Not that all New Zealanders are indifferent to the beauty of their land; many of them admire and enjoy it. Large State reserves protect some of the more charming landscapes; in certain places societies guard their local scenery. The Government Tourist Department advertises the country's scenic attractions, and smooths the path of the visitor or holiday-maker in a score of ways. But to the typical colonist all such things are merely by-play. His pride is in 'progress.' The traveller from England is curious about what the islands were in their natural state—about the solemn Alps, the delightful fiords, the untouched forest, the astonishing volcanic forces, the picturesque savages who dwelt among these sights. The heart of the colonist is in the transformation which is turning the stem or beautiful wilderness into a flourishing and civilized State. The bleating of sheep and lowing of cattle are sweeter music in his ears than the roar of waterfalls. To the European visitor a colonial city of fifty thousand inhabitants is just a third-rate town and nothing more. To the pioneer who has seen it grow from a handful of tents and shanties, the prosperous streets, roomy villas, and comfortable cottages represent victory—the triumph of his race in their battle with emptiness and desolation. So in the country: every new road, bridge, line of railway, every additional homestead, plantation, hedgerow, has a meaning to the settler, in whose eyes it spells advance and the conquest of obstacles. So traveller and colonist sometimes find themselves at cross-purposes. The former may occasionally seem to the latter an aesthetic butterfly. The European in his haste now and then sets down the colonial farmer or tradesman as a bit of a vandal.
First and last, then, the dominating idea of the New Zealander is Colony-making. This is his work. Touch that chord, and you will always find him responsive. Why, then, with all this passion for colonization, has the archipelago not filled up faster, and been more completely settled? Sixty-five years—the age of the Colony
