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101

On the 25th February we went down to Earshell Gove, which is part of Useless Harbour, about three miles south-east of our house, and camped there, to cut a track up Mount Phillips. The spurs are very steep, so that it is not easy to find a way up. However, we got out of the bush on to the tussock on the evening of the 27th, but it was too late to climb the peak, so we started early next morning from our tent on the beach, and got out on the (bush-line, 2,000 ft.) tussock at 9 a.m.; but the wind had got up, and we were in danger of being blown away, so we had to come down again and wait for better weather—which was very slow in coming, for all March has been very rough and wet. However, we went down, and camped at Earshell on the evening of the 28th, to be ready for an early start. Next day was just about as fine a day as ever was in Dusky, and we had a pleasure trip. All along the tops of the spurs and up the peak there is a great extent of tussock of a peculiar kind. It grows a fine crop of seed in little husks, like wild oats, but the seed inside the husk is naked, like little grains of wheat. We were up on this tussock country three times, but saw no signs of life above the bush except parrakeets, and the tracks of rats, both after the seed, I suppose. From the eastern spur I could almost throw a stone into Duck Cove, and from the peak we could see the greater part of Resolution Island like a map. It seems to have high mountains all round the coast, with much lower and smoother land in the centre, the outlets being Duck and Cormorant Creeks. Between Useless Harbour and the sound we could see a nice little fresh-water lake. We tried to get at it twice, but the swell prevented us from leaving the boat in safety; but next time I will cut a track to it from Useless Harbour, and then I will locate it on the map. When at home we spend our time improving our homestead. My man does the clearing and burning, and he has a long job in a small space, for the timber is dense and heavy, and hard to burn. The neck of the peninsula at our house is nearly paved with Maori ovens, mostly very old, for they are a spade deep under the peaty soil; and often there are patches of gravel laid down to save the mud, just as we have done ; also a patch floored with the stems of fern-trees, which are very durable. Part of this we allowed to remain. The relics are a big piece of rust in the form of a home-made spike-nail, which was on the surface; a Maori chisel, neatly ground, which I dug up at our door, near a big stone, on which the Maori had laid his sharping-stone until it was covered, up with earth. No sign of crockery or broken glass here, nor anything to indicate that the wreck party* stayed here ; so we have not found their camp yet, nor do I think the Maoris have lived here since the wreck, or we would have found some scraps of her metal. When we were up the sound we saw king-fish, mackerel, and baracouta. The king-fish were big fellows, perhaps 401b. weight, but we did not catch any. I propose to go and camp out next week near Passage Point, and do some dredging for Dr. Parker. We have done a little here, but it is so full of stones and weed that we find almost nothing in our dredge. At the head of Dusky Sound we saw a great many grey-ducks, and a few paradise-ducks and teal. The mouth of the river, which courses from the north, is all broken up into creeks and swampy islands covered with scrub —an ideal breeding-place—where the ducks have a happy home, for there are no swamp-hawks, and very few gulls. The grey-ducks, at least, could go over the mountains for their breakfast if there was encouragement on that side in the way of food, and then the people would wonder where on earth all the ducks came from. The sealers told me that the head of Nancy's Sound was the greatest place of all for ducks. There are very few paradise-ducks in Dusky Sound, because there is so little grass ; sometimes they rear a family on a few yards square of grass. The old ones may fly to all the grass in the sound, which may not total one acre in extent, and poor grass at that. The rye-grass that we have sown on our clearing grows the richest and the quickest I have ever seen, but there are numbers of seedling forest-trees and shrubs growing up with it. Perhaps some animal would eat those down and give the grass a chance to continue; and I think a few goats and an open grass-flat would foster hundreds of paradise-ducks here, for they seem to require only a little grass, and get most of their food from the beaches. I could have burned some fine patches last summer, but I thought it might be disapproved, so I burned only a very few small pieces and sowed some grass-seed, which promises well so far. I think it would be a good plan to try and turn some small island into grass. It is only on rare occasions that a fire will go through this scrub, and then only in favoured places ; but I can attend to that, and will have a clearing, if I am not forbidden. We have started to fell a big piece of bush on Pigeon Island. It is in a hollow south of the house, and cannot easily be seen from any quarter; and, of course, I cannot burn it until next summer. I am quite willing to make tracks or go anywhere on Resolution Island, but every day I go there, unless with an object in view, I do more harm than good, for our dogs are sure to find roas and run them about, so I keep off it unless I have business there. 1 cannot tie the dogs up and leave them at home, because the sandflies would eat them. I never had such a hard task to train a dog: one day I want him to look for birds, and the next he must not look at them. I have not been on Five-fingers Peninsula, because of the surf, that would be too rough for our little boat, which is not fit to be bumped on the stones. It is only twenty minutes' pull from home, and we have often been along there; but there are no beaches at high water this side of Goose Cove. There are many calm days when we can land anywhere, but then there may be difficulties about getting off again. I will take over a camp, haul out our boat, and stay a few days, so that in my next letter I will be able to tell you something about it. I have not been on Anchor Island, but on many of the others. Between Anchor and Indian Islands, among many small islands not named, there is one that I will call " Maori Island." It is a pretty place, with no very high land

* The ship " Endeavour " was wrecked at Facile Harbour in 1795.