A climber in New Zealand

by Malcolm Ross

Like this lady’s “late ’usband,” there are many people who have heard of our Alps and volcanoes, yet have little idea of their size and importance. Let me endeavour, by way of introduction,—which the non-Alpine reader may skip if he likes,—to give some idea of the character of these mountains and of their history from a climber’s point of view.

The flora and fauna of the New Zealand mountains are especially interesting, but it would need much more space than is available within the limits of this book to deal adequately with them. Such references as I have made are only the passing comments of the climber, and not, in any way, the studied dissections of the scientist. But there is one matter, partly of historic and partly of scientific interest, the facts of which may very well be placed on record here. It relates to an experiment in acclimatization that is, I believe, unique in the history of the world.

I had often thought about the introduction of chamois to the Southern Alps; but the difficulties of capturing a sufficient number and of transporting them from the heart of Europe half-way round the world and through the tropic seas seemed so great as to make the experiment almost impossible of achievement. But some few years ago, when my friend Kontre-Admiral Ritter Ludwig von Höhnel, then an honorary aide-de-camp on the staff of the Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary,—himself a famous chamois hunter,—was in New Zealand, we talked the matter over. Höhnel then said to me that if he could get some of the curious New Zealand birds, such as the kiwi, the weka, the kakapo, and the kea for His Majesty’s Zoological Gardens at Schönbrunn, he believed that the Emperor, in return, would send out some chamois for the New Zealand Alps. This was too good a chance to be missed, and I told him that, so far as the New Zealand Government was concerned, I felt sure that our side of the project was already as good as arranged. Von Höhnel replied that he could not, of course, speak for the Emperor, but he would do his best to persuade him. Without more ado I took my friend along and introduced him to Mr. T. E. Donne, then the head of the Tourist Department, and he, being keenly interested in acclimatization matters and also a sportsman, promptly fell in with the idea, which was also readily taken up and sanctioned by Sir Joseph Ward, at that time the minister in charge of the Tourist Department. In due course the birds were sent to Austria, and eight chamois were forwarded to New Zealand via London in 1907. The chamois arrived in New Zealand on March 14th of the same year. They received the utmost attention on the voyage, and stood the journey very well. I went to see them on the arrival of the steamer, and they appeared to be in fine condition. Afterwards they were sent by steamer and train and wagon to Mount Cook and liberated in their new home in the Southern Alps. A few years ago some of them were seen, by one of the guides, with young at foot.

The other day, while in Vienna, I paid a visit to Schönbrunn, and looked for the New Zealand birds. I found that all but one had died. He was a sedate and venerable kea, and very sad he looked, confined, as he was, in an ordinary parrot cage. I said a few words to him in his own kea language, and he cocked his head knowingly on one side and eyed me curiously as if he had heard the sounds before but had almost forgotten them. For his own part, he seemed to have lost the power of speech in kea language. I have no doubt in the years gone by he was one of the young bloods of Kea land who used to come home with the milk and rouse us from our peaceful slumbers in the mountain hut on the Great Tasman Glacier, and that I myself had hurled both stones and imprecations at his wise-looking head. But now I felt sad at heart when I saw him cribbed, cabined, and confined in his little cage. It seemed as if his death after all would be laid at my door, and I longed to take him back with me to his friends and relatives in his home in the Southern Alps. But with the chamois it is different. They have a new home more glorious than their old one, and for years to come they must be protected from the gun of the hunter. In these Southern Alpine solitudes they can multiply and thrive in the land of the bird for which they were exchanged, while he—poor fellow—pines in his foreign cage.

The capturing of these chamois for New Zealand resulted in the destruction of many others, which, in their wild flight from their would-be captors, dashed themselves to death over the precipices of their rocky fastnesses, while others were maimed. There was therefore an outcry in Austria against their capture. Through the persistent efforts of the Admiral, however, the experiment is to be repeated this year on a small scale. I had the good fortune to meet him again in Vienna the other day, and he was quite keen about it, there being now, of course, a necessity for a change of blood if the experiment is to be quite a success. New Zealand owes to the Emperor Franz Josef and to Rear-Admiral von Höhnel its best thanks for their efforts in connexion with this novel essay.

The mountain system of New Zealand is as varied as it is interesting. In the North Island there is a series of volcanic mountains as fascinating, almost, as are the Southern Alps. How the fire came to New Zealand is told in Maori legend. The Maoris themselves looked upon the higher volcanic mountains with superstitious awe, and they considered them tapu, or sacred. No white man, and certainly no Maori, dared set foot upon them; and the fact that they were tapu prevented, for a long time, the obtaining of scientific knowledge regarding their craters and their summit configuration generally. Their origin was attributed to a famous tohunga, or high priest, who piloted one of the canoes of the early migrants from Hawaiki, the fabled home of the Maori people. This man, with another high chief, took possession of all the country between the Bay of Plenty and Mount Ruapehu. In order to assure fruitful years, these two ascended the neighbouring volcano of Ngauruhoe, and set up an altar to make the necessary incantations. The cold then, as now, was very bitter,—for the winds blow keen from the adjacent snows,—and it seemed as if the old tohunga would die, when happily the thought occurred to him of sending for some of the sacred fire that was in the keeping of one of his sisters in far-away Hawaiki. She straightway came with the fire. Wherever she halted in her underground travels there fire remained, and where she came to the surface to breathe there appeared boiling pools and geysers. Thus there was a trail of fire and boiling pools all along her route from White Island, down through all the thermal region to Ngauruhoe and Ruapehu. The fire revived the old man, and, in commemoration of the event, he left it burning in Ngauruhoe. As a sacrifice to the gods he cast his slave wife down the crater, and the mountain has ever afterwards been called by her name. The legend is picturesque, but unsatisfying. Years afterwards a famous chief called Te Heuheu was killed in a great landslip on the shores of Lake Taupo. His body was being taken to burial on the sacred mountain, when a terrific thunderstorm, or an eruption, came on, and the bearers, hastily depositing their burden in a cave, turned and fled. This made the mountain still more sacred and the early scientists dared not attempt to explore the range. Both Hochstetter and Dieffenbach must have been greatly disappointed that they were not allowed to set foot upon these sacred mountains, because then, as now, Ngauruhoe was the real centre of volcanic energy in New Zealand.

Ruapehu from Ngauruhoe.

It is, however, the thermal region in the vicinity of Lakes Rotorua, Rotomahana, Tarawera, and Taupo that is best known to the great majority of New Zealanders and to the sight-seers, who, from all parts of the civilized world, flock to this truly wonderful region. All the thermal phenomena possible seem to have been plentifully distributed throughout this territory. The crowning glory of it all was the Pink and White Terraces; but these, alas! are no more, for on June 10, 1886, they were either blown to bits or buried in the rain of mud and scoria that came from the eruption of Tarawera, and made the beautiful surrounding country a desolate wilderness. The story of that eruption with its loss of life, both Maori and European, has often been told, and there is no need to repeat it here. Nature is gradually reclothing the scarred hillsides, and even the bruised and wounded trees have been healed by the hand of time. The tourist wanders through the land just as he did before the eruption, and the birds and the fish killed or starved to death, as a result of the rain of mud and stones and fiery bombs, have been replaced by others of their kind. In this particular part of the thermal region the main centre of activity remained at the site of the old terraces, but during later years it seems to have shifted to the region of the famous but short-lived Waimangu geyser. This huge geyser threw a column of boiling water, steam, mud, and stones considerably over a thousand feet in air. In August 1903 the geyser was the scene of a terrible tragedy, an unusually severe eruption resulting in the death of two young girls, another visitor, and the guide, Joe Warbrick. The party had gone rather close in order to get a photograph. The eruption suddenly became terrific, and a great column of boiling water, shooting out at an angle, swept them off the hill into the overflow from the geyser. They were carried down in boiling water for nearly a mile towards Lake Rotomahana. The bodies were recovered shortly afterwards. Within the last few years Waimangu has become quiescent, but there is still great activity near by at a spot that has been aptly named Frying-pan Flat. There is much thermal activity too on what is supposed to be the site of the old Pink Terraces.

The completion of the North Island Main Trunk Railway has now brought the volcanoes within easy reach both of Wellington and Auckland, and year by year Ruapehu, Ngauruhoe, and the Tongariro Range are becoming favoured playgrounds for the more energetic class of holiday-makers. Ngauruhoe is apparently entering upon a period of renewed activity, and within the last four or five years there have been some fine volcanic displays from its crater. It is a perfect volcanic cone, 7515 feet high, and terminates the Tongariro Mountain Range to the southward—a range that has, within comparatively recent times, been the scene of tremendous volcanic energy. The desolate nature of the country on the eastern side of the mountain, and the vast extinct craters of the range itself, are now silent witnesses of the fiery activity of bygone ages.