Part 14 (2/2)
The Maoris at the present time are remarkably peaceable among themselves,--being never known, as we were told by local officials, to quarrel one with another, not even in their cups; for while liquor makes them foolish, it seldom makes them pugnacious. It was noticed that the fathers often carried the infant children on their backs, and in the same style adopted by the mothers. From this and other indications we got the impression that they are very kind to their children. One thing is certainly remarkable: these native babies never cry. We were a full week among them, witnessing their domestic life at nearly all hours, and we never heard the first cry from their lips. The same peculiarity as regards infants was also noticed by the author both in China and j.a.pan.
As has been mentioned already, the funeral of one of their chiefs had drawn numerous representatives from other tribes to Ohinemutu, so that the number of aborigines was largely increased at the hamlet during our stay. The last day of our sojourning here was Sunday, a certain outward respect for which is observed by the natives as well as the few white residents at Ohinemutu. The little rude earthen-floored chapel, where a Roman Catholic priest officiates, was not large enough to accommodate both the resident tribe and their visitors at the same time, so they divided into two parties,--one half attending the services in the chapel, while the other half remained outside squatting upon their hams and playing cards for pennies. This seemed to us to be a little out of keeping with the church-going idea, but the average native is not at all amenable in his feelings to the conventionalities of the whites.
Gambling with cards under the shadow of the church presented no anomalous aspect to these waiting wors.h.i.+ppers. When the first audience had completed the usual religious exercises,--listening to prayers read in Latin, which of course were ”all Greek” to them,--then the card-players changed places with them, and each party did as the other had just done. The afternoon was devoted to foot-ball by the men, and to bathing, gossiping, and smoking tobacco by the women. The food and stimulants had evidently become exhausted, as the visitors prepared to depart to their homes, but they were dismissed as usual with riotous tokens of joy.
The Government now owns a considerable portion of land in the Hot Lake District, which has been purchased at a fair price from the natives. The region called the King's Country contains at least ten thousand square miles, lying within clearly-defined boundaries. Its possession is sacredly secured to the Maoris by treaty with the Home Government of England. The aborigines however would in no contingency permit any encroachment upon their present domain; they would declare open war first, and fight for their rights. It is remembered by the whites that these natives _can_ fight when incited to do so by their chiefs, and by a sense of being wronged. This was made clear enough in the early days of the European occupancy, when it cost the English thousands of lives and vast amounts of treasure before peace was finally brought about by the abundant concessions of Sir George Gray, the then Governor. The natives had very rude weapons in those days; now, however, they have fire-arms, and know how to use them. No foreigner can go into the King's Country without a native permit; no white man can travel there without a Maori guide; a murderer or other criminal cannot be pursued thither by a Government officer, except by first obtaining the proper permission. In these reserved lands the Maoris show a bold and warlike front. They enjoy full political rights in the government of the country, and return their own members to the National a.s.sembly from the several districts in their province. The few educated members of the tribe are distinguished for a certain kind of eloquence, and can speak well and forcibly in behalf of the interests of their race. Like our own American Indians, they abound in poetical figures of speech and natural ill.u.s.trations.
Instances were related to us of some of these Maori representatives (generally with more or less European blood in their veins), who had electrified the legislative body to which they belonged, by their eloquent and powerful harangues, and who had more than once carried their purpose to a successful issue, against the manifest popular wish of the a.s.sembly, by their clear force of argument and manly speech.
Government is building a sanitarium at Sulphur Point, as it is called, situated about half a mile from the Lake House. The baths attached to it are supplied with water from springs which are highly charged with chemical matter, each being quite different from the others in its peculiar properties, and supposed to possess special curative powers.
There is also here a hospital already in operation under the control of the Government, in which there were a score of patients when we visited it. Several of these were grateful and enthusiastic for the benefit they believed themselves to have experienced by bathing in the ill-smelling waters. Said one to us: ”I now leave my crutches under my bed; but when I came here two weeks ago I could not walk across my room without them.
Now, however, I walk a mile in the open air, forenoon and afternoon, without any help, and have a grand appet.i.te, with the digestion of an ostrich.”
A large town has been arranged for by the authorities in antic.i.p.ation of the future popularity of these hot springs. Broad, regular, and well-laid out streets have been graded and fenced, having nicely gravelled road-beds, lined with ornamental trees; but there are yet no dwelling-houses here except the very comfortable Hospital structure.
There is, however, a grocery store, a Post-Office, and a Town Hall,--these last two being of brick. It seemed to us that the atmosphere of Sulphur Point must always prove an insuperable objection to its being adopted as a permanent home. The constant odor rising from the subterraneous fires not only excites disgust, but is disagreeably suggestive of the nearness to active volcanic agencies. The Lake House is situated upon a gentle elevation, thirty or forty feet higher than the lake, and overlooking the lands all about it; but Sulphur Point is nearly on a level with the water, and is so low that any rise of the lake would inevitably flood it, and it must always be very damp.
Yet invalids have come all the way from the North of Europe to test the advantages of these springs, and, as we were a.s.sured by the attendant physician, with almost unvarying success. A railway is constructing from Oxford hither which will connect Ohinemutu with Auckland direct, obviating the necessity for staging, which no invalid should attempt unless the road is in a very different condition from that in which we found it. The railway will doubtless be finished within a twelvemonth.
One must start before sunrise from Ohinemutu in order to reach Auckland on the same day, though the distance is only a hundred and sixty miles, all but thirty of which is by railway. We have shown that the road between the Lake District and Oxford is one requiring time to deal with.
When we left the Lake House, the silvery gray of the morning was struggling through the clouds of hot vapor and sulphurous steam which hung over and about the place. The stage lanterns and those in the hands of the attendants cast a weird and fitful glamour all about us. A dog was baying down among the Maori cabins, albeit the hamlet as a whole still slept. The horses brought out from their stable into the crisp morning air were a little restless, and a hostler held the bits of the two leaders. Presently the driver called out, ”All right! let them go!”
and in a moment more we were rolling smartly away by the borders of Lake Rotorua.
The extended programme was completed, and now our steps would be turned toward distant America.
No intelligent person can be blind to the favorable position of New Zealand or to the promise of its future commercial importance. Situated as it were in the centre of this Austral Ocean, the future highway of the world, it is accessible from all quarters. On the west, not far away, lie the busy harbors of Australia, with which her exchanges of merchandise are constant. Within easy reach of India and China on one side, she has California, Mexico, and South America on the other. To the north lie the hundreds of islands which const.i.tute the groups of Polynesia, notable for their voluptuous climate and primitive fertility.
With the opening of the Panama Ca.n.a.l or other available means for crossing the isthmus, New Zealand will lie directly in the highway between Europe and the gold-fields of the great island-continent,--between England and her largest colony. The insular position of the country does not necessarily indicate inaccessibility. The many beautiful islands of the South Sea must sooner or later come under the commercial sway of New Zealand, as they may be explored and civilized. Her admirable harbors, n.o.ble estuaries, and navigable rivers are elsewhere unsurpa.s.sed. If destined to achieve greatness, these islands, like those of great Britain, will do so through the development and maintenance of maritime power; and with so many advantages as they possess, we predict for them this final accomplishment.
As an attractive country to the explorer and traveller, though so many thousands of miles away from the beaten tracks, New Zealand is rendered accessible by the growing facilities of our times, and certainly combines within itself a grand variety of natural phenomena which nowhere else are so readily reached or more striking to behold. Her soil produces all the vegetation and fruits of the teeming tropics; and yet within a few hours' travel of flower-clad plains, one can ascend mountains as lofty, and behold glaciers as frigid and grand, as in Switzerland or Norway. While perennial verdure characterizes her valleys and plains, her lofty ranges are snow-capped all through the year. In the north she has geysers, boiling springs, heated caldrons, and active craters, as endless in variety as they are countless in number; in the south she has myriads of cool lakes which for beauty of scenery excel the Lake of Geneva, and for depth vie with the famous fjords of Scandinavia,--thus giving us an epitome of the grandest exhibitions of many lands. Her native race is unique, excelling nearly all others in originality, and full of interest to the ethnological student. In the wild Maori country the paths are among a wilderness of boiling waterspouts, and in the open districts of the lower country one is sheltered by fern-trees, tall, graceful, and picturesque. From the crests of burning mountains we may look into regions where sulphurous fires never cease, and by turning the eyes in another direction behold crystal waters tumbling over precipices hundreds of feet in height, to feed the streams which irrigate the fertile plains below.
These marvellous forests, precipitous gorges, lovely rivers, and fruitful valleys have neither legend nor history to lend them fortuitous attractions; but is it not quite as fascinating to tread such unworn lands, to make one's own path in the unbroken forest, and to be brought face to face with Nature in her primal condition? He who has become blase with travel in Europe, or even in the less worn fields of Asia, may here encounter wonder upon wonder which will be sure to ”whet his almost blunted appet.i.te,” and to renew in him all the early charms of foreign discovery and travel.
<script>