HOUGH'S PASS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume II, Issue 153, 3 July 1867, Page 3

HOUGH'S PASS.

TO THE EDITOK OP THE, NELSON EVENING MAIL. Sik —Will you allow me a few words in your valuable paper? Being well acquainted with Mr. Hough's route to the Karamea Valiey, I took the trouble, last night, to read over Mr. Groom's report, and I am almost ready to conclude that he must be " a duffer." He speaks in the first place of difficulties which have no existence, for nothing can be easier than to make a Bridle Track from the Baton to the Upper Forks, in Skeet's Eiver, and yet he tells us that they crossed the river 20 times. Poof fellow, I am afraid he must have got his feet wet! But this is absolute nonsense, for there is no necessity of crossing it once if a Bridle Track were made on the south side of the river. In his Bth paragraph, I read Mr. Groom's description of the fearful difficulties he encountered this day. Does he not know —of course he does —that this day's difficulties and troubles ought to have been left out of his catalogue of troubles altogether, since it formed no part of the route marked out by Mr. Hough. The other men had the honesty to confess this, but Mr. Groom has not followed their example. There is one thing in Mr. Groom's report which puzzles me. Those who are acquainted with the country know full well that from the Upper Forks to the saddle, by the way they went, cannot be more than about three miles; but Mr. Groom tells us that the distance from the spur from the saddle down to the valley below, to the Crow, is only one and-a-half miles, that is altogether four and-a-half miles, and yet he tells us in his report that it would require 15 miles of side cutting, to get over four aud-a-half miles of road. There, Mr. Editor, I confess I am nonplussed. I cannot understand his logic, his deductions are a complete mystery to me. If he can explain them, let him d'o so. I am, &c, One Who Knows the Eoad.