for the rooms, just because we happened to have everything; but I
should not recommend any one to do so, for the expense of carriage,
though moderate enough by sea (in a wool ship), is enormous as soon
as it reaches Lyttleton, and goods have to be dragged up country by
horses or bullocks. There are very good shops where you can buy
everything, and besides these there are constant sales by auction
where, I am told, furniture fetches a price sometimes under its
English value. House rent about Christchurch is very high. We
looked at some small houses in and about the suburbs of the town,
when we were undecided about our plans, and were offered the most
inconvenient little dwellings, with rooms which were scarcely bigger
than cupboards, for 200 pounds a year; we saw nothing at a lower
price than this, and any house of a better class, standing in a
nicely arranged shrubbery, is at least 300 pounds per annum.
Cab-hire is another thing which seems to me disproportionately dear,
as horses are very cheap; there are no small fares, half-a-crown
being the lowest "legal tender" to a cabman; and I soon gave up
returning visits when I found that to make a call in a Hansom three
or four miles out of the little town cost one pound or one pound ten
shillings, even remaining only a few minutes at the house.

All food (except mutton) appears to be as nearly as possible at
London prices; but yet every one looks perfectly well-fed, and
actual want is unknown. Wages of all sorts are high, and
employment, a certainty. The look and bearing of the immigrants
appear to alter soon after they reach the colony. Some people
object to the independence of their manner, but I do not; on the
contrary, I like to see the upright gait, the well-fed, healthy
look, the decent clothes (even if no one touches his hat to you),
instead of the half-starved, depressed appearance, and too often