FIJI-NEW ZEALAND EXPEDITION 325 
luded to above. Two hundred million dollars in gold is a con- 
servative estimate of the region’s yield since the sixties. Fully 
twice that amount, we were told, awaits the giant dredges 
backed by capital and operated by the skill and courage of men 
like Lewis, the Yankee dredge boss. 
WESTLAND 
The district of Westland lies between the Southern Alps and the 
ocean. It is one of the narrowest and longest geographical units 
of its kind anywhere. It is close to two hundred miles long and 
from fifteen to thirty miles wide. The habitable area is still 
narrower since the width just given is from the crest of the Alps 
to the sea. In places the flat lowland strip barely exceeds a 
width of five miles and ten or fifteen may be considered an 
average. 
There is one good road lacking several bridges running close 
to half its length. When the torrential streams are fordable a 
government motor carrying mail makes semi-weekly trips from 
Hokitika down to a point below Fox Glacier. Beyond this the 
mail goes by pack horse. On the morning of July 30 we boarded 
this ear for Waiho ninety miles away. The weather was frosty 
and clear and all wore heavy wraps, gloves and laprobes. A 
ton of mail and eight or ten passengers with their baggage gave 
the Studebaker a heavy load. In Westland temperature is meas- 
ured by blankets. We heard our fellow passengers remark that 
it was ‘‘a blanket cooler today than yesterday’’, and that a 
certain part of Westland was ‘‘two blankets warmer’’ than 
another. In winter every New Zealander carries a large woolen 
blanket, a sort of glorified steamer rug, and he is ‘‘rugged up”’ 
when aboard the train, or in a coach, or even when seated in a 
hotel lobby. The hotel keeper expects his guest to have one 
and to add it to his bed if needed. 
The road winds in and out past old placer dumps, over raging 
ereeks, and occasionally over splendid bridges all of which are 
unusually long for such small streams due to the fact that these 
streams overflow widely after a rain but subside rapidly. Inno- 
cent looking gravel bars wholly dry may suddenly become the 
sites of raging torrents lasting an hour or two. Our driver 
pointed out where a car had been overturned and a man drowned 
at a place where he had crossed on dry ground a few hours 
before. It rains in Westland to the extent of more than one 
