278 ADVENTURE IN NEW ZEALAND. Chap. XI. 
glass bottle picked out of the sand, and begging E Puni 
to have the natives' dogs carefully tied up and to keep 
the pigs at home — the company began to arrive from 
Wellington. Carts, waggons, bullock-drays, were all 
pressed into the service to-day, and the line of road 
was a miniature representation of that to Epsom. Six 
or eight of the ladies came over in a spring-cart con- 
taining chairs covered with flags ; and the only gig in 
Wellington, an importation from New South Wales, 
brought over the chemist of Medical Hall and two 
other shopkeepers. One waggon contained the band 
of music ; and a large flotilla of boats, of all shapes and 
sizes, brought over those who had no carts or horses 
or were too lazy to walk. Booths, tents, and stalls 
were rapidly put up ; and one man wheeled a barrow 
about selling " ginger-pop." 
The " coming in" was close to Colonel Wakefield's 
old house ; and there a cold collation had been provided 
for the ladies. The grand stand consisted of a few 
planks on the top of eight or ten water-butts outside 
the fence, supporting the chairs out of the carts. 
And now my duties began to multiply. Here I had 
to explain to a party of natives why they could not lie 
basking on the middle of the beach ; there to beg a 
party of whalers to haul their boat right up or push 
her nose off the beach ; to get the sails of another boat, 
moored close off, furled so as not to flap about in the 
horses' eyes ; and finally to stop the persevering band 
as the horses were " coming." 
It was one of our brilliant cloudless days, with the 
heat of the sun just tempered by a light air from the 
southward as the tide made. Five or six hundred 
people were assembled by eleven o'clock when the 
horses started ; and it was truly exhilarating to see so 
English a sport well supported, under the more genial 
