cotton garments. I could see the dim outlines of the high hills,
which shut in our happy valley on all sides, and the smell of the
freshly-turned earth of a paddock near the house, which was in
process of being broken up for English grass, came stealing towards
me on the silent air. The melancholy cry of a bittern, or the
shrill wail of the weka, startled me from time to time, but there
was no other sound to break the eternal silence.

As I waited and watched, I thought, as every one must surely think,
with strange paradoxical feelings, of one's own utter insignificance
in creation, mingled with the delightful consciousness of our
individual importance in the eyes of the Maker and Father of all.
An atom among worlds, as one feels, sitting there at such an hour
and in such a spot, still we remember with love and pride, that not
a hair of our head falls to the ground unnoticed by an Infinite Love
and an Eternal Providence. The soul tries to fly into the boundless
regions of space and eternity, and to gaze upon other worlds, and
other beings equally the object of the Great Creator's care; but her
mortal wing soon droops and tires, and she is fain to nestle home
again to her Saviour's arms, with the thought, "I am my Beloved's,
and He is mine." That is the only safe beginning and end of all
speculation. It was very solemn and beautiful, that long dark
night,--a pause amid the bustle of every day cares and duties,--
hours in which one takes counsel with one's own heart, and is still.

Midnight had come and gone, when the sputter and snap of striking a
match, which sounded almost like a pistol shot amid the profound
silence, told me that one of the sportsmen had been successful. I
got up as softly as possible, wrapped my damp shawl round my still
damper shoulders, and, fastening the flax-stick securely in the