Other formats

    Adobe Portable Document Format file (facsimile images)   TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

Philiberta: A Novel

Chapter XLIII

Chapter XLIII.

The Itinerant Show fell in love with Clyde. Our Tenor said he would like to be brought there to die and be buried, and he tried to inveigle Our Basso into a promise of bringing him there when his time came. But Our Basso said it would take him all his time to look after his own funeral, and he could not promise to attend to other people's. Did Our Tenor take him for an undertaker, lie would like to know?

Clyde may not be the prettiest of the Dunstan townships, but it will dwell in the memory of the Itinerant Show as quite the pleasantest. Whether this is owing chiefly to its delicious page 281climate, or to the friendliness of its inhabitants, or to the genial influence of the kindly, comfortable, and sparkling hostess of the Dunstan Hotel, it would be hard to say. I think that hostess had most to do with the perfect pleasure of our stay at Clyde. There are some people one can never think of without a smile and benediction; she is one of those people. Bless her! Bless her Chinese cook, too! for he was a jewel worthy of the middle place in a celestial diadem. Such a man as he to look after one's daily well-being would almost resign one to existence. His omelettes—his—but why dwell upon what is a happy experience, divided from us by cruel years and miles that can never be bridged by mere unsatisfying memory?

Six miles or so distant from Clyde on one side is Alexandra; at a distance of seven or eight miles (perhaps a little more) on the other side is Cromwell. You reach Alexandra by crossing a flat skirted by that most dangerous of rivers the Molyneaux; a river that respects not man nor the works of man, but works itself up to flood-pitch at all sorts of unreasonable hours, and with appalling suddenness sweeps down bridges and houses, and carries off tremendous slices of its own banks, and is altogether as wicked and uncertain as old Mississippi. It is deep and wide and muddy, and in its peaceable intervals flows along in a soapy lazy fashion, very unlike its high action in flood-time.

The road to Cromwell is most picturesque. We followed the river through Dunstan Gorge, on both sides of which are caves in the rocks, wherein people do sometimes dwell. A while ago, when the Dunstan rush was at fever-heat, these cave dwellings were well patronised by men who were in too great a hurry to build for themselves.

For graphic and beautiful description of all the Dunstan district, the reader should peruse Vincent Pyke's clever novel 'Wild Will Enderby.'

Many romantic little episodes are woven in with the history of these goldfields. To us a communicative fellow-passenger related a plaintive little story anent a small empty hut standing at the foot of the Cairngorm Mountains, a little way out from page 282Clyde. In the gold-days, he said, it was inhabited by a lonely man and woman who lived together, and worked together—the woman taking full masculine share of the toil—and seemed in every way amicable, conjugal partners. Until she died—quite suddenly—and then there was a coroner's inquest; and the man in evidence told how he had met her some time before in Australia, and sought to make her his wife; how she had refused, but offered to live with him unmarried if he would allow her to work with him as a man, and have a man's share in all profits, and never ask her any questions. He agreed, and they went together to the Otago diggings, and were very comfortable together, despite her taciturnity and the mystery that seemed to enshroud her and sometimes cloud her mind. Then she died, and examination of her few effects brought to light the newspaper account of the trial of a criminal in Australia—a criminal whose crime and sentence were both in the last degree—and the copy of a last passionate appeal from his wife to the Crown for commutation of his sentence.

And then a description of the hanging, for the law, it seemed, had been inexorably deaf to the sad petition. This was the dead woman's secret, doubtless; and a sorrowfully heavy one to carry hidden in her heart through all those years of strange, toilsome existence, the toilsomeness being probably all that kept her sane and alive so long.

Cromwell is a more populous township than Clyde, and has a lofty opinion of itself, as have all these settlements. Nothing can so offend the settlers in one as praise bestowed on another. We offended the Alexandrians and Cromwellians mortally by our hearty preference for Clyde. Our Basso, discovering the weakness, never wounded people in that way again. Ever afterwards each township we came to was the 'finest he had ever seen,' just as every woman he could get five minutes' private conversation with was an 'oasis in the desert of his existence.'

In reference to this amiable tendency, Our Tenor said confidentially to me one day that one of these times Our Basso would be 'scooped in' before he knew where he was. I said:

page 283

'How d'ye mean, Harry?'

'Why, some woman will marry him.'

'Perhaps he won't mind,' said I.

'Yes, he will,' said Our Tenor. 'Tom loves his liberty. He'd as soon break stones on the roads as tie himself up to one woman for life. I've heard him say so.'

'Then,' said I, 'I hope that cook at St. Bathans will be the happy scooper.' For my heart was sore with the recollection of how Our Basso had got round that cook—a bearded woman, too—for sweetbreads and kidneys and all kinds of delicacies, while we had to take ordinary rough fare and be thankful.

The first objects of interest outside Cromwell, as you travel towards the Lake country, are Mount Pisa on the north-east and the Kaik Range opposite. After these comes Kawam Gorge, a ravine through rugged grand mountains, from which huge masses of rock fall from time to time into the river. The coach has at times to climb along sidings scarped out of the overhanging mountain sides. Any sinners that happen to be in that locality on the day when sinners will want rocks and mountains to fall on them will not have long to wait. Those huge overhanging masses seem scarce to need an invitation to topple over and bury everything below.

The renowned waterfall 'Roaring Meg,' and the natural bridge formed by huge rocks across the noisy river, are features of interest to travellers on this route, as is also a track over the hills to Arrowtown, called Gentle Annie's Bridle-path, along which, in the early digging days, unfortunate barmaids were packed and charged for by weight, so much a pounds avoirdupois, like any other merchandise. Most of the country after Naseby that is not distinctly mountainous is formed into terraces, many of which are so compactly and regularly designed as to suggest the hand of man in military earthworks. There is little doubt that the plains between these are dry lake-beds, and that the terraces have been formed by the gradually receding water. At Morven we crossed the river, not without danger. In flood time it is utterly impassable. The road after crossing climbs a tremendous ascent, and page 284presently brings the traveller into rich little Arrowtown, all hemmed In by the gloomy circle of ranges. Our journey from Arrowtown to Queenstown was through heavy rain, which brought on the darkness of night so rapidly as to obscure all the grand scenery, save a glimpse of great Ben Lomond, of the lofty Remarkables, of Walter Peak and Mount Cecil, and pretty Lake Hayes.

It was pitch dark when we crossed the riotous stream Shot-over and reached Queenstown. And we were the wettest, tiredest, hungriest crowd that ever struck that place, I verily believe. We were utterly incapable of doing anything or of thinking of anything beyond supper and bed. We enjoyed a glorious banquet before a roaring wood fire at the hotel, and then—half asleep and wholly torpid—we went to our blankets like boa-constrictors, and knew nothing more until late next morning.

Owing to the villainous weather, we did not prosper at Queenstown; nor did we realize all the glory of the scenery until the day we were leaving, though we did spend one whole rainy day in going to the head of the lake in a boat. The captain of the boat told us all about the place, and pointed out the special features, or rather the places where they were located. But we saw nothing but a dense fog, and so had nothing but the captain's word for what lay beyond. But even if we had seen everything, it would be the stalest kind of folly for the present writer to attempt description of the beauties of Lake Wakatipu after the abler pens of other authors have given them to the world. As we were returning from the head of the lake the clouds, clearing away a little from before the dying sun, gave us one glimpse of a glory over Mount Alfred, and among the glaciers that surpassed the description of heaven in the Book of Revelation.

Next day we departed in fine weather by steamer for Kingston. And then we discovered how very lovely Queenstown is, nestling in a bend of the lake at the foot of the hills, so near the edge of the water that the township is reflected house for house in the clear azure depths. Ben Lomond and page 285the Remarkables showed enough of themselves that day to enable us conscientiously to say we had seen them. All down the lake to Kingston the scenery is of varying magnificence, but Kingston itself is a desolate-looking little place, resting on a flat with mountains overshadowing it gloomily on every side. From Kingston we travelled through country that had been most obviously once a series of lakes. When about half-way to Invercargill, we came to patches of bush, and passed through dense small forests of white pine trees and manuka scrub, vocal with the sweet cry of the tui, or parson-bird, the simple song of the mokamoka, and the short note of the bell-bird.

It was late when we entered Invercargill, and we were unable to obtain accommodation at any of the hotels, so took refuge in a cheap boarding-house. Like many other cheap things, this house was nasty. Doubtless fatigue would have compelled sleep and forgetfulness of all our miseries had not a man in the chamber exactly above ruled otherwise. Perhaps the man was drunk; perhaps he was only too large for his couch; however it may have been, he certainly fell out of bed with a persistent frequency and regularity worthy of a better cause. For ten minutes after each tumble the atmosphere of my room was dense with dust and profanity. The dust came from the ceiling, the profanity from—well, never mind! Between falls the man up aloft groaned and snorted, and so the monotony of his other performance was relieved. He kept at it till daylight, and then I quitted my high-scented couch and left.

We managed to get into a good hotel the day after our boarding-house experience, and so were comfortable during the remainder of our stay.