Soon after this little incident torrents of rain came down, in which we drove up to the door of a hut in the backwoods, kept by some Berkshire people, and where we ate the luncheon we had brought.
For the next twelve miles we were driving through the bush, the damp steaming up on all sides and showing the vegetation in all the glory of its luxuriance, the leaves and moss shining with the dripping raindrops. Nature was perspiring at every pore, and putting forth a new growth in the moist heat.
At first we missed the familiar foliage of the oak, or elm, or beach, but soon you grow accustomed to the grey skeleton trunks, branching off so high in the stem of the native tree. There was the Karaka, a tree with thick glossy foliage, and a red berry which the natives eat, the Puriri, which is the hardest of New Zealand woods, the Katukatea, or white pine, and the Totara. This tree has the bright olive-green foliage that imparts so much vividness to the bush. It has a durable wood, which worms never touch, and for that reason is much used for the piles of wharves. Then there is the Rimu which, when the bark is stripped off, is found to be of a blood red inside. It produced the beautiful effect we saw as we passed along, when sections of these trees rotting on the ground, mingled their crimson blood with the yellow mosses and lichen.
Again and again we remarked that great curiosity of the Rata, which is found throughout both islands. The Rata begins like a creeper, hanging down in tendrils from the branches, and joining together below them, to form a stem about one-third of the size of the trunk. Growing gradually downwards, it circles round, and closes in "under" the roots, gradually eating into and sucking the life from the tree. It performs the part of an ungrateful child, who kills the parent who gave it life. Along the coast the same curious formation is found about the trees, but there it is called Pohutukawa, and grows in exactly the opposite way, striking from the roots upwards, and performing the same work of death, with its fibrous arms. Sometimes this Pohutukawa is also called the Christmas tree, from the bright red blossom that flowers at Christmas. They say the effect of the bush at a distance, and when the trees are intertwined by this scarlet mass of blossom, is very beautiful. The general idea is that the Rata and Pohutukawa are produced by a species of caterpillar about a foot long, but we found many of the islanders do not agree with the theory. We brought one of these caterpillars home with us, and it is still preserved in a tin case.
The giji, a small rush or coarse grass, growing in isolated clumps on the trunks of the trees, forms another special feature of the bush. But the chief is that wonderful tangled mass of tropical undergrowth, and the tree ferns which grow in large clumps. Their fibrous black trunks attain to a height of six feet, expanding at the top into feathery arms, long and graceful in their sweeping curves. Nestling under their broad shadows are every other species of fern; the beautiful crape fern, so called from the crisp double texture of the fronds, the Hiane or creeping Lycopodium, the Kioko or Polypodium, the Panaka or Asplenium, and the Mangemange or creeping fern. Then there are all kinds of parasites, like the Tararamoa or climbing bramble; the latter has a red or yellow berry, and a prickly bristling leaf, which has given to it the name of the lawyer's plant, or bush lawyer; there is the Kareao, a climbing wiry vine, the "Supple Jack" of the Colonists, the Kiekie, Kohia, and Pikiarero or clematis; and the Hinau which blossoms with a white flower, and has an astringent pulp, the bark furnishing a black dye to the natives. Beneath all there is a carpet of bright green moss, three inches thick.
It is very difficult to give any adequate idea of the extraordinary luxuriance of these bush forests; I could hardly have believed before what wonderful shades of colouring could be contained in a single tangle of green. There is something about the bush which prevents your saying it is tropical, partly on account of the trees which look sparse and hardy, partly on account of the damp climate, but it is, nevertheless, as beautiful as any tropical jungle.
We were very much struck by the oppressive silence and the absence of all bird life. We heard the whirr of two wood pigeons, and the twitter of a tui once or twice.
It was getting dusk as we emerged from the bush, and quite dark before we saw the black waters of Lake Rotorua. Clouds of steam and vapour rising from the hot sulphur and mineral springs, told us the whereabouts of Ohinemutu.
I confess that the last part of the drive Nature had been asserting herself, and I was too tired, hungry, and sore from the jolting to feel interest in anything but an arrival at the Lake House.
We found the coach and party from Tauranga (the other route to the Hot Lakes) had just arrived there, and on comparing notes, we saw that our road had been infinitely worse, but that we had been saved from a tossing last night on the sea, in a miserable little steamer. We had coached fifty miles during that day.