fashion.  Come, my friend, and sit with us,” and deposited three bottles of beer at my feet, while provisions enough for Dan Lambert were stored around—­a sort of Homeric way of honouring me, and perhaps they made a Benjamin of me.  However, I had already eaten a mouldy biscuit and had a glass of beer at the house of the Chinawoman, so I only said grace for them, and after talking a little while, I shook hands all round and went off.  Their hands, being used as knives and forks, were not a little greasy; but of course one does not think of that.

As I passed the end of the Pa I heard a cry, and saw a very old man with a perfectly white beard, too old to come to the feast, who had crawled out of his hut to see me.  He had nothing on but a blanket, and I was sorry I had not known of his being there, that I might have gone to the old gentleman, so we talked and shook hands, and I set off for my eight miles walk back.  The whole island is one vast peat field, in many places below in a state of ignition; then the earth crumbles away below and pits are formed, rank with vegetation, splendid soil for potatoes.’

Christmas-day was spent at Wellington, in services on shore, the Christmas dinner eaten on board, but the evening spent at the Governor’s in blind man’s buff and other games with the children, then evening prayers on board for the crew.  The stay at Wellington was altogether enjoyable, and it ended by Mr. Patteson taking the command of the vessel, and returning with Mrs. Selwyn to Auckland, while the Bishop pursued his journey by land, no small proof of the confidence inspired by so recent a mariner.  He was sorry to lose the sight of the further visitation, and in his New Year’s letter of 1856, written soon after receiving a budget from home, there is one little touch of home sickness:—­

’Really it is a fine land, with wonderful facilities for large manufacturing, commercial, and agricultural interests; worth visiting, too, merely for the scenery, but somehow enjoying scenery depends a good deal upon having one’s own friends to enjoy it with.  One thing I do enjoy thoroughly, and that is the splendid sunsets.  I don’t remember anywhere to have seen such fine soft golden sunsets; and they are not wanting in variety, for occasionally he goes to bed among red and crimson and purple clouds, with wild scuds flying above, which suggest to me the propriety of turning up my bed and looking out for a good roll in the night.  But there is certainly a peculiar transparency in the air which makes the distances look distant indeed.’

This trip, so cheerfully described, was rather a pull on the frame which had yet to become seasoned to the heat of the southern midsummer, and there was a languor about the outward man, the last remnant of the original sluggishness, which, if ever a doubt arose of the fitness of the instrument for the work, awoke it during the voyage.  There was depression likewise, in part, no doubt, from the spending the first Christmas