Page:Tales-of-Banks-Peninsula Jacobson 2ed 1893 cropped.pdf/303
Rest a thousand songsters, singing
Hymns of rapture ere they fly;
Where are giant willows[1] growing,
From Napoleon’s distant grave;
Where are creeks for ever flowing,
Giving verdure as they lave;
Where do sunclad wavelets wander
To Zealandia’s fairest shore,
In embracing, growing fonder?
’Tis in lovely Akaroa.
III.
Where do sunsets’ rays of glory,
Gold and purple raiment, throw
O’er the hills[2] renowned in story
In the Maori long ago;
Where does wild clematis,[3] flinging
Tendrils o’er the boughs below,
Cover sprays, where birds are singing,
With a cloak of purest snow;
Where, in wild, sequestered valley,
Grows the wondrous nikau[4] palm,
Forming ever verdant alley,
Where there is eternal calm;
Where are silver fern-trees[5] spreading
Fairy fronds of beauty pure,
Aromatic fragrance shedding?
’Tis in lovely Akaroa.
- ↑ The weeping willows growing in Akaroa are all said to have sprung from a slip brought by a Frenchman from Napoleon’s tomb at St. Helena. They are of enormous size.
- ↑ The hills around Akaroa were the scenes of many a renowned Maori conflict.
- ↑ The wild clematis, with snowy blossoms fully a foot in circumference, is of marvellous beauty.
- ↑ The nikau palm grows only in the most sequestered and sheltered valleys.
- ↑ The silver fern-tree’s fronds are a brilliant green above, and pure silver underneath.