Page 1 Advertisements Column 6

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 7, Issue 348, 18 June 1863, Page 1

Up shot the lurid t'ongites of flame ! They did burst forth so fast " - - No human power that fire coiihl tame—- “ The boats ! the boats !” at last. The boats were launch’d—too fast, indeed ; The first went down from view ; “ Great haste,” the proverb says, “less ~ speed.” : Alas! it proved true. The second boat, with its living load,' Went down as did the first; Wild were the shrieks—l hear them yet— Which from the drowning burst. 1 Full many an earnest prayer was made 1 Ob,that dread night of death ;;/■ ' : i And some who never before had knelt Now pray’d while they had breath. The raging fiend pursued me _ Till, stimn’d with fear and smoke, I plung’d into the glowing sea, , And— —happily awoke ! By the following .morning the gale had : abated, 7 and we slid quietly out of port, I taking my last glympse of Wellington. But we were not to get off so easily after . all, for during the night the wind rose from the north, and drove, us from Mana liack to cape Terawiti. With some difficulty we made Kapiti, where we remained prisoners at anchor from Sunday . morning until Thursday.'. Sunday morning was drizzling and uncomfortable. A dense mist veiled the upper, part of the island , all day. During our four days’ ’ detention we, like philosophers, made the best of our time. “We” here signifies the only two passengers besides myself, one of whom was Dr. T. Our chief employment was fishing, in which we were very successful, catching fish of several species, such as kawhia, tariki, pakirikiri, wario, snappers, &c. The dorsal and , ventral fins of some of these were so spiny and sharp, that 'it was no easy matter to take hold of them by the hand without being wounded. , But by far the most interesting event was a visit to Kapiti and the adjacent islets. Two men had come on board from, the island, and with ; them we went bn shore; The sea was Jroughish, and made hard work for four ■ I rowers, of whom the Dr. was one. On ; the way nothing particular happened, ; except that the skipper’s dog, having an ; anxious eye to porpoises, fell overboard, which obliged-us to back oars and pick i him up,,upon which he testified his gratitude by shaking the water from his dripping sides upon his neighbours. - The Dr. afforded us a laugh by twice railing backwards off his seat' 2 whilst oaring...... We visited the station (Mr. B.’s), and were kindly entertained with a supply of milk ■and eggs. • After a short stay here we ' went to explore some caves in the vijcinity. It was a terribly rough scramble /over sharp-pointed rocks and shingle, but |we were repaid for our trouble by arriving at a real “ smuggler’s cave,” which .'we cautiously entered with lighted candles. "VYe discovered no smuggled goods , or grizzly goats, but something as ‘ eerie, 5 j—to wit, a number of human bones and 'skulls, the caves having been used by the Maories as places of sepulture. In the ■third cavern, which was the largest, we [found a young penguin, about,-the size of (■a pullet. Monsieur penguin did not show | much surprise, at so many unlocked for visitors, but permitted himself to be freely handled, only making an occasional dab at some hand which he thought rude. Having only rudimentary wings flying was out of the question, I mean on the part of the penguin, not of the implumecl bipeds. On . the beach I found lots of shells, conspicuous amongst which was,the pava, and a curious pretty round thing, covered with prickles, which I supposed was the echinus or sea urchin. Upon each of the two nearest islets we saw the graves of some old whalers, fenced with huge bones of the leviathan which they had spent ; their time in catching. There, too, were the remains of a rude stone house. Those lonely graves By the sad sea waves, Which murmur at ebb and flow, Have nought but stones And bleach’d whales’ bones To mark what lies below. What a story these relics might tell of rude scenes enacted here by the rude whalers S I attempted to compose a poem on the subject, but got no further than the above quoted verse, so lame was my Pegasus. Evans island was the last visited, and there were found, besides some beautiful shells (some of which contained the fish) and algae,- a number of seagulls’ eggs. These were as lai’ge as a duck’s egg, with umber daubs on a dirty yellowish ground. “ Hope deferred maketh the heart sick each night we had retired to rest hoping that before moruing the wind would change. At length our whistling was rewarded, for early on Thursday morning, the wind having chopped round, the anchor was hove ; the sails expanded themselves to the breeze, and away we went, passing a brig which, like ourselves, had been weatherbound since Sunday morning. Friday forenoon saw the gallant little Tyne speeding up the rivei*, where her arrival had been anxiously expected. I was, on the whole, well pleased with my trip to and from Wellington—well pleased with that thriving city—and- more than ever pleased with dear old Wanganui.