MAKURI NOTES.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XII, Issue 3949, 27 October 1891, Page 2

MAKURI NOTES.

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

The weather has been very change* able up here lately. One day we gob a gale from the.east and next a howling northwester. On the 19th wa were favoured with a hailstorm oo« coiupsniea by thunder. Our road outside the gorge is drying up now, but all through the gorge it is something frightful. The mud is nlmost stiff enough to bog a horse, and the horses will insist on walking along the edge of the cliff and aro in gre«t danger of falling into the river below. Last week three of Mr Sinclair's pack horses went over the gorge in this way, but fortunately none of thein got killed. Mr Wilson, from Motoa, Foxton, who has recently taken up land in the Upper Mukuri, had a narrow escape whilst riding out to Pahiatua the other day. Both horse and rider went over the gorge, but fortunately they managed to arrest their descent on a ledge of rock about twenty feet over the cliff. Had they passed this ledge both rider and horso would

have been killed, as there is a perpen-

dicular drop of two hundred foot on to a rooky bottom at this particular

place. Messrs Tylee and Patterson were close by, and with the assistance

of some ropes managed to get Mr Wilson and his horse on tko bridle track again.

The contracts for the formatian of the Makuri Gorge road have not been let yet, and us the season is far ad» vaaced settlers are beginning to complain of the tardiness of the County Council in letting these contracts. Considering the district has been settled for three years, we have only a squirrel track barely wide enough to allow a pack horse to pass through.

Several members of the " Coonoor" small farmers' association (which is situated in the Upper Makuri-Puketoi Block) have arrived iu here and com* menced work. They have been proparing a patch of land for potatoes, whilst the Chairman of the Association IAIr Saunders) lias been in Wellington to arrange where their individual sections shall be. The association block is SOoO acres in extent, and is situated about one and a tiiiies beyond the course of the Makuri river, and about two miles below the Hawke's Bay rabbit fenoe. The total distance from Pahiatua will be about twenty-five miles, of which tho last four or five miles is only a walking track.

There are at the present time, t believe, about 100 settlers in the district, and it is a fact, and not a very insignificant one, that w® have uo mail service in here whatever. -Fortunately the settlers take comPaß-

sion on each other and carry the letters backwards and forwards whenever they go out. As to the newspapers, sometimes they are too many to carry in front of a person and are left in Fahiatua for weeks at a time. Had we a regular mail service there is.no the correspondence would be three times as much as it is at present. Notwithstanding the scarcity of men, a large area of bush is boing felled in here this season. la the middle and upper Mnkuri district 32G0 acres have been let and hundreds of men are engaged at tho work. Also 1100 acres that were advertised liavt been withdrawn till next season on' account of the high prices asked for by contractors. The bush that was fallen last year and not burnt look*' mo o likely to burn, and should it do so, and we anticipate it will, the idea that this class of bush must be fallen late to ensure a burn will be exploded The undergrowth last autumn in the shape of ferns, etc., was killed by the severe trosts last winter. .

Wild cattle are becoming very scarce in tho Makuri-Puketoi. The crowd of bushmen in here have eatou

nearly all of them. Whenever are found, if possible, they all shot down', the caiups are acqiumiteii of the haul and every pound of whether bull or cow, lean carried away. ; There is plenty of work for real good axemen hero. It is utterly use* less inexperienced men coming in looking for bushfalling. Contractor! will not engage them, they arc only in the way. When I speak of "inexperienced " men I mean those who cannot chop, have no idea of utu)er* scrubbing, and men who get lost in the bush. A party of so-called nn« employed are at work here underscrubbing, and at the price they are getting ought to earn 10s or 12s per' day, but so far have just about made that a week. They are worse than useless, being both lazy and slovenly, and would not be kept on could better men be obtained.

Some of the men engaged falling'on Mr Ncvin's section thought they would try and explore a subterraneans creek. They approached the top end, where the creek entered the limestone tunnel, and rolled a block of limestone in, which went rumbling dowu into tho bowels of the earth, so they would not tackle that. They tried where the creek re-appeared. It looked practicable, but after entering a few feet thoy encountered hundreds of "wo tag," so they beat a basty retreat, and gave it up, Tho M weta" is a repulsive looking insect, something like 5 large grasshopper, only minus tho wing<s. It is striped, black and yellow, has: large spiked hops, formidable jawa for its »ize, long icelers in front of the head, and an appendage resembling a sting behind. Their bite iseaid to be poisonous.