Through South Westland : A journey to the Haast and Mount Aspiring New Zealand . ryway, in ordinary beds, having probably dinedoff excellent Otago mutton. I am afraid no realgratitude was in my heart for these surveyor sleeping liappily in the bush : theschoolmaster teaching those few lambs in thewilderness : my friends among the settlers all had helped to spoil me for the returnto the routine of daily life. It was much more of a climb now, though thetrack was at no point too steep to ride, and wefollowed each other in single file. A cloudlesssky above, rushing water on a
Through South Westland : A journey to the Haast and Mount Aspiring New Zealand . ryway, in ordinary beds, having probably dinedoff excellent Otago mutton. I am afraid no realgratitude was in my heart for these surveyor sleeping liappily in the bush : theschoolmaster teaching those few lambs in thewilderness : my friends among the settlers all had helped to spoil me for the returnto the routine of daily life. It was much more of a climb now, though thetrack was at no point too steep to ride, and wefollowed each other in single file. A cloudlesssky above, rushing water on all hands, and, exceptfor that, the deep silence of the bush. Graduallyit had lost its tropical look, and we came to barecliffs where the mountains seemed to come downon ones head. Coming up a narrow gorge werounded a shoulder of cliff, and saw high up theopposite mountain, the Haast glacier—not theone of that name farther north. This one seemedto topple over a razor-back mountain, poisingitself like the crest of a mighty wave somethousands of feet above us. We could not see. THE LAST STAGE. 119 whence it came—a shoulder of snow-cappedmountain intervened—but the more we scanned itthrough the glasses the stranger it we surmounted the next ridge above a sunnypool with shingly bottom, the streams were stillall running west, but beyond the ridge, lo ! theyran east, down to a wide valley where Ted toldus the Fish river ran. The beech forest hadfinally conquered, and the hills rolled away, evenlyfurred with dark, monotonous green. A stakeby the track marked the junction of Westlandwith Otago. Alas, I viewed it with no feeling of exultation !It was only by the promise we should come againand complete that unfinished stage of the MainSouth Road that Transome roused me toany feeling of satisfaction. I let the others goon with the horses down the steep descent, prefer-ring to walk. But the track was hot and dry,and the yellow clay along the sides, was crackedwith heat. U
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