THE MAIN NORTH ROAD.

Southland Times, Volume I, Issue 13, 23 December 1862, Page 2

THE MAIN NORTH ROAD.

Brain North Ivoad will ultimately be continued on the line of Dee-street to the Mukarewa river, which may there be bridged xcry easily. Hut, us the road to Wallacetown Mas already made when the project of opening up the communication with the upper district by the Oreiti Valley, was first undertaken by the Government, and as beyond the Makarewa also. the line by Wallacetown was much the easiest, to make, common prudence suggested that where expedition and cheapness were the greatest objpet sought, the ready made road should be adopted rather than one more direct, (though it will only shorten the distance by twomilesj, but laborious and costly to construct. At the outset the traveller meets wha*. we fear, many must have found a very serious difficulty, for the road through the Waikivi bush has long been impassible to any but well colonized nags, whose struggles through its adhesive clay painfully recall to the mind of the rider the image of a fly in a pot of treacle.

Experience proves that in this province heavy red pine found on clay soil, is the most difficult and expensive obstacle to roadmaking. The accumulation of peat iound the roots of these trees, thus added to the interception of the sun and winds by the high trees, makes such a road utterly unsound, unless it is excavated to the very bottom, or a dtep embankment carried over it. This is now being done over a portion of the road, but it must be carried much farther, and a very substantial coat of metal put upon it, before it can make at all a good road. From the bush to Wallacetown, the subsoil on -which the road is funned is sound enough, but it is clear that without metal it •will soon be spoilt.

On this road, about live miles from town.on emerging from a small belt of bush on a hill-top, a view opens which is so strikingly beautiful, that it ought to be more known and appreciated, especially as so little of the picturesque is to be seen immediately round Invercargill, that many are indolently disposed to conclude that it does not exist in the province.

The ford over the Makerawa, across which the road now passes, is almost always safe, but alife waslost inattemptingitiinprudently last winter ; there is, however, a boat and ferryman, and very soon the bridge will be completed.

The Wallacetown plain is too well known to ne.^tl remark. At the end of it is the beautiful Hunt! red of the Messrs. Grieves, at Branxholm, a specimen of what may be done by judicious farming; a deep and treacherous creek used to be a serious obstacle here, but there is now an excellent bridge over it. and cauesway over the fiat. North of JJrauxholm the country is not so sound <md clrv as the Wallacetown plain, and the lVa.'l will soon require metalling, but at present it is e\' ; elleiif : a few sluggish water courses which Ci'os." it. and in which drays have heretofore bten bog-el, have so completely disappeared uncicr The drainage to which they have been subjecCiid, that a thoughtless woman criticised tho ccM'?rt antl causeway a.< a waste of money in such dry places.

The Oreti river Hows at aujut a nyile distance, and its bar and spits will fL'rnL-') 1 abundance of clean shingle when, the commerce requires, and the funds will allow, the road to be gravelled throughout.

At the north boundary of the New Hi .-or II vi id ml, about 14 miles from town, the horse track, commonly known as M 'Cleans, diverges from the roarl, the contractors for bridges over two considerable streams being behind hand with their work. These bridges ought, at all events, to be finished in a fortnight, and. as the cutting through the win ton Bush is finished, the t runic can then go by the road, which is two miles shorter than M' Loan's track, and on much sounder ground, the vYiiiton Plains, on both sides of the considerable stream of that name, i) C ino- all gravelly at a very small depth below the surface. At the south side of the Wintort binh, the village of V/inton is being laid off. \s it is about nineteen miles from town, it will affjrrt a very convenient stage; the situation is delightful, being sh.-ltoml in>m the west by the finest, and a road from the very line open limestone country north of Forest Hill continued up from the Mataura road through the Mabel district, will join the North road near this point. North of the Winton Bu«h the road passes over a must beautiful plain for five or si's miles, having a continuous belt of forest on the right, at a distance varying from a quarter of a Hire to half a mile. "and on the left at two or thnv miles distance the Oreiti Ki\cr, in iiV'S'"' 7-eie bends of which there are pretty large cli 7. 0 f Kowai scrub. In the forest on 'the rig.. re seen several small eminences; these arc all composed of excellent limestone, and one of them, which is very near to the road, has iust been let for lime-burning pur-

poses. This limestone formation is, in f-^t. continuous from TnrrFt Hill t<> the hills abutling on the Oiciti on Mr. M'l>an's run, though \n places it is so low a? only t > show ;i few small conical peaks above the plum - the two extremities rising to an elevation of several hundred feet. The north road crossed ne;u- the northern one. and runs then along its riaces, which constitute the only hill- on the road from Invereargiil to the Wakatip Lake ; they are not steep, nor very high, and to scale them is certainly much better than to cross the Oreiti and back again, which would otherwise be necessary. A few small swamps at the foot of the limestone range?, about four miles south of Mr. M-Lean's homo station, have not yet been touched; nor has the cutting through a narrow belt of bush, in the north side of the range, been commenced; but horsemen and wool drays can Set up the open ridge from the Orcti and join the road on the top of the range, and as soon as the bridges before referred to are finished, this will he the best way for travellers. Frnn the back part of M'Lean's run, drays can cither cross the Oreiti at a passable ford, and proceed upon the west side by a most superior natural road on the Dipton plain, or they can go on by a vcrj' fair road to a much better ford just abieastof the Dipton Bush, to which crossing they take ; they will have no further diifieulty to encounter all the way to the eastern end of the Dome Pass. The present road by Barnhill's, and round by "Wentworih's, is very circuitous, but a shorter and better line is just about to be opened by t'io road party now employed on the terraces on the cast side of the Oreti, which joins the road up the Waimea Valley with the North Rond on Mr. Wentworth's run.

Cn the whole, this road is one of the very best for such a distance in the colon;- ; the works now nearly completed will well suffice for this voars' wool, and for present wants, and if the Wakatip commerce should appear likely greatly to increase, the materials for further improving and for metalling the road lie so near at hand, that as soon as the funds are provided, it can be made equal to any demand. The natural facilities are so great, that it is impossible to ride over this line without asking oneself— How soon will this become the line for a railway ?

Those of our townsfolk who may feel desirous of undergoing- the torture of "toothdrawing'' will be gratified by learning that a dentist of very considerable experience has temporarily taken up his residence in Invcrcargill. From the short stay which he purposes making, the opinion he has formed of our "grinders" must be flattering to their owners, but not satisfactory to the operator in a pecuniary point of view.

A letter from Lake Wakatip, dated Dec. 18th, gives very flattering accounts of the new field. The -writer says : — " I have seen as much as 91bs. in one man's possession, the proceeds of one day's work." lie further on states that "flour is 2s. per Ib. ; tea, 7s. ; mutton, Is. 3d. Picks are sold at 20s. each. There are a good supply of boats on the river (Lake?) . . . The route by the east side of the L^ke, via the 'Devil's Staircase,' is not so bad as represented, I have made the passage overland in one day. The gold is patchy. There is an abundant supply of provisions here at present."

We have to thank a gentleman, -who resides not a hundred miles from town, for a splendid sample, or more correctly speaking, a good sized basket-full of strawberries, -which were left at our office n clay or two since. We are also promised "cherries," and, -whether they come or not, can say with Eugene Aram, that we are " equal to cither fortune." "We have no wish to make much cf the changeable climate of Southland, but a fewmore " sops to Cerberus" like these will effectually stop our grumbling. Can any of our readers tell us the meaning of the following nonsense from the Lyttcllon Times t — Anotjieb Cukious Fact tok JN t atukai.ists. — As the miners were going to their work ut midnight on Thursday last tliev were astonished to find a monstrous fish near the" face of the Lyttelton end of the tunnel, which seemed to be an enormous shark about eight feet long. They nt once attacked the monster with their picks and boring tools, but without success, ns from the position it occupied there was no possibility of getting a fair blow without encountering certain death from its fearful jaws. After some time one of (lie men contrived to get along the roof of the tunnel, nnd succeeded iv boring a hole in the creature's head, in which he rammed a charge of powder, and having applied a fuse speedily settled the difficulty. It is still a matter of extreme surprise how this monster of the deep found his way into the tunnel. The Provincial Kngineer, who happened to he un the spot, is of opinion that there must be a subterraneous communication with the 'West Coast, an 1 feels sanguine that before long he will be aide to turn this discovery to such aeecuut that Lyttelton will be supplied iv less than a year with coal direct from the Grey Kiver. If this should prove to be the case, the future of the port, is assured, and Lyttelton must become tho central coaling depot for all the mnil steamers. A l'vet lms since been discovered which bears out. the inference that there is a passage from the West Coast. In the belly of the shark were found some surveying instruments belonging to Mr Rocbfort, known to lui\"* been lost while taking soundings nt the mouth C? 'he Grey. We have since heard some details which gi^c "further interest: to this curious story. The skHeton of tho shark has been forwarded to the j/hilo'opliieal Institute. On examiniition it turns out to belong to a hitherto unknown species. We belu/ve the learned chairman entertains the idea, owing v. 1 t tic peculi.-ir formation of the lower fins— the boi.es 'if which are like those of fingers and toes— thai it uiiy prove to be a specimen of the long-talked of • r -nnd Shark' (saurian pemis/ . Further li^ht will n° doubt be thrown on this interesting discovery before long."

The first animal examination, of the Invcrcargill Grammar School came off yesterday atjl2 o'clock noon, a goodly number of parents, and those interested in education, being

present. The principal subjects taught were introduced by the teacher, he calling upon Mr. Tarlton, inspector of schools, to elicit the amount of knowledge possessed. The pupils and he were perfectly satisfied with each other on all subjects excepting arithmetic, they imagining his desire was more to puzzle than to ascertain their strength. Vpon the whole, however, the efforts of both teacher and pupils were highly satisfactory. There was a large prize-list, but owing to the books not being forwarded from Melbourne in time, tlie awarding of them was necessarily postponed till New-years eve.