400 Tr ansae tions. — Miscellaneous . 



round in the same place, with the sheep standing below him. 

 Presently the dog ran off upwards, and I then saw the reason 

 of his strange efforts to escape, for the snow had evidently been 

 in the act of parting where the dog had been. Then a great 

 sheet of snow began sliding down, carrying the sheep with it, 

 and shooting into a narrow channel leading down the moun- 

 tain abreast of the spur on which I stood. ^ On entering the 

 gully the snow began to break up, and at times all the sheep 

 were buried from sight, then several bodies would pop out, 

 disappearing again like porpoises playing at sea, others appear- 

 ing and disappearing as the whole mass rushed down hill. 

 When the snow came to a stop the sheep commenced to force 

 a way out and shake themselves, and I believe every one 

 came out all right. Of course these sheep were merinos, and 

 so good climbers and very active. 



A most wonderful sight was the remains of a very large 

 avalanche at the shady side of Mount Nicholas. I saw it after 

 the bulk of the winter's snow had thawed in the spring on the 

 sunny slopes. Travelliiig round the back, along the foot of the 

 mountain, which is detached from the main range by small 

 valleys, I came to a large gully which descended the moun- 

 tain-side. This was at the foot filled up with gigantic snow- 

 balls, one on top of another, 30ft. or 40ft. deep, some 6ft. 

 through, others not less than 3ft., all circular, very hard, and 

 distinct one from the other. I went across, stepping from 

 each one as if they had been large boulders, and could hear 

 the water of the creek rushing under them, deep down under- 

 neath. 



One very severe winter, which was commenced by the 

 most terrible thunderstorm with heavy rain, the thunder being 

 almost continuous, aided by the echoes and vibrations along 

 the mountain-sides, it seemed during the darkness of the 

 night as if half the mountain-sides were coming down in land- 

 shps. All this confusion of sound and fierce lightning caused 

 the merino sheep to make upwards through the melting snow 

 left from a previous storm, it being the natural instinct of 

 the mountain-bred sheep to hurry upward when in danger or 

 fear. Consequently, when the heavy rain was succeeded by an 

 unusually heavy fall of snow, several large mobs of sheep 

 which were collected together on the upper parts of the range 

 became completely blocked in by the snow. They by tram- 

 pling consolidated the snow under foot to a thin sheet of ice, 

 and so made an enclosure with solid walls of snow some 8ft. 

 high. One large mob of about fifteen hundred were trapped 

 in this way at the head-waters of the Afton Creek, on the 

 south-west side of Lake Wakatipu. The snow, being in the 

 form of dry crystal cubes, had no adhesion on the surface, 

 so the cold dry winds which succeeded the storm blew 



