FOR THE GIRLS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 229, 27 September 1930, Page 2 (Supplement)

FOR THE GIRLS.

SPRING IN THE BUSH, CLEMATIS THE STAR CHILD. ' My Dear Girls, — Spring has come to the bush and garden in spite of cold wind* chilly shower#, and Jack Frost's impish face is still around in the mornings The lovely bush flower folk are the first to respond to its early call' The golden kowhai proclaims it with its showers of yellow rain. Back - in the mighty forests, where the joyous thrilling tuis are not frightened by the presence of man, they are sipping honey from its tassel-like blossoms. Sweet-smelling clusters of white flowers light up the dark green leaves of the puka puka trees, or bush notepaper as the children call it, for the leaves can be picked and dried, and the bluish-white of the underside of the leaf can be written upon and will keep for years. Even the spiteful old bush lawyer is a thing of beauty just now, with sprays of sweet smell, ing flowers. Tiny round-faced manuka babies are opening to the sunswinging on the end of feathery branches, they appear to be having a game with every breeze that passes. The stately rewa rewa trees, too, are'- ■- putting on their spring trimmings, and posies of dark red blossoms are' peeping out from the stiff branches. If you look very carefully. you may come upon the whau, with its broad shining leaves and clusters of tiny cream flowers. Cattle love this plant and it has become rather scarce, though there are a good many to be seen on Mount Eden. This familiar mountain owes its original name, Maungawhau, to this plant, which at one time grew there in great quantities. But the Queen of Spring in the bush just now is the lovely stnrry clematis, which climbs up the trees in handsome clusters and revels in the warmth of the sun. At night time the dew-spangled blossoms greet their parents in the sky, for, runs the Maori legend, the clematis is the child ' of the stars. * Before the Maori came to Ao-tea-roa, the star Rehua loved the star Puanga, and their children were fair and beautiful like themselves. But loveliest of them all was Puawananga, whose blossoms herald the spring. "How do I know, pakeha?" says he who tells the tale, "well, are not the flowers of Puawananga starlike as the parents that gave them birth? Moreover, does it not salute its parents by shining beautiful on earth when they are shining beautiful in the heavens? Therefore it is well seen that Puawananga is a child of the stars.' Our bush is full of graceful climbing plants twisting and twining in and out. ' Some attain their object of reaching the sun by turning themselves round a tree and mounting to the top. The bush lawyer, as we have often felt, climbs by means of little hooks. Our aspiring star child, the clematis,, climbs . by tightly clasping an object with its young leaf dj\JL JP stalks. It struggles over many shrubs and tall trees i till it meets the sun god Ra, and there rests, where it may ''look at the sky all day.", V -•