turned there since the creation of the world, and the whole country
wore the peculiar yellow tinge caught from the tall waving tussocks,
which is the prevailing feature of New Zealand scenery _au naturel_.
Every acre had been "taken up," but as yet the runs were rather
understocked. Our fourth day's ride was the longest,--fifty-five
miles in all, though we halted for a couple of hours at a miserable
accommodation house. Our bivouac that night was close to Lake
Wanaka, at the Molyneux Ferry-house, and there I was kept awake all
night by the attentions of a cat. I never saw such a ridiculous
animal. Prince, for that was his name, took the greatest fancy to
me, or rather to my woollen skirt I suppose, and found a linsey lap
much more comfortable than the corduroy knees on which he took his
usual evening nap. At all events he followed me into my room, which
only boasted of a mattress, stuffed with tussock-grass by the way,
on the floor. Here I should have slept very well after my long
journey, if Prince would have permitted it. In vain I put him out
of the window, not always very gently; he returned in five minutes,
bringing a palpitating, just-caught bird or mouse, which he softly
dropped on my face, and purred loudly with delight at his own
gallantry. Twenty times did I strike a match that night and try to
restore the victims to life; only one recovered sufficiently to be
released, and Prince brought it in again, quite dead, five minutes
later. I shut the little casement window, but the room became so
hot and stuffy, and suspicious fumes of stale beer and tobacco began
to assert their presence, so that I found myself obliged to open it
again. Sometimes the victim's bones were crunched close to my ear,
and I found more than one feather in my hair in the morning. Never
was any one so persecuted by a cat as I was by Prince that weary
night.