page 24

"The Cottage."

Before the opening of the 'seventies the town of Wairoa could scarcely be said to exist, for at that time the principal settlement on the coast was at Mohaka and the Native title prevailed practically all over the lands between the Mohaka and the Mahia areas. Wairoa boasted three hotels, a school-house, court-house and lock-up—the latter situated in the neighbourhood of "Spooner's Point," two or three stockades for defence against hostile Maoris and three or four stores scattered along the present-day Marine Parade, not in any form of street alignment, for the owners were "squatters" on the sufferance of the Maori owners, and a shack called "the survey office" stood about the middle of what is now known as Coronation Square. The regular meeting places of the inhabitants were the hotels, and these, with the stores, could never have existed long but for the fact that the proprietors were out to exploit not only the bibulous ones, but the unsophisticated Maori as well, for in trade a one pound note was just a £1 note, and if the blanket or the shawl was only worth eighteen shillings, no change was forthcoming; the Maori did not ask for it, and the wily trader scorned to tender it, on the Shakespearean principle, slightly paraphrased, "'twas his, 'tis mine, etc."

The Cottage,^* with special emphasis on the word "the," was the spot in old Wairoa where page 25most of the rogueries, and shady land deals were hatched. It was a kind of annexe, or outpost of the Clyde Hotel, the licensee of which in the 'seventies was the late John Jude Taylor, an estimably honest and genial host, but tolerant to a degree of the doings of "the gentlemen" who foregathered in the building o' nights, and stayed there till the waiters appeared in the early morning to clean up and to bury the "dead marines." It stood on the Marine Parade site, quite blocking traffic westwards, except for a narrow path along the bank of the river, sometimes used by the residents, but not often, as the usual extent of the perambulations of the men of that day was between the two hotels, and "the Ravenswood" was situated eastwards. The architecture was very modest and the building possessed little copyright, being constructed of white pine split slabs set upright, whilst the roof was covered with shingles split from the noble kahikateas of Wairoa. The Cottage, again with special emphasis on the word "the," was the sanctum sanctorum of the military inefficients of that period, one of whom bore the distinguished nickname of Colonel Leather head, and most of the land-grabbers of those days, who continued to decry the value of Wairoa lands while at the same time they were busy getting the signatures of the Maoris to deeds of sale or lease at ridiculous prices.