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Updated: May 23, 2025
For it was there that the kauri timber grew; it was there that the pigs were most plentiful and the cargoes of flax most easily obtained; and when a man named Turner set up a grog-shop on the shores of the bay all the whaling ships made this their usual place for resting and refitting.
We knew that kauri would give us less work, but the result would not be so lasting or satisfactory. Therefore, we elected to go in for puriri. The posts stand about eight feet above ground, and are sunk some three or four into it. Their average thickness will be from nine inches to a foot. They carry five rails almost as substantial as the posts, both being of roughly split timber.
A small one was cut down, and found to be similar to the pitch pine, too heavy for masts, but the carpenter was of opinion that, by tapping, the wood would be lightened, and that then the trees would make the finest masts in the world. These trees were the celebrated Kauri pine, from which a valuable gum is extracted. It also makes very fine planking.
"How am I to put down a rise of 12s. 6d. a ton on Kauri gum in a schedule? But when you come to 2000 tons it's £1250." "He's very old; isn't he?" "But as strong as a horse." "He's got the money?" "Yes; he has got it safe enough. There's no doubt about the money." "What he talks about is only a will. Now you want the money at once."
Of course, the material of the building is entirely kauri timber, with the exception of the chimneys, which are of brick, and the piles, hidden from sight, which are of puriri wood. There are many angles, corners, gables, wings, and outputs, designed for utility as well as appearance. Round the whole house runs a broad verandah, following the irregularities of the edifice.
The so-called gum for which he searches is the turpentine, which, oozing out of the trunk of the kauri pines, hardens into lumps of an amber-like resin. Its many shades of colour darken from white through every kind of yellow and brown to jet. A little is clear, most is clouded.
In this direction is situated Government House, a large mansion of wood, standing in park-like grounds, where the English oak, the American maple, the Australian blue-gum, the semi-tropical palm, and the New Zealand kauri mingle their foliage together. Some distance further, and to the left of the road, rises Mount Eden.
As the British ox, with his short horns and cube-like form, is the result of generations of breeding with a single eye to meat, so that huge candelabrum, the kauri, might be fancied to be the outcome of thousands of years of experiment in producing the perfection of a timber tree.
The land breeze strengthened in a last effort, and the Wonder, slipping swiftly through the water, ranged alongside the Kauri and began to go by. Greetings flew back and forth, then David Grief called out: "Seen anything of the Willi-Waw?" The captain, slouch-hatted and barelegged, with a rolling twist hitched the faded blue lava-lava tighter around his waist and spat tobacco juice overside.
It appears to be indifferent as to whether the house is new or old, well-built or ruinous. If the structure is of kauri timber the kauri-bug will be there, and it will put up with any other wood if kauri timber is not available. It is one of the peculiar products indigenous to Northern New Zealand, and it is the least attractive of all.
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