Page:Charleston • Irwin Faris • (1941).pdf/39



HE port of Charleston was Constant Bay, a small inlet lying about a mile to the south of the Nile River mouth; an insignificant little bay whose existence was unknown to white men until gold was found upon the ancient leads adjoining it.

Mariners with experience of the seven seas viewed this South-West Coast with distrust; its reputation was known to all, and the ships that passed by day and night gave it a wide berth; it looked better from a distance. In all likelihood, eye of man excepting Maori, Tasman or Cook, had not until then viewed its narrow entrance. Tasman may have given it a casual glance as he sailed past on the 13th December, 1642, for his log shows that after sighting land (the hills between Okarito and Hokitika) he stood close in and ran along the coast within easy distance of the breakers, the weather being very calm. If he did give such a glance he little thought that behind it lay treasure such as he had been directed to seek—a land flowing, not with milk and honey, but with gold. However, no blame to him; it was not until he had been dead for about two hundred years that anyone else thought of seeking there for gold.

The bay was declared the port of Charleston by proclamation on 9th October, 1869, and defined as being “a circle of one nautical mile from the flagstaff,” though not before several vessels had ventured into it, and at least one had rued the day that she did.

The flagstaff and signalman’s cottage were upon the rocky point locally known as Flagstaff Hill, referred to in the