Page:Rambles on the Golden Coast of New Zealand.djvu/164

128 wind rushing down from the mountains above, vessels are generally obliged to moor to trees or pinnacles of rock, whenever they reach a cove in which an anchor can be dropped. Accordingly, while we were in Milford Sound, the ‘Clio’ lay at anchor in Harrison’s Cove, only a few yards from the shore, and moored head and stern to huge trunks of trees. Immediately above rose Pembroke Peak to the height of nearly 7000 ft., covered with perpetual snow, and with a glacier reaching down to within 2000 ft. of the sea. The lower slopes of the mountains around are covered with fine trees, and with the luxuriant and evergreen foliage of the trees, and the other beautiful undergrowth of the New Zealand forests. Two permanent waterfalls, one 700 and the other 540 ft. in height, add picturesque beauty to the gloomy and desolate grandeur of the upper part of Milford Sound. During a storm of wind and rain, mingled with snow and sleet, which, though it was the middle of summer, raged during three days of our stay, avalanches were often heard thundering down, with a roar as of distant artillery, from the snow-fields above; while a multitude of foaming cascades poured over the face of the lower precipices, hurling with them, into the sea, masses of rock and trunks of trees. On the other hand, nothing could exceed the charm of the few fine days which we enjoyed during our voyage. In his work, entitled ‘Greater Britain’ (Part 11, chap. ii.), Sir Charles Dilke has truly observed ‘that the peculiarity which makes the New Zealand West Coast scenery the most beautiful in the world is that here alone, you can find semi-tropical vegetation growing close up to the eternal snows. The latitudes, and the great moisture of the climate, bring the glaciers very low into the valleys; and cause the growth of palm-like ferns on the ice river’s very edge. The glaciers of Mount Cook are the longest in the world, except those at the sources of the Indus; but close about them have been found tree ferns of 30 and 40 ft. in height. It is not till you enter the mountains that you escape the moisture of the coast, and quit for the scenery of the Alps the scenery of fairy land.’

“Again Sir C. Dilke’s description of the view from Hokitika at sunrise would apply also to the same view from many other points on the West Coast. A hundred miles of the Southern Alps stood out upon a pale blue sky in curves of gloomy white that were just beginning to blush with pink, but ended to the southward in a cone of fire that stood up from the ocean; it was the snow-dome of Mount Cook struck by the rising sun. The evergreen bush, flaming with the crimson rata blooms, hung upon the mountain side, and covered the plains to the very margin of the narrow sands with a dense jungle. It was one of those sights that haunt men for years.

“The neighbourhood of the sea, and the semi-tropical magnificence of the foliage, are features in which the New Zealand Alps excel the highest mountain ranges in Europe. As members of the Alpine Club, of England, have already scaled the peaks of the Caucasus, it is hoped that they will ere long explore the glaciers and summits of Mount Cook, together with the elsewhere unrivalled scenery of the neighbouring fiords. Mount Cook (as has been already said) rises to 13,200 ft. above the sea-level, that is, surpasses all but Mount Blanc and one or two others of the highest of the Alps of Europe.