Blanche Edith Baughan

“ Just a-layin’ there on the sand one was, all as quiet! for all the world like a long silver sash-ribbon. . . . Eh, I remember I did wish it was a sash . . . wouldn’t I ha’ got it round me quick if it had been! though a rare sight it would ha’ made, to be sure, a-tyin’ in a dungaree over-all. ”

“ The want o’ too much jam on your bread don’t make everythin’ else sweet, so far as I can see; an’ ours was a rough life, an’ a narrow. It’s good to think as the children can be taught. It’s good to think as the men needn’t now to drop asleep all wore out, or to stay awake fit for nothin’ but liquor, after the tough day’s work o’ sawin’ or burnin’; an’ to know that the women can have their washin’ machines an’ their sewin’ machines, an’ stoves—yes, an’ their pianos, too, an’ their time to think as there’s somethin’ else in the world besides children an’ the Bay. ”

“ We’d make tea out of all kinds of Bush things, manuka for choice; an’ for tobacco the men would grind up different kinds o’ bark; but, bless you, they never seemed to get no satisfaction out o’ ne’er a-one an’ ’twould be grumble, grumble, grumble amongst ’em until the boat got back—about as good company as a teethin’ baby is a baccy-lovin’ man without his pipe. Clothes? Well, we’d have a roll o’ dungaree down at a time, an’ everythin’ made from that, pants an’ jumpers, an’ skirts an’ bodies’, an’ all-round pinnies for us children—I can’t remember that we ever wore anythin’ else in the summer ”

“ The tumble, an’ the sight of her own blood scared her so as to save her; for a-lookin’ up an’ around an’ all ways for somethin’ to help, there she sees the chimney; an’ lively wi’ fright, she does what she’d never ha’ thought, most-like, o’ doin’, else—she scrambles up that chimney, an’ out, an’ down the other side, an’ comes to mother, all over bruises an’ blood (my word! she was a sight) , but anyway, safe from Joe. Mother she kep’ her till it was evenin’ an’ she could get away to her own people, an’ they smuggled her out o’ the Bay, an’ Joe never got her again. ”

“ For you left all your friends behind you, an’ you knew you could never get back no more for to see ’em; leastways, people like mother couldn’t. That was why it was best all to come in a family, when you could, fathers an’ mothers, an’ brothers an’ sisters, an’ the little children—all together, an’ all a-lookin’ the same way. ”

“ But I’m not a-goin’ to give in to it, for all that, as you’ve a-got all the meat while we had all the shell. There’s many a worse thing to be had in this world than light hearts, an’ good nature, an’ neighbourliness; besides, we’ve all of us grown up tough an’ hearty, an’ done our day’s work in the world. ”

“ Three fine fat pigs he got for nothin’ that way, an’ goodness knows how many more it might ha’ been, but that one mornin’, very early, before any of us was up, we heard a great squealin’ o’ pigs up at the pa, an’ mother, she says, ‘I doubt Larry won’t get much more Maorified pork, an’ a very good thing, too; for they seem to be killing the lot.’ An’ then, while we was a-dressin’, we saw their biggest canoe a-goin’ out the Bay, an’ ‘There goes the Maori pigs up to Town,’ says mother again. ”

“ You’d ha’ thought the sow-thistle would ha’ ruined the taste of everythin’, nasty, bitter stuff; but it didn’t.
“How them Maoris did use to catch fish too! They was the ones, my word! I’ve a-seen a Maori man a-layin’ down on a rock over the sea with a bare hook in his hand, no bait—an’ him a-bendin’ over, an’ a shoal of fishes a-passin’ underneath, an’ him a-haulin’ of ’em out with this ’ere hook, same as I might spoon dumplin’s out of a pot. An’ the Maori women too—how I did like to see them women a-catchin’ eels! ”

“ Mother she didn’t. Anybody say anythin’ to the natives about it? No, how could they? But I can tell you one thing though—Taipo didn’t trouble the pa much after that.
“Well, well! the pa itself is gone now, an’ there’s the cheese-factory in its place; an’ you’ve church every week, an’ a public hall an’ library, an’ a couple o’ stores; an’ a steamer a-callin’ every other day for to bring you mails from Town, an’ the mornin’ paper, an’ baker’s bread, my word! an’ to carry you off for to see your grannies any time you’ve a mind. Civilisation on tap, as you may say. ”

“ But, O dearie me! it wasn’t the Maori pigs as had gone to Town. When father went down for to feed ’em, he found it was ours! ours, an’ that thief of a Larry’s! It seems, the natives they’d tumbled at last to the Taipo business, an’ this here was the way they was a-settlin’ the fresh-pork bill, an’ a-havin’ their little joke all in one—they’d stole all our pigs before we was up, killed ’em in our very ears, an’ sent ’em up to town afore our very eyes, an’ that at the rate o’ ten to three. ”

“ Yes, there she sat an’ cried, nor I don’t wonder at it—no more I don’t; an’ couldn’t be got even to look towards our hut, much less to go into it, whatever poor father could do; an’ I sat there with her, while they got the chests and things out of the boat, an’ cried too, for company, at first; only presently there was a two-three children come a-runnin’ out o’ one o’ the other huts, an’ them an’ me stood a-lookin’ at each other. ”