Erewhon, or, Over the range / by Samuel Butler.

  • Samuel Butler
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Erewhon, or, Over the range / by Samuel Butler. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    wet and we were half-perished with cold ; indeed we were very uncomfortable. There was brush¬ wood about, but we could get no fire till we had shaved off the wet outside of some dead branches and filled our pockets with the dry inside chips. Having done this we managed to start a fire, nor did we allow it to go out when we had once started it; we pitched the tent and by nine o’clock were comparatively warm and dry. Next morning it was fine; we broke camp, and after advancing a short distance we found that, by descending over ground less difficult than yesterday’s, we should come again upon the river-bed, which had opened out above the gorge; but it was plain at a glance that there was no available sheep country, nothing but a few flats covered with scrub on either side the river, and mountains which were perfectly worthless. But we could see the main range. There was no mistake about this. The glaciers were tumbling down the mountain sides like cataracts, and seemed actually to descend upon the river-bed ; there could be no serious difficulty in reaching them by following up the river, which was wide and open ; but it seemed rather an objectless thing to do, for the main range looked hopeless, and my curiosity about the nature of the country above the gorge was now quite satisfied; there was no money in it whatever, unless there should be minerals, of which I saw no more signs than lower down. However, I resolved that I would follow the river 31
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