The road from Christ Church to Main's is metalled for about four and a
half miles; there are fences and fields on both sides, either laid down
in English grass or sown with grain; the fences are chiefly low ditch
and bank planted with gorse, rarely with quick, the scarcity of which
detracts from the resemblance to English scenery which would otherwise
prevail. The copy, however, is slatternly compared with the original;
the scarcity of timber, the high price of labour, and the pressing
urgency of more important claims upon the time of the small
agriculturist, prevent him, for the most part, from attaining the spick-
and-span neatness of an English homestead. Many makeshifts are
necessary; a broken rail or gate is mended with a piece of flax, so,
occasionally, are the roads. I have seen the Government roads
themselves being repaired with no other material than stiff tussocks of
grass, flax, and rushes: this is bad, but to a certain extent
necessary, where there is so much to be done and so few hands and so
little money with which to do it.
After getting off the completed portion of the road, the track commences
along the plains unassisted by the hand of man.
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