0 
DESCRIPTIVE NARRATIVE OF JOURNEY. 
I had left at the camp, had lighted an enormous fire to guide us, 
and it was not without many tumblings, and other adventures, 
that we arrived at the Boto-iti river at nine o’clock, and at our 
camp at ten, to reach which we had, as a sort of bonne louche , 
ultimately to scramble through a dense growth of wild irishmen, 
lawyers, and other prickly plants, which horribly retarded our 
progress. 
There is no need to say that we slept well after this day’s work. 
I spent part of the next day in making notes, sketches, &c., and in 
the afternoon ascended a beautiful pyramidal hill, about two miles 
from our camp, and rising some 500 feet above the level of the 
plain. 
On the 18th of January we struck our tents, and started for 
the Howard, from whence, according to Mr. Brunner’s informa¬ 
tion, we had to make our way to Lake Kotoroa, the Lake Howick 
of the maps. We were directed to follow the Eiver Boto-iti for 
fourteen miles; and it was with great pleasure that, after travel- 
ling about frve miles from the lake, we met Mr. Mackay and his 
nephew Alexander, who had come from the Howard to meet us. 
They had camped on the Howard, which they had reached from 
efson, on the previous day. Mr. Mackay conducted me to the 
end of the high terrace between the Boto-iti and the Lake-house 
valley,where he pointed out to me a granite hill rising through 
the old alluvium It was from this-point that I first obtained a 
complete view of the high mountain chain, called by my friend 
Mr Travers the bpencer mountains, whose highest peak, clad 
with eternal snow, rose grandly above the low hills in front of it. 
JolmBrankli m ° Untadl Mount Franklin, in honour of the late Sir 
The name given to the gorge through which the Boto-iti 41ows 
(the Devil s Grip) led me to believe that it would be impossible 
to construct a road through it; and I was therefore much sur- 
prised at finding, instead of rocky precipices, only numerous 
wooded spurs sloping to the river at easy angles, presenW no 
serious difficulty to the construction of a bridle track The mine 
had been given to it by its first explorers, whose garmentXd 
been destroyed m their attempts to get through the dense ^rowD 
ctS. mShmm ‘“W with which tfe wSSdi 
On reaching the _ Howard, we expected to see Mr. James 
Mackay, junior, Assistant Native Secret'irv -Pm* +1 * v , * . c V 
had contracted with the ProvLcid Qo7jlni j 'Vf ’ '1° 
explore for an available road to the Grev r bW r j 0 f on 
now on his way to that countrv for th A i ,. . lc F and wdio was 
taying land f/om the Nation feVtfJw f 
however, gone through the Devil’s Grin mi ^ • 1 ' atl > 
intending to reach the river flowing from pre V° xls da 3b 
junction with the Boto-iti On the fi 11 * Ivoto ™ a lake at its 
U ' Uu 1116 following morning I started, 
