372 SPORTING IN BOTH HEMISPHERES. 



CHAPTER XXV. 



NEW ZEALAND PORT OF AUCKLAND GOLEMS INN WILD PIGEON-SHOOTING 

 CURLEW AND DOTTEREL SHOOTING DEPARTURE. 



ON a beautiful morning in the month of January, 1856, and 

 the midst of an antipodean summer, I left Auckland, in com- 

 pany with a very intelligent German gentleman, with the 

 intention of visiting the interior of the island, and of pro- 

 ceeding, for about twenty-five miles, as far as a place called 

 Cole's Inn, where the forest scenery commenced, and where 

 that magnificent growth of foliage peculiar to New Zealand 

 might be witnessed in perfection. Our conveyance was a 

 rather rickety kind of gig, and an equally problematical 

 horse, which we had hired for the occasion, and contained 

 ourselves, a carpet-bag, and our guns. 



The first part of the road, which was good and well laid 

 down, led through cultivated farms and hedgerows similar 

 to many in England, but the country was almost completely 

 bare of trees. After having passed a small town or village, 

 about ten miles from Auckland, we emerged upon a vast 

 plain of ferns, interspersed with rocks, and gently undulating 

 hills. Now and then a brawling torrent would cross the 

 road, and large patches of bog and morass, plentifully covered 

 with the wild flax, or pJwrmium tenax, were visible in the 

 valleys, but little or no signs of animal life, save a few cattle 

 picking up a scanty subsistence amidst the ferns, met our 

 view. Presently, groves of trees, of gigantic size and most 

 beautiful and varied foliage, appeared on the sides of the 

 hills, and after about twenty-five miles driving, we arrived at 

 Cole's Inn, a small hotel and farm-house, situated on an 



