Then and Now.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1690, 21 April 1886, Page 4

Then and Now.

Speaking at a temperance meeting, held at Dun edin recently, Sir Win. Fox mentioned that he arrived in New Zealand in 1842, before the province of Otago - was in existence. On his first visit there the only buildings were Dr Burns' schoolheuse, Mr Valpj's house," Capt. Cargill's house, and a dozen or two cottages, and he could assure them it was quite an undertaking to get there from Wellington. He had to wait for three weeks in that great Empire City— the hub of the universe— before a vessel of any sort or size could be chartered for the . trip, and ultimately succeeded in procuring the cutter Fly, of 15 tons measurement,, manned by a captain and a cabin Iboy. Captain Swan, whom he had met since, was a very good fellow indeed, but the cabin boy he had never seen — ho was so encrusted with grease and dirt as to be invisible. [Laughter.] The speaker (adds the Otago Drily Times) gave an amusing recount of their difficulty in getting iuside the Heads, and went on to speak of the satisfaction it crave him to revisit the colony and see the magnificent country into which it had growD.