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Letters from Early New Zealand

Lyttelton. November 18th, 1851

page 250
Lyttelton. November 18th, 1851.

My Dear Mother,

I must begin another letter, it seems so long since I wrote my first part; but we have been away, and not writing, for more than a fortnight, at Akaroa, which I have at last managed to see; and very glad I am to have done, though the going there was quite an undertaking. Colonel Campbell, whom I told you was sent there to decide old land claims under the French Company, by whom Akaroa was originally settled twelve years ago, is a very unsatis-factory person to deal with, and my husband had to go over there, to watch how things were going on, while the claims were being decided; so, as it was a good time of year, it was settled that I should go too, and William, and at last I made up my mind to take Arthur, too. We left Captain and Mrs. Simeon in the house, and started on October 29th, in a Maori boat; sometimes sailing, and sometimes rowing. We went about four miles up this harbour, then eight of open sea, and then four again up Pigeon Bay, where we arrived in the afternoon, and found it quite far enough; for though we had a very smooth day, for this place, there was swell enough to make me perfectly ill nearly all the way, and Arthur had a touch of it, but luckily slept more than half the time. We went to stay for the night at Mrs. Sinclair's. I have told you about them, and about the two daughters who came to stay here, at the time of our Regatta. They are very nice simple people, excessively Scotch, and old-fashioned, and live a regular colonial life, according to one's old ideas of it; plenty of cows, and milk, and butter, and cream, and doing everything for themselves; they have not a servant in the house. They have just built quite a pretty new house in a most lovely spot; it is in a little bay near the head of the harbour, which they have quite to themselves. There is a beautiful stream under the windows, at one side of the house, with cold clear water, that you page 251would not know how to appreciate, but we from Lyttelton do. It is shaded, too, with trees, quite to the beach. There is a garden in front, with a great many common flowers, and some English grass laid down, and another is being made behind the house, where they are clearing away some trees; but the rest of the valley stretches away into very thick bush, with fern trees, and birds singing so loud that they almost wake you in the morning. Arthur was almost wild with delight, and we enjoyed the change just as one does getting into the country, after a long stay in London. The day, too, was lovely, and it was the beginning of a lovely fortnight. The next morning we started at about ten, in a boat, to the head of the harbour; and there met Frank Sinclair, with his pony, on which I was to travel, with Arthur, as much of the road as I could manage to stick on. We began with four miles of a track through thick bush, so that I had to balance myself on a man's saddle with one hand, holding Arthur on in front, and with the other guarding our faces, as well as might be, against the branches and briars, through which we had to duck and dive in the most active way. Every now and then we had large ditches, where the pony must jump, and get through as it could; or a large tree fallen exactly across the path; and a large stream wanders through the valley and crosses the path eleven times. As I am very discreet, now, in riding, specially when Arthur is in front (or, as my husband expresses it, "the greatest sneak he ever saw") I used to dismount at any intimation of a difficult place, not feeling at all prepared for feats of horsemanship; but we did stay on to pass through the stream once, where the water was rather deep and the bank steep and muddy on the other side. I should have stuck on well enough; but the saddle was old, the girths broke with the strain of getting up the bank, and down we both fell, saddle and all, over the pony's tail, I 'lighting on my head and shoulders and Arthur, who scarcely looked surprised, very comfortably on me. I ought to have been hurt, by all natural rules, but somehow or other, I am thankful to say, we were not either of us even scratched, though, of course, it was very unpleasant. We got on slowly enough, for when we walked the road was page 252rough, and Arthur's legs were not long enough to surmount the obstacles without frequent tumbles. His father carried him sometimes. William carried the bag, with our needful for a fortnight's quiescence, and a cloak in case of bad weather; and a Maori carried my husband's small port-manteau with his needful, and some business papers, for the sum of 10s.; the distance being nine miles. Some of our people at home would have thought that rather high pay, but the Maoris think they cannot ask too much, and we could, besides, get no one else. At the end of the bush we halted for luncheon, and then had a climb up a hill of perhaps a mile and a half; the first part through fern, and very hot, the last half through bush, and so steep that it was difficult enough to get up, even on foot. From the top we had a magnificent view; the whole of the valley and the harbour, and across about ninety miles of sea, beyond, to the snowy Kaikoras; my husband thinks it is the finest view he has seen in N.Z. Then, as you go down on the other side, you catch, through the first opening in the wood, beautiful views of Akaroa harbour, which is very large, and divided into endless smaller bays by rocky points, most of them magnificently wooded. The descent is longer than the ascent, but the view is lovely all the way. Then you ascend another smaller hill, and descend on to the very shores of the harbour, through one of the most splendid banks of wood that you can conceive; and then our troubles were at an end, for we saw the boat coming for us, that was to carry us up the harbour to the town (if so it may be called) of Akaroa. It is a delightful journey, except that it is a little too difficult; there is always some little anxiety about getting child and pony safe to the end. If I could have walked all the way independently, with my husband, I cannot fancy any better fun in the way of expedition. However, soon after six, we were all safe on the beach. Arthur, who had thoroughly enjoyed his day, prudently recruited himself by sleeping, for the hour or more that we were in the boat, and we all went up to tea with Mr. and Mrs. Watson.

Mr. W. is the Resident Magistrate there, and I knew him before, as he was staying with us for some days in June. His house is a very snug little cottage of three rooms and page 253a loft, about half a mile from the beach, up such a pretty English-looking road, half grown over with short English grass and clover. Then you go through a very neat gate up a nicely kept little patch of lawn, a beautiful stream on one side, and on the other a high hedge of roses, the monthly ones in full blow, and the cabbage provence, etc., just beginning. You may imagine Arthur's delight with the stream; it is just like our Welsh ones, full of stones and pools and had ducks living on it, and at the steps opposite the back door, a party of tubs which, with a stick and careful guiding, could be made to go through many very interesting nautical movements. I think the stream was quite as attractive to me as to him, it looked so very like home. Here we have no brook, only, as we call it, a gully, dry already, or very nearly so; and the rivers on the plains are quite of a different kind, like deep running canals, as clear as crystal, running very fast, too, and with rather deep banks. Mrs. Watson is a very nice good-natured little creature, and Mr. Watson pre-eminently so, and quite a gentleman by nature. He had hardly been out of Ireland until he came to N.Z. eight years ago, under Captain Fitzroy's protection; and as soon as he was sufficiently settled he wrote to Mrs. Watson to come out to him, and they were married in Wellington three years ago. They were as civil and kind to us as possible, and insisted on our living with them all the day, for the whole time we were there, and at night we retired to a house on the beach, where they had a room to let; a funny little "lean to", with a transparency all round of light, between the boards and the floor. But it was so warm that this did not signify at all. William lived at a Coffee House close to us, and when we wanted anything to eat at our apartment used to bring us from there fresh milk and butter, and excellent home-made bread. There is no baker in Akaroa, neither is there a butcher; but those who keep such things now and then slaughter a sheep, or a "beef", and then people hear of it, and send for what they want, and salt what they cannot eat while it is fresh. The price is lower than it is here, and wild pork, which is excellent there, is to be had at 3d. a lb. Anyone can get it too, for nothing, who will take the page 254trouble to go out hunting with a good dog; you are sure of plenty of sport. So the people live very cheaply and well. There is plenty of fish in the harbour. One man, while we were there, went out in a boat for three hours, and came back with more than a hundred of a kind of rock codling, something like a very large coarse whiting, which is also very good, a little salted. They split them, and dry them in the sun. Milk is 3d. a quart, eggs 1s. a dozen, butter 1s. or 15d. a lb., so that going from here, people feel in the midst of plenty, and the beauty of the place keeps them in good humour. The climate, too, is very pleasant, for they get our beautiful bright days, without our wind and dust. Mr. Aylmer, the chaplain of the Lady Nugent, who was so much horrified with this place and with Christchurch that he meant to go on to Nelson, or home, is now so enchanted with Akaroa that he says he hopes to lay his bones there, and all his family are equally contented.

At Akaroa, we all at once found summer; for some days, it was so hot that we could not attempt to walk until quite the evening, and there are delightful walks in every direction. The harbour is made up of an infinity of small bays, in the largest of which the town stands, and it is in every sense a most beautiful one; very safe, and easy to get into. It was a great whaling station, a few years ago; that is, several large whale ships used often to come in together to refit, and they have helped to make the place as large as it is; but it has got on very slowly, as far as actual progress goes. The place seemed to me very foreign, from the people about being mostly French; their houses, too, are some-what different in pattern to our English wooden houses. They are rather larger, with larger doors and windows; more pretentious and less snug, and now that some of them are getting out of repair, they have a somewhat desolate look. There is a little flax swamp, too, near the beach, in what is called the French part of the town, where we were. The English part is still prettier, and you see everywhere gardens, and abundance of fruit-trees. We had asparagus until I was quite tired of it. Plenty of water, too, everywhere. There are four good streams along the bay. I am a bad hand at describing, though, and what I have written does page 255not look a bit like Akaroa, but you must please to imagine it very pretty, and looking doubly so to us from comparison. We spent, altogether, a very pleasant time there, and made one expedition in a boat to see some of the distant bays, and made a fire in the bush and toasted, Maori fashion, on a bit of stick, a fish, that we got from a boat we passed. The men in it had been fishing an hour and a half, and caught seventy-five. Mr. Watson talks with a tremendous Carlow brogue, which amused me very much; the simplest thing sound so funny when they are said so, and he had staying with him a young lady cousin, just come out from Ireland, direct, with a still worse one; and to hear him laughing at her was inimitable. My husband said hers is a very vulgar one, but I am not yet a connoisseur on the subject, and to me, brogue is brogue, excepting that in the North of Ireland the people seem to speak almost pure Scotch. Poor Mr. Watson is sadly put out by Col. Campbell's visit, and his vexatious, underhand way of doing business. The colonel has such an overweening idea of his own importance, too, that he thought fit to treat poor Mr. Watson (who hates anything that interferes with a quiet life) most rudely, but I will spare you on this subject. We were at Akaroa for very nearly a fortnight, and at last had, for our departure, such a misty, doubtful morning, that we should have put it off, if my husband had not been a little anxious to get back, as he always is; we have been waiting for the arrival of the C. Assoc. Surveyor, and when he came, my husband did not like to lose a day. He is always quite nervous when he is away from business, lest anything should be happening, so that it is scarcely any holiday to him when he is out of the office for a day. However, after we had got to the head of the harbour in our way back, it rained so much that I did not feel inclined to undertake our journey over the hill, where you must go on the whole nine miles without shelter of any kind, except what the dripping bushes may give; and we began to talk to the boatman about the possibility of our sleeping at his house, which is a sort of public house, but of very small pretensions. He did not encourage us, for he said he had nothing fit to offer us, but that if we like it, we might have "un bon lit", as he and his wife could go page 256into the other room, and so it was at last arranged. It cleared before 3 o'clock, and we tried to make our start, but progressed so slowly, and saw so much rain on the hills, that we thought it wiser to return, and it was lucky for us that we did so, for we were ten hours in getting to Mrs. Sinclair's the next day. We spent the afternoon in walking about, and visiting one or two other settlers, all French, at the same little piece of flat land as the boatman's, and as it got dusk, went back to our "hotel", where we were promised for the souper the dinner that was not ready before the attempted start, and whose blank we had supplied with an unlimited amount of bread and butter. It was a cock, whom our host had, very soon after our arrival, sallied forth with a gun to attack, but, as the gun would miss fire, a dog was at last unchained, and he soon laid him dead at our feet; and in another half hour he was simmering in the pot, in the form of a stew with herbs. Before our start, Madame Lièvre, the nice little fat wife, would not let us have it; it was not enough done, and then the cock, as she assured us, was not very young. However, in the evening it was excellent, with a salad dressed with cream, and some coffee. We had such a funny little room, with no window, only a shutter and small spaces in the wall, through which the bright sun shone next morning, and made us all get up very early; however, when we began to think about starting, the pony that was to help us on our way had slipped its tether rope, and it was ten o'clock before it could be recovered, and we all set in movement. Mr. Lièvre gave us a little pair of young rabbits, and lent us a donkey to carry the bag, instead of William, and then we began our march, after a very affectionate parting with our hosts and their very jolly little baby, a "prize child" of five months. Our progress was very slow. William was not well, and could scarcely walk at all up hill, and then we missed our road, where the track crossed a little swamp, and was not easy to find, and we lost some little time in getting right again. The hill seemed very long, and yet, when my husband, Arthur, and I, got to the top and sat a long time to rest, we still heard and saw nothing of the pony and its boy, William and the donkey. John, at last, went down page 257to see after them, and found that in climbing up the path, in one very steep stony place, the donkey had fairly rolled over backwards, rabbits, bag and all, and they were very long in picking him up again. You can fancy our slow progress when we got down the hill again, and had to push our way through the bush. At last we did get through safely, and without accident, to Pigeon Bay, and then had to get a boat, and go across to the Maori pah, and arrange to have a boat to take us to Lyttelton next day; and by the time we had pushed across again to Mrs. Sinclair's, it was after eight o'clock and quite dark. We were very glad to get in, and were most kindly received, of course, for they are the kindest people it is possible to conceive, and we were all tired and very hungry; for we had brought nothing with us but a very little bread, not expecting to be later in arriving than about two. The Sinclair's eldest daughter is married to the captain of a whaler, who had returned from a nine months' voyage while we were at Akaroa, and brought home innumerable curiosities, but alas! no whales or oil; having never been fast to one, as the saying is, during the whole voyage. Most of his time had been spent in Behring Straits, and he had a number of beautiful fur dresses worn by the natives there; one lady's dress (which by the by she took off and presented to him herself) quite surprised us, from its fashionable make. It had a frill round the throat, and down the opening in front, made of a long whitish fur, and the same was applied round the sleeves, which were made exactly in the same shape as the newest shape of open sleeves that we have out here. There were a number of curious arms, etc., but what, I think, surprised me most was a doll's dress, about six inches in length, made exactly like the big one, frill and all, and lined with feathers. I thought it a great fact that their children should have dolls, for they are amongst the least enlightened of the Esquimaux and are not even cooking animals; for they have literally no fuel, and no fire, except what they have in their oil lamps, and live in holes underground, upon raw or dried fish. The voyage home took them to some of the South Sea Islands, and there were other curiosities, from hot climates, and a few pineapples and cocoanuts. Captain Gay himself had page 258gone off to Hobart Town, the very day that we arrived, taking his wife and child with him, for a short trip. She is the nicest of the Sinclairs, I think, and I was quite sorry to miss her. The next day (my birthday) we spent at Mrs. Sinclair's, for the Maoris came early to say that the wind was too strong for them to go out to sea. It was raining, too, and I was not sorry to have another day of country.

November 15th. We did get safely back to Lyttelton, starting before eight and arriving a little before twelve, just as the sea breeze set in. The strong wind of the day before had blown from the land, so the sea was perfectly smooth, and I got home without disgracing myself. Though we had abused Lyttelton amongst the beauty of Akaroa, we were so much delighted to be at home again, with everything, comparatively, so very comfortable and clean, that even the place seemed almost beautiful. The garden, too, had improved wonderfully. Powles had been working there, and Captain Parsons, who had arrived from Nelson soon after we left, and been established by Powles in our spare room, had been up soon after four every morning, watering the garden till breakfast-time, and everything we had sowed was showing the effects of all this labour. I think I told you that our little patch is drained far too completely, and unless much pains is taken in watering, the things gradually die down. Captain Parsons sometimes carried up as many as seventy buckets of water into the garden in one morning, and it was quite cheering to see the garden looking quite green, giving good promise of everything; the little bits of sweet-briar that were sent me some months ago from Wellington, were positively sweet, and full of leaf, and so were the rose-trees. We do not aspire to flowers for this year. The first thing was to get our letter by the Sir George Pollock, which had been in nearly a week, and I don't know why, but I had somehow frightened myself about those letters, and quite dreaded the idea of opening them. At last I saw the daguerreotype that Sara has sent me of Vernon, and that gave me courage to read her letter; and then I went to Frances'. You can imagine my thankfulness to find nothing worse than there was. Though indeed it is far from comfortable to hear of William's scarlet fever "not bad yet". page 259But I must hope and pray for the best. The Cornwall is nearly due now (December Ist). I am very sorry, too, for all your trouble about the servants, specially nurse's going, which will be, I am sure, a sad inconvenience to you, and for poor Coombes no better, but worse. I shall miss them both very much if I ever do get home; and no schoolroom tea! and Frances so very big, I suppose. I had a letter, too, from Mr. Weld, our friend out here, who went home with Mr. Fox, and promised to call upon you. But I was disappointed to find he had not seen you, as his friends were all in the country, and he of course stayed sometime to see them. At the end he said he was just going to London, and would call upon you, but I am afraid found you gone. I hope he may see Sara though. I am so much vexed about that box, it seems as if it would not arrive, and then if you are gone, there will be such a bother in sending after you; but, however, one must resign oneself to such contretemps, and hope for better luck another time. I am glad to hear of poor Charles going to Ireland, and to Killegar, something so different will be good for him, even in health, I hope; but I wish my husband had been there to meet him. For myself, my wishes never can get across the Channel. I can not get much beyond a certain spot, about twenty miles from Conway, eighteen from Denbigh, and so on. Mr. Weld's description of getting home was sadly tantalizing, and he seemed to find all well…. Homme propose, et Dieu dispose, and so I sometimes think almost with more dread than pleasure of getting back to England, if it is ever to be.

We have here been very sad lately about poor Captain Parsons. He took, as you must know, the appointment of Harbour-Master here; only a little more than £100 a year, but still, with what he has, that made a beginning for his family, and he wrote home for them to come out at once. He himself was to finish off his engagement with the ship at Nelson, and return here, sending on the first mate, in charge of the Ly. Nt., and his son, Jack (about eighteen), to take all messages, etc., home, and to fetch out Mrs. Parsons and the children. His trouble was that, from gold-digging reports in Australia, the wages for seamen were so high, at the time he got to Nelson, that after his men knew that he page 260was going to leave the ship, they every one ran away, except his own son, the mates and Jim Truelove. The captain chartered a small vessel, to bring him down here immediately, about November Ist, and as fresh hands were not to be had there, he engaged twelve men, as soon as he got here, and sent the little vessel back with them, remaining here himself. Well all seemed right, everything was arranged, and they were going to sea that very afternoon, when the first mate, Jack and some more, went on shore for the last time, with some papers, in the same "gig" in which we have so often been; and meeting a great swell, though they were only rowing, the boat was swamped, and poor Jack and the first mate were both drowned. The others were saved, with some difficulty, as the boats were afraid of venturing to them, there was so much swell on the bar, just where the accident happened. Well, the poor captain had engaged the little vessel for a second trip, to bring down some things that he wanted from Nelson, and she came off directly with the sad news, and I cannot attempt to describe his distress when it arrived. He was so very fond of that boy, as he is indeed of all his family, and then he said his mother thought so much of him; and then he had to give up his prospects here, and go off at once to Nelson, to take the ship home himself, as he had no one to replace the first mate who could be trusted with her; and so, a few days after the news came, he was off, in sad grief, crying like a child when he wished us good-bye, and we not much better. He says he is now so sick of the ship, he would give anything not to be at sea again, and that as soon as ever he gets home, he shall sell and dispose of all he has, and bring his wife and five children out here, and I hope they may do well, for he has something, and a very little goes a long way out here, where money is scarce, and by that time (D.V.) things will be cheaper. He keeps his section in the town here, and is to have a house built on it directly. As they will not require a great deal to make them happy, I think they will most likely find it answer very well, and at all events it will be a great matter that he should go home with some plan fixed, and one that will give them plenty of occupation, when he has to break the bad news to his wife. A day or two before page 261he left us, we got a message one morning at about seven (November 25th) that the Bishop had just anchored and hoped presently "to introduce Mrs. Selwyn". At eight o'clock we saw him at the early Service, and he came back with us to breakfast. Then he went on board and brought off Mrs. Selwyn and the little boy Johnnie, who is exactly the Bishop over again, no other difference whatever, except that necessary between seven and forty-two. Mrs. Selwyn is just the same age as the Bishop, within, at least, six months,—and exactly the woman you would expect his wife to be, excepting that she is very delicate. She is rather tall and thin, and has very dark, but small, eyes and a very clear, but sickly, complexion. She has not been well lately, and has quite a faded look, but her features are good, and I think she must have been very pretty; she now looks worn with anxiety, and has quite a painful expression of face. It is true she has enough to make her anxious. Last year, for instance, her husband was away from her, in two expeditions, ten months out of the twelve, and during his absence their little girl of a few months, a great treasure, died. You cannot be with her without seeing that she is perfectly good and charming, and she has quite a lively manner with children; but in general it seems rather an effort to her to mix in society. You feel afraid to speak to her, lest she should have the trouble of answering. I can see her now, as she sat in the evening, at tea and afterwards, in the corner of the sofa, with a piece of paper over her side of the lamp for a shade, and looking as if she would fall asleep, if it were not for some great pain. For the first four nights they were here, the Bishop wished her to sleep on board, lest she should get unseasoned, for she is a bad sailor and only likes better being on board than being left alone at home.

I must not omit to mention another ball which took place on the night of their arrival, and was given on a scale of unrivalled splendour by the four bachelors who live together in what we call Singleton House: Mr. Hanmer, Mr. Wortley, Mr. Maunsell and Mr. Bowen. They had taken the greatest possible pains with all their arrangements, had a large porch made over the door, etc., for the night, and quite a smooth floor, which is a most pleasing variety. There page 262was a very recherché supper, too, I believe, but after four dances we came away. Also, the week before, the nicest of the Misses Townsend was married to our Doctor McDonald and we, or rather I, had to go to the wedding, and we went to the ball in the evening for about the same time. Also the day before we got home from Akaroa, a grand ball took place on board the Canterbury. I was so glad to find it over, for we should have had to go, and besides all the bother of going off on a rather rough night, I know I should have been ill. Mr. Townsend and some more on board were. But you see we are very gay. You can imagine that our time was pretty well taken, as long as the Bishop was here. I had a very long letter to copy for my husband, and I really had scarcely ever a moment. Now, to give you an idea, I will tell you how Friday passed. Soon after eight, the Bishop came to breakfast, and at nine, on that day, we went to the Morning Service, which was to open a Clerical Meeting; about half an hour after I got back, Mrs. Cookson who is one of the nicest people, I think the nicest, we have had out, came in with two children. As she was going, Mrs. Selwyn arrived, so she paid all her visit over again, talked of mutual friends, and so on, and as I was handing her out, in came Mrs. Jacobs, and paid a long visit, and as she went out, in came Mrs. Puckle (I think you must know all the names now) and two gentlemen from Port Phillip, and going back came to say good-bye, she stayed very long, and promised to come back to dinner (at two), and when she went, I got Mrs. Selwyn, who was quite overdone, to come to my room and lie on the bed (Captain Parsons being still in his downstairs) and to stay there until after her dinner, and I came quickly down, and wrote about half a dozen lines, when in came Captain Simeon to receive my congratulations on the birth of a little girl, and his wife so well. Then came, while he was still here, Mrs. Puckle back to dinner, and presently the Bishop; and Mrs. Puckle sat till 4.30, and then came back to tea. Well, when she went, I wrote about six lines again, and then the Townsends came, and then Mrs. Selwyn came down, and then I forget what the rest was till tea-time, but I know it was in the same line; and then, in the middle of tea, I had to go out and wish poor page 263Captain Parsons good-bye; and the Clerical Meeting lasted all day, and till 11.30 at night, and so the Bishop and my husband had to go off to it again, and people kept coming in that night till we had to make tea three or four times over, some of them quite strangers. I was as much tired as if I had walked over to Christchurch, with talking and making company all day. For the last four nights of their stay, the Bishop, Mrs. Selwyn and the little boy, slept here, for it was really too great a fatigue for anyone so delicate as she is to begin and end the day with an expedition in a boat, not always on a very smooth sea. On Sunday, the Bishop had a hurried breakfast here, and went off to the Church for a Maori Service at eight. It lasted very long, for eighteen adults were baptized who had been preparing ever since his former visit here; we did not get in for our service until just eleven. (You will be glad to hear E. Lewis was confirmed, and stayed for the Communion, and "Charity" too.) He stayed in the Church and a Confirmation was held, he preached for the Australian Mission, and with the Communion Service, it was over just at two; then he and my husband got on their horses, and rode to Mrs. Puckle's, where they had engaged to dine on their way to Christchurch, where there was a Confirmation also, in the evening, and the Bishop again preached, and they got home to tea here at about nine. He had been eight hours in Church, taking part or all of the services; but he is never tired. He arrived here only a fortnight after leaving Auckland, having been meantime at the Chatham Islands for several days; from here he intended to go to Nelson, and from there to Wellington; and after his business there was finished, Mrs. Selwyn was to go home alone, and he, leaving the ship, is to take a walk of a thousand miles through the country, calling at all different Maori stations where there are Christians, and calling at Auckland, for a few days, in his way up to the extreme North of the Island. He spent one long day here at the school, which he was much pleased with. Indeed, he was very complimentary, for him, to us, this time, and seemed very well satisfied with the advance we had made in different ways. Mrs. Selwyn even admired this place very much, but she was not well enough to attempt going page 264over to see Christchurch. One day, when she rode to the top of the hill to see the view of the Plains, the day changed just in time to meet her on the top with a good blow and driving mist, and she was, besides, completely tired, with the shaking of coming down the hill. The Bishop, I thought, looking rather older than last year, and he has, besides, taken to wearing trowsers under his long coat, instead of the gaiters he had last year; which is to my eye very incorrect, but I hope it may be only a temporary alteration, from his having hurt one leg very much on the shin, and it is so often knocked that it cannot get well. The first morning he came on shore he knocked it so badly in getting —(a page here is missing)—… is not quite so pretty as the little Undine, which was only twenty-one tons and scarcely safe for some of his long voyages; besides which he could not have Mrs. Selwyn with it, for more than a day or two, the accommodation was so very small and bad. He says she is not to be called a yacht, but belonging to the Australian Mission, which he is so much devoted to. He had been on it for five months, just before he picked up Mrs. Selwyn at Auckland, on his way here, and had been to several of the most savage and "undiscovered" islands, and had collected altogether thirteen boys, whom these savages had somehow or other been induced to give up to his care, and brought them to his College. He says that in any island from which he has once had a boy, he is always perfectly safe. But he is not fond of allowing that there is much danger at any time. One of the schoolmasters here is anxious to go as a Missionary to some of these places, and when we told him so, he said, "Well, only before he goes he must count the cost well, for anything, even Maori accommodation here, would be luxury compared to what he would find there"; and I added, "Besides, I suppose, some risk for his life"; "Oh!", he said, "the risk would not last long, not more than a year or two!—unless some adverse tribe to the one he lived upon should prove the strongest and carry him off (!!) or unless they happened to ascribe any unforeseen calamity or epidemic, to his presence before he had time to teach them better," which seemed to me, I must own, a tolerably sufficient amount of risk.

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When the Bishop left, we imagined the Governor to be at Nelson, and so Captain Simeon asked, and obtained, a passage for himself to go up there to see him himself, about this business of the Resident Magistrateship. The business has increased so very much, lately, that my husband cannot get through all he has to do, and has had to write sometimes nearly nine hours a day in his office. So he has sent in his resignation. The next thing is, who shall we get instead? Of course, whatever the Canterbury Association may settle and order at home, Sir George Grey is the only person who has the power of appointing the new one. However, I dare say he will give it to Captain Simeon, but I can't imagine how he can all of a sudden be able to perform all its duties; for it is a very different thing from being simply J.P. at home, where you need not do much more than you like, but requires a tolerable knowledge of law. Still he is nothing daunted, only I am selfishly somewhat afraid that my husband may have to go on, in fact, doing a good deal of the business himself. We heard, two days after he sailed, that Sir G.G. was at Wellington again, so he has lost time. Mrs. Simeon was in a great state of excitement about seeing the Bishop, and had been afraid, ever since she came, that she should be confined just when he was here; the time she expected to be taken ill being Advent Sunday. On the Tuesday before, when she was quite well, he came, and they called that afternoon, while the Bishop and Mrs. Selwyn were out, and they went early on board before tea. We asked the Simeons, and some more, to come to tea the next night; but the same shower that caught Mrs. Selwyn on the hill, and me at a duty visit a long way off, made the road a little slippery down the hill from Mrs. Simeon's house, and she was afraid to venture down. The next day, at one o'clock, the population of the settlement was increased to the amount of a Miss Simeon; everything doing as well as possible, but, of course, she never saw the Bishop, and was thereby a good deal disappointed. I see her pretty often, and she says she is dull, but it is no wonder, for she never sees her children, hardly, they still only come to her one at a time, and even the one only comes once in the day, I believe. They are all five, with the governess and nurse, at page 266lodgings in the town. Mrs. Simeon preferred having them in a different house from herself, for the time. I never saw anyone so well as she is; she never looked even weak for a moment, and could talk, etc., quite as usual, which, by the by, is saying a good deal.

December 17th. Last Sunday Captain Simeon got back from Wellington with his appointment as R.M. from Sir G. Grey, who was most gracious about it; who even told him himself that he would be sure to make a great many mistakes, but that they should be overlooked, or something to that effect, as much as possible. Yesterday was the anniversary of the arrival of the first ships, and celebrated with many rejoicings at Christchurch; I did not go over, as it was not very easy to manage it, but my husband went, and was one of the gentlemen eleven in the cricket-match. They played the mechanics, by invitation. I hear the day was most successful, and that everything did as well as possible, the weather even though very hot very pleasant. Everyone was there; more people, John said, than he thought were in the Settlement; there was a tent, and booths, and horse and foot racing, and sports of all kinds, and in the evening there was to be a public dinner, and to-night a ball, and another very aristocratic one to-morrow. We had such a hot day in the port, with a good deal of dust and blow; but a lovely evening, and Arthur and I went up to tea with Mrs. Cookson, in the tent in front of her house, blew soap bubbles, and ate hot girdle-cakes, and that was our anniversary, and we just met my husband coming home, as it got dark. The horse he was on, Lady Nugent, had won one match. There was a Maori horse-race too, in which Jack, our late Maori boy, rode and got a fall.

December 18 th. I have now all your last letters to thank you for, and am very thankful to hear of William so much better. Then for your own troubles! I quite groaned at the idea of the linen cupboard without Taylor and her keys, and at the bare idea of starting the whole thing without any of your old helps, for I think even Surmon did not come for a day or two after you, I am glad you got the box and letters, after all, just before you started. But you ought to have had the letters I wrote next, after those in the box, before your page 267last date. I wonder whether you saw Mrs. Jackson after all; she said she would call on you. My husband asked her to do so. But then, when she arrived, you would not be in London, and then, I suppose, when the row comes, they will both be very angry with the Association, and all connected with it. I shall hope to hear that you had nice weather for your 12th of August visitors. I wonder when, if ever, I shall eat another grouse!!! There is a greedy bit of sentiment! but like Mrs. Nickleby's roast pig, the idea brings back a great deal to one's mind. The letters as they come out, each time, make me wish more and more for the next batch! and here are we so hot! and so near Christmas. I must write down my wishes to you now, for this letter must go to-morrow. My third Christmas, if I live to see it, out of England; and three more since my last at Voelas. I shall think of you all a good deal, but that does not happen to me only on Christmas Day. We talk of going over to the Plains in about a fortnight, but this year we are to be, I believe, in a real house, just finished, and intended for Mr. Dean's ploughman eventually, but as he does not want to occupy it immediately, he has offered it to us for as long as we like. There is, of course … (letter is not complete).