Page:Our New Zealand Cousins.djvu/231

 down in round figures at some 600l., and their assets a modest ten-pound note.

"Tarantara!!"

As the urbane celestial blandly observes.

"Bankee lupchee, welly goodee. Got him cash, got him goods. All same Englisman. Go tloo courtee!!"—

Close by is the famous Gabriel's Gully, which was about the first gold field in Otago. What a scene was this in those rude lawless times. Every one conversant with the literature of the early gold days, can imagine the roar and turmoil, the ever-shifting phantasmagoria on those slopes; and along these flats, crowded with tents, blazing with camp fires, and the air resounding with the din of tongue and shovel and cradle, and not unfrequently the sharp report of firearms. Now the little settlement is peaceful enough. There is still one rich working up the creek, called the Blue Spur claim, which gives employment to about one hundred men. The houses are scattered over knolls, and up secluded gullies, and many pretty villas surrounded with ornamental gardens crown the ridges. There is a pretty quiet cemetery surrounded by pines on the hill behind the town where the coffin of many a wild and turbulent spirit moulders. At present the trees are for the most part leafless, and the aspect of the country is dun brown, and bare; but in summer this must be really a pretty district.

We pass Waitahuna, a great flat, where companies of bestial-looking Chinamen are fossicking