Chapter VII. Manukau Bar—The Lovely Half-Castes.

I Left Auckland by bus for Onehunga, a port on the opposite side of the island, a distance of about eight miles from Auckland, so narrow is the strip of land at this point. The country through which we passed was wildly beautiful, and evidently volcanic. Mount Eden, the monarch of the many other sugar-loaf-shaped hills scattered here and there, containing extinct craters, stood out in imposing grandeur as we drove down Kyber Pass. Our driver was not far out when in his peculiar phraseology he remarked: ‘This must have been a hot old shop at some time or the other, sir.’ Dire, indeed, must have been the devastation worked, and hellish the discord, when those huge blocks of scoria, strewn in rugged piles round its base, were torn and disrupted from the bowels of the earth, and hurled with resistless force into their present admired disorder. I was always a lover of nature, even in her rudest and most terrific aspects. They have ever possessed an irresistible charm for me. When others quaked with fear I experienced intense enjoyment, and I could not help longing that I had been present to witness, at a safe distance, those now peaceful hills belching forth clouds of smoke, streams of lava, and storms of stone. Round the foot of Mount Eden now nestle, among beautifully-planted grounds, numerous suburban residences, the most lovely retreats possible for the tired business man.

After a good night's rest at the hotel by the wharf, the porter woke me at an early hour to ensure my being on board in time. As I walked down the wharf I noticed some lady passengers, but they were enveloped in wraps, as the air was cold, and in the misty morning light I could not see what they were like.

We pushed off from the wharf just as the rays of the rising sun made their first appearance on the horizon. The Manukau Harbour is a large inland sheet of water, into which flow numerous rivers and creeks. The bar at the Heads had been about three years previously the scene of the disastrous wreck of H.M.S. Orpheus. Owing to taking a wrong channel, she struck on the rocks, and sank almost immediately, with a loss of somewhere about one hundred page 27 and eighty lives, seventy only being saved. There had been an animated discussion between our captain and some landsmen as to whether this dangerous bar was safe to cross on this particular morning, just before we left the wharf. During the last two days there had been rough weather at sea, and the matter appeared doubtful. Our skipper, however, maintained that the pilot had signalled it safe, so he would certainly try it. The other party remarked that the pilot was an old fool, and he would certainly recommend the passengers to have the funeral service read before they started, as there would be no time later on. This tended to discompose some of our passengers, especially an elderly, sour-looking, unprotected female. She had not the appearance of one who would require much protection, by the bye. She had brought with her a lot of cases of goods, and was, it turned out, a milliner by trade.

‘Is there really any danger, captain?’ she inquired with a look of terror, which in a moment changed to a shrewd, businesslike one, as she added, ‘because if there is I won't go this trip, and then if you do go down I'll purchase a good stock of crape and mourning stuffs, which will sell well in Taranaki next week. I've only got summer goods here.’

‘Well, my dear,’ retorted our amiable captain, ‘I hardly think we shall oblige you this time by letting you turn an honest penny that way. On some future occasion perhaps I may send my wife instead of myself, if you'll promise me the crape cheap for my sleeve and hat, and also agree to console the poor widower with the half of your business and the whole of yourself.’

‘Fie on you, captain!’ she exclaimed. ‘Why, you would be for drowning me in a week.’

‘Well, it's certainly quite possible.’ Here he made a pause, to the great amusement of the passengers; then went on, ‘We'll drown you as it is if you try to land at Taranaki this trip, so it's a pity you didn't bring the crape along, for I'm sure such a smart girl would be deeply regretted.’

‘You're talking nonsense just to frighten me, I know you are.’

‘Indeed, then, I'm not. It will be mighty rough there for the surf boats, I can see.’

‘Well, I must land if possible, for I've promised a lot of dresses by the end of the week, and not a stitch in the stuff yet, for it's here.’

This little dialogue would not have been worth recalling did it not lead up to an incident to be related further on.

We were now fast approaching the bar, and as the sun was now fairly up, the scene was one of most magnificent splendour. As far as the eye could reach was a mass of enormous rollers, crested with foam and tiped with a golden hue. The rugged Heads, gilded with a similar glittering colouring, rose abruptly to a great height on either side from the angry waters; the mighty waves dashing at their feet with a force of relentless fury, which made one wonder that even rocks could withstand such fierce onslaughts. The stern decree, Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther,’ was never better exemplified here, and, I may say, never more madly, though impotently, resisted.

The Northern Heads were partly clothed in bush, especially about their skirts, and were particularly broken and mountainous. The southern side is less precipitious, and the country is open on the seaward slope. The pilot station and lighthouse now stand on this page 28 height, having been removed from the North Head, where they were originally placed. Our captain informed us that the rebel Maoris, on one of their midnight excursions to search for powder which might have been washed ashore from the wreck of the Orpheus, in a fit of dare devilry ascended the cliff and cut down the flagstaff at the pilot station with a saw they had procured at a deserted homestead, and then decamped without doing further damage, or waking the guard, who far exceeded them in number. One more slight digression, in the shape of an anecdote related by a party who was present. Two white men and a Maori were strolling up the beach, when they discovered the dead bodies of some of the unfortunate sailors, which had been washed ashore from the wreck before mentioned, greatly decomposed. There was no cemetery within reach, so procuring some tools they dug graves for them on the spot, and were about to cover them up, when the Maori said, ‘Hold on, make prayer first.’ The white men could not at the moment think of anything applicable, and ridiculed the idea, but their darker brother immediately knelt down, threw off his hat, and uttered in broken English that grandest and simplest oration in our collection, ‘The Lord's Prayer.’ The rough bushmen allowed that they never felt more touched at anything in their life than at the simple faith of this Maori. They had been accustomed to hold missionaries in contempt, and deny that they worked any good among the natives, but after this lesson from one of their pupils they never allowed anyone in their presence to make fun of those worthy men.

But to return to the Stormbird. While feasting my eyes on the scenery I have been trying to describe, an animated and melodious voice behind me exclaimed, ‘Oh, Alice, we are just in time! I would not miss this sight for worlds! How awfully lovely!’ This word was here used in its true sense as expressing a sensation of awe as well as beauty—for the concomitant of danger was most certainly present in the furiously rolling breakers—not as it is used by so many young ladies of the present day, to hide the paucity of their adjectives.

I immediately looked round, and beheld two of the ladies I had noticed coming down the wharf enveloped in wraps. They had now discarded them as the day had become warmer, and appeared on deck in neat-fitting travelling dresses, which showed the outlines of their graceful and well-developed figures to perfection. They were evidently sisters.

‘Yes, Fanny, it is lovely, but the sea is very rough. It must be rather dangerous.’

‘That is the beauty of it. I do love to overcome danger.’

The flush of colour which suffused her almost dusky brow, the rise and fall of her shapely bosom, the flash of undaunted courage from an eye which made me quail as I met its bright glance, and the manner in which her whole form appeared to dilate with the idea of danger, all showed that in her was blended the blood of a once savage race with that of our own. I at once perceived that these young ladies were half-castes, the elder sister, Fanny, showing even more of the attributes of her dark-skinned parent than the younger, although she undoubtedly was by far the most lovely girl. What amazed me most was that I noticed a quaint but pronounced likeness to my father in both the young ladies. Failing, of course, to see the least reason for it, I dismissed the idea from my mind, and stood spellbound watching with much pleasure the intense enjoyment Miss Fanny appeared page 29 to experience as she clung to the rigging, her hat blown off, and now far behind us on a voyage of its own, her profusion of dark lustrous hair flying in the breeze, having escaped all control of pins and ribbons, her red, full lips parted with a rapturous expression, which did not leave them when an extra heavy roller, threatening instant dissolution, came in contact with our vessel, and made her timbers creak and groan, as if grieving at their fate in having been removed from their quiet home in the bush to be launched on this troubled sea.

The captain's face paled, as he feared another such shock would entirely annihilate us. The other such shock, however, was spared us, and by strictly adhering to the rules, and being guided by the painted beacons on the hill-sides, we at last safely negotiated the bar, and arrived in what, after our recent experience, we considered smooth water, although, under other circumstances, it would have been a great stretch of imagination to so term it.

The beacons before mentioned are placed so that by keeping those on one cliff in a line for a certain distance, then turning and adhering to the course indicated by others on another hill, the mariner can steer a course of comparative safety. If these rules are not strictly followed it is a case of smash, not everlasting, but of a very limited duration.

Breakfast was now announced. The bar, however, had economically obviated the necessity of both breakfast and dinner as far as the greater portion of our passengers was concerned. One young fellow said, with a ghastly smile, that he considered it a sacrilege to eat when his soul had been satisfied with such ‘heavingly scenery.’ The suffering the poor fellow had undergone must have wrung this atrocious play of words out of him, so we forebore to punish him. The two young ladies, who proved splendid sailors, myself, and the officers of the ship were all that sat down to the abundant meal spread before us. The keen sea air and the excitement we had experienced enabled us to do full justice to the tempting viands.

I am aware that, according to all preconceived notions, it was by no means correct of me to be capable of despatching a hearty breakfast, for I had undoubtedly fallen violently in love that morning, and this proceeding is popularly supposed to destroy the appetite. On me, however, it never had that effect. I could always manage a good substantial meal. This peculiarity, I doubt not, enabled me to bear its vicissitudes with greater composure. Be this as it may, I was rendered supremely happy, first by securing a seat next my divinity, and secondly by a sudden roll of the vessel causing her to spill a portion of her coffee over my unmentionables. To hear her apologies, to feel the soft touch of her hand, as with her delicate handkerchief she in vain endeavoured to remove the stains, was almost too much bliss. I remember the instance as vividly as if it occurred yesterday, the more especially as on looking over a lot of old curiosities in the secret drawer of an old desk, amongst withered flowers, faded ribbons, and the usual contents of such a receptacle, I discovered—I blush to mention it, fair reader—a small remnant of coffee-coloured tweed. The remainder of the garment aforesaid, which had not been invested with a charm by the touch of that fair hand, was subsequently presented by me to my uncle's stockman, who, after replacing the abstracted portion with a piece of sheepskin, made them do good page 30 service in saddle and stockyard, and eventually clothed with them a venerable scarecrow set up in the garden. Such is life!

I much fear I shall suffer in the estimation of my readers by the facility with which I succumbed to feminine charms, and the length of time, by my own confession, that I retained possession of my love tokens, not to mention the peculiarity of one of them. However, I cannot help it. I must plead guilty, if guilt there be, to having been a most impressionable youth. My first proposal was uttered, as we emerged from the bath in the simplicity of attire which Adam and Eve affected before they made themselves aprons, to a fair cousin. Our combined ages at the time would perhaps have totalled eight years, but certainly not more.