COLONIAL SKETCHES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2086, 15 February 1894, Page 45

COLONIAL SKETCHES.

HOLIDAY LIFE AT THE HANMER PLAINS. I.

" Now I saw in my dream that when the pilgrims had passed through that goodly city called the City of the Plains, they journeyed for the space of a day, and came unto a broad valley very fair and pleasant to look upon, and in it were many streams and a garden of flowers. So they went on till they came to an inn. Now this ion was at the foot of a pass called Jollie, and it was kept by one Idle."

Does this not sound inviting to wornout teachers and professionals and nervous mothers ? What names could more agreeably suggest a summer holiday ? There is exactly what we want — a castle of cheerful idleness. If you have been unfortunate enough to have stayed before in a New Zealand country hotel, pray get rid at once cf all the unpleasant associations. This is not a large bare staring place, with a perpetual smell of liquor, with cheap tawdry decorations, a disgusting superabundance of worse food, and with nightly brawling of drunken tramps. In appearance and habits it is like a country house or homestead, where host and hostess are absent and the guests amuse themselves. The theatre, or, to speak still more classically, the forum or agora — or, putting it in plain English, the common meeting place of guests — is the pleasant sitting room whose French windows open on to the long verandah with its climbing roses. The outlook is on to a smooth slope of green, a spreading willow, a tennis lawn, and a bright patch of flowers. On one side tall willows and orchard trees almost hide a low manuka-covered ridge. On the other is the yard, open to the road and the hilly pass. There is a good deal of "local colour" about that yard. There are all the sheds — the cowshed near the paddock, where in the twilight the calves stand calling for their "milky mothers"; the stables, the men's sheds — all of corrugated iron, dazzlingly bright in this hot weather. Ot corrugated iron, too, i 3 the " etore " (also in the yard), a sort of Noah's Ark kept by the barman in the intervals of his heavier duties. Here we can buy all sorts of miscellaneous articles — from rabbitskins to second-hand boots — except of course anything that we may happen to want. Here is the pigeon lofr, with its pretty fluttering inhabitants, above the shed, where the sheep dogs are frisking and barking. :

There i 3 the old hotel, where the bar is still kept—the resort of tired and thirsty

rabbiters, musterers, and shearers, who come riding from the dry hills and the hot plain. Morning and evening there is yoking and harnessing and unharnessing going on in this ground. Here, when the morning coach leaves for Oulverden, we take leave of our few days' acquaintances with regrets and vows (which we will very likely forget in a few more days) ; here by the white garden gate we joyfully welcome old and new friends, when they arrive travel-worn in the evening. Here come buggies and riders from the stations round. Here in rainy weather the team was unyoked from the canvas-covared wool waggon, and the great draught horses gathered round their feast of oatß. Here staited the team of 14 horses up the steep pass away " far back." Here was the van of the " Cheap Jack," with its painted invitation to " Inquire within for everything." Yes, the yard of this inn deserves a casual glance.

If we had not any faculty for gazing time might occasionaliy pass too slowly. And yet it is wonderfully easy to do nothing. We come downstairs just in time for breakfast, or perhaps long enough before to stroll a few yards down the road, and watch the high hills purple with the morning depih of colour and the grass tracks wet with dew. After breakfast comes the morning drive to the springs, through manuka and flax and tussocks, and over the pebbled bed of a clear and shallow stream. The air is pure and fresh, with a suggestion rather than tcent of those flax stems and heathery manuka blossoms. Ie is all very quiet ; little life to be seen. A cottage perched on the river bank, a white tent among the bushes, an overturned house reminiscent of the earthquake, the baths, the little brown church, and in the distance a homestead among fir and willow trees — that is all. Little even of animal life : a rabbit scampers out of its burrow, a hawk swoops down over the young lambs, sheep wander everywhere, and the little grey sandlarks fly over the road. But at the springs there is comparative animation — people on horseback and in buggies and coaches. Here we dismount, bathe, and then lounge under the trees, on the verandah, or in the reading room. A few desperate convalescents stroll over the grass to one of the springs and drink the water. Then comes the drive back, followed by lunch, conversation in the sitting room or under the willow tree, afternoon tea, afternoon drive to the springs, a doze, novel reading or more talk, and then dinner. The evening is whiled away by a walk up the hill to watch the gorgeous sunset, a little Uiusic, caid*>, chess, or, among the gentlemen, a game of billiards. The monotony of such days is relieved by

a stroll among the manuka scrub, or through the oat field to the little creek, or by a diive to some station near. A characteristic New Zea'and concert was given one evening on the wide verandah of the homestead at St. Helens, shearers assisting the performers, who drove over from Idles. Then there is sheep-shearing to be seen. The shed is busy with the clipping, sorting, classirg, and pressing of wool, and the weigMrg and marking of bales. Even here in North Canterbury the unseasonable rains have kept the shearing about till the end of January. We arrived in time to Bee the shearers having " a spell," drinking hot sweet tea out of pannikins, and eating a sort of currant loaf borne sloft to them in a large black baking dish. A smoke or a song fills up the short interval, then the bell ring«, and all the shed is alive again. At Woodbank, where the hillsides are richly covered with rative birch, the men were still out mustering. Here we spent a pleasant day picnicking in true colonial fashion, while in the bueh a moko-mcko discoursed sweet music. During the three days' rain the lively members of our company provided entertainment in the form of dancep, singing, and a boisterous game of dumb crambo. So wo did not feel overwhelmingly dull. This sort of existence is very much like that on board ship. Duties, cares, and responsibilities — all are forgotten, and we " fleet the time carelessly as they did in the golden age."