Horrible as a large swamp is however to a timid horsewoman, it is dear to the heart of a cockatoo. He gladly buys a freehold of fifty acres in the midst of one, burns it, makes a sod fence, sown with gorse seed a-top, all round his section, drains it in a rough and ready fashion, and then the splendid fertile soil which has been waiting for so many thousand years, "brings forth fruit abundantly." Such enormous fields of wheat and oats and barley as you come upon sometimes,—with, alas, never a market near enough to enable the plenteous crop to return sevenfold into its master's bosom!
I shall not inflict upon you a description of all our rides in search of members for our congregation. Two, in widely differing directions, will serve as specimens of such excursions. In consideration of my new-chumishness, F—— selected a comparatively easy track for our first ride. And yet, "bad was the best," might surely be said of that breakneck path. What would an English horse, or an English lady say, to riding for miles over a slippery winding ledge on a rocky hill side, where a wall of solid mountain rose up perpendicularly on the right hand, and on the left a very respectable sized river hurried over its boulders far beneath the aerial path; yet this was comparatively a safe track, and presented but one serious obstacle, over which I was ruthlessly taken. It is perhaps needless to say we were riding in single file, and equally unnecessary to state that I was the last; for certainly we should never have made much progress otherwise. Helen, my bay mare, would follow her stable companion, on which F—— was mounted, so that was the way we got on at all.
A sudden sharp turn showed me what appeared to be a low stone wall running own the spur of the mountain, right across our track, and I had already begun to disquiet myself about the possibility of turning back on such a narrow ledge, when I saw F——'s powerful black horse, with his ears well forward, and his reins, lying loose on his neck, make a sort of rush at the obstacle, climb up it as a cat would, stand for an instant, exactly like a performing goat, with all four legs drawn closely together under him, and then with a spring disappear on the other side. "This wall", I thought, "must be but loosely built, for Leo has displaced some of the stones from its coping." Helen, pretty dear, hurried after her friend and leader; and before I had time to realize what she was going to do, she was balancing herself on the crumbling summit of this stone wall (which was only the freak of a landslip), and as it proved impossible to remain there, perched like a bird on a very insecure branch, nothing remained except to gather herself well together and jump off. But what a jump! the ground fell sheer away at the foot of the wall, and left a chasm many feet wide, which the horse could not see until it had climbed to the top of the wall, and as turning back was out of the question, the only alternative was to give a vigorous bound on to the narrow ledge beyond. Terrified as I felt, I luckily refrained from jerking Helen's head, or attempting to guide her in any way. The only chance of safety over New Zealand tracks, or New Zealand creeks, is to leave your horse entirely to itself. I have seen men who were reckoned good riders in England, get the most ignominious tumbles from a disregard of this advice. An up-country horse knows perfectly well the only sound spots in a swamp; or the only sound part of a creek's banks. If his rider persists in taking him over the latter, where he himself thinks it narrowest and safest, he is pretty sure to find the earth rotten and crumbling, and to pay for his obstinacy by a wetting; whilst in the case of a swamp the consequences are even more serious, and the horse often gets badly strained in floundering out of a quagmire.
But it was not all danger and difficulty, and the many varieties of scene in the course of a long ride constituted some of its chief charms. At first, perhaps, after we had left our own fair valley behind, the track would wind through the gorge of a river, with lofty mountains rising sheer up from the water side. All here was sad and grey, and very solemn in its eternal silence, only made more intense by the ceaseless monotonous roar of the ever-rushing water. Then we would emerge on acres and acres of softly rolling downs, higher than the hillocks we call by that name at home, but still marvellously beautiful in their swelling curves all folding so softly into each other, and dotted with mobs of sheep, making pastoral music to a flock-owner's ear. Over this sort of ground we could canter gaily along, with "Hector," F——'s pet colley, keeping close to the heels of his master's horse,—for it is the worst of bad manners in a colley to look at a neighbour's sheep. The etiquette in passing through a strange run is for the dog to go on the off side of his master's horse, so that the sheep shall not even see him; and this piece of courtly politeness Hector always practised of his own accord.
A wire fence always proved a very tiresome obstacle, for horses have a great dread of them, and will not be induced to jump them on any account. If we could find out where the gate was, well and good; but as it might be half a dozen miles off, on one side or the other, we seldom lost time or patience in seeking it. When there was no help for it, and such a fence had to be crossed, the proceedings were, always the same. F——dismounted, and unfastened one of his stirrup leathers; with this he strapped the wires as firmly as possible together, but if the fence had been lately fresh-strained, it was sometimes a difficult task. Still he generally made one spot lower than the rest, and over this he proceeded to adjust his coat very carefully; he then vaulted lightly over himself, and calling upon me to aid by sundry flicks on Leo's flank, the horse would be induced to jump over it. This was always a work of time and trouble, for Leo hated doing it, and would rather have leaped the widest winter creek, than jumped the lowest coat-covered wire fence. Helen had to jump with me on her back, and without any friendly whip to urge her, but except once, when she caught her hind leg in the sleeve of the coat which was hanging over the fence, and tore it completely out, she got over very well. Upon that occasion F—— had to carry his sleeve in his pocket until we reached the neat little out-station hut, where Jim Salter lived, and where we were pretty sure to find a housewife, for shepherds are as handy as sailors with a needle and thread.
I shall always believe that some bird of the air had "carried the matter" to Salter, because not only was he at home, and in his Sunday clothes, but he had made a cake the evening before, and that was a very suspicious circumstance. However we pretended not to imagine that we were expected, and Jim pretended with equal success to be much surprised at our visit, so both sides were satisfied. Nothing could be neater than the inside of the little hut; its cob walls papered with, old Illustrated London News,—not only pictures but letter-press,—its tiny window as clean as possible, a new sheep-skin rug laid down before the open fireplace, where a bright wood fire was sputtering and cracking cheerily, and the inevitable kettle suspended from a hook half-way up the low chimney. Outside, the dog-kennels had been newly thatched with tohi grass, the garden weeded and freshly dug, the chopping-block and camp-oven as clean as scrubbing could make them. It was too late in the year for fruit, but Salter's currant, raspberry, and gooseberry bushes gave us a good idea of how well he must have fared in the summer. The fowls were just devouring the last of the green-pea shoots, and the potatoes had been blackened by our first frosts.
It was all very nice and trim and comfortable, except the loneliness; that must have been simply awful. It is difficult to realise how completely cut off from the society of his kind a New Zealand up-country shepherd is, especially at an out-station like this. Once in every three months he goes down to the homestead, borrows the pack horse, and leads it up to his hut, with a quarter's rations of flour, tea, sugar and salt; of course he provides himself with mutton and firewood, and his simple wants are thus supplied. After shearing, about January, his wages are paid, varying from 75 pounds to 100 pounds a year, according to the locality, and then he gets a week's leave to go down to the nearest town. If he be a prudent steady man, as our friend Salter was, he puts his money in the bank, or lends it out on a freehold mortgage at ten per cent., only deducting a few pounds from his capital for a suit of clothes, a couple of pair of Cookham boots for hill walking, and above all, some new books.
Without any exception, the shepherds I came across in New Zealand were all passionately fond of reading; and they were also well-informed men, who often expressed themselves in excellent, through superfine, language. Their libraries chiefly consisted of yellow-covered novels, and out of my visits in search of a congregation grew a scheme for a book-club to supply something better in the way of literature, which was afterwards most successfully carried out. But of this I need not speak here, for we are still seated inside Salter's hut,—so small in its dimensions that it could hardly have held another guest. Womanlike, my eyes were everywhere, and I presently spied out an empty bottle, labelled "Worcestershire Sauce."
"Dear me, Salter," I cried, "I had no idea you were so grand as to have sauces up here: why we hardly ever use them." "Well, mum," replied Salter, bashfully, and stroking his long black beard to gain time to select the grandest words he could think of, "it is hardly to be regarded in the light of happetite, that there bottle, it is more in the nature of remedies." Then, seeing that I still looked mystified, he added, "You see, mum, although we gets our 'elth uncommon well in these salubrious mountings, still a drop of physic is often handy-like, and in a general way I always purchase myself a box of Holloway's Pills (of which you do get such a lot for your money), and also a bottle of pain-killer; but last shearing they was out o' pain-killer, they said, so they put me up a bottle o' Cain pepper, and likewise that 'ere condiment, which was werry efficacious, 'specially towards the end o' the bottle!" "And do you really mean to say you drank it, Salter?" I inquired with horror.
"Certainly I do, mum, whenever I felt out o' sorts. It always took my mind off the loneliness, and cheered me up wonderful, especial if I hadded a little red pepper to it," said Salter, getting up from his log of wood and making me a low bow. All this time F—— and I were seated amicably side by side on poor Salter's red blanket-covered "bunk," or wooden bedstead, made of empty flour-sacks nailed between rough poles, and other sacks filled with tussock grass for a mattress and pillow.