The Forest Republican. [volume] (Tionesta, Pa.) 1869-1952, 1890-04-02
ANTIPODEAN FARM LIFE
COMFORTABLE EXISTENCE OF THE
NEW ZEALAND SETTLER.
The Bush Farmers a Race of Giants
Purchasing Land on Easy
Terms-SnuU Earmhouses

Purchasing Land on Easy
Terms-Snug Farmhouses.
For solid comfort and quiet enjoy
ment of life, there could hardly be
more enviable lot than that of bush
farmer in New Zealand. The climate is
truly temperate. The greatest summer
heat never exceeds eighty degrees, and
there is so little frost in winter that ten
der plants-like geraniums and hello
tropes-remain out and actually blossom
all the year round. Yet it is not at all
an enervating climate. The bush-farm-
ers are a race of giants, and all domestic
animals grow to great size, and are of
prime quality.
The bush-farmer usually buys his land
from the Government, on deferred pay
ments, or else gets perpetual lease.
That means that he pays very low
rent for it until he has saved enough
money to make it his own, when he
pays from SIS to $40 an acre for it, and
gets title guaranteed from the Govern
ment, which cannot afterward be ques-
toned by anybody. He can buy from
twenty acres to 620. Most of the bush
farms are about $50 to 200 acres, and
that makes very nice little property in
deed.
The land, when bought, is covered
with what is called ''virgin bush"-that
is, primeval forest, cypress and yew
trees, 100 feet or $50 feet high, with
dense underground of smaller vegetation,
tangled and matted together by canes and
wild vines and creeping brambles. 1t is
all very lovely to look at, but it has to
| be got rid of before the land can be used,
| and unless there is sawmill handy,
where the timber can be sold, the only
thing to do with it Is to fell it and burn
it. This takes two years before it is thor
oughly done, but by that time the land
which is exceedingly rich-is covered
with a magnificent crop of grass, and the
farmer is already in position to start
his dairy and to rear young stock for
market.
The bush farmer builds his own house
of totara slabs, with the rugged brown
bark left on, and good roof of thatch,
made of the rushes which abound on the
edge of the bush. Timber costs nothing,
so he need not stint himself for space.
He generally begins with four good sized
rooms, besides a loft overhead, and a
cooks hut outside. He makes his own
furniture, too, unless he has some house
hold goods which he brings with him in
bullock dray. Many of the farmhouses
in the bush are extremely snug inside,
with every domestic convenience, and all
sorts of little comforts and refine
ments. In the rougher ones, the furni'
ture is limited to plain tables and
benches of sawn timber, with bunkl
against the wall to sleep in; and the
cooking utensils are only two in number
"a frying-pan and chilly or tin pot
for boiling or stewing. But even sucl
primitive habitations as these are by nj
means to be despised. They are warn
and wholesome, and when kept clean arr
really very comfortable. Outside, th'
bush farmer usually plants some scarle
geraniums, honeysuckles and climbing
roses, which soon spread all over th
house and convert its rough slabs ant
thatch into bower of beauty.
Food abounds on bush-f farms, and tn
universal rule there is for men, womel
and children to eat three square mea
meals II day. The bush is full of wil'
cattle, wild pigs, wild goats and wil'
birds, so that there is no butchers bill
to pay, and the larder is always supplied
with plenty of the pest at the cost of
charge of powder and shot. Then ever
creek swarms with eels-which are
favorite article of diet-and an excellen
vegetable, called Maori cabbage, grow
all around. All that the farmer has t
buy is flour, sugar and tea, and these ar
to be got cheaply enough at the neares
village store and carried up TO the farr
on a pack-horse, or on the farmers ow
back. The sturdy folks there thin
nothing of carrying ''swag," weighin
100 or $50 pounds, for fifteen or twent
miles in a day. The farmhouse is us
! ually well stocked with hams, bacon
smoked beef or mutton, and all descrip
tion of stores; and if any number of Wis
itors arrive, they are heartily welcomed
and pressed to eat and drink as much a
, they like.
When once the bush is cleared and tn
land paid for, the profits of the farm al
considerable, aud the bankers say some O
the snuggest accounts they have are thos
of the bush farmers ORce-a- Week.