Land
(Golder Project subject term)
Represented in
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The Thrashing Floor in New Zealand Minstrelsy
- The forest grounds converting to fertile fields of grain, / Though blacken’d stumps, the ghosts of bygone times, may remain.
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A Bushranging in New Zealand Minstrelsy
- Lo! see yon bush clearing, its aspect how cheering! / Where Industry toils, and fresh gardens do grow; / The axe still resounding, hard labour abounding, / While bushmen exult o’er the forest laid low.
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Canto Fifth in The New Zealand Survey
- As ’mid the revolution of events, / Old Nature’s aspect wild must be transformed, / And fresh resources be developed, where / Such seemingly once no existence had! / So now we see the work of bliss begun, / Appearances display a wonderous change
- Yet there are here, / In timber large, the means of fair employ, / To bring to market, such, reduced to shape / Fit for the builder’s use; or other craft / Of neater work, as furnishings for homes, / Remunerative to the man of toil,— / But the chief aim is, to subdue the land, / By the strong arm of industry, and bring / From nature’s secret treasures, such rewards
- For bygone ages had their times of change, / Preparatory to some future plan / To be accomplished in its season due; / And, as the earth has first to be subdued / Ere man, its lord, can bring it to his use; / So now a mighty change is passing o’er / Those scenes; however slow may be its course, / Its progress, like the stealthy steps of time, / Is certain, with improvements in its train, / To tame this once unbroken wilderness / Of savage grandeur!
- Could this unhappy people, as they were, / Be called the true possessors of the soil? / Their occupancy never seemed secure; / And dread debarred their aiming to improve / In cultivation’s art, or ev’n t’ extend / Their labours more than served a present need; / Or what some exigency might demand! / But not for social intercourse in trade / Among their neighb’ring tribes; for jealousy / Debarr’d such efforts, lest they’d fall a prey / To lawless lust; and, as their wants were few, / So even these with little must be met; / Unless it were when plund’ring was the rule! / The wilderness remained an idle waste! / The land was uninhabited, while those,
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Canto II — , Page 13. in The New Zealand Survey
- Although I have not been more than about 60 miles of a radius away from Wellington, still in that compass much may be observed to shew that New Zealand as a country has nothing to boast in regard to its antiquity. For instance—its sandstone rocks are but in what may be termed a puerile state. In a sandstone formation, at the depth of about two feet I have come upon a species of granite boulders, three in number, which had no appearance of being connected with the locality; they were incrusted with a substance similar to oxide of iron, and seemed to have been dropped there together, and so got thus embedded when such formation was in a soft and plastic state; which sandstone formation is on the top of a hill from five to six hundred feet high. Such sandstone formations do not shew the same shattered state as those of a harder nature, which seem as if they had not yet got over the damage they have sustained from the rendings and throes and upheavings of the earthquakes, which forced the mountain framework of the country from beneath the waves. Nothing as yet have I seen as a consolidized rock, from which a grindstone or a gravestone, or a piece of pavement can be made; or from which building material can be had like what is obtained in other countries, whose geological records tell of earlier dates.
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Stanzas — On hearing of the Sudden Demise of Mr. G. Copeland, on May 22, 1866, Aged 65 Years in The New Zealand Survey
- Colonial prestine wildness, truly / Can from the past his praise declare; / As he in his allotment, duly / Has done his part with special care! / That part which makes the desert drear, / To bud and blossom as the rose;
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Canto Third in The New Zealand Survey
- ’Twas furnished in due order with all things / Which requisite were for the various needs / Which could anticipated be, to spring / In man’s creation’s ultimate design; / So that his comforts therein might be found, / According as his needs would urge the search / For such requirements, and rewarded be / For industry well guided; thus t’excite / Such gratitude, that might result in praise!
- Now, th’ ancient world, when from the depths of nought / It rose to being by the great command / Which called it forth, as when an infant’s born; / It had progressive stages, and its times / Of revolutionary changes, meet / For growing to maturity,
- So the volcanic mountain, as with joy, / At being raised high ’bove the briny floods, / Would now send up its volumes of red flame, / Oft burnishing around the face of heaven; / While squirting high its jets of liquid fire, / With stones, which fly like meteor’s through the air, / Sublimely dreadful all to be beheld!
- Hard was the labours of the prestine rocks / At such a juncture; as when painful toils, / Or other inward maladies severe / Affect the human frame, when steaming sweat / From ev’ry pore exudes—and may of blood, / When agonizing under dreadful woes; / So in like manner, ’mid the direful throes, / And rendings of the bowels of the globe, / In pressing upward, ’bove the surface high, / O’er ocean’s waves, what long had been depressed! / Such labour, and such heat intense combined, / Internal, must have made the precious ores / Exude, as sweated drops, whence such have lain / Incorporate with granite grains, and quartz, / From first, when the creation was begun; / Till melted, by electric heat, forced out, / And running into chinks, and other rents,— / As in a furnace, molten ores are run, / Into the moulds for their reception made, / Till cooling formed into a solid state;—
- A fearful hasty rocking to and fro, / Awhile most violently driven, occurs / With an unwonted energy; and next / Transverse as fiercely; then with sudden twist / And circular motion;—as if one, whose grasp / Had hold on thee, and loosening thy base / Most deeply fixed beneath, as with a turf / He with much force would loosen from its bed / Ere such he pulls;—while heavings strange are felt, / As when ’tis said of yore, old Atlas hove / His mighty load, with strenuous effort oft, / Ere he its weight upon his shoulders poised! / Rocks burst assunder! with commotions dire; / While various orders ’gainst each other crashed, / And shattered into fragments, got commixed / In wild confusion, jostled to a strange / And mutilated heterogeneous mass / Of various sorts; all meanwhile much upturned / And sideways shoved by that explosive force / Employed to urge the hollows downside up / Them sending towering far above the waves! / Amid such breaking up of solids, and / The transformations passing o’er the scene, / Old ocean, smitten, raged with furious storm, / Aye, fiercer than when roused by boisterous gales; / Then waves no longer followed, as in chase, / Each other, tossing sportively their spray / As they before the breeze would scud along; / But, billows met with billows, all deranged
- As when a father, with his happiest smile, / Beholds the newborn infant whom he owns; / So has it thus, New Zealand, been with thee!
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Canto First in The New Zealand Survey
- While all those hills of sunlit varied shade / Of foliage in their groves of evergreen, / Although inviting to th’ admiring muse, / They yet appear as unapproachable / To interprizing man! Though he the vale / Must needs subdue:—
- leave our frigid heights / And lofty seated forests to ourselves! / As we thy admiration still may claim, / To cheer you ’mid the cares of worldly toils!”—
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Canto Fourth in The New Zealand Survey
- In all due time / This newly raised isle’s uncouth nakedness / Must disappear, and some adornment have!
- So see this valley, as it now exists / In all its native grandeur, cov’ring much / Of elemental rudeness with the garb / Of vernal beauty; it can tell its tale / (Ev’n so of others may the same be said) / Of mighty revolutions undergone, / As marvellous as when above the waves / Yon mountain summits rose and stood on high.
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Preface in The New Zealand Survey
- New Zealand is the land for scenery; such that contains a vast amount of grandeur and picturesque beauty; not only so, but it also contains much that prompts enquiring wonder, when first is seen its lofty ridges covered with evergreen forests, and its deep ravines from which issue its many purling brooks, all beckoning and inviting the reflective mind to go far into the past of time, there to witness scenic phenomina which language almost fails to describe.
- from such a height to overlook an extensive valley filled with one dense mass of forest, the mind is filled with awe to contemplate the amount of labour required before such can be subdued;
- to look across an extensive tract of country—extensive when compared to the valleys which run in among the hills—like that of the Wairarapa, where level plains extend far away like a bowling green, skirted here and there with belts of forests; while through openings far beyond, the assisted vision may discover other districts lying in a state of wildness. At such a view a loneliness is apt to seize upon the spirits while musing on such solitudes in all their pristine wildness!
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Canto Second in The New Zealand Survey
- At such a time, this island’s loftiest peaks / From now-styled Egmont, to Kaikoura’s range / Or other alpine ranges, where they rear / Their summits to the clouds, all nameless then; / With ev’ry other hill like those around, / Were—what?—but mere embryos, all unseen / As closed within a womb!—were all immersed
- this modern isle,—
- Have they stood / As they appear, since first the great command / Was given, “Let there be!” and earth uprose?—
- All begging for inhabitants to come / To take possession of their fertile soils,—
- Have these been always as they now exist? / Or say, has all this scenery’s whole extent, / Nay all the country wide from shore to shore / From genial North to the less genial South / Been, as some would declare? surmising thus— / “These are the heights of some great continent, / Which filled the Southern ocean once, now sunk / By Nature’s fiat; these the remnants left / Above the waves, when earthquakes shook below / The ocean’s level, ev’ry spreading plain! / While now existing plains were once the heights / Of table mountains, and the many hills / Were loftier ridges, rising, clad with snows,— / The Continents great Alps!—Those valleys but / The ancient river courses, where once rolled / Their torrents, issuing from their founts on high, / Where many a glacier sparkled in the sun, / All stored in regions cold!” But look around / And room we find for theories diverse / From that advanced, which now may be declared!
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Canto First in The Philosophy of Love. [A Plea in Defence of Virtue and Truth!] A Poem in Six Cantos, with Other Poems
- Oh Isha! my Beloved!—dear to my heart!— / Part of myself!—The darling of my soul! / Second to Deity! to me, thou art; / MyJoy! in thee, is happiness complete!— / My heart was lonely, notwithstanding all / Around would joy impart; but who was there / To whom I could communicate a thought? / Or would rejoice mine ears with speech, to shew / Intelligence of soul as kindred pure, / So as to prove mine equal, or take part
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Canto Second in The Philosophy of Love. [A Plea in Defence of Virtue and Truth!] A Poem in Six Cantos, with Other Poems
- Yes, but for Love; their hearts-uniting love; / Their lost condition had been barren ground, / Full worse than land, which brings forth noisome weeds; / On which no sweet enjoyment can exist.
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Canto Third in The Philosophy of Love. [A Plea in Defence of Virtue and Truth!] A Poem in Six Cantos, with Other Poems
- How sweet the distant prospect to behold!— / Love-fancy’s ever bright with golden dreams; / How like you sunny landscape glowing ’neath / A summer sky, in all its beauteous charms, / Where woodland hills, ’gainst the horizon’s blue, / Stand forth in all varieties of green; / While hedge-environ’d fields display a vast / Of flowery beauties, in their mingling hues, / Bespangling the green pastures, where the kine / ’Mid sweet luxuriance graze:—all to the eye / Of observation charming—fit to cheer / The care-beclouded mind, or grieving heart:— / But all such pleasures subject are to change; / For, while enraptured with the lovely scene, / Foreboding clouds pass over the bright sun, / And buries the fair landscape in deep shade; / Which casts a reflex influence on the mind!
- the sunny scene,—a landscape fair / Of villas, fields, and rills, with woodland heights / At distance gleaming,—all, where Nature gay / Displays her beauties ’neath the blest effects / Of a bright atmosphere, and cheering beams / Of summer’s sun;
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Canto Sixth in The Philosophy of Love. [A Plea in Defence of Virtue and Truth!] A Poem in Six Cantos, with Other Poems
- When love, matured, is like the fruitful tree
- Love’s blessings are not sent as full matured;
- To have no one to love, or no good deed / To do; or have no influence for good, / Can leave no mark behind, when thou art gone / Beyond life’s bourn, to tell that virtue lived / In such a sphere; thy life will only shew / The image of a desert, amid which
- Love cultivated brings its own reward; / It yields like all good crops abundant joy! / A loveless life but ill becomes the soul / That claims to be immortal! Love is life, / And its chief essence, through the course of time, / And must upheld be: the reverse is Death / In all its small details; in which, such bears / No sweet regard for bliss! So in this world / Is man’s probation fix’d, as if to prove / His fitness for a higher state of bliss, / According as th’ affections of the heart / Have cultivated been, to gain the prize! / As Love to God, breeds love to bosom friends; / And Love to bosom friends will act as proof / Their tendency is upward; towards HOME!
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A Lay on Wanganui in The Philosophy of Love. [A Plea in Defence of Virtue and Truth!] A Poem in Six Cantos, with Other Poems
- A reflex influence has the land / Upon its owner, as on seed; / When its fertility will stand / A surety for each gen’rous deed! / Mete emblem of a bounteous soul, / Whieh would devise no scanty measure: / Ev’n as culture’s bland control / Would wilds convert to scenes of pleasure! / The country round begins to wear / An aspect new; the old’s outworn: / As civ’lization has a care / To brighten up things once forlorn!
Searching
For several reasons, including lack of resource and inherent ambiguity, not all names in the NZETC are marked-up. This means that finding all references to a topic often involves searching. Search for Land as: "Land". Additional references are often found by searching for just the main name of the topic (the surname in the case of people).
Other Collections
The following collections may have holdings relevant to "Land":
- Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, which has entries for many prominent New Zealanders.
- Archives New Zealand, which has collections of maps, plans and posters; immigration passenger lists; and probate records.
- National Library of New Zealand, which has extensive collections of published material.
- Auckland War Memorial Museum, which has extensive holdings on the Auckland region and New Zealand military history.
- Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, which has strong holdings in Tāonga Māori, biological holotypes and New Zealand art.
- nzhistory.net.nz, from the History Group of the Ministry for Culture and Heritage.