Cruise of the Wanderer

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22519, 29 September 1938, Page 7 (Supplement)

Cruise of the Wanderer

PART 111 Exciting as Tahiti had been, it was nothing to the glamour and bustle of San Francisco. By the time Tom and Pierre had left the Wanderer lor the first glimpse of America it had been definitely decided that for at least a week the crew of the Wanderer would become land-lubbers lor a change and take their chances, with the thousands of miners from all parts of the world, of uncovering a fortune in gold. While Tom and (Pierre wandered aimlessly through a San Francisco filled with saloons and miners, and adventurers, the elders of the Wanderer’s crew made their arrangements lor going to the goldfields. The first mate was in charge of the party, Captain Howell, still indignant at his crew taking to the shore, resolutely refusing to join in any mining. He was staying with the Wanderer. By next morning the party was ready to leave, A collection among the crew had raised enough money to buy mining gear—picks, shovels, paps, and the rest-—and to hire , horses and waggons to take the party to Cpnical Valley, some 90 milea inland, which the first mate had heard said to be the most promising of all the new fields. The journey oyer rough roads and no roads at all to Conical Valley would have been full of interest to Tom had not it been overshadowed by the thought of the work that lay ahead of them. All along the journey the waggons had in sight lines of other waggons, and even miners, with all their money spent, who had to walk to their claims. And everybody had only the one thing to talk about—gold, Conical Valley itself was a collection of tents and ramshackle wooden buildings looking as if they had been rushed up in an afternoon, The inevitable saloons were busy, but busiest of all were the stores which bought gold and sold provisions—at sucn prices that Tom, even when he translated dollars into pounds, did not think anyone could afford to pay. , . Before the party staked its claim —a small section of ground In an area where hundreds of new arrivals were pegging out their own El Dorados —Tom went with the first officer to see a most exalted personage, the warden and sheriff. A huge figure of a man, he was more awesome to Tom than even of his own Captain Howell. His voice boomed when he said, “It’ll cost you 20 dollars, stranger,” when the claim was formally notified. And more compelling than his booming voice, to Tom, was the sight of the two revolvers that hung, (me at each hip, as if they were waiting tor instant use.

“You want to be careful what you do here, Tom.” said the mate, jokingly, as they walked back to the others. “That man is no one to trifle with. There are some tough customers here, but I’ll bet he can keep them in their place.” Casting a backward glance at the huge, severe sheriff, Tom thought so, too.

The actual work el digging was not as romantic or even as pleasant as Tom and Pierre had thought it would be. The work in hard rocky ground was more tiring than any at sea, and the hot Californian sun made it even worse. And even the great moment when the third pan washed by Michael Hanlon disclosed eights of gold was not what Tom had hoped lon AU that could be secfh

(By L. R, Hobbs)

were pome specks, most of them the pise of a pinhead, of bright yellow motel. Tom had hoped for nuggetP. And his disappointment was nothing to that of the Maoris. When they had their first glimpse of the yellow specks and were told it was the gold they had come so far to find they were astonished. “But we’ve got that stuff back in our own country,” they said., “Have you that?” said Michael Hanlon. “Well, just find it when we get back, and the lot of us will never need to go whaling again.” After that first sight of gold the Maoris in the party lost ,a lot of their enthusiasm for the diggings. The work was too hard, and born sailors hated■ to be so far inland. But the whites in the crew kept them to it. and the claim proved

much more than payable. Every dish washed had its gold, and there was less discontent when the mate announced after three days’ work that when the gold was divided each man had earned more money than he would in three months at sea.

It was a great moment when Hanlon and the mate were deputed to take the gold to the nearest goldbuyer, seven miles away, to change the week’s gold into money. The two were going not to Conical Valley, for they did not want too many in the valley to know of their good fortune- In a much smaller mining camp some miles further inland was another gold-buyer, and he was chosen for the deal.

Hanlon and the mate had expected to be away for some hours—four at least—and when an hour after they had first left the camp Hanlon was seen coming back alone and on foot—the pair had left on horseback— the whole crew knew that something was wrong.

As Hanlon came closer the crew stopped their digging, and ran to meet him. He was hurt. A rough sling was round his left arm and his face was cut and bleeding. And in his hand he still carried the precious bag of gold. “The mate’s dead,” he said when the first of the party met him. “We were going over a ridge when suddenly two masked men came out

with guns. I guess we'd have given them'the gold anyway, but they shot the mate without giving him a chance. I turned and ran with the gold. They shot the horse from under me and got me in the arih, but as they came closer io me again, old Anderson the sheriff came up from the other way riding with someone else. Just by luck he hadn’t been far away; and hfe heard the shooting. He chased the others, and that’s the last I saw of them.” The news that the mate had been murdered shocked the whole crew. Riverton at home in New Zealand in the 1840’s was a lively enough place, but murders were unheard of. and for a man to be shot down without a chance to defend himself was unthinkable. Then and there, the Wanderer’s crew decided that the sea, with Riverton at the other end of a long voyage, was preferable to any fortune they might make in such a place as California, where unarmed men might be murdered for money.

Hanlon’s ) wounds were attended to by a doctor from Conical Valley,. and within an hour of the news of the mate’s death, the claim pegged out by the Wanderer’s men had been sold out for 2000 dollars —a small enough price" considering that in the week it had been worked nearly that much gold had been taken out of it. However, any price was good enough for the Wanderer’s crew, so anxious were they to be quit of California and the goldfields. In spite of the money the party had, from the sale of the claim and of the gold—finally disposed of in Conical Valley—it was a sad and dispirited procession that left the busy goldfields for San Francisco. Captain Howell was glad to see his crew. The bustle of life in the centre of a new gold hub for the world had not appealed to him. Less than an hour after the party was back in the new city—which Michael Hanlon described to Tom as “still in it* worst growing pains," the Wanderer was being made ready for sea.

The journey back home took many yreary weeks. First- there was a call at Sydney where the crew, on Captain Howell’s .'advice, invested most of the money they had won in California in sheep—and introduced real pastoral wealth to Southland—and then the passage

across the Tasman was as stormy as any the Wanderer had ever made. Tom never forgot to his dying day the thrill of first seeing Riverton ini the distance once again, for months afterwards the whaling station talked of little else than the Wanderer’s amazing trip; and Tom wore his American cut clothes, of a fashion not to come to |tew Zealand till years later. He, and all the crew, including Pierre, who >came bach to New Zealand to make his home there, always remembered that the Maoris had said there was gold in New Zealand —and then on their return resolutely refused to find it for the white jpen. Tom thought secretly that, after their San Francisco **. penence the Maoris did not want a gold rush in their own beautiful Tom certainly, did not, and wbsa ? y« r » later the gold rush <4 the South Island began, m otaas and on the West Coast, Tom and Pierre were two New Zealendentp take no part in it. (The End.)

WILLIE WORM Young Willie was a worm wh# knew. As he would say, a thing or two, was hi. hobby; ind through clay, or soil, if He’d even pushed through wet cement (Though at the time he hadn’t meant To taclde something quite so hard; But with birds near the way wet ■ barred And he was forced to have a shot At digging through, and, through _ he got. Through but one inch ere he was out. It was a trip to boast about)

Though other worms just dug far _ food. Young Will would pass a multitude Of dainty morsels and not think Of common things like food and drink. When others mentioned this to him, Hed answer with ambitious grin; Sir Hubert Wilkins, ’neatb the sea. Is an explorer, I'shall be Sir William Worm beneath the land. And there explore the clay and sand. He wants to reach the Southern Pole, J, Wish tp find a safe Worm Hole Where worms may climb up to the air And know no bird is waiting there." The others laughed, they said, “Indeed, . We’d rather sleep, then dig an«f leec /' On what -we find, than waste our -* time In seeking for some safe incline (Which no one yet has ever found! That leads to good, yet bird-free ground." And though they laughed and said that be Did not deserve to find his tea, . Young Will kept on and searched around. In hopes of finding bird-free ground. And one day, to his great surprise. He found a place of quite large size In which no bird could ever get. As it was covered with wire-net. An acre of the richest ground . That held an orchard he bad found. Now William’s happy and content He gets the best of food as rent. For all the other worms now pay To have a bird-free holiday. And spend their summer in bia ground. , Where fallen fruit and leaves abound. « * —W.F.W.