NO REGRETS.

Thames Star, Volume LXII, Issue 17319, 6 January 1928, Page 5

NO REGRETS.

SAYS AN IMMIGRANT.

iAT COMING TO N.Z.

ARTICLE IN ''SPECTATOR."

One immigrant who has no regrets about his' pilgrimage from England'to New Zealand, records his impressions of/the land of his adoption in an article ... in the Spectator. He writes as follows: ■

It was nearly dusk- when we landed at Wellington. It was Sunday, too, and a strange city is still more strange if you do not know its Sabbath customs. A desire for real shoregoing food was uppex*most in my mind. This seemed to be general, for as we went from restaurant to eating-house —and sometimes back again—we met almost entire company similarly occupied.

On Monday we dispersed to our. various destinations. My particular train went southward discharging on to the tiny 'back-country platforms, here . a weeping, domestic, there stolid north country ploughman, and perhaps a somewhat forlorn schoolboy. Perhaps we saw them hoist their bundles into a farmer's gig before the night swallowed them up. Friends of but six weeks' acquaintance, biit bound by the curious intimacies of a sea voyage, and by our common hopes for the' future in this new land.

• My own destination was Christchurch. The Y.M.C.A. opened its hospitable doors' to me, and directed me to reliable lodgings, where a motherly person gave me a taste of real Colonial kindness. I. had decided on a short stay in the city to refresh myself and my small wardrobe, and hoped to find casual work to harden" me up after the comparative of the voyage. I scanned the advertisement column of the daily papers as soon as they appeared, and would be off after a "tomato picker" or odd job man wanted, as fas as my legs could carry me. But always someone with longer legs was there first. I applied at employment bureaux; but temporary jobs for unskilled men there were none. If ; I didn't get fit working I had plenty of exercise looking for work. The money brought from England to last me until I found a job began to run low; and, pleasant as it was to walk about in that most English and pleasant city, I realised that it was time to carry out my original intention, which was to tire to the back country and seek my fortune • there. . ..W ' Headed South. v One perfect morning. I took;tht train southward, north or it/was all the one to me, but the south looked more exciting on the map/so south I went. At a little town- on the coast I met a man who said: "You try the Mackenzie Country, they always want men there. It's such a cold, wild spot no one will stay in it." So to the Mackenzie Country I repaired; An inn on the shores of the loveliest lake gave me a night's lodging. .But. the next day l must find quarters elsewhere, for it was Easter time and there would be no room. I had heard much of colonial back-country hospitality, but, accustomed to English ways, it is not easy to intrude, oneself to the-extent of practically demanding food and lodging from complete strangers. However, there seemed no alternative.

. I had left the Canterbury Plains sweltering in heat. I came to the Mackenzie in a snowstOTm and remembered the words of my; friend on the coast. But the sunset that was clear; and the next:"day, Good Friday, as bright and sparkling as a winter's day in the Swiss Alpa, 1 chose at random a sheep station some 18 miles away and set off with a very light heart. The heat of the sun soon cleared the snow from the plainsmiles and miles of rolling plains', not a tree to be seen. Only the brown tussock' grass and—most welcome sight to sea and pavement-weary eyes— a great circle of glorious snowy mountains. Leaving the. lake and valley, where I had lodged that, night, I followed a rough road that led over slowrising ridges until an even more enchanting valley lay before me. : There was a wide river bed down which the Tasman took itswarious channels. Beyond this the mountains rose steeply to 7000 ft. or 8000 ft. Southward the river 'melted into a great blue lake. But it was the view up the valley that left, me breathless. There were the monarchs of the New Zealand Alps, Sefton, Tasman, La'Perouse and, above them all, mighty Aorangi. But this is in danger of becoming a description.of scenery, whereas it is intended to be an account of an emigrant's progress. A Station by the River.

Towards evening I found Braemar Station, delightfully set / among trees a little above the river, and, inwardly trembling, announced, that I was looking for work—and could I have a bed of any kind for the night. Almost before I knew what had happened I was provided with soft shoes and a racket and playing tennis as though I had lived there all my life. The low white bungalow was that perfect colonial homestead I had read and dreamed of. Its inhabitants seemed to have no other thought than to make a stranger comfortable .and at home. Six tea found me recovering from a kind of stupor. Thereafter billiards, and so blissfully..to bed. The most amazing happening of that Good Friday was reserved for, late in the evening when the owner of a neighbouring station came in and tnere and then took me on as a "rouseabout."

The two miles' walk next day proved to be the end of my pilgrimage, [n default of other lodging an ancient hut in the garden was allotted to me, my place laid at the family table, ,-nd. I had found my fortune on the oanks of the Tasman River, between the mountains and the lake. To one who, though no countryman, had been- accustomed to the various calls of life in the navy, most of the ordinary farm and sheep-work did not present insuperable difficulties.' .The care and maintenance of a tearn bf draught horses devolved first upon me. Certainly their standing and running

(Continued oh. next column.)

rigging was' a little hard to master— j but then I was not brought up in sail. The second day found me harrowing ; with two horses. Within ai week I was : promoted to the "grubber" and a team j of four. This was the job for me, for 1 I would .sit on the seat and smoke my ' j pipe like' any skipper on his own bridge. ■.-,..•; '• ■, , , ,-. \ ',,! Autumn turned to sunny, frost-bound j winter, and now the boss' activity in ■; turning up his ploughs and other implements is a sure sjign that spring is ' at hand and real work toward. Perhaps I was born under' a lucky , star. I may have been. 'But lam quite convinced that anyone who comes here, with health and strength and as few preconceived ideas, as possible, will find, as I have found, endless 1 satis- - faction with his personal and material \ surroundings, and 1 unlimited'oppnrtuiii- J ties for work and advancement. : -Si