480 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



level plain to the lake. On this plain is situated the new township of 

 Eotorua, and that part of it between the suburbs and the Puarenga would 

 form an admirable position for the hothouses and portions of the recreation 

 grounds. 



On a plateau-looking depression in the hills to the southward, elevated 

 about 250 feet above the plain, and commanding a most magnificent view 

 of the whole basin of Eotorua, is an admirable site for the main sanatorium 

 buildings and hotel residences, with an atmosphere ever clear, and free from 

 the vapours inseparable from the vicinity of medicinal springs. This 

 plateau, and adjacent hills, with the slopes to the level of the plain, and 

 extending between the Taupo and Wairoa roads, would form the area on 

 which the art of the landscape gardener would be chiefly employed. It is 

 now quite open and fern-covered, but exhibits a combination of features 

 favourable to landscape improvement which would be difficult to find 

 surpassed. 



Towards the north-east of the general situation are two picturesque 

 headlands extending into the lake, called Owhata and Owhatiura, whereon 

 could be located a number of detached villas in variety of design, giving 

 accommodation for the large number of visitors, who, desiring to remain 

 a few weeks or months, would prefer to live near the lake. Near Ohine- 

 mutu there are two other beautiful headlands, called Koutu and Kawaha, 

 and on all these places private enterprise would soon furnish abundance of 

 detached accommodation, the initiation or nucleus of which is only required 

 to be provided by the sanatorium. 



To the eastward of Whakarewarewa is the road to the great attraction 

 to tourists, Eotomahana, and to the west the road to Taupo. The soil on 

 the hills and the slopes at their base is all that can be desired, while that of 

 the plain, though light and sandy, is all the more suitable for the higher 

 horticultural operations invited by the abundance of natural heat flowing to 

 waste, and apropos, — the writer's attention has been drawn to an account 

 in the journal of the Society of Arts, of date 27th June, 1884, of the 

 utilization of a hot spring at the baths of Acqui, in a hothouse, by means of 

 which semi-tropical vegetables were ripened in spring season. This applica- 

 tion of the natural heat of the Lake District has long been a favourite idea 

 with many besides the writer. Its extent of adaptability is almost un- 

 bounded where a natural fall of hot water exists, or where it can be 

 economically raised and circulated by water power. 



The waste water at Whakarewarewa, at a moderate computation of its 

 volume, and an average of 700 units of heat available from every gallon, 

 would furnish per diem heat equal to that derived from the combustion of 

 six tons of coal in the same time. 



