egetables. He was very glad to have company, and to receive the
newspapers which I had taken care to bring him. He had a real genius for
simple cookery, and fed me excellently. My father's 5 pounds, and the
ration of brandy which I nightly gave him, made me a welcome guest, and
though I was longing to be at any rate as far as the foot of the pass
into Erewhon, I amused myself very well in an abundance of ways with
which I need not trouble the reader.

One of the first things that Harris said to me was, "I wish I knew what
your father did with the nice red blanket he had with him when he went up
the river. He had none when he came down again; I have no horse here,
but I borrowed one from a man who came up one day from down below, and
rode to a place where I found what I am sure were the ashes of the last
fire he made, but I could find neither the blanket nor the billy and
pannikin he took away with him. He said he supposed he must have left
the things there, but he could remember nothing about it."

"I am afraid," said I, "that I cannot help you."

"At any rate," continued the shepherd, "I did not have my ride for
nothing, for as I was coming back I found this rug half covered with sand
on the river-bed."

As he spoke he pointed to an excellent warm rug, on the spare bunk in his
hut. "It is none of our make," said he; "I suppose some foreign digger
has come over from the next river down south and got drowned, for it had
not been very long where I found it, at least I think not, for it was not
much fly-blown, and no one had passed here to go up the river since your
father."

I knew what it was, but I held my tongue beyond saying that the rug was a
very good one.

The next day, December 4, was lovely, after a night that had been clear
and cold, with frost towards early morning. When the shepherd had gone
for some three hours in the forenoon to see his sheep (that were now
lambing), I walked down to the place where I had left my knapsack, and
carried it a good mile above the hut, where I again hid it. I could see
the great range from one place, and the thick new fallen snow assured me
that the river would be quite normal shortly. Indeed, by evening it was
hardly at all discoloured, but I waited another day, and set out on the
morning of Sunday, December 6. The river was now almost as low as in
winter, and Harris assured me that if I used my eyes I could not miss
finding a ford over one stream or another ever