a profession, and, near settlements, the owners are thankful to get
two cents a pound for sirloin and rump-steaks. These, and great
herds which are actually wild and ownerless upon the mountains, are
a degenerate breed, with some of the worst peculiarities of the
Texas cattle, and are the descendants of those which Vancouver
placed on the islands and which were under Tabu for ten years. They
destroy the old trees by gnawing the bark, and render the growth of
young ones impossible.

As it was getting dark we passed through a forest strip, where tree-
ferns from twelve to eighteen feet in height, and with fronds from
five to seven feet long, were the most attractive novelties. As we
emerged, "with one stride came the dark," a great darkness, a cloudy
night, with neither moon nor stars, and the track was further
obscured by a belt of ohias. There were five miles of this, and I
was so dead from fatigue and want of food, that I would willingly
have lain down in the bush in the rain. I most heartlessly wished
that Miss K. were tired too, for her voice, which seemed tireless as
she rode ahead in the dark, rasped upon my ears. I could only keep
on my saddle by leaning on the horn, and my clothes were soaked with
the heavy rain. "A dreadful ride," one and another had said, and I
then believed them. It seemed an awful solitude full of mystery.
Often, I only knew that my companions were ahead by the sparks
struck from their horse's shoes.

It became a darkness which could be felt.

"Is that possibly a pool of blood?" I thought in horror, as a rain
puddle glowed crimson on the track. Not that indeed! A glare
brighter and redder than that from any furnace suddenly lightened