'In New Zealand,' he said, 'with its forests, the females had to carry their loads along narrow paths. The proper way to carry a pack is on the head, but the trees made that impossible. Hills, too, had often to be climbed, and to ease the ascent a bending posture must be taken. Add that fact to the load on the back, and it was a consequence that Maori women should evolve clumsy figures.
'In Australia there was more open ground, and in many parts the method was to carry a load on the head. Thus, the native women were better of figure, though quite unequal to their 116 THE ROMANCE OF A PRO-CONSUL. lithe, graceful Kaffir sisters of South Africa. Here the country was free and open, and the carrying of a weight on the head naturally followed.' Second, the men of those races.
'The Australians,' Sir George went on, 'were hunters, and had to climb trees in search of opossums. They drove holes into the trunks with their stone axes, dug in their big toes, and ascended. Such efforts provided them with long legs, while, again, they walked with turned-in toes. Why? Having scrub to penetrate, they must cut roads through it—a tiresome labour, not pursued more than was necessary. If they turned in their toes, they could sidle along a mere bee-line of clearing.
'The Maoris were very short in the limbs, this arising from the amount of time they spent in their canoes. Peculiarities of environment equally distinguish the Kaffirs, who were the most agile of the three races. Set against any of the others, all in the primitive state, the Kaffirs might have prevailed, though who could say? Neither the Maoris, nor the Australians, worked in iron weapons, while the Kaffirs did, and that circumstance would have told, in the clash of prevailing or going down.'
Contrasts were sharp in Oceana when she was young, which entitles you to pass quickly from Sir George Grey's careful estimate of the native races he ruled, to a little romance of South Australia. A Highland settler, with the Highland name McFarland, lived in a cottage some twenty miles from Adelaide. He was an informed and interesting Scot, and when the Governor was tired, he would ride over to his shieling and stay a day or two.
'A number of German colonists,' Sir George's narrative on this proceeded, 'had come to South Australia, seeking to improve their condition. Labour being scarce and highly paid, the German girls went out and did shearing. They moved from farm to farm, accompanied by some of the older women, and at night they would be housed by the settler who happened to be employing them.
'Among the shearers was a girl who had a great reputation for beauty. She was quite a belle, and so winning that everybody liked her. One morning old McFarland rushed in upon me at Adelaide, in a state of high excitement. His nephew, a genuine McFarland also, had, the previous night, eloped with the German beauty. The uncle was indignant that the nephew should run away with a foreigner—yes, a foreigner! He implored me to send the police to search for them, but I replied that I could do nothing. He must go to the Justices of the Peace and petition, if he wished to take action, on which point I offered no advice.
'Scarcely had he left, when the relatives of the girl, escorted by the German pastor, invaded me, full of an equal indignation and also demanding the police. I could only repeat the answer I had given to McFarland, even when it was pleaded that the girl, like other members of the German community, had pledged herself not to marry outside it. It was urged that anything she might do to the contrary would not count, but that argument would not hold. We heard, by the evening, of the marriage of the runaways.
'They had been united by some Justice of the Peace, a frequent occurrence then, there being few ministers, and the match proved a happy one in every respect. How the bold young McFarland managed to carry off his bride from her custodians I never learned, and I suppose I did not inquire.'
Only in a South Australia, rescued from the chasms, grown stalwart under the hand of Sir George Grey, could there have been such a romance. It needed a stout heart and a trustful, loving one, and these are the characteristics of a healthy community.