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many miles long, the logs are conveyed to the floating-place, and 
thence to the saw-mill by canals with which, here and there, swell- 
ponds are connected. 
The timber of the Kauri pine resembles the timber of our 
white pine or silver-fir. It supplies splendid ship spars, and first- 
rate wood for inside and outside house work; painted furniture, 
sliip-planking, decks and fittings. The deals and boards arc said 
to possess the peculiar quality of shrinking more in length than 
in breadth. In 1859 nearly the whole of Auckland with the ex- 
ception of a few stone buildings consisted of houses built of Kauri 
timber, 1 and it is especially to the Kauri pine, that the province 
is indebted for its first rise. 2 
In remote inlets of the sea , and branches of rivers which were 
formerly frequented only by the lonely canoe of the savage, there pre- 
vails now a brisk intercourse of vessels of all kinds. Extensive saw- 
works, constructed upon the best principles, are scattered along the 
banks of those rivers and bays. In the dark bush , over hill and dale 
and in ravines which were once hushed in deathlike silence , the ring- 
ing of the axe, the creaking of the saw, and the far-sounding “cooey” 
of the wood-cutters arc to be heard. Men whose nerves and sinews 
had been hardened in the wild woods of California and Canada, — 
Scotchmen and Irishmen , and now and then also an ill-starred Ger- 
man, — - they are the champions combatting those giants of the 
woods. Merrily the columns of smoke whirl up from their log-fires; 
and many a wonderful story is told, when in the hour ot repose 
the pipes arc alight and the gin-bowl is going the rounds. 
But the Kauri pine yields also, as already mentioned, a second, 
very valuable product , the Kauri gum , Kapia of the natives. This 
resinous gum, as it oozes from the tree, is soft and of a milky 
turbidness, 3 not unlike opal; in course of time, however, it hardens, 
becomes more or less transparent, and assumes at the same time a 
1 Houses built of Kauri-timber are said to last 50 years. 
2 The forests of New Zealand furnish, however, besides Kauri several other 
kinds of excellent timber; see Appendix. 
3 In this form, the gum is often chewed by the natives, 
