Extract form Mr. Godley's Private Journal.
Sent to C. B. Adderley, Esq., M.P.

On Thursday evening (the 11th), after a tedious day's work, beating up the northern shore of Banks's Peninsula, we came to an anchor about seven o'clock just outside the heads of Port Cooper. If we had had two hours' more daylight, we should have gone in; but our captain was very cautious, and though we bad been positively assured that nothing could possibly happen, even if we ran in blindfold, he preferred waiting till morning. At six we weighed anchor, the wind being fair, though light, and passed quietly up the bay. None of us, I believe, were prepared for the beauty of the scenery. It took us more by surprise than even at Otago, for the sketches which we had seen in England were very far from inviting. The character is very different from that of the lovely lake on the banks of which Port Chalmers lies, but I am not sure that I do not prefer it. The hills are very bold, both in face and in outline; bare for the most part—that is, with only small patches of wood at the bottom of the glens—but with much of that sublimity which is produced by extent of view and rugged wildness.

The harbour is very fine, both in a picturesque and utilitarian point of view. The captain and all the nautical men on board were delighted with it. It consists in a regularly page 50shaped inlet, about seven miles long from the entrance to the end, and varying from a mile to a mile and a half in width. It is open to one wind (E.N.E.), but everybody agrees that it never blows bard from that quarter, and also that the swell is lost before it reaches the harbour. There is a good anchorage outside in seven fathoms, and from thence it gradually shoals to three fathoms, about five miles up. There are two small bays, in which, if it should be found necessary, shelter for ships may be found from the only wind to which the rest of the harbour is exposed. No pilot is required, as there is literally nothing to avoid, except the hills on each side; and there is width enough to beat in or out in fine weather. Half-way up the harbour we passed a whale boat, which informed us that we might go up and anchor opposite "the town." At that time we had seen no sign of civilization, except the line of a road in process of formation, along the face and over the top of the hill on the northern shore, and no human habitation, except some Maori huts, close to the beach; but we held on, and presently another whale boat, with Captain Thomas, the Chief Surveyor of the Association, on board, shot from behind a bluff on the northern shore, and boarded us. Immediately afterwards we let go our anchor, though "the town" was not yet visible, and my wife and I went off with Thomas. On rounding the bluff aforesaid again, I was perfectly astounded with what I saw. One might have supposed that the country had been colonized for years, so settled and busy was the look of its port. In the first place, there is what the Yankees would call a "splendid" jetty; from thence a wide, beaten-looking road leads up the hill, and turns off through a deep cutting to the eastward. On each side of the road there are houses scattered to the number of about twenty-five, including two "hotels" and a Custom-house! (in the shape of a small weather-boarded hut certainly, but still a custom-house). In a square, railed off close to the jetty, are four excellent houses, intended for emigrants' barracks, with a cook-house in the centre. Next page 51to this square comes a small house, which Thomas now inhabits himself, and which he destined for an agent's office. Behind this, divided from it by a plot of ground intended for a garden, stands a stately edifice, which was introduced in due form to us as "our house." It is weather-boarded, has six very good-sized rooms, and a verandah; in short, after seeing it, we could not help laughing at our own anticipations of a shed on the bare beach, with a fire at the door. Thomas had received about a week before our arrival a letter announcing it, which I had sent by the Monarch, so he had everything ready, expecting us to stay. I had, however, for many reasons, quite made up my mind to go to Wellington, and not to settle finally at Port Cooper till after learning something tolerably decisive about Canterbury from England. Indeed, I ascertained, in the course of the first five minutes' conversation which I had with Thomas, that he had already overdrawn his credits to a considerable extent, and consequently that the works must be suspended as soon as possible. I should, therefore, have literally nothing to superintend or do at Port Cooper, and can employ myself more usefully here in communication with Mr. Fox, the principal agent of the Company, and the other leading men among the colonists, from whom I want to learn as much as possible pertaining to colonial politics, society, and other local subjects. My chief objects in communicating with Thomas were to see what has been done, to ascertain what has been expended, and to give directions for the conduct of future proceedings. The two last were soon accomplished: for the funds being exhausted, there is no difficulty in determining that, until we get more, we must stop. Indeed, a stop would have been come to some time ago, had not Mr. Pox offered, on behalf of the Company (to whom, in case of our failure, the land reverts), to advance a sum in addition to what was originally contemplated, of about £3,500, which Thomas calculates will keep them going, on a reduced scale, until the next advices.

With this arrangement I determined not to interfere, as page 52everything had been settled in conformity with it. I therefore contented myself with directing that no new contracts should be entered into, and that preparations should be made for discontinuing operations at the close of the arrangement now made with Mr. Fox for an extension of credit. In order to get a general idea of the country, I asked Thomas to have a couple of horses taken from the carts and saddled for us; upon these we started to cross the hills into the plain. The track lies up the side of what may fairly be termed a mountain. In fact, it can hardly be called a track at all, and it requires some habit and nerve to keep the saddle. Near the top we both dismounted, and scrambled up the rocks on foot, leading our horses. It is about two miles and a half, in a straight line from the port (Lyttelton), to the nearest point of the plain; and it took us two hours to ride to Deans's farm, which is nine miles off. From the top of the hill there is a perfect view of the whole district intended for our settlement; and I was struck by the accuracy with which its reality corresponded with the idea conveyed by the map. In fact, you have it before you, in the office at Charing Cross, almost as vividly as on the spot.

There is an amphitheatre of mountains, not snow-covered, but snow-sprinkled, and a vast grassy plain, without the smallest apparent inequality on its surface, stretching between them and the sea; absolutely no other feature whatever, except a large lake close to the sea, on the south-west corner of Banks's Peninsula (or rather promontory), and several streams which, from flowing in very deep channels, make a small show at a distance. The promontory itself must contain exceedingly beautiful scenery, as its whole surface consists of hills covered with forest, broken and diversified in outline, and indented by bays, reminding me of the "fields and fiords" of Norway. The hills immediately around Port Cooper alone appear comparatively bare; their character resembles very much that of the mountains which form the "Ogwen Pass" near Bangor, or, perhaps, still more that of page 53the "Bosom of Fann" on Lough. Swilly; for while the Welsh mountain is higher and grander than ours, it would, on the other hand, be very unjust to compare our beautiful dark blue bay to such a paltry lake as Ogwen. The first view of these plains, as of all others that I have seen in New Zealand, is rather disappointing to an English eye: that is, one misses the greenness and luxuriousness which the growth of grass in a country long cultivated and grased over exhibits.

The flax plant, too, which grows largely over them, exactly resembles at a distance that kind of bulrush which we call flags; so that, although in fact the presence of it denotes, as I am told, unerringly, that the soil is sound and sufficiently dry for cultivation, the appearance given by it is that of barren swamps. When we got down into the plain we soon perceived the difference between the real bulrush, which does actually grow in some spots, and the flax. We overtook several of our fellow-passengers, who had started before us, walking, and found them, unaccustomed to new countries as they were, open-mouthed about the want of luxuriant grass. We saw the country to great disadvantage, for there have been six months of almost unprecedented dry weather; but after making allowance for this, I am sure that until it shall have been either broken up or grazed over, no part of it will produce grass to be compared with a soil of equal quality in old countries. There is no difference of opinion, however, so far as I can learn, amongst those who know the country, as to the land in the Canterbury plains being of fully average quality, capable of fattening sheep and cattle, as well as of giving good crops of all kinds. When we arrived at Mr. Deans's farm we had proof of this; for his garden, which never saw or heard of manure, is producing luxuriantly every kind of vegetables and fruit. I never saw a finer show of them—apples, pears, peaches—everything, in short, flourishes. I wish I could send home a specimen of the apples; they look like wax-work.

Mr. Deans has been for several years a settler on these page 54plains. Dissatisfied with Wellington, he came clown here on an exploring expedition, and had judgment enough to foresee and to say that, sooner or later, the plains would be the site of a large settlement. He has been long waiting for it, and was almost tired of his solitary abundance. I am told that two years he had nearly made up his mind to go away. However, he is now rewarded, and I am glad of it; his title has been recognised to 400 acres of land, with 25 acres of wood, close to the site of our intended capital; so it is his own fault if he does not make his fortune. He has 1500 sheep, 303 cattle, and 80 or 40 horses. He grows corn enough for his own consumption, and says he gets from thirty-five to forty bushels of wheat per acre. He has been made a J.P., and administers justice on the bench at Port Cooper, with the Collector of Customs, and the Stipendiary Magistrate from Akaroa. The "bush" beside which Deans's house is placed is exceedingly valuable; it contains fifty-five acres, and it, with one other piece about twice as large, is the only source of supply for wood in the immediate neighbourhood of the "capital." It is strange that there should be so very little, and can only be accounted for on the supposition that the bush has been destroyed gradually by accidental fixes, such as even now threaten and occasionally diminish what is left. I understand that, as we approach the mountains, we find more and larger patches of wood, and along their base stretches a dense, unbroken forest; but on the Port Cooper side of the plains, the main supply must, until the plantations shall have grown up, be derived from Pigeon Bay and the other harbours of Banks's Peninsula. The site of our chief town is laid out on the banks of a river navigable for the largest barges; that is, with more than four feet water, and there is already a constant communication by water between Port Cooper and Pigeon Bay on the one hand, and the surveyors occupied in laying out the site and surveying the neighbourhood of it on the other. By this channel, sawn timber can be laid down at the town for 12s. 6d. per page 55one hundred feet, and fuel for 15s. a cord (I quote the present prices; it is impossible to calculate how far the proportion of demand to supply may be effected by a large colonization), the same as at Port Cooper, and 30 per cent. cheaper than at Dunedin, which is in the middle of woods: a most important fact in illustration of the cheapness of water carriage, and of the facilities which it will afford to us of remedying our deficiency in timber on that part of the plain which is within the reach of water.

The chief work now in progress at Port Cooper is a road over the hills from Lyttelton (the port) to Christchurch (the intended chief town), a distance of 10½ miles. Until this shall be completed, the only mode of conveying goods from the harbour to the plain will be by boats round the heads of the port and up the river before-mentioned, and this will of course only be available in fine weather. The completion of the road is therefore an object of primary importance, as the track over the hills is hardly practicable, even for a horseman.

On our return to the port we found our passengers and crew scattered about, loud in their praises of the progress which had been made in so short a time, as well as of the prospects held out by the settlement. They forget that Thomas has had the spending of a larger sum of money on a given spot than any other pioneer of settlement in this country has had, so that the superiority of his operations is not to be laid altogether to the account of his merits. However, certainly no body of settlers ever found so much done to smooth their path for them as ours will find. Most agricultural produce, except flour, is already cheaper than at Otago. Meat is plentiful at 5½d. per lb.; fresh butter, 1s. per 1b.; "native" cheese, 1s. per 1b.; eggs and milk, apparently varying in price, but generally reasonable enough; potatoes, 4s. 6d. per cwt. The chief supplier of the market is a man named Rhodes, who lives on the opposite side of the harbour from Lyttelton, and who is the only person, besides page 56Deans and those who have bought from the French at Akaroa, whose title to land has been recognized. He has, I understand, 400 acres, and his stock consists of 2500 sheep, and about 300 head of cattle. We dined with Thomas; and there was also a great dinner at the grog-shop, dignified by the name of the "Mitre Hotel," and kept by Major Hornbrook, a field-officer of engineers in the Spanish Legion, who has come down from Wellington on a speculation, and who says he will give £100 a-year to the individual who gets the section on which he has located himself. This gallant officer's cookery and accommodations are very well reported of.

On Saturday evening, Thomas having come off with the gapers which I had asked him to prepare, and two of our young gentlemen who had spent the night at his house, I reported myself to the captain as ready to sail; but the wind being foul, he gave us permission to land again, and I went off in Thomas's whale boat to see part of the road works. We pulled a couple of miles down the harbor, and landed at the Maori village, which we had seen as we sailed up. The women were squalling as usual about the doors, some wrapped up in blankets of different colours, others with nothing but coloured shifts upon them, their faces horribly tattooed, and their black thick hair shining with oil. Their huts are made of grass, and each of them has a hole in the ground before it, where they cook and bake. Thomas has brought 120 Maori laborers from the Northern Island, and considers his having induced them to come, and kept them in good humour while with him, as no small feat. Every one told him it was impossible, one great difficulty being that the tribes from which he took these men had, ten or twelve years ago, made an incursion into the Port Cooper country, when they killed and ate the greater portion of the aboriginal inhabitants, so that a feud of blood prevails between the survivors and the conquerors. It does not seem to have been prosecuted, however, and all agree—the Maoris themselves, their white superintendent, and Thomas—that the experiment has been perfectly page 57successful. He has been paying them 2s. 6d. a-day, when well, and 1s. when sick— this last a bad arrangement, as he admits. By having these natives at his back, he gets a great pull upon the white labourers, who would otherwise have him at their mercy. He thinks, however, that the whites are, as yet, cheaper at 4s. 6d. a day than the Maoris at 2s. 6d. We climbed the hill to where the road passes over it, and looked down the other side upon the plain. It is two miles from Lyttelton to the top of the ridge, and two miles down from thence to the plain. The road is a tremendous piece of work on the harbor side—great part of it being carried through solid rock, which can only be removed by blasting. It reminds one of the steepest parts of the Holyhead road; only that the precipice here is far higher, and at the bottom there is sea instead of river. The line, to my unprofessional eye, seems very well engineered, being nowhere steeper than one in twenty—that is, what mail coachmen used to call good trotting ground; but the expense is very great, and the time which it will require must also, I fear, be considerable, the nature of the ground not allowing an unlimited application of force.

We were amused with seeing the Maoris at work. They struck, shovelled, &c., altogether, keeping time to a song, like sailors at a windlass. We spoke to several, and they seemed most civil, good-natured fellows, laughing immoderately at our questions, and chattering broken English very fast in reply. They all expressed themselves delighted with the treatment they had received, and said they were taking home "plenty money" with them. They are Christians, and, I am told, pray together regularly morning and evening, before and after leaving off work. To our eyes they appeared nearly equal to average Europeans in stature and muscular development; but they have not, in fact, the same strength and endurance, and, above all, they seem deficient in the power of steady continuous work. They do everything by fits and starts, and they must be coaxed, like children, by talking to page 58them, or singing to them, or in some artificial way stimulating their vanity and emulation.

It will cost more than £7000 to finish the road, without which the plain can hardly be called available for settlement; and, with the labour at our disposal, a considerable time will be required, too, for its completion. However, Thomas has so evidently done his best, has spared himself so little, and has evinced so much zeal, that I thought it would be cruel, as well as useless, to find fault with him, except in the mildest form, for his errors in judgment.

The only point on which I feel not so charitably disposed towards him is the excess of expenditure over credit, inasmuch as nothing could be more explicit or imperative than his instructions on this point, and with ordinary foresight he might easily have adhered to them. There is, however, something very satisfactory, and useful too, in creating, at the earliest possible moment, that appearance of civilization and finish which young settlements are so long deficient in under our present system; and I feel sure that the advanced and prepared look of Lyttelton will materially influence the character of the colony, by encouraging and welcoming the first settlers, and producing upon their minds pleasant first impressions. Much of the deterioration in manner, costume, and even in more weighty matters, which we all see and deplore in colonists, may doubtless be traced to the coarse, rough, scrambling life which they are compelled to live during the early days of settlement, and which becomes habitual and traditionary among them. A little care and expense in preparing for them decent habitations, passable roads, and such like elements of civilization, would enable them to keep up old-country habits from the first, and perhaps modify the whole character and fortune of the growing people. These are things which ought to be done by the Government of a colonizing nation. It is in default of such performance of duty by our Government that mercantile companies and amateur associations are compelled to page 59attempt a task for which they are by no means equally fitted; for a mercantile company must necessarily, in the main, be actuated by mercenary motives (I do not use the word in a bad sense); and amateur associations are generally deficient both in earnestness and in means.

We have no choice, however, and must work with such means as we have; and I think all those who see the Canterbury settlement will admit that, as I have said before, no first body of colonists from Britain have ever found so much done to prepare for and welcome them as ours will find. In fact, difficulties in the usual sense of the word, as applied to colonization, there will be none: no roads to make, no forests to clear, no want of food or lodging, or of facilities for choosing or settling upon land. Many things will, no doubt, be expensive at first; for example, wood, some articles of provisions, and labour; but every man's enterprise may be made the subject of a calculation on paper, as in an old country. Humanly speaking, there is no uncertainty or chance of disappointment to provide against. He may lose his money; but if he does (again, I say, humanly speaking) it will be his own fault, and not the result of obstacles which he could not foresee. I feel certain that a vast deal of discontent and mutual bad feeling takes its origin from the discomforts and embarrassments experienced by men thrown with their wives and children upon a bare shore, at the beginning of winter, without a road, or a clearing, or a Sign of civilization to welcome or to cheer them.

While we were absent with Thomas, the captain, with some of the passengers, had gone up to Mr. Rhodes's farm, and came back in the evening, highly delighted both with him and with what they had seen and heard. I am amused at seeing how those who had been the most inveterate sneerers and croakers about our settlement during the voyage, have changed their tone since they have been on the spot; very often, indeed, with almost as little reason as they had for their former prejudices. Even the disappointment of those page 60who expected far more luxuriant vegetation on the plains, has entirely yielded to the "unanimous testimony of men who are practically acquainted with the results of the soil and the climate in combination, as regards the production of crops. Our explorers brought back some magnificent "cobs" of Indian corn, perfectly developed and ripened, and some water melons, also perfectly ripe, both of which the Maoris had grown in their gardens. Rhodes, too, not only spoke highly of the agricultural capabilities of the country, but backed his testimony by exhibiting a very full and flourishing garden. In the course of the afternoon, a brigantine came into the harbor from Wellington, chartered by Thomas to take back the Maoris to their own country, which is the central part of the Northern Island. They had bargained with him to be taken back before the commencement of the cold weather; but they will be delighted to return if required in the spring, and I have no doubt that this experiment will lay the foundation for a regular supply of native labour to the Middle Island.

As yet it has been found impossible to make use of the Maoris for farm work. They require the stimulus of society and superintendence; but from idleness and cannibalism to gang-work and Christianity is a much longer step than from their present step to civilization—so that we may hope to see one instance at least of a reclaimed and amalgamated native race.

Thomas is very proud and happy at the successful result of the new plan of surveying. It is very cheap, not more, he assures me, than five farthings an acre for the whole district, and very accurate and satisfactory. The colonial surveyors, who began by disapproving, have all read their recantation; and Captain Stokes, of the Acheron, a most competent judge, has told him that he has seen nothing south of the line to equal the maps that Thomas has shown him. He has triangulated about 700,000 acres, and promised that by July the maps of at least 300,000 acres of the best agricultural land page 61will have been completed in detail. After that our progress must be regulated by our financial accounts from home.

The supposed discovery of bituminous coal is not confirmed; but there is undoubtedly some anthracite; and at different places, especially along the Courtenay River, considerable quantities of peat. It is very fortunate that carts can traverse the plain in every direction (except of course where rivers intervene), so that the deficiency of wood, though very important, is more easily remediable than it would be elsewhere. However, the first settlers must fence with banks and ditches, and plant gorse and quicks upon them; and they must also make up their minds to pay a high price for their fuel. This is the one drawback to what would otherwise be an incomparable district for settlement; and its existence should be known and published to prevent deception and disappointment. There are quantities of wild pigs on the plain, and quail and wild ducks innumerable; I wish I had a good pointer and retriever. Probably the Indian sport of boar-hunting with the spear on horseback will be introduced, as the country is specially fitted for it. I cannot bring myself to wish for foxes; but deer and hares we must positively have, as well as partridges and pheasants. There are a pair of partridges at Dunedin, which, after being imported with much difficulty, turned out to be both cocks; so, as I cannot hear of any others in the colony, I fear the unfortunate animals are doomed to spend the rest of their lives in cheerless celibacy. If the Association goes on and flourishes, it could not do better than send out by each ship that it charters, pairs of these animals, until it receives intelligence that a sufficient number to make the propagation of the species certain have safely landed. It is impossible, of course, to draw a general conclusion from our limited observations of the climate, but it is worth remarking that, though we have been just a month in or on the coasts of New Zealand, at the end of autumn, we have had only one wet day, and not above three or four that were showery or otherwise un-page 62pleasant. In general the sky has been almost cloudless, and the temperature pleasant—quite warm and sunny in the day-time, and cool at night with heavy dews. On Sunday morning (the 14th) we sailed from Port Cooper with a light southerly breeze, which died away when we were about twenty-five miles from the harbor, and before evening it came on to blow from the north-east. Since that time we have been beaten about or lying-to with the wind dead on end for a week, and only anchored in Wellington Harbor this morning between midnight and one o'clock. It is a land-locked lake, about six miles long by four broad, surrounded by low hills, partly covered with grass, and partly with wood. The town is much more considerable than I expected; in fact, what the Yankees would call "quite a smart city." It is scattered over a large expanse of beach and hill; and there is a general air of bustle and stir about the port which is very pleasant to see. I have just received a visit from Mr. Fox, the New Zealand Company's principal agent, and accepted an invitation to my wife and myself to dine with him this evening. The Woodstock, now in port, is to sail direct for England in two days: so we shall have an opportunity of sending our letters by her bags.