CHAPTER III
THE HERMITAGE AGAIN
Mountain gorses, ever golden,
Cankered not the whole year long,
Do ye teach us to be strong,
Howsoever pricked and holden,
Like your thorny blooms, and so
Trodden on by rain and snow.
Up the hillside of this life, as bleak as where ye grow?
In the spring of 1909 I had word from Graham that if I still wished to keep to our arrangement of the previous year I could not do better than come over early in the season before the Christmas rush of tourists made serious demands upon his time.
Nothing loath, I made my arrangements, and on December 6th left for Lyttelton by the s.s. Marama. I am ever unhappy at sea, so the less said of the five days' voyage the better. The fact that I willingly undergo such days of misery every year may give some idea of how deep is my devotion to New Zealand.
Once on land again I ceased to feel so wilted, and by the time the south-bound train moved slowly out of Christchurch life was worth living once more, and the rattle of the wheels resolved itself into a joyous refrain, "Mountain bound, mountain bound!" The houses were soon left behind, and the wide, barless windows framed picture after picture. First, a field of growing grain, swaying before the soft spring breeze; bounded by hedges
