Some three miles away there shone the sparkling waters of a tiny bay, whose shores, at that distance, could be seen framed in emerald green, as the forest trees grew right down to where the sea could almost lave their roots, and goodly ships have made fast cable or hawser to their trunks. And yet, in all the length and breadth of the glorious vale, stood but one house, sheltered in another tiny valley, running off at right angles; while right up and up, higher and higher, tree, crag, and mossy bank were piled with a profuseness of grandeur that displayed novel beauties at every glance.
“‘And I said, if there’s peace,’—I don’t believe any place could be more lovely, even in this land of beauty,” muttered the traveller, tapping the ashes out of his smoked pipe on to a mossy boulder, and then blowing them carefully away. “Here am I, too, defiling Nature’s beauties with my vile nicotine. But beauty is beauty, Joey; and it only satisfies the eye; and man has a stomach, and bones that ache if they don’t have a bed; so, my gallant steed, we’ll finish our journey to the Moa’s Nest, and see what friend Lee will say to us, and whether he will bestow on thy master, damper, tea, and bacon, and on thee some corn.”
The gallant steed did not even sniff at the prospect of the feed of corn, but submitted, like the well-broken animal he was, to the replacing of his bit; when, arranging his bridle, his master mounted, put up his umbrella again, and then, leaving the pony to pick his way, slowly descended the zigzag track which led to old Martin Lee’s station, known far and wide, from an old Maori tradition, as the Moa’s Nest.
The distance seemed nothing from where he had been seated; but the track wound and doubled so much, from the steepness of the descent, that it was getting towards sundown before the traveller rode up to the long, straggling, wooden building, that had evidently been erected at various times, as the prosperity of its occupant had called for farther increase; when, slowly dismounting, he closed the great umbrella, hung his bridle upon a hook, and stalked in to where the family were at tea, if the substantial meal spread out could be so called.
“God bless all here!” he said heartily, as he brought down the umbrella with a thump; “How’s friend Lee?”
“Right well am I, parson, thank you!” exclaimed a bluff, sturdy-looking farmer. “Won’t you draw up to the log fire?”
There was a merry laugh at these words; for it was midsummer, and the Gap was famed for its hot days and nights.
“And how is the good wife, and my little queen, too?” continued the new-comer, shaking hands with Mrs Lee, a sharp, eager little woman; and then taking their daughter’s blooming face between his hands, to kiss her lovingly, as if she had been his own child. “All well? That’s right! Yours obediently, sir,” he continued, to a tall, dark man of about thirty, who had risen from the table with the others.
“A neighbour of ours, Mr Meadows,” said Mrs Lee; “Mr Anthony Bray.”
“Your servant, sir,” said the new-comer stiffly. “A neighbour, eh? Lives close by—six or eight miles off, I suppose?” And then he muttered to himself, “I know what’s your business.”