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Poverty Bay Standard, Volume III, Issue 215, 21 October 1874, Page 2

A New York correspondent of a contemporary writes : —“ It is to be hoped that the tide of immigration this season will be light. Unless immigrants have friends here, who can give them a helping hand, they will be wise to stay away till the skies are clearer. Employment is scarce ; many men in the large cities are idle; and complaints of pinching times and hard struggles are frequent from the farming districts, The various steamship lines seem to feel that the rush of immigration must be stimulated by low fares, and are already cutting down prices. But at present labourers of all kinds can do much better in England than in America. I say this with a full knowledge of the facts, and with the sole desire, by a frank statement of the truth, to warn intending immigrants of the risk they run by seeking our shores during the present depression.”

HOT SPRINGS OF THE NORTH ISLAND.

The following letter, addressed by Mr. Fox to the Premier, and printed as a Parliamentary Paper, will be of much interest to many, conveying, as it does, a very readable description of that most interesting part of the country:—

“ At the date of my retirement from office last year, I left behind me a memorandum, intended for the incom ing Ministry, on the subject of tho hot spring country in the interior of this island, and 1 made suggestions relative to the acquisition of that country by the Government. During the past summer, I spent several weeks in the principal districts where the hot springs exist, and I have now the honor to address to you a few memoranda on the subject," which may possibly be useful to your Government, if it should ever carry out my former suggestion of utilizing the springs for sanitary purposes. “ The hot spring country is well defined by Dr. Hochstetter as commencing at the northern base of Ruapehu aud Tongariro mountaifis, at the southern end of Lake Taupo, and thence extending in a north-easterly direction, for a distance of about 150 miles, to White Island, in the Bay of Plenty, being for the whole distance about the same width as Taupo Lake, say twentyfive to thirty miles; and possibly fed by an underflow from that lake. A few springs not included in that area may be found in other parts of the island, as at Tarawera, fifty miles from Taupo, on the Napier road, and at Mahurangi, in the country north of Auckland, and a few other localities. But these are insignificant in comparison with those which lie within the limits above defined. “ There are some half-dozen sites in the country referred to in which the number of springs and other active volcanic agencies are so great as to afford almost unlimited facilities for the establishment of sanitary institutions, and it is to these that I wish to draw the particular attention of the Government. Before doing so, however, it may be well to distinguish the different forms in which the heated water and steam emerge from the subterraneous reservoirs and appear on the surface. They are classified by Hochstetter under three heads : 1. Puias, which are geysers continuously or intermittently active. 2. Ngawas, which are inactive puias, emitting steam, but not throwing up columns of hot water 3 Waiarikis, which signifies any sort of cistern of hot water suitable for bathing. The lines of distinction are perhaps not always very well defined. To these may be added mud volcanoes, and numerous creeks and streams either entirely hot, or tepid, or cold with occasionally hot springs breaking into them and raising their temperature for several yards around. This feature also occurs in some of the lakes, as Rotorua and Rotomahana.

“ I will now proceed to describe the localities which, from their wealth of hot springs and fumaroles, appear more particularly adapted for sanitary purposes, and the establishment of hydropathic institutions.

“ Beginning at the southern extremity of the district above defined—that is, at the southern end of Lake Taupo—there is, at Tokano, a very largely developed group of active and quiescent springs. The Native village which bears that name is erected in the midst of them, and they are used for the various purposes of bathing, cooking, and other domestic uses, by a population of two or three hundred souls. The principal bath consists of a deep ngawa between two boiling puias —the two outer ones, above and below, being boiling hot, or nearly so, while the central one is of a temperature of not more than 100° to 110°, and therefore very pleasant for bathing. Its heat can be increased or diminished at will by shutting off its connection with the upper puia, which is easily done with a sod or bunch of fern leaves. The bathing pool is about six yards in diameter, and its construction is convenient and peculiar, consisting of a deep central channel which cannot be bottomed by diving, surrounded by a shelf of a yard or two wide, on which the water is only two or three feet deep. This affords accommodation both to the expert swimmer, and to those who have not acquired that useful accomplishment.

“ A fine clear creek of cold water, five or six yards wide, runs through the settlement, on both shores of which are many puias and ngawas, some violently boiling and others of various degrees of heat and ebullition. Some of these already mingle their waters with the cold creek, rendering it for a few yards a pleasant warm bath, and in many more places the hot and cold could easily be led into each other, so as to provide an almost unlimited number of baths of any temperature which might be desired. “ Tokano has a special importance relating to the settlements of Wanganui and other places on the West Coast, from which it will be easily accessible when the road now under construction is finished. The bathing facilities, however, at present, can only be used in common with the Natives, who, morning and evening, resort to the principal bath in such numbers as often to completely fill it. If they should continue to occupy Tokano, it would be necessary to utilize some of the other springs or cisterns in the neighborhood for those who might prefer privacy to the communistic lavatory system of the Natives.

“ Besides the existence of great bathing facilities, Tokano offers many other objects of interest to the tourist or valetudinarian. Yachting on the lake ; excursions to the falls of Waihi, and the place of Te Heu Hen’s sepulture, beneath a vast landslip which engulphed bis village and a large number of bis people ; the ascent of Tongariro, and possibly of Ruapehu (a feat yet to be achieved, and not unworthy of the foremost members of the Alpine Club),—such features confer attractions on Tokano which ought some day to establish it as one of the most favorite resorts of the district.

“Leaving Tokano, there are, I believe, no springs worthy of noticealong the eastern shore of the lake till the northern end is reached at Tapuaeharuru, where the Waikato River, which flowed in near Tokano, flows out again, much after the fashion of the Rhone through the Lake of Geneva, —with this difference, however, that while the blue color of the Rhone has passed into a proverb, the waters of Waikato are of an equally lucid and transparent green, unsullied by any trace of muddy deposit or tinge of snow water from the weepings of Ruapehu. “ On the western bank of Waikato, where it leaves the lake, stands on a jutting promontory an old Maori pa, with some rather fine but rapidly decaying remains of ornamental gateways and barge boards. On the eastern bank is the Constabulary post, aud the surveyed site of a township, which consists at present of a single public house and store.”

(To be continued.)