SOFTCOVER

GOOD CONDITION

ADVENTURE IN NEW ZEALAND BY E J WAKEFIELD

From 1839 to 1844,With Some Account of the beginning of the British Colonization of the Islands

Vol I 482 pp Wilson & Horton Ltd Akl c1970

Facsimile Edition of original 1845 London editions

"It is given to few young men, particularly one not yet twenty, to be part of such a stupendous undertaking as the birth of a nation.

It was fortunate for New Zealand that Edward Jerningham Wakefield, who came from England in the Tory in 1839 as secretary to his uncle, Colonel William Wakefield, had a definite literary bent, for he has left us a most colourful (if sometimes one-sided) account of the beginnings of Wellington and the other New Zealand Company settlements.

His official position, inquiring mind, and an urge to see as much of this new land as possible, gave young Wakefield unique opportunities to record impressions which are invaluable today.

Such prominent contemporary figures as Governor Hobson (whom he derides as “the Auckland Pasha”), Captain Fitzroy, Lieut. Willoughby Shortland, the Wakefield brothers, early explorers such as Dr Dieffenbach and Charles Heaphy, the missionary Octavious Hadfield and the notorious Te Rauparaha and many more, pass through his pages. Jerningham Wakefield’s book has been variously described as "a very effective piece of New Zealand Company propaganda . . . valuable for its colour and vigour . . . a remarkable production for a young man in his early twenties . . . as picturesquely enthralling as it is prejudiced."

But, whatever its faults, the book (now reproduced by Wilson and Horton Limited, Auckland, in facsimile form*) remains for the modern reader a rich tapestry into which has been woven vivid pictures of almost every conceivable aspect of life in the first few years of the colony".

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