VIEWS OF THE WEST COAST SCENERY.

Inangahua Times, Volume X, Issue 1536, 3 June 1885, Page 2

VIEWS OF THE WEST COAST SCENERY.

The beauties of the West Coast have hitherto been made known to strangers chiefly through the medium I of the excellent photographs prod need j by Messrs Bnrton Brotiiers anil others ; | but some pictures have lately come j under our notice which enable a still more intimate acquaintance to be. made with the scenery embosomed in the slops' of the great mountains that boond our western horizon. Theso photographs are the work of Mr J, Ring, of Greymonth, who has spent * considerable portion of his time travelling about the Coast in the pursuit of his vocation. The result of his *♦ travels in search of the picturesque " are embodied in a varied and remarkably interesting collection of Coast views, which cover a much wider area than the work of any master of the camera we have yet seen. Mr Ri"g makes a specialty of raining pictures. His views of hydraulic nozzl«s at work on the placer mines of Kumara, the labyrinth of flaming at Dilloianstown, the quartz batteries, with their great water-wheels, and pictures, give a better idea of what gold- mining is like, its difficulties, dangers, and the immense expenditure of money, labour, brains and patience, and anything short of an actual visit to the scenes themselves can do. Mr Ring lias numberless views of the West Coast road, of course, but some of them are quite novel. There are one or two little bits of the Otira Gorge in which some striking effects of light and shade are obtained. The •• Grry River in Flood" (and a bigflood, *too)..with the melancholy ruins of tliat conspicuous monument to engineering folly, the Cobden bridge, given an idea of what a Coast river is like after the nor'-wester has cone down in all itsfury. Othorviews arive so«nes on th« Buller, one of the most remarkable rivers in the Island, and Mr Ring is just now engaged improving his. acquaintance with this district, whioh uwgjhf •%■/ result in * striking

addition to the regular stock views of the CoMt. Along the little-known overland road to Nelson, which follows ! the coarse of the Boiler for many miles, it to be found scenery second only te that of the Otira Gorge, though widely different in character. Everywhere along the river can be seen most wonderful beds ef fetns of extraordinary delicacy of foliage and diver- j sity of tint — in fact, were the place ] not so far away, it would he a perfect j Paradise for fern-hnnters. Then the river for many wiles is as an like what we usually understand by a New Zea land river as possible. The district, wh«n thoroughly opened np by a skilful photographer like Mr Ring, ought to I prove a perfect treasure miue of pic.tnres. Another queer-looking photograph sjiows the littl« cage which j travels on wires across the Terej makau .at a point almost on the 1 seashore itself, and where the building i of a bridge would be a highly exprni- ! give operation. Travellers to Oreymouth all have to cross th is sarial ferry, , which was described, if we remember j rightly, in ih« Scientific American as' [one of the most ingenious pieces of ■bcha.-ii&m of the kind ever' devised. fThe photographs give an exact repres entation of the cage as it appears slung in the air. There ar<; a good many ; pictures of this kiud at once striking : and new to the general public to be. found in Mr Rin»'s collection, and is is not surprising to hear that th« tourists who visit the West Coast in yearly increasing numbers eagerly hoy up the. products of his camera a* fast as they can be supplied. We fancy that were he to introduce them to the notice of residents on this side of the island they would find as ready a sal* as those of hitherto better known artiste. — Lyttel ton Times.