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Otago Daily Times, Issue 15301, 15 November 1911, Page 20

Ever sinco its establishment Auckland, would sccin to have betrayed those samo characteristics which in theso days lead tho citizens of that city to regard the rest of Now Zealand as a suburb of tho northern town. As far back as 1862 the Otago Daily Times was having a facetious tilt at Auckland bombast, and on November 19 of that year published a leading article dealing with tho exaggerated statements which had emanated from tinio to iinic from that quarter with regard to goldficlds. A portion of the nrticle may be quoted as follows Auckland, ft sccrns, aspires, like Geclong, to have a dialect of its own. Our readers have probably mostly heard nf tho Geelongcso dialed, and perhaps the curious amongst them will fed an interest in tho new vernacular wliieh, for eonvcnienco sake, wo may call Aucklandesc. It is a curious mixture of several types—tho figurativeness of the Maori is combined with the fulaomwws of an Eastern language and both engrafted on tlto English idiom. . . _. We should tay that although incipient symptoms of tho language have for ft long while been visible, it was not until the dkcovcry of the goldficlds of Otago ar.d the continent intense desire of tho Aucklanders to have goldficlds of their own that they displayed any sign of virulence. Thus in connection with tho supposed goldficlds w'e liave its most stroiujly marked characteristics iimi for n first lesson wo cannot do better than run through the Aucklandcrs' goldfield vocabulary." ' As oarly as 1852 tho iden was mooted of using lor commercial purposes the ironsand found so abundantly in Taranaki. In that year leases were granted to Captain Morshcad, who had formed a company for working tho sand. This company was formed in England with a capital of £150,000, but as the promoter had kept ccrtain of the conditions of his lease a secret, it was afterwards ..wound up. Evor since that day tho samo idea has been in mnnv minds—to amass wealth by extracting the iron from' tho Taranaki sand, but so far no fortunes have come from this source.