Through South Westland/Part 1/Chapter 2

by A. Maud Moreland

CHAPTER II.

BY THE WATERS OF WESTLAND.

A land of streams! Some like a downward-smoke,
Slow-dropping veils of thinnest lawn, did go;
And some thro’ wavering lights and shadows broke,
Rolling a slumbrous sheet of foam below.
They saw the gleaming river seaward flow
From the inner land: far off three mountain-tops,
Three silent pinnacles of aged snow,
Stood sunset-flush’d: and dew’d with showery drops,
Up-clomb the shadowy pine above the woven copse.

Tennyson.

Those who go to Ross do not usually visit it for pleasure—though I once knew a lady who spent a week there, but I think it was because she could not go any farther. It is strictly a place that minds its own business, which is gold-getting; and those who go there, go either directly or indirectly because of the gold. It is rather a fascinating place, reminding one a little of a French town, with its houses perched about on reddish-coloured hills from which the bush has been cleared. There is no attempt at regularity, it straggles about, up and down the hills, and a very little way outside, the bush closes in again and rolls away, range beyond range, hill beyond hill, clothed as with dark green fur. To seawards a yellow flat stretches to the sand-dunes. Gaunt, dead trees stand on the flat, and a ragged forest of white-pine borders it; there are pools and bogs surrounded

by waving marsh grasses, and a river wanders through undecidedly in many streams. They told us it is the richest alluvial gold deposit on the coast, and were that plain drained and mined, gold lies in bands and pockets in fabulous measure. I was shown a coloured section of its supposed riches, that made one wonder why everyone was not digging there! Indeed, I imbibed the spirit of Ross—which is a chastened kind of gold fever—very quickly, and found myself continually scanning the ground, and peering into creeks, or picking up bits of brown stone they called “Maori stone,” and which they told us only occurred near gold. Might not some one of those streams contain potential chances of a fortune? Indeed, many a one has been made—and lost—here. In those now far-off days, when the gold rush was at its height, men penetrated far into the ranges—by the creeks and rivers; camping sometimes together, sometimes alone, with perhaps but a rude wharé of boughs to shelter them. They dug and washed for gold in the creeks with the most primitive of outfits, amidst much toil and privation; and the solitaries came to be known as “Hatters,” the only explanation I ever got of the term being, that if they had nothing else to wash in, they washed in their hats! Further south, we came now and again on a “Hatter”—usually some old and broken man, who had taken possession of a digger’s forsaken hut, and from sheer force of habit spent his days delving and washing in his creek. Most of them nowadays subsist on the old-age pension of ten shillings a week, and perhaps the kindness of friends—but ready always to give a welcome to the passer-by. Some of these old men could tell strange tales of old Australian days, when life ran hot and furious in the saloons and on the race-courses, and money went as fast as it came—there was always the lucky chance luring men on. A man might arrive at night worth his £500, and leave the little township next day without a penny. And if they played hard, they worked hard too, and endured hardships and privations little heard of nowadays. In the end the successful ones went back to civilization, or took up land and settled down with wife and family. The failures drifted away, leaving a few old derelicts, whose ties were too long broken to be mended, and the mate they worked with dead and gone. But Ross has gone ahead since those days, and gold-mining demands all the latest machinery, and sluicing on a vast scale is carried on. We came in for a very wet day during our stay, and I spent it climbing about behind the town among the old workings, where chasms yawned whose bottoms were filled with black waters, and where one scrambled over mountainous heaps of broken rock and débris. In all directions the hills were gashed and rent by the power of the sluicing hose. Here and there, amid blackened stumps, some forest giant still green held up

protesting arms to heaven; tangled masses of tree-ferns and creepers still sent out living fronds and tendrils, though pitched headlong down the screes—everywhere ugliness and ruin:

“The ruined beauty wasted in a night,
The blackened wonder God alone could plan,
And builds not twice! A bitter price to pay
Is this for progress—beauty swept away.”

But the ruin and the ugliness are inevitable. Where there is gold, all outside beauty must flee away before the digger. The disused workings were a desolate place on a wet afternoon, and broken sheds and rusting machinery depressed one; and as I viewed these things, I sorrowed for the passing of the Forest. Behind me the hills were hidden in a pall of rain; in front stretched the gold-flat with a ragged row of poplars on its marshy edge; beyond that again, a blank wall of mist hid the Pacific, moaning sullenly on the sand. I was glad to come in to tea and a cheerful fire from these meditations.

In the hotel we had visitors. The only harbour-master south of Hokitika came and told us tales of a wonderful region where few have been; where the olivine rocks shine blood-red on either side of a tremendous gorge. “It’s the finest sight you’ll ever see,” said he; “the road’s none too good; you’ll need be careful in the rivers, specially the Haast; there’s many a man’s been washed down in the Haast, and they never come out alive—no, nor do the bodies neither.” We questioned him as to distance and accommodation. His brother-in-law would put us up, and he lived at the very end of the Main South Road, where it can go no further because of an impassable country of deep fiords and mountains guarded by precipices. This sounded truly fascinating. Like the harbour-master, the parson was the last on the Coast. He might travel 200 miles and come to no parish boundary, and to visit those few sheep in the wilderness meant long days in the saddle and on foot in that lonely land. There was a doctor too, also the last, and from him we heard of a wild night ride, seventy miles through rivers and over mountains, to save a woman’s life; and how when he had done his share, he found there was no one to nurse her but men who knew not what to do; how he sat by her bed tending her for a week till the danger was past, and another urgent summons came for him to go back; of the terrible ride through flooded rivers, in storm and rain, ten hours on relays of horses; to fall ill at the end from exposure and fatigue.

But Ross was a very different place when the sun shone, and I forgot all the dismal impressions, and remembered only the kindness and friendliness of everybody. We left it on one of those wonderful balmy West Coast days of perfect blue—blue of sky and water, bush and mountain: is there anything in the whole world like it? Riding out of the town we passed the sluicing operations in full swing; saw the irresistible power of the great hose turned on the face of a hill that came crashing down before it in tons of red clay and rock. We saw the muddy water flow back from the cliff face into channels paved with wood, where it leaves its silt from which the gold is taken; heard how this, later, is melted into rude bricks to be sent away; and the man who explained it to us told us that they were at present taking out £4,000 a month. I think those bricks must be just like the talents of gold of King Solomon. The roar and noise were deafening; and they told us, were the man who seemed with such ease to direct the nozzle of the hose to get in front, he would be dashed against the cliff like a straw in the wind. Round the bend of the hill almost all trace of man and his works ceased, and we rode along the fringe of the bush some distance inland, with the sea on our right hand, through ever-changing scenes. Now it was across a wide river-bed, through blue streams breast-deep; now down a leafy tunnel where the great trees met, and all beneath, save for that lonely road, was a tangle of creepers, lianes, and ferns. The sunlight lay in bright patches among the tracery of mauve shadows on the road; or at times the shade was too dense for sun to penetrate. Vistas opened of far-rolling hills and purple gorges, clothed everywhere with unbroken forest—no impression had been made by the few small clearings along the coast on that great solitude. We saw ahead of us a house, the Waitaha, with name and sign, all alone in a clearing by the roadside; beyond it the road led on and on straight through the heart of the bush. Here we halted. We strolled away in the afternoon to see Lake Ianthe, being told it was but three-and-a-half miles off; but it seemed nearer five. At any rate it was well worth the walk. The road wound down to it through magnificent forest, where the tree-ferns expanded glorious fronds fifteen or twenty feet long, and everywhere grew a wealth of exquisite greenery. Strange new forms—new at least to our eyes—constantly attracted the attention. What the forest lacks in brilliancy of flowers, it gains in its wonderful variety of form. Except the ratas and a red honeysuckle, most of the flowers are white, or green and inconspicuous; but their perfumes are there, and every shade of green and gold and brown. Between the tall shafts of the trees we caught glimpses of a shining water, and we made our way to the shore and sat there entranced. The reflections were perfect: every leaf and twig, mountain summit, and sunset cloud lay there, as in a great looking-glass.

The snows of the distant Alps were flushing rosy-pink above the dark hills, clothed always to their tops with trees. And as we sat and watched, the water at our feet became golden with the reflection of the rosy cloudlets floating in it. Colours like the inside of a pearl-shell blended, and faded, and the evening mists crept over all, and we turned back down the darkening forest aisles. And as we went, the moonlight laid

black bars across the road, and touched the giant ferns with silver, and every sound was hushed. Surely it was at Lake Ianthe the enchanted forest world began to speak to us, and bid us understand?

We heard we should have a forty-two mile ride next day, because the next stopping-place was occupied by a party of bridge-builders, and there was no room for ladies. So we made an early start—only those who have ridden out thus into the forest in the freshness of early morning, can know anything of its perfect beauty. It is a different beauty from the glory of noon-day, or when the evening shadows fall: it seems to cry aloud and sing for joy. The tuis and the bellbirds were calling with those notes that, for me at least, have far more music than the nightingale’s—no bird, unless perhaps the bul-bul, has any notes like them. I only asked to go on and on: give me more, ever more, of these sights and sounds, these perfumes, this utter loveliness!

As we passed Ianthe it lay all blue and fair in its setting of green, the water just ruffled here and there by a light breeze. Two large rivers, the Little Wanganui and the Big Wanganui were crossed with ease, though as we went south they were getting more turbulent. There is a little settlement here, where we stopped for a ten-o’clock breakfast. Our welcome was, as always, most kindly, and we were given fried trout with new potatoes, apricots and cream—a truly astonishing bill of fare! They told us we were very lucky in thus crossing the rivers, for the heat was bringing down sudden floods from the melting snows in the ranges.

When we left this sunny, beautiful spot, we entered on a lonely bit of road, except for an isolated house or two at long intervals, which looked helplessly small face to face with the forest. Rosy children would run out from them to wave to us, and I always wanted to go in and see who lived in these lonely spots. I did too, sometimes. I used to hear touching little tales, and the women especially were glad to see me. Once it was a story of a young girl, brought up in the palace at Copenhagen who followed her sailor-husband out to this far land, in utter ignorance of the life before her. She found herself alone—cut off by rivers on each side from neighbours twenty miles away. She dared not cross them on her horse; the forest frightened her as much as the rivers. “What did you do?” I asked. “I cried for two years; then my baby came—that comforted me, and I cheered up a bit. I gave up thinking about getting back when I had three or four of them wanting everything!” Now they are all grown men and women, and in forty years she has never seen one of her own people. She showed me groups and photographs taken in Denmark: the beautiful old burgher house, with grave, prosperous-looking men and women; the palace and the streets of Copenhagen. How much lay behind that little story; but it was only one among many—the common lot of a pioneer’s wife.

Far south it is even more isolated—only this generation has been born and brought up on the Coast. The old generation came from another world. There is a certain sense forced upon one of the smallness and feebleness of man, when brought face to face with the Forest—when from some hill-top you look out over that undulating sea of green-blue hills and valleys, all untrodden, all impenetrable, wherein is no open track or glade save only up the bed of a torrent. Then it is borne in on the mind how easily one could be lost—“swallowed in vastness, lost in silence, drowned in the deeps of a meaningless past.”

About mid-day we were crossing Mount Hercules. From its summit we gazed out over the wide flat of the Wataroa; miles and miles of rolling country—part yellow plain, part billowy forest—spread like a map at our feet. The Main South Road descended here in loops across the face of a mighty bluff—down, down; one side of the road was fringed by the tops of the tallest trees below, the other was overhung by crags with clinging trees and ferns. At last we got to the bottom. A fairly straight road ran between dykes and tall marsh-grass, where the red-legged pukakis rose and flapped away, their blue-black plumage shining in the sun. Mile after mile we travelled onwards, crossing many small rivers. The heat in this wide country was very great, and we were thankful to see an arcade of shady trees ahead. Their boles were literally stuck over with big black and grey crickets, whose myriad voices filled the air—so loud they almost prevented talk! Then we came to a hut, and a notice that one might, in an emergency, summon the ferryman by telephone. A little further the wide river-bed spread out in a fan-shaped desert of boulders and shingle, dead trees, and islands of grass and scrub. We could see the ferryman coming across to meet us, and we waited for him. He reported the river as fordable, and another wayfarer catching us up, we three entered it in single file. The Wataroa was decidedly the swiftest and deepest river we had crossed, but the horses came through bravely, without having to swim—although at one time it seemed like it. The accommodation-house was half-a-mile further on—the old one by the river having been carried away in a flood. This present one was really the barn and stables, and every inch of room was occupied by the party of thirteen who were cutting timber for the new bridge. We could vouch for it, it was not the only place which stood badly in need of one! The ferryman came with us to the house. He was a German, very powerfully built; and we heard he has saved many lives in the Wataroa—even when washed down with a drunken man, he could keep his head and bring his helpless charge out alive—no mean feat.

Our host and hostess were terribly grieved at having to send us eleven miles farther, and tried to make up for it by feeding us sumptuously. The talk ranged over many subjects—the Sistine Madonna to Holman Hunt’s “Light of the World” among them—and we found the ferryman was something of an enthusiast, and knew his Dresden Gallery well. Our host was a man of much reading, and told us how in the old camping days they were a strangely mixed crew, hailing from all parts of the world; sometimes Oxford and Cambridge men among them—come gold-seeking or exploring like the rest. These would insist on the others in camp reading, so as to be able to keep the talk going round the fire at nights; and an enthusiasm for history, Shakespeare, and the “Saturday Review” grew up. Men lent books to one another, and the budgets of papers when they arrived, were eagerly read and handed on.

“Ah!” said our host, “they were good old days! We youngsters learnt a lot mixing with men of education; it was grand to sit round the fire o’ nights and hear the talk—and they made us enter into it too, for they insisted on us reading. We have the schools now all down the Coast, but there’s not the same chance; we never hear the talk we did in the early days.” At every place they were loud in praise of the Government. A telephone connecting the whole length of the Coast was under construction, and soon every small settlement would have its connection. One of the women said to me: “It’s almost the same thing as having neighbours and living in town; we can talk to each other in the evenings—they let us keep the wire as long as we like. Oh, I don’t mind the bush now we’ve got the telephone!”

But the afternoon sun was drawing towards the west, and we mounted once more, and rode away on the lonely road skirting the foot-hills that always reminded me of the coast of a yellow sea. Here it was part marshland, part good grazing—surely when the plain is drained it will wave with golden crops and raise the finest cattle in the West. Late that evening we came to Lake Whahapo—a silver mirror, where a crested grebe made its slow way across in an ever-widening V of ripples. Tiny lamps of phosphorescent light glowed under the ferns that bordered the track—tired as I was, the peace and beauty of it all held me in its spell. Just as it grew dark we reached the Forks Inn. There was light enough to make out the stables across the road, and to recognize Mr. Heveldt, the host, who came and led away the horses, while his jolly Irish wife gave us hearty welcome. It was a merry household, and as Transome washed at a tin basin in the kitchen, I could hear peals of laughter as she entertained him the while—interlarding her remarks with threats to “Kill Baby Franz Josef, if he wasn’t a good boy!” She called the baby after the glacier—not the Emperor.

All night a torrent outside roared and tumbled. Whenever I awoke I heard its never-ceasing voice

—truly in South Westland one is never out of sight and sound of running water. Whether it be of the great rivers hurrying to the sea, or the white cascades or streams rippling fetlock-deep across the track, that voice of many glasses of water is always in one’s ears. There are times when the fierceness of the rivers fills one with a sense of impotence. A wide river-bed strewn with tree trunks and enormous boulders when the flood comes down—and they chafe and roll in wild turmoil—is an awesome enough sort of place. And the more you have to do with New Zealand rivers, the stronger becomes the awe in which you hold them. On the west they are often not twenty miles long in their whole course, and rising as they do in the snows of the high Alps, the rush of water is terrific for nine months of the year. It is almost as if they were live things possessed by some spirit, ready to work disaster to those who meddle with them. From this place, named the Forks, we had a choice of ways—either to continue to the coast, visiting Okarito on its lagoon—one of the last nesting-places in the South Island of the white crane^[1]—or to turn inland along the Southern Alps. The road leads by Mapourika, most beautiful perhaps of New Zealand lakes, lying below the jagged peaks of the Minarets. Beyond, the great Franz Josef glacier winds down from those homeless wastes of ice and snow, where the Minarets and Mount Dela Bêche rear up like islands from the white expanse of the Tasman and adjoining glaciers. From their summits one looks, on the one hand across the eastern plains, and on the other over this green Western land of streams and forests, as Moses looked from Pisgah. Verily it is a Promised Land, but as yet the inheritance has not been wholly entered upon. Mapourika is beautiful at all times in that wonderful setting of forest and mountain, but when the sunset flush on the peaks above is mirrored in the windless lake, and every tree and fern springs from its own double along the shore, I think it comes very near being Paradise. We decided we must see both, so Okarito and its cranes might come first.

1. Or rather heron (Herodias timoriensis): ranges from China through Malay Archipelago to Australasia.