The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 7, Issue 5 (September 1, 1932)

“Pember Bay.”

“Pember Bay.”

The eastern and north-eastern end of the lake, bordered with some tall timber to the water's edge, was named by Sir Walter Buller “Pember Bay,” in honour of the late Hon. W. Pember Reeves, who visited Papaitonga shortly before he went to London to take up the post of Agent-General for New Zealand. Mr. Reeves cruised about the bright waters in a Rob-Roy canoe, and he gave expression to his admiration of the hallowed place in a poem, which perhaps is not so well known as his other verses. Here are three stanzas from his poem “In Pember Bay”:

Nought shakes the ferns, whose interlacing fronds,
Like seabirds' wings, uplift their giant pinions;
Nought stirs the brakes whose creepers' myriad bonds
Guard green dominions.
Look, while the sunset clings to yonder range,
Look, while the lake gleams silver in its ray,
And pray that though all beauty else may change,
This scene may stay.

Suburban Transport on the N.Z.R. (From the W. W. Stewart Collection.) An Auckland suburban train entering Mt. Eden station

Suburban Transport on the N.Z.R.
(From the W. W. Stewart Collection.)
An Auckland suburban train entering Mt. Eden station

Here the wild bird, from ancient coverts pressed,
May seek asylum by this silent mere,
And though no other glade or wave give rest,
May find it here.

When Mr. Reeves visited the place, Papaitonga was a tapu place for bird life, and it was a pretty sight to watch the duck and teal and the dabchicks sail about the quiet waters in security. In the shooting season duck congregated here in thousands, for refuge. The white swan was here, too, filling in the picture with its graceful shape and stately motion.