Page:Rambles on the Golden Coast of New Zealand.djvu/61

Rh that adjacent lie,” had a very significant influence upon the powers of speech possessed by the passengers on board the “Geelong.” The most liberal quotation from the language of genius is almost unavailing in conveying a conception of some of Nature’s pictures on this West Coast, and, as it was, our party had not been “coached” for the occasion in that particular, nor was the presence of native genius revealed. There were as many of us, perhaps, as there were wounds in Cæsar’s body, and, like them, we were “poor, poor, dumb mouths”—by our very silence eloquent of our admiration of the grandeur of the scene. We all quite agreed with the practical man—that to make the country available, there must be a new dispensation; that it was formed, not for the present race of pigmies, but for a nobler race to come after. There was one picture which almost suggested that the nobler race had already come. On a terrace, about 3000 ft. high, there had been a slip, and even to the least imaginative amongst us, it assumed, by the peculiarity of its outline, the appearance of a man. I think we compared him to a solitary sentinel—a weird warrior, on one of the watch towers of the race of giants who, it might be, inhabited these hills. This is no romancing. The illusion was most complete.

Midway, in the sail through this Strait, we opened up Wet Jacket Sound. It is a smaller sound than the others; but, like them, it presents nothing but the picturesque—snow-clad hills descending right into the sea.

It was resolved by His Honour, after leaving Breaksea Sound, to proceed direct to Martin’s Bay, calling only at Milford Sound on the way, and leaving any of the other Sounds which it might be desirable to visit until the steamer was on her way back. As we steamed out of Breaksea Sound, the moon was just beginning to outshine the last light of the sun, and we enjoyed a bright moonlight night along the coast; but its features, except when seen in detail, are not attractive. They are sufficiently grand, but lose by comparison with what we had seen, by what some of us knew to be waiting us further north. Running closely inshore as we did, we could see nothing of the back or snowy ranges, and the view, if it was not dismal, had a dark and frowning aspect. In most parts, the mountain sides go down into the depths of the ocean, as in the Sounds. It is only to the southward of George Sound that we get the first glimpse of a beach of any kind. There is here an apparent change in the rock, and up to Bligh Sound the ranges have more of the indications of schist, or of a gold-bearing country. South of Bligh Sound, the remnant of a terrace protrudes into the sea, skirted by a beach of white sand, and a similar beach was seen in Catseye Bay, and it was the intention to have visited them on our return; but in that we were disappointed. From this point northward, the grandeur of the scenery accumulates. The snowy ranges come close to the coast, and a view is obtained of the three easily-recognised commanding peaks which form some of the magnificent surroundings of Milford Sound—Pembroke, Mitre, and Lawrenny Peaks. On each of these there were visible fields of snow, thousands of acres in extent, and of a depth probably measurable by fathoms. As we saw them they were cloudless. Only from one or two of the Sounds, banks of white clouds, at a