covers it with blooming vegetation. The fecundity of the earth is wonderful: it springs easily into cultivation. Some small tracts have only a slight layer of mould lying on a rocky, untractable substratum, but even here the verdure thrives thick and rank. Sandy flats, which in regions less profusely irrigated would be naked and valueless, are here speedily overgrown, while the salt spray of the sea showering upon the green mantle that in some parts overlays the islands to the water's edge, does it no injury.

In this mild and agreeable climate man attains old age without pain, nor is he compelled ever to be on his guard against the influences of the weather. During three-fourths of the year the settler in the neighbourhood of Cook's Strait may sleep with his bedroom window open; but when violent winds and showers prevail, a small fire is by no means a superfluous luxury, especially as the colonists' residences are very often no more than partially wind-and-water-tight. With the exception of these intervals, occupation under the open sky is before all others the most healthy and pleasant. The luxuriant vegetation, the everlasting green of the trees and pastures, the atmosphere so transparent that objects can be discerned at an amazing distance, the varying tints of the sky, with the picturesque landscapes afforded by the harmonious mingling of hills, plains, lakes, and woods-all these delight the eye, and kindle the animal spirits. Herds and flocks may wander unhoused at all seasons of the year without excess of wet or bitter frosts to injure them.

Every climate of course has its incidental diseases; and in New Zealand the humidity causes sometimes ulcers, boils, abscesses, and eruptive affections, which, however, never assume a malignant character, and disappear without medical aid. Among the natives, from various causes foreign to the climate, carbuncles occur. The Europeans, when acclimatised, may be all but sure of health. Inflammatory complaints, strictly so called, are unknown; they almost always assume, when their symptoms do appear, the form of catarrh. No endemic disease exists. Influenza and croup occasionally appear as epidemics, and with careless people rheumatism is not uncommon. But, on the whole, no country on the earth is more salubrious. We do not find in it, as a traveller has observed, the bilious planter of the East or West Indies, or the aguish settler in the forests and on the river banks of South America. There are no epidemic or endemic fevers, as in the East and West Indies, and parts of the United States; no ague, no dreary winters, as in Canada; no hot winds, long droughts, conflagrations, snakes, and vermin, as in Australia. The pure air, continually in motion, invigorates the frame and buoys up the mind. Invalids rapidly recover. The thermal springs in the North Island indeed, with the attractive scenery and delightful atmosphere, present it as a healthy and picturesque place of sojourn for those who have worn down their constitution in the dangerous climates of the East.

The value of New Zealand consists rather in its soil, its climate, its position, and its commercial capabilities, than in its natural productions. The indigenous fruits of the earth are few, and not important; while those that have been introduced render it one of the richest countries in the world. It does not yield, indeed, spices or camphor, or all the luscious delicacies of the Oriental orchard; but it affords the growths of Europe, and that which

will purchase from the neighbouring East every rarity its inhabitants could desire to enjoy. Besides the mineral treasures we have noticed, it contains others most valuable to the English settler-abundance of water, timber, coal, lime, and stone of various kinds, the chief materials of industry. The soil is variously distributed over the surface of the country, supporting, as we have already remarked, various classes of indigenous vegetation. On the banks of streams, among the hilly tracts, a deep, rich, alluvial mould prevails, and in some of the valleys-that of the Hutt in Wellington District in particular—a pure black or brown sandy loam lies in a stratum so thick as to appear inexhaustible. Wherever dense forests exist, the same soil abounds. When the woods are cleared from parts covered only by a thin layer, this is often washed away by the rains, leaving nothing but a cold, clayey earth fit only for pasturage. To illustrate the effect, however, of climate or weather upon the soil, it may be mentioned that this, which is spread over the drier, hilly, and undulating districts, when well turned over, and subjected to the influence of the atmosphere, becomes extremely fertile. In other respects the same influence is remarkable. Sandy strips of land, which from their nature would in many other countries remain sterile and naked, are here by the natives planted with potatoes very successfully; stony hills, most impracticable in appearance, flourish with abundant crops of that nutritious vegetable.

One great drawback, nevertheless, to the agricultural capabilities of New Zealand is the fact, that even in the richest valleys or plateaus, where the forests have been cleared, the waters wash away the upper soil, laying bare the less liberal clay; but an improved system of husbandry, with the judicious rotation of crops, the use of proper fertilising appliances, and, above all, the careful regulation of the water - flow by drainage, all such inconvenience can be remedied: such at least is the opinion of wellinformed residents in the group. Industry can afford, however, to be vigorous in its exertions when the soil is so ready to reward it.

We may now approach the subject of the natural and acquired wealth of the province, and here its peculiar character should be remembered. We shall find it possessing many of the characteristics which Adam Smith pointed out with respect to England, and Sir Stamford Raffles, with modifications, in reference to Java. It is an agricultural, pastoral, and mineral country. First among the productions of the soil we may reckon timber, which in regions destined, as Lord John Russell once said, to give laws to a great part of the southern hemisphere, deserves to be considered as of great importance. The indigenous trees tower, many of them, to a prodigious height, producing timber in unequalled perfection-some close-grained, heavy, and durable, for domestic and public architecture; some fit for shipbuilding; others hard, light, of fine texture, and elegantly veined, for cabinetwork; and others indeed for every variety of purpose: the white, yellow, and red pine-the last with leaves like ostrich plumes; the totara, a reddish wood, with roots that take a beautiful polish; and many others, not known in Europe, which it would be useless minutely to describe. Some of the timber-trees bear fruit; others rich clusters of flowers, like the purple honeysuckle; others leaves like the myrtle, and blossoms with crimson petals and golden stamina. One produces leaves, affording a fragrant beverage resembling tea. All are in immense variety and abundance,

yielding materials for every kind of work. Beautiful furniture has been made in Edinburgh and London from some of these finely-grained, hardtextured, brilliantly-polished woods, several of which yield rich dyes, while others emit a grateful perfume. Among the trees which have been introduced are the oak, the ash, the horse-chestnut, the Spanish chestnut, the walnut, and several species of the mimosa. They appear to thrive well; but the experiment is not yet sufficiently mature to decide on the quality of the timber in its full development.

Equally important with the timber is the native flax of New Zealand, a peculiar plant, of which ten or twelve varieties have been found-some in the low marshes, others on the surface of rich alluvial plains, others on hill-sides barren of everything else. The largest kind has leaves ten or twelve feet in height, and tapering from three or five inches to a point. These never lie open, but are folded in a graceful curve, like huge eccentric seashells. Bunches of flowers grow from the stem with purple chalices full to the brim of a delicious syrup. Though it grows wild everywhere, it must be planted and cultivated with care, to be made available for manufacturing purposes. Fifty or sixty fern-plants exist in New Zealand. Their roots once formed an important article of food with the natives; but since the settlement of Europeans, so many materials of subsistence superior to them have been introduced, that the lordly Maories have abandoned to the wild hogs this humble provision, together with the root of the bulrush. From an edible pulp contained in the stem of one variety the early colonists used to make a very respectable imitation of apple-tart. The fruit of one shrub, called tutu, affords the natives an insipid but harmless wine; the seeds, however, are poisonous, and at particular seasons the leaves highly injurious to cattle. A few indigenous grasses occur, all of them perennial; but the scrub-flax and fern occupy the wide plains and slopes, where myriads of sheep and cattle might find pasture. An indigenous anise-seed grows in many parts, greatly improving the flesh of the animals feeding on it. European grasses, however, spread rapidly, and the native species promise soon to be altogether extinguished.

Like Australia, therefore, New Zealand is on the whole poor in natural vegetable growths. Only one indigenous fruit of any importance is known-the kiekie, a parasitical plant, bearing a cucumber-shaped fruit, said to come to perfection only once in three years. Poor as it is, however, in this respect, the country now possesses almost every vegetable produced in Great Britain, with many others transplanted from the exhaustless soil of the East. Captain Cook, it is believed, introduced potatoes more than seventy years ago: new varieties have been added from time to time to improve the quality. The root now thrives in great perfection, and the natives subsist principally upon it. In the poorer soils two crops are annually obtained. During the prevalence of the California gold-fever, speculators in Wellington bought large quantities of this vegetable for £5 a ton, shipped them, and sold them at San Francisco with a profit of 700 per cent.! A small sweet potato is also grown, and a small but delicious yam, which some suppose was brought by the Maories when they came to New Zealand from their original country, undetermined by ethnographers, in Polynesia. Maize was introduced before the islands were systematically colonised, and flourishes in great abundance, except

near Wellington, and in some of the more southern districts, where there is scarcely sufficient hot weather to ripen it. Melons, pumpkins, gourds, and others of the same class, wild oats, yellow trefoil, and other grasses, now prevail plentifully, affording abundant subsistence to man and the creatures which minister to his necessities. Every sort of grain known in Europe, with its numerous varieties, has been introduced. Wheat from an Egyptian mummy has been sown with great increase, and the blackbearded wheat with solid straw, so plentiful in the south of Spain. The corn grown in the Valley of the Hutt is of a quality so fine that it might be exported with advantage even to England. Its straw is nearly six feet high, and it yields an average of from forty-five to fifty bushels per acre. The ordinary qualities thrive to rich perfection in the alluvial valleys, and along the borders of streams where a fine soil prevails.

Oats are cultivated as much for the straw as the grain. Two crops of oaten straw are frequently cut in the course of a single year-the first yielding four tons and a half per acre. Hops and barley grow in great profusion, and if industriously cultivated would prove of immense importance to the colony. Free as the climate is from injurious electrical phenomena, and abounding as the islands do with pure wholesome water, they might supply Australia, India, and South America with malt liquor, of which it is calculated more than 100,000 barrels are annually exported from England. The moderately rich soil on the hill slopes is best adapted to this description of husbandry. As we have already said, almost every grass in the pastures of Great Britain has been introduced into New Zealand. Twenty-five species mingle on the Hawkshead Plains in Wellington District, carpeting them with a soft, beautiful covering, where herds of sleek cattle and thickly-fleeced sheep fatten all the year. When the curing of flesh for exportation to the neighbouring regions is undertaken on a large scale, this branch of husbandry will prove of eminent importance, and every emigrant carrying out good seed will be a benefactor to the colony.

Clover, saintfoin, trefoils of various kinds, vetches, tares, lupines, lucerns, beans, peas, buckwheat, lintseed, mustard, rapeseed, and mangel-wurzel thrive extremely well; and though coriander, caraway, and cress—which grow so abundantly on the fertile hundreds of Essex-have hitherto been neglected in New Zealand, they would no doubt afford an ample profit to the proprietors of land in the alluvial districts.

In the vegetable garden we find peas, broad beans, French beans, cauliflowers, carrots, turnips, broccoli, potatoes, celery, cucumbers, strawberries, tomatos, radishes, lettuces, parsnips, beet-root, spinach, onions, asparagus, sea-kale, artichokes, cardoons, rhubarb, capsicums; indeed everything of the kind grown in Great Britain.

Picottees, carnations, geraniums, polyanthuses, primroses, cowslips, crocuses, tulips, hyacinths, roses, pinks, pansies, dahlias, balsam, China asters, peonies, honeysuckle, violets, and almost all other European flowers flourish richly; and in December no sight can be more beautiful than the bloom of a New Zealand garden.

The orchard contains plums, apples, pears, figs, peaches, nectarines, grapes, currants, the common gooseberry, quinces, filberts, raspberries, apricots, cherries, and the Cape gooseberry-a wholesome, pleasant fruit, whether raw, cooked, or preserved, which thrives like a weed wherever it

is introduced. The banana, and a few others of an Oriental character, form immense orchards. Many fruits which are annual in England are biennial, or even perennial, in New Zealand; while others which we delicately rear in the hothouse, grow there vigorously in the open air. If the flower-garden be managed well it will shew a fine bloom all the year round. Geraniums, as in Portugal, take the shape of shrubs; hedges even are formed of them; and if the varieties are judiciously mixed, this beautiful fence of verdure will throughout all the season be spangled with bright flowers. Considerable plantations of tobacco have been raised by the natives; but the manufacture of it, even for consumption among themselves, has not yet been attempted by the colonists.

If Australia be poor in the animal creation, New Zealand is still more So. No beasts or reptiles native to its soil, except bats and lizards, are found upon it. In the neighbouring seas, however, abound those mammalia which crowd all parts of the Pacific Ocean—the sperm, the humpback, the fin-back, the pike-headed, the large-tipped, and the black whale, frequent its coasts, and their capture for the valuable oil and bone afforded to the early colonists their most adventurous and profitable occupations. Seals of numerous kinds formerly abounded in Cook's Strait and off the shores of Middle Island, but the sealers since 1827 have nearly exterminated them: this has doubtless been through an inconsiderate plan of fishery; for by judicious arrangements, leaving the seals in breeding seasons unmolested, this source of profit might have been perpetuated. The conger-eel, sole, plaice, and flounder, inhabit the waters, with an infinite variety of others unknown to Europe-a kind of shark or dogfish, some like the cod, others the doree, others the mullet. Immense fisheries might be established, especially as salt is easily procured by evaporation; and a large and lucrative market is offered among the Roman Catholics of the west coast of America, of Manilla, and of Australia.

It was

Several kinds of birds are indigenous to the woods and neighbouring waters of New Zealand-among them a gigantic albatross, the oystercatcher, the bittern, the kingfisher, cormorant, quail, wild-duck, mocking or parson bird, parrots, paroquets, woodhen, pigeon, and others; some of them with superb plumage. There have been introduced peafowl, pheasants, turkeys, geese, ducks, common fowl, Guinea - fowl, canaries, and bullfinches. The varieties kept in cages for their song are continually increased by the favourites which emigrant families carry out with them. A degenerate mongrel-breed of dogs exists in the islands. probably introduced by the early voyagers, and is used by the natives in the chase of the wild-hog. The skins of those with silky white hair are made into garments by some of the wilder Maorie tribes, and tufts from them adorn their spears. Bulldogs, kangaroo-dogs-a mixture of greyhound and mastiff-Scotch deer-hounds, German boar-hounds, Scotch colly sheep-dogs, Newfoundlands, terriers, and spaniels, thrive well, and are rapidly multiplying. It is remarkable that distemper and hydrophobia have been hitherto unknown among the dogs of New Zealand. Horses are already supplied in considerable numbers to New South Wales, and a swift, strong, hardy breed is furnished to the cavalry regiments in India. Cattle have been introduced from Australia and Van Diemen's Land, as well as some Devon bulls and cows. Beef and pork might be cured in great quantities,