Foot-prints of Travel, Maturin Murray Ballou [best romantic books to read .txt] 📗

upon wiry little horses, bearing upon their arms large well-filled baskets. Women, with small handcarts full of slaughtered rabbits, cry them for sale at twelve cents a pair, besides which they receive a bounty for killing these pests.

The river Derwent, which rises far inland where the beautiful lakes St. Clair and Sorell are embosomed, broadens into a lake six miles wide where it forms the harbor of Hobart, and is famous for the regattas that are rowed upon its surface. Here, the largest craft that navigates these seas can lie close to the wharf and the warehouses. A visit to the Lake District of Tasmania affords many delightful views, where those inland waters just referred to lie in their lonely beauty, now overhung by towering cliffs, like those bordering a Norwegian arm of the sea, and now edged by pebbly beaches where choice agates and carnelians abound.

The charming cloud-effects which hang over and about the lofty hills which environ the capital of Tasmania, recall vividly those of the Lake of Geneva, near Chillon, while the Derwent itself, reflecting the hills upon its blue and placid surface, forms another pleasing resemblance to Lake Leman. In ascending Mount Wellington, the lion of Tasmanian scenery, when we find ourselves at an elevation of about two thousand feet, it is discovered that we have reached the Old World ocean-floor. Here, there are plenty of remains of the former denizens of the ocean,--fossils, telling the strange and interesting story of terrestrial changes that have taken place in the thousands upon thousands of years that are passed.

About twenty miles from Hobart we find a forest of the remarkable gum-trees of which we have all read,--trees which exceed in height and circumference the mammoth growths of our own Yosemite Valley, and fully equal those of Victoria. The immediate locality which contains them is known as the Huon District. A walk among these forest giants fills one with wonder and delight; their lofty tops seem almost lost in the sky to which they aspire. No church steeple, no cathedral pinnacle reared by the hand of man, but only mountain peaks reach so far skyward.

Tasmania is largely occupied for sheep-runs and wool-raising. The eastern side of the island is studded with lovely homesteads carefully fenced, the grounds about the residences being covered with fruit trees and flower plats. There does not appear to be any waste land, all is carefully improved in the peopled districts. The roads are often lined with thrifty hedges, symmetrically trimmed, frequently consisting of the brilliant, constant flowering, fragrant yellow gorse, and sometimes of the stocky species of scarlet geranium. This sort is not fragrant but becomes very thick by being cut partly down annually, until it makes an almost impenetrable hedge. Prosperity and good taste are everywhere noticeable, amid a succession of landscapes like those of the populous New England States.


CHAPTER VI.

We embark at Hobart by steamship, for Southern New Zealand. After following the course of the river Derwent for a distance of twelve miles, its mouth is reached, where the ship's course is a little south of east, the dull green of the waters on soundings rapidly changing to the navy blue of the ocean. The prevailing winds here are from the west, which with the Australian current and the Antarctic drift, are in our favor, so the ship speeds cheerily on her way.

The tedium of the voyage is beguiled by watching the graceful movements of the wandering albatross, the fateful bird of nautical romance, which is sure to be seen in considerable numbers below the thirtieth parallel of south latitude. The peculiarities of this sea-bird's flight are a constant marvel, for it scarcely ever plies its wings, but literally sails upon the wind in any desired course. We wonder what secret power can so propel him for hundreds of rods with an upward trend at the close. If for a single moment he lights upon the water to seize some object of food, there is a trifling exertion evinced in rising again, until he is a few feet above the waves, when once more he sails with or against the wind, upon outspread, immovable wings. With no apparent inclination or occasion for pugnacity, the albatross is yet armed with a tremendous beak, certainly the most terrible of its kind possessed by any of the feathered tribe. It is from six to eight inches long, and ends in a sharp-pointed hook extremely strong and hard. It has been humorously said that if he pleased, the albatross might breakfast at the Cape of Good Hope and dine in New York, so wonderfully swift is he in flight and so powerful on the wing.

At night the phosphorescence of these lonely waters lying just north of the Antarctic Circle, between Tasmania and New Zealand, is indeed marvellous. Liquid fire is the only term which will properly express their flame-like appearance. If a bucketful is drawn and deposited upon deck, while it remains still it appears dark and like any other water, but when agitated it emits scintillations of light like the stars. A drop of this water placed under a microscope is found to be teeming with living and active creatures. If we suspend a muslin bag for a few moments over the ship's side, with the mouth open, then draw it up and permit it to drain for a few seconds, placing what remains in a glass tumbler, we shall find the abundance of living forms which it contains quite visible to the naked eye. No two of these minute creatures seem to be of similar form; the variety is infinite, and their activity incessant. Most of these animalcules, however, are so small that if it were not for the microscope we should never know of their existence.

The voyage from Hobart to the Bluff, South New Zealand, usually consumes four days, and it is often a very rough passage. Sailing-vessels making this trip carry a quantity of crude oil, which in extreme cases they employ to still the boisterous sea about them, when "God maketh the deep to boil like a pot." It should be known that our own Benjamin Franklin first suggested, about a century ago, the carrying of oil by vessels for this purpose. This shrewd American philosopher was also the first to suggest, about the same time, that ship-builders should construct the hulls of vessels in water-tight compartments, thus affording sufficient sustaining power to float them when by accident portions of the hull became leaky or broken into. After the lapse of a century both of these precautions have been adopted, and are much used.

As we sight the land, the southwest coast of New Zealand is found to be indented with deep fjords [Pronounced _feords_.] almost precisely like the coast of Norway from Bergen to Hammerfest; and, singular to say, these arms of the sea, like those of the far north, are much deeper than the neighboring ocean. The Bluff, also known as Campbelltown, is situated in the very track of storms, being open to the entire sweep of the Antarctic Ocean. Its shelving side, sloping towards the harbor, forms a sort of lee, or sheltered position, which is occupied by a pretty little fishing-village of some sixty houses, and contains a population of less than a thousand. These people gain their living mostly from the neighboring sea, and from such labor as is consequent upon the occasional arrival of a steamship bound northward. We may here take refreshment at the Golden Age Inn, which is the most southerly house of public entertainment on the globe.

New Zealand did not become a recognized British colony until the year 1840. For three-quarters of a century after Cook's first visit, the native tribes remained in free possession of the country. It is true that England was mistress of these islands by right of discovery, but she made no formal assumption of political domain until the period already named, when it was formed into a colony subordinate to the government of New South Wales. As early as 1815, white men of venturous disposition began to settle in small numbers among the natives; but often their fate was to be roasted and eaten by cannibals. Before 1820, missionaries, no doubt influenced by truly Christian motives, came hither and devoted their lives to this people,--in more senses than one, as it is well known that they not infrequently met with a fate similar to that of other settlers.

New Zealand lies as far south of the equator as Italy does north of it, and is divided into the North and South Islands by Cook's Strait. The South Island is also known as the Middle Island, to distinguish it more fully from Stewart Island, which belongs to the group, and which lies to the south of it. This last-named island is separated from Middle Island by Foveaux Strait some fifteen or twenty miles across the water from the Bluff. It is about fifty miles long by thirty broad, and has a mountain range running through it, the loftiest peak of which is a trifle over three thousand feet high. There are some fishing hamlets here, but there are very few inhabitants. All these islands are popularly believed to have once formed part of a great continent, which is now sunk in the sea.

Unlike Australia, New Zealand is rarely visited by drought. The whole eastern coast abounds in good harbors, while the rivers and streams are ever flowing and innumerable. Though it is a mountainous country, it differs from Switzerland in that it has no lack of extensive plains, which seem to have been left by nature ready to the hand of the farmer, requiring scarcely ordinary cultivation to insure large and profitable crops of grains. This diversity of surface, as well as the fact that these islands extend over thirteen degrees of latitude, give the country a varied climate, but it is a remarkably temperate one, its salubrity far surpassing that of England or any part of the United States. While snow is never seen in the North Island except upon the highest mountains, the plains of the South Island, as far south as Otago, are sometimes sprinkled with it, but only to disappear almost immediately. The rivers are generally destitute of fish, and the forests of game. It is no sportsman's country; but vegetation runs riot, the soil being remarkably fertile, clothing the wild lands with perpetual verdure and vigorous freshness.

The area of the islands known as New Zealand is about one hundred thousand square miles, being a few more than are contained in England, Wales, and Ireland combined. The entire coast line is four thousand miles in length. Out of the seventy million acres of land, forty million are deemed worthy of cultivation. The soil being light and easily worked favors the agriculturist, and New Zealand is free from all noxious animals and venomous reptiles. It is stated that no animal larger than a rat was found here by the discoverers. The remote situation of the country, surrounded by the greatest extent of ocean on the globe, has kept it in a measure unknown to the rest of the world, even in these days of rapid communication with all parts of the earth. Wellington, the capital, is about fifteen thousand miles more or less, from the Colonial Office in London; in other words, New Zealand forms the nearest land to the actual antipodes of England. The precious metals are distributed over the land in gold-bearing quartz reefs, rich alluvial diggings, and in the sands of its many rivers. Mines of tin and iron as well as other minerals are supplemented by an abundant supply of the most important of them all; namely, coal.

There is little of interest to detain us at the Bluff, so we continue on