d it is a
considerable wool depot. Our visit was of the briefest, as we took the
cars the same afternoon back to the Bluff, whence we were to sail
northward.

It is a curious fact, probably remembered by few of our readers, that
Franklin proposed in a printed article to colonize New Zealand from our
own country, so highly did he regard the possible advantages to be thus
derived. This plan, if it had been adopted, would have anticipated by
nearly a hundred years the action of the English Government in that
direction. As early as the year 1800 our whalers had learned to seek the
sperm whale in these waters, and to enter the harbors of New Zealand for
wood and water and to make necessary repairs. American sailors, as well
as others, shipped on board these vessels, and while in port here took
Maori mistresses; and the children who sprang from these unions became
numerous, their descendants being at once recognized to-day. Such have
generally sought European connections, and are occasionally found here
and there in all parts of the country, frequently engaged in the walks
of business life. It will be remembered that New Zealand did not become
a recognized British colony until the year 1840. For three quarters of a
century after Cook's first visit the native tribes remained in free
possession of their country. It is true that England was constructively
mistress of these islands by right of discovery, but she made no formal
assumption of political domain until the period already named, when it
was formed into a colony subordinate to the Government of New South
Wales. Up to the year 1840 English and American trading-vessels and
whalers bought and sold articles from the natives, mostly consisting of
flax (the wild growth of the country), for which they paid in fire-arms
and powder,--though the weapons thus disposed of to the Maoris were such
generally as had been condemned as useless in American or European
lands. The sale of fire-arms to the islanders was stopped as soon as the
English took formal possession; but in the mean time the Maoris had
possessed themselves of sufficient weapons to make them dangerous
enemies in the warfare which so soon became a settled condition of
affairs between them and the white invaders. As early as 1815 white men
of a venturous disposition began to settle in small numbers among the
natives; but often their fate was to be roasted and eaten by cannibals.
Before 1820 missionaries, no doubt influenc