Page:Through South Westland.djvu/303

Rh a narrow track that keeps rather high and avoids the river-bed, but involving a good deal of scrambling and several boggy places to get over—and the four miles took us a long time. We found the family at home. Macpherson, a true Highlander, tall and big, entered with zest into all our plans, and said we would try for the Ice-caves to-morrow, if the weather cleared. He was a great talker once he started, and knew a great deal about the mountains, though he had never been to the Ice-caves. He holds 54,000 acres of barren mountain, the only good land being the strips along the rivers and in the valleys. As we sat talking, the rain came down in torrents, and mist hid the mountains, and one could imagine how lonely and desolate is this little settlement from autumn to spring. Sitting round the tea-table we heard more stories of the river.

This spring Mrs. Macpherson took the children to Pembroke in the trap—leaving her little boy with Macpherson. When they left Russell’s Flat on the return journey, rain came on, they were wet through, and her husband was not at the ford. True, there was the Niger Hut, but they wanted to get home, and she drove the horse into the river; but in a little time she found he was being carried away and beginning to swim. The children cried with fear, and in terror of the river she got the horse turned, and wet and cold they got out. Fortunately the rain ceased, and unharnessing the horse, they started to walk by the bridle-track.