SHIPPING INTELLIGENCE.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume I, Issue 4, 2 April 1842, Page 15

SHIPPING INTELLIGENCE.

ARRIVED. March 31, the schooner Gem, Pearce, from Port Nicholson. Same day, the barque Hope, M'Lachlan, with cattle, from Sydney.

The Renfrewshire Reformer publishes a table compiled by the Paisley Relief Committee, showing the state of the unemployed people, whose numbers are fearfully on the increase. The following numbers were supplied with meat, bread, and potatoes, on a day specified: — ■ Married men, with their wives . . 1,240 .Children belonging to the above . . 1,546 j 2,786 Widows and deserted wives, with unmarried females 509 Children belonging to these . . . 747' 1,256 Single males, mostly young men . . . 166 Number supplied 13th October, 1841 . . 4,208 New applications on the 14th .... 78 The total number of loomsteads in the district is 5,746; ,of these 3,158 are unemployed, and 871 are unoccupied. There are 440 empty houses, and 100 empty shops. The Paisley relief list on Saturday numbered 4,133. The total amount of contributions, including £25 from the Bishop of Durham, is £1,730; the exjienditure exceeds that sum by £25. — New Zealand Gazette. On Thursday, two houses (near the river, in the neighbourhood of Mr. TytlerJ under one roof, belonging one to Mr. Macgarry and the other to Mr. Nichol, were wholly destroyed by fire. The chimney of Mr. Nichol's house was built the lower part of clay, the upper part was made of fern or towai-towai; and the flame, carried by the high wind from the hearth, ignited the more inflammable portion. In a moment the whole was in a blaze, and the materials of which the building was composed prevented any measures for stopping the flames being of tbe slightest effect. We understand Mr. Macgarry has sustained a loss of £80 and upwards, he having bud in stores for the purpose of opening a small shop. Mr. Nichol's loss was slight, we believe.

MR. E. J. WAKEFIELD'S TRIP INTO THE INTERIOR OF THE NORTHER* ISLAND. We take from the columns of the Neu Zealand Gazette an interesting account ol his trip into the interior of the Northern Island, by Mr. E. J. Wakefield. Which ol our fellow settlers will be the first to explore the interior of the Middle Island it were hard to say. There is a wide field open. Energy and emulation will not be wanting doubtless in due time. Our Wellington friends muat not set us so good an example to no end. On the 9th of November last, I left the settlement at the mouth of the Wanganui river, and ascended the river about 100 miles, to a village called Tata. Being delayed by rain one day, we did not, reach this until noon on the 15th. Beyond Te kau Arapawa, which I have formerly mentioned in your pages, the navigation of the river is obstructed by frequent rapids or falls, caused by shingle-banks or snags, there being as many as twenty-six in the next 50 miles. The scenery improves in proportion as the land immediately on the banks becomes less available and easy of access; -but the native plantations:, as well as settlements, are prettily scattered along both sides the whole way up. Besides numerous small villages, I passed thirteen forti fled villages or pahs, of which ten are on tbe west bank. The principal ones are Tunu aire, 15 miles from the sea; Ikurangi, 60; Pukihika, 70; and Pipiriki, 80 miles up the river. Pukihika is the largest one of all, being in fact a collection of eight or nine small pahs on a commanding hill on the west bank, which has been Tecently seleoted by the united inhabitants of Wanganui as a place of defence against their common enemies from- Waikato, or Rotorua. From Pipiriki to Tata, the scenery is magnificent, the river flowing between cliffs 100 feet in ■ height, fringed with foliage and mosses down to the water's edge, while the, wood on the top hangs far over the stream from both sides. In this part the only path to the settlements consists of a rude but strong ladder, consisting of trees and kareau or supple-jack, reaching from the water to the top. Such was the path by which we climbed up to Tata, upwards of 100 feet. Hjere the chief E Kuru, with all his family and adherents, were drawn up to receive me. He has a nice quiet settlement on the flat, which reaches, about 300 yards in breadth, from the edge of the cliff to the hills. The next day I was guided by the natives to a mountain called Aurupu, close to the river about two miles higher up, from which I got a view of Tonga Biro and Mount Egmont. There is an extensive tract of fine wooded country all about here, not very hilly, and possessing an extremely rich soil. In many places, cleared -by the natives, there are tracts of 500 or 600 acres where the plough could be used. The native plantations on both sides of the river are very extensive. After enjoying the view, we descended to the river's bank, and crossed in a canoe to Tieke, a large settlement, inhabited by people chiefly of -the Ngatiawa tribe. Here there is a beautiful monument in honour of, a dead chieftainess. It consists, as usual, of a large canoe stuck upright ; and is thirty feet high, ornamented with carving, representing three figures standing one at the top of the other's head. The workmanship is most elaborate, scarcely a square inch of the wood being left plain; and the whole is painted with red ochre and fringed with albatross feathers. The two men who carved it told me it took them six weeks to complete. ' I returned to Tata in a canoe. It was not till the 19th that my party were all ready to start for Taupo. On that day we got into the canoes, and pulled down about , four miles to the place where a tributary called Manganui, or large branch, flows into the Wanganui. This we ascended about two miles, the natives jumping out and tracking the canoes up -.rapids, several of which had a fall of six feet. The Manganui also runs between cliffs, but nearly 200 feet in height, and is Inhabited as far up as we went that night. We slept at a settlement called Moe awatea, or sleep-in-the-day-time, and proceeded the next morning, after crossing the rivertwice immediately above, through hilly forest land for about five miles. Here the boys were tired with their heavy loads, and stopped in a patch of fern for the night. But it would be tedious to relate each day's journey separately. Suffice it to say that, although I had been told it was but two days' walk from the Wanganui to Taupo, at noon on the 23d the natives said it was still two or three days' walk. We had proceeded but slowly. Our path lay chiefly along the valley of the Manganui, which keeps an average of two miles wide, and is intersected by a deep gully in which the river runs. Many parts of the valley are clear, and in some places we passed small plains of grass : in others we plunged into the forest, and crossed steep ridges, apparently in order to avoid circuitous bends of the valley. We had forded the river five times; and the assistance of the natives was most welcome in overcoming the difficulties occasioned by the rapidity of the stream and the slippery rocky footing. . This road must be perfectly impassable in winter, when the river is swollen by freshets. The heavy loads had made our progress very slow; so that the potatoes began to run short, and they all stopped to dig fern. Fortunately the river abounded with a kind of bird between a coot and a widgeon, called wio, of which we shot half a dozen at each ford. I now selected two natives to carry my tent and bedding, and determined to push on, with & gentleman who had accompanied me from WanganuL We accordingly left the rest to tout fern to their hearts' content, and bring up the. heavy baggage at their leisure, We bad only performed 3i miles, according to rough calcu-

lation, since leaving Moe awatea. The whole ▼alley has been thickly inhabited by the tribes who, leaving Taupo and other parts' of the interior, gradually migrated to Wanganui, and have now fixed their residence on its banks. At every mile we were, shown the site of pahs, and the fields on which numerous battles had been fought in the olden time between the different tribes from Wanganui, Taupo, Waikato, and even the Ngatikahuhunas. We pushed on about six miles more to-day through bush, and encamped at dark under an old rata tree called korake.' We_had forded the river twice, and ascended its bank the last time by means of a rickety kareau ladder, about 'thirty feet high, which is fixed to the cuff at the exact spot where a small waterfall spouts over the edge, and renders the ascent far from safe or pleasant. 24th. It poured with rain at daylight; but we had now no other alternative but to push on, defying the weather. Ten miles, over a level table land covered with wood, brought us to the Manganui, where it is swollen by three smaller streams. We descended at least'l,soo" feet to the stream, crossed it and two of its tributaries, and then ascended a ragged ridge to the opposite bank of the dark deep dell in which the stream flows. This dell, with its various branches, presents an uncommonly picturesque 'appearance, from the steepness and height of its banks, w,hich are covered almost wholly with the towai. Five miles more along a dead flat through towai forest brought us to level grass plains, which continue at the same height as the table forest land. The plains seemed about four miles in width, and bounded on either side by wooded hills, whose summits were hidden by thick masses of clouds. This kind of prairie is called mania by the natives. It is covered with a poor tufty grass, with a very delicate blade, though here and there are excellent patches of other grasses, well fitted-for pasture. At twilight we prepared to encamp at the edge of a point of wood, which projected like a promontory from the eastern edge of the prairie. We had some difficulty to light a fire, as it had poured incessantly the whole day; and were obliged to fere on short commons, and sit wrapped in our blankets by the fire, until the warmth made us sleepy enough to turn in notwithstanding the wet. Two young wekas or wood-hens, about as large as sparrows, which ray dog- pulled out of their burrow, were esteemed a valuable addition to our- scanty supper. 25th. The rain had continued all night, and .gave no signs of mercy this morning ; but, as one viio and twelve potatoes were our whole ■stock of provisions, and we were still far from our journey's end, ■ delay was out of the question. At the first dawn of day we pulled on our wet clothes, and walked eight miles along the prairie, which is in many parts swampy and covered with rushes. We now crossed a smail tributary of the Wanganui, and, after two - miles' walk through a belt of towai forest, anotber, called the Tawai. The plains now seemed to extend on every .side, and, as the weather cleared up and the clouds lifted, we saw the majestic forms of Tonga Riro and the Para te tai tonga volcano within a few miles of us to the eastward. Furthest to the southward lay Tonga Riro itself, covered with snow. This is the mountain seen from Cook's Straits.- A low ridge joins the northern spur of Tonga Riro to j the southern- base of Para tetai Tonga, a mountain of equal height, bufr hidden by the former from the south coast. This latter is the mountain which Mr. Bidwill ascended in 1838, and calls Tonga " Dido." Tonga Riry, however, is a generic name sometimes used for the whole mass of mountains. Tof the north-east of the ' volcano two peaks, apparently extinct volcanoes, ! complete the gigantic mass. These are called Riiapehu and Puki Onaki, and are not above two-tlu'rds the height of either of the others. The whole distance from the summit of Puki Onaki to that of Tonga Riro may be about twenty miles. After eating half a widgeon and tw<fpotatoes each, for breakfast and dinner, we pushed on about twelve miles over a barren plain to the northern spur of Puki Onaki, on the highest part of which we rested to look about us. We had just passed close under the base of a small eztinct volcano, which rises from the western side of the mountain mass to the height of' 1,400 or 1,500 feet, and crossed the Wakapapa, a large tributary 'of the Wanganui. This stream takes its rise from a small lake, situated to the westward of the lowest part of the ridge which unites Tonga Riro to Para te tai tor-grf. The lake is in theimiddle of a large circular basin of rocks, five or six miles in diameter, which is stated by the natives to have once been the site of Mount Egmont. On quarreling with his friend Tonga Rare about the affections of a small volcanic mountain in the neighbourhood, which is stated to be a lady mountain of most fascinating appearance, old Taranaki is said to he... torn up his rocky foundations from this basin and left the ragged and splintered edges to it, which are pointed out as proofs- of the fact. He then clove a path through mountain and wood to the sea-coast, and the Wanganui sprang up in his old site, and followed his footsteps to the sea. So runs th« native legend, and the basin is called to this day Rua Taranaki, or Taranaki's dyke. 'It most likely refers to some tremendous eruptions of nature which have doubtless torn these islands at no very« distant date. On the northeastern- ride of the spur, we crossed the Wanganui itself, where it just trickles between the stones which form its bed, and is not above a yard wide. It rises from the N.W. side of Puki Onaki, and, after being swollen by the Wakapapa and Tawai, flowß far towards the W.S.W. From the highest part of our path, *we could trace the broken country formed by its valley far many miles almost directly towards Mount Egmont.- The whole country to the W. and S.W. ieems criesea of wooded mountain.

[To be contmutd.']