uncertainty in New Zealand, but all to no purpose. Great seagoing steamships, ‘leviathans of the deep’ in those days, with a fleet of smaller steamers able to jump over the bars or perish in the attempt, with all sorts and conditions of sailing vessels, chartered or owned by West Coast merchants, were busily engaged in the conveyance of goods and passengers to the new El Dorado, and Hokitika was honoured as the central port where one and all were dumped on the shore from the big steamships tendered by local tugs, and drafted north and south and inland, as their friends or fancies led them. It was no uncommon thing at the first of the rush for the bar tenderers, such as the Bruce and the Yarra, to land 500 or 600 passengers a day at a pound or so a head. It was indeed a busy time for shipping companies.” As showing the magnitude of this particular rush the correspondent of the Nelson Examiner wrote on April 6th: “The Hokitika River has a most mercantile appearance. There are no less than 22 vessels inside the bar, while three or four are in the offing.”
To provide accommodation for this influx, canvas stores and hotels were going up in every direction, cut timber being almost unprocurable. This acute shortage, however, was relieved somewhat when Messrs. Nees and McBeth erected a sawmill which marked the beginning of the timber industry in Westland.
