The table was covered with white linen, borrowed at the township, and all the equipage we could muster was displayed upon it. Plates, forks, spoons, and knives, there were in plenty; but we had not been able to collect enough dishes and bowls for the profusion of viands Old Colonial had provided. Some parts of the service were therefore peculiar, and caused much addition to the merriment. There was always such incongruity between the excellence of the comestible and the barbaric quaintness of the receptacle that happened to contain it. Soups in billies, turkeys in milk-pans, salads in gourd-rinds, custards in cow-bells, jellies in sardine-boxes, plum-pudding in a kerosene case, vegetables, fruits, and cakes in kits of plaited flax; anything and everything was utilized that possibly could be.
High enthroned upon a pile of potato sacks, Old Colonial presided over the feast he had created; while, as vice, sat O'Gaygun, his barbaric conservatism laid aside for the nonce in favour of grace and gallantry. What glorious fun we had! What a flow of wit beneath the august influence of ladies' smiles! And we were cool in our ferny bower, out of the strong hot sunshine. And in the intervals of eating and drinking, we could look about us on the splendid perspective of bush and river, across the clearings, where the air shimmered in the heat, where the crickets whistled and hummed, and where the cattle were lazily lying among the stumps. It was a magnificent picnic, so everybody declared. There never was anything to match it in all New Zealand!
I can fancy, that in days to come, when the full tide of civilization has overtaken this fair country, some of those ladies will be sitting in boudoirs and drawing-rooms talking to their children; and they will tell them of the early pioneering days. And one of their best-remembered stories will be that of the Christmas-time, when they were banqueted by Old Colonial and his chums at our shanty in the bush.
To a certain extent we are of musical tastes, and, though our time for practice is limited to an occasional half-hour of an evening, we consider ourselves no mean instrumentalists, and sometimes give public performances, as will appear hereafter. We have two flutes, a clarionet, a cornet, and a French horn, often supplemented by two violins and a concertina. Old Colonial does not play, neither does O'Gaygun. They fiercely decline to add to what they term the beastly uproar.