THE SUNDAY ISLAND SETTLERS.

Lyttelton Times, Volume LXXIII, Issue 9090, 29 April 1890, Page 5

THE SUNDAY ISLAND SETTLERS.

[Feb Fee ss Association.] AUCKLAND, Apeil 28. The steamer Hinomoa arrived to-day, bringing back thirteen of the settlers who left New Zealand a short time ago to take up their abode on Sunday Island. The returned settlers are—Mr and Mrs J. Wells and family, Messrs M'Cullock, T. Jackson, A. W. Beckett, T. Macnaught, J. Eobson, E. Cotter, W. Carver, and A. E. Taylor. One of the settlers states that Sunday Island is extremely rugged and mountainous. The flat at Denham Bay was poor laud, consisting for the'greater part of sand and pumice, and it was impossible to cultivate the slopes of the mountains. Vegetables of all kinds suffered severely from the successive attacks of four or five different species of caterpillars, whilst in the beginning of January rats showed themselves and destroyed everything within reach. What had escaped the caterpillar was taken by the rats, who devoured unripe cobs of maize, and the pods of beans and peas, and even burrowed in the ground to the kumeraa and potatoes. A few patches of vegetables near the houses were saved, but the returns from thorn were unsatisfactory, and the maize-cobs and potatoes were small. Beans and kumeras gave the best return; There are on the island groves of bananas, which, however, are stunted. The climate seems very moist. The settlers say that had it not been for the timely arrival of the Hinemoa they would have been on short allowance before the winter was over.