PIPIS, AND "ROUND THE ROCKS."

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 32, 8 February 1915, Page 18

PIPIS, AND "ROUND THE ROCKS."

Different varieties of shellfish have always been a favourite dish of the Maoris, and before the era of reclamation began they had ample supplies of this food handy to the pas in and about Wellington. Indeed, pipis abounded in many places along the main beach, while other shellfish made their homes on the rocks, and even when the winning of land from the sea had removed some of the sources of supply there were — right up to les3 than two decades ago — well stocked pipi beds at Pipitea and Evans Bay, anq in Oriental Bay, where Maoris used to improve the shining hour by obtaining supplies, not only for their own use but for European tables — it was a common sight to see Maori women carrying flax kits of pipis from house to house for sale. On Saturday afternoons, Sundays, and holidays, too, "round the rocks"— Oripntal Bay atid Evans Bay — was quite an institution with many heads of households and their olive branches. There is comparatively littles left to-day of the city portion of tho old line of beach "round the rocks," and no signs of that nightmare of the youngsters who would resent being called old to-day — the dangerous quicksand patches, which, despite the more or less exaggerated alarming histories given them by careful fathers and mothers, always exercised a fascination on the venturesome youth, who would only cease his personal investigation when he found tho treacherous surface quivering under the pressure of a foot, gradually and crucllv prepare to receive *»he little limb aud Jjody above,. M<"*x

were the awesome stories told of that quicksand, and the writer, with a vivid recollection of a leg that suddenly dieappeared and another that started to follow suit before a watchful father dragged him to safety, is still prepared to believe them all. To-day the quicksand is never head of, the foreshore is unrecognisable, and if some folk have their way the old picnic spot of not so many years back will disappear as completely as has "down the beach" — the Lambton-quay of our forefathers.