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attention than a mess-dinner or the style of an uniform coat. He has not indeed to tell us "of cutting foreign throats, of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades," for his residence in New Zealand was in truth wholly pacific; but he has a great deal to say of the character, the habits, and the condition of the natives of that island, and something of its natural productions and climate. He appears to have collected, during his sojourning among the New Zealanders, much more accurate information than we before possessed of the people and their country; and though we may be told that there is, after all, little variety in the features of savage life, yet it certainly is an object of some moment to gain the report of a sensible observer upon a great island, whose shores have already attracted the frequent resort of our vessels for their whale-fisheries and timber, and which is likely to become of increasing importance in connection with our neighbouring colonies. His narrative, besides, is thoroughly unpretending and modest. The interesting matter which it contains might perhaps be compressed into a smaller compass, but we entirely approve of the form which he has adopted, of a journal; because he simply tells us facts, and we prefer, and his readers will do so likewise, to extract their spirit for ourselves. He might have chosen, after the fashion, the curse of modern travelling and voyaging, to have inflicted a quarto upon us; and we thank him that he has not. He might have diluted the essence of his remarks in an ocean of insipidity, and we are his debtors that this he has not done.

The occasion of Major Cruise's visit to Australia was, as we should conceive, not the most pleasant of all duties. To dimi nish the expence attendant upon the transport of convicts to New South Wales, as well as with the humane design of affording them the comforts of a large ship during their voyage, it was determined by Government to make the experiment of sending out a considerable number in a king's vessel, and the Dromedary store-ship was selected for that purpose. After completing her voyage, she was to proceed to New Zealand, and procure a cargo of the fine timber of that island. The author sailed in the Dromedary, in command of a strong military guard, which was necessary to restrain the lawless spirits embarked in her, to the number of nearly four hundred. The outward voyage was attended with nothing remarkable, and Major Cruise commences his journal with the departure of the vessel from Port Jackson for New Zealand. But, from the difficulty of finding timber of the size and quality required, in situations where it could be embarked with convenience, and

from the impossibility of inducing the capricious natives to cooperate with earnestness in the work, the crew of the Dromedary, after their arrival at New Zealand, passed ten months on the coast, before they could complete their lading; and during this time Major Cruise was of course at liberty to indulge his curiosity among the natives. The imposing force of the Dromedary overawed their disposition to violence and treachery, and rendered an intercourse safe and easy, which would have been attended with serious danger, or rather would have been impossible, for a passenger in a mere trading vessel. We shall remark only that the object of the Dromedary's voyage was at last accomplished; Major Cruise's brief account of the timber, which was considered sufficiently valuable to be sought in this distant quarter of the globe, we give in his own words:

"The immense spars requisite for making the top-masts of the larger classes of ships in the navy, had become so extravagant in price, and so scarce in Europe, that it was necessary to look for them elsewhere. Captain Cook had mentioned in his voyages, that he thought the timber he had seen in New Zealand, if light enough, would make the finest masts for ships in the world; persons who subsequently visited this island had confirmed his opinion, and a small spar which was brought from thence to England by the Catherine whale-ship, was much approved of, and purchased for a foretop gallant-mast for the Dromedary. It was well tried during its return to its native country, and proved itself to be, in seamen's phrase, a stick of first rate quality.

66 It may be proper here to observe, that two kinds of trees are known in New Zealand, which, from the circumstance of their growing to an immense height without a branch, are considered fit for masts of large ships: the one is called by the natives Kaikaterre, the other, Cowry, or Cowdy. The Kaikaterre is found in low swampy ground, frequently on the banks of rivers, and is, on that account, easy to procure; it produces a leaf like the yew, and a red berry. The Cowry, to which the inhabitants of the island give a decided preference, grows on dry ground, and often on the tops of the highest hills; its leaf, though considerably larger, is not unlike that of our box-tree; it produces a cone, and yields abundance of rosin. Some of the Cowry trees which we measured, rose one hundred feet from the ground without a single branch, and afterwards headed almost as umbrageously as the lime; the stems of others, not so tall, gave a circumference of forty feet.

"The Cowry was the timber which the Dromedary was directed, if possible, to bring home, and as it is requisite that every spar fit to make a top-mast for the larger ships of the navy, should be from seventy-four to eighty-four feet long, from twenty-one to twenty-three inches in diameter, and perfectly straight, the success of the attempt in

a great measure depended upon the proximity of the trees to the water's edge, and also in no small degree upon the friendly disposition of the natives.". P. 2.

The general result of Major Cruise's residence in New Zealand has certainly been to impress him with a favourable opinion of the country; and we collect from the general tone of his remarks, that he considers it to offer many inducements for colonization. The soil appears to be generally good, and well watered, and in many places very rich. The natives themselves, in their rude agriculture, raise great quantities of the sweet and common potatoe; at the house of one of the missionaries, who had but lately established himself among the people, Major Cruise ate excellent bread made of wheat grown in the neighbourhood; and he observed promising crops of Indian corn. Of the potatoe, it was evident that two crops might easily be raised in the year. The useful plants left by Captain Cook, viz. cabbages, turnips, parsnips, carrots, &c. our author found still numerous, but much degenerated. Pease and water-melons were raised with great success while the Major was on the island; and the missionaries had peach trees in good bearing. New Zealand produces naturally a flax of very fine and silky quality, of which the natives weave their clothing, or mats. The soil, in its pristine state, except in the wooded districts, is usually covered with heath and fern, and very little natural grass was observed. But an herbage of very nutritive quality must grow among the high fern, for some cows and sheep which the missionaries had imported from New South Wales were in good condition; and the draught bullocks brought in the Dromedary from the same quarter, and employed with timber-carriages, in conveying the spars to the water-edge, were found to fatten upon the native pastures. The hog thrives well, as it does almost everywhere; and domestic fowls are easily raised.

Of the temperature and general character of the climate, Major Cruise has enabled us to judge in some measure for ourselves, by a regular diary of the state of the weather; which he has advantageously thrown into a connected table at the end of the volume. To judge from the variations of the thermometer during the ten months of his residence, we should pronounce the climate to be admirably adapted to an English constitution. The heat very rarely exceeded 74° of Fahrenheit, and the extreme cold was never below 40°. But in fact the whole winter did not produce twelve days of lower temperature than 50o; and, during the greater part of the year, the

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thermometer seldom varied farther than between 58° and 70°.. We should suppose the climate to be, on the whole, humid; and, indeed, it is a proof of this, that the verdure of the country continued unimpaired throughout the whole year. The proportion of fine weather, however, was by no means small; and we find no complaints of sickness, nor any facts to induce a suspicion of unhealthiness. The season begins to grow cold in April, and the depth of the winter falls about the middle of July.

Of the parts of the eastern coast of New Zealand examined by the Dromedary, Major Cruise considers that the country on the Thames affords the most favourable situation for colonizing. The western bank of that river he describes as level, and clear of wood, intersected with deep and navigable rivers, and the people well-disposed and most anxious for Europeans to settle among them. One of the most beautiful islands," says he, "we ever saw, extending several miles in a parallel direction to the Magoia shore, was offered to us by its chief, when we lay near it in the schooner, for a single musket." continues:

`66

And he

"With reference to the western coast, though, from motives of prudence, the Dromedary did not go into Shukehangar, the river was, at different times, minutely surveyed; and the harbour, for ships drawing less water than ours, was found to be perfectly safe and commodious. Here the facility of getting cowry is much greater than in any other part of the country that afterwards fell under our observation. It grows in greater profusion; and it was remarked that the north-east gales, which made so much havoc on the eastern coast, abated much of their violence before they reached this point of the island; and the climate was less humid. There are large tracts of arable land on the banks of a branch of the river called the Mangamooka, which runs very far inland; and we observed that the potatoes grown upon it were larger and drier than those got on the eastern coast. The gentle manners of its inhabitants at once attracted our notice; nor had we any occasion to change our opinion. Honest, industrious, and generous, when all hope of the Dromedary visiting their river had vanished, they carried their baskets of potatoes on their backs to Wangarood, (a distance of thirty miles,) and frequently left the price they were to be paid for them to our own. discretion." P. 289.

Notwithstanding the partiality of our author for the New Zealanders, over which we have more than once been tempted to smile, we cannot think that the general tenor of his own evidence is calculated to remove the reproach of ferocity and

treachery from their character. It may be true, as he argues, with regard to the destruction of the crew of the Boyd, and other minor instances of their atrocity, that great outrages are often committed upon them by the masters and seamen of merchant vessels. But he is himself constrained to attribute the safety with which he and other persons belonging to the Dromedary mingled with the natives, to the awe inspired among them by the numerical force of that vessel, and to their conviction that any violence would be followed by summary punishment. One fact against them, at least, is decidedly established by this journal, if indeed there had been room for doubt on the subject: their horrible propensity to cannibalism, not merely as a superstition, or in the indulgence of ferocious vengeance, but, to use Major Cruise's own expression, as a sensual animal gratification. A chief confessed to the author, (p. 37.) that his tribe eat the bodies of some enemies whom they had slain. When men of rank among them die, a certain number of the enslaved, or Helot part of the population are sacrificed, in proportion to the dignity of the deceased, and afterwards devoured. Upon one occasion, (p. 109.) the body of a recently murdered child was found concealed under a mat by some of the Dromedary's crew. Two or three days afterwards, to investigate the truth of the account given by these men, a party of the officers went to the same place, and discovered only about half the body remaining. The chief of the village gave a very embarrassed and contradictory explanation of the circumstance, and affirmed the body to be that of the child of a cookee, or slave, to whom the decency of burial could not be allowed; and he pretended that the dogs had partially devoured it. At another period, (p. 118.) a party of warriors arrived at the anchorage of the Dromedary with some prisoners taken by them in battle against a hostile tribe. They suddenly disappeared, and it was positively stated by the natives in the neighbourhood, and by members of their own tribe, that they were gone into the interior to devour their captives without intrusion or molestation. Some time after this, (p. 177.) some gentlemen of the Dromedary happened to be passing through the village of Rangehoo, when the people were making a cannibal feast, over the body of a cookee who had been executed for some alleged crime. The party observed the natives particularly active in throwing their mats over some object round which they were sitting, when they saw the strangers approach. The gentlemen, of course, continued their walk without appearing to notice what they had seen; but a sailor belonging to the Catherine whale-ship, who followed at some

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