RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30738, 30 April 1965, Page 22

RANDOM REMINDER

THESE ENGLISH

Picture a newly-arrived English couple with newlymade New Zealand friends camping together near the Franz Josef and bending over backwards to indicate that they were as ready as the next to rough it One evening, as she tried to cook the sausages on a pressure stove the wind kept extinguishing, he volunteered to walk to the village for milk. The road lay through a cutting with high, bush-clad banks; and it was dark when he returned through it. He whistled softly to himself, but could not help but feel he was under observation. And a quick glance over his shoulder confirmed that

there were a pair of eyes up the bank focusing on' him. Recalling his recent service in Malaya, where tigers were not unknown, he padded silently on, apprehension rising. They had said there were no wild animals in New Zealand, but these eyes did not look tame. He stole another glance. They were keeping level, all right. Then, as the end of the cutting came into sight, he realised that the charge must come soon. The eyes were parallel with him now and he decided to act. Flinging the billy and milk at the apparition, he burst into a sprint apd stumbled into the camp, wild of eye

and breathless. The natives laughed, boasted that New Zealand tigers could be knocked off by hand and offered to show hint how it was done. So back they went; and the Englishman was nearly satisfied when he saw the eyes glint again through the scrub. But he admitted in a whisper that they didn’t appear as large as he first thought And come to think of it there appeared to be eyes everywhere. The bank was aglow. What on earth? The other burst into laughter and immediately the light faded. Scary, little things, glow worms.