Rangitikei 18 May 1852 My dear Puss The mail leaves tomorrow at eight am. I have just had a comfortable tea and now I must give an account of myself. Of course there has not been an opportunity otherwise you should have heard from me if it were only two lines. We arrived here after a cold blowy ride on Saturday night and I frequently thought how lucky it was that I had not my little pet to look after. She would be starved with cold and fatigue. She would take a dislike to the romantic rambles of her old plague and might even insinuate I will not go again but I must not accuse poor Dugy of disobedience. She is decided at all times and at all hazards to obey. We are as yet at the Rangitikei hotel Scott's where every thing is most clean and comfortable. Excellent cream, clean salt, plenty of nice towels, tea at 7 am and only old Mrs Scott and her husband to attend to about 15 of us. You may thank your stars that I do not take you to the bush and give you plenty of employment but even there I feel certain my own pet would be happy as the wife depicted by Washington Irving if Providence should place us in the same circumstances. I cannot look at a milch cow or a fine growing heifer or calf but I think how well