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FLAX, timber, seals and whales
gave the more adventurous fruitful
opportunities for the development
of trade and even sporadic settlement. Kauri
spars for ships abounded in the
North
Island. Flax drew expeditions from Sydney to
the shores of New Zealand. More cosmopolitan still was the whaling and
sealing community, which, led by
Americans, scoured waters varying from the inlets of the tepid
Bay of Islands to the icy narrows of
Dusky Sound.
The sealing gangs, often
abandoned by the master of their
ship, were too much concerned with their work and the trials of
providing food and shelter in their isolation to interest themselves in
the exploration of the interior.
Whaling crews were even less inclined to travel inland; for the
most part they operated from the ships, and it was not till the late
twenties and the early thirties that the
first shore stations sprang up in
both islands. The part the shore whalers played in the development
of the interior was indirect; their existence attracted
other Europeans to
New Zealand, and their
settlements were a useful approach to the new
land.
A sprinkling of
deserters and escaped convicts mingled with
the traders and the whalers. The community found business and pleasure
with the Maoris; sometimes they
met in harmony, occasionally in bloodshed. But, with the coming
of missionaries, for every group of riotous whites to
corrupt the Maoris, there was a
mission station as a
civilising influence.
The country was also visited
at this time by other navigators, Dumont d’Urville, for example,
the French navigator, who did
useful work on the
coastline. His work is commemorated in the names of French Pass,
D’Urville Island, and Astrolabe
Roads.
Then hard on their heels came
the real forerunners of the organised settlers. Typical of the
forerunners were the Deans brothers who settled in Canterbury in 1843,
and prospered as sturdy inhabitants of plains till then untrodden by
white men.
The time was now ripe
for work to begin in the interior.
Dumont d'Urville's 'Astrolabe' is seen making in
1827 the dangerous passage of the French Pass, between D'Urville
Island and and the mainland, one of the French navigator's principal
discoveries. Rocks and a tide rip make this straight difficult even
for a modern steam ship. The 'Astrolabe' had to anchor many times, and
twice went around while negotiating it. These lithographs by de
Sainson were published in the 'Voyage of the Astrolabe.'
The 'Astrolabe,' cruising in the Bay of Plenty in a
storm, was seen in a sudden clearing of the mist to be nearly on a
reef. By clapping on more sail, the danger was narrowly avoided.
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'There she blows' - a familiar
scene in a whaler's life.
A roll of flax prepared for the
European traders.
A Kauri tree on the ranges of
the Coromandel Peninsula.
Half-castes of a North
Island pa, a lithograph from Commander R.A. Oliver's 'Sketches in New
Zealand' (1852)
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