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Gisborne to Opotiki.

Having like most Colonists a few weeks of holidays in summer time, we determined to employ it by visiting places we had never seen before, although all save one of our party were natives of the soil. A few weeks ago, we left Gisborne and proceeded in a north-westerly direction by the Motu Road (officially called the OrmondOpotiki). The Cook-given name of this district “ Poverty Bay ” is a grave misnomer, unless it be confined to the bay or harbor itself, which is indeed poor—and loudly calls for a manifestation of that spirit of enterprise for which the Gisborne people are distinguished. During the short time we spent in the borough, we saw no indication of that vice and immorality against which, lately, an honorable judge thought it his duty to declaim from the Supreme Bench. The Gisborneites are very social in their habits, and freemasonry runs high, but no one can charge that ancient mystery with promoting irregularities of conduct. The poet Cowper says “ God made the country, and man made the town ;” so we set our faces to the former, and made towards the untamed and desert mountain region through which the boundary between counties Cook and Whakatane passes —only on the map, however. To reach this little known country we had to pass through the fertile valley through which the Waipaoa and other streams flow, and which, in flood time, they partially inundate. Everywhere are to be seen indications of the richness of the soil. Luxuriant pasture seems to have sprung unbidden from the teeming earth. A goodly proportion of cropping is also undertaken but one could scarcely blame the people if, where bountiful Nature does so much unaided, they did not over-exert themselves in the race for riches. It was pleasant, too, to see that the ancient inhabitants live comfortably on their own homesteads, intermingled with the more aggressive race. Indeed, here the Maoris are the lords of the land, and that they do not sport territorial titles may be accounted for by the consideration that such things have had their day, and that (leaving royalty alone) dukes, et hoc genus omne, are what Thomas Carlyle would call the “ old clothes ” of barbaric and feudal times. Burns, one of the people’s poets, once remarked to the Duke of Athole of his day, “ Princes and lords are but the breath of kings ; an honest man’s the noblest work of God.” This was the poet’s apology “ in form ” for leaving his patron, Murray, standing on the one side of Princes-street while he ran across to shake hands with his friend James Hogg. Which name survives in our affections need not be told. May the Maori and the Colonist too be encouraged to regard honest toil as sweet and honourable enjoyment, and not to strive after tinsel decoration or fashionable trappings. The road before us was mostly a bush country, without inhabitants. We therefore had to lay in sufficient food for ourselves, and a bit of corn for our five horses, besides carrying blankets and other extra clothing for the wilderness, in an upland region, to which, even in midsummer, John Frost occasionally pays a visit. The road contains about 70 miles of bush. Some five years ago a horse track was opened up by the Government, but since then nothing has been done to repair landslips or decayed bridges, or to remove such obstructions as fallen trees and exuberant growth of scrub. The existence of the last-named impediment is to be accounted for by the infrequency of the traffic, and the entire absence of cattle. We were fortunate in finding an old hut, left by the roadmakers, to take shelter in from the cold (happily we had no rain) during every night of our journey. As one of our party has sent a report on this road at the request of a highly respected and eminent official at Gisborne, a copy of said letter is hereto annexed. (The letter has, already, appeared in our columns.) In this untamed wilderness, the reflective mind finds much to awaken

those powers which lie dormant whilst we are daily in the haunts of moneygetting man. This is surely an approach to that “ other world ” in which some day dreamers amongst us moon away many a meditative hour. Here things are primitive, existing as they did “ when Adam was a boy.” How old the giant trees are, or how many links of generation they have, who can surmise ? The stored vegetable wealth of countless ages is to be found in this Motu forest district in great profusion. The giant monarchs which now flourish are varied —rimu, maitai, totara, tawa, kahikatea, rata, with perhaps some others, being the most conspicuous. It is in the early morning in such a place, when the traveller awakes with mind and body renewed and refreshed by the “ great restorer,” sleep, perhaps after a dream of things foreign to the region, that one’s whole soul is taken possession of by the grandeur of nature as it abounds in this lonely wilderness. It would be well worth the attention of Henri Ketten, or some other skilled musical phonographer, to put in line and scale, time and tune, the wonderful songs of the feathered worshippers in this vast, free, heavenly “ temple of the dawn.” We did not examine their “ nests,” but the pious mind cannot escape from the reflection that a verse is wanted in an ancient nursery hymn written as an infant introduction to natural history, and that it might be improved upon from the following : —

Who taught the birds to sing their songs Of love, and peace, and joy ? Who knows what talk, and news, and praise Their cherub tones employ ? A man’s mind must be impure indeed if he cannot worship the Great Creator in such a situation, aided as he is—for a choir—by the songs of birds, pure as angels, and forming in this the earliest, first, and most eastern diocese of Christendom, where every day, week, month, and year commences, where everything is new and fresh, except the decaying bridges on the track—the work of man. The last night we slept in the bush was in a forest clearing of a few acres extent, 11,000 feet above the sea level and eighteen miles from the sea at Omaramutu. Here a sharp frost awoke us before dawn, and we observed that the ground and dock leaves were hoar within six feet of our log fire, which had burned all night. These summer frosts in New Zealand prove the glorious purity of our atmosphere, allowing the heat of the day to radiate off the earth into star space. The same purity caused it to be succeeded by one of the hottest days of the season. It is impossible to notice, except with reprobation, the entire want of a sense of responsibility for their actions which seems to characterise the Whakatane County Councillors. They are entrusted with £1000 to improve the greater part of this road, and yet they have made a commencement by letting a contract for about £200 to be expended on the first six miles of the road, over which already a dray can comfortably travel, and one which we came at a canter. The present road there might very well have been left as it was, and as the Natives have allowed it to be used, though through their land, instead of banking over a swamp on the road line. What they clearly ought to have done was to remove the dangers and obstacles in the dense bush portion, being assured that the road through open country was well able to take sufficient care of itself. It is proposed to give a free grant of land to some one or two persons who will set up one dr two houses of accommodation on this line, and likewise to make clearings at points along the route where grass may grow. There is no doubt that in course of time this road will be converted into a coach road, for the gradients are easy. The fertile land through which it passes, though mostly bush, will no doubt in a few years be the home of numerous happy and healthy settlers. It would form a through road for cattle and other traffic between Poverty Bay and the other East Coast districts with Auckland, Thames, and intervening portions of the island.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/PBS18810330.2.6

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume IX, Issue 930, 30 March 1881, Page 3

Word count
Tapeke kupu
1,404

Gisborne to Opotiki. Poverty Bay Standard, Volume IX, Issue 930, 30 March 1881, Page 3

Gisborne to Opotiki. Poverty Bay Standard, Volume IX, Issue 930, 30 March 1881, Page 3

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