Page:Through South Westland.djvu/181

Rh prepare flax-fibre—even sent down machinery and engaged men to cut flax. When they had cleaned out the savings of many a trusting West Coaster, they decamped. No one was ever brought to justice, and my nice old man from Newtonards lost his all. He was living with the ferryman and his brother, and everyone was very kind to him. We had engaged the ferryman—Ted, as I must call him—to guide us over the pass. It did not seem to matter at all about the ferry; our old friend would take charge, and nobody but the mail-man was likely to want to cross in the next fortnight.

That was a gala night. Another goose was cooked for us. Some of the men from the Survey Camp up the Haast came in. One of them (whom I found to be the father of the beautiful children at Okuru) brought me a handkerchief full of exquisite ferns, some of which 1 had not seen before. He had a passion for ferns, and promised me a dried collection. I have it still, a reminder of that night. We sat late talking, while the storm raged outside. This man, with his love for ferns, and for the untrodden mountains where he had climbed and prospected in years gone by, described for us in vivid language the practically unexplored region west of Mount Aspiring. He spoke of wonderful ice-falls, of great glaciers, of a river that shot full-grown from beneath an arch of ice; of ice-caves, and a vast blue ice-fall where thousands of tons plunged into an abyss with deafening roar.