mes. The Moorhouses and McCleans were old friends, and had
been together in Australia on the diggings many years before. He was
not, I recollect, much impressed with Moorhouse's speculation, but as he
had a run at the south of the Wanaka and a homestead there he arranged
for our reception and for a boat to take us a portion of the voyage up
the lake.

The next day's ride lay through the scene of the late Lindis diggings,
but not a vestige of the encampments remained beyond the ruins of the
hut walls and excavations. The gold diggings proved a failure, and
within a few months of our leaving them they were deserted. They were, I
understood, subsequently re-opened by a company who employed machinery
with more success than was possible with manual labour.

The country beyond this was bleak and uninteresting, until the following
evening when we arrived at the Molyneux river, where it flowed out of
the south end of the Wanaka Lake. We were here again in the midst of
mountains and very near to the great Alpine range which towered above us
and which, although it was midsummer, was capped in snow.

Upon the opposite side of the river, and on the shore of the lake, stood
the very fine group of station buildings erected by Mr. Robert McClean.
His people having been advised of our coming, a boat was sent across,
behind which we swam our horses, and were soon comfortably fixed for the
night and hospitably received by the overseer, who had a boat ready to
convey us the following day twenty-five miles up the lake to another
station formed there.

The Molyneux struck me as being the clearest water I had ever seen; it
was quite colourless, and though of great depth, even here at its
source, the bottom was distinctly visible from the boat. It was a grand
river, large and deep enough to float a small steamer.

Early the following morning we saw a large timber raft come down the
lake and enter the Molyneux. There were extensive forests at the head of
the lake, and an energetic contractor had engaged men to cut timber
there, which he was now floating down the river to the coast some 200
miles distant. The raft was forty feet square, composed of rough round
logs bound together and covered with a load of split and sawn timber,
forming altogether a very valuable cargo. The contractor and four other
men stood on the raft, each provided with a life belt, which he wore
ready for accident, and fastened to the side of the raft lay several
coil