Thomas Butler]
The writer of the following pages, having resolved on emigrating to New
Zealand, took his passage in the ill-fated ship Burmah, which never
reached her destination, and is believed to have perished with all on
board. His berth was chosen, and the passage-money paid, when important
alterations were made in the arrangements of the vessel, in order to
make room for some stock which was being sent out to the Canterbury
Settlement.
The space left for the accommodation of the passengers being thus
curtailed, and the comforts of the voyage seeming likely to be much
diminished, the writer was most providentially induced to change his
ship, and, a few weeks later, secured a berth in another vessel.
The work is compiled from the actual letters and journal of a young
emigrant, with extracts from two papers contributed by him to the Eagle,
a periodical issued by some of the members of St. John's College,
Cambridge, at which the writer took his degree. This variety in the
sources from which the materials are put together must be the apology
for some defects in their connection and coherence. It is hoped also
that the circumstances of bodily fatigue and actual difficulty under
which they were often written, will excuse many faults of style.
For whatever of presumption may appear in giving this little book to the
public, the friends of the writer alone are answerable. It was at their
wish only that he consented to its being printed. It is, however,
submitted to the reader, in the hope that the unbiassed impressions of
colonial life, as they fell freshly on a young mind, may not be wholly
devoid of interest. Its value to his friends at home is not diminished
by the fact that the MS., having been sent out to New Zealand for
revision, was, on its return, lost in the Colombo, and was fished up
from the Indian Ocean so nearly washed out as to have been with some
difficulty deciphered.
It should be further stated, for the encouragement of those who think of
following the example of the author, and emigrating to the same
settlement, that his most recent letters indicate that he has no reason
to regret the step that he has taken, and that the results of his
undertaking have hitherto fully justified his expectations.
LANGAR RECTORY
June 29, 1863
CHAPTER I
Embarkation at Gravesend - Arrest of Passenger - Tilbury Fort - Deal - Bay
of Biscay Gale - Becalmed off Teneriffe - Fire in the Galley - Trade Winds-
-Belt of Calms - Death on Board - Shark - Current - S. E. Trade Winds -
Temperature - Birds - Southern Cross - Cyclone.
It is a windy, rainy day - cold withal; a little boat is putting off from
the pier at Gravesend, and making for a ship that is lying moored in the
middle of the river; therein are some half-dozen passengers and a lot of
heterogeneous-looking luggage; among the passengers, and the owner of
some of the most heterogeneous of the heterogeneous luggage, is myself.
The ship is an emigrant ship, and I am one of the emigrants.