Saturday, November 3rd.—This morning we visited the Sanatorium and its beautifully kept gardens, where roses flourish as if sulphuretted hydrogen and the proximity of steam were the finest treatment for them. The Sanatorium is another Government institution, and, with the Baths, is under the control of a Government Official, Dr. Wohlmans, upon whom we had to call in order to obtain certificates of health that would permit us to sample all the various baths. These include sulphur springs of different strength, mud baths, and mineral water baths of different degrees of heat. After this formality we crossed the road to the Tourist Office, where Captain Greendays presented his letter of introduction from the Auckland branch, and by great good luck Warbrick, the well-known Maori guide, happened to be in the office, so that we were able to secure his services during our stay.
In the afternoon we drove out to Whakarewarewa, a native village about twenty minutes’ drive from Rotorua, where most of the active geysers are. Warbrick met us there, and took us first to see Maggie Papakura, another guide very well known to all visitors to Rotorua. She has a most captivating voice and manner, and is a great favourite, especially with the Australians, who feted her tremendously when she visited Sydney. She invited us into her whare, or hut, which to our surprise was furnished in European style as a bed-sitting-room, divided by a tall bookcase filled with all the modern works of fiction and travel, and a reed curtain. And here she entertained us for over an hour, showing us pictures and photographs, telling us tales of travellers she had met and happenings in her experience. And then her sister Bella came in, and played the accompaniment to Maggie’s singing of Lord Henry Somerset’s “Echo.” Her voice was so sweet that we asked her to sing again, but Warbrick suggested that it would be too late to see everything if we lingered any longer, and so we spent the rest of the afternoon looking at boiling mud-pools, geysers, and so on. But none of the orthodox marvels were half so astonishing and certainly not nearly so pleasing, as Maggie the guide. Who would have expected to find culture and accomplishments in a Maori village? But it seems that most of the Maoris are educated now, and Warbrick and Maggie are only half Maori, as each of them had a European parent.
Sunday, 4th.—We went to the early service in the Maori English church this morning, at Ohinemutu, and then walked round the quaint little village to see the people washing clothes and cooking in the natural hot pools. There is a bust of Queen Victoria there, opposite their guest or meeting house, and it looks so quaint stuck up on tall carved poles with a funny little roof over it. The little Maori children diving for pennies into the hot pools, and sitting there grinning from ear to ear, were delightful.
After this we went for a drive to the top of the mountain behind the town, expecting to see the seven lakes tradition declares are visible from there. But though we were only able to distinguish Rotorua and the sister-lake, Rotoiti, we
