72 ERITONGA RIVER. [PART I. 



where the hills are low and undulating. At the 

 town of Wellington there is consequently a long 

 line of water-frontage, with deep water at a few 

 yards from the shore. 



The neck of land between the island of Mana and 

 Port Nicholson consists of hills, with deep ravines, 

 intersected by watercourses, where the natives have 

 some plantations. Of similar configuration is the 

 neck of land separating the port from Wairarapa, or 

 Palliser Bay. At high-water the passage from 

 Wellington to the head of the bay was impassable, 

 but since I left Port Nicholson a road has been 

 constructed, connecting the valley of the Hutt im- 

 mediately with the town. A road has also been 

 made across the neck of land to the Pararua, a river 

 which discharges itself into Cook's Straits opposite 

 the island of Mana. 



Having on a subsequent occasion (August, 1840) 

 explored the valley of the Eritonga, I will here give 

 a description of that river. My intention was to 

 have crossed the snowy mountains which are seen 

 to the northward of Port Nicholson, and to have 

 entered the valley of the Manawatu, which I was 

 told by the natives approaches those mountains in 

 its long and serpentine course, forming a fertile 

 valley, and afterwards discharging itself into Cook's 

 Straits. This I was unable to accomplish, from the 

 difficulties presented by the heavy forest and under- 

 wood, although surveyors' lines had been cut for 

 about twenty miles up the valley, from the necessity of 



