idiculous accident which happened to one of these mail
carriers, who had been despatched to fetch mails across the plains. I do
not think I mentioned that there were numbers of wild cats to be met
with all over the country. They were not indigenous, but domestic
animals or their descendants gone wild, and with their wild existence
they engendered a considerable addition of strength and fierceness. The
shepherd's dog was the natural enemy of these animals.

On the occasion to which I refer, the messenger, an old Irish servant of
Mr. Rowley's, was riding quietly on one of the station hacks, a horse
called "Old Dan," a noted buckjumper in his day. Heavy saddle bags with
the posts were suspended on either side, in addition to various packages
tied on fore and aft. Suddenly Pat's dog put up a cat and went away in
full chase. The plain was quite open, with no trees or shrubs nearer
than the river bed, half a mile distant. The cat finding herself hard
pressed, and despairing of reaching the river-bed before the dog would
catch her, spied old Dan with Paddy and the post thereupon, and
conceived that her only chance of safety lay in mounting too. No sooner
thought than done. She doubled, sprang on old Dan's tail and fastened
her claws in his hinder parts. Dan not approving of such treatment, set
to bucking. First Pat went off, then the saddle bags and parcels,
followed by puss. Old Dan finding himself free, ran for his life, the
cat after him, and the dog after the cat, leaving poor Pat on the ground
to watch the trio as they disappeared from sight.

[Illustration: PAT AND HIS MAIL-BAG DISLODGED BY A CAT.]

Pat had over ten miles to travel and carry the bags and parcels as best
he could, and return the next day for the saddle. The story of how the
cat robbed H.M. Mail was long laughed over on the Ashburton, and Paddy
was unmercifully chaffed for his part in the performance.

I was busily employed till late in the following autumn finishing the
works I had in hand, and lived a portion of the time at Glent hills, Mr.
Rowley's hill station, where I had a considerable contract for wire
fencing with which Mr. Rowley was dividing up into extensive sections
the wide valley in which lay the lakes Emma and Clearwater.

[Illustration: GLENT HILLS STATION.]

During the summer I joined once again in the general mustering, and
lived on the mountain sides for days and nights together. It was here
I contrived to catch some cold which caus