400 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



Art. L. — Belies of the First Neio Zealand Press. 



By E. CouPLAND Harding. 



[Read before the Wellington Philosophical Society, 20th March, 1900.] 



Plate XXV. 



It is well known that the late Eev. W. Colenso was the 

 pioneer of the printing art in this colony. In his little book, 

 " Fifty Years Ago in New Zealand " (1888), he has described 

 the institution of the missionary press, the plant having 

 arrived at the Paihia Mission Station on the 30th December^ 

 1834, and having been landed in the early days of the New 

 Year. He gives a vivid account of the difficulties he under- 

 went through the want of technical knowledge on the part of 

 the under-secretaries of the Mission-house in London, who 

 were above taking counsel with their printer-elect, or, indeed, 

 any other practical man. The result was that many essen- 

 tial articles, including even printing-paper and printers' cases, 

 were omitted, and makeshifts had to be resorted to in the 

 colony, at great expense to the mission. There was not even 

 a composing-stick, " save," he says, " a private one of my own 

 that I had bought two years before in London — a most for- 

 tunate circumstance. . . . Fortunately, I found a handy 

 joiner in the Bay, who soon made me two or three pairs of 

 type-cases for the printing-office, after a plan of my own ; for, 

 as the Maori language contained only thirteen letters (half the 

 number in the English alphabet), I contrived my cases so as 

 to have both roman and italic characters in the one pair of 

 cases, not distributing the remaining thirteen letters (con- 

 sonants) used in the compositing of English, such not being 

 wanted." On page 30 he says, " On my coming to reside in 

 Hawke's Bay m 1844 I brought hither with me a small Albion 

 press and types, which I again found to be of great service ; 

 though, having a people scattered over a very large district to 

 attend to, with its consequent heavy travelling on foot, there 

 being then no roads, I could not use my little press so much 

 as I wished." 



In Mr. Colenso's will he bequeathed to me his little press 

 and all the printing material in his possession, including 

 "type, old and new," and, specially, "my sole composing- 

 stick, with which I did so much work both in England and 

 New Zealand." This material is still stored in Napier. On 

 my visit there this New Year I went over it, ai^d found that 

 certain portions had foruied part of the first printing plant, set 

 up in 1835. 



