Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/505

Rh Yorke had several bachelor friends in town, and once set in the way to further introductions, soon found himself in the full swing of the London season. He had got over the mauvaise honte which oppressed him as a lad. Everybody, he used to fancy in the time of his obscurity, was disposed to look down on the obscure subaltern of native infantry; but nobody could want to slight the decorated lieutenant-colonel of cavalry, who was one of the most fortunate and rising men in the service. Mutiny heroes had not gone out of fashion, and Yorke found himself welcomed and petted to the top of his bent. Always the London season has charms for the young of both sexes; but to be thoroughly enjoyed, it must come as it did to Yorke, with all the freshness of a new revelation.

And this is the man, he thought to himself sometimes, in the brief intervals allowed for reflection, who had made a vow to practise misanthropy, and never look in a woman's eyes again. I used to flatter myself that if I was not attractive, I had at least the merit of constancy. Yet here I am, as frivolous and pleasure-loving as any empty-headed fellow in London. And is it due to my constancy, I wonder, that I have not fallen in love again, or is it that the women make so much of the men, and are so easily won, that they cease to be attractive? And yet the one perfect woman I have seen was easily won too, though not by me. And then for a time he would fall to musing over the past, wondering idly what had been Olivia's fate.

 

 From Cornhill Magazine.

Wednesday, Nov. 11, 1874, the writer found himself on the borders of Lake Taupo, at Tapuaehararu, a town consisting of an inn and a military outpost. Long had it been his wish to reach the great lake, with its giant volcano, Tongariro, its geysers, and its memories of Maori chiefs, and Maori courage, and Maori cruelty. Yet when he arrived, on a pouring November afternoon, he felt inclined to turn tail at once, and leave early next day. There before him lay Taupo Moana — "the great sea" — sure enough, lying on its bed of pumice: there flowed a warm stream, making a little inlet of the lake warm enough for a comfortable bath; there were the great jets of steam bursting from the hillsides with noise and fury; but no Tongariro was to be seen. The rain, which had fallen unceasingly for many hours, threw a dark wet blanket over the landscape. The astonishing desolation and dreary brownness of the country damped all ardour to proceed. No grass, no fern even, seemed to flourish on these desolate shores, whose only vegetation was manuka scrub, and a certain poisonous shrub which had proved fatal to a fine horse on the way. No living creatures, birds or four-footed things, had been seen, and the country, buried ages ago under a desolating storm of pumice and ashes, looked dreary and desolate as the banks of the Dead Sea. So, in melancholy mood, disappointed of his dreams, the solitary traveller sat in the inn at Tapuaehararu, by the waters of Taupo.

The sight of another still more miserable wight revived him. A second traveller, the ne plus ultra of wretchedness, entered. "Give me some brandy-and-water hot, and a bed." It was about six o'clock in the afternoon, so it may be conceived that he must have been somewhat fatigued. His horse had eaten of the poisonous shrubs and died under him fifteen miles away. Over hill and dale he had tramped, in the pouring rain, guiding himself by the telegraph-posts across the roadless country. Any one who has seen a rough volcanic country, covered with a baffling scrub, will understand the difficulties and weariness of such a walk. Tea and a little brandy-and-water gave us both courage, and we determined to voyage together up the lake next morning. Let me introduce my travelling companion as W——. Henceforth at various odd places on this globe we two "globe-trotters" kept meeting, arriving often from most diverse directions at the same spot on the same day: until at last, on arriving at New York on the way home, although I thought my friend was thousands of miles away, I looked in the travellers' list with a sort of half-expectation, and saw his name first among the arrivals at the hotel that day.

There is a steamer at Taupo, thanks to New-Zealand enterprise and to Mr. Vogel, the prime minister. It was to start next morning for the head of the lake. "When would it return?" "Whenever suited our convenience," was the answer. So next day we steamed peacefully over the waters for about twenty-eight miles up the lake. Everything had changed from the day before. Tongariro showed his great 