Page:A Voyage of Discovery and Research in the Southern and Antarctic Regions Vol 2.djvu/120

100 part of the business being to mix with the different groups, addressing each in their turn, and seeing that they all enjoyed themselves. We could not help thinking that the provisions might have been equally well secured upon a less elaborate and expensive structure.

After crossing the river we observed a marked change in the geological structure of the country, from a sterile pipe-clay to a richer decomposed volcanic matter at the surface, densely compressed beneath, and mixed with mica, hornblende and quartz, which had perhaps at one time been a hard granite rock, and if exposed to great heat and pressure, might again become so. Ascending the steep hill on the opposite side of the valley the increased fertility of the soil was strikingly manifest, and on reaching its summit the neat-looking village, and the church with its conspicuous steeple, came in view; the houses of the missionaries, built quite in the English style, together with the well-cultivated farms and fields, divided by hedgerows of true English green, formed a most gratifying sight, and reminded us more of our own country than anything we had seen in other parts of the colony.

We were received on our arrival, early in the afternoon, by Mr. and Mrs. Taylor in the most cordial manner, and after doing justice to an excellent dinner they had prepared for us, we walked through the gardens, in which we found abundance of delicious strawberries and other fruits of our own country mingled with those of the tropical