1843.] 
THE GARDENERS’ 
CHRONICLE. 605 
WANTED, the following Numbers of the Gardeners’ 
Chronicle, for 1841. Nos. 7, 10, 21, 35, 36, 37, 50, and 51; 
‘six shillings will be given for the above eight Nos.—Apply at No. 
4, Ave Maria-lane, London. 
The Garveners’ Chronicle. 
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 1848. 
| MEETINGS FOR THE TWO FOLLOWING WEEKS. 
Horticultural . . «+ 3 pm, 
Floricultural .  . 6. 7 P.M 
Country Snows.—September 8 . 
ae a tn 
— WW. . Kingston. 
— 15 : ¢ South Spilsby. 
From ‘the first establishment of this Journal we 
have thought it a duty to give our support to those 
who advocate the claims of New Zealand as an agri- 
cultural colony, because we have always considered 
that the evidence in the possession of Botanists as to 
its climate and products was such as to leave no 
reasonable doubt as to its fertility and salubrity. We 
stated long since, that, so far as it was possible to 
judge from the information that had been received in 
Europe, New Zealand is the colony where of all 
others there is most to hope and least to fear; and 
that, in fact, with the single drawback of the possi- 
bility of collisions with the natives, everything gave 
promise of its being the most advantageous settlement 
for farmers under the British crown. We were led 
to do this partly from a desire to point out to agricul- 
tural emigrants the place where of all others their 
energies could be best directed, and partly for the 
sake of contradicting the false reports, which,— 
invented by the disappointed in New Zealand, and 
the interested in Australia and Van Diemen’s Land, 
were largely propagated in this country by the daily 
press. According to those stories, the country is either 
uncultivable from its ruggedness, or absolutely sterile, 
or storm-bound, or flooded, or so overrun with bush 
and fern, as to cost more for clearing than it is worth, 
or, finally, exposed to the constant inroads of ferocious 
savages, who refuse to recognise the validity of the 
sales which they have made, and perpetually threaten 
to resume by force the land of which they have been 
deprived by fraud. 
Public opinion has now taken a direction so 
decidedly favourable to New Zealand, and the vast 
importance of itis at last so fully recognised by the 
Colonial Government, that it may almost seem super- 
Hluus to combat any longer the misrepresentations 
tha have been made upon the subject, But its 
colinization is still only in the bud,—thousands are 
stil wavering as to the place where their little capital 
wil be best invested, and it is of such vital importance 
to hem to know exactly what they have to expect as 
engrants, that we think we cannot do better than 
divct our readers’ attention to a rich supply of facts 
wich have been furnished by the settlers themsely es, 
in, collection of their letters which has lately been 
pulished.* For here we have no suspicious testi- 
mny,—no highly-coloured representations by land 
agnts and speculators, but plain and simple state- 
mnts from men actually in the islands to their friends 
abome. 
In the first place, it is highly gratifying to see that 
or fears of quarrels with the natives were groundless, 
ad that their character had either not been at all 
uderstood, or that the judicious regulations of the 
kw Zealand Company have effectually removed al] 
‘use for serious complaints. Disputes, indeed, have 
‘curred here and there, but so far as we are 
‘quainted with them, they have arisen from causes 
isily arranged, and with the worst of the natives, 
hose acts their own countrymen openly discounte. 
ance. We may add, too, that where they have led to 
npleasant consequences, this has been mainly caused 
ice or wrongheadedness of the settlers 
Tuesday, September 5, . 
Liverpool. 
Royal Hort: Soc, Cornwall: 
dhurst. 
y the 
hemselves. 
“The New Zealanders are a fine race of people,” says 
i settler at Nelson (p. 78), ‘stout and well made. Much 
xas been said in England about their fierceness, but a 
milder, kinder people, I believe, does not exist. Our 
ladies of the Fifeshire, that almost dreaded the idea of 
seeing an ugly tattooed New Zealander, would no more 
be afraid of one of them, or I believe not so much, ag 
they would of one of their country of the lower orders__ 
at least they are perfectly harmless, and I believe that 
nothing would induce them to meddle with, or injure q 
white man. Some say they in some cases steal; ] 
believe in no case have they been known or proved 
to do so; I a little suspected it, but I now believe no 
such thing; the lost things I have found, and 1 haye 
trusted them anywhere, and lost nothing by them.” 
—Some dress in English clothes,” says Mr. Gillingham, 
a yeoman, (p. 154), “ the others wear blankets, which is a 
good article to barter with them. ‘They are a fine race of 
people. I like them much, and am not afraid to go ten 
miles inland to live amongst them; they seem to be ver 
harmless and strictly honest ; they come into the tents, sit 
* “Letters from Si Labouring Emigrants in the New 
Zealand Company's Settlements,” 12mo, Smith and Elder, 1843, 
down, laugh, and are very entertaining with their gibber- 
ish.” _“ The natives,” says another witness (p.158), “area 
good-humoured, good-for-nothing set of vagabonds; ex- 
tremely well-disposed to Europeans ; and when inclined 
to work, which is but seldom, they are of great assistance 
in constructing houses; at first they took tobacco for 
every trifling service they rendered ; but now nothing will 
0 but clothing or money. There is not much fear of 
their quarrelling with us ; they are too much alive to their 
interests for that. As long as they continue as well 
treated as they are at present, there is no chance of any 
interruption in the amicable intercourse between the two 
races.’” 
So that, instead of the fierce and bloodthirsty ogres 
which they have been represented to be, they are 
really above the average of European peasants. Indeed, 
it is quite evident that they are amicable and kind- 
hearted. The greater part of the population in Cook’s 
Straits originally came from ‘Taranaki. This name 
alone has a magical effect upon them. Whenever 
Mr. Cook mentioned Taranaki to them, they began to 
cry like children, and made a thousand inquiries about 
old friends, old pahs, gardens, rivers, &c. &c. (p. 156.) 
And when a destructive fire broke out at Wellington, 
destroying fifty-nine of the best houses in the town, 
the natives actually collected five pounds among 
themselves for the sufferers (p. 57). 
The calumnies relating to the natives being thus 
disposed of, let us see what the settlers say of the 
land, which we have been told is all cut up into gullies 
and precipices, utterly unfit for agricultural purposes, 
and incapable of improvement by the plough: — 
“ Here,” says Mr. W. Bayly, a yeoman of Devonsbire, 
“are thousands and tens of thousands of acres as level as 
can be found in England ; I would say, when the land is 
cleared, all that I have seen, that the plough shall go over 
nineteen acres out of twenty. The soil is very deep in 
high land as well as low. I believe for climate and soil 
not better to be found in the known world. I know a 
man that has tilled the third crop of Potatoes in the same 
piece of ground, and I am expecting a crop within twelve 
months.’’—** There is plenty of land that is fit for agri- 
culture ; it is a beautiful soil and a beautiful climate; all 
kinds of Corn will grow well. You may grow Pease all 
the year. That small portion of Wheat which I brought 
with me yielded after the rate of seven quarters to the 
acre, I saved the whole of the seed, and made myself a 
hat with the straw, which I believe to be the first that has 
been made of straw grown in the colony. J have sown 
the seed on twelve rods of ground, and it is growing 
beautifully, I have got half an acre of land in cultivation. 
We sow the Wheat in July, and reap in January. I am 
sorry to say, there are but few who support cultivation; 
they seem to be afraid of the bush, which is not half so 
fierce as it is represented.”’—Eatract of a Letter from a 
Producer, p. 35.—* There is no doubt about its being 
good, very good; and much superior to any land at home. 
We can produce two good crops in one year, which can’t 
be done in England : Wheat, averaging sixty bushels an 
acre, and Potatoes sixteen tons ditto.””—A small Devon- 
shire Farmer, p. 61.—‘* The farmer, the labourer, and 
the independent colonist, have assumed a healthy and 
vigorous bearing, full of well-grounded hopes, and 
determination to do their utmost by a soil which barely 
asks for their powers to clear and cultivate it.’—J. Cs 
Esq., p- 67.— The soil is a black vegetable mould, 
about four feet or from four to six feet deep ; generally 
speaking, the subsoil is a yellow clay.”—Mr. Charles 
Paimer, p. 177.—‘* New Zealand looks more like an 
English nobleman’s domain;—rich valleys with gentle 
slopes, and woody knolls, dark groves of Pine, apparently 
sloped by art, rivers and mountain streams, and every 
bush filled with songsters,—nay, everything that can 
¢harm the eye or captivate the senses.’’—From a Settler, 
113.—‘* I can truly say, ‘ Here one can live in ease, 
without care or trouble, in one of the most genial and 
healthy climates in the world, and where it onlyrequires the 
hand of man to make a Paradise.’ ’’—Dr. Geo. Rees, p. 52. 
—‘' There is also plenty of clear land suitable for grazing 
in the immediate neighbourhood, within two hours’ sail of 
the heads. Thereis a large valley extending for forty miles 
inland, clear of trees, and covered with the finest grass, 
capable of maintaining large herds of cattle, if once it was 
opened up. The country is only becoming known ; no 
sooner is one valley explored and surveyed than another is 
discovered contiguous to it. They seem mostly to turn up 
from the sea, and to be sheltered at their entrance by high 
bare hills from the winds which blow with such violence on 
the coast, which three-fourths of those who come out here 
only see, and have no idea of the luxuriant evergreen 
verdure with which the country in the interior is covered.” 
—Alexander Perry, Esq, p. 20.—'' The valley of the 
Hutt is much morg extended, more level, and is, perhaps, 
one of the most even and the finest districts for agri- 
cultural purposes in all New Zealand. In fact, there is 
plenty of room in this one place for the exertion and 
capital of at least one hundred thousand Englishmen. At 
‘Taranaki, where new Plymouth is situated, there is an 
opening for at least a million of people ; and the country 
there is open, so that you may have a clear view upon 
almost any of the rising grounds for at least thirty miles, 
and in some cases you can see land fifty miles off.”’— 
John Wallace, p. 12.—‘* This is the finest Wheat and 
Barley country that ever was seen, and that you would 
say if you were to see it.’—S. and W. Curtis, p. 133. 
Tf from this we turn to the accounts of the produce 
obtained, the evidence is not only satisfactory, but 
even beyond all expectation :— 
2 
“I don’t believe any country in the world will beat 
this for breeding ; sheep, I have little doubt, will breed 
twice in the year. Some of my goats have kidded three 
times in less than fifteen months. I landed four females 
and one male, and in less time considerably than two 
years, counted 25 in number. Our bush or rich land is 
too strong for‘Wheat. I put some into my garden, and 
had to cut it down twice before I could get it to stand up, 
so luxuriantly did it grow. I have some Oats growing in 
my garden, on rich soil, seven feet high ; and some of the 
stems measure one inch in circumference; and a large 
sort of English Pea growing so high, that I could not 
reach some of the upper pods. You will think I am 
romancing, but I give you my honour that I am not. 
Some Cabbages (the Flat Pole) growing on a piece of 
bush-land on our farm, measure five feet across, and have 
only been planted out eight weeks. We have planted 
15,000 of the Flat Pole, Jersey Cow, and 100 Headed 
Cabbage for our milch cows. Cabbage plants are 2s. 6d. 
per hundred, but I grew all we required, and more. At 
this present mament my garden is groaning under a pro- 
fusion of most excellent vegetables; it is most of it bush- 
land, near an acre in extent, but not all cleared, although 
fenced in. Some Mangel Wurzel now in seed is seven 
feet and eight feet high; in fact, 1 am quite at a loss to 
say what the land will not produce when under a proper 
system of cultivation and manured: this arises as much 
from the climate as the soil. Cattle do remarkably well.” 
—p- 205.—‘* Wheat is calculated to pay 25/. an acre, 
which is about the average price here, and not likely to go 
much lower.”"—A Private Letter, p. 29.—‘ This is a 
most splendid country for farming, when the land is 
cleared. You know I brought some Wheat out with me; 
it was two quarts. I had a small spot of land, and I 
sowed it, and I have reaped and thrashed ten gallons from 
it; mine was the first harvest in the country. I had ten 
men and boys to cut it for me one evening.”— William 
Henwood, p. 149. 
Captain Smith has a large garden, with Cabbages 
12 feet round, Onions 20 inches round, Roses, Pelar- 
goniums, Sweetbriars, fruit-trees, and all kinds of 
vegetables.—H. 8. Tiffin, to his father, p. 11. And 
another person, (p.117,) speaks of his Turnip Radishes 
16 inches in circumference. 
“ Mr. Molesworth raised last year at the rate of eighteen 
tons of Potatoes (Kidneys) to the acre, and ninety bushels 
of Wheat to the acre.* Thisis in the Valley of the Hutt, 
on land newly reclaimed from the forest, and flooded two 
or three times in the year.”— A Selller, p. 33. 
It should here be remarked that this flooding is one 
of the evils which people have been told render New 
Zealand-unfit for cultivation. But Mr, Stokes shows 
most distinctly that the floods of New Zealand are—as 
those of the Nile—a source of fruitfulness, and not of 
injury. 
“In my last visit to the Hutt, I ascertained a very inter- 
esting fact relative to this point. I should state that this win- 
ter we have had more rain than in the two previous ones, and 
the Hutt has several times overflowed its banks. I saw 
Wheat that had been four times covered with water, and 
yet was in beautiful order. But the point to which I 
wished to direct your attention was in the instance of 
Mr. ——’s Barley; that which bas been flooded is, I 
understand, in first-rate order, that which has not beeu 
flooded has been attacked by the grub. Now, a flood in 
New Zealand seems to produce an opposite effect to what 
it does in England, or a colder climate to ours; it pro- 
duces a fertilizing effect in the deposit which it leaves, 
and, as it would appear, a salutary effect in destroying 
the grab, while the frosts which usually succeed floods 
in England, and nip the young blade, are unknown here. 
This is important to be known, because in the district of 
the Manewatu, more to the north, and still warmer than 
Port Nicholson, on either side the river there are at least 
100,000 acres of good Jand, easily drained, and still more 
easily brought under cultivation, but which must be occa- 
sionally subject to overflows from the river. Now, if 
these overflows (as are proved by our experience in the 
Hutt) are beneficial, they must remove any apprehension 
or doubt from the mind of the cultivator.’” 
The only well-founded complaint concerning the 
soil applies to what is called fern land, extensive 
districts of which have fallen to the lot of some 
settlers. This is represented to bea strip of land 
along the coast, about 200 yards wide; behind which 
is a belt of bush land, as it is called, composed of the 
most beautiful shrubs from five to twenty feet high, 
filled up with fern of the same height, which is about 
three miles wide. 
It is said by one person (p. 204) that this sort of 
soil “ will not grow a heavy crop the first year, the land 
having been run out by the fern; and ‘there is such 
an immense quantity of fibrous root left, that, after 
rain, it puffs up, and you waik over it like walking 
over a Turkey carpet. This lets in the air, the ground 
dries too quickly, and you require rain every third 
day to make things grow.” “And another witness 
declares that it is all humbug what has been said 
about fern land being so good (p. 156). But as 
Mr. Jollie observes (p. 126) the very fact of the 
fern being 80 rank shows that the land has in it the 
power of vigorous production. And such is evidently 
the fact, for a writer at p. 204, says, that a great 
* This must be considered an exceptional case; the average 
Production per acre being estimated at 60 bushels fot Wheat, and 
16 tons for Potatoes. 
