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Settlers and Pioneers

A Reading List

page 147

A Reading List

As the greater part of this survey of New Zealand's pioneer period was written from my own knowledge and experience on the border of settlement and from the human documents that, unlike a book, could be cross-examined, a long list of authorities is not necessary. Some references, however, are necessary in order to point the reader to selected useful books dealing with periods and phases of New Zealand's pioneer development.

Foremost of the books which describe the transition period, when the pakeha-Maori flourished, is Sir John Logan Campbell's Poenamo (London, 1881), treating of the shore of the Hauraki and its life in 1840. It is a better book than Maning's Old New Zealand (Auckland, 1863), but is not so well known. Bush pioneering at its roughest is described in D. V. Silk's History of Puhoi (Dunedin, 1923). There are two excellent histories of the Nova Scotian Highland settlement in the bush at Waipu, N. R. McKenzie's The Gael Fares Forth (Auckland, 1935) and Gordon Macdonald's Highlanders of page 148 Waipu (Dunedin, 1928). Nation Making (London, 1890) by J. C. Firth of Matamata is a story of pioneering enterprise on a liberal scale. Tutira: The Story of a New Zealand Sheep Station (2nd edn., Edinburgh, 1926) by that great nature-lover, H. Guthrie-Smith, is considered by many New Zealand's greatest literary work.

The Maori wars are described sectionally in many books; the only complete history of the campaigns from 1845 on to the early seventies, giving both sides of the struggle impartially, is James Cowan's New Zealand Wars (2 vols., Wellington, 1922-3), published by the New Zealand Government. It could be read in conjunction with A. J. Harrop's recent volume, England and the Maori Wars (London, 1937), containing the British Government's documents from the Public Record Office.

The History of the County of Patea (Hawera, 1937) by C. J. Roberts is a volume typical of many local records containing original pioneer narratives. An earlier book, E. S. Brookes's Frontier Life: Taranaki (Auckland, 1892), is the record of a surveyor and bushman. A Surveyor in New Zealand (Christchurch, 1932) contains the recollections of John Holland Baker, who was a friend of Samuel Butler in Canterbury. It should be read with Butler's First Year in Canterbury Settlement (London, 1863).

The Life of Sir Frederick Weld (London, 1914) by Alice, Lady Lovat, contains accounts of early sheep-farming in Wellington and Marlborough. Tales of page 149 Banks Peninsula (2nd edn., Akaroa, 1893) by H. C. Jacobson is a combination of pioneering stories, local legend, and topography. Books on Canterbury and Otago pastoral enterprise are L. G. D. Acland's The Early Canterbury Runs (Christchurch, 1930), High Country (Christchurch, 1938) by R. M. Burdon, and Early Days in Central Otago (Dunedin, 1930) by Robert Gilkison. Rambles on the Golden Coast (Hokitika, 1884) by R. C. Reid is the best account of the early Westland goldfields.

During 1939 two collections of pioneer reminiscences by members of women's organisations have been published. These books, Brave Days (Wellington, 1939) by the Women's Division of the Farmers' Union and Tales of Pioneer Women (Christchurch, 1939) by the Women's Institutes, contain many narratives of women's endurance, courage, and skill in backblocks life.