"So say I," chimed in Slyde. "Good thing about a war, attracts best fellows of all nationalities--Johnnies that prefer discomfort and revel in danger; used to light marching order, too. Sort of war correspondent business; murder and sudden death thrown in. Deuced exhilarating when you come to think of it." "Do you know, I find it so," answered Massinger, entering into the joke. "And our light marching order is a triumph of economy of space. Nothing approaches it but a middy's wardrobe, and he has a ship to carry it. I must have myself photographed when we--may I say _if_--we return to camp. Let me see--Forest Ranger, 'in his habit as he lived;' applicable to either case, you see. Item--_Swag_. Did I think I should ever carry one? One blanket, one great coat, twenty rounds of ammunition, all put up in a waterproof; three days' rations of meat and biscuit; half a bottle of rum. Revolver, carbine, cartridge-box, tomahawk--all most useful, not to say ornamental, when sliding down precipices in the dark, as we did on entering camp last night." "Camp accommodation; don't forget that," added Slyde. "Fire strictly forbidden. Sleeping apartment of the wild boar of the forest. I'll swear that where you and I, Warwick and Hay, slept last night--for we _did_ sleep--under the hollow rimu tree, had belonged to one. 'Feeds the boar in the old frank,' as the wild prince says. Also, over and above all these pleasures and palaces, our lives hang on a chance from day to day--that of being surrounded in the heart of a forest, and cut off to a man." "Conversation most improvin'," said Mr. Slyde. "Seems to lack the comic element, though! 'Want a piano,' as the Johnnie said to Thackeray after lecture. As we've an early _engagement_--ha, ha!--in the morning, suppose we turn in? Now 'I lay me down to sleep.' Rain recommencing. 'Drought broken up,' as they say in Australia." It was not very late--nine o'clock, indeed, no more. Camp evenings were apt to be long without late dinners or books. However, it not being their watch, the friends lay down in their "lair," and in five minutes, despite the rain, from which, indeed, the o'er-arching tree in great part saved them, fell fast asleep. At midnight on the third day the march was recommenced and the cliff path reached. Von Tempsky, with seventy men, made a start punctually, as was his wont. Massinger felt doubtfully entertained at the idea of swinging in mid-air, clinging to a rude arrangement of trailers, with, perhaps, expectant Maoris at the top. However, he forbore remark, and after he had seen Von Tempsky shin up the swaying half-seen line like a man-of-war Jack, he felt reassured. "What a leader he is!" thought he. "'Alike to him the sea, the shore, The branch, the bridle, and the oar.' We are all in hard condition, luckily." Between the precarious foothold on the cliff and the ladder of withes--Warwick, by the way, was immediately behind him--he reached the top safely.