As strangers, we are invited to occupy the seats of honour—on the box beside the driver. There are no lady passengers to snatch the coveted post from us. Dandy Jack says to me—
"Of course, I should prefer to have a lady beside me, but, somehow, I'm always glad when there arn't any. It's a grave responsibility—a grave responsibility!"
Whilst we are endeavouring to evolve the meaning of this mysterious remark—it is not until a while later that we fully comprehend it—preparations are being made for the start. Four ungroomed, unshod horses are hitched on, and their plunging and capering shows they are impatient to be off. Our driver's lieutenant, Yankee Bill, mounts a fifth horse, and prepares to act as outrider. Then Dandy Jack, loudly shouting, "All aboard! All abo-ard!" springs to his seat, gathers up the reins, without waiting to see whether every one has obeyed his injunction or not, bids the men who are holding the cattle stand clear, gives a whoop and a shake of his whip, and then, with a jolt and a lurch and a plunge, off we go.
Hitherto we have seen nothing of the settlement, except the hotel and the goods warehouse on the bank above the wharf. These appear to have been shot down into the middle of a moorland wilderness. But now, as the coach surmounts some rising ground, several homesteads come into view, scattered about within a distance of one or two miles. Beyond the paddocks surrounding these, all of the country that is visible appears to be covered with tall brown fern, and a low brushwood not unlike heather.
As we go lumbering up the rise we are passed by a young lady riding down towards the hotel. Very bright and pretty she looks, by contrast with the rough surroundings. Quite a lovely picture, in her graceful riding-habit of light drab, and her little billycock hat with its brilliant feather. So think we all, especially our gallant Jehu, who bows profoundly in response to a nod of recognition, and turns to look admiringly after the fair equestrian.
Then, upon the right, we look down upon the great feature of the district, Mr. Lamb's flour-mill and biscuit-factory. In this establishment are made crackers that are well-known and much esteemed far beyond the limits of New Zealand. The Riverhead manufacture is known in the South Sea and Australia. The factory stands on the bank of the creek, having water-power and a water highway at its door. It is a large structure, mostly of timber, with a tall chimney of brick. Near it is the residence of the proprietor, and a row of houses inhabited by his employès. The whole is surrounded by a grove of choice trees and shrubs, by gardens and paddocks, evidently in a high state of cultivation. Beyond tower the brown and shaggy ranges, and all around is the uncouth moorland. It is an oasis in the desert, this green and fertile spot, a Tadmor in the wilderness.
Yet when we make some remarks, as new-chums will, about the apparent richness of the land down there, a settler, who sits behind, takes us up rather shortly. He appears to consider Mr. Lamb's estate as a positive offence. "Bone-dust and drainage!" he says with a snort of contempt. It seems that the land about us is considered to be of the very poorest quality, sour gum-clay; and any one who sets about reclaiming such sort is looked upon as a fool, at least, although, in this case, it is evident that the cultivation is merely an ornamental subsidiary to the factory.
But these poor lands are only bad comparatively. Much of the soil in them is better by far than that of many productive farms at home; only our colonial pioneer-farmers have no notion of any scientific methods in agriculture. They have been spoilt by the wondrous fertility of the rich black forest mould, and the virgin volcanic soils. They will continue to regard manuring and draining and so forth as a folly and a sin almost, until the population becomes numerous, and all the first-class lands are filled up.
Fresh from high-dried systems and theories of agriculture as practised in Great Britain, we are dumbfounded by the tirade against manuring, and the revolutionary ideas which our coach-companion further favours us with. We are evidently beginning to learn things afresh, though this is our first day in the bush.
By the way, I must explain this term to English readers. "Bush" has a double signification, a general and a particular one. In its first and widest sense it is applied to all the country beyond the immediate vicinity of the cities or towns. Thus, Riverhead may be described as a settlement in the "bush," and our road lies through the "bush," though here it is all open moorland. But, in a more particular way, "bush" simply indicates the natural woods and forests. A farmer up-country, who says he has been into the "bush" after cattle, means that he has been into the forest, in contradistinction to his own cleared land, the settlement, or the open country.