LORD NORTHCLIFFE’S DIARY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18898, 26 June 1923, Page 8

LORD NORTHCLIFFE’S DIARY

STORY OF THE WORLD TOUR. ATTRACTIONS OF ROTORUA, IFeom Oue Own Cokbesfohdent.) LONDON, May 18. Although only two not very long chapters are devoted to New Zealand in the Northcliffe Diary, it is certain that the dominion will receive one of its greatest advertisements through the publication of this volume. All the reviewers have quoted extensively from these chapters. The Publisher’s Circular devotes almost a column to the late Lord Northcliffe’s experiences in Rotorua. However superficial the traveller's impressions of the rest of the dominion are, he has certainly done justice to the Thermal District of the North Island. “On the whole,” he writes, “I consider that Rotorua is the most interesting place for a holiday, other than London or Paris, that I know of. Within easy reach of this hotel there is the finest fishing in the world, and excellent deerstalking. There is a great opportunity hero for botanists and nature observers. There are deer, rabbits, duck, teal in myriads, and wild swan. When I say that the local anglers measure their annual catch by the ton per man I am not exaggerating in the least.”

“I shall never forget that first motor drive in New Zealand,” wrote Lord Northcliffe. “The roads in this part of New Zealand are frankly infernal. I am told that in the South Island they are good. At the golf club there are no caddies. In fact, I hear that there are no caddies in New Zealand. No one is out of work. The courses are mostly flat inland golf courses, covered with sheep, and so rich is the soil in places that 80 sheep can feed on 100 acres. There is no accent here at Auckland; the people speak English, and in some parts broad Scotch is still spoken, , . When you look at a Canadian audience, it is difficult to say whether it is or is not American. \\hen you look at an Auckland audience th «Jf 18 n ? mistake about it. It is English.” Then, in a nice open-air pavilion, a» terriiTo tea was served. What butter! What cream! The table was decorated as tastefully as any I have seen with violets and all the spring flowers you will get next March, not forgetting the primroses. But too much to eat. : * • At Hamilton is the best golf course m New Zealand. The captain of the club, Mr Gillies, is a brother of Dr Gillies (known ns Giles in the golf and Garrick Club world), who is probably fishing in my little river in Hampshire at this very moment. “Before going to golf I visited the Government Farm, where they have an avenue of New Zealand trees planted by visitors. They asked me to plant a tree—the rarest they have, the cabbage tree (Cordylin australis). The farm was wonderful. . . , The milk was being brought in by young farmers. A sample for analysis is taken from each great can. The milk is then weighed by some Danish apparatus. It is' never touched by hands, for the cows are, in New Zealand, milked by machinery, almost entirely’. I saw as much milk and cream here as would have supplied a regiment. Many of these farmers are gentlemen by birth and often comparatively recent arrivals from Home. X have not met one who wants to eo back. 6 AT ROTORUA. ‘Rotorua, the uncanny home of the volcano, is one of the wonders of the world. . . Wasting no time, as usual, I took later in tho evening the Duchess Bath—a natural hot swimming bath of silica, and most delicious. . . . We then went to see the Maoris cooking their food in natural hot water. I won’t attempt to describe this Maori village situated among geysers, boiling rivers, and steaming holes. No one could describe it or photograph it. The Maori ladies have tho lower part of the face tattooed (by their husbands, I suppose) so that no one can say ’ha didn't know the lady was married. - Soma Maoris talk English beautifully with voices like gentle people. They boil their chickens and vegetables and scald their pigs in holes in the rook which they have railed off for the purpose. In one place I saw a boiling river flowing' into a cold river. In the cold river there are a number of fat rainbow trout. I presume that Nature teaches them to keep out of the hot part. “Rents are terrific. The rent of a tiny four-roomed wooden house is three to five pounds a week (not quarter or year). I think the people are easy-going, other than the farmers. I do not think that doing everything by Government is good. Anything more leisurely than the State-owned railway I cannot conceive. I read this morning that the railways are not paying, expenses. The trains stop a considerable time at stations—very pleasant for us who want to look about. There appear to be no very rich people and no poor people. The devotion to Mother England is fine. They love to be compared with England. But they are afraid of tho influence of American films.

“We know nothing about trout in England or Scotland or Ireland or, I should think, anywhere else. The rainbow trout going up the little rivers here (which form the big lake) on their way to spawn were in such quantities that as we went up in a boat wa literally forced our way through them. The rainbow is one of the quickest fish, but the throng was so dense in places that they could not get away from each other. It waa an inconceivably beautiful river, very like a winding Hampshire stream, -but with mimosa, palms, and all sorts of unfamiliar New Zealand trees on the banks. It waa evening, and an English blackbird was sitting up high in a mimosa tree singing his evening song. There is a- good deal of bird life here. Wild duck are in great numbers. I saw that watercress is becoming a curse in New Zealand. It grows in' dense masses and chokes the rivers. One stream rises from a deep and bright white spring with such force that you can put a penny into the water and it can't sink. Down this deep spring the big rainbow trout were enjoying themselves, swimming head downwards. It is no good trying to describe the thing—tlic beautiful evening light and shade, the birds, the trees, and wonderful cloud effects. LAND OF EQUALITY.

“ The more I study the volcanic eruptions here, the mud holes, and the geysers, the more weird I find them. It is like Niagara—it grows upon one. . . For a pound a year you can have deer stalking (five stags per gun), and for anotheV pound you can have fishing, better than any in the world, all over New Zealand. There are no game laws here; everybody shoots over everybody’s land, and, as for rabbit shooting, farmers pay you to come and shoot them. With regard to deer, they are getting so numerous that 2000 have had to be slaughtered in one district alone this year. No wonder these young people are very different from the peasants of Essex and Wiltshire. Their attitude is more like that of Scotch people (but with no respect for the laird). They are independent but polite. I am all the time trying to detect whether they are developing an accent. I find that some of them say ‘verce’ for ‘very,’ and ‘Sydnee’ for ‘Sydney.’ New Zealand is the land of British family mysteries. On occasion heirs to titles and fortunes have been unearthed here. But the New Zealanders certainly don’t like titles. I should think, first, because in. the mind of each of them is the desire for a Utopia—a land of equality, said, secondly, because they have had some very bad specimens of titled people here. Even now each town has its little coterie of wellborn remittance men—those who live upon doles from England."