive appearance. The units to be operated between Wellington, Masterton, and Palmerston North are as large as the cars on the Main Trunk expresses. They are roomy and designed for a maximum speed of 60 miles per hour. The length is 50 ft., the width is 9 ft. at the waist, and the height is 11 ft. 6 in. There are 49 seats for passengers in addition to those for the driver and conductor. A special luggage
Artist's impression of the type of petrol-driven rail-car to be used for the night services on the Wellington-New Plymouth Line.
The body is carried on six wheels—one leading four-wheeled bogie and a single pair of driving wheels. The power is provided by a Leyland 10-litre 6-cylinder petrol engine, through fluid gear and combined bevel and spur gear drive on to the driving axle. The car is intended for single headed operation, but it is provided with reverse gear for manoeuvring purposes, and it is capable of making the same speed in both directions.
The lavatory accommodation and toilet will be of a standard equal to that provided on the best express trains, and the car will be controlled by Westinghouse air-operated brakes.
On each side of the front of the car there are driver-controlled doors operated by air engines, and the emergency doors are provided at the rear.
The car will, of course, be electrically lighted, and will have artistic modern fittings. Heating is secured by means of the hot air circulated by electric fans, and special roof ventilation has been arranged. The windows are of the half-drop type, set in aluminium frames. The seats, of tubular construction, are chromium-plated, of bucketed form and fitted with comfortable upholstery and footbar rests. The flooring will be rubber-covered.
The colour-scheme on the outside will give the Department's standard midland red for the sides, and the roof will be finished in aluminium.
The whole car is of steel construction, excepting the body panelling, which will be of aluminium.
Among the Books
(By “
(By “
Shibli Bagarag.”)A Literary Page or Two
Can it be that this country is at long last awakening to a realisation that New Zealand has produced books equal to, and often better, than the work of writers in other parts of the world? Certain it is that no two New Zealand books have been given a more enthusiastic press here than has greeted the publication of Ian Donnelly's “Joyous Pilgrimage” and John Guthrie's “The Little Country.” The former I reviewed last month. Now it is my pleasure to refer to Guthrie's outstanding novel which comes from Nelsons, London.
It was a great satisfaction to note the instantaneous interest aroused over the appearance of the book. There was a heavy cloak of mystery over the identity of the author. “John Guthrie” it was rumoured, was a nom de plume. Whose identity did it hide? Being regarded as a source of information on all matters relating to New Zealand literature, “Shibli” (pardon his blushes) was appealed to. I organised a literary search party without success. That arch sleuth of the press, “N.Z. Truth,” approached me for information. I shook my head and suggested that if they could track down Guthrie it was worth splash headings. It is hard to hide anything from “Truth,” small wonder therefore that “John Guthrie” stood revealed the following week under big headings as John Brodie, a New Zealand journalist, former Rugby star, etc.
The sales of “The Little Country,” because of the intrinsic worth of the book and the story behind the author, have mounted by leaps and bounds, and John Brodie must now find that in spite of his harrowing fight for physical health, life has its compensations.
“The Little Country” is reviewed at length on another page.
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And now let me tell you of another New Zealand book on the stocks—“Confessions of a Journalist,” by Pat Lawlor. It will be published in about a month's time by Whitcombe and Tombs, Christchurch. This is the autobiography of a New Zealand journalist who has been associated with nearly every literary movement in the Dominion for twenty odd years past. The writer gives the inside story of many interesting, often sensational happenings connected with leading newspapers and magazines in Australia and New Zealand and supplies intimate pen portraits of over sixty writers of the antipodes. The book, which will be illustrated with interesting photographs and caricatures, has a pre-publication price of 5/- from all branches of Whitcombe and Tombs, Ltd.
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I have been criticised in some quarters over my review of Nelle Scan-lan's latest novel “Ambition's Harvest.” One correspondent asks why did I praise the book when it was criticised adversely by the majority of New Zealand reviewers? My reply is that I consider it the best novel Miss Scanlan has written. I am pleased to note that I am in good company, for the Sydney “Bulletin” gave the book a most favourable notice. Finally, I might go back a few years when I, alone among New Zealand reviewers,
One of the latest of New Zealand book-plates, that of the Rev. David Calder, Wellington.
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Whoever compiled Newbold's latest book catalogue (just to hand from Dunedin) must be a keen collector. Such a mass of bibliographic detail has previously not been gathered in any catalogue published in this country. There are items to suit all tastes and pockets. The catalogue is posted free to applicants.
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That high-class travel journal “Walk-about,” published in Australia, invariably contains one or more articles referring to New Zealand. These are, in interest and illustration, well up to the generally high standard of the publication. A recent issue included a most interesting article on “The Kauri Forest of Waipoua,” by A. H. Messenger.
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Booklovers at home and abroad will be interested in Johannes Andersen's latest book, “The Lure of New Zealand Book Collecting,” which will be published shortly by Whitcombe and Tombs, Christchurch.
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I met the other day an extremely modest little literary lady, Miss V. Foote, who is doing splendid work for New Zealand verse in the publication of her magazine, “The New Zealand Mercury.” I mention the fact because I understand that if Miss Foote secures a few more subscribers the financial success of her paper is assured. Her sole desire is to encourage New Zealand verse, and she has succeeded in a remarkable way. Another fifty subscribers is all I am appealing for. The annual subscription is 11/- (post free) and the address 35, Nairn Street, Wellington. The virtue in “The Mercury” is that, while maintaining a high standard of poetry and prose, it offers education and encouragement to our writers, and heavens knows it is wanted! Monthly cash prizes are an added inducement to contributors.
One of the oldest bookshops in the Dominion is that of Kealy's Ltd., in Shortland Street, Auckland. The second hand department is an Aladdin's Cave for the collector. The choicest of those books are periodically listed per catalogue. The latest (No. 8) is just to hand. There are some real bargains in the list which is sufficiently varied to interest many tastes. The catalogue is free on application.
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Reviews. “Without Reserve.”
This notable book by Mr. F. A. Hornibrook, who spent some years in New Zealand prior to the War, gives the outspoken opinions of a clear-thinking Londoner upon all the principal subjects of public interest. The title “Without Reserve” is well chosen. There is no hesitation in expressing an opinion and there are no half measures either in praising or codemning men or conditions. Compromise does not enter into Mr. Horni-brook's philosophy of life and he is, to use words chosen from his book, “the enemy of all cant and hypocrisy.”
It is seldom that a book so boldly written or so clearly expressed comes into circulation. Coloured with the liveliness of personal experiences and punctuated with good stories appropriate to the subject under discussion, whether it be malnutrition, education, government, physical training, or war, and exhibiting first-hand knowledge of leading men and national movements, “Without Reserve” will furnish material for endless discussion and is not likely to be relegated to the dust and silence of the upper shelves, that fate which awaits so many books of a non-controversial nature.
Particularly interesting are the chapters on Government and Courage. In the first the author unhesitatingly announces the conclusion of various experiments in Government in the countries of the world. His chapter on Courage
Unless we are greatly mistaken, “Without Reserve” will be one of the most “Wanted” books of the year. The book is published by Heinemann and is priced at 7/6.
A publishing venture of Hutchinson's, London, that has met with remarkable success has been the Century Omnibus series. I understand that the total sales to date are near the half million mark. This is not to be marvelled at when we dip into one of these volumes—each over a thousand pages. In recent issues I have reviewed the Century Love Stories, Strange Stories, Sea Stories and Humorous Stories. Now comes possibly the most interesting volume of them all, “A Century of Detective Stories” with an introduction by G. K. Chesterton. Referring to the forty-six leading writers who contribute to this volume G.K.C. aptly remarks: “It is their pride as artists to deal in daggers and startle the unfortunate reader with the stab of a short story.” However, the reader is not unfortunate, for there is a great thrill in being stabbed with a short story. I have gladly suffered the stabs of this outstanding collection of detective thrillers particularly when the dagger is in the hands of such rare writers as Edgar Allan Poe, Gilbert Frankau, Eden Phillpotts, Edgar Wallace and the great G.K.C. himself. As with the other Omnibus series, my copy comes from Whitcombe and Tombs.
“Herd of the Hills,” by Allan Fraser (W. and R. Chambers, London) is a first novel. I cannot help thinking that publishers are unwise in emphasising the fact that such and such a book is a first novel. The author is immediately at a disadvantage, for the reader, in his supreme conceit, is on the search in the first page for actual or imagined deficiencies. However, this new author need not worry. His inherent art grips one after the reading of the first few dozen lines. Mr. Fraser is a writer of promise. His first novel, a romance of the Highlands, provides excellent reading. Even while the reader is buoyed up with the interest of the yarn, at the back of his mind is the thought—this book is worth while—it is well written. We will wait for Mr. Fraser's next—we have him on our list as one worth watching.
“Touring in New Zealand,” by Dr. A. J. Harrop (Allen and Unwin) has been compiled following on the author's visit to the Dominion last year. It is an intensely practical book and for this reason should have a strong, sustained sale among prospective visitors to New Zealand, also among our own people who wish to have on their literary shelves an attractive guide book concerning the Dominion. The book contains a comprehensive coverage of the tourist attractions of New Zealand with much valuable advice to assist the visitor. The illustrations are excellent.
Shibli” Listens In.
In connection with the Hans Andersen Centenary this year it is not generally known that Mr. Johannes C. Andersen is a descendant of the famous writer.
The proposed new Australian fiction magazine, “South,” referred to by me recently is, as a Sydney correspondent mentioned to me this month, “still down South.” It may appear shortly.
“The Australian Mercury,” a new literary magazine edited by P. R. Stephensen, recently made its appearance in Sydney.
Two books by the veteran New Zealand writer, Mr. James Cowan, are now in the press and will be published shortly.
Our Women's Section
Helen
Timely Notes and Useful Hints.
When Dorothea was ten, the world was rather a wonderful place, except for those moments, soon forgotten, when small duties such as dish-drying or scale-practising delayed her from absorbing games in her own or a neighbour's garden; or those rarer times when some small sin (ranking large in Dorothea's own eyes) roused the displeasure of mother, father or school-teacher. No other grown-ups loomed in Dorothea's world. As she was a bright and tractable child, school was as carefree as the rest of her existence. Her few desires—good food, comfortable clothes, healthy exercise, activity for an eager brain, affection—were easily satisfied. In fact, she did not consciously know that she desired these things. Like that of the majority of children, Dorothea's childhood was happy.
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At fifteen, Dorothea's conscious wants had increased. She had now begun to realize in part how her own desires might conflict with those of other people. Even with her mother, Dorothea had had one or two little battles. On one occasion a school-friend, unknown to her mother, had invited Dorothea to a party. Dorothea, all excitement, expected to go, and was cast into a state of tearful rebellion by her mother's refusal. Dorothea was realizing herself as a person and was proving herself rather mutinous to commands. It was only after a strained thirty minutes that her mother's reasoning overcame Dorothea's resentment.
During the next year or two only the tact and love of the mother, and the natural reasonableness and friendly disposition of Dorothea, prevented such little upsets from breaking the loving and trusting mother-and-daughter relationship, which had meant, and was to mean, so much to both of them.
Dorothea, at this time, was leading a full life at high-school. Her hours and her thoughts were mostly employed with lessons, sports and social activities. Only in the holidays and in occasional hours of “do-nothing” at week-ends, usually on a Sunday, did the developing Dorothea start to make acquaintance with herself. Even then, her thoughts as to herself were not very coherent. She was inclined to drift into day-dreams of herself grownup, a different Dorothea in all essentials from this Dorothea gazing so unseeingly before her. Often a vague melancholy assailed her—a melancholy she did not attempt to analyse, for the analytical side of her brain developed only in later years. From this mood of self-pity, she would presently emerge to bury herself in a book. Any interruption by her family during these moods was resented by a Dorothea who was for the first time seeking solitude.
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The years of leaving school, of being regarded as “grown-up,” of mixing with the adult world, were years of quick change. The “grown-up” Dorothea had to sort a kaleidoscope of impressions. She began to realize the meaning of “responsibility”—the duty of the individual to choose from alternatives offering, that one which, after consideration, seems to be for the good of the individual. Dorothea's reading was helping her here. A course at the University, and a curious mind, had brought her into contact with the writings of economists, psychologists, philosophers. She had become interested in the world and its citizens and in herself as an individual as well as a citizen of the world.
In deciding matters for her own “good” she had to have some idea of what this “good” was. Her upbringing, her thinking, her reading, aided her in this. Dorothea found that her task was to live fully. So many writers professed to offer help in this business of “living,” but Dorothea found that one cannot accept a ready-made philosophy. To each the task of formulating his own guide to living.
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After much mental turmoil Dorothea settled a few points. She decided, as have others, lowly or of great repute, that the aim is to adjust desire to reality. A lot of her desires, she realized, would not really be of benefit to her if fulfilled; others she would outgrow. So she began pruning, her brain all the time developing in alertness and in power of analysis. Some desires, she found, might conflict with those of others. There, adjustment was necessary, and only experience and dispassionate consideration would show how much to adjust. Still other desires could not possibly be fulfilled, so it was best to jettison them.
All this, of course, was a gradual development aided by experience, and this was the stage reached by Dorothea at twenty-five. And at twenty-five. Dorothea realized that one is never finished with “growing-up.” The business of adjusting desire to reality must continue to the end of life. Desires are not static. They change and grow. Life is continual adjustment. Throughout history those who have come nearest to real happiness are those who have most ably made this adjustment. Dorothea, even now, has more serenity than many of her contemporaries. Does she realize that she is moving in the steps of the masters of living—Christ, Epictetus, Confucius—and other humble ones who have managed to “grow up” a little more than the rest of mankind?
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Noticed Here and There.
Several bridesmaids lately have been forecasting summer in their hat-brims. Width is the thing, but the correct tilt must be allied to it. Such hats have a Marina air and seem to require the Marina demeanour (unexpected rhyme!), figure, what-you-will, to carry them off with the éclat worthy of such creations.
A simple type of hat, in a style suited to most of us, was in woven hemp-straw, the brim lined with a contrasting shade and the crown banded with the new spotted ciré ribbon.
Spots, by the way, are dancing before our eyes—bronze or silver beaded spots on sleeves or yokes of hostess gowns, spots accenting cravats or “bibs” worn with the new suits, gay and charming spots on spring tub frocks.
Capes, coats with cape sleeves, or just plain coats accompanying many of the new season's models. The little extra, suits the vagaries of our New Zealand climate admirably. Capes lined with contrast, plaid or plain, are specially dashing. And with your cape wear a hat reminiscent, even though faintly, of the sailor.
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Noticed, also, some smartly permed heads, very neat, very trim, but—un-cared for!—although they are taken to the hairdresser regularly for shampoo and set. These women would be horrified at the suggestion that they neglect their hair, but, judging by its appearance, they do.
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Brushing does not hurt a perm., but neglect of the scalp does. Daily stimulation of the scalp, by brushing or massage, is necessary. Part the hair, and brush along the partings with short sweeps of the brush. Always brush the side and back hair up.
Remember that brushes need washing more often than hair. Hair regularly attended to will soon shine and gleam again, losing that dusty, faded, frizzled look.
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Which reminds me of a little girl I met at my hairdresser's. It was the tinting of her nails I noticed first—a delicate shade of coral. Quite charming, and I didn't object to tinted nails in her. Some time ago, in a tram-car, I saw my first coloured nails—a brilliant red, matching the carmine mouth of a woman who was fighting age, not very successfully. Mentally, I shuddered, and conceived an instant prejudice against tinted nails. Since then, I have modified my opinion, though I still object to it in all but those few who can afford to be impeccable from head to foot, and those others whose job requires the little extra in the way of smartness.
Hollywood, by the way, is focusing even more attention on nails. The latest idea is to apply transfers. Imagine ten little dogs' heads running up and down the keys of a piano, or a hand in no trumps held by ten clubs! I can't imagine the directors approving, can you?
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We all appreciate glass ovenware. This material now fashions a whole dinner service—and it is artistically patterned too.
Watch the new spring goods for un-crushable linens or linen tweeds for the suit which is an indispensable adjunct to your wardrobe this summer.
The most fascinating blouses and vests of lace and net are seen with jabots and bows finishing a V neck. Also in all of the shops one sees charming collars with pleated jabots in net and organdie which make lovely finishes for a Spring frock.
Hats and scarves to match are very popular. For instance, a frock crowned with a halo hat made of spotted silk with a scarf to match can be very smart. In fact, there is no end to “matching” this season—hats and handbags, hats and gloves, gloves and handbags, and so on as far as our imagination will take us.
The new cotton materials are beautiful—the new designs and colourings absolutely enthrall us. We notice among the prevailing colours our old stand-bys of navy blue, brown, lemon, alongside new combinations of these shades, pinky beige, etc.
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A Quickly Knitted Bed-Jacket.
(See opposite page for illustrations.)
Materials required: 11 ozs. 4-ply super fingering wool
Measurements: Length from shoulders, 23 inches; length of sleeve, 20 inches. Will fit a small to medium figure.
The Back: Take No. 12 needles and commence at lower edge by casting on 101 stitches. Work in rib K 1, *P 2, K 2, repeat from * to end of row. Repeat this row for 3 ½ inches.
To make slots for waist: K 10, turn, P 10, repeat these 2 rows for 1 ¼ inches (11 rows). Break off wool and knit next 10 stitches like the last. Continue until all slots are made then pearl one row to join the slots. Now change to No. 5 needles and knit 66 rows garter stitch (plain knitting). Cast off three stitches at the beginning of the next two rows, to form the armhole, then knit two together at the beginning of succeeding rows until 89 stitches remain. Change to No. 12 needles and work in rib for 4 ½ inches (this forms a yoke). Cast off.
Fronts: Cast on 61 stitches and work in the same way as the back. After the slots are made change to No. 5 needles. Decrease on the front edge by knitting two stitches together every seventh row until the ribbing is reached. Cast off five stitches at arm-hole and knit two together at the beginning of each succeeding row until 37 stitches remain. At the eighth row of the armhole change to No. 12 needles and knit in ribbing to match the back (4 ½ inches). Cast off.
Sleeves: Using No. 12 needles, cast on 61 stitches and work in ribbing for 3 ½ inches. Change to No. 5 needles and work in garter stitch the required length of sleeve. Now decrease one stitch at the beginning and end of every row until four stitches remain. Cast off.
Band for Edge of Jacket: Using No. 12 needles, cast on 11 stitches and knit a band the required length in garter stitch.
To make up: Press on wrong side under a damp cloth (do not press the ribbing). Sew the shoulders together, then sew on band, stretching slightly at the neck. Lightly press the joins. Sew in sleeves, then underarm and side seams. Run ribbon through the slots, allowing the garment to fasten in crossover style.
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Home Notes.
When buying, fish in season should be chosen as it is more wholesome and has a better flavour. The chief points to look for when choosing fish are: Red gills, bright eyes, firm flesh, a fresh smell, and plenty of scales.
Before cooking, fish should be thoroughly cleaned. Remove any black skin and blood by rubbing with salt and scraping. Wash in cold water. Remove the yellow part near the head as it is bitter. White fish, such as sole, flounder, cod and hapuka are the most easily digested. Oily fish—terekihi, trout and salmon—have more nourishment, but are not as easily digested. Oysters have a good food value and are easily assimilated. Cray-fish and other shell fish are more or less indigestible.
To boil fish: Have enough sea or salt water to just cover. It should be just off the boil when the fish is put in. Simmer gently, allowing ten minutes for each pound, and if thick an extra ten minutes.
To steam fish: Place between two buttered plates and steam over a saucepan of boiling water. Allow ten minutes for each pound and ten minutes over for thin fish, and up to twenty minutes over if fish is thick. Add the liquid to the sauce.
To fry fish: Dry thoroughly with a cloth and coat with batter or egg and breadcrumbs, and fry in boiling fat. Drain on paper and serve with slices of lemon.
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1 ½ lbs. cod, 1 cup breadcrumbs, 1 dessertspoon chopped parsley, ½ teaspoon dried herbs, 1 oz. butter, egg (if liked), seasoning.
Method: Melt the butter and add to breadcrumbs, parsley, herbs and seasoning. Add the egg. Prepare the fish and place the stuffing inside. Sew up. Brush with egg and sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Dot with butter and cover with greasy paper. Bake in a moderate oven for half an hour. Serve with parsley or other sauce.
N.B.—Any other fish, such as terekihi and butter fish, may be cooked in this way.
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2 cups cooked fish or tinned salmon, ½ pint white sauce, 2 cups boiled rice, 1 egg, a little nutmeg, sea-soning, chopped parsley and hard boiled egg to garnish.
Method: Mix all together and make very hot. Pile on to a hot dish. Garnish with parsley and sieved yolk and finely chopped white of egg.
These fish may be grilled, fried, steamed or boiled. They are so good in themselves that the plainest and simplest method is advised. A well grilled sole or flounder is delicious.
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Immediately a tin is opened the contents should be turned out and used as soon as possible. Food put up in glass jars is less liable to deterioration than in tins, but, they too, should be turned out at once. Even fruit, if left in tins, is apt to become a poison. All bulging or rusty tins should be refused, and anything that gives out a rush of air on being opened should not be used.
Tinned fish should be cooked at once after being opened. Sardines or anything preserved in oil are less liable to decay, but they should not be kept indefinitely.
Perpetrated and illustrated by
Ken Alexander
The essence of Existence is a discreet selection of the things worth while and a positive rejection of tinselled jim-cracks which glitter like gold but ring like lead. Only experience, both bitter and sweetened, can prove the worth of each article of Life's litter; but, as one man's meat is another man's dyspepsia, far be it from me to dogmatise upon the things that count and those that are deficient in arithmetic.
But, were I asked to designate three things which count most to me, I should say:
Laughter, because laughter is the world's universal language understood equally by the Hottentot, the Zulu and the Hindoo.
The power of laughter is a power for good. It raises the spirits, purifies the soul, testifies to tolerance, kills resentment, routs enmity, disrupts distrust, promotes understanding, makes all skins kin, puts Man “one up” on the beasts of the field and only one down on the gods of Olympus. It is the best peace propaganda known to civilisation, being more easily understood than Esperanto or “desperanto.” It says more with less expenditure of air than any other form of human expression.
The person who laughs easiest lives easiest, and the nation which laughs longest lasts longest.
But a laugh must be a Laugh. It must have its origin far below the front collar stud. Its source must be the heart; it must be reflected in the eyes; it must even influence the feet. It must permeate the personality, titillate all territory, shake the frame with subterranean joviality and emerge full, vibrant and unstinted.
A snigger is sly, a giggle is a laugh gone wrong, a smile is a compromise, but a real laugh is a day-dream on holiday.
It may never be proved, but it's reasonable to guess that laughter has done more to promote progress than money, mortgages and motors. Probably, before man learned to laugh he was crueller and cruder. Certainly, when the “s” is subtracted from “slaughter” we have “laughter.”
Laughing lessons should be included in school curricula; there should be laughter leagues; each meal should be preceded by “laughter before meat.” Every married man should make a vow at the altar that he will make his wife laugh before breakfast each day, and she should promise to make him laugh—even when she presents bills for hats. The League of Nations should make laughter its big bet for producing international understanding and, instead of a muzzy murmur in fifty-seven varieties of language, the one universal language of laughter should rattle the rafters in the Palace of Peace. Mussolini and the King of Abyssinia should get together and have a real good laugh. Hitler should laugh instead of getting “Nazty.”
Laughter should be cultivated as assiduously as the heavier-than-air aids
“Each meal should be preceded by ‘Laughter before Meat.’”
Memories, because they are milestones on the path of personal progress, pleasant revivals of purple patches from the past, or object lessons in what to do, and what not to do, in the present and future.
Memories are not necessarily the prerogative of Old-age mumbling in the inglenook, nor are they the secret vice of “dreamers.” They are little lessons in life to be turned up for reference when occasion demands. And so I am one of those who say:
Let's shake the coloured prisms of the past,
Whose colours grow more vivid with the years—
Kaleidoscopic patterns changing fast, Old hopes, ambitions, loves and hates and fears;
All there! Vignetted memories, brightly tinted,
Provided one retains the power to capture
The things that passing Time has never stinted—
The darting shafts of Memory's pain and rapture;
Impressions coloured yellow, red or blue,
Or multi-coloured like a rainbow's sash,
Or monotone, with no relieving hue, Or recollection like a crimson splash Upon the spattered palette of the mind—
For every recollection has its dye—Unless, of course, one draws a mental blind,
Or wears a patch upon one's inmost eye.
Memories are an entertainment, a moving picturegraph on the silver sheet of one's mentality. You press the button on your mental picture projector (if you are so constituted) and the reel of retrospect slips smoothly past the lens. The result may not be as hectic as the Harlow, it may not grip like the Gable, or have the “hypo” of Hollywood, but, as your own personal property, it is the most moving “movie” of them all — and it doesn't cost a thing.
Sitting here I press the button and shoot a “short,” willy-nilly and at random, releasing a reel that makes itself as it goes. Here's what I see without conscious effort:
Horses racing on a hard beach; thudding hoofs, sand thrown into the eyes and mouth. Waving tails, undulating backs wet with sweat, flying manes, a sense of being catapulted through the air, and a heart thudding to the tune of the hoofs' tattoo.
A prison gate with its little grid, like a bird cage on a monastery wall. A click, and a face appears; scrutiny, explanation and a shooting of bolts. A long yard painfully tidy, a row of barred windows and the words streaming through the mind. “Abandon hope all ye who enter here.” (I hasten to explain that I was a visitor, not a boarder).
A stripling willow against the setting sun, on a promontory in Lake Rotorua—like a silhouette on a Japanese fan.
“ Land of Hope and Glory”
“A vacuum cleaner can even mop up a pair of pants.”
A doctor snipping the catch of his brown bag at a bedside.
A rabbit washing its whiskers among young grass.
My grandfather lighting his cherry-wood pipe.
A little girl sweeping leaves from a gate.
A log across a black pool.
An aproned woman waving to a train from the door of an unpainted shack.
Green and red lights reflected in the harbour.
Impressions! A packet of snapshots of no intrinsic value except as an illustration of my meaning; but each impression is impregnated with the colour of its surrounding circumstance.
Spring, because spring is rather an emotion than a season. It is the soul's shedding of winter's wet overcoat; the splitting of the cocoon which releases the spirit from winter's bondage. It is a period of contemplation, renovation and inspiration.
But spring has its penalties, like fame, fortune and festivity, though the vacuum cleaner has done much to reduce the pain of “the spring clean.” It can even suck up collar studs, stray ties, a vagrant sock or a pair of braces; it can even mop up a pair of pants, and so the human male is not yet freed from the annual agony of disruption and distraction consequent on the spring offensive. This is why, in the spring, strong men strew themselves over public parks and chew grass while they await the abatement of domestic disorder. They look rapt in contemplation but really it is estimation as to the time which should elapse before it is safe to return to the nuptial nest. And, speaking of nests, Bill the sparrow, about this time, brings home the first straw for the new residence, and roughly sketches out to his spring bride the design he proposes to adopt. Strictly speaking, it is the same old design used in all his previous matrimonial adventures, but somehow it seems bigger and better and different; such is the influence of spring.
The young salute the salubrity of the season with whoops of rude joy; thrushes gurgle, hens cackle, dogs bark with added abandon and nature and man revel in the awakening of the earth.
And that is why Spring is one of those events worth while. There are others such as birds and beasts, sunshine and stars, effort and sleep, but—enough! more than enough.
By “)
Old Sport
Savidan—The Cross Country Empire Runner.
Although W. Savidan, the Auckland marvel, was beaten back to sixth place in the Australian Cross-country Championship in a race run in very fast time, he has such a wonderful record that we all trust and believe that this was only a passing aberration on his part.
He first won the New Zealand Cross-country Championship in 1927, at Christchurch, and the next year he won again at Wanganui in a great race where the world record holder, Randolph Rose, was his chief opponent. A month ago he won the title for the sixth time, the only occasions he did not win it since 1927 being the two years he was out of New Zealand at the Empire or Olympic Games, and in 1934, when he did not defend the title although in New Zealand at the time. In 1930, he won the six mile Empire Championship in Canada in record time for the Empire, and in 1932, at the Olympic Games, he was fourth in both the 5,000 and 10,000 metres races, in each case being the first British athlete to finish.
The Australian race, it is reported, was run over what could hardly be regarded as a true “cross-country” course. Savidan is a good track runner over distances above two miles, but it is in the real “cross-country” work that he has achieved his great successes and it is difficult to credit that Pullar, the Otago champion who came second in the Australian race, or any of the four Australians who headed him, would be able to beat Savidan over the real country when our champion was at his best.
In any case Savidan's past performances stamp him as one of the gamest distance runners New Zealand has ever bred, and his modest and sterling personality makes him one of the most respected athletes of his day. If all goes well he will have undeniable claims to represent New Zealand again
The statement that Lovelock is “definitely the best English-speaking miler” may not long be true if the sensational improvement that the young Englishman, S. C. Wooderson, is making, continues. Just over a year ago this boy was second to Lovelock in the English Mile Championship run in slow time, while the year before he won the English Public School Championship in the record time of 4 min. 29 4/5secs. This last July, on Love-lock's return from his great American race, Wooderson beat him in the English Championship Mile, and as Wooderson has equalled 4-13 in an Empire Games race (where he was second to Lovelock) and has since equalled (or just broken) 4-12 in a handicap mile, it is evident that he will be in the world's championship fields in at most a few years' time.
Away back in 1886, the great W. G. George startled the athletic world by running the mile at Lillie Bridge in 4 mins. 12 ¾ secs. To many old-timers this record appeared likely to stand for all time, and it was not until about forty years later that it appeared to be in serious danger. Then came the great Finn, Nurmi, who seriously set himself to beat it (as a proof of his seriousness is the fact that he was the first miler to run with a stop-watch on his wrist), and in 1923 he brought the record down to 4 mins. 10 2/5 secs. At that time we in New Zealand were the more keenly interested in this struggle against time because of our own Randolph Rose who was knocking at the same door.
The chances that New Zealand would be hailed as the birthplace of the world's greatest miler looked bright for a time, and particularly to those of us who remembered the red-haired youth who so often scored in one of the world's great sporting events—the morning run for the Eastbourne ferry boat.
The best time Rose was able to achieve was 4 mins. 13 2/5 secs., but with experience and full training he could have bettered this and could probably have broken 4 mins. 10 secs.
So New Zealand settled down to watch with less personal interest the campaigns in France and Finland that in 1931 culminated in the feat of Ladoumegue, who was the first to get below 4 mins. 10 secs. At that time we knew that a New Zealand Rhodes Scholar, J. Lovelock, was running successfully at University meetings in England, but we had no idea that he was quietly preparing to tilt his cap at the world's champions. Although he had established an English record of 4 mins. 12 secs, we did not wake up until the morning we read in the papers that Lovelock had won the inter-University race at Princeton Stadium in the sensational time of 4 mins. 7 2/5 secs.
This was in 1933, and although the great American, Glenn Cunningham, has since lowered the record to 4 mins. 6 4/5 secs., this was in a race where the runners had the advantage of a large “second” clock erected to enable them to judge the pace. Lovelock again beat Cunningham and Bonthron decisively at Princeton a few months ago. To-day he is definitely the best English-speaking miler. He has, however, yet to prove that he is as good as Beccali, the Italian who defeated all the fastest milers the world has seen at the 1932 Olympic Games in the 1500 metres (1650 yards) race. It may be claimed that Lovelock was then not at his best, but Beccali repeated his victory over Lovelock at Turin, in 1933, and clinched his claim to be considered the greatest miler who ever ran.
John Lovelock, who has again put New Zealand on the mile map, was born at Reefton in 1910. He won his scholastic honours from Timaru Boys' High School and subsequently attended the Medical School at Otago University, where he won the mile in 4 mins. 24 secs. Winning the Rhodes Scholarship has enabled him to reduce his time by over 17 secs.
O. N. Gillespie
(Written for the “New Zealand Railways Magazine” by O. N. Gillespie.)
Mr. John Brodie (“John Guthrie.”)
I had all the feelings of a successful explorer who has reached his goal, as I read through this delightful book. I understand now, as I write this review, some of the feelings of Mr. J. T. Thompson, when, on 13th July, 1861, he penned his official report on the goldfields of Central Otago.
Here is a novel which is of the essence of New Zealand, the very fabric of our daily lives and doings, of our outlook and our thought. The author uses a very large canvas, and on it, with light, easy but sure strokes, he paints in for us scores of people whom we know well. It is an authentic picture of the New Zealand “scene,” containing hundreds of subtle touches that will show the reader living abroad, the differences that mark our life here.
That is the magical new quality of this work of art.
Inclined to be complacent about our prowess in sport and kindred matters, New Zealanders are possibly unduly self-deprecatory about their literary achievement. When we lay claim to world figures, most of us stop at Katherine Mansfield and Lord Rutherford. But the truth is that we have produced an astonishingly large number of writers known all over the world. Our particular talent seems to have lain in the making of text-books which are, at the same time, great literature—works of scientific authority which are written in limpid, imaginative, and beautiful prose. I will not weary you with the long list of New Zealanders who have won world honours in this sphere, but I want to stress the point that the combination of these qualities is a rare one. I believe, though, that an ingredient which makes for this phenomenon is that most New Zealanders can write, and write well.
Still, our distinctive New Zealand novel has been a long time arriving, and the reason is not hard to discover.
We are simply a million and a half Britishers living a month's travel from London. Owing to the unique nature of our colonisation, with its principle of rigid selection of the settlers, communication with the “Old Land” has been continuous and uninterrupted from the earliest beginnings. Everything British, from the last scientific work to the latest fashion fad, has been in our country by first steamer. No effective dilution of alien blood ever took place. Our percentage of Anglo Saxon stock is the highest in the world. Further, the country thus settled was the nearest in configuration and climate, and in the smallest detail of its soil constituents, to the British Isles. This compulsion upon us of things English, this passionate love of our British heritage of tradition and sentiment, this adoration of “Home” may be splendid and admirable, but it invests us with a certain narrowness, and it particularly limits the scope of the story-teller. Novels of New Zealand life, many of them, might have been written in Leicester, Lurgan, or Leeds.
Still, our little land has developed differences and with the eye of genius, “John Guthrie,” or rather Mr. John Brodie, discerns them.
Mr. Brodie is a journalist, a well-known Rugby player, and a typical New Zealander who has worked in many places, and has looked at life in many contrasting localities. This copious, full, and harmonious novel, is an astonishing first effort, and it is little wonder that the London reviewers are treating it as a note-worthy contribution to letters. I do not remember a better review than is given this book by the usually caustic Ralph Strauss.
The “cast” is enormous, but every portrayal is a gem of observation, lit with rich humour, and tender sympathy.
The difficulty of writing about folks in so small a community has made him coin names for his “locations” but Auckbourne, Tem, and St. Christopher are easily recognisable, as is Paradise Bay, where the story opens. The description of the Svon as it rambles through St. Christopher is a prose poem of very great beauty and power, and the two characters that live there, two gentle old maiden aunts, are in a perfect setting and wholly adorable. There is there, too, a rich figure of roguery in the Reverend James Silvering, who is affording them the opportunity of subscribing towards the fund for building his “Temple of Eternal Light.”
In the painstaking search for something to fault, some of our critics find the plot too thin. It is a rambling story rather on the lines of “Mr. Finchley Discovers His England.” It rivals the latter great work in its joy of living. So living are the people one meets, so believable are the happenings, that interest never flags for one instant in the doings of the characters.
Just by way of special mention there is the jubilee of Tem when its native-born assemble from all over the Dominion to celebrate. A gale of laughter blows through this episode, and as in all the best of literature there are moments of tears. The court case where the shifty Mayor proceeds for damages against the lad who fell on him from the gallery, the borough council intrigue to hold up a subdivision of sections, the mountaineering trip, and the notable description of the Maori tangi, are good things among a host of others.
Mr. Brodie must continue this fine work, and one obvious way in which we can all help that necessary and laudable objective is to read, buy, and praise his book. If you fulfil the first piece of advice here you will comply with the other two. I tender my warm congratulations to Mr. Brodie for an achievement which will give lustre to the name of New Zealand.
The novel carries, by the way, the imprimatur of Mr. L. A. G. Strong, who selected it for publication by the famous London publishing house of Thomas Nelson and Sons.
Variety in Brief
Three men were recently having a drink in the bar of one of our city hotels. Becoming increasingly jovial they ordered another—and another. During the garrulous conversation the barman gathered they were bound for the express, so, with commendable disregard for further business he suggested that if they wished to catch the train it really was time they were making tracks. They consequently ambled out of the bar to find the tram had just departed, so there was nothing for it but to cover the distance of a quarter-of-a-mile or so on foot. Arrived at the station, what was their disgust to find the train just pulling out. However, two of their number just managed to scramble onto the guards-van—the third collapsing on his face on the platform. The solicitous stationmaster, anxious to do the kind Samaritan act, tried to help the man up, but what was his amazement to find him helpless with laughter! Regaining his composure to some extent he sputtered—“Thosh two—hic, hic—came—hic—to shee me off!”
—“Jasmine.”
* * *
Just off the main coast road from Whakatane to Tauranga, in the Bay of Plenty, there is what appears to be a small meteorite. Whether or not it is a meteorite is not known, for its composition has never been definitely determined. However, it consists of very hard material which is an excellent medium for sharpening tools, knives, etc. In fact, it is stated that long ago Maoris used to come from the Waikato and other distant parts to sharpen their spears and other weapons, and to use the stone for utility
The cutting properties of this mineral are not too drastic, for a keen edge can be put on a knife with half a dozen rubs. In the past, attempts have been made to dig out the stone, but it is too deeply embedded. The trench where the early diggers worked is still to be seen. Also, it requires considerable effort to chip off even a small piece. Even to-day farmers in the vicinity make use of this natural sharpening stone for putting keen edges on blades of all descriptions.
—G.D.M.
* * *
Original advertising methods are employed in the Old Country by the New Zealand Meat Producers' Board. For instance, on a Wednesday morning recently over eight hundred happy children were given a free cinema display in the Majestic Theatre, at Blackburn, Lancashire. They were competitors in the New Zealand lamb painting competition. Several interesting films illustrating life in the Dominion were shown, together with other suitable pictures, which were greatly enjoyed by the youngsters. The twenty-three fortunate winners of cash and consolation prizes received their awards from the New Zealand Meat Producers' Board's representative during an interval.
About this time two silver championship cups, measuring twenty-one inches in height, were open to local butchers for the best shop window displays of New Zealand lamb.
—“Pohutu.”
His Back was Full of Aches
Work was Becoming Unbearable.
Work was Becoming Unbearable
Now Thanks Kruschen for “Good Health and Daily Bread.”
If you have ever suffered with backache you will know just what the writer of the following letter means when he says: “My back was full of aches and pains.” No wonder he began to feel that his work was getting too much for him—until he started taking Kruschen Salts. Read what he says now:—
“My age is 50. My work is hot, hard and heavy. Up till recently I felt my work beating me more every week, and this has been going on (to be truthful) for years. My back was full of aches and pains, and it was often a hard task to bath after my shift was finished. On two occasions I could not get off my hands and knees. I suppose I have taken Kruschen Salts now for about four months. I would not have thought it possible, and would not have believed its effects if another had told me it was his experience. In my case, Kruschen advertisements are 100-per-cent truth, and I feel I have to thank Kruschen for my daily bread and good health.”—G.M.
The six salts in Kruschen will coax your kidneys back to healthy, normal action so that they will rid your blood-stream of every particle of poisonous waste matter. As an immediate result you will experience joyous relief from those old, dragging pains. And as you persevere with the “little daily dose” of Kruschen the twinges will become less and less frequent until finally your backache will be no more than the memory of a bad dream.
Kruschen Salts is obtainable at all Chemists and Stores at 2/6 per bottle.