fairy-light, and fairy-bright. It might be made of marble lattice-work, or of silver, so slender and shining it looks—and built out upon clear glass, or painted on it, so airily is it advanced upon the water . . . with a twin self, see! fairer yet, gleaming up to meet it through the lovely, unwavering blue. There is a charm of Italy down there, in the vivid colouring and enchanted aspect of the bay; just as up here in the rocky pastures and crisp air there is something Alp-like and Swiss. But Switzerland has no sea, Italy no such racy sense of newness and beginning. No! we are in New Zealand, and that is best of all.
But now we have got our breath again, and must push on. Good-bye to the trees, to the bay, and the snug little settlement; for we shall see no more of them till we reach this spot again on our return. On, and up! Resolute as ever, the track goes climbing now high into the enclosing hills. They are all cleared, these lower paddocks—both of Bush and of burnt Bush. Fenced off from the track by mossy old grey posts and slackened wires, away on either side of it they spread, steep of slope, and with a surface all tossed up into hillocks and tumbled down into hollows, but richly mantled over, at this season of the year, with the emerald velvet of the grasses.
The grasses! This is the time of their full glory. The summer warmth has made them succulent and strong, the summer heat has not yet dulled their hues and dried their juices. I should like to have a festival in honour of the Grass Goddess; she is so wholesome, so bountiful, so kind to the eye, withal, so simply beautiful. No wonder that Whit-
