CHAPTER II. 
New Zealand. Sketch of its physical Structure. 
Position. — Area and shape. — Name of Islands. — The South Island. — The Southern 
Alps. — Physical features and natural scenery. — West coast. — East coast. — The North 
Island. — Continuation of the Southern Alps. — Volcanic zones. — Yaupo zone. — Auckland 
zone. — Day of Islands zone. — Harbours. 
On the opposite part of our globe , and just below our feet — 
nearly 180° long, distant from us, and as far to the South of the 
Equator as Italy is to the North of it — there lies in the South 
Pacific Ocean , between the Australian and S. American Continents, 
a country, of which Tasman , in the middle of the 17 century, brought 
the first tidings to Europe. The Dutch named it New Zealand . 1 A 
marvellous country it is, that land of our Antipodes, where people 
- as we used to think when children — walk with their feet to- 
wards us, and their heads downwards : “all upside down,” because, 
1 English writers on New Zealand protest strongly against I his name. Hurst 
houses opinion is, that no one has even done less for the land of his discovery, 
than Tasman, the Dutchman; he came, saw and went off again, without even 
setting foot on the land. He named it after a small, flat province in Holland, that 
resembles it as much as a herring a whale. 4 South Britain or Britain of the South 
would be much more appropriate, and ‘King of South Britain would sound much 
better than ‘King of New Zealand', a lille that might induce some mischievous court- 
lady, to sing His Majesty the song of the “King of the Cannibal Islands' Taylor 
says, that, whereas the more euphonious names of Tasmania and Australia have 
been substituted for Van Diemensland and New Holland , so also New Zealand ought 
to be re-christened. To this end he proposes names such as “Austral Britain ”, 
“ Austral Albion Zealand ia was likewise proposed. 
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