This book contains an account of an excursion to the interior of the North Island of New Zealand in 1865, following the British Invasion of the Waikato and the Tauranga Campaign the previous year, one of the major military exercises of the New Zealand Wars.

Its author, Herbert Meade, who served on board HMS Sandfly, a ship used by the colonial government during the conflict, joined two Māori and two Europeans to visit Lake Taupo on the command of the governor of New Zealand, Sir George Grey. The expedition surveyed military sites used by Māori during the campaign and visited some prominent natural wonders such as the geysers and hot springs surrounding the present-day city of Rotorua.

Around half of the book describes Meade’s excursion, his descriptions of the interior of the North Island and his personal opinions on Māori culture. The remainder of the work focuses on Sandfly’s voyage to various Pacific islands in 1865-6. The ship visited Norfolk Island, the New Hebrides (now Vanuatu), Fiji, New Caledonia, the Solomon Islands, Tonga and Tahiti and Meade provides descriptions of his travels, which clearly demonstrate his personal, often negative, views of life on the islands, Islander society and the behaviour of non-conformist and Catholic missionaries.