CHAP. VI A KIND WELCOME 221 
killed. A strong break-wind has since been erected 
there. We parted with these engines some distance 
below on level ground. Here the Wairarpapa Plains 
extend to the head of the Pairau Plains, eighty miles 
distant, and the dreary, flat, and monotonous country, 
with its pebbly surface, looks like the bed of a 
wide river. At Masterton, the largest town in this 
district, our train journey was over. A waggonette 
and capital pair of horses met us, and after lunch we 
had a lovely drive over the hills to my friend's station, 
some twenty miles away. 
The homestead lay nestling among a forest of 
pines. We crossed the bridge over the river, where 
the banks below looked refreshingly cool under the 
shade of great willow trees. Then a quick sweep of 
the road up the avenue of pines where the scent of our 
own blue gums and Australian wattles (growing better 
here than in their native home) was filling ^e air, and 
up through the garden gate to the many-gabled old- 
English-looking house, with its trellised roses climbing 
up the windows, and rich creepers clothing the walls 
everywhere. My friends were waiting for me at the 
door with words of welcome. How nice everything 
did look, and how pretty the drawing-room was, with 
its deep bay window at the end, and the conservatory 
beyond with ferns and trellis covered with ripening 
grapes. The low French windows opened out on to the 
smooth well-kept lawn and tennis-ground, and beyond 
it was the garden gay with groups of tall sunflowers, 
lilies, and such a wilderness of scarlet poppies. How 
big my room looked too, and how comfortable, after 
my three months' experience of hotels, and what a fresh 
sweet home -look there was about everything and 
everybody 1 
In the cool of the evening, after tea, we had a walk 
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