TAPANUI.

Evening Star, Issue 3909, 3 September 1875, Page 3

TAPANUI.

(From our own Correspondent.)

Tapanui, September 1,

I have undertaken a patriotic task. I have resolved to furnish the future historian of Otago with unlimited material, and shall from time to time permit your readers to anticipate the pleasures of posterity by forwarding you an odd leaf or two from my itinerary. lam a poor hand at the gazetteer business; in fact, I rather pride myself on being intensely unpractical, so if any of your readers have come this length in search of useful information they had better read no further. But to commence. Tapanni is an up-country township situate at the foot of the Blue Mountains. Its principal natural product are, as far sis I can judge, sawn timber, whiskey, and babies. It possesses a church, two public houses, a doctor, a cemetery, hall-a-dozen saw mills, a Good Templar Lodge, a scab inspector, a grand stand, and of course a lock-up. It is chiefly populated by bullock-drivers and their bullocks. I am disgusted with the former; they are false to all the traditions of their race —they do not swear very much more than cockatoos. Indeed, I have been in company with a dozen of them, and did not hear many more than twenty oat hs per minute. Deferred payment selectors, rabbits, and other vermin threaten to overrun the district. There is serious ta'k among the runholders of baiting a few old sheep and putting their faith in strychnine, if the Supreme Court should fail them. I have no doubt the plan would succeed, as the fact of mutt on being 5d a pound is a leading grievance at Tapanui. The only public body here is the Progress Committee. I was accidentally present at a meeting of this distinguished association, and was much struck by the oratory displayed. The finest speech was mode by an elderly individual with a strong accent - -, and as a model for imitation I report it in full“ Lads, I’m awfu’ dry; let’s hae a wee drap whuskev.” This constituted the entire business of the Tapanni Progress Committee. The grand, soul-stirring question of the hour when I was in Tapanni referred to billiards. The local constable insisted on play ceasing at 10 p.m., and', the golden youth were up in aims. No serious insurrectionary movement is anticipated, so you, of Dunedin need not resuscitate your extinct volunteers. I notice all the native children have an old look, I don’t know why, but suspect the sawdust. Ht and the mud rare the chief features of the landscape. The Government regulations for conserving the bush act most efficiently. People only having a short tenure go in to have the worth of their money, so that production is almost doubled. I doubt if that vns what the Waste Lands Board meant by “ conserving,” but then that body generally means )the exact antipodes of what it says. There is a commonage at Tapanni, an enormous boon to the inhabited its. 1 counted at least twenty tussocks on its rich expanse, and some 200 cattle racing for tb e feast. I expect the people will by and-by follow the example of Roxburgh, and go in for a few hundred thousand acres as an outlet fur the pet lambs. At present they are qudet, contented, and happy. Tapanni is about the only township I know that shows progress witho nt symptoms of decay. Some L 12,000 per annum is paid by the various mills in wages, so that bu niness is always good. Wore the railway brought, to it there is no saying but it might some day eclipse even the mighty city of LawrenceSome day when I have g lenty of time, and do not feel too lazy, I shiidl forward you some valuable information aba ut Tapaaui; for the present, “ Here’s towards you.”