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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 6, Issue 1 (May 1, 1931)
Historic Waitangi
Historic Waitangi.
We viewed the spot where this unique rite—the forming of a treaty between civilised and uncivilised man—took place. Across the harbour from Russell, on the right-hand side of the Waitangi estuary as you enter, is a beautiful shelving beach, page 48 and a grassy slope backed with pohutukawa and puriri. One could picture the assembly, the white marquee for Hobson and his colleagues, and the savage gathering without. On the left bank stands the ancient Maori meeting house, which has been moved across the estuary, that it might stand on Government reserve; Waitangi, the site of the treaty, being now private property.
One can navigate the entrance to the estuary, or lagoon, only at high tide; the quaint beauty of the mangroves is then apparent. Their gnarled trunks rising
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from the water are fascinating and the pohutukawa, gracefully bending from the cliff faces, adds majesty to the scene. We wound up the calm estuary with the mangroves on our right, the steeper contour with forest growth and pohutukawa on the left. About a mile up, the estuary widened, assumed the shape of an upturned bowl, over whose rim flowed the waters of the Waitangi. A charming picture, the perfect curve fringed with overhanging greenery, and the white waters tumbling into the mirrored surface below.
A Pretty Scene in the Bay of is Lands.
A pearling vessel near Russell, North Island, New Zealand.