G A Henty

Maori and Settler G A Henty

Book Excerpt: ...ave no doubt have plenty to eat and drink; and that is more than we shall do if we stay here. I could not earn anything to speak of here: the most I could expect to get would be ten shillings a week as an office-boy. And as to your idea of a school, you might be years before you got pupils; and, besides, when there are two men in a family it would be shameful to depend upon a woman to keep them.""Why do you think of New Zealand more than Canada, Wil?""Because, in the first place, the climate is a great deal pleasanter, and, in the second place, I believe that as the passage-money is higher the emigrants are of a better class, and we are likely to have more pleasant neighbours--people that you and father can associate with--than we should have if we went to a backwood clearing in Canada. Tom Fairfax has an uncle in New Zealand, and I have heard him say there are lots of officers in the army and people of that sort who have settled there. Of course I know it is going to be hard work, and that it...