I am particular in styling Auckland a "city," and not a "town," for were I to use the latter term I should expect to earn the undying hostility of all true Aucklanders. It is a point they are excessively touchy upon, and as the city and its suburbs contains a population of more than twenty thousand—increasing annually at an almost alarming rate—it were as well for me to be particular. We take a stroll or two about the city in company with a colonial friend, who obligingly acts as our cicerone.
The wharf is naturally the first point of interest to new-comers. It stretches continuously out into the river from the lower end of Queen Street, and is over a quarter of a mile in length. It is built of wood, and has several side-piers or "tees," whereat ships discharge and take in cargo. The scene is always a busy one; and in the evening the wharf is a favourite promenade with citizens.
Out in the river, lying at anchor, is the good ship that brought us here, and not far from her are a couple of others, one of which will shortly sail for England. Puffing its way between these vessels is a little white cock-boat of a steamer, that seems tolerably well crowded with men, whose white sun-helmets and yellow silk coats give quite an Indian air to the scene. These persons are probably business men coming over in the ferry-boat from North Shore, where we can see some of their villas from the wharf.
Lying alongside the wharf are one or two vessels of considerable tonnage, loading or discharging cargo, while at their respective tees, whereon are offices and goods-sheds, are several fine steamers of moderate size. These ply in various directions, taking passengers chiefly, but also goods. Some go and come between Auckland and Grahamstown, or Coromandel, in the Hauraki Gulf; others go to Tauranga, the Bay of Plenty, Napier, Wellington, and the South Island; one or two go northward to Mahurangi, Whangarei, the Bay of Islands, Whangaroa, and Mongonui.
The splendid and sumptuously fitted-up Pacific liners that call here once a month, on their way between "Frisco," Hawaii, Fiji, and Sydney, are none of them in the harbour at present; but there, at the extreme end of the wharf, lies The Hero, the Sydney packet, and a magnificent steam-ship is she. All the schooners, cutters, and craft of small tonnage that fill up the scene, and crowd alongside the wharf and its tees, are coasting or Island traders.
There is one from the Fijis with cotton, coffee, and fresh tropical fruits; there is another from the Friendlies with copra and cocoa-nut fibre, which she will shortly transfer to some ship loading for England; and there is the Magellan Cloud, fresh from a successful whaling cruise in Antarctic Seas. There is a vessel from Kororareka with coal and manganese, or kauri-gum; there are others from Mahurangi with lime, from Whangarei with fat cattle, from Tauranga with potatoes, from Poverty Bay with wool, from the Wairoa with butter and cheese, from Port Lyttelton with flour, or raw-hides for the Panmure tannery, from Dunedin with grain or colonial ale, and so on and so on.
Just off the wharf, and facing the river at either corner of Queen Street, are two large and handsome hotels, while to right and left on the river frontage are sundry important commercial edifices. Passing to the left as we leave the wharf, we come to several extensive timber-yards, and to a long jetty, used exclusively as a timber-wharf. The immense piles of sawn timber lying here give to us new-chums some notion of the vast timber-trade of Northern New Zealand, especially since we learn that much which goes to the South Island and elsewhere is shipped direct from Whangaroa, Hokianga, the Kaipara, and other ports in the north. The road along the river front, here, is shortly brought up abruptly at the base of a lofty bluff, whereon is a church and other buildings, near the site of old Fort Britomart.
Retracing our steps, we enter Queen Street, the main street of the city. All the lower portion of it abutting on to the wharf was, we are told, reclaimed from swamp and mud only a very few years ago. The street is a fine one, leading straight away from the river, curving imperceptibly to the right, and gradually ascending for about a mile, until it branches off into other streets and roads. Down at the lower end of the street most of the buildings are of brick and stone; and some of them are of tolerably fine architecture. There are banks and warehouses and merchants' stores of all kinds, interspersed with hotels and public buildings. Higher up Queen Street, and in the cross-streets, stone and brick edifices are less numerous, and wooden houses more plentiful.
The broad, well-paved thoroughfare is crowded at certain times of the day with carriages, cabs, buggies, omnibuses, equestrians, express-carts, waggons, drays, and every species of vehicle. The side-walks are thronged with passengers, who pass up and down under the awnings that stretch from the houses across the wide pavement. Many of the shop-windows would do no discredit to Oxford Street or the Strand, either as respects their size or the goods displayed in them.
Some distance up Queen Street, and turning a little out of it, is the Market House, where a very fine show of fruit, vegetables, and other eatables is frequently to be seen; and then there is the United Service Hotel, at the corner of Wellesley Street, which is a structure that Aucklanders point to with pride, as evidence of their progress in street architecture. At night, when the gas is lit in the streets, the shops, and the saloons, and one mingles with the crowd that throngs them, or pours into the theatre, the Choral Hall, the Mechanics' Institute, the Oddfellows' Hall, or other places of amusement, instruction, or dissipation, it is almost possible sometimes to imagine oneself back in the old country, in the streets of some English town.