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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 14, Issue 7 (October 2, 1939)

Aotea Harbour

Aotea Harbour.

Round deep-blue shores where seaweed-drift and shell
Shine by the lazy washing of the seas,
The little valleys lie. No tongue can tell
The strange wild history of these.
Deserted villages, a vanished race,
Gone from the nets and fields of toil,
Gone from this pleasant seaward place,
No footprints in the fallow soil.
Where tribal conqueror trod a trail of blood,
The conquered sleep within the pale sea-caves,
With blue tide filtering at the flood,
And water-lights, and gentle sound of waves.
They sleep serene; yet still about these bays
Remains some imprint of their sterner days—
A melancholy dignity and grace
That Time shall never manage to efface.

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