A VIRILE PEOPLE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18342, 7 March 1923, Page 5 (Supplement)

A VIRILE PEOPLE.

HARDY AND SELF-RELIANT. CODE OF THE BUSH COUNTRY. A TASK JUST BEGUN. The better one becomes acquainted with the virile people of the King Country, the more one appreciates their worth. It is a land of the robust virtues which go to th e building of great nations and great empires. The hardy pioneers of the early have left their stamp upon the people. The high standards they set aro to-day the standards of the bush farms, the sawmill settlements, and the wide open spaces below the mountains. The pioneers tell of their brave days when men and women were bound by bonds of common hardship and common sacrifice. The younger generation tells of the sterling qualities exhibited in times of calamity— times when bush fires rage and epidemics reach out their hideous hands to the lonely places far from skilled aid. The bushman then rises to the heights of his manhood, the woman of the milling camp becomes a Florence Nightingale. One has sometimes to go to the outback country to learn afresh the real lessons of life. The people are not by means perfect, but the charges now so commonly levelled against the city dwellerscharges of shallowness and frivolity— do nox hero apply. These fine folk have no chance of cultivating the fruits of idleness, not do they learn the arts of killing boredom. Th« hard realities of their lives., and ' perhaps the inspiring influence of the great mountain to which they li'/t their eyes, safeguard their sense of proportion and correct their perspective. There are no studied shams about your typical King Country man. He meets you as man to man. He jpurneys awhile with you, but never inquires your business, and he seta out on a 30-mile ride to Heaven knows where with the nonchalance of one who is going round the block. As becomes a sturdy, self-reliant people, the King Country is not a land of verbosity. There is a sparing of words, and a good deal is left unsaid. But gather a body of men together for amusement, and they are filled with clamorous good humour. An audience does not study the art of restraining self-expression. The writer went to a boxing tournament, 'to which young men and old, and not a few women, had rolled in from all directions, and though local rivalries were most evident, there was a refreshing lack of the spirit that spoils sport. The contestants in the ring for the most part grinned the more as the knocks became harder, and they certainly do not "shadow spar" in the King Country. Rival parties urged their champions on, but there were no heartburnings when they "took the count." , - Visit almost any homestead and if you make, inquiries you will hear a story of full-blooded courage. There stands the old whare, built of timber "packed in" 6ft. or Bft. lengths, up. gorges and along spurs, years before the road Was made. So was transported the fencing, wire and every piece of material used on the farm, with the exception of posts and rails. Here came the great , fire, which , swept through miles of log country, destroying everything in its fierce career. Down by the yards is the sheep dip, in which * brave woman • with her babies crouched choking in the heat and smoke while her home,. was devoured by. the flames and the work of years blotted" out. The tall grass in the hollow of the hills is where 5£X) sheep were destroyed, and under that hanging cliff is the place where. a courageous man found a place of safety foi his horse and dogs. It has all been part of the price of •-settlement. It all stands for. the white man's burden. "We've now got our road," they say, but what a road. Cut out along the sides of the ridges, it winds and winds like a giant snake up and up and down and down. Its ."hairpin' ' bends have to be experienced to be understood, and the nervous do well sot to look down on the tree tops of the gorge. It is big country, and the task has just been begun. But the right people are there t to make it.