The heels of my boots, my polished boots, point to the upper air--ay,
point; but when, oh, when again, shall I salute thee, gentle air; when
again, unchoked by the saline flood, cry _Veni, aura?_ When, indeed!
for now I am wrong end uppermost, drifting away with the tide, and
ballasted with heavy pistols, boots, tight clothes, and all the straps
and strings of civilization. Oh, heavens! and oh, earth! and oh, ye
little thieves of fishes who manage to live in the waters under the
earth (a miserable sort of life you must have of it)! oh, Maori sea
nymphs! who, with yellow hair--yellow? egad--that's odd enough, to say
the least of it: how ever the Maori should come to give their sea
nymphs or spirits yellow hair is curious. The Maori know nothing about
yellow hair; their hair is black. About one in a hundred of them have a
sort of dirty brown hair; but even if there should be now and then a
native with yellow hair, how is it that they have come to give this
colour to the sea-sprites in particular?--who also "dance on the sands,
and yet no footstep seen." Now I confess I am rather puzzled and struck
by the coincidence. I don't believe Shakspeare ever was in New Zealand;
Jason might, being a seafaring man, and if he should have called in for
wood and water, and happened to have the golden fleece by any accident
on board, and by any chance put it on for a wig, why the thing would be
accounted for at once.

The world is mad now-a-days about gold, so no one cares a fig about
what is called "golden hair:" nuggets and dust have the preference; but
this is a grand mistake. Gold is of no use, or very little, except in
so far as this--that through the foolishness of human beings, one can
purchase the necessaries and conveniences of life with it. Now, this
being the case, if I have a chest full of gold (which I have not), I am
no richer for it, in fact, until I have given it away in exchange for
necessaries, comforts, and luxuries, which are, properly speaking,
riches or wealth; but it follows from this, that he who has given me
this same riches or wealth for my gold, has become poor, and his only
chance to set himself up again, is to get rid of the gold as fast as he
can, in exchange for the same sort and quantity of things, if he can
get them: which is always doubtful. But here lies the gist of the
matter--how did I, in the first instance, become possessed of my gold?
If I bought it, and gave real wealth for it, beef, mutton, silk,