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The original publication details are as follows:
Title: Autobiography of an early settler in New Zealand / by Edgar Jones.
Author: Jones, Edgar
Published: Coulls, Somerville, Wilkie, Wellington, N.Z., 1933
AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN EARLY SETTLER IN NEW ZEALAND
BY EDGAR JONES
Wellington, N.Z. ;
cmills Somerville Wilkie Printers and Publishers.
1933
autobiography of an early settler in the back blocks of New Zealand and some comparisons with the present day conditions.
EDGAR JONES.
P.O. Box 27,
Timaru,
New Zealand,
12th September, 1932
Dear Mr. Edgar Jones
I have read every word of your book and found it most interesting. Your account of your trials and loss through Scab was a revelation to me. I remember the dread of Scab amongst sheep farmers but had no idea it was so disastrous as you desscribe it. The way you have faced difficulties through life and by care and self-denial reached your present position must be a great satisfaction to you now that you are getting up in years and a great example to the younger generation that is now so pampered. It is a book that will interest many others than your relations and friends, especially the sheep farmers, and is historical to a certain extent. Your ideas of politics and economy though almost identical with my own do not go down with many, but all the same are quite right and I am very pleased to see you speak so openly on the subject of the labour laws, etc., many people seem afraid to say what they think.
Many thanks for letting me see the manuscript.
Yours truly,
C. H. TRIPP.
Introduction.
I HAVE been asked by many to write an account of the life of the settlers in the back blocks of New Zealand in the early days.
I cannot write the history of others so am obliged to write my own, and the inevitable “ I ” appears too often to please me, for which I ask the reader’s clemency. I have tried to describe in as simple a manner as possible the life and conditions that the early settlers had to go through, so as to leave some record of it. I have not tried to exaggerate—rather erred on the other side. As most of the lands in the temperate zones of the world are now more or less settled, never again will pioneers have to go through the same experiences, particularly as we now have all the improved conveniences that science and the engineers have invented for us.
When I was born the world was recovering from the French Revolutionary Wars. My father used to tell me of the very bad times th«“ world had gone through. After these wars Great Britain had such a large debt that taxation impoverished the country. It was not until the invention of steam which gave an impetus to everything, that a recovery was made. Remembering this, I looked for similar conditions after the last Great War, and
could not understand why it did not come. I think now, the Politicians to get votes and power, and the people having grown up in too extravagant a manner, have got into the way of borrowing money and expending it lavishly, so that we were living under a bogus system of inflation; even paying the interest on our loans with the money derived from further loans and it was over ten years before this bubble burst. I feel sure that in order to recover we must go back to the plainer, simpler way of living that I shall describe, so as to repay the debts that the War and the extravagance of the Politicians have involved us in. The employer must be satisfied with smaller profits and the worker with lower wages. Believing this and desiring to do some good, I have diverged from my early experiences and interspersed comparisons with the present day conditions and those of years ago.
If I have erred in turning attention away from my history alone I must beg the reader’s consideration, but I feel that I am right in doing so.
I have observed how the world is being upset by Socialism, Communism, etc.; much of the unrest being because of the greater power given to Labour by the granting of universal manhood suffrage. I have seen how discontent has grown with our present civilization, notwithstanding the amenities that have come with it all, such as Old Age Pensions, Free Education, Workers’ Indemnity and many
more, nearly too numerous to mention, and a comparison made with the old days is positively startling; and yet, with education that should help to make people realise the immense advantages they are receiving compared with the past, more discontent has come. lam not writing against education, the advantages of which are universally acknowledged, but against its misapplication.
I have also seen how Politics have degenerated into a scramble of class against class —Labour against Capital, which means in New Zealand where everyone had an equal chance, the thriftless, or descendents of the thriftless, against the thrifty. The have-nots are always trying to bring in legislation to make those who have pay higher taxation, until it can be borne no further and collapse will come. We all know it would be right if we elected as legislators, the best in the land who would unselfishly pass only laws for their country’s good regardless of any class.
December, 1932.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I. —Invention of saddle cloths, gun wads, armour battleships and revolving turrets. Left England, 1867. Chanties. Food on ship. White squall.
CHAPTER ll.—Walked to Christchurch, small town, now over 100,000. Chief reason why population leaving country for towns.
CHAPTER lll.—Left hotel—rented cottage. Cooked dinner. Mr. Gregg asked me to Longbeach.
CHAPTER IV.—Mustering cattle. First cadet on Longbeach.
CHAPTER V.—Big flood after snowstorm. Sheep driven from Christchurch nearly lost in Rakaia.
CHAPTER Vl.—Money lent on terms. Advice given me on starting. My advice. Bought Waiau run. Went exploring over Lewis Saddle. Put arm out.
CHAPTER VII. —Camped cattle run. Erecting yards, huts, etc. How catch wood hens. No one need starve.
CHAPTER VIII.—Bull nearly killed me Arahura. Cattle became wild. Account of mustering them.
CHAPTER IX.—Tree nearly rolled on us, Ahaura Saddle. Cheque dishonoured. Long ride to overtake man to recover money.
CHAPTER X. —Saved the lives of three men who were lost.
CHAPTER XI.—Tallow candles and few conveniences. Shod own horses. Got year’s supply of food. Wages in early days. Bought 1,000 ewes, £5O. Wool prices rose after Franco-Prussian War. Cooking utensils used.
CHAPTER XII.—10,000 acres bush burnt. Description of mustering with packman.
CHAPTER XIII.-Member County Council. Names of others. Back countrymen in Christchurch, November show. On return home with cattle on one trip found man dead.
CHAPTER XIV. —Bullock drivers. Remittance men. Our treatment of the Maoris.
CHAPTER XV. —Thoughts on Politics and World Governments. Advocating thrift.
CHAPTER XVI.—Account of brother milking cow. Trip round South Sea Islands and happiness of natives.
CHAPTER XVII.—Big sale, St. Leonards. Saved shepherd’s life on Waiau run.
CHAPTER XVIII.—Wattle fences. Government mistakes in early days.
CHAPTER XIX.—Scab and what it was. Killed all my sheep. Practically ruined.
CHAPTER XX.—Farmers’ fortune honestly made. Free from gambling. Not unearned income. Death duties getting too high.
CHAPTER XXI.—Drove sheep to West Coast. Bad snow storm one trip. How drive sheep properly.
CHAPTER XXII.—Took sheep, Reefton. Mining shares selling, 6d. each. Diggers licked quartz specimen all round. Horse sees in dark bush track.
CHAPTER XXIII.—Rabbit fence erected. Secretary Amuri Farmers’ and Employers’ Association. Imported stoats and weasels. Capt. Kean imported silver grey rabbits.
CHAPTER XXlV.—Upper Waiau bridge built by Handyoide. Blown down. Present bridge built by Anderson’s Ltd. Account of opening ceremony.
CHAPTER XXV.—Hanmer hot springs. Amuri part of Nelson province. Long ride to Nelson. Land sold cheaply.
CHAPTER XXVI.—Account of usual work on run. Frozen industry cause of New Zealand prosperity. Had to guarantee space in insulated vessels. Lost money.
CHAPTER XXVII.—Grew turnips and fattened lambs. Vicissitudes of farming. Rains damaged crop. Stored wheat, Cuverden shed. Leased Pahau pastures.
CHAPTER XXVIII. —Communications in old days. Farmer as expert businessman or tradesman.
CHAPTER XXIX.—Wild pigs.
CHAPTER XXX.—Sir Julius Vogel and Public Works. Many political squanderings. Cost of food, 1891.
CHAPTER XXXI.—Social life. Cricket. Swaggers.
CHAPTER XXXII.—1888 earthquake. Shearing after.
CHAPTER XXXIII. —Midland Railway League, Would not sign petition. Selfishness of people.
CHAPTER XXXIV.—Cut crops, first side delivery. Then twine binder. Ride through night to replace breakage. Shooting paradise ducks. Many native birds gone through Acclimatisation Society importations.
CHAPTER XXXV.—Seddon Government. Socialistic legislation. Arbitration Court.
CHAPTER XXVI.—Times more prosperous after 1900. Land rose in value. Government Land Purchase Board. Interest on Government loans.
CHAPTER XXXVII. —Bought Mt. Nessing station. Fattened all lambs. Advocated Marketing Boards, Instance of hop growers in England.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.—Went Home, 1902. Coronation festivities, Suva. Conditions, America and England.
CHAPTER XXXlX.—Account of snow storm Mt. Nessing.
CHAPTER XL.—Motor runs, Mt. Nessing. Trouble, wet sheep at shearing.
CHAPTER XLI.—Sheep dogs howling at night. Collie dog’s reason and faithfulness.
CHAPTER XLII.—Scientific breeding of the human race.
CHAPTER XLIII.—Ploughmen lived in travelling huts. Times easier but younger generation more independent. Shed hands refused to work except in sheds.
CHAPTER XLIV.—Comparison with present day and old time workmen. Sold all my properties.
CHAPTER XLV.—Went to England with family. Experiences during war. Minehead girls knitted socks. New Zealand horse covers. Recruiting, U.S.A.. Victorious tanks. Mass aeroplanes.
CHAPTER XLVI.—Universal language.
CHAPTER XLVII.—Comparison between living present days and in old days.
Present Homestead.
CHAPTER I.
I was born on the 24th September, 1850, at Mitcham. London. At that time Mitcham was more or less a country village, situated about twelve miles outside the city of London, but now there are rows of streets all the way from Mitcham Common to the centre of the Citv.
My father was a felt manufacturer and a very capable man. I have not forgotten, although I was a young lad about nine years old at the time of his death, one of our friends saying to me at his funeral, “If you only grow up like your father you will get on in the world.” From what he said I made up my mind that I would do so, and I think I have been fairly successful. The felt my father made was the only kind used in the manufacture of pianos. It had some especial properties which he invented and patented that made it the best and only felt used. As he was fond of horses, hunting and other sports, he also originated the felt saddle cloth and the felt wads for loading gun cartridges of which he made large quantities at the time of the Crimean War. He was the first to think of the armour clad battleships, and the revolving turrets for the big guns. He offered the ideas to the Admiralty but they did not then adopt them.
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He was of a quiet retiring disposition and deficient in the assurance so necessary in this world, to push things through. The Americans were, I believe, the first to adopt the revolving gun turret after my father’s death.
When about eight years old I went with two of my brothers during my father’s lifetime to Queenwood College, Hampshire. This was run by a Quaker headmaster and had a very efficient staff of masters. Amongst others I remember that Professor Tindall was the science and chemical master, and no doubt his lectures were well worth listening to. As I was so small a boy, I only remember some of his experiments; one was when he gave some of the boys laughing gas which certainly made them laugh, and on another occasion he burnt a small piece of diamond in a gas retort. Although brought up as a member of the Church of England I have always had a respect for Quakers after being at Queenwood. No doubt I got into a certain amount of mischief. The worst case I remember because it was the first and only time I got a real thrashing which I well deserved. The masters generally sat on a high square stool about four feet high. This particular master taught carpentry to those of us who wished to learn it. The master was more of an artisan, not so well educated as the other masters, and boys are quick to notice this. The older boys put the younger ones, of
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whom I was one, up to putting some cobblers’ wax on this stool on a summer’s day. After the master had been sitting for some time on it when he wished to get down, the stool followed him, and it is so long ago that I forget whether he had to get out of his trousers or how he got away from that stool. He found out I had a hand in putting the wax on it. and as I could not give the others away I suffered. It was a lesson to me that I did not forget, and I did not again allow my elders, or others, to lead me astray.
Another amusing boyish freak happened on one occasion when I was returning home from school by train for the holidays. I lost my ticket at Woking, and it was arranged, as I had not money enough to pay for another ticket, that I was to crawl under the seat at the last station before London, and the other boys were to sit close and hide me with their feet when the collector came round. This was done, but when the collector came along he said, “Did any boy lose a ticket at Woking station?” I was so overjoyed at its being found—and being only about eight years old —that I pushed my head out between the boys’ feet and called out, “Yes, I did”! The collector burst out laughing and called the guards and porters to see me crawling out from under the seat. Queenwood was an exceptionally good school, but unfortunately I left it soon after my father died.
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One last event I must mention, which I have not forgotten because I think we are all more inclined to remember an injury done to us than a kindness. The mathematical master was leaving to start a school of his own in Norfolkshire and he promised to give a prize to the boy who answered the exam, papers best in the fourth and fifth classes. I was in the fifth class and the boys in the fourth were older than myself, but I was always good at figures and won the examination. The master got my address and promised to send me the prize, but he failed to do so.
When old enough, and having expressed a wish to enter the army, I was sent to a master at Woolwich to prepare me for the examination before entering Sandhurst Military College. My people, knowing some of the officers at Woolwich, I remember how delighted 1 was to be invited to the officers’ mess. An officer of the military train used to invite me down with him when he went with a troop to the Woolwich arsenal. The troop used to go down there to haul the guns and ammunition about with their horses, and I used to be very proud when I was sent along the troop with an order to the officer in front. Nowadays machinery does many things, but then the machine that made the minnie rifle bullet out of leaden bars at a great pace was considered a wonderful invention.
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Just before going up for the Sandhurst examination, one of my guardians persuaded my mother not to let me go into the army. 1 asked her years after why this was, and her reply was that if I had got a commission in the army, the chances were that I should have been shot.
I was taken from school and put into an Underwriter’s office, Mr. Charles Sleep’s, at Lloyds. Mr. Charles Sleep, besides underwriting for himself also did so for four other gentlemen. Although only sixteen years old he gave me his account book to carry on. There were other clerks who kept the other Underwriters’ Books. I was rather pleased when the time came for balancing the books. My employer’s accounts did not balance with mine, and after going through all the accounts again it turned out that it was his mistake.
Not being allowed to enter the army unsettled me, and hearing some young fellows at our house who had been to New Zealand giving very glowing accounts of the possibilities out there, I decided upon going to that country, and got my mother to agree to it.
The preparations made were in many ways different from 'an emigrant’s outfit of the present day. I had a revolver, bridle, saddle, blankets and many other things that are not thought of now. I also provided myself with many introductions,
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including one to Sir George Grey, who was then Governor of New Zealand. Many of these I did not use, but some were of advantage to me.
In March, 1867, I sailed from Gravesend in the “Lancashire Witch,” a sailing vessel under the Shaw, Savill Company flag of 1,600 tons register, 3,000 burden. Quite a large vessel for those days when there were no steamers to New Zealand. We had adverse winds from the start and were nearly a week before we got clear of the English Channel. The vessel, besides being heavily laden, had about ISO female emigrants, 50 married couples and families, and single men on board, besides at least 60 first and second class passengers, and the crew. I need hardly write the cubic feet of space allowed for each person was far short of what is now compulsory, and the conditions of the passengers and the emigrants, few of whom were good sailors; whilst we were beating about in the English Channel were very severe and uncomfortable; conditions that few of the present generation would put up with for one moment.
I am not going to say, as one so often hears old people remark, that we could do, and did, what the present younger people could not do. I believe with our improved knowledge of hygiene and better food, etc., the young people in New Zealand of the present generation are growing up a more virile stronger race—but I think with the mechanisation
23
of the present age, when so many things are done for our convenience, they are growing up too particular. They look for most things to be done for them, and will put up with very little inconvenience. However, we all expected nothing else in those days and took everything as a matter of course. I believe, if the people now would not complain so much —always appealing to the Government for aid —and would be more selfreliant, the world would be a better and a happier one.
Whilst we were in the Channel the poor sailors had, what I can only describe as a dreadful time; constantly called out during the night and day and during all kinds of bad weather, “All hands ’bout ship,” when they had to swing the ship round to go off on another tack. When the French and English coasts were close together, such as going through the Straits of Dover this was done every one or two hours. The weather was thick with rain and wind most of the time, so that we did not see any land, and the navigation must have been careful and good, that we did not run ashore.
The sailors of those old clipper sailing ships were wonderful men, and went through great hardships without a murmur, looking forward to their next rest on shore, when the most of them spent their money recklessly; then off again on the first ship available, happy and singing with zest the old
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chanties as they pulled the yard arms round with the ropes. “Goodbye, fare ye well,” then “Hurrah, my boys we’re outward (or homeward) bound,” “Haul in the bowline, the bowline haul,” “We are off to the Rio Grand,” and many others that I am afraid are now forgotten. They had to go aloft in all weathers, when the vessel would be rolling heavily, with the wind whistling through the r 'gg‘ n g, and crawl along the yard arm with only an unsteady rope for their feet, to take in a reef or furl the sails. Some of these sails, the “Royal” for instance were a long way off from the deck, and one slip would mean, death.
I have never forgotten one morning, when we were in the “Roaring Forties,” South of the Cape of Good Hope, when it had rained through the night and frozen afterwards, so that the deck, the rigging and everything was coated with ice, seeing the boatswain, one of the best sailors, seated astride at the end of the main yard arm splicing something. The vessel was rolling heavily so that at one time he was down near the waves and soon after, perhaps 40 feet up in the air, and it was so cold that the wonder was that he could work at all.
Everything has an end, so we at last got out of the Channel and had, I think, light winds to the Tropics. Passing the line, Father Neptune came aboard and many had to go through the shaving and ducking; but those who wished to avoid it
25
got exemption, myself amongst the number, by paying for a bottle of grog. The result was that by the evening the greater number of the crew were drunk, and it is doubtful, if a storm had come on, if there would have been sufficient sober men to navigate the ship.
We were becalmed several times, and on one occasion, after being so for rather a long time, the Doctor who was in charge of all the emigrants, and who also read the Church services on Sunday read the prayer for wind. Half an hour afterwards the wind came up. At the conclusion of the voyage he gave an address to the emigrants and made a great point of the breeze coming up after his prayer.
On another occasion we had only a very light wind and all the sails set, even a Stunsail to catch all the wind we could. I was near the boatswain when I saw a look of horror come into his face and he called out to all of us to “Let go every sail.” He rushed to the side and undid rope after rope, and many of us, not knowing the reason, helped him. We soon found out it was a “White Squall,” the wind came with great force, heeled the vessel over and some of the sails were blown to ribbons, but the vessel did not go right over; I believe the boatswain saved all our lives that day.
The female emigrants were all together down the main hatch. I never went down, but Ido not
26
think they had any portholes; their only daylight would be when the hatch was open, and they had to climb a sort of ladder to get up on deck, which they were allowed to do, for a few hours only each day. They could not have had a very pleasant time. One day there was a great noise down there, screaming, etc., and we all wondered what was wrong. The doctor was sent for and started down the hatchway, but before he got one halfway down a pannican (a kind of tin cup) hit him in the face, so he came up again, saying, “Let the she-devils fight it out themselves.” It turned out that the Irish girls had disagreed with the others. We know that the Irish are fond of a row.
I think I ought to mention the food to give some idea of what it was in those days. The sailors, and I presume, the emigrants, had chiefly salt beef and the ship’s biscuits, which were very hard, slightly yellow colour and about two inches thick. They used to get what they called, “Plumduff,” and I think, porridge and no milk, no thought of fresh meat, and I do not think any vegetables. There was some tinned food on board. One was called “soup and boulli,” and I am nearly sure only the passengers got that. Everyone had to take limejuice, which was served three or four times a week to keep scurvy away, which it certainly did. The sailors also got rum at times. There were twelve sheep on board for the passengers, but these
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were ail killed and eaten before we got to the Tropics. Vegetables also ran out; bread was cooked, and there was a certain amount of tinned food, but not much variety then; no tinned meats such as are provided now.
We went far south of the Cape of Good Hope, I presume, to get a good wind behind us. Few people, unless they had seen them, have an idea of the immensity of the waves in those seas. Our vessel had very high masts, but when in the trough of the sea the oncoming wave behind us seemed to be higher than the top of our highest mast. I often remarked, “This wave is coming over the top of us,” but up we would go as it came along and ride on the top of it. I think every vessel had lightning conductors, but when south of New Zealand in a bad storm, while the sailors were pulling round a sail, a streak of lightning struck the ship. It seemed to hit the anchor with a clang, the sailors all let go the ropes, and luckily no harm was done.
About July 22nd, after a long voyage of four months and three days, during the whole of which time we saw no land, and only, I think, two vessels in the Tropics, we reached Lyttelton harbour. As we sighted Bank’s Peninsular there were fires all over it, and those on board, who had been to New Zealand before, told us the settlers were burning the flax, but I found out afterwards that it was the
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usual thing in the Spring to burn all the native tussock, fern, and other growth. This at times has been overdone, and some of the land impoverished, but if done judiciously, not too often, and when there is plenty of moisture in the soil the grass soon grows again, and the pasture is improved.
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CHAPTER II.
It was perhaps a risky undertaking for so young a lad to come out by himself so far away as New Zealand. I was only sixteen years old; my seventeenth birthday was not until two months after I reached New Zealand. I had as I mentioned before, some introductions, but I did not know anyone in the colony.
By my father’s will I was allowed in advance £l,OOO to start me in life—if advisable—before I came of age, and this I had. I also had untiring energy and a determination to get on.
As soon as I could get on shore, I started oft to walk over the hills by what was known as the “Bridle Path.” There was a long tunnel being made through the Port Hills, but it was not finished until some time after my arrival. At Heathcote, on the Christchurch side of the Port Hills, I met a milkman who was only too pleased to give me a ride in his cart to Christchurch, as I was able to give him all the latest English news. After some distance he stopped and got out, but I did not think of doing so as there were so few houses, and I had no idea that we were in a town, until he said, “Here you are, this is Christchurch.” We were at what
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was then Matheson’s Agency office, opposite Tattersall’s and the White Hart Hotel. Down High Street, along which we had come, there were very few buildings. Now, for miles along the road there are nothing but streets and shops, etc. To the North and West of where we stopped were the Triangle, Cashel, Hereford and Colombo Streets to Victoria Square, and there were shops and office buildings something like a small village.
Christchurch now has over 100,000 inhabitants ,and the people are proud of their city and its population, but I often think with regret that they are so for this reason: —New Zealand is—and is likely to be for some time —an agricultural and pastoral country. From the land all her exports come, wool, meats, butter, hides, etc., etc.; therefore, the more people working on the land to produce these exports, the better for the country. But there is the difficulty to get sufficient people to work in the country. The Politicians pandering to the Labour Unions for votes, have protected a large number of industries in the towns by high Custom’s Duties. With this protection, it has been possible to increase the rate of wages beyond what the farmer can afford to pay, because what he produces has to go overseas to be sold in an unsheltered market, often at a low price.
The manufacturer in the New Zealand towns can charge a higher price for his goods as they are
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protected against the cheaper imported article by the Custom’s Tariff. The poor farmer has consequently to pay the high price for all requisites. With most things protected and wages high, the worker naturally stops in the town and grows up more fond of pleasure, sports, pictures, dances and many other amenities, which are not so easily obtainable in the country. The towns, therefore, grow at the expense of the country.
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CHAPTER III.
I obtained a room at the Clarendon Hotel, and returned the next day (through Sumner) to the vessel, by a very rough coach road, and collected and arranged about getting my luggage to the Hotel. My wish was to get on one of the sheep runs or farms to obtain practical experience how to work the land and stock in New Zealand, but not having any friends in the Country, I found this was not so easily done. I used some of my introductions, which generally meant I was asked to dinner, and that was the end of it.
After two or three weeks at the Clarendon, a ship-mate and myself arranged to save expense which was eating into our capital—which neither of us wished —that we would rent a furnished, or rather, partly furnished cottage for 10/- per week. This we did. The furniture was very meagre, a couple of beds, a few chairs, a table, etc. We both had brought blankets, and I for one expected to rough it when I started for New Zealand, and did not mind doing so.
Neither of us knew a scrap about cooking; I had been in our kitchen in England, but I think it was more to raid the larder than anything else,
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and certainly did not take any notice of what the cook did, so I need hardly write that our meals were rather poor ones. After about a week my ship-mate could stand it no longer, and returned to the hotel.
Soon after, I met in the town four young friends that I had made, and laughingly talking about my carrying on by myself, they said they would come to dinner if I would cook them a meal. It was agreed that I should cook it myself, and not buy it at a shop. Here was the meal I cooked, but it must be understood that I was a lad fresh from England, and, as I have stated before, knew nothing about cooking. Later on, as most of us did in the early days, I learnt how to cook everything; bread included. For this my first attempt, after thinking it out, I decided that being fond of liver and bacon, I would give them that, and an apple pudding. I went to the butcher for some liver, and he gave me a bullock’s liver about three inches thick. I suppose I thought that the New Zealand livers were different from the thin pieces which I used to have when in England, so I cooked the liver in the frying pan as I got it, three inches thick. Then came the apple pudding; I got some apples, flour, and a cloth to tie the pudding in. I remembered that the apples were generally cut up, so this I did, and the dough, of course, was flour and water. I did not know of any other ingre-
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dients, so none were put in. The dough was made and rolled out, the apples put in, the dough doubled up, and the pudding made, and then I began to lift it to put into the cloth, but the dough burst at the bottom and the apples all came out. I tried many times but this always happened. I knew nothing about a basin. After many attempts I put the dough in a cloth, with apples on top, and tied it all up the best way I could and put it on to boil. When the visitors came the liver was raw inside, the pudding was a mixture of dough and apples boiled up. I think they ended with bread and cheese and other things which I had got from the shop.
The day after, I went to dinner with Mr. Grigg of Longbeach, to whom I had brought a letter of introduction. I mentioned in joke during the evening about this dinner, and he asked me to go down with him for a visit to Longbeach as he was going there in two days’ time.
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CHAPTER IV.
Early in the second morning we started off in the coach which 1 think went to Timaru, one hundred miles away, in the day. All the rivers had to be forded, as there were no bridges. At Rakaia, there was always a man to ford travellers over the river and he was very expert in finding a ford. Later on, I learnt how to pick a ford for myself as all of us had to do in those days.
We stopped at Ashburton for luncheon. In Ashburton there was only an hotel, a blacksmith’s shop and a small store. One of the stockmen from Longbeach had brought two saddle horses for Mr. Grigg and myself, and we started off for the homestead sixteen miles away. I had often ridden in England, but after so long on shipboard, I was soft. Mr. Grigg, after fording the Ashburton river, put his horse into a canter which he kept up until we got to the head stockman’s hut seven miles away. I had a valise, part of my outfit from England in which I had my brush and comb, etc. The stockman at Ashburton had not strapped it on the saddle firmly so that I was scrambling all the time to save my belongings, until Spicer, the head stockman fastened it on safely for me. We cantered on to the station, only stopping to open two gates. I
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was sore from the riding, which they noticed at the homestead, as I did not like the hard chairs, so they gave me some arnica to put on, but forgot to tell me to dilute it.
Next day, we went out and rounded up about six hundred head of cattle, and Mr. Grigg and a buyer from the West Coast, who took about sixty head of the fattest, cut out each fat one from the mob and a stockman held these at a distance from the main mob. The horses got very clever, turning quickly as the bullock turned. Everyone had stock whips, some up to twenty feet long, but I found later that one from eight to ten feet did the most execution. There were only cattle on Longbeach then, so that the next day we were out driving cattle, but by this time I was nearly raw, and very glad to stand up in the stirrups if no one was looking. I wanted to go out to help the following day, but they did not allow me. When Mr. Grigg was returning to Christchurch the next day. he told me that as I wanted to get on a place, I could stay at Longbeach, so I asked a friend in Christchurch to send all my luggage down. Mr. Grigg told me afterwards that he let me stop because he thought I must have some energy, as I would continue riding when I was not fit for it, and he asked me to come down at first because I stuck to that cottage with its discomforts when the other young fellow gave it up.
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My advice to any young man starting in life is, "Do not be afraid of working too hard. No matter what pay you are getting, work your hardest. It pays best in the long run.” The “goslow” policy is wrong. I was getting no pay at Longbeach. Mr. Grigg took me on, and I got the chance to obtain the experience wanted, and I also got into the way of working hard, which helped me to get on in life, and one is really happier feeling they are doing their best always.
Longbeach, when I went there was more than one half an almost impenetrable swamp. I believe it was 32,000 acres in all, and I think it must have taken a great amount of pluck and foresight to give two pounds an acre for this land in those days, and to go to work to drain and clear it. Mr. Grigg did this in the right way. He had surveyors, who waded through the swamps and took levels everywhere. They could then tell the best places to cut the drains effectively. It took a long time, and great energy, to clear and drain all this land, but the result is well known. Longbeach was often spoken of as the finest farm in the world. All honour should be given to the early pioneers who had to rough it, and made such beautiful homes out of the wilderness, as Mr. Grigg, amongst others, did. I know of one politician who called these men “Social Pests,” because they had made money by energy and hard work which enabled them to
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acquire large pieces of land, which they improved until they were fine estates. I was a year on Longbeach, and was the first of the many cadets who were taken on later to learn farming.
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CHAPTER V.
In February, 1868, there was an exceptional flood. Soon after I landed in New Zealand in 1867, there was a very heavy snow-storm. After coming from England, and the snow-storms I experienced there, I did not think so much of that in Christchurch, although it was about the heaviest they had ever had. Luckily, the back hill country such as the Mackenzie, etc., was not fully stocked up then or there would have been a total loss of all the sheep. Even the front country sheepfarmers lost large numbers of their flocks in this snow which was a long time in thawing, and many of the gulleys, in the following February had big patches of snow left. When the hot Nor’ Wester came with heavy rain which I think, lasted for three days, all this snow was rapidly melted, and the biggest flood which so far as we have known took place.
At Longbeach we rode out to muster the big paddock on the banks of the Ashburton. I rode along the sea coast, and I had not ridden four miles from the homestead before I came to the water and the further I rode the deeper it became. For miles ahead it was one sheet of running water and I had to return to the homestead. The
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Ashburton river had broken over its banks a long way up and an incredible amount of water ran down the plains into the sea. I believe some protective works have been done to prevent this happening again, but they will have to be very considerable to guard against such another flood in the future. My experience is, history generally repeats itself, and should such a flood occur again, it would be very disastrous for many farmers, settled on all this land, which was covered by a raging torrent many miles wide.
I was on the South of the Ashburton river but do not think any water broke over the North side. Many of the other rivers overflowed their banks. The Waimakariri threatened Christchurch seriouslv.
A short time before I left, Mr. Grigg decided on buying some sheep for Longbeach, so for experience, I went up to Christchurch to help drive about 5,000 Cheviot Hill Merino wethers down. There were eight of us. One man was in a dray with the tents and food. There were few fences to hold the sheep against, so at night time we had to surround them, and took turns in watching them—four of us alternately every four hours. When we got to the Rakaia we commenced forcing the sheep across the river, which was not very high then. The man in charge rode up to see Mr. Grigg who was passing in the coach. Someone had told Mr. Grigg that, as it was Winter, sheep should not
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be crossed after 2 p.m. In the meantime we had got them across one half of the river. Cheviot sheep were well known to be bad in the rivers. As it was past 2 p.m., according to orders, we left the sheep in the river bed and camped on the north side. A Nor’ Wester came on and the river rose during the night so that in the morning we saw the S,(XX) sheep up to their knees in water. Fortunately it did not rise any higher, but it was two days before the river was low enough to swim them over the other half. When we got them over they were so hungry that it was decided we could not hold them in the open all night time, so they were driven up to a small paddock at the hotel three miles out of our way. I told Mr. Grigg afterwards of the narrow shave he had of losing all those sheep.
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CHAPTER VI.
Canterbury was not so prosperous after I arrived. Most of the front country runs then taken were fully stocked, and money which used to be loaned at ten per cent, was procurable at a much lower rate of interest. I tried to get the money that I had out at interest to a sheepfarmer on what was, I think, called “on terms,” but the time for that had gone by. The loan was made by the lender buying, say, 1,000 ewes for the landowner. Next year the landowner gave the lender, I think, one-third of the wool and one-third of the lambs, and continued to graze those which the lender had branded with his own brand. This only lasted until the sheepfarmer had stocked up his own country, but for the time was profitable for both parties. I began inquiring about properties to invest in and a man, to whom I had an introduction, told me of a small run in Amuri that was in his hands as a land agent for sale, and went up with me to see it.
Before leaving England a friend of our family, who lived near us, who was a Director of the Bank of New Zealand gave me several introductions. He said to me “You are a very young man, do not act too much on your own opinion but take advice from
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those older than yourself.” I took notice of what he said, which I now consider very bad advice. I should now advise, “Only take advice from successful men and be sure they are disinterested.” The man who took me up to see this place and whose advice I took never did any good for himself, lost everything, and advised me to buy because he was interested in the sale of this run to myself, as he obtained the agent’s commission.
It was a rough run lying fairly warm to the sun with, I think, about 2,500 sheep on it. The partner I had was a rough uneducated man, and as soon as I could afford it, in about three years, I bought him out. When signing the deed of purchase in the lawyer’s office I happened to mention that I was only seventeen years of age, and would be eighteen in two months’ time. The lawyer only said “You had better not mention that to anyone.” As I was only an infant in law, that sale should never have gone through.
The only house on the place was built of cob, that is, trodden clay, as many of the up country houses were built of that material then. I slept in the loft, and had to go up a ladder to get to it, but later I built a small place six feet wide and ten feet long, as I preferred having a room to myself. At one time a neighbour, Mr. W. O. Rutherford, came to see me. At night time I gave him my
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bunk to sleep in, and slept myself on the floor. This bunk was only six feet —the width of the room —which was quite wide enough for me, but a different proposition for him, as he was six feet six inches. We very soon changed places as he was too cramped; so he took my place on the floor and I occupied the bunk.
Soon after I bought my run, as Canterbury had only been settled eighteen years, I thought possibly that the whole of the country had not been explored, and I fancied that I might find some new country which would be useful for stocking. I rode off one day on my horse to explore. On the saddle I had a fly—that is a calico sheet, which with poles, I could pitch at night to keep me dry —a blanket, a billy to make tea, a pannican, and sufficient food for four days. I rode up a branch stream, called the Lewis, which ran into the Hope River, as I knew the other streams had been explored, camped at the top when I could ride no further, and tethered my horse.
All the mountains around were high and clear on the top because they were covered with snow through the Winter, but the hillsides were covered with bush three parts up. Early in the morning I climbed through the bush to the top of the highest mountain. From this top I could see a fine plain to the North West which looked good cattle
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country, so I made my way down to it and was congratulating myself upon having discovered a valuable piece of grazing land. It began to get late, and as there was a low saddle between the creek at the head of this plain and the Lewis, I started up the creek so as to walk over the saddle. When I got to where the creek closed in and the bush commenced I came upon a surveyor’s blazed line, that is, where they chop down scrub, etc., so as to take a theodolite shot. I knew then that others had been before me, that I had found nothing new. A little further up I came on a hot spring, and as I had heard someone speak of one at the head of the Maruia plain, I concluded I must be at that place, which I found out afterwards was correct. I had now to make my way over the Lewis saddle before dark.
In a New Zealand bush in the dark one cannot see one’s hand in front of one’s face, so in such a wild rough place it meant stopping where I was if Denighted. I had been walking since dawn, but I was young and not easily tired. I got over the top and commenced to make my way down towards my camp, and coming to a creek and being very thirsty, threw myself on my hands and knees and commenced to drink. There were large round stones covered with slimy moss, the growth of many years. My left hand slipped, and down I went into the creek with my left arm under me,
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and feeling as if it were out of joint. I rolled over, and in doing so decided that as the arm went out through falling in one position, the only way to get it righted was to at once try to jerk it back in the opposite position, and I managed to push it in again. I asked a doctor afterwards if it would have been possible for me to have done this, and his reply was that some of the ligaments might have been holding, and in that case I could have done so. I reached the camp just before dark and got very little sleep that night. Next morning I had to put the saddle on the horse, roll up and strap on my things with one hand, and then ride home. It was a considerable time before my arm became strong again.
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Hope Cattle Run.
CHAPTER VII.
We had a cattle run, carrying about ISO head of cattle about 20 miles further up the river. There were river bed flats with native bush up the hillsides, which were about 6,000 feet high —very fine scenery —and about seven miles up this property which was about eleven miles long, there was a hot sulphur spring. At first we only had young cattle which we bought down country, and kept up there until they were big enough to sell again, but after a time, we commenced breeding, which entailed erecting yards and fencing in paddocks to enable us to brand and ear mark the calves. There was plenty of fine red Birch timber up there, the trees being about six feet through. We went up there and felled a number of these trees, and split them into posts and rails. My partner went back to the homestead and I stopped in the camp, and he came up now and then to help at the heavy work. I must have been three months there. I had the horses for a time, and dragged out the posts and rails to the line where we intended erecting the fence and yards. I also split timber and shingles, so that we could erect a hut which we built later, and which lasted for a long time, in fact may be there yet.
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I remember one night when asleep in the tent, I was awakened by a native black rat eating my hair. The wood hens (weka) also were very plentiful, and they would steal anything bright which I left about. I used to catch these wood hens for eating at times when I was short of mutton. I caught them in the following manner. First I got a thin stick about four feet long. In the old days all the native birds were very tame. There were numbers of native Robins, some of which would perch on a log close to me, and would watch my stick while I gradually advanced it towards them. When it was only a foot away a quick motion of the stick would knock the robin over. The next thing was to procure two longer sticks—about six feet long; then get a blade of native flax, tie a slender piece round the Robin’s neck, leaving a length of three feet, and tie the other end to the end of one of the sticks. To the end of the other stick I would tie a fair sized noose with some more flax. When I saw a weka I would dangle the robin hanging at the end of one stick behind the noose at the end of the other. As soon as the weka caught sight of the robin, he would make a dash for it and in doing so would put his head through the noose, which I at once tightened, and the weka was caught and up in the air at the end of the stick. In those days, wekas were so tame that one could catch them without fail in this way. I used to think that no one need starve—
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First Hut Built on Hope Cattle Run.
lost in the bush —if they knew how to catch the birds in the way I have just described.
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CHAPTER VIII.
1 generally took a draft of the cattle, when fat enough, to the West Coast. There were two ways of going there, one by Lake Sumner over the Hurunm Saddle, and down the Teramakau to the Arahura, the saleyards for Hokitika; the other up the Doubtful river over the saddle, and down the Ahaura River to Greymouth or Reefton.
On one occasion, I took a big Devon bull that I had used long enough, and wanted to sell, to the Arahura saleyards with a number of other cattle. I was showing him to the auctioneer, Mr. Mark Sprott, before the sale, and went into the yard to prove how quiet he was, when he suddenly charged me and catching me between his wide horns pushed me against the rail. I shouted at him, and he eased his pressure a little, and being very active in those days, I put my hand up, caught the top rail and pulled myself out of danger. The bull I should estimate was over one ton in weight, and if he had pressed his whole weight on my chest, he would have crushed me. The auctioneer used often afterwards to speak to me of the time when I was nearly killed by that bull.
It was not altogether a success breeding cattle up there. The first calves from the quiet cattle
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were very quiet, but the second and following generations were very wild, especially as we only went amongst these cattle three or four times in a year to brand the calves or to take away a draft. At the last I had to take all I could away as they became too wild. It meant very rough riding on this riverbed to muster them together, and I need hardly say, dangerous, as a fall on these very rough stones might have been serious. Luckily, I only had one, but got a fair shaking that time. We got away all we could —about 100 the first time —-and sold them at Addington. I then took up about twelve very quiet cattle and used them as decoys to drive with the wild ones into the paddock. Three of us were a fortnight collecting about twenty more. Sometimes we would get a mob down near the paddocks and they would all break away.
One big bullock, which we had brought out from the bush with the quiet cattle, and were driving down the river towards the paddock would —after a time when he got heated—rush out and charge after us. One of us would then keep him going on the way to the paddock, until he got too close to the horse to be comfortable, when we would put the horse at its utmost pace and gallop away. He would then dash off and hide in a clump of Matagowrie or Wild Irishman, eight to ten feet high, of which there were many in these river flats. We would then drive the quiet cattle into this
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Matagowrie and leave them for about half an hour so as to give the bullock time to cool down; then he would come out with these cattle and go along for a time. As soon as he became heated he would charge us once more. We got that bullock into the paddock as he was charging one of us through the gateway. Once in the paddock, by driving them about when they were cool, we got them quiet enough to take away.
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CHAPTER IX.
On one trip with cattle to the Ahaura, I had a young fellow as packman named Toller who had been a bank clerk in Christchurch, and knew nothing about cattle. On the West Coast side of the Ahaura Saddle it is steep, and the track sidles off to the left. The cattle would not go down this track, and we were using the stock whips and dogs to force them, when they suddenly dashed straight down through the bush which was very steep. Following them on foot, we found one bullock had landed about half way down on his back against an old fallen dead tree about five feet through. His feet were up in the air, and he could not get up. The only thing to do was to get the axe and chop this dead log through. The log was very rotten, we were on the lower side, and before we had chopped one quarter of the way through, the bullock gave a struggle, the log broke and began to roll down on to us. I made a bound downhill, and it being very steep I must have gone fifteen yards; then I jumped behind a tree. I then began to think of Toller. There was no place within thirty miles where I could have procured help if that log had gone over him. At last, I plucked courage to call out, “Toller,” and thanked goodness that he answered and was unhurt.
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On another occasion, I sold a mob of about forty head of fat cattle off the run for, I think about D per head, the man giving me a cheque in payment on a Greymouth bank, and I helped to start him with these cattle on the road to Ahaura. I sent the cheque to my banker for collection, and it was some time —as mails were slow in travelling then—before I had word back, saying that the cheque was dishonoured, marked, “Not sufficient funds.” It was soon after I had a very severe loss from scabby sheep coming on to my run —which I will describe later—so I could not afford to lose the money.
I had a legal book, “Every Man’s Own Lawyer,” and in reading it up, I found that if a cheque was dishonoured, I could, while the cattle were “In transitu,” seize them again provided I claimed them before the man had sold them. To make sure, I rode seven miles to Waiau and telegraphed to my lawyer, and obtaining a satisfactory answer, 1 decided that although the man would be near his journey’s end, if I started at once and lost no time, I might overtake him. It was late in the afternoon, so I packed up a tent fly, blankets and provisions for three days, and left at once. I rode until about twelve o’clock that night, and by that time I was approaching the bush leading up to the saddle in the dividing range, so had to wait till daylight. I tethered the horse as he might have made off home,
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and, as I had to consider him for the long journey in front of me, I kept moving his tether every few hours on all the different stoppages on the journey. Next morning I stared very early, and rode as far and as long as I could, with some consideration for the horse. Fortunately it was fine weather all the time. After another long day’s ride, on the third day I overtook the man with the cattle, only about a mile from his journey’s end. After explaining the position to him, and that I should take the cattle over and sell them myself if I was not paid he promised to go to Greymouth the next day to obtain the money, which he did. I returned after a strenuous ride with the cash in my pocket. It was worth the trouble, as I doubt if I should have obtained the money if I had not overtaken the man in time.
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CHAPTER X.
On another occasion when riding up to this cattle run through Glyn Wye, and about three miles from where the bush track commenced, I saw three men with their “swags,” blankets, etc., walking along the rough bank on the other side of the Hope river. I knew at once they should not be there, so I cooeed to them and by their answer—especially after I started to ride down to them and there being a dip in the land so that I got out of their sight—and from their frantic screams, I was assured they were lost. I found when I got to them that they had walked from the Ahaura and instead of fording the river Hope, which with little difficulty they could have done, they turned up it, which would have led them back to the West Coast, and as they were nearly starving when I found them there is little doubt that they would have perished.
How many people have died in New Zealand, through doing the same thing, we shall never know. I have always tried to impress upon people that if they would only follow a stream down, they would soon, in a small country like New Zealand, come to some inhabitated place.
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I divided the lunch I had with me amongst them, gave them, one by one, a ride behind me over the river and put them on the track for Glyn Wye, which was about twelve miles away. To show how exhausted they must have been, it was about 10 a.m. when I put them on the road to Glyn Wye, and when I returned there after dark and made enquiries about them, only one had arrived. We went out and gathered the others in safely.
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CHAPTER XI.
We had very few conveniences in those early days. Everyone burned tallow candles which we made in a mould, twelve at a time. They constantly required snuffing. Our nearest Post Office was at Waiau, a seventy miles ride there and back. The station owners about Hanmer subscribed, and got the tenant of Jollie’s Pass Hotel to ride to Waiau once a week for the mail, and the three runholders up the Waiau took it in turns to go for it, so I only had to get it once in every three weeks, a thirty miles ride.
As it was too far to get a tradesman up for any repairs, we were all, what was called, “Bush Carpenters,” and most stations had small forges, and people could shoe their own horses, and weld small breakages. We had to order a year’s supply of provisions, etc., which came up as backloading when the wool was sent down. Every station had a small store built on high piles with tin nailed round these piles at the bottom, so that rats and mice could not get up, and damage our provisions.
The wool had to be carted to Salt Water Creek, or Kaiapoi—at first in bullock drays, and then in six horse waggons. The carters slept under the
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drays at night. In a bad Sou’ Wester it could not have been very pleasant. Wages were 10/-, 15/to 20/- per week, and found. Shepherds got £6O per annum and found, and yet many of the wealthy to-day are men who saved from these wages. They were a hardy lot, and never complained. Unfortunately, there were many, as there are to-day, who never saved. These men, at the end «f the year, would come for their cheques. Many a time I asked them to put their money in the savings bank, and commence to save, but without success. They would leave with £4O to £6O and return nearly always within a fortnight, with all their money spent, total wrecks, and shaky from drink, and I generally gave them a little whisky for two or three days to put them right.
Wool was a very low price, and when the runs became stocked up with sheep, the surplus sheep were hard to sell at any price. Soon after I bought my partner out to stock up, I bought from Mr. Wigley of Balmoral, 1,000 ewes, six-tooth and full mouthed —with the right to reject any sheep I did not like—-for 1/- per head. £5O for the 1,000 Merino ewes. There were no other sheep in New Zealand but Merinos then. One run-holder on Parnassus at that time killed and skinned 5,000 Merino wethers, and threw the carcases over into the Waiau river. The old sheep had to be got rid of to make room for the younger, better sheep.
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At St. Leonards they had a boiling down plant, and I think they netted about 5/- to 8/- per head for the fat and skins provided, of course, that the sheep were fat.
After the Franco-Prussian War, in 1871, wool made a great jump in price. I got 1/6 per pound for my back country Merino wool. Times boomed, and we all made money. As a consequence land went up in value, as it is always sure to do as profits increase. Land, like shares or anything else, is worth what you can make out of it. I cannot quite remember how long this boom lasted, but in the eighties times were bad again. Many who bought land during the boom lost their all, and the rest of us who had been thrifty enough to withstand the slump, had to scrape along with small profits.
The cooking, in the early days in the back country, was very primitive. We had none of the conveniences which came later. Everything was cooked in an open fireplace with a wood fire. The cooking utensils consisted generally of a billy, kettle, frying pan, a few tin pans for mixing the bread, etc., an oval boiler, saucepan, and a camp oven in which the bread was cooked. The camp oven was a large cast iron utensil with an iron lid, and it was hung over the fire. The dough was put in, the lid put on, and live embers put on the top, so that the heat was both at the top and bottom.
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The colonial oven followed this. It was set into the fireplace and raised to about eight inches from the floor, with a door which opened outwards, and two shelves inside. Most of the cooking was done with a fire lit on top of this oven, but if anything required baking in the oven, a fire was lit underneath also. These ovens were fairly useful until the more convenient cooking range took their place. I helped to do the cooking and bread making for a few years, as did many others on small runs and farms. We all had to rough it, and no one expected anything else. Then as I got on, and increased the station buildings, and so made more accommodation, I engaged a man cook.
It might be interesting to explain further how our cooking was done. All the bread had to be cooked on the place, the nearest bakery being at Kaiapoi, 80 miles away, so we all had to make our own yeast, and know how to set and bake bread. We also made a sweet loaf called a brownie, and scones with currants in them. Most of our cooking, and also all the bread-making, was done in the evening as we always worked at least eight hours a day.
After our supper in the evening, we would if required, boil an oval boiler full of potatoes in their skins, and roast in the camp oven, or boil a joint of mutton for the following day’s meals. On
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getting up in the morning, one of us would fry some chops while the other would put on the billy to boil for making tea, then lay the few tin plates, pannicans, etc., we had on the table and quickly peel a few of the potatoes already boiled overnight. After the chops were cooked, these potatoes were put in the frying pan with some fat, mashed up and quickly warmed. With the tea which we had with every meal, there was no milk. Few back country stations had that at first. We made a good meal with the chops, potatoes, and some of the brownie or sweet scones; no butter. For dinner, which we had to prepare so that we could return to work within the hour, we had some of the overnight cooked joint with potatoes again warmed up in the frying pan, and brownie, and we had the same for supper. At odd times we would boil some rice or sago, and on Sundays we had plum duff. What was left over was cut into slices and warmed up for the weekday meals. These were the general meals on all the stations in those times. No one grumbled, and everyone seemed to thrive on the food.
I often wonder what the present generation would think of this, when so much is talked about the standard of living. There was plenty of good wholesome food, but now that people have been spoilt by having too many luxuries —which in many cases they would be better and healthier without—
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I have no doubt the} r would very much resent going back into the simple life, that if the present conditions last they may yet be forced to do. One thing I noticed was that no one became tired of mutton, which was the only meat on the sheep stations. When at Longbeach, there were at first only cattle, and we all got tired of beef, and I remember how very pleased we were to have some mutton after the sheep came on the place.
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CHAPTER XII.
Between my run and the neighbours to the South there was a large extent of green bush chiefly silver “Birch”—really “Beech”-which was of very little value. I was always trying to burn this. In a heavy Nor’ Wester it is wonderful how, from the dry leaves on the ground, fire would spread into the branches of the tall “Birch” trees and sweep up a hillside. I could only burn in patches. One very dry Summer, however, the whole bush went. I never knew who lit it, but quite 10,000 acres were burnt. This left an open boundary between my, and the other two properties. I applied for and obtained, a lease under the Nelson Provincial Land caws, of all this unoccupied burnt bush land. The rent was small, but there was no grass upon it. I offered the Government to sow English grass upon it if they would make me an allowance for the purpose, but they refused. First there grew sow thistle in the Summer, which was fattening for the stock, then Scotch thistle, afterwards different grasses. I gave the musterers a small bag of cocksfoot to scatter when they were on the country and it so improved it, that after a few years, I was able to carry treble the number of sheep on the run.
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Although we got nothing for our surplus sheep, unless they were fat, the cost of living and all farmer’s requisites were low, and they kept low so long as wages were low, but when wages rose, all other costs went up accordingly.
Mustering was fairly strenuous work as the mountains were rugged and steep in man}' places. I required five shepherds to muster the sheep in from the back country. We had to take a packman with food, tents, and our blankets, etc., to the far end —twelve miles. After camping for the night, we would get away at daybreak, as it was important to catch the sheep on their camps on the hill tops. We would drive them along the mountains towards the homestead, and at times, if a mob, as there were many mobs on such an extent of country, broke back, as often happened in this difficult country, the rest of us would have to wait while the shepherd on whose beat the sheep had broken back, went for them, so that often we were out the most of the day. At night we went down to camp which the packman had shifted, again pitching the tents, and having a meal ready cooked for us. The next morning it was even more important to start at day dawn to catch the sheep before they began wandering back. That day we would have them all mustered and driven to the homestead. The front part of the run could be mustered in blocks, the shepherds going out in the morning and bring-
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ing the sheep in at night. On Mt. Nessing, which I owned many years later, there was only one block on the Hakataramea side that required a packman. On all the rest of the run the shepherds could ride out along the wide valley leaving their horses at the foot of the hill country whilst they mustered it and drove the sneep into the paddocks, catching their horses and riding home. Nowadays, I believe most of the runs have out-huts built to save the trouble of shifting the tents, etc.
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CHAPTER XIII.
Soon after I bought the run in the Amuri I was elected a member of the Road Board which was afterwards changed to the Amuri County Council, and I continued a member of this for over thirty years until I left the district. The first Members I remember were Mr. Caverhill, of Hawkeswood and afterwards of Highfield; Messrs. J. H. Davison, of St. Leonards; W. Thomson, of Balmoral; D. W. Mcßae, of Glens of TeKoa; John McArthur, St. James’ and myself. Afterwards Messrs. James Macfarlane, Achray; Duncan Macfarlane, Lyndon; W. Acton-Adams, Hopefield and Tarndale; and Duncan Rutherford, of Leslie Hills; became Members. It was a long way to Waiau for the Council meetings once a month, and sometimes after the business was over, we would all stop and have dinner at the Hotel, and have a social evening. We did not have many. I can remember more than once, the day dawning as I rode home over the Leslie Pass with another Council member.
It was a long way to Christchurch, and as I emigrated to get on in the world, I stuck to my work, and only went to town once or twice in the year; at the Grand National races in August, and the
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Agricultural and Pastoral Show in November. Most of the farmers in the back country used to visit Christchurch at the same time, and as only men with plenty of go would have tackled the breaking in of this wild back country, I am afraid, when in town, some of them used to, what is called, "Paint the town red,” and no notice was taken of it. I suppose it was looked upon as the exuberance of superfluous energy. One prank that I was an unwilling partner in, was the following : a neighbour who was a very big powerful man that few would care to tackle, came to me at the Clarendon Hotel during show week, and told me that he could not get a room, and would I allow him to bring a mattress into mine, and let him sleep on the floor. He got the number of my room, and about twelve o’clock woke me up and brought in a roll of mattress, sheets, blankets, etc., which he put on the floor and was soon asleep. I found out next day that he had stripped all the bedclothes out of the nearest room that he could find unoccupied to mine, and when the poor fellow who had engaged the room went to retire for the night, he found nothing but the bare iron bedstead.
I used sometimes to ride to Christchurch to buy yearling cattle, which I drove back to the run. The distance was slightly under 100 miles and I always rode that distance in the day, and a dog followed me also. Many have told me they thought
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it too far, but I never had any difficulty, nor did I notice that the horse got too tired. I always considered “It is the pace that kills.” I started very early, before 5 a.m. so that I could give the horse a rest and a feed about 9 a.m. and again in the middle of the day, and in the evening. The horse was one of those I bred on the run and they were a hardy sort. It was a long trip up with the 80 head of young cattle I usually bought.
On one occasion, my partner was helping me to drive up from Christchurch a larger mob than I usually bought, and when near the station —as we had not time to drive them all the way up, because it was getting dark —we left them about three miles down the Waiau river and rode home. When leaving for Christchurch, about a fortnight before, we had left a man in charge of the place. He was a decent honest worker, but one of the kind that usually spent all his money in drink. The homestead was below a high terrace and when we opened the gate and looked down upon it, everything was in darkness. We rode down, tied our horses up and opened the door. Still everything was in darkness, so we struck a match and saw the man lying dead upon the floor with a cup in his hand. Upon investigation, we found he had broken into my separate little building which I had left carefully locked, and taken a two gallon jar of brandy which I had there, and as the brown stain of the brandy
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was in the cup which he had in his hand, there was no doubt that he had drunk himself to death. Here was a good, and I should have said an honest fellow, but the temptation of drink was too much for him. After this, I have always thought that, although a moderate drinker myself, a bootlegger, and those who put temptation in the way of men like this poor fellow, are a curse to humanity. We had to take the body to Jollie’s Pass Hotel, and the Count de la Pasture who was the owner of Glyn Wye seven miles up the river, acted as Coroner for the inquest.
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CHAPTER XIV.
Much of the wool was sent down from the stations to the port of shipment by bullock teams of generally six to eight bullocks. The bullocks, travelled very slowly, and it took a long time to make the trip down and back again. The bullocks became very tractable, and a good driver could take them anywhere with perfect safety. The bullock driver on Glen Wye station was an old Oxford graduate who was well educated and possessed a good memory. He was fond of addressing his bullocks in Latin with often, I fear, a few bad words interspersed. He was one of many on the stations for whom drink had been too much, and they had lost good positions through it. Many of the good families in England to get rid of their “Ne’er-do-wells” had sent them out with small allowances paid to them periodically by a lawyer, on the principle, I suppose that “Out of sight, out of mind.” These men were generally spoken of as “Remittance men.” Happy-go-lucky individuals, not a credit to either themselves or their families.
In the South Island we were not troubled with the Maori Wars, although they were going on in the North Island for many years after I arrived. I saw the other day a statement that New
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Zealanders could be especially proud of the way in which they had treated the aboriginal race. I seem to think that the chief credit is to the Maoris themselves. They were a noble race of savages that held their own against us in the wars. If we could have over-run them as the whites did with the Australian Blacks, or the North American Indians, I expect they also would have sunk and been pushed out of existence as in those other countries. The Maoris commanded our respect and even admiration, by the way they held their own against us. They are not even diminishing in numbers, but will have a hard struggle to survive now that the European vices, drink, etc., have got amongst them. I believe they will hold their own yet against all temptations, as few other aboriginals have done, to their own credit and not to ours, although we are trying to help them.
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CHAPTER XV.
Living so much by myself—although time always passes quickly when you are working hard—--1 had to find something to do during my hours of relaxation. At first I took up astronomy, and the more you study it, the more interesting it becomes, but my telescope was a very indifferent one, and I had not sufficient good books on the subject, so I gave it up. Then I began thinking and reading of world affairs, not politics as the Politician looks at it—with his party before everything —but world affairs and world Government as it should be, and I have been interested and thought of these questions all the rest of my life. About this time, Mr. W. E. Gladstone was advocating manhood suffrage. Queen Victoria, who was a clever woman, was opposed to him, and I think she was right. To make all equal by giving them the vote to elect our legislators, who make the laws we have to abide by, is wrong. We are not all equal, and never will be. If you give all a vote surely the educated, the clever Scientist, and those who have a big stake in their country should have more votes than the weakling, or a person who never thinks, and can be led off by anyone.
I have never forgotten that about this time (in the seventies), when mustering my run, and camped
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out, I had quite a political lot of shepherds. Round a camp fire, they were laying down the law how capital had more than its share, and ought to be made to disgorge. I listened to it all, then said, “If things were to happen as you are proposing, it means bursting up our capitalistic civilization, and going in for a scramble of the spoils.” An Irishman, who had been the chief spokesman all through the argument answered, “Yes sor, and that is what I would like to go in for.”
Then I began to consider, and what I am going to write is what I thought over fifty years ago, and talked to many people about. Lately I have seen others have also written about it. I deliberated. The world has repeatedly risen to a certain stage of civilization and then fallen back more or less to a dark age again, the Babylonian, Assyrian, Egyptian, and we do not know how many more. In America, wonderful buildings have been found, showing that the same sort of thing has gone on there. The last, the Roman Empire is the only one we have any authentic record about. We know Rome fell because she got too effeminate, and in other words, too rich and indolent. The nobles were the chief cause of Rome’s fall. Now with manhood suffrage the masses are given the power, and I think they will use it to bring down our civilization. If you give those who have nothing, power over those who have, it is, in my opinion, only
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to be expected, that some day they will use that power to bring all to the same level, and go in for the scramble that the Irishman desired. Envy and jealousy are the two strongest traits in human nature. We all have these traits. Think for yourself reader. Are you never envious of something or somebody?
Labour is gradually increasing in power, and has certainly become more indolent, and cut down the hours of work: yet all our civilization is a question of work. If we give up work, and take things too easily, we shall soon degenerate.
A neighbour in Amuri, to whom I often used to express these opinions, always answered me that education would put everything right. Education must be a great help in seing things in a better, clearer way, but unfortunately, envy and jealousy are too strong in most of us and education with envy is more inclined to make people dissatisfied with their lot. Does the Labour Leader who thinks only of his own class, and does all he can to bring down those who are better off —although he sees that they are doing the best they can for all—consider all sides of the question ? Instead of preaching and encouraging class warfare, how much better it would be to help the thriftless, and educate them to learn how they could save and prosper. Anyone in New Zealand who is willing
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to work in the country, and save, could grow rich. A short time ago a good man on a farm could earn two pounds per week, equal to £lO4 per year and found, and for several years this was the farm wage. If any young single man—and the time to save is when one is young—had gone to work on a farm, with the intention of saving, as so many of the men who have retired on a good income did in the old days, they could, in about ten years, save enough to start on a farm on their own account.
Let anyone calculate it. Not much was required for clothes, etc., in the country, so that most of the wages could have been invested in Government bonds then procurable at 5| per cent. From these invested savings, with compound interest, it is easy to estimate the large sum which would accumulate. How much better to teach a man to be thrifty and prosper, than to spend his earnings and become an agitator against those who, by saving, have become better off. I have advised many young fellows to save and invest as I have just written, but some have answered “When you are young is the time to spend your money in enjoying yourself,” and I have said, “How about when you become old.” Their reply has been. Oh, then I can go in for the old age pension.” I need hardly say that with such men it is hopeless, and if I had the making of the laws, I would force them to save, by making them put by a portion of
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their wages as a provision for old age. Why should they be supported in their old age when they have been thriftless in their youth?
Owing to universal manhood suffrage the thriftless "have-nots” being in the majority, are gradually forcing legislation, so that the thrifty are taxed more and more, by death duties and every other way that can be thought of, to enable the State to spend more money on Old Age Pensions, family allowances, increased education, more and more conveniences, etc., etc.; until at last the goose that lays the golden egg will be strangled, and no more money will be procurable for all this. Those who have most stake in the country should have more votes than those who have none.
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CHAPTER XVI.
After a few years I kept a man cook on the station. These cooks were generally old men who, being too fond of drink, had never saved anything, and wanted to be off on another spree as soon as they had sufficient money. As by this time I was employing more men, as also were all the other station-owners, we were often left in an awkward fix when the cook left, and we could not get another at once. None of the stations around had milk, and very few had vegetables, except potatoes. It was too much trouble to milk a cow, and no gardeners were kept except on the front country properties.
My brother came out from England a few years after I had been on the Waiau run and he said, “Why do you not have a cow and some milk?’’ I told him we had plenty of cows on the cattle run and if he would milk one we would soon bring one down. He agreed to do so, and the cow was brought down and a yard erected in a corner of a paddock. All went well until the winter came on, when heavy rain and the cow tramping in the yard, which had a stiff clay subsoil, made it into a sea of mud, and there was no shingle to be got near. One wet morning I walked round to the
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yard. There was some native bush on a flat below the house, and my brother had got wet through because the cow had been dodging him about in the bush, not wishing to come up to the yard. He was sitting on the stool milking, not in the best of humours. The cow had a long tail which draggled in the mud in the yard and she suddenly swung her muddy tail round and hit him in the face with it. He picked up the bucket, threw it at the cow, milk and all, and that was the end of the milking until, a few years later when I engaged a married couple. As most women want milk to cook with, the husband milked.
I remember Mr. Andrew Anderson, the engineer who had come up to build a sheep bridge for the Rutherford Brothers- —who were then the owners of Glen Wye—did not like being without milk, and as my brother was milking the cow at that time, I used to send him a bottle every other day. The townspeople did not readily take to roughing it, such as we had to do then in the country, though the station hands never complained. They had sufficient, but not much variety, in their food. They did not expect anything different, and I believe they were happier because they were contented. Ido not think there is any doubt that real contentment is true happiness.
About 1890, I went with my wife for a trip round the Pacific Islands in the old S.S. “Ovalau,”
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belonging to the Union Steamship Co. The natives struck me as being the happiest people I had ever seen. They seemed always laughing and happy. Their huts were only made out of palm leaves. If they required food, fruits were growing upon all the trees around, their wants were few, because they did not know of, nor expect, the luxuries that our present civilization has taught us to look for. I mentioned all this to the Captain of the “Ovalau,” and he told me that he had been trading through these Islands from the early days, and at that time the natives were the happiest people he had ever seen. He noticed, later, after the traders had brought in drink and other things, and the natives saw the more luxurious way in which the whites lived, that there gradually came discontent amongst them. Verily, if a man lived in a barrel like Diogenes, and was content, he would be happier than a king in his palace who was dissatisfied. Three years ago as I was leaving Suva in the “Aorangi,” I heard one of the native wharf labourers say, in a surly way, “Goodbye, money,” and I thought “Yes, the discontent has come and ruined these poor natives.”
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CHAPTER XVII.
About the 1880’s —I forget the exact date — there was a big sale of the St. Leonard’s property, which Mr. Davison had managed for Messrs. Rhodes & Wilkin. It was altogether about 100,000 acres of freehold, and was cut up into several blocks. I bought about 1,200 acres of the agricultural land at Rotherham for £3 per acre. I built a small house upon it, fenced it, and ploughed up some of it for turnips. Growing turnips on this tussock land, ploughing a wide flat furrow fourteen inches and only three inches deep, and then sowing turnip seed broadcast, we used to get very fine crops on this virgin soil.
After buying the land, I spent most of the Winter months there as there was plenty to do to break this new place in. I left the shepherd, whom I had engaged in Christchurch, in charge of the run. About a fortnight after putting him there, I rode up the 25 miles from the farm to see how he was getting on. When I arrived at the homestead I found him, with one boot off, looking very wild, and he evidently had had nothing to eat for some time. I lit a fire and commenced to prepare a meal, and then went outside. On hearing a noise I rushed inside, and found he had tumbled
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over nearly into the fire. I dragged him to his bed in the next room. He kept endeavouring to get up, and I had to keep pushing him and holding him down. Thinking he had gone mad, I got all the implements, knives, etc., and hid them. I was for hours keeping him down on his bed, and towards dawn he went off to sleep. I got my horse and rode as hard as I could to the Hopefield station, four miles away, and had to ford the Waiau river in the dark. The Manager, Mr. O. Scott Thompson, and another man returned with me, and I rode off to the Waiau township, 35 miles away, for the doctor. When the doctor examined him, he found he had contracted Syphilis, and had been dosing himself with too strong, and wrong, medicines. I had to remain about three days to feed him up, and get him strong enough to go in the coach to the Hospital. The doctor refused to come up to see the man unless I guaranteed his fees, which I did. As the man had only earned two weeks’ wages, it took most of that to pay his coach fare and other expenses. That man never would repay me the doctor’s fees, although the attention which I gave him saved his life.
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CHAPTER XVIII.
At first, on the run, there was a great deal of newly burnt manuka six to ten feet long. We made most of the fences out of it to save expense. We sawed some of the thickest into stakes, which we drove into the ground about one yard apart, and then we laced the long thin straight Manuka between the stakes. This made quite a good fence. The trouble was that the stakes would not last long in the ground, and had to be renewed every four or five years. Gradually, as the Manuka rotted away, we had to renew with wire fences. No doubt it would have been better, had sufficient capital been available, to have erected wire fences in the first place, as they would have lasted an indefinite time. I know of a wire fence which was erected with wire strainers 70 years ago, and it is still quite a good fence. However, starting with limited capital I had to consider expense, and save all I could, so these wattle fences—as they were called —were the best under the circumstances. I obtained fences which saved me considerable outlay, and which lasted for some time with a certain amount of repairs.
The Amuri, at first, was in the Nelson Province, and the rents we paid for the crown lands were very
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little. I think I paid £d. per acre per annum, and many of the large runs in the front country, such as Cheviot Hills, St. Leonards and others, were bought at 5/- per acre. On my run I had about 1,500 acres freehold, which cost me about 10/- per acre. The road rates were also very low, and there were few other taxes. The British came to New Zealand about 100 years ago, and they got most of the land from the Maoris for nothing. It is a very prolific country with an exceptional climate, and if the people had been wise they could have made a paradise upon earth of it. Instead of which, we are nearly ruined, and taxation has to be further increased to make it possible to pay our debts. If people would think of what is, and of what might have been, they will not thank our legislators.
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CHAPTER XIX.
Early in the history of New Zealand, there was scab amongst many of the flocks in the South Island. Government Inspectors were appointed to enforce the laws to dip, and clean the sheep. Scab is a minute insect rather hard to see with the naked eye, but, with a magnifying glass, it is easily detected. The insect bored through the sheep’s skin, and lived on the tissues underneath. The wool peeled off, and a scab formed, which gradually spread all over the sheep, and if the disease was not stopped, the animal died. The way to stop it was to dip the sheep. Tobacco, which we used to grow ourselves, and lime and sulphur, were generally used. Both these had to be boiled about 20 minutes. We had two 400 gallon tanks bricked in to hold the heat, in which these ingredients were boiled. The first dipping killed all the live insects on the sheep, but not all the eggs, which hatched out in fourteen days, and so it was necessary to make sure of dipping all the sheep again in about a fortnight. One left, and they would go on breeding again, besides which sheep in pain would often rub off some insects with their wool, and as they lived for a long time on the rubbing post, another sheep might come along and pick them up. It is
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easy therefore, to understand that scab was a very difficult thing to get rid of. South of the Waiau river, where my run was situated, had been clear of scab for several years, and as the Waiau is a deep, rapid running river, the sheep would not swim across —we all considered—of their own accord.
Soon after I bought the farm at Rotherham, Messrs. McArthur Bros, of St. James Station on the North side of the Waiau, bought 2,000 Merino wethers from Messrs. Mallock and Lance, Horsley Downs, which is on the South side of the Hurunui river and South of the Waiau. They drove them up to St. James’, which was the only run in the Amuri still infected with scab, and turned these sheep out there. My Waiau run was situated in a direct line between St. James and Horsley Downs; there were many mountains between, and it was impossible for those wethers to have seen their old home, but some instinct, which we do not understand, must have told them the direct way back. My shepherds returning from work, but unfortunately without their dogs, saw the shepherds on the other side of the Waiau, put their dogs round about ten sheep which instantly dashed for the river and swam across, and without dogs my shepherds were unable to stop them after crossing. They told me, but it was too late to get them.
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I went out at day dawn to muster the hill the sheep had gone up, and got one scabby sheep amongst my own sheep, but not the other nine which were still at large. The law made it compulsory to at once inform the inspector, and also all the neighbours if one found a scabby sheep. I mustered all my sheep off my front country at once and dipped them. Then I mustered a portion of my back country and with about 150 sheep found another scabby one. We built temporary bush yards and killed and skinned the lot. Then we all helped Mr. G. W. Mcßae, Gians of Tekoa, to muster his adjoining block, and got another of these scabby sheep amongst about 500 sheep. All the scabby sheep were Horsley Downs wethers from St. James. Mr. G. W. Mcßae decided upon killing the whole of these 500 sheep, and having wire yards on this country, they were put in and we helped him to skin them. By killing these sheep he saved the whole of his flock of about 20,000 sheep from being declared infected, as no other scabby sheep were found on any of the remainder of his run.
The law then was, if a run was declared infected, no sheep could be sold or removed from it, and if one of the sheep with the sheep brand of that infected run strayed on to an adjoining run, the Inspector could declare that run also infected. I was in an awkward position. Mine was an exceedingly rough run. In some places it was a sheer
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precipice for thousands of feet. One could not sidle round in mustering, but had to go under or over the top, so that it was a difficult run to muster, and get all the sheep in, which, as I have mentioned before is so necessary to clear scab; besides the boundaries were not good, owing to the bush fires, and there was every possibility of a few sheep straying on to the neighbour’s property.
In the whole of this portion of the Amuri District south of the Waiau, between the Waiau and the Hurunui rivers, there were about 350,000 sheep, and if the District had been declared infected none of these sheep could have been removed South without bing dipped twice at the Hurunui. The Government Inspector and the runholders consulted together, I only had about 7,000 sheep, and if they were destroyed, the runholders would be saved from the District being declared infected. So they subscribed 1/3 a head and the Government promised the same, and they offered me 2/6 per head to kill the lot off, at the same time telling me if one of my sheep strayed on to their properties, they would claim legal damages for having infected their flocks. I had not possessed my run very long and had bought the farm with what profit I had made, also having a mortgage over it, so financially I was not in a very sound position. Messrs. McArthur Bros, who had infected ray sheep were also not financially sound. To kill the sheep would
cripple me, but I risked being ruined if I did not. I decided upon killing them off. Some of the neighbours helped me to muster.
In those days in the Autumn most of the sheep were fat on the runs. There was a lot of anise and many annual grasses, and herbs that were very fattening which have died out now with the heavy stocking and burning. I skinned all the sheep, and fellmongered the skins afterwards. I also cut the legs off to make hams, which I salted and sold to the men working on the Weka Pass making the railway to Waikari. All the fat I could collect was saved and sold, and the rest of the carcase was so fat that, after putting some extra Manuka sticks on the fire every morning, they burnt themselves away. This misfortune was hard on a young man just starting, but I never gave in, and made the best of a bad job. The country being rough, there was trouble in getting the last sheep. My brother was very useful. He and another man camped out all over the run getting all the sheep they could, and then they shot the rest. We found no more scabby sheep. In the meantime, I put cattle on, but it was not cattle country so there was not much profit.
After two years I wanted to stock up agair. but the Inspector wished me to wait until three years had expired. As I knew we had not seen any more scabby sheep I felt this was unreasonable.
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The Act read, if a land owner mustered all his sheep, he could call on the Inspector to come and inspect them, and if he could make a declaration that he was producing ail the sheep on his property, then if the Inspector could not find any scab, he must give a clean certificate. I had twenty sheep left in the paddocks for killing, so I got the Inspector to come up, made all the declarations and the Inspector had to give me a clean certificate so that I could stock up the run again with sheep. I might mention that in the meantime St. James and the Clarence runs had got rid of the scab, and there was none in New Zealand and never should be again if only reasonable precautions are taken.
When I wanted to buy the sheep for restocking the run I went to my Agents, the N.Z. Loan & Mercantile Agency Co., Christchurch, to borrow the necessary money. Before deciding to make the advance they sent their land valuer up, and I went all over my properties with him. The Manager in Christchuch i,old me afterwards that the Valuer’s report was, that I was already mortgaged to the full extent of the value of my properties. In other words, I had lost everything, but he was advised that it would be better to let me carry on than to take over the properties and try to work them, so I had to start afresh, and all the capital I had put into these properties had gone.
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CHAPTER XX.
If a farmer makes a fortune, it is honestly made by efficient production. He is not a gambler or speculator, as are some city business men, who operate on the rise and fall of the market, in wheatshares or other stocks, which may often mean that on a low market the forced seller is a loser to the buyer’s profit. Where gambling comes in, even at bridge or horse racing, when the stakes are high, the winner gains at the expense of the loser who, perhaps, can ill afford to lose. Ido not wish to be misunderstood, and the old saying “Judge not, that ye be not judged,” comes to my mind. Ido not for an instant mean that all wealthy business men made their fortunes wrongly. What I wish to demonstrate is that the farmer, if he sticks to his farming alone, must come by his wealth at no one else’s expense. It is made out of the land, his sheep, cattle, etc., that grow into money for him in return for his careful tillage and management. He is perhaps a public benefactor by growing more food for the people.
Now I have retired, they call my income “unearned income” and forget it was made by hard work, thrift and management when I was young, denying myself many of the pleasures which the
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thriftless had. Too much of our Legislation to-day is at the instigation of Labour agitators, quite forgetting that if they take too much from the rich (who pay most of the taxes), so as to impoverish them there would be no money available for the hospitals, education, etc. No one should object to a reasonable death duty. We all have the State’s aid, which costs money, to enable us to live m peace, and earn a competence. Without that aid in policing the country-as there is a good deal of the tiger in human nature—the envious and jealous would seize the fortunes made by energy and thrift, but surely a rate of 24 per cent, is enough. The Lnited Party, two years ago, at the dictation of the Labour Party increased it to 34 per cent, over £lOO,OOO, and it may soon be 50 per cent. Will people go on saving, and undertake the worry and anxiety of employing, when one half they make is taken by the State ? The Nation cannot progress if thrift and enterprise are discouraged.
There are many who think and preach that all will be well, if only money is circulated, but what is really necessary for progress is the accumulation of capital for fresh enterprises, which create employment, and at the same time provide the people with money or services which they require.
When I was a young man, practically before there were any Labour Unions, the working man
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in many cases, had a hard time, and there was a certain amount of sweating going on, so that the Labour Unions were necessary and did a great amount of good in putting right these bad conditions ; but it must not be forgotten that most of the humanitarian legislation was brought in by the early Politicians, who could in no way be called Labour Members.
Having found out the power that Union gives, these Labour leaders by agitation obtained more and more power, and the Politicians pandering to them for their votes, the Unions have gone mad in demanding extreme conditions. Unless the sober minded, sensible Labour leaders see in time what it must all lead to, I fear there will be ruination for any nation under extreme Labour rule. Surely, preference to Unionists interferes with the liberty of the subject, and is a selfish, unfair law.
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CHAPTER XXI
I have already mentioned that I used to drive cattle to the West Coast diggings, and I used to take sheep over also from my run. In those days the sheep were all Merinos, and used to get very fat partly owing to the pastures being richer than they are now after so much heavy stocking. Sheep used to be sent from other runs in the Amuri. The sons of Mr. Rutherford of Leslie Hills, often took mobs over. As a general thing, with fine weather, it took about sixteen days to drive the sheep overj and three days to return. The number taken was four to six hundred. The price we obtained for these Merino wethers at Arahura was, I think about 8/- to 10/- per head. We were content with smaller profits then. Everyone lived economically and that wonderful “Standard of living” which is so much preached now, was very much lower then. Two of us went with the sheep; we had a horse each and a pack horse. Through the Glen Wye run there was a yard built especially to put sheep in at night. After that, going up the Hurunui river flats above Lake Sumner, there being only cattle there, and therefore no danger of mixing with other sheep, we turned them out on the flats in front of us during the night, and they required
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no watching. Down the Teraraakau river there were also flats where the sheep could camp at night time, and the hillsides being covered with bush there was no danger of the sheep straying from these flats.
Hokitika was a very gay place; nearly every other house in the main street was either a hotel or a dance saloon, and the diggers used to squander their money.
For food, on our trips, we would kill a sheep for meat for ourselves and our dogs. On the packhorse we would have flour, with soda and acid to make scones, sugar and tea, and I think that was all. Our cooking utensils consisted of a frying pan, billy and pannicans for the tea. Our bread was made by mixing up the flour with water and with sufficient soda and acid to make it rise. We then cut the dough into scones, heated them in the frying pan until they were hard enough to stand against large stones, slightly heated, and put round the fire, and when cooked on one side they were turned. In this manner we could cook a large number of scones in a very short time. With some of the flour we rubbed in melted mutton fat, then added sugar, soda, and acid, and made a sweet scone which was our only luxury. The meat was nearly always cooked as chops, and as it rains frequently on the West Coast, practice made us
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experts at lighting a fire in any rain, and cooking the necessary meal in the middle of the day.
At night time, we broke off short lengths of Birch tree branches, which we laid on top of one another for “feathers” on the ground inside the tent, and then the waterproof ground sheet, and our blankets. In the morning this had all to be packed on the pack-horse, and away we went again. In fine weather, as a young man I enjoyed it, but sometimes we struck very bad weather, and then it was a strenuous time.
On one trip, going to Hokitika, it came on to snow very hard as we were going over the saddle at the head of the Teramakau river, so that the sheep would not travel, and we had difficulty in forcing them on, and could not get them down to the first small flat, which was the usual camping place. Night coming on we had to pitch our tent in the bush, using the frying pan to scrape the snow off the ground for a place upon which to erect it, and also another place where we lit our fire. It snowed all night, and we had to drive the sheep on again in the snow. It took the whole day to get them down to the first flat, and the latter part of the way we had to tread a track for the sheep, as there was by this time, over two feet of snow. We had again to use our frying pan to clear a place for the tent, etc. It was very cold and snowed all night,
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and as the hillsides were very steep on each side of us, and covered with bush, trees were crashing down all round us owing to the weight of snow on their branches. It cleared the next day, but there was three feet of snow, and we could do nothing but feed the sheep and horses on the branches of the native shrubs. It was chiefly Ake Ake, a shrub which they do not care for. We were two or three days in this place, then, when the snow had melted slightly, we trod a track with the horses and ourselves, and gradually drove the sheep down the river. Naturally the further we went down the less snow. Those sheep, when I got them to the sale yards were no longer fat, and if I remember rightly, I was glad to get 3/6 per head for them. I could not take them back.
Sometimes we were stopped by floods in the river. At its source the river was only a very small stream, but further down, with its tributaries running into it, it was quite a large river, and we had to swim the sheep over.
There is a great deal to be learnt about driving fat sheep on such a long jojurney, with so many rivers to cross, and landing them at the journey’s end still in a fat condition, fit for the butchers. When first I began driving them over to the West Coast, I had a man with me, who should have known better than to harass them as we did. We dogged and
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shouted at them all the way, nearly frightening the life out of them, so that they arrived in a very much worse condition than when they started. There were two brothers —Peter and Hugh Elder—who were regularly on the road, buying sheep from the runs in the Amuri, and selling them at Arahura, the saleyards for Hokitika.
The auctioneer told me that the Elder Bros, sheep always sold well, because the butchers found that they could depend upon their sheep when killed proving in good condition.
On one trip I took about 300 sheep over by myself, because, when I mustered the run they were all I could find fat enough, and it would not have left much profit to take another man, and pay his wages. I had quite a successful trip, and sold the sheep well. When returning through the four mile bush track which skirts Lake Sumner, I came on a mob of sheep. I guessed that they might belong to the Elder Bros., so I took the only horse I had on that occasion, some distance off the track into the bush, tied him up, and made my way through the bush to the drovers.
We talked for a little time and they gave me all the news, but the sheep had not drawn on, so I offered to go on through the bush to the lead and give them a start. “Oh no,” they said, “don’t do that, leave them, and they will move along directly”:
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which they did after about ten minutes. They told me that they put the dogs round the sheep as little as they possibly could. Up and down the rivers where there were grass flats, they let the sheep feed along at their own pace; they only kept behind so as to keep them in the right direction. At times the sheep would lie down to chew the cud, and they let them. At a river crossing they did as little dogging as possible. They left the main mob with a dog which was trained to hold them, and took a small cut of twenty or thirty sheep up to the river along a spit, held these sheep there quietly, but firmly, with themselves and their dogs, so that none of them could break back. They watched the sheep, when finding that they could not get back, one of them looked over the river—the only way he could go-
Practice had taught them the right time to make their dogs bark, and themselves closed on the sheep. The sheep which was looking across, being pushed from behind by the others, went on and across. The main mob was then brought up quickly and they naturally followed the others. I learnt those lessons, and they were useful to me afterwards. If all drovers studied their flocks in this manner, it would be better for the sheep.
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CHAPTER XXII.
Very soon after Reefton was established I went there with a mob of sheep from my run. Quartz reefs all around were being worked, and the diggers and residents had taken up shares in the many Companies that had started.
It required a fair amount of capital to install—often in inaccessible places—the crushing machinery necessary for obtaining the gold from the quartz reefs. Big stampers crushed the hard quartz to a fine sand, and it was then washed with water over large trays with a number of ripples or corrugations in them. The gold, being so much heavier, lodged in these ripples, and was generally collected once every day. Most of these Quartz Reef Companies had not arrived at the paying stage when I was there. Many of the people had taken up more shares than they had capital to finance, and were unable to pay the calls on their shares.
About every other day an empty beer barrel was rolled out into the centre of the street, and an Auctioneer, Mr. Reeves, offered these shares for sale, using the barrel as a rostrum. One pound shares perhaps 12/- paid up with a call of 1/- per share now overdue would sell for 6d. each. I knew
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nothing about mining and was never a gambler, so did not buy any. Amongst other shares there were some in the Golden Fleece which developed later into a rich reef and paid big dividends, but the greater number of the reefs were not profitable.
Naturally everyone talked about the quartz reefs, and in the bar parlour of the Hotel where there were always a number of diggers, I was rather amused at seeing these men, if they were examining a quartz specimen, always give it a lick with their tongues. It would go round the room nearly everybody giving it a lick, not very hygienic, but none of them thought of that. To dip a specimen in water magnified, and showed the gold clearer, if there was any in the quartz.
The sheep were grazing on a grass flat about four miles from Reefton where I also had my tent. Returning from Reefton in the dark there was a short cut of about two miles of bush track only just wide enough for a horse. I would start my horse on to this track, and then leave the reins loose. It was so dark I could see nothing, not even the horse, but he could see quite well and never went off the track.
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CHAPTER XXIII.
Gradually, the wire fencing had to be extended on my Waiau run. The packing of the wire and standards was an undertaking up the high hills — over 6,000 feet high. The horses were very sure footed, but once one slipped with his load on and rolled about ten chains down a hill. Fortunately he was not very seriously hurt.
Rabbits began to get numerous on the South side of the Waiau river, so a rabbit proof fence was erected all the way up, from the sea to the dividing range. This undoubtedly did good, and saved this country for a long time. Although there were a few rabbits inside the fence, the land-owners realised that it was necessary not to let them increase, and they did all they could to kill them off.
After I sold this run —through some neglect—rabbits became very thick upon all these Amur! runs, and they were not reduced until the price for rabbit skins was so high that the rabbiters were making a lot of money. It was worth their while to kill all the rabbits possible. Before this, when they had reduced the rabbits considerably, it would not pay them to go on, but when the skins rose to a very high price, it was worth killing every rabbit.
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I - Waiau Homestead and Hill Country up the River.
I fear also, a fair number were often purposely left, so that they would increase sufficiently for a profitable trapping next season.
When rabbits commenced to seriously increase in the Amuri, our Farmers and Employers’ Association held several meetings to consider what was the best thing to be done. All the time I was in Amuri, I was Honorary Secretary for this Association and really most of the work fell on my shoulders. Mr. Andrew Rutherford of Mendip Hills, was the first Chairman, and afterwards Mr. Duncan MacFarlane, of Lyndon. It was eventually decided to import, and turn out the natural enemies of the rabbit, stoats and weasels; the sheepfarmers, subscribing amongst themselves sufficient money to defray the cost.
Later on, I think, several other Associations throughout New Zealand imported more. I doubt if it has ever been proved whether this was the wisest thing to do. When the rabbits came down in a wave, as they did, and simply swarmed on the runs, the stoats and weasels were not able to reduce their number greatly, and the trappers also did not decrease them sufficiently; however, owing to the high price for rabbit skins, it paid the rabbiters to lessen their numbers to a minimum. The stoats and weasels were then able to make an impression, and keep their increase in check.
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If this is correct, the landowners should take the lesson, and go to the expense of keeping the rabbits down to a small number, and the stoats and weasels will, I think, do the rest. If the rabbits are allowed to increase again in their thousands, the farmer will be obliged to go to the same trouble as before.
The first rabbits brought into the North of the South Island of New Zealand were introduced by Captain Kean of Swincombe Station, Kaikoura. He brought out twelve silver-grey rabbits, and turned them out on his property. I remember hearing that he dismissed two of his employees for shooting at them. In no time they had overrun his estate, and it is simply marvellous how they multiply on our rich pastures and in our good climate. They ate out his property so that he could not carry any sheep, and was ruined. They spread from there more North than South along the coast, through Flaxbourne and the Awatere. When they were thick it was quite a common sight to see about 100 rabbits at a time running in front of one. They tried breeding ferrets at Highfield and turned them out, but only with moderate success ; then the trapping and pollard poisoning reduced them considerably. Now carrots, with strychnine, seems to be the most deadly method.
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CHAPTER XXIV.
When first I went to the Amuri, there was a very cleverly constructed bridge over the Waiau river, on the same site as the present upper Waiau bridge to Hanmer Plains. It was designed by Mr. Handyside, a Nelson engineer. The whole span was one archway and it was constructed entirely of 4 x 3 scantling; no other dimensions of timber were used, except the planks of the roadway, which was not wide enough for a waggon or carriage. Large mobs of sheep were driven over, and I often rode over it on horseback.
The Road Board used periodically to tar this timber to preserve it, but they neglected to tighten up the four wire stays which were stretched from nearly the centre of the bridge to the rocks on each side, for the purpose of preventing too much swaying of the bridge in a heavy wind. During one very heavy Nor’ Wester the bridge was blown down. The wood was in such perfect condition that the settlers further down the river picked up some very valuable timber.
The present bridge was not built for some years afterwards. Messrs. Andersons Ltd. were the builders, and when it was finished they gave a large
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opening ceremony. They brought quite a large number of people up to it by coach from Christchurch; a long journey then, and also asked practically all the settlers in the Amuri. Champagne flowed freely and all who were there, and are still alive will remember it as a particularly convivial occasion.
I remember Sir Joseph Kinsey brought up from Christchurch as a rarity which had never been seen in the backblocks, a bell topper hat. This was too much for the countrymen, and after the luncheon was over I saw some of the large run-holders owners of 20,000 sheep or more, playing football with that bell topper with great gusto.
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CHAPTER XXV.
The hot spring at Hanmer Plains —which is now quite a large tourist resort with swimming pools, and a number of hot baths—consisted at that time of one circular pool about seven yards across, of a bluish coloured water and a very liquid kind of blue clay below, which easily became stirred up, and the water soon got muddy when we bathed.
The Amuri was included in the Nelson Province for many years, before being merged into Canterbury, as it should have been from the first. It was divided from Nelson by a number of ranges of high mountains. lam afraid they did not spend much of the money —which they obtained from the rents of the runs and the sale of the land —in the Amuri District. Most of it was spent in, and about, Nelson. At first they sold the land as cheaply as 5/- per acre.
Mr. William Robinson came over from Australia and bought 84,000 acres of the magnificent Cheviot Hills Estate for £21,000, equal to 5/an acre. This was such a large amount for anyone in New Zealand to pay down in cash, that he was always afterwards known as “Ready-money Robinson”. St. Leonards, Lyndon, Hawkeswood,
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Mendip Hills, Highfield, Leslie Hills, Montrose, Culverden, Balmoral, in fact, most of the good front country properties, were bought at a low price.
The Nelson Province Councillors were only too glad to obtain the money. Cheviot Hills was sold to the New Zealand Government, under their land purchase scheme, about thirty years afterwards, and I think the land, stock, and everything else, must have netted about £300,000, and it is worth more now. This rise in value of land has been called “Unearned increment,” perhaps it is, but the early settlers had a rough time, and anyone who did not foresee that such a rise in land values was sure to take place as the country got settled, should have done so.
I have often been asked by friends here and in England, what did I think the best thing to do to start their sons farming. My reply has been that population has increased very much and competition is very great, and unfortunately, there is not much spare land; no more Colonies to be settled in their infancy as in ray time, but with vision and energy there may yet be some chances. Ido not know of any in New Zealand of the same sort as in my younger days, although with foresight and hard work there are always opportunities.
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CHAPTER XXVI.
After buying the farm at Rotherham, I had more things to be attended to, and employed more men. On the run the yearly work consisted of shearing in the spring; afterwards we mustered for stragglers, when at the same time we dipped the sheep to kill the ticks, etc. In the Autumn the rams were turned out. During the Winter months we repaired the fences, yards, got in our stack of firewood, and did all the improvements which I thought advisable. As there was plenty of bush on the place, we felled the trees, splitting our own posts and rails and timbers for yards, gates, etc., out of the Silver Birch trees. This is not a very lasting timber, and the posts, etc., had to be renewed about every seven years.
In the Spring we put in a few acres of oats, which we later cut up with a hand chaff cutter. We also put in some potatoes, and then the mustering in order to mark the lambs, came on before next shearing. Another man and myself did all the work. There was always plenty for us to do to keep things in order. At mustering I required three extra shepherds, a packman, and later extra shed hands for shearing. For economy’s sake, I used to work in with other stations, and the
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musterers went to and fro as required getting 10/ a day wages.
With the farm, it was necessary to have more permanent men, a married couple, the wife doing the cooking and the husband doing the other work on the place. Their wages were £BO per annum and found. I also had two ploughmen who received 20/- per week and found. These wages as times improved, rose to 25/- per week, but not for about twenty years. They worked six horses each in a three-furrow plough; they also drove the waggons, carting the wheat I grew to the Waikari Railway Station, a three or four days’ trip, sleeping under the waggon at night time. They had a tarpaulin spread over the waggon, and the wheat. Practically all these ploughmen that I had, saved money and bought farms themselves, and later retired with a competence. Profits were small in wheat growing, and as I kept careful accounts, I knew the exact cost of everything I grew on the farm. Sometimes we only received 2/6 per bushel for our wheat. This was about the cost price, but if we obtained 3/6 per bushel it left us a fair profit.
When freezing was established it gave an impetus to everything, and I think I may say without contradiction, that but for the freezing industry New Zealand would not have prospered as she did. The invention by which vessels were insulated
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and refrigerating machinery was installed, so that the sheep and cattle could be frozen and sent to England, was an immense advantage to New Zealand. A great deal of experimenting had been done in Australia first, and the first sheep sent from this Dominion were sent from Dunedin. They were, I believe, frozen on board. There was great rejoicing in New Zealand by those who realised the true meaning of the experiment, when we learned that the sheep had been landed in England, and were quite edible. Mr. John Grigg deserves great credit for the energy, and trouble he took in organising the Canterbury Frozen Meat Co., which, for several years froze the sheep and cattle for the farmers, and placed them on board the insulated ships.
There were many who would not do anything to help start this industry, and who afterwards reaped the benefit from it. At first the Shipping Companies would not go to the expense of putting in the machinery, and insulating their vessels, unless they could be sure that the farmers would support them by guaranteeing to take up the space and fill the vessels for a few years.
I went round to ask the farmers to help by joining us in guaranteeing to fill the space; but got very few promises, so many of us had to increase our own guarantee beyond our capacity to fill the space so as to make it worth while for the shipping
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companies to insulate their vessels. At first the charges for freezing and freight were high, and the people in England had a prejudice against eating frozen meat. Those of us who guaranteed to fill the space often lost money, and if I had not sufficient fat sheep for this purpose, I generally paid someone else 6/- per head to fill it for me. I had guaranteed to send every year 600 more than I could fatten, so it cost me about £lBO per year to fulfil my guarantee, which I could ill afford in those days. It was worth it though, as the freezing industry made New Zealand prosperous.
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CHAPTER XXVII.
I was the first in the Amuri to grow turnips for fattening lambs on a large scale. 1 would buy forward lambs from the stations at 7/- to 9/- each, which, when fattened averaged 12/- to 15/-, as I generally fattened about thirty of these forward lambs per acre, it left me a good profit.
An agricultural farmer’s life is a varied interesting one, especially if he takes a real interest in his work. In the Spring when the crops are growing, particularly after rain, it is a pleasure to ride round and see everything flourishing. At the same time it has its vicissitudes, which are sometimes hard to bear. No rain may fall in a hot Summer, and all the crops and grass wither up. Diamond Black Moth may come amongst the turnips, or other blights in the crops, which have to be taken philosophically.
At one time I had, on my two places, Pahau Pastures, and Rotherham 1,000 acres of very good crops of wheat, and the Manager of the Ashburton Flour Mills, who was staying with me, inspected the crop in stock in the fields. He bought it at 3/6 per bushel, and took a rubbed out sample. As I drove him back to the railway station it came on
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to rain, and it continued on and off for a whole week. Being a very warm rain, some of the wheat sprouted in the stook. I had much trouble in drying and stacking it. When thrashed no doubt much of the sprouted grain would not sift through the riddles and would be carried away in the straw. Being so damaged, I could not expect the miller to buy it. I sold it at 2/- to 2/6 per bushel. It was estimated as a forty bushel crop, that is, about 40,000 bushels, so it was a considerable loss to me.
At another time, before this loss which I have just described —when wheat was at a very low price, and the railway was being extended from Waikari to Culverden —the Public Works Department had erected the Culverden Railway Goods shed some time before the track was laid. I applied to the Government for the use of shed to store my wheat, pointing out to them they would have the haulage of this wheat as soon as the line was completed. I got permission provided that I paid insurance on the Goods shed. I had another big crop, and nearly filled the shed to the roof. With a double block and tackle fastened to the ring of the platform outside and to the roof, we could lift, with a horse, three sacks at a time to the roof. When I carted this wheat to the shed it was worth about 2/6 per bushel, but in January of the following year, when the line was opened and I railed it all down. I sold it for 3/6 per bushel, making 1/- per bushel profit
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Pahau Pastures Homestead.
on 40,000 bushels or more and saving the extra waggon cartage to Waikari, which was a large item on such a quantity of wheat. This shows farming has its ups and downs. One should take the good with the bad, always remembering that there is a silver lining to the darkest cloud.
About 1885 I leased Pahau Pastures; a very good property, with rich swamp to light, shingly, land. It worked very well with the other two properties. I lived there except when I went up to the run for shearing and other busy times, keeping married men, who acted as overseers, on the other two properties.
I only had Merinos on the run, as being high, mountainous country, it was more suitable for them. Later I used to buy 1,600 half-bred lambs in the Autumn, and put them on the back, burnt, bush part of the run, on which the English grass which I had sown years before had grown well. In the following Autumn I would bring these half-breds down to Rotherham, to fatten them on the turnips there. On the other properties, I kept half-bred and cross-bred sheep.
Freezing, and the fat lamb trade, had revolutionised the sheep industry. Merinos did not freeze well, and were not liked in England because of their dark colour, but I am still of the opinion that a good fat Merino wether is the best of all mutton.
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From the half and cross-bred ewe the farmer gets the best lambing, and the fat lamb is still the most profitable thing off the farm; more than the wool or anything else. The Merinos were only bred on the back high mountains and gradually the Corridale, half, and cross-breds, took their place on all the farms and hill country which was not too rugged. The percentage of lambings increased considerably; whereas with the Merino ewe 60 to 80 per cent, was a fair average, now amongst the half and cross-bred ewes 100 per cent is common, and up to 180 per cent, is sometimes obtained. I have heard of even more.
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CHAPTER XXVIII.
Means of communication have now improved wonderfully. At first the Cobb & Co. coaches started from Christchurch for Hurunui the first day, and went to Waiau the next. The railway gradually crept up, but it was a long time before it reached Waikari, Culverden, and at last, Waiau. Now what was then a two day’s journey from Christchurch to Waiau is done in two and a half hours by motor cars. The roads at first were only tracks with big ruts in places, and after rain had plenty of mud. Then the rough round shingle which is plentiful in Amuri was put on to make a hard surface instead of the mud, and now the roads are in good order for the motor cars, etc. We had either to ride or drive a dog cart or buggy and pair of horses to go anywhere, at an average speed of about seven miles per hour. Now the motor car has taken their place.
There were no bridges over the rivers, and we all had to be experts at picking out a ford in these rapid streams. There were many drownings. When I first went to Amuri, all those who had been buried in the cemetery at Waiau —I think about ten —had been drowned in the river.
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The only communication with Nelson—the town where our land dealings were completed— except by steamer via Wellington, was a long three and a half days journey over Jollie’s Pass, Wairau Gorge to Fox Hill, where we could leave our horse and go into Nelson by coach.
Tarndale Hostel was said to be the only inhabited house in New Zealand at such an altitude, viz., 3,000 feet up. The Wairau Gorge, which is near Tarndale, is a beautiful sight in the Winter. The mountain side, 3,000 to 4,000 feet high, is nearly precipitous on one side and the sun rarely shines upon it. I have seen this a sheet of icicles from top to bottom.
On one trip—returning from Nelson—as the horse track along the hill side was a sheet of ice, I had to ride up the rough riverbed. My horse slipped on a large boulder in the rough stream, and wet my feet. As I mentioned before, the sun never shines in mjd-Winter in this gorge. My boots and socks were freezing owing to the severe cold, and there was a danger of getting frost bitten. I had to ride as quickly as I could to a place on which the sun shone, and lit a fire to dry my wet things.
I once had a very able business man say to me, “You must allow that the farmer, as a general thing, is a fool.” My reply to him was, “If you
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were put on a farm, you might be a fool.” Every one to his trade. Many good farmers who have tried to control mercantile businesses, such as the Farmers’ Co-operatives have made a mess of it, because they were trying to manage something they had not been trained for. A competent farm hand requires a great deal of expert knowledge to do the necessary farm work properly; to plough and skilfully operate all the different machines now used on a farm; to build a stack rightly, so that it will turn all rain, besides the multifarious things which are always cropping up. A competent farm hand, especially in the old days, had to be a “Jack of all trades.” Many farmers, not having had the training, did not keep accounts properly, so they were bad business men, and this accounts for many farmers’ failures.
Anyone can be a farmer, just as anyone can be a business man, but to be a really good farmer, or farm hand, understanding all kinds of agriculture, stock, etc., requires, I think, perhaps more expert knowledge than a business man or tradesman.
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CHAPTER XXIX.
Wild pigs were very numerous in the early days. The old boars were generally called “Captain Cooks.” The pigs used to make a mess of the land by rooting it up, and at Longbeach we were sent out at times, to reduce their numbers. It was work I detested because it was brutal, wholesale, slaughter. We had spears, or often a broken shear blade tied to the end of a stick, and on our nimble stock horses, we would ride after the pigs and spear them. Sometimes we would come to a mob of between fifty and sixty pigs, and only a few of them would escape. The shear blade did not always kill them outright, which was the part I disliked.
I had rather an amusing incident on my upper Waiau run. I was walking along a ferny flat, at the edge of some bush, when I came upon a heap of dead fern, and walked over it. The whole heap moved, and I had trodden upon a wild pig asleep. The pig squealed, jumped up and nearly knocked me over. I need hardly say that I sprang away in one direction as quickly as I could, and luckily the pig ran another.
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CHAPTER XXX.
The first real Public Works policy was started by Sir Julius Vogel. Several millions were borrowed at a low rate of interest and railways were made through both the North and South Islands, which opened up the country, and as they were built at a reasonably low cost, they were an undoubted success.
Unfortunately, as has happend all through the parliamentary history of New Zealand, Political influence was used by some for their own benefit, to have railways and bridges constructed which could not pay interest on the Capital expenditure. It might serve a useful purpose to make a record of every Politician who has deliberately squandered Public money in this way. I fear it would be too Quixotic to expect that this would serve any useful purpose in the future.
The British came to New Zealand and took possession of the land, which cost them nothing. Here was a young country, in a temperate climate, perhaps the most prolific in the World. Here was a chance to try to make a perfect country. The land was sold and most of the money squandered, instead of investing part for the future. Money
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was borrowed and spent recklessly and lavishly, so that now a slump has come, the taxation is more than the people are able to pay.
To build these first railways, a large number of navvies were brought to New Zealand by the Contractor, Brogden. As a rule they were a very good class of men. They came from Great Britain where wages and conditions were not so good as in New Zealand, so that they were satified, and remained in the country. Many saved money, and prospered. Wages in the country were nothing like what they have risen to now. An old cry then for wages in the towns which the men did not always get was, “Eight hours work, eight hours play, eight hours sleep and eight bob a day.” Of course the cost of living was very much less than it is at the present day, and it would fall again if all other costs went down also, as they must if the slump continues, as, I believe, there is very little doubt it will.
The following are a few of the costs of food in 1891, taken from a Government Year Book. Bread 2Jd. to 3d., Oatmeal to 1 fd. per lb., Milk 3d. to 3|d. per qt.. Bacon 7d. to 7$A. per lb., Mutton 2d. to sd. per lb.
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CHAPTER XXXI.
The social life on the stations was very different from that of the present day. Everyone had to work hard and live simply and plainly. It was quite a common thing for a runholder to strap his night things on his saddle, and, upon arrival at another station to Tell his host, who had not expected him, that he had come to stay all night. He could not rush to a place and back again in a motor car as is done now. Another very general custom, no matter at what time one called, was to produce the whisky bottle.
In Amuri, many of the station owners were cricketers, and it was quite a holiday event to get up a cricket match with Rangiora, or other places. We had a field near the Culverden Railway Station, in which we used to have practice cricket matches every Saturday afternoon, and our wives used to take it in turns to give afternoon tea in the small shed which we had erected for that purpose.
We had an annual trip to Kaikoura, all staying at Waiau the first night. Next day we would drive over the Whale’s Back, stopping at the Conway for luncheon and then on to Kaikoura. There generally used to be two four-in-hands,
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several buggies and pairs, and some tandems. We practically took possession of one of the hotels. The next day we played a cricket match with Kaikoura, and had a dance that night. The following day there would be a picnic up the pretty coast line towards Blenheim, and we returned home on the third day. This only happened once a year, because, as a rule everyone kept very close to their work.
Most of the station-owners were sheep men only, and they did not take much interest in agricultural farming, and the Amuri used to produce some of the finest sheep in the colony. One neighbour often used to say to me that he hated the sight of a plough on the place. This gentleman was one of those whom the Christchurch people called in those days the Amuri Wool Kings.
There was always a large number of men walking about looking for work: swaggers they were called, because they carried their blankets or swags on their backs. As I mentioned before, the stations were mostly far apart, and the men had, at times, long distances to walk. If they were engaged in Christchurch, they possibly had to walk all the way up, and could only get food and shelter by calling at the different stations on the way, and it was an understood necessity that they should be fed and housed free of cost. No doubt some men
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took advantage of this, and walked about from station to station asking for work, but never intended taking it. At one time I came upon four of these men playing cards under a willow tree. They were last at St. Leonards, and were making for Kaiwarra, three miles away, but of course did not wish to arrive until the evening, so they were putting in the time playing cards and evidently did not want work, or they would have gone on to Kaiwarra station earlier and failing to get work there they could have walked on to another place that day. Most of the swaggers were honestly looking for work, but it was rather a tax on some of the stations to feed and house so many men each night. St. Leonards, for instance, used to have about ten men every night, which meant supper and breakfast, that is twenty meals every day for these swaggers and no doubt they would take away enough food for their mid-day meal.
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CHAPTER XXXII.
In the Spring of the year 1888, came the big earthquake which wrecked all the buildings in the Upper Waiau, and many on the Hanmer Plains. For two or three years before, we had heard, at times, booms like the report of a big cannon, which seemed to come from the source of the Hope river. No one took any notice of them. Mr. Davison, of St. Leonards, when I mentioned it to him, remarked that he often heard them, and thought they were avalanches, but there are few, if any snow mountains high enough to have avalanches on the dividing range between the Amuri and the West Coast, as there are further South. I used to graze sheep in the Summer time, on some of these hill tops on the dividing range, bringing them down to my Upper Waiau run for the Winter.
I had noticed, when mustering this country above the river Hope saddle, rows of what I thought were trenches. The shepherds had said to me, “Do you think the Maoris ever had a battle here ?” During this earthquake the hills fell in, and formed similar embattlements, from which I judged that there must have been a heavy earthquake up the river Hope many years ago. As the booms came from that direction it is a part which should be
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Homestead, Mt. Messing and Some Old Fashioned Cars.
watched, and if booms are heard again, I should advise the people to beware.
I was at Pahau Pastures when the earthquake came, about 5 a.m., I think. It was a fairly severe shake there. A chimney was moved, and things were thrown off the shelves, but at St. Leonards, three miles away, all the chimneys were shaken down. I noticed the horses realised something unusual was happening and galloped about the paddocks neighing in a very excited state. Cocks were crowing, and in fact, all the other birds and animals were very agitated. All the station hands on my Waiau run, Hopefield and Glen Wye, came down to Culverden, as their houses were all wrecked, and they had no place to live in.
During this earthquake, the top part of the Cathedral spire was thrown down, and the Rhodes family who built it replaced it in sheet copper, which is quite noticable if any one looks at it now. The “Press” Newspaper Coy. sent their reporter, Mr. Carr Rollitt—“the Warrigal”—to inspect and report; I found him a horse, and rode up with him. The first sign we saw on riding up the Waiau river, was on Leslie Hills, opposite Marble point, where the whole hillside had slipped down, and when we reached Hanmer plains we noticed the tops of the terraces —of which there are several up the Waiau — had fallen in leaving a large crack. They are all
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more or less filled in now and vegetation grown over them, but I have no doubt if one looked carefully they could still perceive signs of it.
At the first station we came to (my own) there was nothing left standing except the wooden building I had occupied, and which was tilted on one side. All the other buildings were of cob with galvanised iron roofs—except the woolshed which was of stone. The walls had all been shaken down, and the roofs had fallen on top of them intact; the braces and stays had held them together.
All the other stations we found in the same condition. Every cob, brick or stone building was shaken down with the roof resting intact on top of the ruins, but any wooden structure, although tilted on one side, was not over. Many of them, with the aid of jacks and levers, were got into position again.
The hill sides, in places, had fallen in leaving the same kind of trenches which I have described before. There were cracks in the ground in many places, and the shingly riverbed looked like a spider’s web with the numerous cracks in it. After the earthquake, we all learned that the earth fissure which commences at the Hanmer Plains, runs through my old place, and several miles of Glen Wye, was an old earthquake crack.
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My woolshed, because of the stones which were at the bottom of the crack being easily procurable, was built in the centre of it, so it was no wonder that it was shaken to pieces. One side of this crack seemed to remain firm, while the other side shifted about five feet. I knew this, because I had a wire fence running from the hills in a straight line to the river Waiau. Where it crossed this earthquake crack, it was torn five feet further north. I had a married shepherd in charge up there at the time and he told me that whilst the ’quake was going on, he could not make his wife hear in spite of his shouting to her. Whilst the earth was sliding this five feet, no one knows to what depth, the grinding of the rocks, etc., together must have made a terrific noise.
As I had to shear my sheep in about two months, it was necessary to get the road repaired, timber, etc., up to build accommodation required for the cooking and the men. Many of the shed hands, shearers, etc., had to sleep in tents, but the men were not so particular as they are nowadays. They studied their employer’s interests more than, I think, many do at present, and everything went on smoothly.
The earthquakes kept on for several months; there were constant shocks and after I had the shearers up, some diplomacy was necessary in order to keep them there. The shocks generally came
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in the night, and in the morning, perhaps after a couple of shakes, one or two shearers would come to me and say, “Boss, I cannot stand this any longer, I’m off”! I used to explain to them that the first shake was the worst, and afterwards there was no danger, that it was only a quietening down of the earth. This is generally true, but not always. However, it had the desired effect. None of the shearers left.
We had one rather extraordinary shake, which makes one realise how thin the crust of the earth must be, compared with the immense power beneath. It came about 11 a.m. The sheep being too wet after rain to shear, I had the shepherds helping me to brand some horses. We had one thrown, and half tied up, when the shock came. The colt was let go and struggled up again. I had to make the best of it and remarked, “That was not much of a one. Was it not,” my overseer remarked, “Look there!” He pointed to the hillsides up the river. Clouds of dust were rising from the slips that were along these hill sides; the ground was heaved straight up, and like a ripple on the water, it took, I should think, quite two minutes to settle down again, which gave one an uncanny feeling. Not having had time to rebuild the woolshed, I shore the ewes under a tarpaulin, as the lambs were too young to drive. I drove the wethers and hoggets to my farm at Rotherham,
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25 miles away, and shore them there. The woolshed, which I built afterwards, was so braced and stayed that I doubt if any earthquake in the future would damage it.
There has not been a bad earthquake in the L'pper Waiau since, but, three years ago, there was a very bad one at Murchison, which is not far away. There was also a bad one previous to this at Cheviot which did a great deal of damage, about thirteen years after the 1888 one.
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CHAPTER XXXIII.
Some time after this there was considerable agitation in order to get a railway put through to the West Coast, and the Otira Tunnel cut through the dividing range of mountains. A number of people formed themselves into the Midland Railway League, and sent round petitions for signatures advocating its construction. I always refused to sign this petition, as I considered that it was premature, as also is the railway to Picton, and the Waitaki Electric Scheme. If we had five times the population that we have, there would be some chance of these schemes paying, but for the people to advocate this expenditure when they did, was nothing but thoughtless selfishness. These big undertakings with their huge expenditure, are some of the causes why the taxation is so great, which owing to the slump, the people cannot afford to pay.
In order to finance the Midland Railway the Government was petitioned to put aside a quantity of Canterbury land to be sold at 10/- per acre instead of £2, the usual price, and a lot of land w r as sacrificed at this low price. One person bought, I think, 30,000 acres of the Virginia Country at this 10/- per acre, and sold it shortly afterwards for
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about 30/- per acre, so that the Government lost £30,000 by lowering the price of this land to 10/to help make this railway which was a long time in being constructed, and will not pay for some time yet. It can hardly be said that the politicians were to blame for this. It was the selfishness of the people, who were responsible for this big expenditure too early in the history of New Zealand.
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CHAPTER XXXIV.
When first I grew corn, we harvested it with a side delivery reaper, a rake coming round and scraping the sheaves off the platform after they were cut, and two to four men followed, who tied the sheaves up with some of their own straw. After a time the wire binder was introduced, the sheaf being tied with thin wire. A disadvantage was that if the sheaves were cut into chaff, the wire amongst it was dangerous for the horses to eat. In about two years the twine binder was introduced, and I bought about the first one which was imported into Canterbury, a Deering, and Messrs. Mason Struthers & Co. were the importers. It was not so well made as the present reaper, and was liable to go wrong.
The first season, late one afternoon, the main cog-wheel broke. I unscrewed it with the men's help, and having made sure what new parts I required rode off through the night to catch the early morning train from Amberley to Christchurch, about a 45 mile ride. I could only return by the evening train arriving at Amberley about 6.30, and after getting something to eat, I started off on my horse which I had left there in the morning. I had the iron cog-wheel strapped on my back, I
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think it weighed about forty pounds of solid iron. My back was sore before I reached home early in the morning.
Although eight hours was the usual day’s work, the men at harvest time did not objejct to working from daylight until dark, getting of course, extra pay, as when ripe a crop should be cut as quickly as possible for fear of a Nor’ Wester. I have had half my crop blown out by such a wind. The men, therefore, got up as soon as I returned, and helped put the new parts on, so that we started cutting again at about 4.30 a.m.
The crops in those days required no superphosphate or other manures sown with them. Being virgin land one could depend with reasonable tillage upon a fair crop. Turnips were generally a good crop, but after ten or twelve years the Diamond Black Moth and other pests came, which made it more uncertain.
Native birds were very plentiful, and there was very good shooting, especially the Paradise duck. The ducks were very fond of my stubbles, particularly the barley stubble, and it was not unusual to see 500 in one flock. Using the birds which had been shot as decoys, and getting behind stocks, three guns used to shoot 100 to 200 in a morning. Now one rarely sees a Paradise duck. They were too tame, too easily shot. The Pukaki (swamp)
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hen), were also fairly plentiful and we used to have very pleasant shooting parties with Mr. Thomas Chapman at Mt. Palm, where there was a great deal of swamp. We had to wade through the swamp, sometimes up to our knees, but we were young and did not mind. A great number of birds were lost, as, unless killed outright, they would run and hide in the thick nigger-heads. A good retriever was very necessary. Shooting and the draining off of these swamps has reduced the Pukaki very considerably.
Many of the other native birds have disappeared. The Wekas (woodhens), were in their thousands all over the Canterbury Plains. The stoats and weasels, no doubt, are responsible for their destruction. The kaka parrots, paroquets, moku moku, ground lark and many other birds which are very rarely seen now, used to be plentiful. Several of them used to go back to the West Coast at certain times. Most of the native birds were too tame, and therefore easily destroyed. No doubt, the sparrows, and other imported birds which are more aggressive have also driven them away. The Acclimatisation Societies are responsible for a number of objectionable importations. I think it would have been better if they had gone on the principle of letting well alone in the animal and bird life. Amongst the objectionable importations, I might mention Sparrows, Blackbirds, Thrushes,
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Rabbits, Hares, also the deer (Thar and Chamois), which are exterminating our native flora. The chief success of the Acclimatisation Societies has been the importation of the different kinds of fishes, salmon, trout, etc.
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CHAPTER XXXV.
About 1892 the Seddon Government came into power and a great deal of Socialistic Legislation was passed then and since, amongst others the Arbitration Act. The Opposition opposed this strenuously and I remember they argued that it would, no doubt, raise wages in good times, but when a slump came it would be very difficult to lower wages again to the economic standard required for the lower value of all things produced. Those in favour of the Act answered that this would not be so; that the Judge, having the power, would bring down wages as required. As New Zealand depends on the farmers, and the price of all they produce has gone back to what they sold for in the old days, or perhaps in some cases lower, we must wait and see who was right when the Arbitration Act was passed. Will wages go down to the old level now that the farmers’ produce has done so? There is no doubt about the Arbitration Act having raised wages. As refrigeration got more established and times improved, profits were larger, so that the farmer could afford to pay higher wages, and did so.
In the towns the Labour Union leaders periodically applied for an increase of wages for their
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Union men, which was often granted. The employer, in many cases, resisted half-heartedly. He found he could pass on any increase in wages to the public by a higher price for his manufactured articles, and the farmer had to pay more for his agricultural implements and other requisites. As a consequence of this the cost of living went up.
To give an instance of how the cost of living must go up as wages rise, we will say a butcher employed, in the old days, six men at £l2O per annum, that is a total of £720. When wages were increased 100 per cent, the butcher—although he could buy his fat stock at the old price—had to increase the price of his meat considerably, say 3d. or 4d. per lb., to pay the extra £720 to his six men and he had to pay more for his requisites, implements, etc.; also the hours of work were shortened, which further curtailed his profits. There is no doubt this happened through every trade, and it is just as certain that the costs of all articles will go down, even to the old price, if wages fell to the old level.
I have often had men say to me that they were just as well off in the old days when wages were lower, because they could buy everything so much cheaper. Now they find their increased wages go no further on account of the higher price of everything they have to purchase. It seems better
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to receive £6 per week than £3 per week, and the men are naturally reluctant to take lower wages, but after all it is only a question of economics. The sensible and proper way to look at this question is, that wages should go up and down as the employers’ profits do.
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CHAPTER XXXVI.
The farmers, after about 1900, made money from the increased value of their farms. Land values rose materially because of the increased profits they could make through the increased price of the frozen mutton, lamb and wool, etc., in the, London market, and also as there were more and more buyers wanting farms. Amongst the buyers were the farm hands who had saved and who wished to start on their own account; the farmers’ sons who were growing up and wanted farms of their own, and newcomers from abroad with money.
The chief cause of the increase in land values, however, was the activities of the Government Land Purchase Board which was always in competition with other buyers, and we all know that competition helps to raise values. In actual practice the scheme was not the success anticipated and land rose to the inflated price because of the Land Board’s activities. The Land Purchase Scheme was State Socialism, and now the slump has come the Government has a large number of properties on its hands, on which the tenants cannot pay the rents. As a result, a very large sum of borrowed money used by the Government for land purchases is not earning interest, whilst the Government has to pay
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in London, interest on the loans. In turn, the general public have to pay taxation too heavy for them to bear to find the wherewithal for this interest.
Some of those who applied for these Land Purchase Board sections were not farmers, but men who thought that if they drew a section in the ballot it would be an easy way of making money. Some of these men have allowed the land to deteriorate.
If left to the natural course of events as the owners of the large estates died, their properties would have been sub-divided amongst their sons, who would have grown up with the necessary experience for working the properties to the best advantage. In the case of Cheviot Hills, which was one of the earliest estates bought, it certainly was a success because it was bought very cheaply; times improved, land values rose soon after, and it was an ideal property to purchase for land settlement.
When my lease of Pahau Pastures expired, it became necessary for me to buy another run. It had worked very well with my other two properties. At shearing I commenced with eight shearers at Pahau Pastures and shore there also the sheep from my farm at Rotherham, about 9,000 in all;
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then the men all went up to my Waiau run where they shore about 7,000 sheep. I sent them all up in one of my waggons as there were, including the shed hands, about fourteen of them altogether. It was a long day for the horses, but they made an early start. The waggoner would stay at the Waiau run carting wood, etc., until the shearers had shorn a waggon load of wool ready for bringing down. Shearers wages were then 16/8 per 100 sheep shorn, 2d. per sheep; but it later went up to 20/- per 100. Shed hands got 25/- per week.
It was sometimes hard to please the shearers. Working as they did at full speed all the time, trying to race each other, they got very tired and out of sorts, particular about their food, and quickly complained.
One cook whom I had for about five seasons, was very satisfactory. He used to say to the shearers before starting, “Now, any of you that are not satisfied, come outside, and we will soon settle the matter with our fists!” He was a good cook though, and I did not have any trouble all the time he was there.
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CHAPTER XXXVII.
Before the expiry of the Pahau Pasture’s lease, I went from one end of the South Island to the other looking for a property to purchase. I drove up to Blenheim in my dog-cart and looked over several places, but did not buy any of them. Then I went South by train and I either hired a horse, or the agents took me out to inspect different properties.
Amongst others, I offered a price for Linton Downs, Southland, as a going concern. The owner who was in England, was willing to accept, but refused to include the furniture which was in the house, a very small item in a £25,000 deal. In the meantime I had inspected Mt. Nessing, Albury, and as my offer for Linton was not accepted I closed for Mt. Nessing in the year 1899.
Properties were at a low price at that time. I was fortunate in buying when I did as, after a few years, they rose considerably in value. Mt. Nessing had 12,500 sheep on it when I bought it, and I afterwards added Mt. Mimrod to it, making altogether, 35,000 acres, carrying 18,000 sheep. I used to have about 12,000 breeding ewes, and as I grew several hundred acres of turnips, I fattened and sent direct to London most of the surplus lambs.
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I was never a believer in the middle man, and feel sure that the farmers would have done better if they had appointed their own selling agents in London, and sent all their frozen meat direct to them. I advocated this, and did my best to get it adopted, after my return from a visit to England in 1902. I had seen what was taking place at Smithfield, and am sure it would have been wiser to have taken my advice.
When in London I was told of one large meat salesman and buyer, who having advice that there were about 100,000 frozen lambs in New Zealand for sale, c.i.f., forced a lot of lambs on the Smithfield market with the object of bringing the price down, which he did, and then bought the 100,000 lambs at the lower price. I was told that some of these lambs, forced on the market, were consigned lambs.
Many of the frozen meat buyers have made fortunes out of profits the farmers should rightly have had. If the farmers would only see the wisdom of real co-operation, and support Marketing Boards which would regulate the supply to the consumers, how much better it would be. In that way prices would be kept up, and farmers would not so often be competing against one another, thus forcing prices down. They must, however, all join; even a few standing out might be disas-
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trous. My experience has been that there are always some dissentients.
What has lately happened in England is a good instance of my meaning. Owing to competition among themselves, the hop-growers formed a marketing board and regulated the supplies, selling any surplus for other purposes. Seven and one half per cent, of the hop-growers stood out and the 92j per cent, kept the price of hops from 160/- to 240/per cwt. The 7J per cent, took advantage of this price, and grew more hops until they represented 20 per cent, of the hop-growers, and soon they would have increased the supply by 100 per cent, or more than that belonging to the Marketing Board. The Board, seeing that their endeavours were being frustrated by those who stood out, decided to disband. Hops went down from 50/- to 60/- per cwt., which is less than cost of production.
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CHAPTER XXXVIII.
In 1902 I went for a trip Home. The old settlers used to speak of Great Britain as “Home.” I had been 35 years in New Zealand, and after that time I found travelling very much altered. Instead of the old sailing vessels with their poor accommodation and their limited supply of food; no fresh meat, vegetables, or fruit, etc., there were palatial steamers, and the travellers complained if food was not equal to that in a good hotel on shore; refrigeration, electricity, steam, had altered it all.
I went to England via Vancouver and it being the year of King Edward VIPs Coronation, the natives of Fiji were holding a number of Coronation Ceremonies, and the Union Steam Ship Company ran an excursion steamer, the S.S. Waikari, from New Zealand, in order that people might see them. I went in her; joining later the S.S. Marama, which had come from Sydney, at Suva.
As the natives of Fiji are gradually becoming more civilized and losing all their old war-like ideas and customs, I doubt if there will ever be such exhibitions again. The most interesting was at Bau, the old native capital. The old King’s residence was there. Many hundreds of the natives
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in their old war dresses and paint, armed with native clubs and shields, gave dances, etc., in a large open space in the centre of the Native village. They had a great number of Turtles—which are very plentiful around Fiji —already cooked for food.
At another Island they gave a demonstration of walking over red hot stones with their bare feet. Those who do this, I was told, prepare their feet for about a fortnight beforehand. Large stones which are in a hollow, were certainly heated to red heat. These men walked over —treading form stone to stone—without getting their feet blistered.
Two days after leaving Suva in the Screw Steamer Marama, the Coronation was supposed to have taken place, so we drank the King’s health in champagne, and did all we could in honour of the ceremony, only to find, when we arrived at Vancouver that, owing to his having to undergo an operation for appendicitis, the Coronation had to be postponed. It did not take place until after my arrival in London. A relative obtained a seat for me in the gardens of St. James’ Palace in order to see the procession.
America and her people struck me as being very much alive. Everyone seemed to have plenty of energy. There was no time lost. Things had to be done and done at once. To illustrate mv
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meaning, I noticed while they were building one of their huge sky-scrapers in the centre of New York a drayload of bricks drew up. Instead of unloading it brick by brick thrown from one man to another, as I have seen done in England, the whole dray-load was tipped off; certainly a great saving in time, and they did not seem to mind some of the bricks being broken. When I landed in Liverpool and saw the slow old-fashioned way in which things were going on there, I could not help remarking to a relation, “You all seem asleep here, and if you do not waken up the U.S.A. will get ahead of you, and be the leading nation of the world.”
In the Prairies, round Winnipeg, I saw them using a threshing machine much lighter, and much more suitable for New Zealand conditions than the Clayton Shuttleworth or Rustin Proctor English machine which we had out here. I got full particulars and specifications to bring out with me, but as my cabin-mate in the steamer to Liverpool happened to be Rustin Proctor’s travelling agent I spoke to him about the improvements they should make. He borrowed these specifications and never returned them. If England would manufacture suitable agricultural machinery, they might have a big trade with the Dominions, which they have lost.
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CHAPTER XXXIX.
Mt. Nessing was warm country, facing the sun, but we had one bad snow storm, I think in July, 1903. It came on in the evening and in the morning there was two feet two inches of snow; too deep for the sheep to get about, so after riding out and inspecting, I decided that the only thing to do was to make a snow plough. A very useful, good man, R. Doake, who was on the place helped me. Neither of us had ever seen a snow plough, but the one we made acted perfectly and cleared a track 3 ft. 6 in. to 4 ft. wide. We worked all night and had it finished by the morning. I immediately sent out one of the ploughmen with four horses up the valley with it.
As I had 5,000 hoggets on turnips, I decided that the best thing to do was to telegraph to my Timaru Agents to buy me one hundred acres of turnips, which they did, and we drove the hoggets to Albury, and trucked them to St. Andrews to be put on these turnips. I kept them down there for two and a half months, and as I could use the turnips at Mt. Nessing for the ewes, my loss was not a large one considering that the snow was a month on the ground.
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I am told that I was the first person to truck sheep away to get them out of the snow. It has often been done since. The driving of the sheep down to Albury railway—seven miles away—was a big undertaking. The snow plough was sent first to make a track in the snow. As the sheep could only travel one or two abreast, and there were over 5,000 sheep, the leaders must have been nearly three miles down the road to Albury before the last got started. I put on every man on the place, and my wife and daughters were very helpful. All were on horseback and they rode through the snow, and started the sheep on again when they stopped. It was dark before we got the last sheep down. We trucked them the next day.
I still had the two properties in Amuri, and was fortunate all the time I owned them in having very good, capable overseers. I used to go up to them once a month, and as they were 200 miles distant from Mt. Nessing much time was lost in travelling. I still grew crops at Rotherham and turnips to fatten the lambs, and bought every year a large number of lambs, for fattening, at the Culverden sale. The drafting of the lambs for the freezing in the fattening season took up some of my time, as I still did all the management and bought and sold everything off the places. To save the heavy carting of the greasy wool I shifted the William’s wool-scouring plant to the Waiau run, and all the
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wool was scoured on the place, being classed at shearing and ready for the scouring. The price I paid for this scouring was about Jd. per lb. on the scoured wool, and I paid for half the soap, but if I did not think the scourers were using sufficient I paid for it all. The two scourers were also fed and lodged.
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CHAPTER XL.
After the importation of motor cars, we used to invite any owners of cars for a motor run once a year to Mt. Messing, and quite a number used to come, have luncheon, and walk round the garden, play tennis or croquet, and leave after afternoon tea. Although it is only 25 years ago the cars were a wonderful collection and would be curiosities if they were exhibited now. They have been improved out of recognition, and I think it safe to prophecy that they will go on improving, and the motor car of 25 years hence will be a very perfect machine, if aeroplanes do not cut them out.
After about 1900, rising prices and all kinds of conveniences which were introduced, such as motor cars, telephones, etc., made farming, and country life, much easier. There were few of the hardships and privations that the early settlers had to put up with. The younger generation were growing up unused to them, and quickly resented anything which was not up to the higher standard of living they had grown up with. Farming was easier in many ways but the increasing discontent of the workers made the management more difficult. One had to lose a great deal of one’s independence to keep things running smoothly.
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Thrift, which I have made a point of preaching all through this book, was necessary. I always used to say that a farmer’s chief profits were made out of his savings. As I mentioned before, I was constantly pointing out to the men that if they would save, and with compound interest, they could be worth about £l,OOO in twelve years, and be able to start on their own account. Some took notice of this, and are well off to-day—others did not. One selfish employer said to me, “Don’t tell the men this, or in time we shall have no working men at all.”
Formerly, the flock owner had a great deal of trouble regarding the shearing of wet sheep. It was not in his interest to do this, because wet wool, screw pressed into the bales, soon heated. For about twenty years there was no trouble; then influenza went round the country, and they thought shearing wet sheep was the cause of it, and when every gang of shearers had a Union man amongst them, annoyance commenced. Two days after rain the flock owner would get some sheep, feel them, and considering them dry, would put them in the shed for the shearers to commence upon. The men all the time were being fed and lodged. They would start shearing, when the Union representative would decide that the sheep were wet, and must be turned out again. There was often litigation on the subject, but what could the Magistrate do
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when the shearers swore that the sheep were wet and the owner that they were dry?
The following is an instance of what really happened in my shed at Pahau Pastures. We had several fine days shearing, when it came on to rain about 4 p.m. The shearers had been working hard, racing each other, and no doubt would be glad of a rest —which I think, sometimes accounted for their objection to shear. I had some sheep in the yards, and rushed them into the shed, but not before they had got slightly wet. At the same time some fifty dry sheep which had been left in the shed were driven back in a pen by themselves. The shearers finished shearing the other dry sheep which were still in the front pens, and as it was still raining I did not wait to turn out the sheep we had just put in the shed, to get wetter. I could not bring those fifty sheep from the back to the front without mixing them with the wet ones. The shearers knocked off early when all the sheep in the front pens were shorn. In the evening, during a lull in the weather, I turned the wet sheep out, so as to be able to bring the fifty dry sheep into the front pens ready for the next day. The shearers had not noticed that I had brought forward the fifty dry sheep. The next morning when they started to shear, they decided that the sheep were wet, and refused to go on.
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Mr. G. B. Starkey told me of an amusing incident. He bought some oilskin trousers, some of them yellow and some of them black, put them along his shearing floor and told the shearers, if they thought the sheep were wet to put them on, the carroty haired men to put on the yellow ones, and the dark complexioned ones the black. They would not put on any, nor shear the sheep.
Nowadays, I am told by runholders that they have no trouble, as of old, about wet sheep. Shearers would shear sheep which were too wet if they were allowed. Shearing was very much delayed if there was much wet weather. At Mt. Nessing with twelve shearers and favourable weather we coud finish shearing in three weeks, but in wet weather it might take six weeks and over. As there were quite thirty men, including shed hands, cooks and shepherds to feed, I was pleased when it was finished.
The shearing commenced at 5.30 a.m. and continued until 5.30 p.m. The shearers had one hour off each for breakfast and dinner, and about two hours off morning and afternoon for “smoke oh’s,” so they only worked eight hours altogether. Besides three meals they had five morning and afternoon teas. I had much longer hours than the men, getting up at 4.30 and generally working until 9 p.m. making up tallies, wool accounts, etc.
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CHAPTER XLI.
On a large station where many shepherds were employed, each owning four dogs, if all these dogs started howling like a pack of wolves, it was not a very musical entertainment. I have known thirty dogs at Mt. Nessing, all howling together, nearly always during the night.
Few people realise the wonderful faithfulness of the Collie. He is watching for his master always. I would often drive sheep to the saleyards with my dogs. During the sale the dogs could not be with me on account of there being so many people about. In the afternoon I would leave for home on my horse, sometimes forgetting about the dogs. I might be a mile up the road when I would look back to make sure that the dogs were following me. They nearly always were. They must have been watching for me all the time I was at the sale. I think it safe for me to say many dogs would be faithful unto death. The Collie has a reasoning brain also. He can think things out much the same as a human being.
Here is an instance which I can vouch for myself. After I bought the land at Rotherham and built on it, I used to live there during the Winter.
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In the Summer time during shearing I would be at the Waiau run for some time, and used often to go up there at other times to see how things were going on. On one occasion I went from my Rotherham farm for a fortnight on a visit to Mr. John Grigg of Longbeach. Before leaving I tied my dog up at his kennel, and told the woman I had as farm cook to let him go every day for a run, and then to tie him up again. When I returned she told me that on two occasions after letting him loose he had disappeared, and was away the whole night, not returning until about mid-day. Soon after I went up to the Waiau run to see how things were progressing. They told me that twice my dog had come up there, sniffed round the place, and gone to my own cottage, and slept there on the verandah all night with his face to the door. In the morning, after again looking round everywhere, he had disappeared. I could then put things together and see how, and why, that dog had disappeared from the farm after being let loose. He must have reasoned things out in this way, “What is the matter that he is so long away, he must be at the other place, I will go and see”? The two places were twenty-five miles apart, but the dog went up, and not finding me, came to the conclusion that I would come back to the farm, so he returned there. The second time he went up, no doubt the wonderful keenness of the dog’s scent which we do not comprehend told him that I had
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not been up, so he returned to the farm again. I was young and thought less in those days, and did not fully realize what a sincere friend I had in that dog.
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CHAPTER XLII.
A stock breeder learns a great deal that those who have not had anything to do with stock raising know nothing about. With careful watching and mating, it is marvellous how a particular breed of sheep or herd of cattle, in fact any kind of animal or fowl, can be improved. “Like produces like,” is a well-known saying among stock breeders. It takes time, though, to establish a particular type or breed. To mate a nondescript animal with a well-bred animal may result in progeny either good, bad, or indifferent. Both sire and dam should be of a type which produces true to breed. It may take years and many generations to produce an animal true to type, but in the case of sheep which reproduce soon after they are one year old—it therefore does not take so long as with many other animals.
It occurred to me many years ago, that if scientific breeding were taken in hand for the human race a breed of super men and women would be produced. This has been written and talked about of late years but I thought and spoke about it quite fifty-one years ago, so think I am entitled to publish my opinion. We are all animals with more or less organs as the lower animals, that of
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reproduction among others. We know that the principle of “Like produces like” applies to us. For instance, when there is madness in two families, we know they should not marry. I once spoke about this theory to a well-known artist, and he replied, “We do not want to produce a race of gladiators.” He had not thought very deeply on the subject when he imagined that only the physical and not the mental traits were reproduced. The purer the breed the more certainly of reproduction true to type.
Years ago, there was a well-known sire, “Blood Royal,” in New Zealand. He was very vicious and dangerous, as also were a great many of his progeny. A sire with a weak constitution is very apt to have stock with the same fault, more especially if he was descended from a weakly constitutioned family. Years ago breeders considered that the Merino sheep had not sufficient wool on their faces, so we all went to work to breed Merino rams which had more wool on their faces and legs, etc., with the result that the Merinos grew so much more wool round their eyes that nowadays it is necessary to eye-clip them or the wool would grow so long before shearing that they would be blinded. I think all this goes to prove that if the human race could be taken in hand in the same way, they could be bred up to something beyond our present comprehension.
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I read the other day that a Professor of Eugenics had stated that all this had not been proved with the human race, and he arrived at that conclusion because it had been noticed that where husband and wife were similar, either physically or temperamentally, their children were often different. lam afraid that Professor did not understand the true meaning of pure breeding. Human beings, if I may express my meaning as a stock breeder looks at it, are a race of mongrels owing to the haphazard way in which marriages are made. The man falls in love with a pretty face or particular manner. Rarely, I may say never, does the man or woman think, “Are we suitable to mate ?” In the same way as the stock breeder calculates, the married couple that the Professor referred to, might what the stock breeder calls “Throw back.” That is, the good or bad points might be reproduced from three or four generations back.
So far, no thought and no real effort has ever been made to establish a true type with the human race, and as they do not commence to reproduce until they are twenty years old or over—starting from zero, as would have to be done —it would take at least 200 years to establish a type of superhumans. Amongst many of the French families I believe most of the marriages are not love matches, but arranged for family and mecenarv
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reasons when the children are very young. The marriages, in many cases, are just as happy as love matches, so things could be arranged if people would only look at it in the right light. Some day I believe people will realise all this and put it in practice. If any nation does do so, it would in time rule the World. It is, I think, for the women to decide upon it.
I am not going into the question of breeding by the unfit, because everyone knows that it should not be done. We are advanced enough to know about birth control, so that point can be got over. Some things would be difficult to decide, very difficult. Who is to breed, and who is not to do so ? However, I feel that if all the difficulties were solved and there is no doubt they can be, it is hard to imagine to what heights the human race might soar, and men like gods might then be an accomplished fact.
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CHAPTER XLIII.
As there were about 6,000 acres of agricultural land at Mt. Nessing I kept four ploughmen each with four horses and a double furrow plough. I had six horses and a treble furrow plough at Rotherham.
I remember on one occasion on Monday morning the ploughman commenced ploughing a forty acre paddock. He told me “If fine I shall finish it by Saturday night,” which he did. The land at Rotherham was perfectly flat and an easily worked loam, but at Mt. Nessing it was more hilly and a stiff clay sub-soil, and a double furrow plough was more suitable. As it was twelve miles to the end of the agricultural land the ploughmen slept in travelling huts on wheels, and the cook had a galley also on wheels which they moved with the feed boxes, etc., from one paddock to another, as necessary, and at harvest time there was perhaps another hut, or tents sent out with the extra men required. Gradually with so many new conveniences of all descriptions, the management of my properties was very much simplified, and the rough pioneer work was passed, never to come again. Transport by motor car, railways, etc., minimised the work and the time required for it.
Mt. Nessing was about thirty-three miles from Timaru and whereas it took, in the old days, about nine hours to drive there and back, I could do it in a motor car in about a quarter of the time. The traction engine would come to the wool-shed and take away about 100 bales of wool at a time. Many other things made it easier, and the work on a station being something similar to what it is at the present day, there is nothing out of the way particularly interesting to mention. Profits were greater, and as I have already mentioned, land increased in value. Many farmers bought land at such a high price that now the slump has come, they are blamed for paying too much. Land is worth what one can make out of it, and it is more their misfortune than miscalculation that they are in difficulties now. Many people bought shares a few years ago at double their present price, and therefore they are as much to blame for miscalculation as the farmer is. When profits were high wages went up considerably; the men were entitled to the good times as well as the farmers.
Unfortunately there is too much independence and discontent owing to frequent Arbitration Court decisions. Amongst other things, preference to Unionists, and also the lead given to the men by the Labour Union agitators. The younger generation knew nothing of the hardships that the first settlers had to go through. They, therefore,
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resented any discomfort and, I fear, grew up looking more for their wages than to the work which they should give in return. The older workers took more interest in their jobs, while many of the younger men took none, and would do no more work than they possibly could. For instance, the shed hands who were paid more during shearing than the average farm hands found out that they need only do the shed work for which they were engaged, while in the old days if the sheep were too wet for shearing, we would put them to help in the garden or some light work. After a heavy ram it would take three fine days for the sheep to dry. The shed hands refused, under the Arbitration Act Award, to do any other work although we had to pay and feed them all the time the sheep were drying. I maintain that we are all better working than lolling about doing nothing when one could work and do some good.
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CHAPTER XLIV.
This being a history of the early days, and conditions existing then, it is not necessary to describe those of the present day, except for comparison. One has only to read the newspaper and they wdl often see complaints by the unemployed and others of conditions that were every day occurences then. If times do not improve, as I fear they will not for some time, many of us will of necessity have to return to some of those old conditions. With every Nation impoverished and suffering from unbearable taxation, with many unemployed, it requires very little thought to decide that recovery must be very slow, and this only if everyone bears their burden and helps. I feel a great respect for the old workmen; they had hardships to go through but did not complain or expect anything better, and I feel positive they worked with a greater will and more interest in their work than many do now.
About 1908 I sold the Upper Waiau run, and the Rotherham farm, which I transferred to my wife, was sold soon after. In 1913, I sold Mt. Nessing to the New Zealand Land Purchase Board. It was cut up into about thirteen blocks and I was pleased to find that most of the men who drew
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blocks in the ballot that was held have done fairly well. It was some satisfaction to feel that though I was content with the price I got for the place, still I did not make such a profit that those who came after me were so handicapped that they could not make a living, as so often happened on the land purchased for settlement purposes. As stock had risen in value, we got a fair price at the clearing sale held at Rotherham and at Mt. Nessing.
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CHAPTER XLV.
After the sale of Mt. Nessing I went with my family to England, and the war breaking out in 1914, it might be interesting to mention my experiences. My wife and I arranged at the commencement of hostilities that as I was too old to go to the front and our son only 11 years, we would help all we could by living very carefully and all our surplus income should go to assist. The difficulty was to find out the best way to help. In different ways we gave about £2,000 to £3,000 per annum to assist. We were at Elgin Towers, Minehead, when the war broke out, and as the women and girls there were willing to knit socks and other comforts for the soldiers, we got half a ton of wool, all of which they knitted up in under four months, and the garments were sent to the front.
The old British saying, “We shall muddle through,” was very much in evidence at first. I found that the horses which had been used to being stabled in the Winter and had been bought for the new Kitchiner Army, and were picketed out on Salisbury plain amongst other places, were dying, owing to their being unused to such exposure.
After the Winter was over, it was stated in reply to a question in the House of Commons that
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16,000 had died in Great Britain. The only cover which they had was a thin stable rug, or one made of jute which soon became wet through and in the wet British Winter with so little sun, they could never dry these rugs again, but had to put them on the horses in the evening wet through. I drew the War Official’s attention to our New Zealand covers made of waterproof canvas and a warm lining, and pointing out that in New Zealand few horses are stabled, but generally turned out in the paddocks all through the Winter and the cover keeps them absolutely warm and dry. They are healthier outside than standing on the brick floors of the stables. I tried my best to get the War Office Officials to adopt these covers which would have saved so many of the horses lives, and 1 even got a number of these covers made and distributed them amongst officers commanding mounted regiments. They all saw their value, but told me that knowing I had already brought the matter of their adoption before the War Office Official they did not dare to bring it up again, when I requested them to do so.
I then asked our High Commissioner, Sir Thomas Mackenzie to take one of these covers to Lord Kitchener, which he did, but he could get nothing done. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and the Blue Cross Society saw their advantage, and I went up to London and
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got 250 covers made for them for the wounded horses.
As I could get no notice taken of them by the army officials, and the stupidity of their not adopting them was getting on my nerves, I returned in 1915 with my family via America to New Zealand, arriving in 1916. When in San Francisco, by chance I found out that volunteers for the British Army from U.S.A. were going up to Vancouver. The Americans, especially in California at that time, said they were neutral. Later on, when in Vancouver, I tried to find out about these men, but had great difficulty until I got an introduction to the Commandant. I told him that I was anxious to help with money, if desired. He informed me volunteers were being brought out, but the U.S.A. prevented them if possible. One officer, who was sent recruiting to Seattle, was then in gaol there in consequence. They were short of money to pay the passages of these men up, and as the Canadian Government would not give them any, they would be glad of help. He introduced me to the Intelligence Officer, Captain Manchester, and I gave money to help bring as many volunteers as I could from the U.S.A. I met this gentleman again in Vancouver after the war and he gave me before leaving, his photograph in uniform and the following letter which I have preserved and framed as a record of some help I did towards the War; —
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“Please accept this as a reminder of the Canadian Officer whose success recruiting in the U.S.A. was largely due to your assistance. Before the United States came in we recruited 4,808 men and your aid coming when it did, laid the foundation for the whole scheme.”
While in Los Angeles in 1915 I also sent to the War Office, London, a plan for a shield on wheels to advance and cut the barbed wire in front of the German trenches, etc. I noticed at the end of the War that claims for money rewards were being put in for the invention of the “Victorious Tanks” which it was acknowledged originated from a shield on wheels. I then wrote to the War Office enclosing their two letters dated 1915, acknowledging my letters to them with the shield on wheels proposal, and I think I could fairly claim that I was the originator of the idea of the tanks. I added that I would not take any money. There has been too much of that sort of thing.
Soon after my return to New Zealand I advocated, at a Public Meeting in Christchurch, the mass production of aeroplanes by the Allies, and I afterwards went to Wellington and interviewed the Rt. Hon. W. Massey and Sir Joseph Ward on the subject. The German manufacturers, no doubt, were fully employed in producing all the war material they required, whilst the Allies had all the manufacturers of the ■world at their command.
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An influential, sympathetic Los Angeles friend, Mr. Adams, who saw the advantage of this, when I sent him the paper report of the Christchurch meeting, got a large automobile factory in the United States, I think it was the Overland, to agree to take up the aeroplane manufacturing for the Allies, and no doubt, if we had found the dollars, most of the other manufacturers would have made them also, I believe they are cheaper to make than a big gun.
If 10,000 aeroplanes, loaded to capacity, had flown over Berlin in mass formation, first on one side, and returning on the other, the result would have been too awful to imagine, and with the chemists’ further knowledge about poisonous gasses the next war, when it comes, will be utterly disastrous to our civilization unless people realize in time its fearfulness.
Let me repeat the following tale: Some time ago a man was killed by falling off a train. He was really thrown off by a number of men who had decided that he was too dangerous to live. Water, we all know, is composed chiefly of oxygen and hydrogen gasses. This man had discovered an ingredient, which if thrown into the sea would start the oxygen burning and once it was alight it never went out. This tale is rather far fetched but, and it is a big “but.” Can anyone tell, now we know a little, what the scientists may find out in
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the future, about the immense powers in Nature. The last war proved that if, during another war, the scientists of a Nation found out by some chemical or in any other way that they could destroy the people and cities of the Nation they were at war with, they would do it, such is human nature.
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CHAPTER XLVI.
After the War I wrote a circular letter advocating the adoption of a universal language, and I still believe it would help, more than all the League of Nations will do, to establish universal peace and understanding. I did not advocate Esperanto especially, although it might be the groundwork, but rather that the leading grammarians of the world should come together and decide on some language which we could all easily understand. Then, if it was taught in all the schools in every country, what an immense advantage it would be to have the power to make oneself understood wherever one may go. I have travelled considerably, and know the feeling of helplessness in a foreign country where I did not understand the language. A stranger in a strange land; one nearly feels resentful at the people who pass you by because you cannot express your feelings and wishes. What a difference it would make if there was a universal language which everyone could speak. It must bring people more together. It is chiefly the difference in language, which makes the people of the world keep apart from one another, and causes many of the wars. How much better for business if everyone could write and do business
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in a universal language. I believe it is only the natural conservative perversity of human nature which has prevented this being seen and adopted before.
I do not wish to be misunderstood; I am not advocating the scrapping of each Nation’s own language. The language of a Nation expresses best the sentiments, poetry, etc. of the people. lam only writing in favour of a simple universal language which we could all easily understand and learn if taught at the schools; that we must all know would bring us more together than anything else that can be thought of. I have wondered why the League of Nations has not adopted it. I have heard Frenchmen say that French should be the Universal language and Englishmen say that English should be. That means selfishness which would be the end of it all.
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CHAPTER XLVII.
It might be interesting to make a comparison between the present and the old days I have tried to describe. As I have already made some comparison with the social improvement such as manhood suffrage, universal education, old age pensions, and so many more that I could write a book in itself to enumerate and remark on them all, I will only mention now the personal advantages that all of us have now over those old days. Instead of getting up in the morning in a cold room with only the dim light of a tallow candle that constantly required snuffing, I switch on a bright electric light and being an old man, requiring all the comforts obtainable, my bedroom is warmed by electric heat all night, and my clothes are warmed by the same heat for me to put on. In place of no bath at all or a cold one with only the chill taken off if a can full of hot water was brought to me, I have plenty of hot water electrically heated which I can turn on as required. My breakfast and also all my other meals are cooked by electricity and would consist, if I so desired, of a choice of many things, cereals, etc., and many kinds of condiments that were not known of sixty years ago; but I still prefer the simple wholesome foods which are the
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best for us all. The morning paper gives me all the latest news from the uttermost ends of the earth, instead of the old newspapers with only the local news, and no cablegrams. Formerly, if there was any news from England or other places, it was only after the arrival of one of the sailing vessels that we would receive it, and it would be three or four months old.
My sitting rooms, if not heated by a fire, are heated by electricity: the carpets are swept by an electric vacuum sweeper more thoroughly than by the old brooms. A motor car will take me quickly wherever I may wish to go, in place of the horse and trap. A wireless gives me instantly all the the latest news of any special event taking place in any part of the world, instead of getting the news three or four months old. With the telephone I can talk to people in any part of the world. My daughter, the other day, spoke to her cousin in the Argentine quite distinctly although the voices were carried via London, a distance of 17,000 miles. In those old days the only way to communicate with anyone abroad was by letter, taking seven to nine months, including the reply. Ido not often go to the pictures because I do not think many of those shown on the screen are fit and proper ones, but at any rate they are very different from the magic lantern which we used to have. An electric reading lamp with a daylight globe, so as not to hurt
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the eyes, gives me light to read myself to sleep in place, again, of the tallow candle.
Why can I afford to have all these amenities ? Because in my youth I was thrifty and saving, realising that in my old age I should want all the comforts procurable. My book shows that at one time, through no fault of my own, I lost everything and had to make a fresh start. If any of my young readers will take notice and follow my lead, I shall have done some good in writing this book.
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CHAPTER XLVIII.
In conclusion let me epitomise some of the sentiments I have written in this book, perhaps in a rather disjointed way. Now that the world is suffering from a more serious slump than any living person has seen and during ray lifetime I have seen several, in my opinion the hoping and waiting for higher prices is only delaying the recovery which we are desiring.
Before we can hope for better times there must be a general levelling down of everything; we must return to a more thrifty life. With all costs and wages being down the farmer could produce and sell his produce at a profit getting to work again and employing more labour, because until the farmer can produce to sell at a profit New Zealand cannot hope for prosperity, and the sooner we realise this the better. Men could buy their requisites at a much lower price and, therefore, although their wages would be less, the spending value would go quite as far.
I have intended to show that years ago, the prices of farm produce were no higher than they are now; but the cost of all things being lower — as will be the result if wages are lower—the farmer
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then made a small profit, and it is to these same conditions we must return. Selfishness must be put on one side, we must think of others and our country first, and do all we can to save our present civilization.
If an individual is hard up and has lost much of his capital and income, as most of us have nowadays, what does he do? If he is not one of the spendthrift thriftless kind who are hopeless, he reduces his standard of living and tries to discover how he can save so as to live within his income knowing that only economy can pull him through. Surely the same thing applies to a Nation that has over-spent and over-borrowed so that her debts are nearly more than she can repay.
Some young political economists blame the going off the gold standard and several other different ideas. Others are advocating inflation; the issuing of paper money for everyone to spend, and circulate their money in the same way as they would if times were good and business prosperous. It would be very nice if possibly correct, but can we afford to spend when we are hard up? Only saving can bring us and the country back. If we launch out like the spendthrift and go on the gamblers’ throw the result may be very serious for us all.
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There is too much gambling and I think it is on the increase. The big sweepstakes, Art unions, the Totalisator, Bridge, to mention a few. Ido not say that I have not gone in for all these things but I do not now, and do say very decidedly that we would be better without them all. There is no royal road to fortune and never will be. Only hard work and economy are the sure way to success. All must practise both of these. The capitalist must be satisfied with lower interest and profits, and the traders and workers with less remuneration, The thoughtless, discontented, and those with nothing to lose, may advocate any change, it would make little difference to them. The Bank Managers and older and thoughtful people nearly all advocate the slow and careful way of recovery.
After the Napoleonic wars, as I have pointed out in the early part of this book, the world had to go through a similar experience, the indebtedness of the Nations was so great that the taxation crippled them and recovery was slow, because money was scarce. It is sad to think that we must all come down after our higher, better style of living. No one would advise this if it could possibly be avoided, but I maintain that it cannot be. Those with nothing to lose —and I fear there are many such, whilst this high living and gambling craze, etc., are so much in evidence—are only too willing
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to try any change not thinking of the consequences. What would these consequences be?
I will try to give my idea of what would happen if Capitalism were done away with, and Socialism tried which, I believe, means that everyone should work for the state and one another. Is human nature, as it is at present constituted, perfect enough for such an experiment? Will the lazy person alter his disposition and do a fair share of the necessary work? Without any incentive will all do their share ? The Labour Unions by agitating for equal pay for all —whether for a good or a bad workman —have discouraged the good workman who wished to earn more for his family or himself, and have brought down the standard of work.
If my advice in this work (in Chapter 42), for improving the human race by scientific breeding was adopted there would be a certainty of improvement, but I am afraid it will be many a day before the people see the advisability of it, and try to improve our race as we do those of the lower animals.
Socialism as preached by Carl Marx and others has been tried and failed in several places. I believe a community some years ago went to South America to try to live together on these principles. After a time differences of opinion came amongst
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them, and they quarrelled so that it was not the success that they had hoped for, they dissolved and went back to live under the old capitalistic system.
Should all the world try this, would selfishness, dishonesty, greed and all the other vices disappear and everything be as it should be with happiness for all ? The gamblers’ wish of plenty without toil. How much we all wish it could be so, but suppose it is not? Those who think must be perfectly aware that human nature has not yet reached the stage of perfection which would make it so, and that if we proceed on those lines we are certainly heading for a fall.
I fear in the densely populated countries starvation, misery and death would often take their toll. With the wealthy done away with, no real wealth in a country, and no incentive to make it, where would money come from to pay for education and every other improvement that our present civilization has worked up to, and if left alone will keep on advancing as it has done in the past. I have already said I do not believe the people will do all the work necessary to carry on as we do now with no incentive to go to the extra trouble necessary to perfect themselves for the higher knowledge required to carry on the work for the control of the professions, manufacturers, etc.
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For instance, would many toil for the knowledge a clever doctor requires. How many would study hard and burn the midnight oil if there was no incentive of gain for all their work. Doctors would degenerate and the people would not get the good advice, and help to keep them alive. The same would apply to all professions. The world would gradually degenarate and a lower standard of living would come with none doing their utmost. No encouragement to make a better life for them-seh-oc that the gain of wealth brings. There would come times of famine and, with no wealth to buy food from other nations, misery and death would come to many. The Nation would decay until some strong man arose, took charge and ruthlessly ruled —which by that time would be necessary. The people would be obliged to obey and the present liberty of the subject would be gone, replaced by an Autocracy. The masses would have a hard time, ruled by a few relentless over-lords.
How much better to do what I have tried to advocate, and keep on improving our present civilization, not by any methods to favour one class at the expense of the other, but to help all, giving everyone who tries to be thrifty, security for their saving and toil, realizing that only toil and saving can make wealth, also not being envious of those who have inherited wealth from their careful parents but rather encouraging such a natural
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endeavour for the benefit of their chifdren. Protecting those who have made wealth honestly, understanding that the more wealthy people there are in a Nation the wealthier that Nation must be, and the more can be got by taxation (in reason) to pay for all the improvements the poorer people desire.
I hope none will think I have taken the side of the capitalist too much in what I have written. I have not wished to do so, but unfortunately politics have degenerated into class warfare. Labour against Capital, and yet in New Zealand we are all equal and I think it is safe to assert that more than one half the well-to-do (capitalists) in the country have, through thrift, risen from being workers and poorly off. I would give much to see all work together for the public good. Will it ever be ? I fear not.
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Bibliographic details
APA: Jones, Edgar. (1933). Autobiography of an early settler in New Zealand. Coulls, Somerville, Wilkie.
Chicago: Jones, Edgar. Autobiography of an early settler in New Zealand. Wellington, N.Z.: Coulls, Somerville, Wilkie, 1933.
MLA: Jones, Edgar. Autobiography of an early settler in New Zealand. Coulls, Somerville, Wilkie, 1933.
Word Count
37,838
Autobiography of an early settler in New Zealand Jones, Edgar, Coulls, Somerville, Wilkie, Wellington, N.Z., 1933
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