THE PASSING FOREST.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20508, 8 March 1930, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE PASSING FOREST.

RAPTURE AND REGRET.

BY HILDA KEANE.

Women do not, or pretend they do not, like that ever-recurring ritual at the kitchen sink—washing up. The pile of dishes to bo subdued, the orderly arranging of silver, the heaps of knives, large and small, tiers of saucers, nests of cups! Steaming water, frothing while over the soap tin, the—but you know the sequence only too well. I have no great grudge against all this, because for years I havo seen above the bowl of water, above tho china and tho,draining board, other things! I have watched tall rewarewa trees grow crimson with flowery goblets; havo seen tho greens deepen in the cushioned puriri; have traced the changes in the elfin horoekas. Each spring has brought a lily crown to tho hinau below me; and all the months round I havo rejoiced in the swaying manuka trees—those tall, slender ■ trunks, alert to every whiff of wind, those feathery shaken tops, whose smallest tips aro pencilled against the sky. And beyond, I havo dreamed about the spires of kauri —high, blue steeples in their new growth, grotesque old giants in their battered age—until the forest has becomo a soft azure haze, melting into the far horizon. Full compensation all this for tho washing of crocks, tho beating of - refractory eggs, the slicing of unnumbered beans, aud all the other chores which go to make, aud to follow, successful breakfasts and lunches and dinners. But I suffer a slight reverse. The New Settler. A new settler is arriving. Ho has paid his deposit, signed his deeds, entered into possession of his land. How do I know ? For as many days as a week holds the sounds of his, or his hireling's, axe have filled the hours; and now there is a patch of light sepia where once manuka fell into golden high lights and deep mossy shadows. A cleai iii£j. The trunks of rauriki, that white tea-tree of tho old bushmen, wear an ashamed appearance as though disliking tho bare, hard light that grins at their modesty. One old fellow, in ancient struggles to heaven, described a semicircle; he does not like our seeing his deformity; his failure to run straight up like his neighbour is exposed to the world. Very soon, on that scored square in the bush, a neat dwelling will arise—a house with white walls and roof, red, or blue, or green. It will look not amiss among the foliage, and its inhabitants will say: " Come and look at our view! What do you think of our bush?" When I am officiating at my sink I shall see this home; its site is in a straight line with the tap. My abstract dreams of trying to determine the exact tints of tho kauris will become imaginary conversations, carried on behind those windows, or on that verandah. My mind will inevitably consider people, not things. Thoso who live in tho bush havo no quarrel with new settlers; indeed every new-comer makes nearer the day when a shiny grocer's van will deliver unnecessary packages; when tho postman's whistle will impel one to run to the gate; when tho hooting of the half-hourly bus will lure tho most determined recluse into the Queen Street sales. But we cannot hc-lp wishing that the man with the axe showed a nicer discrimination with regard to trees. Those who one day will know better may bo heard saying: "Chop it down! It's only a tea-tree!" The Graceful Manuka. I hold no particular brief for the ordinary kahikatoa, which converts a forestshorn hillside into one sombre olive hue. Its. flowers, on near approach, aro delightful, but one can havo too much of a delight. Properly tamed, it will become a treasured garden shrub; but in tho weed stage—a weed being defined as .a plant growing too luxuriantly where it is not wanted —one loses respect for it. But there is another manuka which calls for protection. This is the graceful rauriki, with its crown of feathery foliage, snowwhite in the early summer, and a magnet for all the bees. The sweet scent of its small white blossom fills the air; full of necttir, its sprays in every little breeze wave like long white fingers. More than anything else, these resemble trees which Turner painted as overhanging Mediterranean bays; they havo the samo brush-like top, the same slinjShigh trunks. In any garden they would be decoration; along the road they are essentially characteristic of our landscape. There are a few fine specimens of them in the Auckland Domain, pathetically bound by iron hoops, in tho attempt at preservation. Yet, because they make good firewood, tbev ore mercilessly felled wherever new settlement spreads. A Nurse for Eegrowth. When a forest is destroyed Nature sets straight, to work to regenerate. Bracken fern, all green and golden; then millions of tiny manukas prick through the hard soil. Undisturbed, seedlings of all the forest trees, sheltered by the tea-tree, come cautiously through. Soon, over tho heads of the scrub, ake-ake and olearia appear, then tho taller stems of «rimu, rewarewa and the like. Clumps of rauriki soon swing to the breeze; and in not so many years, lo! here is the forest again. On these western hills, older residents, with many years yet to live, have seen the bush burnt and reburnt; and they know how easily native forest regenerates itself. But' not if the new settler says, " Bother tho bracken! Burn it! Get a man to fell that tea-tree scrub! Chop down those manuka trees!" For these arc the nurses of the greater forest life. No one need despair of having forest, except, where imported weeds like privet and tobacco are allowed lo possess the land. Many a long year will pass before man conquers tho tea-tree scrub; and it requires only ten years or so of abandonment to see tho fine city of Auckland claimed once again by its real trees. Meantime every new hill-dweller will do well to spare tho rauriki. He will revel in lis golden lights at morn; marvel at its later lilacs and pinks. He will love the sound of nuzzling bees about its bloom, and his eyes mako search for the liny rain-bird trilling in its high top. On winter days ho will watch its wild swaying, and hear the crack and thud of its broken branchlets. Above his house the tiny leaves will float, and the hard seed pods crack in (he hot suns of summer. Full of interest always, not, resenting houses, a friendly, intimate tree, perhaps tho most welcoming of all our native forest. Easily made part of the scheme when /.he garden is planned, and with little effort—which means letting it. alone —the forerunner of pleasant bowers and shady, tortuous walks. So, Woodman, when impelled, from sheer energy, to use your axe, spare the white manuka, tho rauriki of old Maori times.