OVER THE FALLS AND OUT ON THE OCEAN.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VII, Issue 69, 20 March 1872, Page 2

OVER THE FALLS AND OUT ON THE OCEAN.

By F. R. G. S. C Concluded from the Australasian, March 2.J At last, after nearly a week's delay, we decided to take the pistols fully charged, and risk the yells, by revisiting our waterhole. if it still existed. Th° flood in the lagoon had gone down, and the river was at its old level so on a Monday morning we again provided ourselves with lunch, and the remains of bottle No. 1 (P. R.) in our fhsk, and with the revolver, but, a'as ! without our diggers' tools, we once more set sail for the " Golden (or Devil's) Gully, 1 ' and after the usual time turned up into the gloomy " Styx." While we were out in the bright ar.d cheerful sunshine our spirits had kept up well, but wih the infernal gloom that brooded for ever over that wretched river, so did a corresponding fall take place in the thermometer of our spirits. "I say, mate," said Tom earnestly, "for Heaven's sake don't risk any more of your ghastly puns ! If that was the devil who guards the gold, I am 'certain he didn't; like your last one about the ' Styx ' you know, and those yells might have been in consequence ! " " Anyway he took a long time to seethe joke," I replied, " but Tom, we aereed that it might be the moa, you know, and in that case, here, come closer, and let me whisper, moo's the pity we didn't see him." Tom looked at me, with a white face that apppared quite ghastly in the semi-darkness, and, with a gesture of horror, paddled rapidly awav from my vicinity, evidently not regarding me as by any means safe company. At last the waterfall began to boom, and we came in sight of it, and hardly dared to look up the cliff's side, for fear of seeing we knew not what — perhaps his satanic majesty himself in all his terrors, but there everything was just as we had first seen it, and no signs of the supernatural nor antediluvian, with the exception of the hoary old cliffs, that must have existed before the flood, and who, if they had the power of speech, could, no doubt, " a ta'e unfold." We had been terrified by- " Vox sed praeterea nihill ! " but that was the awe-aspiring part of it all. If the German's pit? had squeaked, or we had seen our ghost, or moa, or whatever had caused those appalling sounds, there would hive seemed more probability in our story. But who would believe us now ? As they said to the Germans, •' you were frightened at a shadow," so of course we knew they would tell us we had been scared by the scream of a sea gull. However, we knew better ! In the meantime we made fast the canoes, as before, and scrambled ashore, drew on our boots, and clamberrd up on to the ledge. We found our watercourse path now greasy and slippery, and considerably more difficult of access than it had been a few days previously. At last we reached the plateau where our pool — our hoped for " bank" had been. I say advisedly bad been, for there was now not a vestige of it left, not even enough to swear by ! To our dismay, we found it had been blended into another channel during the rush of wrter, and all trace? of it had been taken away. We found the pick jammed between two stones, but the shovel had vanished, and the tin washing dish had, no doubt, lone since careered joy ously out to sea. For several hours we picked, fossicked, and explored, above, below, and all over the plateau. We scraped out a hole and tried for the color as well as we could, in my cabbage-tree hat, but deuce a speck did we find. In fact we found it a bad spec altogether. The contents of our auriferous pool had " made tracks" duri'g the flood, and "where, and oh! where " should we find another ? We sat down to lunch, with anything but pleasure depicted in our countenances 1 To have it so nearly in one's grasp, yet that it should have been $u ruthlessly torn from us by the elements ! It was heartrending, but still we decided we would not as yet give it up, so, after a long nip and a strong nip, and a " nip " both together (alas ! it proved our last nip during this expedition, as will be seen, although bottle No. 2 still at that time snugly reposed . in the tent), we decided that we would once more take to the canoes, explore the lagoon, and try our fortunes ia, perhaps, th ■ bed of some other watercourse. Slowly we moved down the " Styx," and bitterly

we execrated the horrid flood that seemed to have come with the express pxirpose of baffling us. Six and six pen'orth of gold dust! when there must have been hundreds and hundreds of pounds worth lying at the bottom of that abominable hole before it was swept away. As For remainder of news see fourth page.

we reached the entrance of the lagoon, I slewed my canoe round, broadside on, and looked up the dreary, black avenue still reverberating with the sepulchralboom of the giant cascade in the distance. "Ob, you thrice accursed place!" I could not help exclaiming, " May storms wash you away altogether, and may all who succeed in getting thus far, in future, be as disappointed as we have been 1 " Little did I think how " curses, like chickens, always come home to roost," nor how it would reflect back upon the one who uttered it, as in defiance. I fired off one chamber up the gloomy gorge, saying, " Now shriek and yell if you like." The crack of the pistol re-echoed from cliff to crag, in sharp .reverberations, now seeming to cease for a second, and then fresh rocks taking np the sound again, and carrying it on out of hearing, as if a whole regiment of sharp-9hooters had commenced an action on both banks of the " Styx." "That'll rouse him out!" said Tom; but it didn't. We waited for several minutes, and then continued owr voyage of exploration, going up creeks, and prospecting ashore, in sand, in earth, araid<split quartz, in gullies, in valleys, in the bush and in the open, with the same ill-success. We found not even the color. Just as night closed in we went on board again, disheartened, angry, and disappointed, and proceeded to paddle home, , Home ! how we hated the sight of the camp, and all connected with it. The snug little tent, where we had been so happy before, now seemed to our jaundiced eyes to be the essence of inconvenience; and we both decided that if the weather held, we would commence our voyage to Nelson, coastwise, on the morrow. If anything more than another helped our resolution, it was an accident which occurred just as we landed, and it acted like the " last straw which breaks the camel's back. 1 ' Cold and shivering in the night air, I sought for our only remaining bottle ot P.B. to put a little strength and spirit (I don't mean this for a joke) into us, before we set to light the fire, and having found it and the pannikin, and was just pouring out a drop for Tom first, when my halffrozen hands forgot their duty, and down went the bottle on a ledge of rock, and the greedy sand sucked up every drop of its (to us) precious contents ! For the second time, in the course of this veracious narrative, I draw a curtain across the scene that followed. We went to bed without a fire, just after changing our clothes; a few drops of chlorodyne in water and a biscuit, were all we had for a meal, and the candle too kept blowing out so often, that at last we left it unlit, and tried (in fain for some time) to get to sleep. At length the heat from our bodies, closely confined by the fur of the 'possum, generated a feeling of warmth, to which (in every sense) we had been for some time strangers, and we slept '' the sleep of the disgusted. Next morning early, we lit the fire, eat a hearty meal of pickled fish, bacon and duck, and some hot chocolate, and then struck camp, and packed everything in its place in the canoes (everything but our shovel and tin dish). About 9 o'clock we made a start, for we wanted to get to the whare of some stone quarrymen, 30 miles off, to save our camping out any more at night, and we had a long journey before us. As there was a nice breeze, we decided upon sailing; but to avoid reefs and sunken rocks near shore, we paddled right out into the track of steamers, fully two miles out at sea, and then set sail. The fresh sea breeze, and the fine day added to the thought that we were '"going home," cheered us up a little, but our disappointments and troubles were as yet of too recent a date to allow : of too much exuberance of spirits, so we didn't talk much, but thought a good deal. The expedition had been well planned and successful " up to a certain point," but there luck had changed, and it was clear nothing else could be done till next midsummer. Little over six shillings' worth of gold after all the work of bringing out one canoe from home and building another, the risk of coming down " Over the Palls," and our perils " Out on the Ocean ! " But it seemed we had not yet done with perils, for while we were deep in thought and our canoes w.ere rising and falling on the ground-swell, and going a steady five miles an hour, I fancied I saw something white glimmering down in the depths of the clear blue water between Tom and me, and going about the same ! pace as ourselves. We were then about six or eight yards apart. 11 Look out, Tom ! " I sung out ; but hardly were the words out of my mouth, when, with a ' sudden upheaving of the water, which flew over our decks by his sudden movement, a huge shark, above 17ft. long, rose to the surface out of several fathoms of water, right between our two canoes, and sticking his great back fin high out of the water, proceeded to ogle us out of his little pig's eyes. We bad seen lots of sharks before, but they : had been comparatively small specimens, and had ' respectfully kept their distance. There was something unpleasantly novel about this chap, ■ and we felt that he meant mischief. I had no ' time to look at Tom, but I knew that my teeth chattered together like castanettes, as I drew the revolver out from under the waterproof cover over my knees, and let go the halyards of my sail, which came down like a flash on the deck, and rather appeared for a moment to disconcert the monster. Tom now shot ahead under sail, \ but the brute stuck to me. All at once a bright thought struck me. I was nearly stationary now, and the wretch was closing in upon me. The , next minute he would be belly up, underneath me, scrunching the canoe between his horrid jaws, and I well knew then what a horrible death awaited me, so cocking the pistol, I grasped the paddle with my left hand, and seizing my cabbage-tree with my pistol hand, I threw it in within two feet of me on the surface of the water. Just as I thought he would, in a second he was on his back, with his horrid jaws extended, just at the edge of the water, then out of the water, to seize the hat, wben, quicker than it takes me to write it, or you to read it, he had three good-sized bullets down his throat and into hio brain, and then dropping the pistol on my knees, I seized the paddles with both hands and shot ahead to get out *of the way of his tail, which in his dying struggles was lashing the water widely. Directly I felt I was out of danger I turned deadly eick and faint, and I was in quite as much danger next minute from drowning as I had previously been of being eaten alive. However, Tom, who had lowered his sail directly he had got out of the way ot a chance bullet, in two strokes of his paddle was alongside of me, and grasping both canoes by their hatchways with his sinewy hands, made them as safe as oneibroad boat, and I leant tipou him till the sickness passed off. A few drops of chlorodyne 6oon restored me, and by the time Tom had picked up my hat and : paddle ; (which latter I had dropped) I was ready 'for a start again. But we had both been so startled, that, as it was now paat noon, we decided to go inshore

again, and land for lunch and a rest. We left the monster, dead as a door nail, floating on his back with lots of hungry sea birds hovering over him. Ugh ! I shudder at the very recollection. Tom and I were very silent during bur two miles paddle ashore. The imminent danger we had both been in appeared to have roused other feelings in both our hearts than we had indulged in lately. The flood in the creek, and the loss of the P.8., both of which had seemed so important at the time, now sank into utter insignificance when suddenly contrasted with the horrors of a violent death, and when we reached the strand, as we were Englishmen, we merely wrung one another's hands in silence, and each understood what the other meant ; probably, had we been Frenchmen or Italians, we should have embraced frantically, cried hysterically, and rhapsodised till dark about our bravery, which, by the bye, never existed at all, but as we were only colonial Britons, we speedily fell to work to refresh the inner man (true British fashion), und felt considerably better after it, and then, as we had no time to lose, once more packed up, and started again within the hour. It was nightfall when we reached Astrolabe, and seeing a light on Adcle Island opposite, and none on the mainland, we pulled straight for it, and soon a number of black forms between us and the fire, standing on the sand, answered our co-o-ey, and (the moon not being up yet) we suddenly paddled oat of darkness into the light of their fire and great was the astonishment of all the rough quarrymen when we jumped ashore, apparently out ot nothing in particular, and dragged our " nothings " above high water mark. It would be wearisome here to describe all their comments and their queries. I don't believe one of them believed we had come from Totaranui, but where the deuce we could have sprung from puzzled them. We "kept park" (as our Yankee friends say) about the shark, or their unbelief would have turned to scorn. We actually had to unload the canoes, tired as we were, lor their inspection, before they were convinced they were really safe, sea-going boats, and not toys. Then the good-hearted fellows bundled us into their whare and made us as welcome as if we had been two princes (and, I dare say, a deal more so), and feasted us with the best they had. The '• bos - " produced a bottle of whiskey, and o ice again we were happy. Of course, we kept quiet about the "Golden (or Devil's) Gully." They gave us a good " shake-down " in a co- of the whare, and we were under a roof again, thoi"?h it was only raupo. I think our sleep this night beat the last one's hollow. By daybreak, all hands turned out to light fires, and breakfast, but the cook's co-o-ey could hardly tear them away from the canoes, around which they were clustered like bees round, a sugar-cane. After a good breakfast, we made over to these good fellows all our little remaining provisions in exchange for a flask of whisky, for we had only 13 miles to go, and trusted to make Motueka before night. We then got into our boats, and manly arms gave us a shove-off into the blue water. We paddled to and fro for them to see how easily the paddles are handled, and how swiftly the canoes move through the water, and then, as a little land breeze was blowing, we hoisted sail, and headed for the clump of trees in the far distance on the water's edge, marking our goa'. while three hearty cheers followed us over the water, echoing from the cliffs above us, and ringing out well and cheerily in the brisk autumn air. Waving our hats in reply, we rapidly ran past Adele Island, and kept out seawards again. When opposite to the Kai-terri-terri we had to douse sails and take to the paddles again, for the wind came in angry, puffy gusts oft the hill tops, and the sun went in, and for all we knerr, went there and then to bed, for we never saw him again for two days. The sea soon bagan to get up, and made paddling hard work. However, after going barely a mile an hour for several hours, about 4 o'clock we pulled into Riwaka Harbor, having been eight hours in doing the 13 miles, and having never left our seats. We paddled up a creek, and left 'the canoes safely moored in a shallow ditch, while we. stiffened and weary, hungry mid thirsty, yet thankful withal, staggered up to a public-house, where we were well-known, and where the weary travellers at last found rest. Here our voyage, as far as " Out on the Ocean " in a Rob Roy canoe (or rather' two of them) is concerned, came to an abrupt termination, for it blew that night as though it would take the roof off the house with it, and next day the sea was lashed into fury. So we ignqminiously put the brave little boats that had carried us so well and safely (under Providence) over so many miles of salt water, both rough and smooth, into a bullock dray and carted them some two miles over to Motueka Jetty (where we had landed the bucking horse), waiting to take them the rest ot the journey to Nelson (20 miles), over on the deck of a large cutter, called the Constellation, as soon as the wind allowed. In two days we set sail, and after a stormy afternoon and part of a night, during what the Nelsonians called a " spout wind," we once more roundf d the Arrow Rock, and were soon moored alongside the pier, and the canoes safely landed after all their dangers. We exhibited our " gold " (such a lot of it '.) to the wondering gaze of our friends, and we both resolved, that come what would, we would start again next summer in a whaleboat. with experienced diggers, and (taking the canoes as dingeys) explore the Devil's Gully again. To make a long story short, this we did the next year, but during the winter that intervened the central part of New Zealand was visited by one of the heaviest earthquakes ever known. Cliffs were toppled over and chimneys fell like apples in the wind, and when we reached where the freshwater lagoon had been, it had vanished like Aladdin's fairy palace. The sandbank was gone, the bush where our tent had reposed in safety had disappeared, and the heavy whaleboat passed over the site of our once happy camp in deep salt-water. The Devil's Gully had altogether gone Bomewhere else, and the waterfall, slightly altered in its course, now fell straight into the sea. My curse, uttered in a moment of bitter disappointment, had. fallen back first on him who made it, " that every one who again visited that spot, should be disappointed ! " I often, while in New Zealand, thought of taking another turn along that coast for curiosity's sake, but other business inter v-ened, and eventually I left Nelson, and I suppose it will be sometime, before I see it again. Perhaps in China and India I may find Bights more grand and wonders as puzzling, but as long as I live the story of the German's pig, the gigantic footmarks in the sand at Tonpa Bay, and that wild, despairing, and never-to-be-for-gotten cry, will, I fear, remain unrevealed. To ; naturalists spiritualists I leave them 1 Reader, adieu J! We Kave Yearned home at last, safe" from oufririp "Over xhe^'lTalls; and oot ON THE OCEAH."