EARLY REMINISCENCES.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 390, 3 August 1889, Page 4

EARLY REMINISCENCES.

W KLLTNUTON, <luly 30. Aucklahdkks will be interested in the following lemituscences of the late Judge Gillies, supplied to the " .Evening I'osc" by a correspondent, %i E. T. G." Ho says :—: — " I knew Mr (Allies— 'Tom Gillies,' us ho was always called in those days — from my boyhood. He ai rived in Otago veiy soon after wo did, and while his father settled at the half-way bush he took up a farm on the Tokomairio district, purchasing it from Mr Robi&on, who, with his partnor, the late Mr \V. Stuait (aftei wards the well-known Premier of New South Wales), had taken up laud at the- loot ot Mount Nurseiy. After a biiei residence there Mr T. B. Gillies moved further south to the Warepa ; his brother, Mr John Lillio Gillies-, now Sccrotary to the Otaeo Harbour Boaid, who had in the meantime anived with his family from Australia, succeeding him at Rivercdalo. Mr T. B. Gillie? and his. wife, a charming and most amiablo lady, -went through all the rough hat d work of pioneer settlement on the Warepa farm for a year or two, until he determined to complete hi& legal studies and to exchange a countiy for a town life. It was not a dillicult thing at that time to secure admission as a legal practitioner. 1 think it was. in 15.34 that Mr Gillies left the Warepa farm. We were then living at Waihold, 26 miles fiom Dunedin, on the shores ot the Lake. At that time everybody in Otago knew everybody else, and tiavellers expected and always received hospitality, rough probably, but genuine. Wherever they went there was no ceremony ; no one waited to be asked. The tia\eller on reaching a homestead turned his horse or bullocks into the paddock, fed them if there was anything to feed them with, and walked into the home, sure of a cheeitul welcome, a hearty meal and a comfortable shakedown. Geneially the fare did not go beyond &alt beef, wild pork, or mutton ; with bread and tea. Most ot the early settlers at any distance from Dunedin had to make the bread from the wheat giown and ground by themsehes. What other flour was used was Adelaide ; but it was terribly dear and the dilhculties of cairiage were enormous. We used to get ours round by sea and tlic Taieri Rivei, m a little schooner named r,he Spec ; but her trips? were few and far between and occasionally our supply ran short. One day I had been out on foot iiotn an early hour in the morning on the run looking for a cow that had calved. It was after dark when I got her driven home and put up the slip-panels. Then I saw a stiange bullock in the small paddock behind the barn. A single walking bullock was a novelty. They always went in pairs, and I think that south of tho Taieri there weie only two that worked in harness. One was well known to me — 'Duke,' who belonged to Mr Dewe, of Tokomaiiiro. I knew Mr T. B. Gillies had another, and as the stranger was not ' Duke' I concluded Mr < ! lilies had armed. Before I could reach the house, I was met by our old .servant, whom we had bi ought from home with us, and she told me I was correct, but added thatjjMr Gillies was accompanied by his wife and two children. In the morning X saw how Mrs Gillies and the children weiotiavelling. Mr Gillies had himself made a laroe sledge. There was not a wheeled vehicle south of the Taieri, and they would have been no use had they been theie, as there weie neither roads nor bridges. On the sledge a low chair had been securely fastened, and in this Mrs Gillies sat with the children at her feet ; while Mi Gillie^ walked beside, and drove the bullocks by reins attached to the brankp. The harness of that equipage was, HketheveHele itself, of home manufacture, counting more of raw hide and rope than ot leather. Mr Gillies piided himself greatly on this, smart turnout, and he had not lost piido in his workmanship when we were laughing over the lecol.'ection a few weeks ago. I lpmembcr he helped Janet and myself in the stockyard woik before breakfast, and after the meal was over the bullock was duly harnessed. ' Good-bye ' said, and his family and he started on the journey, which Mas to lead him to professional and political distinction, ending on the Bench of the Supreme Court. As showing the diihculties of travel, I roav mention that Mr Gillies did not leach Dunedin till close on the fourth day after his start from Wairepa, although the distance, some 75 miles, can now be done in a few hours."

"] am thy father's spiiib !" as the pintilask said to the inquisitive youth who hud been investigating the cupboaid. Amateur Hubert — We lud, fi\e moons were seen to-night, four h'xed and the other did whirl. Muilled Voice from the Audience — Did jevcr — hie— try bromide .' When the Ascalon, barque, irom Londo" to Adelaide, was oil Cape JBorcta tho vessc was hove in stayn for the other tack, and had fortunately lost her headway when the cry " Man overboard !" was heard. One of the apprentices named Yeoman had been pitching the sheets out of the beckoti and tumbled overboard. The master, Captain Langford, ho sooner made his way to the position than he seized hold of some of the running gear and jumped overboard to the rescue, happily getting hold ot the lad in good time. The darkness of the night made matters more unpleasant, but by some exertion both were got on board all right, and the danger being over the vessel was biaced up and put on her course. News from Fiji via Sydney scales that amongst intelligence from the 13 u River a report has reached Levuka that a nativeowned cutter came to grief off tho Ba coast on the 13th ultimo. During the heavy squalhs which occurred on that day the vessel is said to have capsized, all hands being diowned, together with a native constable and four coolie prisoners, who weto an route from Ba to Suva Gaol. In the same squalls tho Savaii cutter lost her mast of! Bega, and drifted about for some days, when her crew managed to get her into Nukuluva passage. News has also come in that on the same day tho Kilsyth cutter was wrecked at Vatu Karasa, between Scrua, and Nadioga.