ROUND THE PROVINCE.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5329, 26 April 1878, Page 6

ROUND THE PROVINCE.

By Viatou. I can scarcely help remembering my Hrst trip to the Wairarapa, seeing Unit it was made only a short three years ago. But connected with the journey itself and one I took but yesterday as it wei c there is so much of contrast that I am tempted to write something about both of them. Then, one got up somewhere in the middle of the night, dressed (unlcs- it were summer time' by candlelight, breakfasted at the Lower Hutt, dined in X'catlicrston, and readied Masfcertou somewhere ala.ut tea-time. Now, one leaves Wellington at half-past seven in the morning, and gets into Masterton early in the afternoon ; or one need not leave until after eleven o’clock, and can reach Masterton in timo_ for tea at seven. This is due even to the trifling exont of our railways open, and the excellent coaching system of the district, which was once a province by Messrs. Hastwell and Macura. Tt is not, however, the trip from Wellington to Masteitou that has been so much accelerated by these causes as what might bo termed a trip right round the province; which may be accomplished, as X have just proved, without too much fatigue, in two days and a half. This time will take yon over the Kinmtaka, up the Wairarapa_ valley In Mastcrton, thence through the Scandinavian settlement and the Iforty-milo bush to Woodville, in the old Napier province, back into Wellington by the famous Manawatu Gorge until i’aliiurston and a railway are reached. From there to Xfoxton, and thence back again to what its Chamber of Commerce delights to call the business centre of the colony. This is somewhat different to the state of matters some three or four years ago, but how much more different to that of tun years since when the same journey could scarcely have been done at all.

I might in a kind of categorical manner or Bradshaw manner tell exactly how the above may be, and is done daily now, but I am vain enough to fancy that a description of it actually as it was done by a traveller last week may be more interesting. X may pass over the journey to Masterton by what is 'called the second coach or by the train leaving Wellington at ten minutes past eleven, and, having reached the farthest of the four Wairarapa townships at seven in the evening, begin to think of getting out of bed in time to catch the coach for Palmerston at 6 o’clock next morning. If one has a few friends in Masterton, and possesses an unfortunate facility for making more, the thought of early rising may be agreeably postponed until well beyond midnight, though tho actual getting up the next day is not by that means rendered less unpleasant. But even if one went to bed in defiance of the maxim which says—

Early to bed ami early to rise, Is the way to grow naughty and make ono cell lies, the practice under vliic.li. ho is certain to be called up at the hotel from which the couch starts would be none the loss objectionable. Your rising U insisted on by a boots of more pertinacity than polish at half-past 4 o’clock, and having dressed, yon descend to eat, or to contemplate a veiy fair cold breakfast for exactly one hour. I do not know if all men are of my persuasion, but I never have an appetite under the circumstances, and even if X had would not feel inclined to indulge it in view of the magnificent one which, the easy drive of an hour and a-lialf to the first stage and real breakfast place is bound to produce. It is belter to sit, therefore, for an hour drinking milk and aodawater and thinking over the funny things you heard the night before. How a well-known character In the Wairarapa, with a taste for indefinite pronunciation, recently went into a store and asked for some “vulgarised imliavnbber,” or how Mr. Dreyer, desirous of rooting up stumps at Hreyer’s Town, unintentionally exploded 281b->. of dynamite at one go, causing his property, like Mr. Mander.q M.H.U., to rise above party prejudice, and journey towards paradise. Nor i» it luiiuteresting to think of how Mr. Dreyer’y assistants, fearing the descent of the township in bits, throw themselves flab upon their faces, nor how Mr. Dryer himself, with a scientific calmness that would have asserted itself in the crater of au active volcano, besought them to stand up, as then they would present less surface to the falling fragments. At six o'clock the coach starts, and if you have the good fortune to he ou the box you soon discover that in the coachman, George Phillips, you have an excellent companion. The road to the end of the first stage, at what is called “ the camp/' is not of the best, but in fair weather is not bad travelling ; whilst on the plain itself rabbits innumerable sit up to wash their faces and stare at the coming coach until it approaches too near, when, with a vi-inri of a tuft and two logs, they scuttle to .shelter at a distance compatible with their ideas of i-afety. IToj-enUy a river is crossed by means of a ford, and the road being fringed hero and there with light bu:h and ti-tree, a bram of pheasants every now and again cross in front, of us with a whir, whir, suggestive or how much better they would Jo-.k after having been hung for a time, and having had their feathers replaced by bread sauce, cayenne pepper, .and red currant jelly. From the camp on the entrance to the Scandinavian settlement the character of the road changes, and it becomes literally one of the best I have ever travelled. The gradients are easy, the turns not too sharp, and formed as it is of limestone gravel it is as smooth, trim, and easy as a billiard-table. The road runs round the outskirts of the settlement, but one is now being made to pass through it, which will shorten the distance by four miles. Alter pacing the last of the Scandinavian clearing there is nothing hut bush to ho seen ou either hand until Kkctahuna—half-way between Masterfcou ami ’W’oodville—is reached. But there is un monotony .about the bush. The road runs along hillsides into valleys, ami up again to the summit of saddles, whilst all aroundis the wonderful foliageof New Zealand, with glimpses here and there of bright rivers below and* brighter skies above. For a long time we are gradually, and almost unconsciously, ascending, until on a sudden crest thei’3 is a view of a pea of hills timbered to their tops. The trees no longer shut out the sky above us, and wo are on the line that divides two great watersheds. .Each rain and dewdrop that falls behind us finds its way to the Fast Coast ; all moisture that the land in front receives has its outlet on the West. Descending, we are soon in Fketahuna, another Scandinavian settlement, where dinner is disposed of. This settlement is thirty miles from Masterton, and about the same distance from Woodvillo. It will ,-oon bo an Important place, for it is the intention of Messrs. Hast* well and Macara very shortly to start on throe mornings of each week, .a coach from the end of the railway on the Wellington side, and. another from that on the Napier side. They will meet in the evening at Fketahuna, where a commodious hotel is to be erected, and next morning will return to the railway terminus, thus enabling passengers to avoid the discomforts of a sea passage to Napier, and to make the trip by a not fatiguing land journey-of some days. But the great importance of Fketahuua will bo derived from the fact that a huge block of Crown land in its neighborhood will soon be thrown open for settlement, and that from it a road in the direction of Castlepoint will shortly be constructed. From Eketahmia, by a succession of long valleys, and after fording one or two rivers, a large stream {lowing into the Manawatu, and presently tho Mauawatu itself, are passed. There arc pnuts at each of these two rivers in case of Hoods, but there is no means nf crossing those we pass before coming to them in case the water is high. And here it may be pointed out that coach travelling to be successful muit as far as possible be rendered independent of weather. In the case of the Forty-mile Bush this cannot be done until the smaller streams unprovided with punts, and indeed not suitable for such, are bridged. The road must become, with each mile added to the railway on the Wellington side, a thoroughfare of increasing trafiic. At present, with the exception of a portion between “ The Camp” ami jVlasterton, it is, so far as the road wry is concerned,perfectly admirable,and thoGovcmment should take cure, and that quickly, that its utility is nob destroyed by its passage at all limes being rendered uncertain for want of a few paltry bridges. And here I may remark how, travelling over the present excellent road through the Forty-mile Bush, evidences are freqnout of ■what a fearful journey by coach there must have been before the road was metalled. For a great part of its course it must have fully borne out the description of being just too thick to swim in and too thin to walk ou. Hence tho tales of the long and wearisome journeys by it to which newspapers up to a short time ago accustomed ns do not a exaggerations. It is to the credit of the coachdriver, the before-mentioned George Phillips, that he has now been driving over it for more than two years and yet has never had an accident by which a passenger was injured. Haying crossed the Manawafcn River, the coach, passing through Woodville, is at the mouth of tho Manawatu Gorge by five o’clock, and hero the passengers wait for the conch from'Napier, I and Home others anxious to see what wc could of one of the sights of New Zott*

before darkness descended,passedacrossthe handsome bridge, and walked down the Gorge, to be overtaken by the coach. The place has been described ad nauseam, and by better pens than mine. Besides the sensation of its great beauty, I experienced another, which mado me cling so closely to the inside of the road, that bad I only worn knee breeches, the buttons on the side next the cuttings must have been worn off. Before twodhirds of the gorge had been passed through, the coach overtook us, and added a third sensation, that of being driven • rapidly down a hill with about four inches of road between the present and the hereafter. However, once out of the gorge all pleasure derived from this source disappears, and when we rattle into Palmerston at seven o’clock, anticipations of a good tea, amply realised at Mr. Gilbert’s Hotel, succeed. At ten o’clock Palmerston is left by train and Foxton reached, where the less adventurous travellers go to bed for three hours and a half, whilst those of a more adventurous spirit play euchre, on the principle that if one has to get up at two o’clock in the morning, after going to bed at eleven, one may just as well not go to bed at all The cause of nur leaving Pox ton in the middle of the night was one over which the coach proprietors could have no control, viz., the necessity fur catching the low tide to cross the rivers. As it was, owing to the number of passengers (none of whom would hear of being left behind), for whom two coaches were provided, our was slow. One coach was stuck up for a while at the Ohau Liver, and we did not leave Chau until eleven o’clock in, the morning, or fortyeight hours after making a start from "Wellington. Under the present mail regulations it is not likely that Messrs. Hastwell and Macara can do more than accelerate the speed between Fox ton and Otakx by making a stage at Horowhenua. Negotiations with Government for a tri-weekly service, by which shorter stages would be made throughout, and a mail through to Wanganui in one day provided, broke down some days ago, and have not since been renewed. I have little news to add, save that we arrived in Wellington between six and seven o’clock, having thus been literally round the province in two days and a half. But I may add a line in testimony of the attention to his business of Mr. Moinet, traffic manager of the railway to Foxton, who looks after the night train himself, and still hay, as he deserves, the good word of everyone in the district.