Ship Up a Tree

New Zealand Listener, Volume 26, Issue 654, 18 January 1952, Page 10

Ship Up a Tree

HE world of trees is so far from the world of ships that I suppose when a sailor gets into difficulties he never uses the expression "up a tree." Yet in the days of long ago I had to retreat from a little ship’s railing as, hugging the bank of an Auckland river, she tore away willow branches; and according to Kipling an Eastern typhoon can send the "stoutest steamers to roost with the startled crows." Poetic licence, perhaps, but "Binnacle" began his. series of talks at 3YA on little ships in New Zealand waters, with a true story of a ship that, in a flood in the Pelorus River, was left suspended between the forks of two trees, and bushmen from the mill where the ship was to get her cargo, obligingly came along and released her with axes, This was an excellent start for a series

of talks of a kind for which.there is an infinity of good material. Before railways had been joined up and when roads were apt to be tracks of mud, little ships were more important in personal transport and general economy than they are today.. Many, of them carried passengers. regularly, often. into out-of-the-way bays and up tidal rivers that don’t see much traffic now. ,They were the sea Coaches of our frontier society. Very little record exists of their history or of the many "characters" among their crews. Indeed, the history of coastal shipping generally has been sadly neglected. Given in an easy, pleasant style, with a good sense of narrative, "Binnacle’s" talks are doing somethine to fill the gap. ;

A.

M.