A WAIKATO ROAD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18885, 6 December 1924, Page 1 (Supplement)

A WAIKATO ROAD.

JOY OF THE MORNING.

BY ELSIE K. MORTON".

J "It is good to be out on the road, and 1 going one knows not where," sings John • Masefield. He would have sung it still more joyously had he been gliding down J the smooth road from Hamilton to Camf bridge in the sweet freshness and glory of t a recent sunny morning. There is no time f in all the day like the hour of sunrise— or an hour or two thereafter— an un- _ hurried motor run down a good road , through the open country. The broad . fields of the sky, clean-swept of night's 3 glittering star-dust, hold azure depths ] that pale in tho burning flood of noontide sunshine ; the air is filled with goodly L odours of sweet growing things, of grass f and clover, briar roses diamonded with 5 dew, and the warm brown scent of the . fire in a fallen pine log that has , smouldered all night. . So that there was no real hardship in that early rising, nor 3 in the six o'clock start for the . forty-mile ' run that was to take , us from Frankton Junction to Arapuni i ... Down through the wide, straight ] streets of prosperous Hamilton, across the river bridge, with the Waikato gleaming I in smooth green reaches beneath the wil- , lows, and out into open country. The . long road stretched straight ahead for , miles, bounded by the grassy plains of the ; Waikato. The morning'breeze sang in _ our ears as the car sped smoothly along j between wonderful hawthorn hedges. . Blossom-time was over, but the great t boughs sweeping down to the grass, bear- ] ing still a few sprays of pink and white . bloom, must have been burthened with a rare load of loveliness a few weeks since, f The lilting cadence of a skylark's f song filled the morning with golden t melody; high up into the blue r plains of the sky it winged, a dark speck against the little white clouds . . . higher, ; higher . . . then silence, and a swift, 3 straight drop, like a stone flung from the stars. ... A blackbird piped his piercing--3 sweet song from the top-most twig of a ] hawthorn bush, and a row of starlings , sat on the telegraph wire and held a bird's J parliament, as noisy and quarrelsome, it c seemed, as those where humans do the 1 talking. 1 Fifteen Miles of Fields. On and on, down the long, straight road., longer and straighter and smoother » than any road north of this wonderful Waikato. Not a scrub-covered hill in , sight, not a single patch of gorse, nor one , tiny blackberry field! Nothing but level ; fields, with fat cattle standing in rich , pastures, nothing but the long lines of hawthorn hedges drawing together in distant perspective —and trees. Such trees! AH Aucklanders should go down to the Waikato in spring or early summer just to see the trees! Here the early pioneers have shown an appreciation of the stately beauty of trees that the men of the North most shockingly lacked. "Hack it down! Burn it!" was surely the battle-cry 'of those who settled the northern districts, so that one may now look across wide areas of level lands and hills and valleys where not one tall tree raises its proud head skyward. No such vandalism has marred the plains of the Waikato. Where the early settlers cut, they planted again, with the result that this is now one of the loveliest country-side districts to be seen in all New Zealand. It breathes the spirit of rural England, rather than of a land where settlement only goes back the brief span of little more than half a century. Noble oaks and poplars and chestnuts grow by- the ws.yside and in the fields, giving shelter to the animals, .girding with beauty the whole fair countryside. Here and there, standing out boldly in the middle of a field, a magnificent cabbage tree in full flower gives a characteristic and picturesque touch to tho landscape, reminding the wayfarer that, this is not England, but just a little bit of the Old World transplanted in a new, strange land, to remind the exiles of that fairest of all gardens that is forever Home. . , . I Company by the Roadside. 1 There was plenty of company by the roadside in addition to the brave companionship of trees and flowers. A little brown bird with a fine crest on his sleek head minced along just in front of the car . . . there was a whirr-r, and s, lightning scamper of tiny feet as a brood of young quail sought the shelter of the tall grass. "Mac-Whirter, Mac-Whir-ter!" came the shrill cry, with a note of urgent warning in it to all the other' little MacWhirters who might bo beetling by the roadside. And the rabbits! Only once before, when motoring through Central Otago, had such a vision of rabbits been vouchsafed my wondering eyes. The road seemed to ho alive with them! They rushed out like mad things six inches in front of the car, they zig-zagged to and fro at the roadside, they frisked like kittens down the vista of the road ahead. Grey rabbits, dappled rabbits, piebald rabbits, brown rabbits, and once or twice a black rabbit, all small things hardly yet out of baby-bunny hood . . . And here and there lay a little crumpled heap of fur on'the roadside, mute testimony to the fid; that a reckless bunny had lately failed to obey that potent warning "Stop! Look! Listen!" But we ran no rabbits down that lovely Sabbath morning. They gave us a wide berth, leaping most comically through the high dew-drenched grass, in cat-like distaste of getting their paws wet. ; Presently other signs of life began to '. appear. They were figures moving about i the pretty homesteads set amid gardens i in the fields; a cart came rattling down ' a- side-road and we were greeted with ' a curious stare from a young farmer tali- i ing his cream to the factory. They must .' work very hard on these Waikato farms! < A turn in the road, and there was 1 Romance, young and golden— a. bareheaded, sun-browned lad standing by his horse, and at his side, smiling up at him, a girl. Her bicycle was propped against • the hedge. They hardly glanced at us j as we slid quietly by . . . Over how many miles had young love drawn them to the ' rendezvous that sweet, bright morning ( . . .or was it merely chance? Or ! perhaps sumo prosaic matter connected with cows or cream cans had winged j their feet? . . . The morning breeze, the • dancing sunbeams and tho blackbird J trilling in the hedge all vowed it was • Romance. ... ' ' By the Lakeside. At .seven o'clock wo stopped the car < and strolled through Cambridge Domain, t the shadows of splendid exotic trees lay t dark on the smooth lawns a littlo track t curved the edge of a steep bank massed c with ferns and foliage and far below, I gleaming like a shield of silver, was the £ lake. In one of the quiet reaches that I pointed a glittering finger far in among i the reeds and ferns, the ducks were having a morning dip, each one leaving a c widening trail of silver across the surface a of the placid waters. . . . The air was c heavy with the rich scent of honey- r suckle wet with dew, and the exotic a fragrance of a magnolia blooming in some c: sequestered lake-side arbour. I On again, down a road lined with mag- a nificent chestnuts and plane trees, then V. presently into typical New Zealand I) country. Tile level fields gave place to s '' li-d,,,. white with tea-tree in full p bloom, with patches of broom ablaze in the o sunshine. ... A swift run down a rugged hillside road, and there was the Waikato t beneath us, its shining waters white- v swirled with rapids. Up past the Tirau -' turn-off, through a wide stretch of scrub I country, ami so to Horahora, and the .■ first glimpse, of the harnessing of a groat f< river that has already played so important a a part in the development of the prosper- e ous and beautiful district of the Waikato. t-