AOL # 1 - Dickens (Waikato) Mystery Cache

"The Art of Language"

The cache is not at the given location, you are welcome to go there however you may get wet

This little series is to recognise some serious contributors to my, (and hopefully yours), "Understanding of Classic English Language. These authors/artists all exhibited a fantastic grasp of how the english language can be assembled to describe and portray the people, places and events around them at the time to their respective audience.

Charles Dickens ability to describe both the London and it surroundings during the time of Victorian England both facinating and shocking to many a modern reader. The stories of the street urchins and wheelers of power, their interactions and daily struggle carry a powere that has entralled for many a year.

Please find below some extracts describing what he saw and the time that he lived in:

1. Ours was the marsh country, down by the river……... My first most vivid and broad impression of the identity of things, seems to me to have been gained on a memorable raw afternoon towards evening. At such a time I found out for certain, that this bleak place overgrown with nettles ………and that the dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with dykes and mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes; and that the low leaden line beyond, was the river; and that the distant savage lair from which the wind was rushing, was the sea; and that the small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and beginning to cry, was
2. The slimy little causeway had dropped into the river by a slow process of suicide, and two or three stumps of piles and a rusty iron mooring-ring were all that remained of the departed Break-Neck glories. Sometimes, indeed, a laden coal barge would bump itself into the place, and certain laborious heavers, seemingly mud-engendered, would arise, deliver the cargo in the neighbourhood, shove off, and vanish; but at most times the only commerce of Break-Neck-Stairs arose out of the conveyance of casks and bottles, both full and empty, both to and from the cellars of Wilding & Co., Wine Merchants.
3. Fog everywhere. Fog up the river, where it flows among green aits and meadows; fog down the river, where it rolls deified among the tiers of shipping and the waterside pollutions of a great (and dirty) city. Fog on the Essex marshes, fog on the Kentish heights. Fog creeping into the cabooses of collier-brigs; fog lying out on the yards and hovering in the rigging of great ships; fog drooping on the gunwales of barges and small boats. Fog in the eyes and throats of ancient Greenwich pensioners, wheezing by the firesides of their wards;
4. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair,
5. 'NOW, what I want is, Facts. Teach these boys and girls nothing but Facts. Facts alone are wanted in life. Plant nothing else, and root out everything else. You can only form the minds of reasoning animals upon Facts: nothing else will ever be of any service to them. This is the principle on which I bring up my own children, and this is the principle on which I bring up these children. Stick to Facts, sir!'
6. In the chimneys of the disused rooms, swallows had built their nests for many a long year, and from earliest spring to latest autumn whole colonies of sparrows chirped and twittered in the eaves. There were more pigeons about the dreary stable-yard and out-buildings than anybody but the landlord could reckon up. The wheeling and circling flights of runts, fantails, tumblers, and pouters, were perhaps not quite consistent with the grave and sober character of the building, but the monotonous cooing, which never ceased to be raised by some among them all day long, suited it exactly, and seemed to lull it to rest.
7. When the wind is blowing and the sleet or rain is driving against the dark windows, I love to sit by the fire, thinking of what I have read in books of voyage and travel. Such books have had a strong fascination for my mind from my earliest childhood; and I wonder it should have come to pass that I never have been round the world, never have been shipwrecked, ice-environed, tomahawked, or eaten.

FINAL

South 37 40. @ # %

East 175 15. & { }

Please Note:

• You are on Private land, and we have been granted permission to enter. Please show respect at all times as the property is also used for conservation education and DOC scientific research into “Peat Lake waterways”.
• Entry to the property is between 8.00 am and 5.00 pm (8.00PM During Daylight Savings).
• Only enter the land at S 37° 40.772 E 175° 15.044. We are able to park in the paddock as there is a hard area within 40 meters of the gateway. If it is very wet park at the roadside staying well off the road.
• Please leave all gates as you find them.
• Please do not approach the birds as they may be nesting, or enter any area where research is being carried out.
• Bring good footwear as the ground can get a little spongy after rain.
• If you see the owner’s (Andrew & Jenny Hayes) or family please wave and say thanks for allowing us to use their farm.

I hope that you enjoy your walk around a Living Peat Lake (they are very few remaining), and yet even fewer that can support life in them.

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