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Our second day’s coaching had more varied interest than the first, and though we again had a good deal of fine rain it was not so misty nor so terribly cold.

We left Longford soon after six, and for the first few hours drove through exactly the same sort of wild bush as on Friday. But presently we began to see signs of the gold industry that has done so much to open up this part of the country. The first sign was a miner’s camp, a very dreary, unkempt affair, two or three ragged tents and a tumble-down whare. Newman turned to me and asked,

“Do you know what the first owner of that camp’s wife answered when he wrote home to her and asked her to join him out here?”

His way of putting it sounded so comical that I glanced involuntarily at Mrs Greendays to see if she had appreciated it before I replied. I did not know Rh