s the attendant stated, he warned him
against attempting to do so, he immediately entered, but the current was
too powerful and quickly washed him off his feet. It was now nearly dark
and the man said that although he ran as fast as he was able down the
stream, he was unable to see anything of the Doctor. This was the
miserable story the station hand gave in at the homestead when he
arrived an hour afterwards.

All hands turned out, and having mounts in the paddock, Cook and
Brabazon were soon in the saddle galloping towards the fording place.
Striking the stream some distance below where the accident occurred,
both sides were carefully searched, as they worked up. When within a
quarter of a mile of the ford Cook discovered the body of the Doctor
lying stranded with head and shoulders under water. Life, of course, was
extinct. He was drawn gently from the stream and laid on the shingle
just as the foot men arrived with torches. It was a sad spectacle, this
fine old man we all loved and respected so much, only a few hours before
full of life and health, now a ghastly corpse, his hair and long white
beard lying dank over his cold white face and glaring eyes. The scene
was rendered all the more weird and awful by the surroundings, the still
dark night, the rushing water, and overhanging cliffs under the red
glare of the torches. His body was laid across one of the saddles while
one walked on each side to keep it from falling, and so they returned to
the station that lonely four miles in the dead of night.

He was laid in the woolshed and a watch placed on guard, and early in
the morning a messenger was despatched to Dr. Haast with the sad
tidings. His party were at first alarmed at his non-appearance the
previous evening, but at length took it for granted that he must have
returned to the station, and felt confident that with his attendant and
a horse he could not possibly have come to any harm, the river being
easily fordable on horseback, or even on foot by a strong man, but of
course such a clumsy mistake as employing too short a rope never struck
anybody. The attendant who was responsible was one of the hands employed
on ditching and fencing, and possibly was not much experienced at river
fording, and he said the Doctor delayed so long botanising that darkness
was upon them by the time they reached the fording place.

Dr. Sinclair's remains were interred the following day about a mile from
the homestead on the flat n