fashion to our usual reckless consumption, the consumption of a
household which has no butcher's bill to pay; for we knew not when
the shepherd might be able to fight his way through the storm, with
half a sheep packed before him, on sturdy little "Judy's" back. The
creeks rose and poured over their banks in angry yellow floods.
Every morning casualties in the poultry yard had to be reported, and
that week cost me almost as many fowls and ducks as my great
christening party did. The first thing every morning when I opened
my eyes I used to jump up and look out of the different windows with
eager curiosity, to see if there were any signs of a break in the
weather, for I was quite unaccustomed to be pent up like a besieged
prisoner for so many succeeding days. We did not boast of shutters
in those regions, and even blinds were a luxury which were not
wasted in the little hall. Consequently, when my unsatisfactory
wanderings about the silent house--for no one else was up--led me
that dreadful stormy morning into the narrow passage called the
back-hall, I easily saw through its glass-door what seemed to me one
of the most pathetic sights my eyes had ever rested upon.

Just outside the verandah, which is the invariable addition to New
Zealand houses, stood, bareheaded, a tall, gaunt figure, whose
rain-sodden garments clung closely to its tottering limbs. A more
dismal morning could not well be imagined: the early dawn struggling
to make itself apparent through a downpour of sleet and rain, the
howling wind (which one could almost see as it drove the vapour wall
before it), and the profound solitude and silence of all except the
raging storm.

At first I thought I must be dreaming, so silent and hopeless stood
that weird figure. My next impulse, without staying to consider my