122 JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 
and a landscape must be beautiful indeed before the “ poor, 
wandering one,” so burdened, will deign to look up at it. 
Our first day’s journey was a pleasant ramble up the valley 
of the Lill-burn. The track was good, over open and level 
country, and the weather fine, and we camped for the night by a 
hut about sixteen miles from the station, named by the 
shepherds, as an inscription informed us, “The Palace of 
Misery.” On the present occasion we could not see the force of 
the name ; but on the return journey, having occasion to occupy 
the same comfortable quarters on a night when the south- 
westerly gales suggested “ dissolved icebergs” to the geographical 
(and poetical) member of the party, we realised the satire of its 
appellation. 
Next day the difficulties of the way commenced, as the first 
two miles took us over rather swampy ground, obstructed by an 
almost impenetrable scrub of bog pine, after which the track 
led through the bush for twelve or thirteen miles. 
Some two years ago the enterprising proprietors of Clifden 
Station tried the experiment of occupying some of the Princess 
country to the west of Hauroto with sheep, and to aid in the 
work of supervision this track was cut, and a boat taken 
through to the lake. This latter work alone was accomplished 
by the aid of a bullock team and sledge, in 11 days. At the 
time of our trip (January of this year) the track was in tolerable 
order, though rather soft, but the bridges had disappeared from 
nearly all the creeks, and had to be replaced. The road was 
certainly not one for horses, and though the plucky little animal 
which carried our pack got through and gained the honour of 
being the first equine quadruped which had ever reached the 
lake, still the experiment was too dangerous a one to be 
repeated. If the pack was taken off once it was taken off a 
score of times, in order to enable its carrier to get over “soft” 
places, besides which it “came off” itself, without requiring to 
be taken, several times in the course of the journey, owing to 
the struggles of the horse in unexpectedly soft spots. It was 
with a feeling of relief, therefore, that we found ourselves at 
nightfall on the shore of the lake, after more than eleven hours 
of steady travelling. The track passes at one part over a saddle 
of Goldie’s Hill, at an elevation of about 1100 feet (taken by 
barometer) above sea- level, while we computed the lake to lie at 
an elevation of about 750 feet. 
The bush through which we had travelled consisted almost 
exclusively of Birch (Fagus menziesit and fF. solandrt), with a 
very sparse sprinkling of Rimu and Totara. On the Lill-burn 
side there was a considerable undergrowth, including large 
patches of Gleitchenia cnnninghami, but in the denser forest the 
ground was carpeted chiefly with Aymenophyllum multifidum 
and dzvalve, together with numerous mosses and Hepatice, 
while the pretty little orchids, Caladenia minor and Adenochilus 
gracilis peeped from out the green moss, and were interspersed 
with lovely tufts of little white violets (V. filicauls). Overhead * 
