ld make up
our minds to invest the modest balance at our bankers in this tempting
bargain. I remember well that I found myself wishing we were not going
to be _quite_ so rich; half our promised income would have been ample, I
thought. My anxieties on that score turned out to have been, to say the
least, premature.

Not to make my story too long, I may briefly say that after making due
allowance for the natural exaggeration of the owner, the run on Lake
Wanaka's shores seemed certainly to offer many attractions. Besides
thousands of acres of beautiful sheltered sheep country, it was said to
possess a magnificent bush, in which sawyers were already hard at work.
Of course all this timber would become our own, and we were to make
so much a year by selling it. "How about the carriage?" inquired F----
cautiously, having visions of costly bullock-drays, and teams and
drivers at fabulous wages. "Oh, the lake is your highway," replied the
would-be seller, airily; "you have nothing to do but lash your felled
trees together, as they do in the mahogany-growing countries, and set
them afloat on the lake, they will thus form a natural raft, and cost
you little or nothing to get down to a good market. You know the Dunstan
diggings are just at the foot of the lake, and they haven't a stick
there; timber is very badly wanted in those parts, not only for fuel and
building, but also for slabbing the shafts which the miners sink."

By the time the coffee was served F---- had made up his mind to buy the
Lake Wanaka run; his business agent urging him strongly not to hesitate
for a moment in securing such a chance. The negotiations reached thus
far without the least hitch, but at this point F----said, "Well, I'll
tell you what I'll do: we will start in a day or two and go straight up
to this run and look round it, and if I find it anything like so good as
you both make it out, I'll buy it on the spot."

Never did that sociable little word "we" sound so delightful to my ears!
"Then I am to come too," I thought to myself, but I prudently concealed
from the company that I had ever had any misgivings on that point.
However, the company did not concern themselves with my doubts
and fears, for our two guests seemed much taken aback at this very
matter-of-fact proposal of F----'s. "That won't do at all, my dear
fellow," said the owner of the run; "I am going to England by the
next mail steamer, which you know sails next week, and the reason I am