f a tree, twenty feet high. About the suburban
residences of this colonial capital laburnums, roses, laurels, and
lilies abound, blooming all the year round. Innumerable exotics have
been brought hither, and as was remarked to us by a citizen who was
exhibiting a fine display on his own grounds, "the plant that will not
thrive in New Zealand in any month of the year with ordinary care, out
of doors, is yet to be found." This gentleman showed us a tiny flower in
bloom, so like the Swiss edelweiss that we asked whence it came, and
learned that it is a native of the mountain regions of New Zealand. It
was surely an edelweiss, the simple but beautiful betrothal flower of
the European Alps. It has a different name here, which we cannot recall.
As to trees, the elm, beech, willow, fir, ash, and oak have so long been
introduced from England, have been so multiplied, and have grown to such
proportions, that they seem native here. Botanists tell us that there
are not quite fifty different species of trees in England; but we are
assured by equally good authority that there are a hundred and fifty
different species found in New Zealand,--an assertion we could easily
believe after having been in the country a few weeks, and enjoyed the
beauty of its abundant forests.

When Captain Cook first came hither, he fully understood the cannibal
habits of the native race, and desired to take some practical steps
toward discouraging and effacing such inhuman practices. Upon his second
visit, therefore, he introduced swine and some other domestic animals,
including goats, in the vain hope that they would ultimately supply
sufficient animal food for the savages and divert them from such
wholesale roasting and eating of one another. The goats and some other
animals were soon slaughtered and eaten, but the swine to a certain
extent answered the purpose which Captain Cook had in view. That is to
say, they ran wild, multiplied remarkably, and were hunted and eaten by
the natives; but cannibalism was by no means abolished or even
appreciably checked. Wild hogs are still quite abundant throughout the
Northern Island, springing from the original animals introduced years
ago.

With equally good intent, though not for a similar purpose, in later
years rabbits were introduced into the country, but have in the mean
time so multiplied as to become a terrible pest, consuming every green
thing which comes in their way. "Like locusts they devour everything