Colenso. — On Waikaremoana District. 363 



pitous mountain, cast its bold outline in fine relief into the 

 sky. This, my Maori guide informed me, was Waikare, to 

 which place we were going. Time, however, would not 

 permit a lengthened gaze, so, descending the hill, I proceeded 

 on. At Hopekoko, a small stream (where we rested a while to 

 dine on roasted potatoes), the bed at the ford was one flat 

 block of sandstone. Having feasted with most hearty zest on 

 our vegetable roast, and fallen into marching-order, we soon 

 arrived at a small cataract, down which the water fell perpen- 

 dicularly about 20ft. into a deep and dark basin. The only 

 ford at this place was on the very narrow edge of the fall 

 (composed of a single mass of rock), over which I was obliged 

 to be carried, not daring to trust myself on that perilous and 

 slippery path, which reminded me of Al Araf, the bridge to the 

 Mahometan Elysium. As it was I very nearly fell, through 

 nervous excitation, into the gloomy depth below. The water, 

 too, above was just as deep, dark, and forbidding, shelving 

 rapidly from the razor-back edge of the rock." About sunset 

 we arrived at the banks of the Eiver Whangaroa (one of the 

 principal branches of the Eiver Wairoa, which disembogues 

 into Hawke's Bay). Here I obtained two small canoes from 

 the Maoris residing here, and paddled down the river about 

 two miles and a half to Te Eeinga, the principal village of this 

 district. This river winds round the enormous hill Whaka- 

 punake, at the base of which the village is situated. I had 

 often heard from time to time from the Maoris of this place, 

 and of the abyss-like cataract in its immediate vicinity, and 

 had long cherished a hope of one day visiting it. Tired 

 as I now was, I wished for morning, that I might realize 

 my desire, and gain a few more additions to the New Zealand 

 flora. The roar of the waters during the stillness of the night 

 had much that was soothing as well as solemn in the sound. 

 Morning broke, and, prayers and breakfast over, I entered into 

 a little canoe and was paddled about tw T o hundred yards to 

 the great bed of rock which, crossing the river, dams up 

 the water and causes the fall. This cataract, from its situa- 

 tion, is exceedingly romantic, the most so, I think, of any fall 

 I have yet seen in New Zealand. The bed of rock, or rather 

 deposit of indurated clay, sand, and mud of a very white 

 colour, which here obstructs the progress of the river (and 



* Sometimes, in my many travellings, I have been so carried (as a child 

 on its mother's back) over slimy, slippery tree-trunks, denuded, too, of 

 their bark, felled and thrown across chasms and deep rivers, where the 

 banks were densely overgrown with thick and creeping jungle. And once 

 in the interior (on the west base of the Ruahine Range) I was in like 

 manner carried down a very high and precipitous cliff, where there was 

 scarcely anything to hold by, the naked feet of the mountaineer Maoris 

 holding firmly on, like a hand, or a bird's or goat's foot. 



