Page:Overland Journey of the Governor of New Zealand.djvu/12

Rh has not yet been completed throughout the distance travelled this day, but there is already a good bridle track. Much of the land is rich, and the mountain and forest scenery is very beautiful, reminding the European traveller of the Italian slopes of the Alps. Contracts for the completion of the road have been taken by the Maoris of Taupo, and it will be finished in the course of the present year, when a coach will run regularly from Napier to the Lake, carrying mails and passengers to the heart of the island. A tri-weekly coach service already exists from Auckland to Cambridge, in the Waikato, a distance of about 120 miles; and the break between Cambridge and Taupo is only some 70 miles. Of this gap a considerable portion has already been filled up by native labour, and the carriage road throughout will probably be completed in the course of a twelvemonth; when coaches will be able to travel from Napier (and soon from Wellington also) to Auckland in about four days, stopping each night at the inns already finished, or in process of erection. A statement asserting the possibility of such a fact would have appeared incredible three years ago, when the natives of the central districts were for the most part in active or sullen hostility. On the 8th the Governor left Opepe, at a distance from which of some 10 miles, an hour's ride along a good road, lies the great lake of Taupo, 1,250 feet above the sea, and resembling in its extent (about 200 square miles of water) and in scenery, the Lake of Geneva. On his arrival at Tapuaeharuru, the native settlement at the north end of the lake, and near the point where the river