A climber in New Zealand

by Malcolm Ross

Wherewith Eternity shall wall

Time round when Time shall fall.”

CHAPTER XV

ACROSS THE SOUTHERN ALPS—concluded

“The’ was ’bout half a minit when I’d hev sold out mighty cheap an’ took a promise fer the money.”—American Author.

When dawn came, Fyfe was still tossing restlessly in his sleeping bag. We got up at 5 a.m., and partially undressed for the crossing of the river. We got over the first branch without difficulty; but the second stream ran swift and deep. Fyfe got near mid-stream, hesitated a moment, and then plunged ahead. But he had scarcely gone a couple of yards when he was swept off his feet and was at the mercy of the current. His swag was over one shoulder, in one hand he carried the Alpine rope, and in the other his ice-axe. I never expected to see swag, ice-axe, nor rope again, and I was just on the point of rushing down-stream with a view to intercepting Fyfe at a bend in the river before he should be carried down to the gorge, once into which there would have been no hope for him. Many years ago a man was drowned while attempting to cross this same river below the gorge. Fyfe, however, with grim determination stuck to all his belongings, and, after a stroke or two, he came to the surface again and floundered into shallower water. The current there was still strong, and he was knocked off his feet for the second time. But in two minutes he had got through the worst of it, and as he gained the farther shore he turned round and laughed. He told me afterwards that, though he had set his teeth with grim determination, and was all the more minded, after his involuntary sousing, to get even with the river, he would not have cared—so great was the pain from his wound—had he been swept into the gorge, whether he got through it dead or alive.

It was now my turn to cross, and as I looked ruefully over the broad stream at my dripping, half-clothed companion, I realized that what he had so narrowly escaped might, perchance, happen to me. Fyfe came back, as far as he dared, into the current, and endeavoured to throw one end of the Alpine rope back to me; but the stream was much too wide, and he failed in his efforts. There was nothing for it, therefore, but to make the attempt, and I waded in. By going a few yards farther up-stream, I took the current at an easier angle, and, though it was touch and go at one time, I crossed in safety. At that early hour of the morning, both the water and the air were icy cold, and when I reached the farther bank Fyfe’s teeth were chattering. We lit a fire to dry our wet things, and between the process of undressing and dressing we were attacked by myriads of sandflies. Ahead was a steep hill covered with dense bush, up which we had to climb, and we knew not what was beyond. Moreover, we had to be content with tabloid tea and saccharine for breakfast, as we wished to keep our last bit of bread as an emergency ration. While we were drying our things a small wren came hopping about, in quite a friendly way, and, though it went to my heart to do it, I killed him with my catapult. Still, in the event of my having to leave Fyfe, one or two of these birds, small as they were, would not be amiss.

One cannot make a very full meal of tabloid tea sweetened with saccharine, and it is scarcely the sort of food for a climber when he has to go through dense forest, and up a steep hill, with a swag on his back. At one time we thought of abandoning our swags so that we might make quicker progress. Fyfe’s leg pained him at every step, and he told me afterwards that he was busy wondering during all this morning why he had ever been born. On gaining the top of the hill we found several gullies running in the direction of the river. We crossed near the head of these, and arrived at a comparatively flat area on top of a ridge, but could see nothing owing to the tallness of the trees. At length with a joyful shout I came suddenly on an old disused track on which were the recent footprints of a bullock.

We presumed that the animal was being used by some lonely miner as a means of transport to his “claim,” and came to the conclusion that if we followed the tracks we should find food and help near at hand. A closer examination of the tracks, however, revealed the fact that the bullock had gone up and down the path, and we could not tell which prints were the newer. Moreover, look we ever so closely, we could find, nowhere, any sign or trace of the presence of man; and, finally, the mystery was solved, and our hopes again dashed to the ground, by the sudden appearance of five or six wild cattle, big and fat, and with great horned heads, that went tearing past us through the forest, and vanished over the brow of the hill into the valley out of which we had just climbed. The noise they made, as they crashed through the undergrowth at close quarters, startled us somewhat, and the first inclination was to dodge behind the trunks of the splendid trees that grew in such luxuriance in this forest primeval. But it was soon apparent that they were much more frightened of us than we were of them, so we continued our weary march down the narrow, half-overgrown track, which led us out of the forest and back to the river a little way below the mouth of the gorge. Here, on the beach, the first thing that met our gaze was the footprints of a man! We would have given a great deal to have found that man, but, like the footprints of the bullock, his tracks, also, went both ways, and it was impossible to decide at which end of his journey he was. I tried very hard to make out which were the more recent footprints, but there appeared to be no difference. They had apparently been made on the same day. We afterwards found that the man was a miner and that he was working hard by.