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diff --git a/old/54366-0.txt b/old/54366-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 39b1102..0000000 --- a/old/54366-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7983 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook, A Colonial Reformer, Vol. III (of 3), by Rolf -Boldrewood - - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - - -Title: A Colonial Reformer, Vol. III (of 3) - - -Author: Rolf Boldrewood - - - -Release Date: March 15, 2017 [eBook #54366] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - - -***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A COLONIAL REFORMER, VOL. III (OF -3)*** - - -E-text prepared by MWS, Les Galloway, and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made -available by Internet Archive (https://archive.org) - - - -Note: Images of the original pages are available through - Internet Archive. See - https://archive.org/details/colonialreformer03bold - - Project Gutenberg has the other two volumes of this work. - Volume I: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54067 - Volume II: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55652 - - -Transcriber's note: - - Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). - - In the expression “the [Ǝ]NE brand” [Ǝ] represent the - reverse E character depressed by half a line. - - In the expression "the M[Ḋ] brand" [Ḋ] represents a - reversed D depressed by half a line. - - - - - -A COLONIAL REFORMER - - -[Illustration: Colophon] - - -A COLONIAL REFORMER - -by - -ROLF BOLDREWOOD - -Author of ‘Robbery Under Arms,’ ‘The Squatter’S Dream,’ -‘The Miner’S Right,’ etc. - -In Three Volumes - -VOL. III - - - - - - -London -Macmillan and Co. -and New York -1890 - -All rights reserved - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV - - -In the strange exceptional condition of nervous tension up to which -that marvellous instrument, the human ‘harp of a thousand strings,’ is -capable of being wound, under the pressure of dread and perplexity, -there is a type of visitor whose face is always hailed with pleasure. -This is a fact as unquestionable as the converse proposition. For -the _bien-venu_ under such delicate and peculiar circumstances, -helpfulness, sympathy, and decision are indispensable. Of no avail -are weakly condolences or mild assenting pity. The power to dispense -substantial aid may or may not be wanting. But the friend in need -must have the moral power and clearness of mental vision which render -decisiveness possible and just. His fiat, favourable or unfavourable, -lets in the light, separates real danger from undefined terror, offers -security for well-grounded hope, or persuades to the calmness of -resignation. - -A man so endowed, in a very unusual degree, was Mr. Levison. Deriving -his leading characteristics from Nature’s gift—very scantily -supplemented by education—he yet possessed the rare qualities of -apprehensive acuteness, intrepidity, and discrimination in such measure -and proportion as a hundred prize-takers at competitive examinations -might have vainly hoped to emulate. Like that Australian judge, of -whom the American citizen, in an inland assize town, is reported to -have said, ‘Wal, Judge Shortcharge may be right, or he may be wrong, -but he _decides_. I go for the judge myself.’ - -Abstinens Levison much resembled that brief but weighty legal luminary, -in that, after due consideration of any case concerning which he was -minded to give judgment, his verdict was clear and irrevocable. - -For this reason the soul of Ernest Neuchamp was glad within him at -the prospect of hearing from the lips of the grave, undemonstrative, -unwavering pastoralist words of comfort or of rebuke, which would be to -him as the Oracles of the Gods. - -‘Jump off and come in,’ he said. ‘Delighted to see you—horse knocked -up as usual? We’ll take the saddle off here, and let him pick at those -reeds; they’re better than nothing. I was having a go-in at the garden -here, just to take it out of myself a little, and forget my annoyances. -But we must have some breakfast, though we are all going to be ruined, -as you say—and it looks very like it.’ - -As Mr. Neuchamp in his revulsion of feeling rattled off these -greetings, partly in welcome and partly in explanation, his guest -removed the saddle and several folds of blanket from the very prominent -vertebræ of his gaunt courser, watching him roll and then attack the -scantily furnished reed-bed, with much satisfaction. - -‘Where did you come from this morning?’ inquired Ernest of his -guest, as, after a prolonged visit to the bathroom, they sat down to -breakfast; ‘you must have made a very early start if you came from -Mildool.’ - -‘I camped on the river,’ said Mr. Levison, attacking the corned beef -in a deliberate but determined manner; ‘in the bend, just below those -free-selecting friends of yours; you don’t seem to have been getting on -well with ’em lately, from what they say.’ - -‘We are not on good terms, I must admit,’ replied Mr. Neuchamp, with a -slight air of embarrassment, recollecting Levison’s prophecy of evil, -which had been verified to the letter; ‘but it is entirely their own -fault. I was much deceived in them.’ - -‘Very like,’ answered that gentleman, with as near an approach to a -smile as his grave features ever permitted. ‘It takes a smart man to be -up to chaps of their sort.’ - -‘Did you stay there?’ asked Ernest, anxious to lead the conversation -into a less unsatisfactory channel; ‘they have not made themselves a -very convenient dwelling.’ - -‘No!’ replied Mr. Levison, preferring a request for another instalment -of the cold round of beef. ‘I never stay at a place if I’m going to -make a deal. It makes a difference in the bargain, I always think; and -I wanted to make a little deal with those chaps, from what I heard as I -came up the river.’ - -‘A deal?’ said Ernest, with some surprise; ‘and how did you get on? I -shouldn’t have thought they had much to sell.’ - -‘Well, they’ve got a middling lot of quiet cattle for one thing; -they’re regular crawlers, but none the worse for that if grass -ever grows again. Then they’ve got, what with their selections and -pre-emptives, a tidy slice, and of not the worst part, of Rainbar run. -And as there was a friend of mine that a small place like that would -suit, and the cattle and the few sheep, at a price—at a price,’ he -continued, with slow earnestness—‘why—I’ll ask for another cup of -tea—I had an hour’s mighty hard dealing, and bought the whole jimbang -right out.’ - -‘Indeed!’ said Ernest, gratified in one sense, but slightly alarmed -at the idea of a second pastoral proprietor being introduced into the -sacred demesne of Rainbar; ‘but they have to fulfil their residence -condition, haven’t they, according to the Land Act?’ - -‘Of course I made _that_ all right,’ affirmed the senior colonist. -‘They’re bound down to reside till their time is up, and they don’t get -the balance of their money till they can convey, all square and legal. -They didn’t know me, as luck would have it, and I dropped to their -being very eager to sell out. These kind of chaps never look ahead -beyond their noses, whereby I had ’em pretty well at my own price, for -cash—cash, you know. A fine thing is cash, when you take care of it, -and bring it out like an ace. It takes all before it.’ - -‘What did you give for the cattle?’ asked Ernest, with melancholy -interest. - -‘Well, these small holders always believe the end of the world’s come -when they find themselves landed in a real crusher of a dry season. -They think the weather is bound to keep set fair for a lifetime. I -showed ’em how their cattle was falling off, and at last they offered -the lot all round at eight and sixpence—no calves given in, except -regular staggering Bobs. And so my friend has the run, and the stock, -and the pre-empts all in his own hands. He’ll do well out of ’em, or -I’m much mistaken.’ - -‘And does your friend propose to come and live here?’ - -‘Well, he might, and he might not. I think I’ll take another egg—fine -things eggs in a dry season. I expect your fowls live on grasshoppers -pretty much. You see, if he could get two or three fellows as he could -depend on to take up some more of the best bits of the bends, leaving a -slice here and a slice there—so as it’s not worth any one else’s while -to come in, because they’d have no pre-emptive worth talking of—he’d be -able to keep all that angle pretty well to himself, and I believe it -will keep well on it a thousand head of cattle some day.’ - -‘I’m afraid it will spoil the sale of the run,’ said Ernest, with some -diffidence; ‘not that it will matter to me much, as I shall have to -sell out whether or no, and at present prices there will be little if -anything left. You will have to take your cattle back if they’re not -paid for.’ - -‘Well, I don’t say but what it _might_ spoil the sale of the run, -especially if my friend was to be wide awake and take up his fresh -selections with judgment. And don’t you think, now,’ Mr. Levison -interrogated, fixing his clear gray eyes full upon Ernest’s -countenance, ‘as it was a blind trick of yours to go and bring these -chaps here, like a lot of catarrhed sheep, all among your own stock, -just to make it hot for yourself and crab the sale of the run, -supposing you wanted to sell?’ - -Mr. Neuchamp had in his hours of remorse and repentance sufficiently -gone over the ground of his errors and miscalculations, so as to -be very fully convinced of the folly of this his most indefensible -proceeding. He had been thirsting for the words of the oracle. Now that -the hollow sounds came from Dodona’s oak, he liked not their purport. -The spirit of his ancestors, temporarily oppressed by misfortune, -awoke in his breast, and he thus made answer: ‘My dear sir, I am most -willing to own that I have in this matter acted unwisely. And the -more I see of this great but perplexing country, the more ready I am -to admit that extreme caution is necessary in many transactions where -such need does not appear on the surface. But I have acted in this, -and in all other stages of my Australian career, upon the principle -of attempting to do good to my fellow-creatures, and of raising the -standard of human happiness and culture. Such motives I hold to be the -true foundation of every instructed, christianised, and, therefore, -permanent community. Want of success may have attended my efforts to -carry out these ideas; but of such efforts and endeavours, whatever may -be the result, I trust I shall never feel ashamed!’ - -As Mr. Neuchamp uttered the concluding words of this vindication of his -faith with a kindling eye and slightly raised tone, he held his head -erect and looked with a fixed and rather stern regard at Mr. Levison, -as if defying all the Paynim hosts of selfishness and monopoly. - -Mr. Levison met his gaze with a moment’s searching glance, and then, -with a relapse into his ordinary expression of judicial calculation, -thus answered— - -‘I ain’t going to say that you are acting altogether wrong in trying -to right things in a general way in life. There’s more than you has -noticed a lot of wrong turns and breakdowns for want of a finger-post -or two. And I like to see a man back his opinion right through, whether -it’s right or wrong. But if you lose your team, and break your pole, -and spoil your loading when you’re on a long overland trip, how are you -to help your mates or any other chap that’s bogged when they want you -to double-bank? That’s what I look at. You’ve got to stand and look on, -just like a broke loafer or a coach passenger. What I say, and what I -stick to, is that a man should make sure, and double sure, of his own -footing, and _then_ he can wire in and haul out any man, woman, or -child as he takes a fancy to put on firm ground. But, if you go too -fast, and your agent drops you, and you want to help a fellow, why, -you’re bust, and he’s bust, and what can either of ye do but sit on -your stern fixings and look at each other?’ - -Mr. Levison’s illustrations were homely, but they had a force and -application which Ernest fully recognised. - -‘You have the truth on your side,’ he said, after a pause. ‘I see it -now—very plainly, too. I wonder why I could not see it before.’ - -‘There’s a deal of studying required, it seems to me,’ propounded his -eccentric mentor, ‘and a deal of experience, and knocking about, and -loss of time and money, too, before a man comes to see the _right thing -at the right time_. That’s where the hardship all lies. If the thing’s -right and the time’s wrong, _that’s_ no good. And the right time and -the wrong thing is worse again. What you’ve been a-doin’ of ain’t so -much wrong in itself—only the time’s wrong, that’s where your mistake -is,—except things take a great start soon; and I don’t say they won’t, -mind you.‘ - -Here Mr. Levison looked at Ernest with an expression half humorous, -half prophetic, so extremely unusual that the latter began to wonder -whether there was any case on record of half a dozen cups of tea having -produced temporary insanity. But the unaccustomed gleam departed -suddenly from the dark, steadfast gray eyes, and the countenance -resumed its wonted cast of calm investigation and unalterable decision. - -‘Does old Frankston ever give you a dressing down in the advice line?’ -inquired Mr. Levison, without continuing the development of the idea -he had last started. ‘Because if he does, you’d have a bad time of -it between us. But I’ve done all the preaching part of the story for -this time, and I’m a-going on to the second chapter. Do you know the -friend’s name as I bought these Freeman chaps out for?’ - -‘No,’ said Ernest. ‘I shall be happy to afford him all the assistance I -can—that is, if I’m here, you know,’ he added, with sudden reflection. - -‘That’s all right; but he’s a youngish chap, and easy had. Will you -promise to advise him to live economically, mind his business till -times improve, and not waste his money, above all things? Tell him I -said so.’ - -‘I don’t think I am the best adviser you could pick in that way,’ said -Ernest. ‘I am too sensible of my own defects; but I will deliver your -message and add my feeble weight to the influence of your name.’ - -‘That’s all right, and handsomely said. Now, my friend’s name is Ernest -Neuchamp! I’ve bought the land and the cattle for him. They’re cheap -enough if he never pays me for them, but I believe he will, and that -those Freeman chaps will be biting their fingers at letting theirselves -go so cheap this time next year. But, mind you tell him not to waste -his money. Tell him Levison said so. Ha, ha! I must start now.’ - -Mr. Levison laughed for the first time since Ernest had made his -acquaintance. It must have been the sight of Ernest’s wonder-stricken -face which caused this unprecedented though brief incongruity. - -‘I can never sufficiently thank you,’ he said; ‘but where’s the money -to come from? The station will never pay it.’ - -‘That’s more than you can know,’ answered the Changer of Destinies; -‘It’s more than I know, too. I don’t mind telling you—as I said -before—you’re not likely to interfere much with any man’s profits. But -cattle are _going to rise_, and that to no foolish price. You mark my -words. Before this time twelve months fat cattle will be worth five -pounds a head, as sure as my name’s Ab. Levison. And if rain comes—and -I’ve seen some signs that I have great dependence on—store cattle will -be two and three pounds a head, and hard to buy at that.’ - -These last words he uttered with great solemnity, and Mr. Neuchamp -perceived that he was fully imbued with faith in his own vaticinations. - -‘I hope it may be so,’ Ernest replied. ‘Good heavens! what a wonderful -change it would make in everything. But why should stock rise so?’ - -‘Because the _yield of gold_ is increasing every day and every hour in -these colonies. Don’t you see the papers? I thought you was sure to -have read everything. Why, you are not half posted up. Look here!’ - -Here he produced from one of his capacious pockets a much worn and -closely printed Melbourne _Argus_, in which mention was made of ‘the -astonishing discovery of gold near Bunninyong at Mr. Yuille’s station, -commonly known as Ballarat, in such quantity and richness as bade fair -to rival the hitherto exhaustless yields of Turonia and California. -Great excitement had taken place. Melbourne was deserted. You could -not get your hair cut. The barristers were gone, leaving the judges -lamenting. The doctors had followed their patients. The clergymen had -followed their flocks. The shepherds had deserted theirs. All society -existed in a state of dislocation!’ - -‘Now,’ he continued, receiving the journal from Ernest, and carefully -refolding and returning it to its place of safety, ‘do you see what -all this gold breaking out here and there and all about means?’ - -‘For the present the Melbourne people seem to think it means loss, if -not ruin, to them. The shepherds have nearly all run away, it seems, -as also labourers of every description. The writer anticipates a great -fall in the value of property. Indeed, houses and town allotments are -considered to be hardly worth holding. I should have thought otherwise -myself, but’ (here Ernest looked at his companion) ‘I begin to doubt -the correctness of my own opinions.’ - -‘Well, that writer’s an ass, whoever he is; and you’re a deal nearer -the mark than he is. He’s a donkey, that, because their ain’t a thistle -right against his nose, thinks there ain’t no more thistles in the -world—let alone corn. Now I’ve been thinkin’ and thinkin’ the whole -matter over since a friend of mine in Port Phillip sent me this paper, -and I cipher it out this way. They’ve sent down five thousand ounces -this week from this place, Ballarat. Then they’ve struck it at Forest -Creek, fifty miles off. Well, that tells me that there’s plenty of it, -and more than years will see out, judging from California and Turonia, -as we know of. Now what do you suppose all Europe—all the world—will do -when they hear of this, that you can dig up gold like potatoes? Why, -they won’t be able to find ships fast enough to bring ‘em here. When -they do come they’ll want to be fed. The tea and sugar and tents and -spades and shovels old Paul Frankston and the other merchants will find -’em somehow; the flour the farmers will find them, or if they can’t, -old Paul and his friends will get it from Chili. _But they can’t import -beef and mutton._ No; not if meat rose to a shilling a pound. Live -stock is the worst freight in the world, and there’s nowhere within -boating distance where it grows plentiful as it does here. So when my -sum’s worked out it means this, that more gold means double and treble -the population, and double and treble the price of everything that we -have here and want to sell.’ - -As Mr. Levison paused,—not for breath, for he did not exceed his -ordinary slow monotonal enunciation, as he propounded these original -and startling ideas much as though he were reading from a book,—Mr. -Neuchamp looked fixedly at his guest, as if to discover whether or -no some subtle local influence peculiar to Rainbar had infected with -speculative mania the shrewd, calm-judging stockholder. - -But the _genius loci_, however seductive, would have fared ill in -a mental encounter with the slow, sure inferences and iron logic -of Abstinens Levison. He displayed no trace of more than ordinary -interest. And from all that was apparent, the onward march of a -revolution fated to flood the land with wealth and to change a handful -of pioneer communities into a nation, was accepted by him with the same -faint unnoted surprise as would have been the announcement of a glut in -the cattle market or the ‘sticking up’ of the downriver mail coach. - -‘That’s how it is in my mind,’ he slowly continued, as if pursuing his -ordinary train of thoughts, ‘and before we meet again you’ll know all -about it. I’m off to Melbourne as soon as I can get on to the mail -line. I shall buy stock right and left, and pick up as many cottages -and town allotments as I can find with good titles. They’ll be like -these Freeman store cattle; cent per cent will be a trifle to what -profits are to be had out of them. But all this yarning won’t buy the -child a frock. Where’s that young man of yours? I want to leave my -horse and saddle in his charge.’ - -‘Where are you going now?’ asked Ernest. ‘How can you get over to -the mail station without a horse? It’s a hundred and eighty miles to -Wargan, where the coach line comes in.’ - -‘It’s only thirty miles to Wood-duck Lagoon, where the horse mail -passes,’ said his determined guest. ‘I left word for them down at -Mingadee to send a led horse by the mailman for me to-morrow. Johnny -Daly’s an old stockman of mine, and one of those chaps that when he -says he’ll do a thing he always does it. I’m as sure of finding a horse -there at ten o’clock to-morrow as if I saw him now.’ - -‘But suppose he loses him on the way, or don’t find your horse ready at -Mingadee, what then? Hadn’t you better take a man and horse from here?’ - -‘Well, I don’t say Johnny would _steal_ a horse, out and out, if he -knew I expected one at a certain hour; he’s a good boy, though he does -come from the Weddin Mountains. But he’d _have_ one for me, some road -or other, if there wasn’t one nearer than Bargo Brush. As for your -horses, I’m obliged, and know I’m welcome, but it would knock up one -going and one coming back, for they’re all as poor as crows, and that -don’t pay, besides a man’s time for nothing. I’ve plenty of time, and -the night’s the best travelling weather now. If you’ll call this native -chap I’ll be off.’ - -Ernest, though extremely loath to let his friend and benefactor depart -on foot—of which, as a mode of progression, he was beginning to -acquire the Australian opinion, viz. that it wore a poverty-stricken -appearance—could not decently oppose Mr. Levison’s fixed desire to -take the road. He therefore called up Jack Windsor, to whose care Mr. -Levison solemnly confided his emaciated quadruped, a much worn and -sunburned saddle and bridle, together with a considerable portion of -gray blanket, which, in many folds, did duty as saddle-cloth. - -‘Now, young man,’ he said solemnly, walking aside with Mr. Windsor, -‘you take care of these and my old horse. Give them to nobody without -he brings Mr. Cottonbush’s written order; do you hear? That’s as good a -stock horse and journey hack as ever you crossed, though he’s low now.’ - -‘He is _very_ low!’ averred Jack, looking at the bare-ribbed spectral -but well-formed animal that was grazing within a few yards of the spot, -‘but he may get over it. I’ll take a look at him night and morning, and -see that he’s lifted regular if he gets down.’ - -‘All right,’ said his master. ‘I had to lift him myself this morning, -and very hard work I had to get him up. But if it rains within the next -two months you’ll have him kicking up his heels like a colt.’ - -‘Are you going to walk to Wood-duck Lagoon, sir?’ inquired Jack -respectfully. - -‘Yes, I am, and no great matter either,’ returned the exceptionally -wiry capitalist. ‘_I’m_ right enough; don’t you trouble about me. What -you and young Banks have to look out for is, to keep all these Circle -Dot cattle well within bounds till the weather breaks, and then you -can’t go wrong, and I look upon Mr. Neuchamp’s pile as made. I’ve taken -to him, more than a bit. Besides, he’s got another good back, though he -don’t know it. I’ve bought out the Freeman’s, stock, lock, and barrel, -so their cattle won’t bother you any more.’ - -Here Mr. Windsor gave a leap off the ground, and cast his cabbage-tree -hat violently from his curly brown locks in another direction. - -‘Yes, I’ve bought ’em pretty right; they didn’t know me, or they’d have -stuck it on—bought ’em _for a friend_! So they’ll have the pleasure of -seeing you and Banks branding the increase next year, just as they are -giving up possession; and the calves will be worth more then than I -paid for the cows yesterday. But I might be mistaken, you know.’ - -‘It would be for the first time; so they all used to say at -Boocalthra,’ answered Jack. - -‘_You_ were there, then?’ said Mr. Levison, bending his extremely -discriminating gaze upon the bronzed, resolute face. ‘_Now_ I remember -your brand; you were the curly-headed boy that used to ride the colts -for the horse-breaker. Glad you turned out steady. I didn’t expect it. -Stick to Rainbar; now you’re in a good place, and you’ll do well. But -whatever you do, if you walk your feet off, don’t let these Circle Dot -cows and heifers get out of bounds till the rain comes. If you are -regularly beat, go down to Mingadee; there’s a hundred and fifty stock -horses there, spelling for next winter’s work, and Cottonbush will -have my orders to let you have half a dozen. I know what fresh cattle -are in a season like this. Well, good-bye, Jack the Devil; I remember -all about you now.’ Mr. Windsor grinned, yet preserved an air of -diffidence. ‘Take care of the old horse, and don’t you lend that saddle -to no one!’ - -With these parting words tending to thrift, in curious -contradistinction to the tenor of his action at Rainbar, Mr. Levison -proceeded to take a hurried leave of his entertainer. - -‘I’ve just been talking to that native chap of yours,’ he said, ‘about -my old horse. He wants a bit of looking after now, but you’d be -surprised to see what style he has when he’s in good fettle. Wonderful -horse on a camp. Best cutting-out horse, this day, on the river. Pulls -rather hard, that’s the worst of him.’ - -Mr. Neuchamp, who, having as yet not gone through the terrible -trials of a prolonged drought, had never witnessed the incredible -emaciation to which stock may be reduced, and their rapid and magical -transformation at the wand of the enchanter ‘Rain,’ looked as if he -really _would_ be surprised at the tottering, hollow-eyed, fleshless -spectre, in appearance something between an expiring poley cow and an -anatomical preparation, ‘pulling hard’ again, or doing any deed of -valour as a charger. - -‘Ah! you’ll be all in the fashion, then,’ said Mr. Levison, with his -customary affirmative expression, which apparently meant that having -asserted his opinion it was waste of time to attempt to prove it. -‘When old BI (that’s what the men call him, his name’s written on him -pretty big) kicks up his heels, it’ll mean that Rainbar’s _worth twenty -thousand pounds_! That’s why I want you to be careful, and not waste -your money and get sold up just before the tide turns. How’s that Arab -horse-breeding notion turned out? They’d fetch about three pound a head -all round just now.’ - -‘Very well, so far; they’re a little poor, but nothing could look more -promising than the yearlings—plenty of bone, and as handsome as you -could make them. I should grieve more about their forced sale than -anything.’ - -‘Well, you’re not sold up yet, and won’t be if you’ll be careful and -take my advice and Paul Frankston’s. You mark me, horses will be -horses in a year or two. They’re hardly worth owning now; but their -turn’s coming, with everything else that any man will have to sell in -Australia for the next ten years.’ - -Mr. Levison placed the few necessary articles which he had abstracted -from his valise, in the moiety of the gray blanket which he had -apparently not required as a saddle-cloth. He requested leave to cut -off and to take with him a fair-sized section of damper, sternly -refusing any other description of edible. Then, turning his face to the -broad plain, he held out his hand to Ernest, and finally exhorting him -not to waste his money, addressed himself to the far-stretching trail -after such a fashion as convinced Ernest that he was no inexperienced -pedestrian. - -Mr. Neuchamp returned to his cottage in a very different frame of -mind from that which characterised his pre-matutinal discipline in -the garden. How short a time, how trifling an incident, occasionally -suffices to turn the scale from anxiety to repose, from despair to -glowing hope. This last cheering mental condition was indispensably -necessary to Mr. Neuchamp’s acceptation of burdens, even to his very -life. He had gone forth in the clear dawnlight a miserable man, -racked by presentiments of scorn unalterable to come, gazing on -‘Ruin’s red letters writ in flame,’ and associated with the hitherto -untarnished fame and sufficing fortune of Ernest Neuchamp; he had heard -in imagination the laugh of scorn, the half-contemptuous, pitying -condolence. Now, though much remained uncertain and unsafe, the blessed -flower of Hope had recommenced to bloom. Its fragrance was once more -shed over the soul of the fainting pilgrim through life’s desert, and -the wayfarer arose refreshed and invigorated, free once more to turn -his brow erect and undaunted towards the Mecca of his dreams. - -This particular morning happened to be that of the bi-weekly -post-day, a day to which Mr. Neuchamp had looked forward of late -with considerably more apprehension than interest. How wonderfully -different, as the years roll on, are the feelings with which that -humble messenger of fate, the postman, is greeted! In life’s careless -spring he is the custodian of friendship’s offering, the distributor of -the small sweet joys of childhood, the dawning intellectual pleasures -of youth, the rose-hued, enchanting flower-tokens of love. As the days -of the years of our pilgrimage roll on, ‘the air is full of farewells -to the dying and mournings for the dead.’ How altered is the character -of the missives which lie motionless, but charged with subtle, terrible -forces!—electric agents they!—thrilling or rending the vital frame from -that overcharged battery, the heart! - -To this undesirable tenor and complexion had much of Mr. Neuchamp’s -correspondence, drought-leavened and gloomy, arrived. Many of his -smaller accounts were of necessity left unpaid. The cruel season, -unchanged in the more vital characteristic of periodic moisture, seemed -to be culminating in an apparently fixed and fatal determination on the -part of Messrs. Oldstile and Crampton to let him have no more money on -account. - -But several minor matters, on this particular day, besides the visit -of Mr. Levison, seemed to point to Fortune’s more indulgent mood. -The pile of letters and papers was pleasantly, if not hopefully, -variegated by those periodicals and peculiarly stamped envelopes which -denote the delivery of the European mail. Upon these Ernest dashed -with unconcealed eagerness, and tearing open a letter in his brother -Courtenay’s delicate Italian handwriting, utterly devoid of linear -emphasis, read as follows: - - NEUCHAMPSTEAD, _6th March 18—_. - - DEAR ERNEST—I cannot acknowledge surprise at the contents of your - last letter, having always looked for some such ending to your - colonial adventure. The day of success for such enterprises has gone - by—if indeed _any one_ ever was really successful at any time in - such wanderings and Quixotisms. You quote the greater examples. Yet - a little temporary notoriety, chiefly ending in imprisonment or the - block, was the guerdon of Columbus and one Raleigh, instances which - occur to me. As I have said before, I have no doubt that our family - would have substantially benefited by remaining on their paternal - fiords and leaving Normandy and England to the robbers and hangers-on - who followed the popular pirate of the day. Being in England, I - suppose we shall have to stay, though the climate daily recommends - itself less to any one whose epidermis does not resemble a suit of - armour. The crops have been bad this year. The tenants are slow and - deficient. No one seems to have any money except certain Liverpool - or Manchester persons, born with an aptitude for swindling in ‘gray - shirtings,’ cotton twist, racehorses, or other equally plausible - instrument for gambling. I spend little and risk nothing. So I may - hope to survive in my insignificance, unless the grand Radical - earthquake, which will surely swallow England’s aristocracy of birth - and culture in a coming day, be antedated. All men of family who - dabble in agriculture, commerce, or colonisation, are earthen pots - which must inevitably be shattered by the aggressive flotilla of - brazen vessels which encumbers every tide nowadays. You will admit I - had no expectation of other result than your ruin when you embarked. - In announcing that fact spare me the details. You will find your old - rooms ready at Neuchampstead, and refurnished. I have been extravagant - in some curious antique furniture. - - I enclose a draft for three thousand pounds. Such a sum is of no use - to a gentleman in England. Fling it after the rest. It may console - you, years hence, when you are adding Australian pollen masses to - the famous collection of orchids for which _alone_ Neuchampstead - is celebrated, that your experiment had full justice. It is only - the bourgeois who leaves the table before his ‘system’ is fairly - tried.—Good-bye, my dear brother. Yours sincerely, - - COURTENAY NEUCHAMP. - - _P.S._—I forgot to add that I gave Augusta your message. How could - you be so incautious? I would have suppressed it, but had, of course, - no option. She starts for Sydney by the mail steamer. Are the women - in Australia so obstinate? But they are much the same everywhere, I - apprehend.—C. N. - -The first emotion which Mr. Neuchamp experienced after reading this -characteristic letter was one of unqualified delight. The sight of -the draft for the three thousand pounds, so slightingly alluded to -by Courtenay, was as the vision of the palm-trees at the well to the -fainting desert pilgrim, of the distant sail to the gaunt, perishing -seaman on the drifting raft—the symbol of blessed hope, of assured -deliverance. The capital sum, or the trifling annual income derivable -from it, in gold-flooded England, might be of little utility there, -as Courtenay had averred with the humorous indifferentism which he -professed. But _here_, in this rich unwatered level, metaphorically and -otherwise, it was like the river-born trickling tunnels with which, -since forgotten Pharaoh days, the toiling fellaheen saturate the black -gaping Nile gardens, sure precursor of profound vegetation and the -hundred-fold increase. - -No use to a gentleman in England! A company of guardian angels must -surely have wafted to him the precious, delicate document across the -seas, across the desert here. What use would it not be to him, Ernest? -It would pay in full for the Circle Dot store cattle, also for those -purchased from Freeman Brothers, leaving a balance to the credit of his -account with those treasure-guarding griffins, Oldstile and Crampton. -Besides, the bills due to Levison for the store cattle were not due -for several months yet. In the meantime rain or other wonders might -happen. The young horses, too, children of Omar, fleet son of the -desert, with delicately-formed aristocratic heads, deerlike limbs, -which had been dear to him almost as their ancestors had been to some -lonely subdivision of the wandering Shammar or Aneezah!—they were saved -from ruin and disgrace—saved from the indignity of passing for the -merest trifle into the possession of unheeding vulgar purchasers, who -would probably stigmatise them as weeds, wanting in bone, or by any -other cheap form of ignorant depreciation. - -Saved! saved! saved! All was saved. Once more secure. Once more his -own. Once more the land and the grazing herd, the humble abode, the -garden, the paddock, even the long-neglected but not despaired-of -canal, all the acted resolves and outcome of a sincere but perhaps -over-sanguine mind, dearer than ever were they to him, their author -and projector. They were his own again. How like Courtenay, too! -Ever better than his word; incredulous as to improved benefits and -successes; deprecating haste, risk, imprudence; doubtful of all but -the garnered grain, the assayed gold, the concrete and the absolute in -life,—but, in the hour of need, sparing of that counsel which is but -another name for reproach, stanch in aid, generous alike in the mode -and measure of his gift. - -Having recovered from this natural exaltation and relief at the -unexpected succour, Mr. Neuchamp turned to the consideration of the -very important postscript of his brother’s letter with apprehension. - -Had his cousin, Miss Augusta Neuchamp, really sailed and arrived in -Sydney, as would appear? If so, where was she to go? What was he to -do? She could hardly come to Rainbar to take up her abode in this -small cottage, which, though possessing several rooms, was, like many -dwellings in the bush proper, practically undivided as to sound; the -conversation of any one, in any given room, being equally beneficial -and entertaining to the occupant of any other. Then there was not a -woman upon the whole establishment. The wives and daughters of the -Freemans, even if the latter were eligible for ladies’ maids, were -little less than hostile. - -A residence in Sydney seemed the only possible plan; but he knew his -cousin too well to think that there would be no drawback to that -arrangement. Energetic, well-intentioned, possessing a clear available -intelligence, and considerable mental force, when exercised within -certain well-defined, but it must be confessed narrow limits, Augusta -Neuchamp was a benevolent despot in her own way. She ardently desired -to arrange the destinies of the classes or individuals who came within -the sphere of her action in accordance with what _she_ considered -to be the plain intentions of Providence with regard to them. Of -the tremendous issues involved in such a translation, she had no -conception. Plain to bluntness in her speech, she rarely evaded the -awkwardness of expressing disappointment. Unquestionably refined by -habit and education, she possessed little imagination and less tact. -Thus she rarely failed to provide herself, in any locality which she -honoured with her presence, with a large and increasing supply of -opponents, if not of enemies. A moderate private income enabled her -to indulge her tastes for improving herself or others. Possessing no -very near relatives, she was uncontrolled as to her movements and mode -of life. She had reached the age of twenty-five, though by no means -unprepossessing in appearance, without finding any suitor sufficiently -valorous to adopt or oppose, in the character of a husband, her very -clearly expressed views of life. Had she consented to reserve a -modification in these important respects, her friends averred that she -might have been ‘settled’ ere now. But such palterings with principle -were alien and abhorrent to the nature of Augusta Neuchamp. And Augusta -Neuchamp she had accordingly remained. - -The appearance of Miss Neuchamp was generally described as commanding, -although she was slightly, if at all, over the medium height of woman. -But there was an expression about her high-bridged aquiline nose and -compressed lips which left no one in doubt as to the fact that, in -controversy or contending action, the first to yield would _not_ be -the possessor of those features. Her clear blue eyes would have been -handsome had there been a shade of doubt or softness at any time -visible. Such a moment of feminine weakness never came. They looked at -you and through you and over you, but never fell in maiden doubt or -fear beneath your gaze. Two courses were open to the individual of the -conflicting sex in her presence—unconditional surrender or flight. - -It was hard, Ernest thought, that just as he was relieved from one -anxiety he should be provided by unkind Fate with another. He revolved -the imminent question of the disposition of Miss Augusta Neuchamp in -his mind until prevented by mutual apprehension from pursuing the -terribly perplexing subject. Of all people in the wide world, he -thought his cousin was the most impracticable, the most unyielding to -argument, the most certain to expose herself to dislike and ridicule in -Australia. She knew everything. She believed nothing, unless indeed it -related to herself or proceeded directly from that source. Everything -which differed from her stereotyped system was wrong, ruinous, -degenerate, or provincial. How she would criticise the place, the -people, the climate, the railways, the houses, the fences, the workmen, -the men and the women, the grass, and the gum-trees! - -If he could only persuade her to take lodgings in Sydney, until he -could go down and argue the point with her, much might be gained. -Antonia Frankston would visit her, and harder than adamant must she -be if that gentle voice and natural manner did not convert her to a -favourable opinion of Australian life. - -No such preparatory process was possible. A letter arrived from the -fair emigrant which left no doubt of her immediate intentions. It ran -thus: - - DEAR COUSIN ERNEST—I have dared the perils of the deep, not the least - for your sake, but _me voici_. I made a short stay in Sydney, but - being extremely tired of the dust and mosquitoes, I decided upon the - course of travelling by rail and coach to your far-away estate at - once. [Here Ernest groaned, a suspicious sound which might have been - in sympathy for the trials of a lonely if not distressed damsel, or - an expression of despondency at the idea of his own inevitable cares - and anxieties, such as must attend the entertainment of the first - lady-guest ever seen at Rainbar. He continued the reading of the - epistle.] If Sydney had been a more interesting place I might have - lingered for a week or two so as to exchange letters with you. Had - it possessed that foreign air which one finds so pleasant in many - continental spots, otherwise dull enough, I could have amused myself. - But being, as it is, a second-hand copy of a provincial British town—I - grant you the botanical element is lovely, though neglected—I could - not endure another week. I seemed to long for the desert, in all its - vastness and grandeur, where your abode is placed. It was like staying - in an Algerian town, a dwarfed and dirty Paris, full of _cafés_ and - shabby Frenchmen playing at dominoes. I had no lady acquaintances. - There _are_ a few, I suppose. So I grew desperate, and took my passage - through the agency company; Cobb, I think, is the name. If you have - no phaeton or dogcart available, you might bring a saddle-horse for - me.—Your affectionate cousin, - - AUGUSTA NEUCHAMP. - -Just after the perusal of this letter, which showed that Miss -Neuchamp’s angles still stood out as sharply as those of a Theban -obelisk—the voyage and change of sky notwithstanding—Mr. Neuchamp was -startled by the sudden appearance of Piambook, who rushed into his -presence with an air of sincere discomposure very different from that -of his usual unimpressible demeanour. His rolling dark eyes gleamed—his -features worked—his mouth, slightly open, could only articulate the -borrowed phrase of his conquerors, ‘My word! my word!’ It was for some -moments the only sound that could be extracted from him by Ernest’s -inquiries. - -‘What is it, Piambook?’ at length demanded Ernest, so decidedly, almost -fiercely, that his sable retainer capitulated. - -‘Me look out longa wheelbarrow,’ he explained at length. He had been -despatched to a distant point of the run at a very early hour of the -morning. - -‘Well, what did you see?’ pursued his master. ‘You can yabber fast -enough when you like.’ - -‘That one wheelbarrow plenty broket,’ explained the observing -pre-Adamite. ‘Mine see um longa plain—plenty sit down—liket three -fellow wheel. Billy Robinson, he go longa township.’ - -‘Well, what then? the coach broke down; that’s not wonderful—passengers -walked, I suppose.’ - -‘Me seeum that one white-fellow gin,’ quoth Piambook, in a low, -mysterious voice. Then, bursting into an immoderate fit of laughter, -he continued, ‘That one carry liket spyglass.’ Here he placed his thumb -and forefinger, circularly contracted, to his eye, and, gazing at Mr. -Neuchamp, again laughed till his dusky orbs were dim. - -Mr. Neuchamp at once comprehended by this pantomime the gold eyeglass -which Miss Augusta, partially short-sighted, habitually wore; and -becoming uneasy as to her state and condition under the circumstances -of a presumed breakdown, asked eagerly of his follower what she was -doing. - -‘That one sit along a wheelbarrow, liket this one;’ here he took up a -book from Ernest’s table and pretended to look into it with great and -absorbed interest. - -‘Anybody in the coach, Piambook?’ - -‘One fellow Chinaman,’ returned the messenger, with cool indifference. - -After this information Mr. Neuchamp at once perceived that no time must -be lost. Augusta could not be left a moment longer than was necessary, -sitting in a disabled coach in the midst of a boundless plain, with a -Chinaman for her _vis-à-vis_. What a situation for a young lady to whom -Baden was as familiar as Brompton, Paris as Piccadilly, Rome, Florence, -Venice, as the stations on the Eastern Counties Railway! He did not -believe she was afraid. She was afraid of nothing. But the situation -was embarrassing. - -The hawk-eyed Piambook had descried the stranded coach—the wheelbarrow, -as his comrades called it—on the mail track, about a mile off his path -of duty. It was full twelve miles from Rainbar. In a quarter of an hour -the express waggon with two cheerful but enfeebled steeds stumbled and -blundered along at a very different pace from that of Mr. Parklands, -when he rattled up Ernest to the Rainbar door, on the occasion of their -first memorable drive. - -However, the distance from home was luckily short, and in about two -hours Mr. Neuchamp arrived at the spot where, in the disabled coach, -sat Miss Augusta Neuchamp, possessing her soul in _impatience_, and -gradually coming to the conclusion that Ah Ling—who sat stolidly -staring at her and regretting the loss of time which might have been -spent in watering his garden or smoking opium, the only two occupations -he ever indulged in—was about to rob and perhaps murder her. As she -always carried a small revolver, and was by no means ignorant of its -use, it is possible that Ah Ling was in greater danger than he was -aware of. His fair neighbour would infallibly have shot him had he made -any hasty or incautious motion. - -When Mr. Neuchamp rumbled up in his useful but not imposing vehicle, a -slight shade of satisfaction overspread her features. - -‘Oh, Ernest, I am delighted to see you; however did you find out my -position? Don’t you think it was inexcusable of the coach company to -send us all this way in a damaged vehicle? I thought all your coaching -arrangements were so perfect.’ - -‘Accidents will happen, my dear Augusta,’ said Ernest, ‘in all -companies and communities, you know. Cobb and Co. are the best of -fellows in the main. But _whatever_ induced you to come up into this -wild place without writing to me first? Have you not suffered all kinds -of hardship and disagreeables?’ - -‘Well, perhaps a few; but I knew all about the country from some -books I read on the voyage out. I studied the directory till I found -out the coach lines, and I should not have complained but for this -last blunder. But what a barren wilderness this all seems. I thought -Australia was a land of rich pastures.’ - -‘So it is—but this is a drought. “And the famine was sore in the land.” -You remember that in the Bible, don’t you? We are a good deal like -Palestine in our periodical lean years, except that they didn’t import -their flour from beyond sea, and we do.‘ - -‘But this looks so very bad!’ said she, putting up her eyeglass and -staring earnestly at the waste lands of the crown, which certainly -presented a striking contrast to the Buckinghamshire meadows or uplands -either. ‘Why, it seems all sand and these scrubby-looking bushes; -are you sure you haven’t made a mistake and bought inferior land? A -gentleman who came out with me said inexperienced persons often did.’ - -‘My dear Augusta,’ said Ernest, quelling a well-remembered feeling of -violent antagonism, ‘you must surely have forgotten that I have been -more than two years in Australia, and may be supposed to know the -difference between good country and bad by this time.’ - -‘Do you?’ said his fair cousin indifferently. ‘Well, you must have -improved. Courtenay says you are the most credulous person he knows; -and as for Aunt Ermengarde, she says that, of all the failures the -family has produced——’ - -‘Please to spare me the old lady’s review of my life and times,’ said -Ernest, waking up his bounding steeds. ‘We never did agree, and it can -serve no good purpose to further embitter my remembrance of her.’ - -‘Oh, but she did not wish to say anything really disparaging of you, -only that you were not of sufficiently coarse material to win success -in farming, or trade, or politics.’ - -‘Or colonisation, my dear Augusta. Perhaps she was not so far wrong, -after all; but somehow one doesn’t like to be told these things, and -I must ask you and Aunt Ermengarde to suspend your judgment until the -last scene of the third act. Then you will be able to applaud, or -otherwise, on correct grounds. I think you will find the country and -its ways by no means too easy to comprehend.’ - -‘I expect nothing, simply, so I cannot be disappointed. It seems to me -a sort of provincial England jumbled up with one’s ideas of Mexico.’ - -‘And the people?’ - -‘I haven’t noticed them much yet. I thought many of the women -ridiculously overdressed in Sydney, copying our English fashions in a -semi-tropical climate. I left everything behind except a few tourist -suits.’ - -‘And most extraordinary you look,’ thought Ernest to himself, though -he dared not say so, mentally contrasting the stern Augusta’s -dust-coloured tusser wrap, broad-leafed hat with green lining, rather -stout boots, short dress, and flattened down hair, with Antonia, cool, -glistening, delicately robed, and rose-fresh amid the bright-hued -shrubberies of Morahmee, or even the Misses Middleton, perfectly _comme -il faut_, on shipboard, in George Street, or at the station, as -everybody ought to be, thought Ernest—unless she is an eccentric -reformer, he was just about to say, but refrained. Was any one else of -his acquaintance going to do wonders in the alleviation and reformation -of the Australian world? and if so, what had _he_ accomplished? Had he -not been in scores of instances self-convicted of the most egregious -mistakes and miscalculations? After all his experience, was he not now -indebted almost for his financial existence to certain of these very -colonists whose intelligence he had formerly held so cheap? - -These reflections were not suffered to proceed to an inconvenient -length, being routed by the clear and not particularly musical tones of -Miss Augusta’s voice. - -‘I can’t say much for Australian horses, so far, Ernest. I expected to -see the fleet courser of the desert, and all that kind of thing. These -seem wretched underbred creatures, and miserably poor.’ - -‘Lives there the man, with soul so dead,’ who doesn’t mind hearing his -horses run down? - -‘They are not bad horses, by any means, though low in condition, owing -to this dreadful season,’ answered Ernest, rather quickly. ‘This one,’ -touching the off-side steed, ‘is as good and fast and high-couraged a -horse as ever was saddled or harnessed, but they have had nothing to -eat for six months, to speak of. So they quite surpass the experience -of the cabman’s horse in _Pickwick_; and I can’t afford to buy corn at -a pound a bushel.’ - -‘I forgot about the horse in _Pickwick_,’ said Augusta, who, a steady -reader in her own line, which she denominated ‘useful,’ had little -appreciation of humour, and never could be got to know the difference -between _Pickwick_ and _Nicholas Nickleby_, _Charles O’Malley_ and _The -Knight of Gwynne_. ‘But surely more neatness in harness and turn-out -might be managed,’ and she looked at the dusty American harness and -rusty bits. - -‘You must remember, my dear Augusta, that you are not only in the -provinces, but in the far far Bush, now—akin to the Desert—in more ways -than one. I don’t suppose the Sheik Abdallah turns out with very bright -bits; but, if he does, he has the advantage of us in the labour supply. -We are compelled to economise rigidly in that way.’ - -‘You seem compelled to economise in every way that makes life worth -having,’ said his downright kinswoman. ‘Does any one ever make any -money at all here to compensate for the savage life you seem to lead?’ - -‘Well, a few people do,’ replied Ernest, half amused, half annoyed. ‘If -we had time to visit a little, not perhaps in this neighbourhood, I -could show you places well kept and pretty enough, and people who would -be voted fairly provided for even in England.’ - -‘I have seen none as yet,’ said Miss Neuchamp; ‘but I believe much of -the prosperity in the large towns is unreal. I met a very pleasant, -gentlemanlike man in Sydney, in fact one of the few gentlemen I did see -there—a Mr. Croker, I think, was his name—who said it was all outside -show, and that nobody had made any money in this colony, or ever would.’ - -‘Oh, Jermyn Croker,’ said Ernest, laughing; ‘you must not take him -literally; he is a profound cynic, and must have been sent into the -world expressly to counterbalance an equally pronounced optimist, -myself for instance. That’s his line of humour, and very amusing it -is—in its way.’ - -‘But does he not speak the truth?’ inquired the literal Augusta; ‘or is -it not considered necessary in a colony?’ - -‘Of course he _intends_ to do so, but like all men whose opinions are -very strongly coloured by their individualism, which again is dominated -by purely physical occurrences, such as bile, indigestion, and so -on, he unconsciously takes a gloomy, depreciatory view of matters in -general, which I, and perhaps others, think untrue and misleading.’ - -‘I believe in a right and a wrong about everything myself,’ said the -young lady, ‘but I must say I feel inclined to agree with him so far.’ - -Ernest was on the point of asking her how she could possibly know, -when the turrets of Rainbar appearing in sight, the conversation was -diverted to that ‘hold’ and its surroundings, the danger of arriving in -the midst of an altercation being thereby averted. - -‘Allow me to welcome you to my poor home,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, driving -up to the door of the cottage, and assisting her to alight. ‘I wish I -had had notice of the honour of your visit, that we might have been -suitably prepared.’ - -‘Stuff!’ said Miss Augusta. ‘Then you would have written to prevent me -coming at all. I was determined to see how you were _really_ getting -on, and I never allow trifling discomforts to stand in the way of my -resolves.’ - -‘I am aware of _that_, my dear Augusta,’ replied Mr. Neuchamp, with a -slight mental shrug, in which he decided that the trifling discomforts -alluded to occasionally involved others besides the heroine herself. -‘But can you do without a maid? I am afraid there is not a woman on the -place.’ - -‘That’s a little awkward,’ confessed Miss Neuchamp. ‘I did not quite -anticipate such a barrack-room state of matters. But is there none at -the village, or whatever it is called, in the neighbourhood?’ - -‘I have a village on the run, I am sorry to say; but though we are at -feud with the villagers, I did attempt to procure you a handmaid, and I -will see what has been done.’ - -It was yet early in the day. Miss Neuchamp, being put into possession -of the best bedroom, hastily arranged for her use and benefit, was -told to consider herself as the sole occupant of the cottage for the -present. Mr. Neuchamp in the meanwhile having ordered lunch, went over -to the barracks to see if Mr. Banks had returned. He had been sent -upon an embassy of great importance and diplomatic delicacy: no less, -indeed, than to prevail upon Mrs. Abraham Freeman to permit her eldest -daughter, Tottie, a girl of seventeen, to come to Rainbar during the -period of Miss Neuchamp’s stay, to attend upon that lady as housemaid, -lady’s maid, and general attendant. He was empowered to make any -reasonable promises to provide the girl with everything she might want, -short of a husband, but to bring her up if it could possibly be done. -For, of course, Ernest was duly sensible of the extreme awkwardness -that would result from the presence of Miss Neuchamp—albeit a near -relative—as the sole representative of womanhood at such an essentially -bachelor settlement as Rainbar. - -Tottie Freeman, who had commenced to bloom in the comparatively desert -air of Rainbar, was a damsel not altogether devoid of youthful charms. -True, the unfriendly sun, the scorching blasts, together with the -culpable disuse of veil or bonnet, had combined to embrown what ought -to have been her complexion, and, worse again, to implant such a crop -of freckles upon her face, neck, and arms, that she looked as if a -bran-bag had been shaken over her naturally fair skin. - -Now that we have said the worst of her, it must be admitted that her -figure was very good, well developed, upright, and elastic. She could -run as fast as any of her brothers, carrying a tolerable weight, -and (when no one was looking) vault on her ambling mare, which she -could ride with or without a saddle over range or river, logs, scrub, -or reed-beds, just as well as they could. She could intimidate a -half-wild cow with a roping pole, and milk her afterwards; drive a -team on a pinch, and work all day in the hot sun. With all this there -was nothing unfeminine or unpleasing to the eye in the bush maiden. -Quite the contrary, indeed. She was a handsome young woman as regards -features, form, and carriage. Cool and self-possessed, she was by no -means as reckless of speech as many better educated persons of her -sex; and though she liked a little flirtation—‘which most every girl -expex’—there was not a word to be said to her detriment ‘up or down the -river,’ which comprehended the whole of her social system. - -Such was the damsel whom Charley Banks had been despatched to capture -by force, fraud, or persuasion for the use and benefit of Miss Augusta -Neuchamp. A less suitable ambassador might have been selected. -Charley Banks was a very good-looking young fellow, and had always -risked a little badinage when brought into contact with Miss Tottie -and her family. War had been formally declared between the houses of -Neuchamp and Freeman, yet Ernest, as was his custom, had always been -unaffectedly polite and kindly to the women of the tribe, young and old. - -Therefore Mrs. Freeman had no strong ill-feeling towards him, and Miss -Tottie was extremely sorry that they never saw Mr. Neuchamp riding -up to the door now, with a pleasant good-morrow, sometimes chatting -for a quarter of an hour, when the old people were out of the way. -When Charley Banks first asked Mrs. Freeman to let her daughter go -as a great favour to Mr. Neuchamp, and afterwards inflamed Tottie’s -curiosity by descriptions of the great wealth and high fashion of Miss -Neuchamp (who had a dray-load of dresses, straight from London and -Paris, coming up next week), he found the fort commencing to show signs -of capitulation. At first Mrs. Freeman ‘couldn’t spare Tottie if it was -ever so.’ Then Tottie ‘couldn’t think of going among a parcel of young -fellows, and only one lady in the place.’ Then Mrs. Freeman ‘might be -able to manage for a week or two, though what Abe would say when he -came home and found his girl gone to Rainbar, she couldn’t say.’ Then -Tottie ‘wouldn’t mind trying for a week or two.’ She supposed ‘nobody -would run away with her, and it must be awfully lonely for the lady all -by herself.’ Besides, ‘she hadn’t seen a soul lately, and was moped -to death; perhaps a little change would do her good.’ So the ‘treaty -of Rainbar,’ between the high contracting personages, resolved itself -into this, that Tottie was to have ten shillings a week for a month’s -service, if Miss Neuchamp stayed so long, was to obey all her lawful -commands, and to make herself ‘generally useful.’ - -‘So if you’ll be kind enough to run in the mare, Mr. Banks—she’s down -on the flat there, and not very flash, you may be sure—I’ll get my -habit on, and mother will send up my things with Billy in the evening. -Here’s my bridle.’ - -Having stated the case thus briefly, Miss Freeman retired into a -remarkably small bedroom which she shared with two younger sisters -and a baby-brother, to make the requisite change of raiment, while -Charley Banks ran into the stockyard and caught the varmint, ambling -black mare, which he knew very well by sight. As he led her up to the -hut Miss Tottie came out, carrying her saddle in one hand and holding -up her alpaca habit with the other. She promptly placed it upon the -black mare’s back, buckled the girths, and touching the stirrup with -her foot, gave a spring which seated her firmly in the saddle, and the -black mare dashed off at an amble which was considerably faster than a -medium trot. - -‘What a brute that mare of yours is to amble, Tottie,’ said Mr. Banks, -slightly out of breath; ‘can’t you make her go a more Christian pace? -Come, let’s have a spin.’ - -‘All right,’ said the girl, going off at speed, and sitting down to her -work, ‘but it must be a very short one; my mare is as weak as a cat, -and I suppose your horse isn’t much better.’ - -‘He’s as strong as nothing to eat three times a day can make him. So -pull up as soon as you like. I say, Tottie, I’m awfully glad you’ve -come up this time to help us with our lady. It was firstrate of your -mother to let you come. Fancy Miss Neuchamp coming up in the coach by -herself from Sydney!’ - -‘Why shouldn’t she? I wish I had the chance of going down by -myself—wouldn’t I take it—quick? But I say, Mr. Banks, what am I to do -when I get there? I shall be so frightened of the lady. And I never was -in service before.’ - -‘Oh, you must take it easy, you know,’ commenced Mr. Banks, in a very -clear explanation-to-a-child sort of way. ‘Do everything she tells you, -always say “Yes, ma’am,” and “No, ma’am,” and be a good girl all round. -I’ve seen you _look_ awfully good sometimes, Tottie, you know.‘ - -‘Oh, nonsense, Mr. Banks,’ said the nut-brown maid, blushing through -her southern-tinted skin in a very visible manner. ‘I’m no more than -others, I expect. What shall I have to do, though?’ - -‘Well, a good deal of nothing, I should say. You’ll sleep in the room -I used to have, next to hers; for you’ll be in the cottage all by -yourselves all night. You’ll have to sweep and dust, and wash for Miss -Neuchamp, and wait at table. The rest of the time you’ll have to hang -it out the best way you can. You mustn’t quarrel with old Johnnie, the -cook, or else he’ll go away and leave us all in the bush. He’s a cross -old ruffian, but he _can_ cook.’ - -‘I wonder if it will be very dull—but it won’t be for long, will it, -Mr. Banks?’ - -‘Dull? don’t think of it. Won’t there be me and Jack Windsor, and an -odd traveller to talk to. Besides, Jack’s a great admirer of yours, -isn’t he, Tottie?’ - -‘Not he,’ quoth the damsel, with decision; ‘there’s some girl down the -country that he thinks no end of; besides, father and he don’t get on -well,’ added Miss Tottie, with much demureness. - -‘Oh, that don’t signify,’ said Mr. Banks authoritatively. ‘Jack’s a -good fellow, and will be overseer here some day; you go in and cut down -the other girl. He said you were the best-looking girl on the river -last Sunday.’ - -‘Oh, you go on,’ said Tottie, playing with the bridle rein, and again -making her mare run up to the top of her exceptional pace, so that -further playful conversation by Mr. Banks was restricted by his lack of -breath. - -As they approached the Rainbar homestead Tottie slackened this -aggravating pace (which resembles what Americans call ‘racking or -pacing’—it is natural to many Australian horses, though of course -capable of development by education), and in a somewhat awe-stricken -tone inquired, ‘Is she a _very_ grand lady, indeed, Mr. Banks?’ - -‘Well, she’ll be dressed plainly, of course,’ said Charley. ‘The dust’s -enough to spoil anything above a gunnybag after all this dry weather. -Her things are coming up, as I told you, but you never saw any one with -half the breeding before. You were a little girl when you came here, -Tottie; did you ever see a real lady in your life, now?’ - -‘I saw Mrs. Jones, of Yamboola, down the country,’ said Tottie -doubtfully. ‘Father sent me up one day with some fresh butter.’ - -‘I wish he’d send you up with some now,’ said Charley, who hadn’t -heard of butter or milk for six months. ‘Mrs. Jones is pretty well, -but think of Miss Neuchamp’s pedigree. Her great-grandmother’s -_great-grandmother_ was a grand lady, and lived in a castle, and so on, -for five hundred years back, and all the same for nearly a thousand. I -saw it all in an old book of Mr. Neuchamp’s one day, about the history -of their county.’ - -‘Lor!’ said Tottie, ‘how nice! Why, she must be like the imported filly -we saw at Wargan Races last year. Oh, wasn’t she a real beauty? such -legs! and such a sweet head on her!—I never saw the like of it!’ - -‘You’re a regular Currency lass, Tottie,’ laughed Mr. Banks; ‘always -thinking about horses. Don’t you tell Miss Neuchamp that she’s very -sweet about the head and has out-and-out legs: she mightn’t understand -it. Here we are—jump down. I’ll put the mare in the paddock.’ - -Miss Neuchamp, having had time to finish luncheon, had walked out into -the verandah with her cousin, when she was attracted by the trampling -of horses, and looked forth in time to see her proposed handmaid sail -up to the door at a pace which would have excited observation in Rotten -Row. - -Mr. Banks awaited her dismounting, knowing full well that she required -no assistance. The active maiden swung herself sideways on the -saddle and dropped to the ground as lightly as the ‘hounding beauty -of Bessarabia,’ or any ordinary circus sawdust-treading celebrity. -Lifting her habit, she advanced to the verandah with a curious mixture -of shyness and self-possession. She successfully accomplished the -traditional courtesy to Miss Neuchamp, and then shook hands cordially -with Ernest, as she had been in the habit of doing. Miss Augusta put up -her eyeglass at this, and regarded the ‘young person’ with a fixed and -critical gaze. - -‘I’m very much obliged to your mother for letting you come, Tottie, and -I am very glad to see you at Rainbar,’ said Mr. Neuchamp. ‘If you go -into the dining-room, you will find the lunch on the table; I daresay -you will have an appetite after your ride. You can clear it away by and -by, and Miss Neuchamp will tell you anything she wishes you to do. You -will live in the cottage, and you must help old Johnny as well as you -can, without quarrelling with him—you know his temper—or letting him -bully you.’ - -Tottie was about to say, ‘I’m not afraid of the old tinker,’ but, -remembering Mr. Banks’s advice, replied meekly, ‘Yes, sir; thank you, -Mr. Neuchamp,’ and retired to her lunch and duties. - -‘I suppose that is a sample of your peasantry,’ said Miss Neuchamp, -with cold preciseness of tone. ‘Do you generally shake hands with -your housemaids in the colonies? I suppose it must be looked for in a -democracy.’ - -‘Well, Tottie Freeman isn’t exactly a peasant,’ explained Ernest -mildly. ‘We haven’t any of the breed here. She is a farmer’s daughter, -and her proud sire has or had an acreage that would make him a great -man at fair and market in England. You will find her a good-tempered, -honest girl, not afraid of work, as we say here, and as she is your -only possible attendant, you must make the best of her.’ - -‘Is she to join us at table?’ inquired Miss Neuchamp, with the same -fixed air of indifference. ‘Of course I only ask for information.’ - -‘She will fare as we do, but will take her refection after we have -completed ours. She cannot very well be sent to the kitchen.’ - -‘Why not?’ demanded Miss Augusta. - -‘For reasons which will be apparent to you, my dear Augusta, after your -longer stay in Australia. But principally because there are only men -there at present, and our old cook is not a suitable companion for a -young girl.’ - -‘Very peculiar household arrangements,’ said Miss Neuchamp, ‘but I -suppose I shall comprehend in time.’ - - - - -CHAPTER XXV - - -Having communicated this sentiment in a tone which did not conduce to -the lighter graces of conversation, Miss Neuchamp resumed her reading. -Silence, the ominous oppressive silence of those who do not wish to -speak, reigned unbroken for a while. - -At length, lifting her head as if the thought had suddenly struck her, -she said, ‘I cannot think why you did not buy a station nearer to town, -where you might have lived in a comparatively civilised way.’ - -‘For the very sufficient reasons that there is never so much money to -be made at comfortable, highly improved stations, and the areas of land -are invariably smaller.’ - -‘Then you have come to regard money as everything? Is this the end of -the burning philanthropy, and all that sort of thing?’ - -‘You are too quick in your conclusions, my dear Augusta,’ replied -Mr. Neuchamp, somewhat hurt. ‘It is necessary, I find, to make some -money to ensure the needful independence of position without which -philanthropical or other projects can scarcely be carried out.’ - -‘I daresay you will end in becoming a mere colonist, and marrying a -colonial girl, after all your fine ideas. I suppose there are some a -shade more refined than this one.’ - -Mr. Neuchamp stood aghast—words failed him. Augusta went on quietly -reading her book. She failed to perceive the avalanche which was -gathering above her head. - -‘My dear Augusta,’ he said at length, with studied calmness, ‘it is -time that some of your misconceptions should be cleared away. Let me -recall to you that you were only a few days in a hotel in Sydney before -you started on your journey to this distant and comparatively rude -district. If you had acted reasonably, and remained in Sydney to take -advantage of introductions to my friends, you would have had some means -of making comparisons after seeing Australian ladies. But with your -present total ignorance of the premises, I wonder that a well-educated -woman should be so illogical as to state a conclusion.’ - -‘Well, perhaps I am a little premature,’ conceded Miss Augusta, whose -temper was much under command. ‘I suppose there is a wonderful young -lady at the back of all this indignation. Mr. Croker said as much. I -must wait and make her acquaintance. I wish you all sorts of happiness, -Ernest. Now I must go and look after the _other_ young lady.’ - -When Miss Neuchamp returned to the dining-room she perceived that the -damsel whose social status was so difficult to define had finished her -mid-day meal, and had also completed the clearing off and washing up -of the various articles of the service. She had discovered for herself -the small room used as a pantry, had ferreted out the requisite cloths -and towels, and procured hot water from the irascible Johnny. She had -extemporised a table in the passage, and was just placing the last of -the articles on their allotted shelves with much deftness and celerity, -when Miss Neuchamp entered. Her riding-skirt lay on a chair, and she -had donned a neat print frock, which she had brought strapped to the -saddle. - -‘I was coming to give you instructions,’ said Miss Neuchamp, ‘but I see -you have anticipated me by doing everything which I should have asked -you to do, and very nicely too. What is your name?’ - -‘Mary Anne Freeman,’ said Tottie demurely. - -‘I thought I heard Mr. Neuchamp address you by some other Christian -name,’ said Miss Neuchamp, with slight severity of aspect. - -‘Oh, Tottie,’ said the girl carelessly; ‘every one calls me Tottie, or -Tot; suppose it’s for shortness.’ - -‘I shall call you Mary Anne,’ said Miss Neuchamp with quiet decision; -‘and now, Mary Anne, are you accustomed to the use of the needle? do -you like sewing?’ - -‘Well, I don’t _like_ it,’ she replied ingenuously, ‘but of course I -can sew a little; we have to make our own frocks and the children’s -things at home.’ - -‘Very proper and necessary,’ affirmed Augusta; ‘if we can get the -material I will superintend your making a couple of dresses for -yourself, which perhaps you will think an improvement in pattern on the -one you wear.’ - -‘Oh, I should _so_ like to have a new pattern,’ said Tottie, with -feminine satisfaction. ‘There’s plenty of nice prints in the store; -I’ll speak to Mr. Banks about it, mem.’ - -‘I will arrange that part of it,’ said Miss Neuchamp. ‘In the -meanwhile I’ll point out your bedroom, which you can put in order as -well as mine for the night.’ - -After the first day or two Miss Neuchamp, though occasionally shocked -at the Australian girl’s ignorance of that portion of the Church -Catechism which exhorts people to behave ‘lowly and reverently to -all their betters,’ was pleased with the intelligence and artless -good-humour of her attendant. She was sufficiently acute to -discriminate between the genuine respect which the girl exhibited to -her, ‘a real lady,’ and the mere lip service and servility too often -yielded by the English poor, from direct compulsion of grinding poverty -and sore need. She discovered that Tottie was quick and teachable -in the matter of needlework, so that, having been stimulated by the -alluring expectation of ‘patterns,’ she worked readily and creditably. - -For a few days Miss Neuchamp managed to employ and interest herself -not altogether unpleasantly. Ernest, of course, betook himself off to -some manner of station work immediately after breakfast, returning, -if possible, to lunch. This interval Miss Neuchamp filled up in great -measure by means of her correspondence, which was voluminous and -various of direction, ranging from her Aunt Ermengarde, a conscientious -but ruthless conservative, to philosophical acquaintances whom she had -met in her travels, and who, like her, had much ado to fill up those -leisure hours of which their lives were chiefly composed. This portion -of the day also witnessed Tottie’s most arduous labours, to which she -addressed herself with great zeal and got through her work, as she -termed it, so as to attire herself becomingly and wait at table. - -In the afternoon Ernest went out for walking excursions to such points -of interest, neither many nor picturesque, as the neighbourhood -supplied. There was a certain ‘bend’ or curving reach of the river -where, from a lofty bluff, the red walls of which the rushing tide had -channelled for ages, a striking and uncommon view was obtained. The -vast plain, here diversified by the giant eucalypti which fringed the -winding watercourse, stretched limitless to the horizon. But all was -apparently barren from Dan to Beersheba. The reed-beds were trampled -and eaten down to the last cane. The soft rich alluvium in which they -grew was cracked, yet hard as a brickfield. How different from the -swaying emerald billows with feathered tasselled crests which other -summers had seen there! Something of this sort had Ernest endeavoured -to explain to Miss Neuchamp when she spoke disrespectfully of the -trodden cloddy waste, contrasting it scornfully with the velvet meads -which bordered English rivers. But Augusta, defective in imagination, -never believed in anything she did not see. Therefore a reed-bed -appeared to her mental vision till the day of her death always as a -species of abnormal dismal swamp, lacking the traditional element of -moisture. - -Other explorations were made in the cool hours of the evening, but -gradually Miss Neuchamp tired of the monotonous aspect of matters. The -dusty tracts were not pleasant to her feet. The mosquitoes assailed -her with savage virulence, whether she walked at sunrise, mid-day, -or darkening eve. If she sat down on the river bank and watched the -shallow but still pure and gleaming waters, ants of every conceivable -degree of curiosity or ferocity discomposed her. There was no rest, -no variety, no beauty, no ‘proper’ wood, valley, mountain, or brook. -She could not imagine human beings living constantly in such a hateful -wilderness. If Ernest had not all his life, and now most of all, -developed a talent for useless and incomprehensible self-sacrifice, he -would abandon such a spot for ever. - -Mr. Neuchamp felt himself pressed to his last entrenchments to defend -his position; Fate seemed to have arrived personally, masked, not for -the first time in man’s strange story, in the guise of a woman. That -woman, too, his persistent, inexorable cousin Augusta. ‘The stars in -their courses fought against Sisera.’ The heavens,—dead to the dumb, -imploring looks of the great armies of perishing brutes, to the prayers -of ruined men; the earth, with withered herb and drying streamlet -gasping and faint, breathless, under the burning noon and the pitiless -dry moon rays,—alike conspired against him! - -And now his cousin, who, with all her faults and defects, was stanchly -devoted to her kindred and what she believed to be their welfare, came -here to madden him with recollections of the wonderland of his birth, -and to fill him with ignoble longings to purchase present relief by the -ruinous sacrifice of purpose and principle. - -‘I don’t know,’ he said, at the end of a closely contested argument, -‘whether all women are incapable of comprehending the adherence to a -fixed purpose, to the unquestioned end and climax. But you must forgive -me, my dear Augusta, for saying that you appear to me to be in the -position of a passenger who urges the captain of a vessel to alter -his course because the gale is wild and the waves rough. Suppose you -had made a suggestion to the captain of the _Rohilla_, in which noble -steamer you made your memorable voyage to these hapless isles. The -officers of the great company are polished gentlemen as well as seamen -of the first order, but I am afraid Gordon Anderson would have been -more curt than explanatory on _that_ occasion.’ - -‘And you are like the man in Sinbad the Sailor, as you like marine -similes,’ retorted Augusta; ‘you will see your vessel gradually drawn -toward the loadstone island till all the nails and rivets fly out -by attraction of ruin, and you will sink in the waters of oblivion, -unhonoured and unsung.’ - -‘But not “unloved,” I trust,‘ rejoined Ernest; ‘don’t think that -matters, even in Australia, will be quite so bad as that. By the way, -let me congratulate you upon your facility of quotation. Your memory -must have improved amazingly of late.’ - -This unfair taunt closed the conversation abruptly. But like some -squabbles between very near and dear friends, there was a tacit -agreement not to refer to it. Subsequently all went on as usual. - -Miss Neuchamp was a very fair horsewoman, having hunted without coming -very signally to grief, by dint of a wonderfully broken hunter, who -was first cousin to a rocking-horse—after this wise: he would on no -account run away; he was easy, he was safe; you could not throw him -down over any species of leap,—hedge, ditch, brook, or bulfinch. It -was all alike to Negotiator. After a couple of seasons and the aid of -this accomplished palfrey, Miss Neuchamp, with some reason, came to the -conclusion that she could ride fairly well. So, having broached the -idea at breakfast one morning, Ernest joyfully suggested Osmund as the -type of ease and elegance, and of such a nerve that an organ and monkey -might, were the consideration sufficient, be placed on his short back -to-morrow without risk of casualty. - -Miss Neuchamp thought that she should like to ride down and visit the -Freeman encampment, when Tottie, who would of course attend her, might -have the opportunity of seeing her mother and other kinsfolk. - -The side-saddle was the next difficulty; but Tottie proffered hers at -once, saying that she could ride in a man’s saddle, which she could -borrow from Mr. Banks. - -‘But you cannot ride in a man’s saddle, Mary Anne; at any rate with -me,’ said Miss Neuchamp decisively, while a maidenly blush overspread -her features. - -‘Why not?’ inquired Tottie, with much surprise. ‘I can ride in one just -as well as the other. You have only to throw the off-side stirrup over -the pommel, sit square and straight, and there you are. You didn’t -think I was going to ride boy-fashion, did you?’ - -‘I was not sure,’ conceded Miss Neuchamp. However, your explanation has -satisfied me. If you like, we will ride down to your father’s place -this afternoon.‘ - -So Osmund being brought round, and Tottie’s side-saddle upon him -placed, that temperate charger walked off with Miss Neuchamp as if he -had carried a ‘pretty horsebreaker’ up Rotten Row before the eyes of -an envious aristocracy, while Tottie disposed herself upon a station -saddle and ambled off so erect and free of seat that few could have -known that she was crutchless and self-balanced. Mr. Windsor followed -at a respectful distance, in case of any _contretemps_ requiring a -groom’s assistance. - -Miss Neuchamp was perhaps never more favourably impressed with the -South Land, in which she was sojourning, than when she felt herself -borne along by Osmund, a hackney of rare excellence—free, elastic, -safe, fast, easy! How many horses of whom so much can be said does one -come across in a lifetime? - -‘This seems to be an exceedingly nice horse of my cousin’s,’ said she -to Tottie. ‘I had no idea that such riding horses could be found in the -interior. He must have been very carefully trained.’ - -‘He’s a plum, that’s what he is!’ affirmed Tottie with decision. ‘He’s -the best horse in these parts, by long chalks. Mr. Neuchamp let me have -a spirt on him one day. My word! didn’t I put him along?’ - -‘I am surprised that he should have let you ride him,’ replied Miss -Neuchamp with dignity; ‘but my cousin is very eccentric, and does not, -in my opinion, always keep his proper position.’ - -‘I don’t know about his proper position,’ said Tottie with great -spirit, ‘but before our people had the row with him—and that was Uncle -Joe’s fault—there was no one within fifty mile of Rainbar that wouldn’t -have gone on their knees to serve Mr. Neuchamp. _As a gentleman he -can’t be beat_; and many a one besides me thinks that.’ - -‘Oh well, if you have that sort of respectful feeling towards my -cousin, Mary Anne, I have nothing to say,’ said Miss Augusta. ‘No one -can possibly have better intentions, and I am glad to see them so well -appreciated, even in the bush. Suppose we canter.’ - -She drew the curb rein as she spoke, and Osmund sailed off at a long, -bounding, deerlike canter over the smooth dusty track, which convinced -Miss Neuchamp that she had not left all the good horses in England. -The scant provender had impaired his personal appearance, but had -not deprived him of that courage which he would retain as long as he -possessed strength to stand on his legs. - -‘I have not enjoyed a ride like this for many a day,’ she said with -unusual heartiness. ‘This is a very comfortable saddle of yours, though -I miss the third pommel. How do you manage, Mary Anne, to ride so -squarely and easily upon that uncomfortable saddle?’ - -‘I’ve ridden many a mile without a saddle at all—that is, with nothing -but an old gunny-bag to sit on,’ said Tottie, ‘and jumped over logs -too. Of course I was a kid then.’ - -‘A what?’ said Miss Neuchamp anxiously. - -‘Oh, a little child,’ explained Tottie. ‘I often used to go out at -daylight to fetch in the cows and the working bullocks when we lived -down the country. Bitter cold it was, too, in the winter; such hard -frosts.’ - -‘Frosts?’ asked Miss Augusta. ‘Do you ever have frosts? Why, I supposed -they were unknown here.’ - -‘You don’t suppose the whole country is like this, miss?’ said Tottie. -‘Why, near the mountains there’s snow and ice, and it rains every -winter, and the floods are enough to drownd you.’ - -‘Are there floods too? It does not look as if they could ever come.’ - -‘Do you see that hut, miss? That’s our place. I heard Piambook, the -black boy, tell father it would be swep’ away some day. Father laughed -at him.‘ - -Here they arrived at the abode of Freeman _père_, at which Miss -Neuchamp gazed with much curiosity. - -In the language of architecture, the construction had been but little -decorated. A plain and roughly-built abode, composed of round saplings -nailed vertically to the wall-plate, and plastered insufficiently with -mud. The roof was thatched with reeds, put on in a very ineffectual -and chance-medley manner. The hut or cottage contained two large and -three small rooms. There was no garden whatever, or any attempt at the -cultivation of the baked and hopelessly-looking clay soil. Close to -the side of the house was a stockyard, comprising the ‘gallows’ of the -colonists, a rough, rude contrivance, consisting of two uprights and a -crosspiece, for elevating slaughtered cattle. Upon this structure was -at present hanging the carcass of a fine six-months-old calf. No other -enclosure was visible, the only attempt at the preservation of neatness -being the sweeping of the earth immediately around the front and back -doors. - -Tottie immediately clattered up to the hut door, the black mare putting -her head so far in that she obstructed the egress of a middle-aged -woman, who made haste to come forth and receive the guests. - -‘Mother,’ said the girl, ‘here’s Miss Neuchamp come to see you; bring a -chair for her to get off by.’ - -This article of furniture having been supplied, Augusta was fain to -descend upon it with as much dignity as she could manage, not being -confident of her ability to drop down, like the agile Tottie, from a -tallish horse, as was Osmund. Tottie, having given the horses in charge -of a small brown-faced brother, who spent his whole time in considering -Osmund, and apparently learning him by heart, welcomed Miss Neuchamp -into her home. That young lady found herself for the first time under -the roof of an Australian free-selector, and felt that she had acquired -a new experience. - -‘Come in, miss; I’m very glad to see you, I’m sure; please to sit -down,’ was the salutation Augusta received, in tones that spoke a -hearty welcome, in very pure unaccented English. - -Miss Neuchamp selected the most ‘reliable’ looking of the wooden-seated -American chairs, and depositing herself thereon, looked around. The -dwelling was, she thought, more prepossessing than the outside had -led her to imagine. Though everything was plain to ugliness, there -was yet nothing squalid or repulsive. All things were very clean. The -room in which they sat was evidently only used as a parlour or ‘living -room.’ It was fairly large and commodious. The earthen floor was hard, -even, and well swept. A large table occupied the centre. The fireplace -was wide and capacious, the mantelpiece so high that it was not easy -to reach. There was a wooden sofa covered with faded chintz, and an -American clock. Half a dozen cheap chairs, a shelf well filled with -indifferently bound books, a few unframed woodcuts hung upon the walls, -made up the furniture and ornamentation. Opening from this apartment -laterally was evidently a bedroom. At the back a skilling, a lower -roofed portion of the building, contained several smaller rooms. A -detached two-roomed building, in what would have been the back-yard had -any enclosure been made, was probably the kitchen and laundry. - -Mrs. Freeman insisted upon putting down the kettle to boil, in order -that she might make a cup of tea for her distinguished visitor, -evidently under the opinion that every one naturally desired to drink -tea whenever they could get it. - -‘And how have you been behaving yourself, Tottie?’ said she, addressing -her daughter, as a convenient mode of opening the conversation. ‘I hope -and trust you’ve been a help to Miss Neuchamp. Has she, miss?’ - -‘Oh, certainly,’ answered Augusta; ‘Mary Anne has been a very good -girl indeed. I don’t know how I should get on without her. And I have -borrowed her side-saddle too. How long will it be before Mr. Freeman -comes home?’ - -‘Oh, he won’t be home much before dark. He’s always out on the run all -day long. He hates coming in before the day is done.’ - -‘Why is that, Mrs. Freeman?’ - -‘“Because,” he says, “what can a man do after his day’s work but sit -down and twirl his thumbs.” He haven’t got any garden here to fiddle -about in, and he can’t sit still and smoke, like some people.‘ - -‘But why don’t you have a garden?’ promptly inquired Augusta. ‘I -suppose there’s no reason why you shouldn’t have one?’ - -‘You see, miss,’ said Mrs. Freeman, casting about for a mode of -explaining to her young lady visitor that she didn’t know what she was -talking about, ‘the ground ain’t very good just here; and though it’s -so dry and baked just now, they say the floods come all over it; and -perhaps we mightn’t be here altogether that long. And Freeman, he’s -had a deal of trouble with the stock lately. I don’t say but what a -garden would look pretty enough; but who’s to work in it? It ain’t like -our place down the country. There we had a garden—lots of peaches and -grapes, and more plums, apples, and quinces than we could use and give -away, besides early potatoes and all kinds of vegetables.’ - -‘I suppose you regretted leaving such a home,’ said Miss Neuchamp, -rather impressed by the hothouse profusion of the fruits mentioned. - -‘Well, I’d rather live there on a pound a week,’ said Mrs. Freeman, -‘than here on riches. Freeman thought the stock would make up for all, -but I didn’t, and I’m always sorry for the day we ever left the old -farm.’ - -As the good woman spoke the tears stood in her eyes, and Miss Neuchamp -much marvelled that any spot in the desolate region of Australia -should have power to attract the affection even of hard-worked, -unrelieved Mrs. Freeman. - -‘Mother’s always fretting about that old place at Bowning,’ said -Tottie. ‘I don’t believe it was any great things either. It was a deal -colder than this, and we had lots of milk and butter always; but bread -and butter’s not worth caring about.’ - -‘You don’t recollect it, Tottie,’ said her mother, ‘or you would not -talk in that way. Don’t you remember going into the garden to pick the -peaches? How cool and shady it was in the mornings, to be sure, without -scores of mosquitoes to sting and eat us up! Then there was always -grass enough for the cows, and we had plenty of milk and butter and -cheese, except, perhaps, in the dead of winter. It was better for all -of us in other ways too, and that’s more.’ - -‘I don’t see that, mother,’ said Tottie. - -‘But I do,’ said Mrs. Freeman, ‘and more than me knows it. There’s your -father isn’t the same man, without his regular work at the farm, and -the carrying and the other jobs, that used to fill up his time from -daylight to dark. Now he’s nothing but the cattle to look after; and -such weather as this there’s nothing to do from month’s end to month’s -end, unless to pull them out of the waterholes. And I _know_ he had a -“burst” at that wretched _Stockman’s Arms_ the last time he was down -the river. He that was that sober before you could not tell him from a -Son of Temperance.‘ - -‘I feel sorry that you should have so much reason to complain of your -lot,’ said Miss Neuchamp. ‘The poor, I am aware, are never contented, -at least none that I ever saw in England. Yet it seems a pity, indeed, -that want of patience and trust in Providence should have led to your -moving to this unsuitable and, I am afraid, ill-fated locality.’ - -‘We’re not altogether so poor, miss,’ said the worthy matron, -recovering herself. ‘Abe will have over five hundred pounds in the bank -when he’s delivered up the land and the stock to this Mr. Levison, -that’s bought us all out. But what’s a little money, one way or the -other, if your life’s miserable, and your husband takes to idle ways -and worse, and your children grow up duffers and planters, and perhaps -end in sticking up people?’ - -‘Oh, mother, shut up!’ ejaculated Tottie, with more kindliness in her -tone than the words would have indicated. ‘Things won’t be as had as -that. Don’t I teach Poll and Sally and Ned and Billy? Besides, what -does Miss Neuchamp know about duffing and sticking up? We’ll be all -right when we clear out next year, and you can go back to Bowning and -buy Book’s farm, and set father splitting stringy-bark rails for the -rest of his life, if that’s what keeps him good. I expect the tea is -ready. Won’t you give Miss Neuchamp a cup?’ - -Mrs. Freeman made haste to fill up a cup of tea, and a small jug of -milk being produced, Miss Augusta found herself in possession of -the best cup of tea she had tasted at Rainbar. She felt a sincere -compassion for her hostess as a woman of properly submissive turn of -mind, who had sense enough to regret her improper and irreligious -departure from the lowly state in which Providence had placed her. - -Promising to call again, and comforting the low-spirited matron as -far as in her lay, she remounted Osmund with some difficulty by means -of the chair, and rode homewards, followed by Mr. Windsor, who had -solaced his leisure by extracting from the younger girls, whom he had -descried fishing, the latest news of the cattle operations of the -family generally. - -‘Your mother seems to be very much of my opinion, Mary Anne,’ said Miss -Augusta as soon as they were fairly on the sandy home-station track, -‘that this is a most undesirable place to live in.’ - -‘Mother’s as good a woman as ever was,’ said Tottie, ‘but she don’t -“savey.” She’s always fretting about our old farm; and it certainly was -cooler—that’s about all the pull there was in it. Father’s made more -money here in two or three years than he’d have got together in twenty -there. I should have been hoeing corn all day with a pair of thick -boots on, and grown up as wild as a scrub filly. I don’t want to go -back.‘ - -‘Your mother seems a person of excellent sense, Mary Anne, and I must -say that I _fully agree with her_,’ said Miss Neuchamp, with her most -unbending expression, designed to modify her attendant’s lightness of -tone. ‘Depend upon it, unhappiness and misfortune invariably follow the -attempt to quit an allotted station in life.’ - -‘Oh, that be hanged for a yarn! Oh, I beg your pardon, miss,’ said -Tottie confusedly, for she was on the point of relapsing into the -Rainbar vernacular. ‘But surely every one ain’t bound to stop where -they’re planted, good soil or bad, water or no water, like a corn-seed -in a cow track or a pumpkin in a tree stump! Men and women have it -in ’em to forage about a bit, else how do some people get on so -wonderfully. I’ve read about self-help, and all that, and heaps of -people beginning with half-a-crown and making fortunes. Ought they to -have thrown the half-crown away or the fortune after they had made it?’ - -‘No doubt some people are apparently favoured,’ said Miss Augusta, -regarding Tottie’s argument as another result of the over-education of -‘these sort of persons.’ ‘In the end it is often the worst thing that -can befall them. Now let us canter.‘ - -When Augusta Neuchamp had remained for a fortnight at Rainbar she began -to perceive that the monotonous existence likely to be unreasonably -prolonged would serve no object either of pleasure or profit. No -amount of residence would teach her an iota more of the nature of such -an establishment as Rainbar than she knew already. What was there -to learn? The plains within sight of the cottage needed but to be -indefinitely multiplied; and what then? An area of country equally -arid, barren, unspeakably desolate. Other droves and herds of cattle -equally emaciated. Nothing possibly could be in her eyes more hopeless -and horrible than these endless death-stricken, famine-haunted wastes. -Why did Ernest stay here? She had tried her utmost to induce him to -abandon the whole miserable delusion, quoting the arguments of Mr. -Jermyn Croker until he spoke angrily about that gentleman and closed -the debate. - -The obvious thing to do was to return to Sydney, but even this -comparatively simple step was difficult to carry out. Miss Neuchamp did -not desire again to tempt the perils of the road unattended. She had -taken it for granted that Ernest, the most complying and good-natured -of men ordinarily, would return to Sydney with her; and she had trusted -to the influence of civilisation and her steady persuasion to prevail -upon him to return to England to his friends, and to what she deemed to -be his fixed and unalterable position in life. - -On this occasion she met with unexpected opposition. Ernest positively -declined to quit his station at present. - -‘My dear Augusta,’ said he, ‘you do not know what you are asking. I -have a number of very important duties to perform here. My financial -state is an extremely critical one. I cannot with any decency appear in -Sydney when everything points to the ruin of myself and my whole order. -I am sincerely sorry that you should feel life here to be so extremely -_ennuyant_, but I should never, if consulted, have advised you to come; -and now I am afraid you must wait until a proper escort turns up or -until I can accompany you.’ - -‘And when will that be?’ - -‘When the rain comes, certainly not before.’ - -Miss Augusta said that this last contingency was as probable as the -near advent of the millennium. She would wait a given time, and, that -expired, would go down to Sydney as she had come up by herself. - -A fortnight, even three weeks, passed away. Augusta had mentioned a -month as the outside limit of her forbearance. She read over and over -‘Mariana in the Moated Grange’ and ‘Mariana in the South’ with quite a -new appreciation of their peculiar accuracy as well as poetic sentiment. - -Daily she worked and read, and walked and rode, and alternately was -hopeful or otherwise about the ultimate conversion of Tottie to the -true faith of proper English village lowliness and reverence. Daily -Ernest went forth ‘out on the run’ immediately after breakfast, -reappearing only at or after sunset. Insensibly Miss Neuchamp became -alarmed to find creeping over her a kind of provincial interest in the -affairs of the ‘burghers of this desert city.’ She listened almost -with excitement to the account of a lot of the new cattle having been -followed twenty miles over the boundary and recovered by Charley Banks. -She heard of a bushranger being captured about fifty miles off—this -was Jack Windsor’s story; of the mail coming in twelve hours late in -consequence of the horses being exhausted. Ernest gathered this from -the overseer of the last lot of travelling sheep that passed through, -having been locked up in Wargan Gaol for disobeying a summons. ‘Such a -handsome young fellow, miss.’ This was Tottie’s contribution. - -What with the reading, the sewing, the teaching of Tottie, the -daily cousinly walks and talks, the hitherto uncompromising Augusta -became partially converted to station life, and finally admitted in -conversation with Ernest that, other things being equal, she _could_ -imagine a woman enduring such privation for a few years, always -assuming that she had the companionship of the one man to whom alone -she could freely devote every waking thought, every pulsation of the -heart. - -‘Do you think there’s any man born, miss,’ inquired Tottie, who was -laying the cloth for dinner, but who stopped deliberately and listened -with qualified approval to the sentence with which Miss Neuchamp -concluded her statement—‘any man born—except in a book—like that? I -don’t. They most of ’em seem to me to take it very easy, smoking and -riding about, and drinking at odd times. It’s the women that all the -real pull comes on.’ - -‘I was not addressing myself to you, Mary Anne,’ replied Miss Augusta -with dignity; ‘I was speaking to Mr. Neuchamp only. I should hardly -think your experience entitled you to offer an opinion.’ - -‘H—m,’ said Tottie, proceeding with the plates. ‘I’m young, and I -suppose I don’t know much. But I hear what’s going on. Don’t you think -I’d better go down to Sydney, to take care of you on the road, miss, in -case there’s a Chinaman to knock over? I think I could do that, if I -was drove to it.’ - -On the next day an unusual occurrence took place in that land where -events and novelties seemed to have perished like the grass, under the -slow calcining of the deadly season—a dray arrived from town. - -Miss Neuchamp, in her sore need of change and occupation, could have -cheerfully witnessed the unpacking of ordinary station stores, in -which, as usual, a little drapery would be comprised. But here again -disappointment. It was merely a load of flour. - -Depressed and discouraged, Miss Neuchamp had condescended to watch -the unloading of the unromantic freight, deriving a faint interest in -noting with what apparent ease Jack Windsor and Charley Banks placed -the heavy bags upon their shoulders and deposited them in the store. - -Rarely was Miss Augusta so lowered in spirit as not to be able to -talk. On this occasion she had informed Tottie, with some relish, that -English country girls were much ruddier and more healthy looking, as -well as, she doubted not, stronger and more capable of endurance, than -those born in Australia could possibly be. - -‘Why so?’ inquired Tottie with animation. - -‘Why?’ said Miss Neuchamp with asperity; ‘because of the cool, -beautiful climate they live in, the regular, wholesome labour they are -born to, the superiority of the whole land and people to this dull, -deceitful country, all sand and sun-glare.’ - -‘Well, I can’t say, miss,’ replied Tottie, plotting a surprise, with -characteristic coolness, ‘about English girls’ looks, because I’ve -hardly ever seen any; but as for health, I’ve a middling appetite, I -never was a day ill since I was born, and as to being strong—look here.‘ - -Before the horrified Augusta could forbid her rapid motion, she bounded -over to the dray, from which Mr. Windsor had just borne his two hundred -pounds of farina. She placed her back beneath the lessening load, and -stretching her arms upward in the way proper to grasp the tied corner -of the bag, said imperiously, ‘Here, Mr. Carrier, just you lower that -bag steady; I want to show the English lady what a Currency girl can -walk away with.’ - -The tall sunburned driver entered into the joke, and winking at Charley -Banks, who stood by laughing, he placed the heavy bag fairly and square -upon Tottie’s plump shoulders. Miss Neuchamp’s gaze was riveted upon -the erratic ‘help’ as if she had been about to commit suicide. - -‘Oh! don’t—don’t,’ she gasped; ‘are you mad, Mary Anne? You will break -your back, or cripple yourself for life. Mr. Banks, pray interfere! I -am sure my cousin will be angry—pray stop her!’ - -Charley Banks was not afraid that anything dreadful would happen. He -had seen the bush girls perform feats of strength and activity ere now -which proved to him that very little cause for apprehension existed in -the present case. - -And there was not much time. For one moment the girl stood, with her -arms raised above her head, her figure, in its natural and classic -grace, proving the unspeakable advantage of the free, open-air life, -with fullest liberty for varied exercise, which she had had from her -birth. The next she had moved forward with firm, elastic tread, under -a load which a city man out of training would have found no joke, and, -walking into the store, permitted it to fall accurately beside the -others which had been shot from the backs of Jack Windsor and Mr. Banks -into their appointed corner. - -There was a slight cheer, and an exclamation of, ‘Well done, Tottie,’ -as she returned with a heightened colour and half-triumphant, -half-confused air to Miss Neuchamp, who, relieved at her safe return -from the dangerous feat, did not administer so severe a rebuke as might -have been expected. - -‘You may be thankful, Mary Anne, if you do not hereafter discover that -this day’s folly has laid the foundation of lifelong ill-health. But -come into the house, child. You _have_ some colour for once. Let me see -no more pranks of this sort again, while _I_ am here.’ - -‘Lor, miss,’ said Tottie, ‘that’s not the first bag of flour I’ve -carried. And father says there was a girl he knew at the Hawkesbury -that took one—and _him a-top of it_—around her father’s barn. He was -only a boy then.’ - -‘I think you may lay the tea, Mary Anne,’ said Miss Neuchamp, not -requiring any more Hawkesbury anecdotes. ‘I feel unusually fatigued -to-day.’ - -Fortunately for all parties, before the extreme limit of Miss -Neuchamp’s patience and the resources of Rainbar had been reached, a -welcome auxiliary arrived in the person of Mr. Middleton. That worthy -paterfamilias had been compelled to visit his outlying stations, in -order to ascertain the precise amount of death and destruction that -was taking place, and was returning to his usual residence nearer the -settled districts. He travelled in a light buggy with one horse, being -thus enabled to carry a supply of forage, and even water, with him. -This, the only known plan for crossing ‘dry country’ in a bad season, -and at the same time maintaining a horse in tolerable condition, was -not ornamental in detail. The buggy, with two bags of chaff secured -behind, a bushel of maize in front, and a large water bag and bucket -swung from the axle, had a striking and unusual effect. But the active, -upstanding roadster was in better condition than any horse which had -passed Rainbar for many a day, and Mr. Neuchamp at once saw his way to -a transfer of responsibility, as far as Miss Augusta was concerned. - -‘Well, Neuchamp, what do you think of Australia now?’ said the old -gentleman, in a jolly voice, as, sunburned and dusty, with a great -straw hat, a curtain and a net veil, a canvas hood to his buggy, and -the fodder previously referred to picturesquely disposed about his -travelling carriage, he drove up to the verandah, causing Augusta to -put up her eyeglass with amazement. ‘Made any striking alterations for -our good? Wish you’d try your hand at the weather, if that’s in your -line.’ - -‘Come in, and we’ll talk it over,’ replied Ernest. ‘I’m charmed to see -you in any kind of weather. Permit me to present you to my cousin, Miss -Neuchamp, who doesn’t approve of your country at all. I must inform -you, Augusta, this is Mr. Middleton, my fellow-passenger, whom you have -heard me mention. I hope the ladies are all well.’ - -‘Pretty well when they wrote last; but, like all ladies, I fancy, they -are terribly tired of the present state of the season—and no wonder. -I can only recollect one worse drought during the thirty years I have -been out here.’ - -‘Worse!’ ejaculated Augusta, ‘I should have thought that impossible. -How did you contrive to exist?’ - -‘We _did_ manage to keep alive, as I am here to testify,’ laughed the -old gentleman, whose proportions were upon an ample and generous scale; -‘but of course it was a serious matter in every aspect. However, we -weathered that famine, and we shall get over this, with patience and -God’s blessing.’ - -That evening it was definitely arranged that Mr. Middleton should give -Miss Neuchamp a seat in his encumbered but not overladen buggy as far -as his own home station, which he trusted to reach in a week; after -which he would undertake, when she was tired of Mrs. Middleton and the -girls, to deposit her safely in Sydney. - -This was an unlooked-for piece of good fortune. Ernest was much -relieved in mind at being freed from the dilemma of returning Augusta -as a kind of captive princess of Rainbar, or undertaking an expensive -and inopportune journey for the sole purpose of accompanying her to a -place which she never should have quitted. - -Mr. Middleton, confident of securing provender, now that he had -commenced to approach the confines of civilisation, was not sorry to be -provided with a young lady companion, having had of late much of his -own unrelieved society; and Augusta was more pleased than she cared -to show at the prospect of escape from this Sahara existence, without -the prestige of the desert or the novelty of Arabs. That night her -portmanteau was packed, Tottie coming in for the reversion of as much -raiment as constituted her an authority in fashions ‘on the river’ -ever after, and such a _douceur_ as confirmed her in Mr. Bank’s high -estimate of Miss Neuchamp as a ‘real lady.’ - -At six o’clock next morning Augusta Neuchamp bade farewell for ever to -the abode of the Australian representative of her ancient house. - -‘When shall I see you in Sydney, Ernest?’ she said, as a last inquiry. -‘I daresay they will wish to know at Morahmee.’ - -‘When the rain comes,’ said Ernest resolutely. ‘Good-bye, Middleton; -take great care of her. Remember me to the ladies.’ And they were off. - -It has been more than once remarked by those of our species who rely -for their intellectual recreation less upon action than observation, -that great events are apt to be produced by inconsiderable causes. -The sighing summer breeze sets free the mountain avalanche. The spark -creates the red ruin of a conflagration. The rat in Holland perforates -a dam and floods a province. - -Mr. Neuchamp sat in his apartment at Rainbar contrasting, doubtfully, -his regret at the departure of his cousin with his recovered sense -of freedom and independence. True, she was the sole link which in -Australia connected him with the thousand spells of home. - -But, ever angular in mind, she had proved herself to be so incapable -of accommodation to the necessarily altered conditions of a new land, -that he had despaired of her acclimatisation. She had even failed to -comprehend them. - -‘This is the result,’ he would assert to himself, ‘of her deficiency in -the faculty of imagination. It may be there are other reasons, but I -trace her special failure in _camaraderie_ to this neglect of her fairy -godmother.’ - -A person with deficient ideality is necessarily imprisoned by the -present. Unable to portray for themselves a presentment of unaccustomed -conditions on the mental canvas, such as is traced by Fancy, coloured -by Hope, yet corrected by Prudence, they are wholly precluded from -the prevision, even in part, of the living wonders, the breathing -enchantments, of the future. To them no city of rest, glorious and -beautiful, arises from the dull vulgarities of life and endeavour; -all with them is of the earth, earthy. A gospel of hard-eyed economy, -grudging gain, unrelieved toil, for the poor; for the sordid aspirant, -by endless thrift and striving, ‘property, property, property;’ for the -rich, a message of selfish enjoyment, grasping monopoly, ungenial ease. - -‘Such would the world be were the human mind divested of the sublime -attributes of Faith and Imagination!’ exclaimed Ernest, borne away from -his present cares. ‘There may be perils for the glad mariner on the -sun-bright, flashing wave; but he has the possible glory of descrying -purple isles, undiscovered continents. Dying, he falls as a hero; -living, he may survive to be hailed as the world’s benefactor.’ - -Much comforted by these bright-hued imaginings and illuminings of the -path in which he knew himself to be an ardent traveller, Mr. Neuchamp -awaited his mail-bag with more than usual serenity. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI - - -The untoward season had not been without its effect upon the thousand -and one gardens that paint, in each vivid delicate hue, with flower -tracery and plant glory, the rocky steeps and fairy nooks which -engirdle Sydney. The undulating lawns were dimmer, the plant masses -less profuse, the showery blooms less dazzling, the trailers less -gorgeous, than in other years. Yet were not the shores of the fair, -wondrous haven, beloved by Ocean for many a long-past æon of lonely -joy, before the bold scion of a sea-roving race invaded its giant -portals, without some tokens of his favour. In the long, throbbing, -burning days, when the sun beat blistering upon the heated roof, the -white pavement, the dusty streets, he summoned from beyond the misty -blue horizon the rushing wind-sisters fresh from the ice-galleries, -the snow-peaks, the frozen colonnades of that lone land where sits -enthroned in dazzling splendour, during days that die not or nights -that never end, the sorceress of the Southern Pole. From their wings, -frost-jewelled, dripped gentlest showers, refreshing the shore, though -they passed not the great mountain range which so long guarded the -hidden treasure-lands of the central waste. Hot and parched, compared -with former seasons, the autumn seemed endless, yet were the gardens -and shrubberies of Morahmee so comparatively verdant and fresh, from -their proximity to the sea, that Ernest would have hailed it as an Eden -of greenest glory, in comparison with the ‘sun-scorched desert brown -and bare’ which Rainbar had long resembled. - -Among the inhabitants of Sydney who made daily moan against the slow -severity of the hopeless season (and who had in some cases good cause, -in diminished incomes and receding trade, for such murmurings), Paul -Frankston, to his great surprise, found his daughter to be enrolled. - -This occurrence, involving as he thought a radical change of -disposition, if not of character, much alarmed the worthy merchant. -Calm and resolute, if occasionally variant of mood, Antonia Frankston -had hitherto been one of the least querulous of mortals. Sufficiently -cultured to comprehend that the stupendous laws of the universe were -not controlled by the fancied woe or weal of feeble man, she had never -sympathised with the unmeaning deprecation of climatic occurrences. - -‘The wind and the weather are in God’s hands,’ she had once answered -to some shallow complainer. ‘What are we that we should dare to blame -or praise? Besides, I am a sailor’s daughter, and at sea they take the -weather as it comes.’ - -In other matters, which could be set right by personal supervision or -self-denial, she held it to be most unworthy weakness to make bitter -outcry or vain lamentation. ‘If the evil can be repaired, why not -at once commence the task? If hopeless, then bear it with firmness. -Provide against its recurrence, if you like; but, in any case, what -possible good can talking or, more correctly, whining do? That is the -reason why men so often despise women, so often suffer from them. Look -at _them_ when anything goes wrong,—how hard they work, how little -they talk! Perhaps they smoke the more. But even that has the virtue -of silence, and therefore of wisdom. Talk is a very good thing in the -right place, but when things go wrong, it is _not_ in its right place.’ - -In former days of autumn, when the rains came not, when the -flowers drooped, when bad news came from Paul Frankston’s pastoral -constituents, and that worthy financier was troubled in mind, or smoked -more than his proper allowance of cigars over the consideration of the -state of trade, it was Antonia who invariably cheered and consoled him. -She pointed out the triumphs of the past; she steadfastly counselled -trust in the future; she soothed the night with her songs; she cheered -the day with unfailing ministration to his comfort and habitudes. - -Now, curiously, the old man thought his darling was different from what -he had ever recollected. She suffered repinings to escape her as to the -weary rainless season. She did not deny or controvert his occasional -grumbling assertions, after a hot day in the city, that the whole -country was going to the bad. She was, wonder of wonders, occasionally -irritable with the servants, and impatient of their shortcomings. She -kept her books unchanged and apparently unread for a time unprecedented -in Mr. Shaddock’s experience. - -Mr. Frankston could not by any means comprehend this deflection of -his daughter’s equable mental constitution. After much consideration -he came to the conclusion that she wanted change of air—that the -depressing hot season was telling upon her health for the first time in -his recollection; and he cast about for an eligible chance to send her -to some friends in Tasmania, where the keener air, the somewhat more -bracing island climate, might restore her to the animation which he -feared she was losing day by day. - -He thought also, amid his loving plans and plottings for his daughter’s -welfare, that possibly she needed the stimulus of additional society. -They had been living quietly at Morahmee of late, and the season of -comparative gaiety, which in Sydney generally dates from the birthnight -of the Empress of Anglo-Saxondom, had not as yet arrived. - -‘We want a little rousing up,’ thought poor Paul; ‘we have had no -little dinners lately, no one in the evenings. I have been thinking -over this confounded season and these bothering bills till I have -forgotten my own darling, but for whose sake the whole country might be -swallowed up in Mauna Loa, for all old Paul cares. I shouldn’t say that -either; but it seems hard that anything should ail the poor darling -that care might have prevented. If her mother had lived—ah!’ and here -Paul fell a-thinking, until the wheels of the dogcart grated against -the pavement near the office door. - -Thus it so chanced that, towards the end of the week, occurred one of -the little dinners for which Morahmee was famous, with a ‘whip’ of -certain musical celebrities of the neighbourhood, and as many ordinary -guests as made a successful compromise between all ‘music,’ which -sometimes hath not ‘charms’ for the masculine breast, and a regulation -evening party, which would have been an anachronism. - -Among the guests for whom Paul, in his anxiety for a healthful -distraction for Antonia, had swept the clubs and the hotels, were Mr. -Hardy Baldacre and Jermyn Croker. Squatters were scarce in Sydney -beyond previous experience. They were all at home on their stations -attending to their stock, except those who were in town attending to -their bills. These last were chiefly indisposed to society. They dined -at their clubs or hotels after half a day’s waiting in the manager’s -ante-chamber, and felt more inclined for the repose of the smoking-room -than for the excitement of the society. - -Mr. Hardy Baldacre had managed to come to town, however, without such -anxieties of a pecuniary nature as interfered with his amusements. Of -these he partook of as full measure of every kind and description as -he could procure cheaply. He had early developed a taste for pleasure, -controlled only by considerations of caution and economy. Those who -knew him well disliked him thoroughly, and with cause. Those who met -him occasionally, as did Mr. Neuchamp and Paul Frankston, saw in him a -well-dressed, good-looking man, with an affectation of good-humour and -liberality by no means without attraction. Paul _had_ heard assertions -made to his disadvantage, but not having bestowed much thought upon the -matter, had not gone the length of excluding him from his invitation -list; on this occasion he had been rather glad to fill up his table. - -Mr. Jermyn Croker, as usual, had constituted himself an exception to -ordinary humanity by remaining at his club during the terrible season -which sent the most ardent lovers of the metropolis to their distant -duties. In explanation he stated that either the whole country would -be ruined or it would not. He frankly admitted that he inclined to the -first belief. If the former state of matters prevailed, what was the -use of living in the desert till the last camel died and the last well -was choked? No human effort could avert the final simoom, which was -evidently on its way to engulf pastoral Australia. Now, here at the -club (though the wines were beastly, as usual, and the committee ought -to be sacked) there would be a little claret and ice available to the -last. He should remain and perish, where, at least, a club waiter could -see to your interment. - -Such was Mr. Jermyn Croker’s faith, openly professed in club and -counting-house. But those who knew him averred that he took good -care to have one of the best overseers in the country at his head -station, whose management he kept up to the mark by weekly letters of -so consistently depreciatory a nature that nobody expected _he_ would -survive the season, whatever the issue to others. ‘Died of a bad season -and Jermyn Croker’ had, indeed, been an epitaph written in advance and -forwarded to him by a provincial humorist. - -Hartley Selmore had also been found available. He, indeed, could not -very well remain away from financial headquarters. So many of his -unpaid orders and acceptances, with the ominous superscription ‘Refer -to drawer,’ found their way to bank and office by every mail from the -interior, that a residence in the metropolis was vitally necessary. In -good sooth, his unflagging energy and great powers of resource, under -the presence of constant emergency, were equal to the demand made upon -them. With the aid of every device of discount and hypothecation known -to the children of finance, he managed to keep afloat. His day’s work, -neither light nor easy of grasp, once over, the philosophical Hartley -enjoyed his dinner, his cigar, his whist or billiards, as genuinely as -if he had not a debt in the world, and was always ready for a _petit -dîner_ if he distrusted not the wine. - -This dinner was, as usual, perfect in its way. The cooking at Morahmee -was proverbial; the wines were too good for even Jermyn Croker to -grumble at—had he done so he would have imperilled his reputation -as connoisseur, of which he was careful; the conversation of the -guests, at first guarded and unsympathetic, rose into liveliness -with the conclusion of the first course, and, simultaneously with -the circulation of Paul’s unrivalled well-iced vintage, became more -adventurous and brilliant. - -‘Where is our young friend Neuchamp?’ inquired Hartley Selmore. ‘I -haven’t seen him for an age.’ - -‘Gone to the bad long ago, hasn’t he?’ replied Croker, with an air of -pleasing certainty. - -‘Heard he had bought a terribly overrated place on the Darling,’ said -Selmore. ‘Very sharp practice of Parklands. Too bad of him—too bad, -wasn’t it, now?’ - -‘Was it as good a bargain as Gammon Downs, Mr. Selmore?’ inquired -Antonia, with a faint resemblance to former archness that lit up her -melancholy features. ‘I am afraid there is not much to choose between -you hardened pioneers when there is a newly-landed purchaser signalled.’ - -‘Really, Miss Frankston, really!’ replied Selmore, with a fine -imitation of the chivalrous and disinterested; ‘you do some of us -injustice. In all this dreadful season, I assure you, the creeks -at Gammon Downs are running like English brooks, and the grass is -green—absolutely green!’ - -‘Why, what colour should it be, Mr. Selmore—blue or magenta? But you -know that I am an Australian, and therefore must have learned in the -many conversations which have passed in my hearing about station -matters that “green grass country” is generally spoken disrespectfully -of, and “permanent water” is not everything. But we will not continue -the rather worn subject.‘ - -‘I fancy Neuchamp can’t be doing so badly,’ cut in Hardy Baldacre, with -his customary assurance, ‘for I hear he is going to be married.’ - -‘Married!’ echoed Antonia, as she felt the tide of life arrested in -her veins for one moment, and, with the next, course wildly back to -her beating heart. ‘Married, Mr. Baldacre, and why not? But papa often -hears from him, don’t you, pappy, and he never mentioned it.’ - -‘Mentioned it! I should think not,’ growled Paul, with a leonine -accent, as scenting danger. ‘I heard from him, let me see, a month or -two back. I don’t believe a word of it. Who to?’ - -‘Well, _I saw the young lady_,’ persisted Baldacre, wholly unabashed, -while he noted Antonia’s pale and unmoved features. ‘I went up in the -coach with her, half way to Rainbar. She’s a cousin of his own; same -name. Just out from England, and ever so rich.’ - -‘How the deuce should she go alone up to Rainbar?’ said Paul, full -of doubt and dread. ‘Surely _we_ should have heard of her, when she -landed.’ - -‘She told me that she made up her mind suddenly to come out to him—did -not let him know, and only stayed a week in Sydney, at Petty’s.’ - -‘Most romantic!’ said Antonia, driving the unseen dagger more deeply -into her heart, after the fashion of her sex, but smiling and forcing -a piteous and unreal gaiety; ‘and was she fair to look upon—a blonde -or brunette? Mr. Baldacre, you were evidently in her confidence; you -cannot escape a description.’ - -‘She was very good-looking indeed,’ said the ruthless Hardy, who had -been struck with Augusta’s fresh complexion and insular manner. ‘She -wore a gold eyeglass, which looked odd; but she was very clever, and -all that kind of thing, as any one could see.’ - -‘Even Mr. Baldacre,’ said Antonia, with a sarcastic acknowledgment. -‘You must have had a delightful journey. You will tell me any other -particulars that occur to you in the drawing-room. I feel quite -interested.’ - -Here the faint signal passed which proclaims the withdrawal of the lady -_convives_ and the temporary separation of the sexes. What mysterious -rites are celebrated above by the assembled maids and matrons, freed -awhile from the disturbing influence of the male element? Does a wholly -unaffected, perhaps unamused expression possess those lovely features, -erst so full of every virtue showing forth in every look? Do they -exchange confidences? Do they _trust_ each other? Do they doff their -uniforms, and appear unarmed, save with truth, innocence, simplicity? -_Quien sabe?_ - -It may not have been apparent to the lady guests, to whose comfort and -enlivenment Antonia was so assiduous, so delicately, yet so unfailingly -attentive in her _rôle_ of hostess, that Miss Frankston’s heart was -beating, her head aching, her temples throbbing, her pulse quickened, -to a degree which rendered the severest mental effort necessary to -avoid collapse. They heeded not the faint smile, the piteous quivering -lip, the sad eyes, while words of mirth, of compliment, of entreaty, -flowed rapidly forth, as she played her part in the game we call -society. But when the small pageant was over and the last carriage -rolled away she threw her arms round old Paul’s neck, and resting her -head upon that breast which had cherished her, with all a woman’s love, -and but little short of a woman’s tenderness, since her baby days of -broken doll and lost toy, she lay in his clasp and sobbed as if her -heart—poor overburdened, loving, despairing heart—was in verity, then -and there, about to break. - -‘My darling, my darling! my own precious pet, Antonia!’ said the old -man, kissing her forehead, and wiping the tears from her eyes, as he -had done many a time and oft in the days of her childish grief. ‘I know -your sorrow and its cause; but do not be too hasty. We do not know if -this loose report be true. It is most unlikely and improbable to me; -though, if it be true, Paul Frankston is not the man to suffer this -wrong to lie a day without—without claiming his right. But do not take -it for proved truth till further tidings come.’ - -‘It _is_ true—it is true,’ moaned Antonia. ‘I had a foreboding. I have -been so wretched of late—so unlike your daughter, my dearest father. -How could Hardy Baldacre have invented such a story? Why did he not -give his—his betrothed—our address, if he had no—no—reason to do -otherwise?’ sobbed poor Antonia. - -‘I can’t say—I don’t know—hang her and her eyeglass—and the day I -first saw him enter this house! But, no, I cannot hate the boy, whose -pleasant face so often made a second youth for me. I hate taking things -for granted; I must have proof before I—and then—Go to bed, my darling, -go to bed; I will tell you what I think in the morning.’ - -It was well for Miss Frankston, perhaps, that the intense pain towards -which her headache had gradually culminated rendered her for a while -unable to frame any mental processes. As she threw herself upon the -couch she was conscious of a crushing feeling of utter darkness and -blank despair, which simulated a swoon. - -She awoke to a state of mind to her previously unknown. In her breast -conflicting emotions passionately contended. Chief among them was the -bitter disappointment, the indignant sense of slight and betrayal, -endured by every woman who, conscious that each inmost sacred feeling -of her heart has been given to the hero of her choice, has been -deliberately forsaken for another. - -True, no word of love, no promise, no seeking of favour on one side, no -half denial, half granting of precious gifts, had passed between them. -In one sense, the world would have held him harmless, while friends -and companions of her own sex, prone always to decry and distrust all -feminine victims, would most certainly hint at mistaken feelings, -delusive hopes, on her part—would be ready to welcome and to tempt the -successful purloiner of a sister’s heart, the unpunished wrecker of a -sister’s happiness. - -But was there no tacit agreement, no unwritten bond, no fixed and -changeless contract, slowly but imperceptibly traced in characters -faint and pale, then clearer, fuller, deepening daily to indelible -imprint on her heart—upon his, surely upon his? Were the outpourings of -the hitherto sacred thoughts, feelings, emotions, from the innermost -receptacles of an unworn, untempted nature, to be reckoned as the idle, -meaningless badinage of society? Were the friendly counsels, the deep, -unaffected interest, the frank brotherly intercourse, all to pass for -nothing—to be translated into the careless courtesy affected by every -formal visitor? - -And yet, again, did not such things happen every day? Her own -experience was not so limited but that she had known more than one pale -maiden, weary of life, sick unto death for a season, unable as a fever -patient to simulate ordinary cheerfulness because of the acted, if not -spoken, falsehood of man. Had she pitied these too confiding victims, -these hopeless, uncomplaining invalids, maimed in the battle of life, -hiding the mortal wound from human gaze, bearing up with trembling -steps the burden of premature age and sorrow? - -Had not her pity savoured of contempt—her kindness of toleration? -and now, lo! it was her own case. But could it be _herself_—Antonia -Frankston, who from childhood had felt no want that wealth and -opportunity could supply? who had never known a slight or felt an -injury since childhood’s hour? to whom all sorrow and sufferings -incidental to what books and fanciful persons called ‘love’ were as -practically unknown as snow blindness to an inhabitant of the Sahara? -Was she a wronged, insulted, deserted woman like those others? It was -inconceivable! it was phantasmal! it was impossible! She would sleep, -and with the dawn the ghastly fear would be fled. Perhaps this dull -pain in her throbbing temples, this darksome mysterious heart-agony, -would leave her. Who knows? - -It is wonderful how much is taken for granted every day in this world, -more especially in the interest of evil devices. - -Mr. Hardy Baldacre would have been sorely puzzled by a -cross-examination, but no one had presence of mind to put it to the -proof. He was rapid in conceiving his plans, wonderfully accurate and -thoughtful in carrying them through. His endowments were exceptional -in their way. Bold, even to audacity, he never hesitated; cunning and -unscrupulous, he pursued his schemes, whether for money-making or -for personal aggrandisement of the lower sort, with a swift and sure -directness worthy of more exalted aim. Undaunted by failure, he was -careless of partial loss of reputation. He was known by the superficial -crowd as a successful operator whenever there was a bargain to be had -in stock or station property. He was shunned and disliked by those -better informed and more scrupulous in their acknowledgment of friends, -as a gambler, a niggard, and a crafty profligate. - -Such was the man who had succeeded, by a lying device, in working -present evil—it may be, incalculable future misery—to two persons -who had never injured him. In this deliberate fabrication he had two -ends in view. He secretly envied and disliked Ernest Neuchamp for -qualities and attainments which he could never hope to rival. He was -one of a class of Australians who cherish an ignorant prejudice against -Englishmen, regarding them as conceited and prone to be contemptuous -of the provincial magnate. With characteristic cunning he had kept -this feeling to himself, always treating Mr. Neuchamp with apparent -friendliness. But he was none the less determined to deal him an -effectual blow when an opportunity should offer. The time had come, -and he had struck a felon blow, which had pierced deeply the pure, -passionate heart of Antonia Frankston. - -He had for some time past honoured that young lady with his very -questionable approbation. He admired her personally after his fashion; -but he thoroughly appreciated and heartily desired to possess himself -of what constituted in his eyes her crowning charm and attribute—the -large fortune which Paul Frankston’s heiress must, in spite of all -changes of season and fluctuation of securities, inevitably inherit. - -Not unskilled in the ways of women, with whom his undeniable good -looks and his prestige of wealth gave him a certain popularity, he -thought he saw his way during her period of anger and mortification -to a dash at the lady and the money, which needed but promptness and -resolution to ensure a strong chance of success. - -He saw by her change of countenance, by her forced gaiety, by her every -look and tone, that the barbed arrow had sped far and been surely -lodged. - -‘Neuchamp, like a fool as he was, had evidently not written lately. The -cousin (and a deuced fine girl, too, with pots of money of her own) -had been staying up at Rainbar—a queer thing to do. Old Middleton, -when bringing her to his place, had told every one that she was his -friend Neuchamp’s cousin. It would be some time before Frankston or his -daughter would find out the untruth of the report. In the meantime he -would butter up the old man, humbug him with regret for his occasional -“wildness,” promise all kinds of amendment and square behaviour for -the future; then go straight to the girl, who, of course, could know -nothing of his life and time, and say, “Here am I, Hardy Baldacre, with -a half share in Baredown, Gogeldra, and No-good-damper (hang it; I must -change that)—anyway, three of the best cattle properties of the south; -here am I, not the worst-looking fellow going, at your service. Take -me, and we’re off to Melbourne or Tasmania for a wedding-trip, and that -stuck-up beggar Neuchamp may marry his cousin, and go up King Street -the next week for all we care.” I shan’t say the last bit. But it will -occur to her. Women always think of everything, though they don’t say -it. That might fetch her. Anyhow, the odds are right. I’m on!’ - -This exceedingly practical soliloquy having been transacted at his -hotel during the performance of his toilette, Mr. Baldacre partook -of the matutinal soda-and-brandy generally necessary for the perfect -restoration of his nerves, and breakfasted, with a settled resolution -to call at Morahmee that afternoon. - -This intention he carried out. He found Antonia apparently not -unwilling to receive him upon a more intimate conversational footing -than he ever recollected having been accorded to him. She was in that -state of anxiety, unhappiness, and nervous irritability which makes the -patient only too willing to fly to the relief afforded by a certainty -even of evil. The climber upon Alpine heights, with shuddering -death-cry, ever and anon casts himself into the awful chasm on the -verge of which his limbs trembled and his overwrought brain reeled. -The overtaxed sufferer under the pangs of mortal disease chooses death -rather than the continuance of the pitiless torment. So the agonised -heart, poised on the dread pinnacle of doubt, flees to the Lethean -peace of despair. - -Having not unskilfully brought the conversation round to the subject -of Miss Neuchamp, Mr. Baldacre touched, with more or less humour, on -certain unguarded remarks of that inexperienced but decided traveller. -He enlarged, as if accidentally, upon her good looks and apparent -cleverness, giving her the benefit of a tremendous reputation for -learning of the abstrusest kind, and generally exaggerating all -the circumstances which might render probable the admiration of an -ultra-refined aristocrat. - -Much of this delicate finesse, as Mr. Baldacre considered it to be, -was transparent and despicable in the eyes of his listener. But, -difficult as it may be to account for, otherwise than by ignoring -all known rules and maxims for the comprehension of that mysterious -mechanism, the feminine heart, there was, nevertheless, something not -wholly disagreeable in the outspoken admiration of the bold-eyed, eager -admirer who now pressed his suit. - -With one of the sudden, tempestuously capricious changes of mind, -common to the calmest as to the most impulsive individual of the -irresponsible sex, a vague, morbid desire for finality at all hazards -arose in her brain. She had listened and loved, and waited and dreamed, -and dedicated her leisure, her mental power, her _life_, to the path -of habit and culture which would render her every thought and speech -and act more harmonious with his ideal. She had thought but of him. He -had his plans, his projects, a man’s career, his return to England—a -thousand things to distract him—all these might delay the declaration -of his love. But she had never thought of _this_! She had never in -wildest flight of conjecture conjured up a _fiancée_, a cousin loved -from earliest child-betrothals, to whom he doubtless had written -pages of minute description of all their well-intended kindness and -provincial oddities at Morahmee. - -And was she to sigh and droop, and pale and wither, beneath the -unexplained, unshared burden of betrayed love? Had she not seen the -colour fade from the fair cheek, leaving a cold ashen-gray tint where -once was bright-hued joy, eager mirth, and laughter? Had she not -seen the light die out of the pleading, wistful eyes, once so deeply -glowing, so tender bright, the step fall heavy, the voice lose its -ring, the _woman_ quit the haunted dwelling where a dead heart lay -buried and a still, gray-hued, hard-toned tenant sat therein, for -evermore resignedly indifferent to all things beneath the sky? Was this -her near inexorable fate? - -No! a thousand times, no! Had she not in her veins the bold blood of -Paul Frankston, the fearless sea-rover, who had more than once awed a -desperate crew by the promptness of his weapon and the terror of his -name? And was she to sink into social insignificance, and tacitly sue -for the pity of _him_ and others, because she had mistaken his feelings -and he had with masculine cruelty omitted to consider hers? - -No! again, no! The rebellious blood rushed to her brow, as she vowed -to forget, to despise, to trample under foot, the memory, false as a -broken idol, to which she had been so long, so blindly faithful. And -as all men save one—for even in that hour of her wrath and misery -she could not find it in her heart to include her father among the -reprobate or despicable of his sex—were alike unworthy of a maiden’s -trust, a maiden’s prayers, why not confide herself and her blighted -heart to the custody of this one, who, at least, was frank and -unhesitating in proffering his love and demanding her own? - -Mr Hardy Baldacre had not thought it expedient to delay bringing -matters to a climax, fearing that highly inconvenient truth, with -respect to the fair Augusta, might arrive at any moment. With -well-acted bluntness of sincerity he had adjured Miss Frankston to -forgive his sudden, his unpremeditated avowal of affection. - -‘He was a rough bushman,’ he confessed, ‘not in the habit of hiding -his feelings. On such a subject as this he could not bear the agony -of anxiety or delay. He must know his fate, even if the doom of -banishment, of just anger at his imprudence, went forth against him. -He expected nothing else. But if, before condemning him to go back to -his far-off home (little she knew of its peculiar characteristics) -a lonely, despairing man, she would only give consideration to his -claims, rashly but respectfully urged, she might deign to accept a -manly heart, the devotion of a life that henceforth, in good or had -fortune, was hers, and hers only.’ - -Mr. Hardy Baldacre had an imposing, stalwart figure, by no means -unfashionably attired, and Nature, while unsolicitous about his moral -endowments, had gifted him with a handsome face. If not in the bloom -of youth, he had not passed by a day the matured vigour of early -manhood. As he bent his dark eyes upon Antonia and poured forth his not -entirely original address, but which, heard in the tones of a pleading -flesh-and-blood lover, sounded a deal better than it reads, Antonia -felt a species of mesmeric attraction to the fatal and irrevocable -‘yes,’ which should open a new phase of life to her and obliterate the -maddening, hopeless, endless past. _For one moment_, for one only, the -fate of Antonia Frankston wavered on the dread eternal balance. She -fluttered, birdlike, under the fascination of his serpentine gaze. Her -words of regret and courteous dismissal refused to find utterance. At -length she said, ‘I must have time to consider your flattering but -quite unexpected offer. You will, I am sure, not press for an immediate -answer. I will see you again. Meanwhile let me tell you that I value -your good opinion, and shall always recall with pleasure your very kind -intention of to-day.’ - -But, with that still hour of evening meditation in which Antonia -was wont to indulge before retiring, came calmer, humbler, more -tranquillising thoughts. As she sat at her chamber window, looking out -over the wide waters of the bay, in which a crescent moon caused the -endless bright expanse of tremulous silver, the frowning headlands, -the garden slopes, to be all clearly, delicately visible,—as she heard -the rhythmical, solemn cadence of the deep-toned eternal surge,—she -recalled the moon-lighted eves, the soul-to-soul communing, of ‘that -lost time.’ - -A strong reactionary feeling occupied her heart. It seemed as if, like -the rushing of the tide, the stormy sway of the ocean she loved so -well, her heart had surged in rising tempest and with passion’s flow, -to ebb with yet fuller retrogression. Surely such were the words of -this murmuring sea-song on the white midnight strand, which calmed, as -with a magic anodyne, her restless, rebellious mood. - -‘I have been wayward and wicked,’ she half sighed to herself, ‘false to -my better self, to the teaching of a life, unmindful of my duty to my -father, who loves me better than life, of my duty to One above, who has -shielded and cherished me, all undeserving as I am, up to this hour. I -will repent of my sin. I will abase myself, and by prayer and penitence -seek strength where alone it can be found.’ - -It was long ere Antonia Frankston sought her couch; but she slept for -the first time that night, since a serpent trail had passed over the -Eden flowers of her trusting love, with an untroubled slumber and a -resolved purpose. - -Pale, but changed in voice and mien, was she when she joined her father -at breakfast. - -‘I see my little girl’s own face again,’ said Paul, as he embraced -her, with tenderest solicitude in every line of his weather-beaten -countenance. ‘I thought I had lost her. She must not be hasty; she was -never so before. All may come right in the end.’ - -‘I have been a very naughty girl,’ said she, with a quiet sob, -‘ungrateful, too, and wicked. I have come to my senses again. It must -have been the dreadful drought, I think, which is going to be the ruin -of us all, body and mind. Fancy losing one’s daughter, as well as one’s -money, because of a dry season!’ - -This small pleasantry did not excite Paul’s risible muscles much, but -he was more pleased with it than with a volume of epigrams. It showed -that experienced mariner, accustomed to slightest indications of wind -and wave, that a change of weather had set in. His soul rejoiced as he -took his daughter in his arms and exclaimed, ‘My darling, my darling, -your mother is with the angels, but she watches over you still. Think -of her when your old father is too far off or too dull to advise you. -If she had lived——’ But here there were tears in the old man’s eyes, -and the rugged features worked in such wise as to fashion a mask upon -which no living man had ever gazed. There was a long confession. Once -more every thought of Antonia Frankston’s heart lay unfolded before her -parent. - -That morning, before driving, as usual, to the counting-house, Mr -Frankston sought the Royal Hotel, and, upon business of importance, -obtained an interview with Mr. Hardy Baldacre ere that ‘talented but -unscrupulous’ aspirant had completed his breakfast. - -So decided was the assurance imparted by his visitor that, with -all possible appreciation of the honour conferred, Miss Frankston -felt herself compelled to decline his very flattering offer, that -Mr. Baldacre knew instinctively that any further investment of the -Morahmee fortress was vain, if not dangerous. He condoled with his -early visitor about the state of the season, congratulating himself -audibly that his runs were understocked, and that he had no bills to -meet like some people; and finally accompanied Mr. Frankston to the -door, with a friendly leave-taking, to be succeeded by a bitter oath as -he lighted a cigar and paced the well-known balcony. - -‘She has told her father. I saw the old boy was down to every move I -had made. Knowing old shot, too, in spite of his politeness and humbug. -I’d have hacked myself, too, at a short price, if I had had only -another week’s innings. They may have heard something, or that fool -Neuchamp is coming down and leaving everything to go to the devil. I -had a good show, too. I thought I held trumps. Never mind, there are -lots of women everywhere. One more or less don’t make much difference. -Of course, it was the “tin” that fetched me, but I don’t see that -I need care so much about that. I think that I shall make tracks -to-morrow.‘ - -On the morning following that of Mr. Baldacre’s unlucky piece of -information Paul Frankston lost no time in applying to headquarters -for information. He, ‘with spirit proud and prompt to ire,’ would, a -quarter of a century before, probably have smote first and inquired -after. ‘But age had tamed the Douglas blood,’ and even if its current -still coursed hotly on occasion, the experience of later manhood called -loudly for plain proof and full evidence before he adopted the strange -tale which had been told at his board. - -Suspending all thought of what he might chance if _any man_ were proved -to have trifled with his darling’s heart, he simply wrote as follows: - - SYDNEY, _10th April 18—_. - - DEAR ERNEST—We have heard a report down here—brought to our table, in - fact, by Hardy Baldacre, a man you know a little—that you are engaged - and about to be married shortly to a young lady, a cousin of your own, - just arrived from England. Also that Miss Neuchamp left Sydney for - Rainbar, after a week’s stay, and was seen by him on the way there in - a coach. - - For reasons which can be hereafter explained, I wish you to send me - a specific admission or denial of this statement. I will write you - again upon receipt of your reply to this letter. I am, always yours - sincerely, - - PAUL FRANKSTON. - - E. NEUCHAMP, Esq. - -On the following evening, after sending this, the most laconic -epistle which had ever passed between them, Paul no sooner beheld his -daughter’s face than he saw shining in her eyes the light of recovered -trust, of renewed hope, of restored belief in happiness. - -‘She must have received a letter,’ mused the sagacious parent. ‘Where -is it, my darling?’ said he aloud. - -‘Where is what?’ she replied, with a sweet air of embarrassment, pride, -and mystery commingled. - -‘Of course you have had a letter, or heard some news. I took the chance -of the little bird’s whisper coming by post. I think I am right.’ - -‘Here it is, you wicked magician. Antonia will never have another -secret from her dear old father. What agonies I suffered for my -hard-heartedness! And oh, what have I escaped!’ - -Here was the letter, with a mere stamp thereon, which contained such a -fortune in happiness as should have entitled the Government to a round -sum on the principle of legacy duty: - - RAINBAR, _4th April 18—_. - - MY DEAR ANTONIA—This letter will probably reach Sydney some days, or - weeks even, before a young lady, for whom I entreat your friendship - and kind offices. [H—m.] When I say that she is Augusta Neuchamp, my - cousin, and my only relation in Australia, I feel certain that I need - not further recommend her to you and the best of fathers and friends. - [H—m.] - - You will acknowledge her to be a refined and intelligent woman, that - goes _sans phrase_, I should hope, and no truer heart, with more - thoroughly conscientious acceptance of duty, ever dwelt in one of her - sex. [H—m.] - - But, writing to you with the confidence of old and tender friendship, - I may as well state, delicately but decidedly, that Augusta and I have - been utterly unsympathetic from our childhood, and must so remain to - the end of the chapter. [Oh dear! surely I can’t have read aright.] - - Even at Rainbar, to which rude retreat she posted with her usual - impetuosity, without giving me the opportunity of forbidding her, we - had our old difficulty about preserving the peace (conversationally), - and once or twice I thought we should have come to blows, as in our - childish days. [Thank Heaven! Oh, oh!] - - You know I am not given to dealing hardly with your sex, whatever may - be their demerits, and of course I am not going to abuse my cousin in - a strange land; but I am again trusting to your perfect comprehension - of my real meaning, when I say that, companionably, Augusta appears to - me to be the _only woman_ in the world I cannot get on with. [Blessed - girl, dear, charming Augusta—I love you already!] - - Of course, as soon as she left Rainbar (we were on very short commons - of politeness by that time) I resolved to write and ask you to take - her in at Morahmee, and show her Sydney and our _monde_, in the - existence of which she disbelieves. You must be prepared for her - abusing everything and everybody. But I know no one who can more - gently and effectually refute her prejudices than yourself, my dear - Antonia. You even subjugated Jermyn Croker, I remember. By the bye, - have him out to meet Augusta. She admires his file-firing style of - attack. Perhaps they may neutralise each other’s ‘arms of precision.’ - [Do anything for her—ask the Duke to meet her, if she would like!] - - I feel that I am writing a most indefensibly long letter. But I am - very lonely, and rather melancholy, with ruin taking the place of - rain—only one letter of difference—and advancing daily. Were it not - so, I would, as the Irishman said, bring this letter myself. Oh, for - an hour again in the Morahmee verandah, with your father smoking, the - stars, the sea, the soft tones of the music, of a voice always musical - in my ear! Ah me! it will not bear thinking of. It is midnight now, - yet I can see a cloud of dust rising, as my men bring an outlying lot - of cattle to the yard. [‘Poor fellow! poor, poor Ernest!’ sighed the - voice referred to.] - - I know you will be kind and _forbearing_ with Augusta. She will - not remain long in Australia. I think you will appreciate the - unquestionably strong points in her character. Of these she has - many—too many, in fact. Apparently it is time to close this scrawl—the - paper says so. ‘Pray for me, Gabrielle,’ your song says, and always - trust me as your sincere friend, - - ERNEST NEUCHAMP. - -[Bless him, poor dear!‘] - -‘So we are to have the honour of entertaining Ernest’s cousin, and not -his future wife, it seems?’ said Mr. Frankston, also cheered up. - -‘Never had the slightest thought of it, poor fellow,’ said Antonia, -radiant with appreciation of the antipathetic Augusta. ‘How I could -have been such a goose as to believe that wicked Hardy Baldacre, I -can’t think. And, papa dear, I _might_ have found myself pledged to -marry him, doomed to endless misery, in my folly and madness. I shall -never condemn other foolish girls again, whatever they may do.’ - -‘All’s well that ends well, darling,’ said the old man, with a grateful -ring in his voice; ‘Paul Frankston and his own pet daughter are one in -heart again. We don’t know what may happen when the rain comes.’ - -How joyous the world seemed after the explanation which Mr. Neuchamp’s -letter indirectly afforded! Life was not a mistake after all. There -was still interest in new books, pleasure in new music. A halo of dim -wondrous glory was ever present during her nightly contemplation of -sea and sky, in the lovely, all-cloudless autumn nights. The moan of -the restless surge-voices had again the friendly tone she had heard -in them from childhood. The sea was again splendid with possible -heroes and argosies; it was again the realm of danger, discovery, -enchantment—not a storm-haunted, boding terror, with buried treasures -and drowned seamen, with treacherous, fateful wastes into which the -barque, freighted with Antonia Frankston’s hopes, had been wafted forth -to return no more. - -It was during this enviably serene state of her mind that a note from -the innocent cause of the first tragic scene which had invaded the idyl -of Antonia Frankston’s life appeared on the breakfast-table at Morahmee. - - MIDDLEHAM, _20th April_. - - DEAR MISS FRANKSTON—My cousin Ernest, with whom I believe you are - acquainted, made me promise to inform you of my proposed arrival in - Sydney, on the conclusion of my visit to Mr. and Mrs. Middleton. - That gentleman has kindly promised to accompany me to Sydney, which - we shall reach (_D.V._) by the five o’clock train on Friday next. I - purpose taking up my abode at Petty’s Hotel.—Permit me to remain, dear - Miss Frankston, yours very truly, - - AUGUSTA NEUCHAMP. - -Of course nothing would content Antonia short of meeting at the station -and carrying off to Morahmee, bag and baggage, this inestimable cousin, -who had behaved so honourably, so perfectly. - -Any other woman, with the mildest average of good looks, shut up in -such a raft of a place as Rainbar metaphorically was, would have -carried off Ernest, or any man of his age, easily and triumphantly. All -the pleasant freedom of a cousin, all the provocation of a possible, -unforbidden bride, the magic of old memories, the bond of perfect -social equality as to rank and habitudes,—what stupendous advantages! -And yet she was so happily and delightfully constituted by nature that, -in spite of dangerous proximity and all other advantages, she was, it -was plain from his letter, the very last woman in the world whom he -could have thought of marrying. O most excellent Augusta! - -Paul, of course, after a show of deep consideration, came to the -conclusion that Antonia’s plan was the kindest, wisest, ‘onliest’ -thing, under the circumstances. ‘Take her home straight from the train. -Bother Petty’s—what’s the use of her moping there, and spending her -money? I don’t think another girl for you to have a few talks with, and -drives, and shopping, and Botanical Gardens, and Dorcas work together, -could do you any harm, pet. So have her home quietly to-night. We must -have a little dinner for her.’ - -Accordingly, when the punctual train arrived bearing Miss Neuchamp and -her fortunes, she was astonished to hear Mr. Middleton exclaim, ‘Why, -there is Miss Frankston come to meet us! How do you do, Antonia, my -dear? Allow me to make known Miss Neuchamp; probably you are already -acquainted with one another by description.’ - -Miss Neuchamp’s expectations can only be a matter of conjecture, -but she was unaffectedly surprised at the apparition of this -distinguished-looking girl, perfectly dressed and appointed, who stood -on the platform, flanked by a liveried servant of London solidity of -form and severe respectability of manner. - -‘Very, _very_ happy to welcome you to Sydney, Miss Neuchamp,’ said -Antonia. ‘Papa and I were so disappointed that we did not know of -your address before you left for the bush. He won’t hear of your going -anywhere but to our house for the present. And, Mr. Middleton, I am -pledged to bring you, as papa says we young ladies will be wrapped up -in each other and leave him in solitude. I can command you, I know. -Pray say you’ll come, Miss Neuchamp.’ - -‘If I may add my persuasion,’ said Mr. Middleton, ‘I could tell Miss -Neuchamp that she could not act more discreetly for the present. I -shall be delighted to wash all the dust out of my throat with some of -your father’s claret, Antonia. I’m your humble admirer, you know, when -I’m away from home.’ - -‘I shall be very happy to accept your hospitality, so kindly offered, -for the present,’ said Augusta, overpowered by briskness of attack and -defection of allies. - -The grave servant immediately addressed himself to the luggage and, -handing the strange lady’s nearest and dearest light weights into -the carriage, remained behind to deposit one of Mr. Middleton’s -portmanteaus at the club, and to convey the remaining impedimenta to -Morahmee per cab. As Miss Neuchamp ensconced herself in the yielding, -ample cushions of the Morahmee carriage beside Antonia, and was -borne along at a rapid pace, the mere rattling of the wheels upon -the macadamised road was grateful and refreshing to her soul, as a -reminiscence of the unquestioned proper and utterly befitting, from -which she had hitherto considered herself to be hopelessly sundered by -the whole breadth of ocean. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVII - - -When Miss Neuchamp found herself installed in a large, cool upper -chamber at Morahmee with a glorious view of the harbour, while on her -table stood a great rapturous bouquet all freshly gathered, roses -intermingled with delicate greenhouse buds, she commenced to wonder -whether all her previously formed ideas of Australia were about to be -seriously modified. - -A good sound reserve of prejudice reassured her, and she bided her -time. She had tasted the fullest measure of comfort perceivable in -Australian country life at the house of Mr. Middleton, where she had -sojourned several weeks. Now she was about to experience whatever best -and pleasantest the metropolis could afford. - -Mr. Frankston had brought home with him Count von Schätterheims and Mr. -Jermyn Croker, so that he and Mr. Middleton, having endless semi-stock -and station lore to interchange, each of the ladies was provided with a -cavalier. - -The Count, who had been informed by Paul that Miss Neuchamp was an -English heiress of vast wealth, travelling to indulge her eccentric -insular taste, paid great attention to that young lady, cutting in -from time to time, to the speechless wrath and exasperation of Jermyn -Croker, who renewed his former acquaintance with great success. - -The fair Augusta was entertained, and not wholly displeased, with their -manifest admiration. - -As the verandah was voted by far the pleasantest place after dinner, -the whole party adjourned to this invaluable retreat, where Paul and -his friend were permitted to light their cigars, and all joined in -conversation with unaffected freedom impossible in a drawing-room. - -‘Sing something, my darling,’ said the old man, ‘and then, perhaps, the -Count will give us that new song of his, which I hear all Sydney is -raving about.’ - -As the rich tones of the grand Erard came forth to them, luxuriously -softened by the intervening distance, Miss Neuchamp tasted a pleasure -from which she had for an age, it would seem, been debarred. She did -not herself perform with more than the moderate degree of success which -can be attained by those who, without natural talent, have received -thoroughly good teaching. But her training, at least, enabled her to -appreciate the delicacy of Miss Frankston’s touch, her finished and -rare execution, and the true yet deep feeling with which she rendered -the most simple melodies as well as the most complicated operatic -triumphs. - -Somewhat to the discomposure of the Count, who had commenced to believe -the opportunity favourable, she rose, and with an expression of delight -passed on to Antonia’s side. Miss Neuchamp had seen too many counts -to attach importance to that particular grade of continental rank; -and this particular specimen of the order she held in fixed distrust, -derived from the recollection of comments to which she had listened at -Rainbar. - -‘_La belle Anglaise_ prefers music to your compliments, Count,’ said -Mr. Croker. - -‘_Chacun à son tour_,’ replied the injured diplomatist. ‘Dey are both -ver good in dere vay.’ - -Whatever might be the Count’s shortcomings, a deficiency of -self-control could hardly be reckoned among them. He twirled his -enormous moustache, condoled with Paul and Mr. Middleton, and explained -that his steward in Silesia had written him accounts of an unusually -wet season. - -‘Ah, dat is de condrey! You should see him, my dear Monsieur Paul: such -grops, such pasdures, such vool, so vine as de zilks.’ - -‘How about labour?’ said Mr. Middleton. ‘I suppose you are not bothered -as we are every now and then with a short supply, and half of that bad?’ - -‘De bauer—vat you call “beasand” in my condrey—he vork for you all -de yahres of his live, and pray Gott for your brosperity—it is his -brivilech to be receive wid joys and danks. De bauer, oh, de bauer is -goot man!‘ - -‘I wish our fellows received their lot with joy and thanks; half of my -Steam Plains shepherds have gone off to these confounded diggings. But -don’t your men emigrate to America now and then? I thought half Germany -went there.’ - -‘I vill dell you one dale,’ said the Count earnestly. ‘I had one -hauptman, overzeer, grand laboureur, ver goot man—he is of lofdy -indelligence, he reat, he dinks mooch, he vill go to Amerika. I -consoolt mit my stewart, he say Carl Steiger is ver goot, he is so goot -as no oder mans what we have not got. I say, “Ingrease his vages, once, -twyei, dree dime—he reach de vonderful som of _fivedeen bount_ per -yahr. He go no more. De golten demdadion is doo crade; he abandon his -shpirit-dask to leat mankint, he glass my vools now dill his lives is -ofer.”‘ - -‘Ha! he wanted a summer on the wallaby track to open his mind,’ said -Mr. Middleton; ‘that would have been a “wanderyahr” with different -results, I am afraid. But I really think many of our fellows would -do better if they had more of the thrift and steady resolve of your -countrymen, Count. I remember when wages were much lower than now -in the colony, and when the men really saved something worth while, -besides working more cheerfully. Don’t you, Croker?’ But Mr. Croker -had departed in the midst of the Count’s story, and was charming Miss -Neuchamp with such delightful depreciation of the Australias, and -all that in them is, that she became rapidly confirmed in her first -opinion, formed soon after her arrival, that he was the best style of -man she had as yet met in the colony. Mr. Croker, on his side, declared -himself to be encouraged and refreshed by thus meeting with a genuine -English lady not afraid to speak out her mind with respect to this -confounded country, and its ways, means, and inhabitants. - -The Count, fearing that the evening would be an unprofitable investment -of his talents and graces, particularly in the matter of Miss Neuchamp, -by whom he was treated with studied coldness, departed after having -sung his song. This effort merely recalled to Augusta some occasion -when she had heard it very much better performed in the Grand Opera at -Paris. Jermyn Croker, who had never heard it before, openly depreciated -the air, the words, the expression, and execution. With more than one -household languishing for his presence, this was a state of matters -not to be continued, so the Count, with graceful apologies and vows of -pressing engagements, took his departure. - -‘You and I, Middleton, can go home to the club together, now that the -_chevalier d’industrie_—beg your pardon, Frankston—I mean, of the -Order of the Legion of Honour, Kaiser Fritz, and all his other orders, -medals, and decorations—— But I daresay the first represents his truest -claim.’ - -‘You are always charitably well informed, we know that, Croker,’ said -Mr. Middleton. ‘Mind, I don’t put my trust in princes or counts of -_his_ sort. I wonder how he gets along. Still swimmingly?’ - -‘Don’t think the fellow has a shilling in the world myself—never did,’ -replied Croker, with cheerful disbelief. ‘But from what I heard the -other day, he will have to make his grand _coup_ soon, now that it’s -known his chance of marrying Harriet Folleton is all up.’ - -‘Is it finally unsettled, then, Mr. Croker?’ said Antonia. ‘Every one -said she admired him so much.’ - -‘She is quite equal to that or any other madness, I believe,’ said the -well-informed Jermyn; ‘and, with her mother’s extraordinary folly to -back her, there is no limit to the insanity she is capable of. But the -old man _has_ a little sense—people who have made a pot of money often -have—and he stopped the whole affair last week.’ - - * * * * * - -Mr. Neuchamp was, perhaps, more disturbed in mind than he had ever been -since his arrival in Australia when he received the unusually laconic -letter referred to from Paul Frankston. Surprise, anger, uncertainty by -turns took possession of his soul. A wholly new and strangely mingled -sensation arose in his mind. Had he misinterpreted his own emotions as -well as those of Antonia? That such was the case as to his own feeling -was evidenced by his sudden and unreasonable rage when he thought of -Hardy Baldacre in the character of an accepted suitor for the hand of -the unconventional, innocent girl whose half-childish, half-womanly -expressions of wonder, admiration, dislike, or approval, called forth -by incidents in their daily studies, he could _now_ so clearly remember. - -Had he, then, won that priceless gem, the unbought love of a pure and -loving heart—no fleeting fancy, born of vanity or caprice, but the -deeply-rooted, sacred, lifelong devotion of an untarnished virgin-soul, -of a cultured and lofty intellect? - -This heavenly jewel had been suspended by a crowned angel above his -head, and had he not, with sordid indifference, bent earthward, all -unheeding, save of hard and anxious travail? He had narrowed his mind -to beeves and kine, dry seasons and wet, all the merest workaday -vulgarities of short-sighted mortals, resolute only in the pursuit of -dross. - -Had he, from neglect, heedlessness, absence, however indispensable, -chilled the fond ardour of that lonely heart, cast the priceless -treasure into careless or unworthy hands? Who was he, that a girl so -much courted, so richly dowered in every way, as Antonia Frankston, -should wait till youth was over for his deliberate approval? And yet, -if she _had_ delayed but for a short while longer—till _the rain -came_, in fact. Ah me! was not all the Australian world waiting with -exhausted, upturned eyes for that crowning, long-delayed blessing? -Fancy such a reason being proffered in England. Weddings, in that happy -land, were occasionally postponed till a semblance of fine weather -might be calculated upon, but surely only in this antipodean land of -contrast and confusion did any one defer the great question of his life -until the _departure_ of fine weather. Antonia was, doubtless, besieged -by hosts of suitors, among them this infernal, lying scoundrel of a -cad, Hardy Baldacre, besides Jermyn Croker, the Count, Hartley Selmore, -and numberless others. Madness was in his thoughts—he would go down, -rain or no rain, wet or dry, tempest or zephyr, hurricane or calm. He -would hunt for the ruffian Baldacre, and slay him where they met. - -Nevertheless he must at once answer Paul’s letter, which he did to -the effect that, ‘He wondered that his old friends should believe any -mere fabrications, unsupported by testimony, to his prejudice. Not -that there was anything discreditable about the report, if true; but -this was _not_ true. His cousin, with misplaced heroism, had visited -him in his solitude; a refined and highly educated woman, as would -be apparent to all, she certainly was. But as a _wife_ he had never -thought of her, nor could he, if their existence ran parallel for -years.’ Having despatched the letter, Ernest felt easier in mind, more -removed from that condition the most irritating and intolerable of all, -the accusation of wrong without the power of justification. It was -hard to resist an almost uncontrollable desire to rush down to Sydney -then and there to set himself right with his friends. But, as he ran -over the obstacles to such a course, it seemed, on cooler thought, to -be unadvisable in every way. First, there was the extreme difficulty -of performing the journey: he had not a horse at Rainbar capable of -carrying him across to the mail station. When he got there it was -problematical whether the contractor was running a wheel mail or not. -It would be undesirable, even ridiculous, to find himself a couple of -hundred miles from home, stranded on the endless, dry, hopeless plain. -To make a lengthened stay in Sydney, should he get there, was not to be -thought of under his present circumstances of debt and anxiety. ‘No,’ -he said, as he crushed the feeling back with a self-repression more -nearly allied to heroism than mere ostentatious efforts of courage, -‘no, my colours are nailed to the masthead, and there shall they hang -till the cry of “victory” is once more heard, or till the fight is lost -beyond mortal hope.‘ - -So, sadly yet steadfastly, Ernest Neuchamp turned himself to the -monotonous tasks which, like those of sailors on a desert island, or -of the crew of a slowly-sailing ship, were yet carried on with daily, -hopeless regularity. Still the ashen-gray pastures became more withered -and deathlike. Still the sad, staggering lines of cattle paced in -along the well-worn dusty trails to their watering-places, and paced -back like bovine processions after witnessing the funeral obsequies of -individuals of their race, which experience, in truth, was daily theirs. - -Then the diet, once not distasteful to the much-enduring palate of -youth, became wellnigh intolerable: the flaccid unfed meat, the daily -bread with never a condiment, the milkless tea, the utter absence of -all fruit, vegetable, herb, or esculent. Truly, as in those ancient -days when a pastoral people record their sorrowful chronicles of the -dry and thirsty region where no water is, ‘the famine was sore in the -land.’ - -At this time, so dreary, so endless, so crushing in its isolated, -unchanging, helpless misery, Ernest was unutterably thankful for the -hope and consolation which his studious habits afforded him. His -library, the day’s work done, filled up his lonely evening as could -no other employment possible under the circumstances. He ransacked -his moderate references for records of similar calamities in all lands -which, unlike the ‘happy isles’ of Britain, are from time to time -invaded with drought, the chief agent in all the recorded wholesale -destruction of animal life. He noted with painstaking and laborious -accuracy the duration, the signs, the consequences, the termination -of such dread seasons. From old books of Australian exploration he -learned, almost by heart, the sad experiences of the pioneers of the -land when they stood face to face with what to them were new and -terrible foes. - -‘It is hard,’ said he to himself, as he paced his room at midnight, -after long hours of close application to such studies, ‘it is hard and -depressing to me, and to many a wretched colonist who has worked longer -and has more on the hazard than I, to see the fruit of our labours -slowly, pitilessly absorbed by this remorseless season. But what, -after all, is a calamity which can be measured, like this, by a money -standard, compared to one which, like this latest famine in Hindostan, -counts its _human_ victims by tens of thousands, by millions? See the -dry record of a food failure, which comprehends the teeming human herds -which cover the soil more thickly than even our poor starving flocks! - -‘Can we realise thousands of lowly homes where the mother sits -enfeebled and spectral beside her perishing babes, whose eyes ask for -the food which she cannot grant; where the frenzied peasant rushes, in -the agony of despair, from his cabin that he may not hear the hunger -cries, the death groans of his wife and babes; where the dead lie -unburied; where the beast of prey alone roams satiated and lordly; -where nature mourns like a maniac mother with tears of blood for her -murdered offspring? - -‘Such is not, may never be, the fate of this wide, rich, peaceful land, -vast and wondrous in its capabilities in spite of temporary disasters. -Let us take heart. Our losses, our woes, are trifling in comparison -with the world’s great miseries. We are, in comparison, but as children -who lose their holiday gifts of coin or cakes. Our lives, our health -and strength, are all untouched. We have hope still for our unbartered -heritage, the stronger for past dangers of storm and tide. The world -is yet before us. There are other seas, untried and slumbering oceans, -where our bark may yet ride with joyous outspread sail. Let us still -labour and endure, until Fate, compelled by our steadfastness, shall be -once more propitious. - - ‘Si fractus illabitur orbis - Impavidum ferient ruinæ. - -I hardly expected to be quoting Horace at Rainbar, but the old boy -probably had some experience of untoward seasons, sunshiny desolation, -like this of ours. I don’t know whether “Impavidum” applies strictly to -any one but Levison. I am afraid that the “fractus orbis” pertains to -our cosmos of credit, which, shattered to its core, will strike us all -soon and put us to the proof of our philosophy.‘ - -A trifling distraction was created about this time, much to Ernest’s -relief, by the arrival of Mr. Cottonbush, who had received instructions -from Mr. Levison to muster, brand, and take delivery of the small -herd of cattle, the single flock of sheep, and the lot of horses -which that far-seeing speculator had purchased from the brothers -Freeman. This pastoral plenipotentiary, a wiry, reticent individual, -utterly impervious to every wile and stratagem which the art of man in -Australia had hitherto evolved from the very complicated industry of -stock-raising, first informed the Freemans of his mission, producing a -written authority with the awe-striking signature of Abstinens Levison, -and then reported himself to Mr. Neuchamp. - -‘It _is_ a bad season, sir,’ he said, in answer to that gentleman’s -greeting, which of course comprehended the disastrous state of the -weather, ‘and many a one wouldn’t bother mustering these three or four -hundred crawling cattle. They might be all dead in three months for all -we can see. But Mr. Levison isn’t like any one else. He sends me a line -to do this, or go there, and I always do it without troubling about the -reasons. _He_ finds them for the lot of us, and pretty fair ones they -generally are when time brings ’em out.’ - -‘I think _I_ know why he made this bargain,’ said Ernest, ‘and I must -say I wonder more about it every day. But I am so far of your opinion, -now that I am becoming what you call an “old hand,” that I shall -imitate your example in letting Mr. Levison’s reasons work themselves -out in practice.‘ - -‘That’s the best way, sir,’ assented the colonel of cavalry under this -pastoral general of division. ‘I’ve never done anything but report and -obey orders since I’ve been with Levison, this many a year. I used to -talk and argue a bit with him at first. I never do now, though he’s a -man that will always hear what you’ve got to say, in case he might pick -something out of it. But I never knew him alter his mind after he’d got -all the information he wanted. So it’s lost time talking to him.’ - -‘And what do _you_ think about this terrible season?’ asked Ernest, -anxiously looking at this iron man of the desert, whose experience -was to his, he could _now_ in this hour of wreck and ruin realise, as -immeasurably superior as the grizzled second mate’s to the cabin boy’s -when the tempest cries aloud with voice of death and the hungry caverns -of the eternal deep are disclosed. - -‘It’s bad enough,’ assented Mr. Cottonbush thoughtfully, ‘bad enough; -and there’s many a one will remember it to his dying day. In some -places they’ll lose most of their stock before the winter’s on for want -of feed, and all the rest, when it _does_ come, from the cold. There -were ten thousand fat sheep (or supposed to be fat) of Lateman’s caught -in the Peechelbah mallee the other day as they were going a short cut. -When I say “caught,” the water had dried up that they reckoned on, and -was only found out when they was half way through. The sheep went mad -and wouldn’t drive. So did the chap in charge, very nigh. When he got -out he had only some four thousand three hundred odd left. That was a -smash, wasn’t it?‘ - -‘Sheep are not so bad as cattle in one way,’ said Mr. Neuchamp; ‘you -can travel them and steal grass. A good many people seem unprincipled -enough to resort to the meanness of filching from their neighbours and -the country generally what no man can spare in this awful time.’ - -‘Well,’ said Mr. Cottonbush, smiling and wincing slightly, ‘it ain’t -quite the clean potato, of course; but if your sheep’s dying at home, -what can you do? Every man for himself, you know; and you can’t let ’em -stop on the run and die before your eyes. We’ve had to do a bit of it -ourselves. But the old man, he bought two or three whacking big bits of -country in the Snowy Mountains, Long Plains, the Gulf, Yarrangobilly, -and two or three more, enough to feed all the sheep in the country, -and started ours for it directly after shearing, while the roads were -good. _He_ knew what was coming and provided in time, same as he always -does. Blessed if he didn’t lease a lot of the country he could spare -to people who were hard pushed and came late, so he got his own share -cheap.’ - -‘And was there abundance of grass and water?’ - -‘Green grass two feet high, running creeks all the summer, enough to -make your mouth water. If we get rain down before the snow comes next -month our flocks will come back better than they went, and with half as -much wool again as the plains sheep.’ - -That day Mr. Cottonbush informed the Freeman family that, inasmuch as -the Rainbar stockyard was a strong and secure enclosure, and as his -employer, Mr. Levison, was a very particular man in having cattle that -he bought properly branded up, he didn’t like any to be left over, and -they must yard every mother’s son of ‘em. - -So, as Mr. Neuchamp had kindly given permission for his yard to be -used, the entire Freeman clan, including a swarm of brown-faced, -bare-legged urchins, arrived on the following day with the whole of -their herd. It was a strange sight, and not without a proportion of -dramatic interest. The cattle were so emaciated that they could hardly -walk; many of them staggered and fell. In truth, as they moved up -in a long woebegone procession, they looked like a ghostly protest -against man’s lack of foresight and Heaven’s wrath. The horses were so -weak from starvation that they could barely carry their riders. One -youngster was fain to jump off his colt, that exhausted animal having -come to a dead halt, and drive him forward with the cattle. - -Even the men and the boys had a wan and withered look. Not that they -had been on short commons, but, dusty, sunburned, and nervously anxious -to secure every animal that could walk to the yard, they harmonised -very fittingly with their kine. - -When they arrived at the yard Mr. Cottonbush counted them carefully in, -and then signified to the vendors that, in his opinion, it would be -wise of them to go back and make a final ‘scrape,’ as he expressed it, -of their pasture-ground, lest there might inadvertently have been any -left behind. - -‘That sort of thing always leads to trouble, you know,’ said he; -‘there’s a sort of doubt which were branded and which were not. Now, -Mr. Levison bought every hoof you own, no milkers reserved and all -that; he don’t believe in having any of the best cattle kept back. So -you’d better scour up every beast you can raise before we begin to -brand. We can tail this mob, now they’re here.’ - -This supplementary proceeding resulted in the production of about -thirty head of cattle, among which there curiously happened to be, by -accident, half a dozen cows considerably above the average in point of -breeding and value. - -This very trifling matter of a ‘cockatoo’s’ muster having been thus -concluded, all the horses having been yarded, and the flock of sheep -driven up—Mr. Levison having made it a _sine quâ non_ that he would -have all or none—the fires were lighted and the brands put in. - -To the wild astonishment of the Freemans, Mr. Cottonbush, having -put the [Ǝ]NE brand in the fire, commenced to place that conjoined -hieroglyph upon every cow, calf, bullock, and steer, assisted by Mr. -Windsor, Charley Banks, and the black boys. - -‘Why, “the cove” ain’t bought ‘em, surely?’ said Joe Freeman, with a -look of much distrust and disapproval. ‘Where’s he to get the sugar, I -want to know; or else it’s a “plant” between him and old Levison.‘ - -‘When the stock’s counted and branded you’ll get your cheque,’ said -the imperturbable manager; ‘that’s all you’ve got to bother your head -about. It’s no business of yours, if you’re paid, whether Levison -chooses to sell ’em, or boil ’em, or put ’em in a glass case.’ - -‘Well, I’m blowed,’ said Bill Freeman, ‘if we ain’t regularly sold. If -I’d a-known as they was a-comin’ here, I’d have seen Levison in the -middle of a mallee scrub with his tongue out for water before I’d have -sold him a hoof. One comfort: the cash is all right, and half of these -crawlers will die before spring.‘ - -‘Not if rain comes within a month,’ said Mr. Cottonbush cheerily. -‘You’d be surprised what a fortnight will do for stock in these places, -and the grass grows like a hotbed. These cattle are smallish and weak, -but not so badly bred. They’ll fill out wonderfully when they get their -fill. You’d better wait and see them counted, and then you can have -your cheque.’ - -Jack Windsor and Charley Banks worked with a will, so did the younger -members of the yeomanry plantation. The grown cattle were of course -pen-branded. By night-fall every one was marked very legibly and -counted out. Four hundred and seventy head of cattle over six months -old, eighty-four horses, and twelve hundred mixed sheep, principally -weaners. These last were fire-branded on the side of the face, -provided with a shepherd, and kept near home. - -The necessary preliminaries being concluded, Mr. Cottonbush handed a -cheque, at the prices arranged, to Abraham Freeman, and turned the -horses and cattle out of the yard. - -‘You haven’t a horn or a hoof on Rainbar now,’ said he composedly; -‘perhaps you have ’em in a better place, in your breeches pockets; and -remember I’ll be up here next November, or else Mr. Levison, to take up -your selections as agreed. Then, I suppose, you’ll be fixing yourself -down upon some other miserable squatter. You’re bound not to stop here, -you know.’ - -Having thus accomplished his mission clearly and unmistakably, Mr. -Cottonbush, whose acquaintance Ernest had first made at Turonia when -he took delivery of Mr. Drifter’s cattle, declared his intention of -starting at daybreak. Waste of time was never laid to the charge of -Mr. Levison’s subordinates. ‘Like master like man’ is a proverb of -unquestionable antiquity. There is more in it than appears upon the -surface. Whatever might have been the moulding power, it is certain -that his managers, agents, and overseers attached great importance to -those attributes of punctuality, foresight, temperance, and thrift -which were dear to the soul of Abstinens Levison. - -‘I’m glad these crawlers of cattle are branded up and done with while -it’s dry, likewise the horses. All this kind of work is so much easier -and better done in dry weather,’ said the relaxing manager. ‘They’re -not a very gay lot to look at now. But I shouldn’t wonder to see you -knocking ten pounds a head out of some of those cats of steers before -this day two years.’ - -‘Ten pounds a head!’ echoed Ernest. ‘Why not say twenty, while you’re -about it?’ - -‘You don’t believe it,’ said Mr. Cottonbush calmly, rubbing his tobacco -assiduously in his hands preparatory to lighting his pipe. ‘Levison -writes that stock are going up in Victoria to astonishing prices, and -that what they’ll reach, if the gold keeps up, no man can tell. So your -cattle _might_ fetch twenty pounds after all.’ - -‘What would you advise me to do with the Freemans’ stock, now that I -have got them?‘ asked Ernest. - -‘If I was in your place,’ said Mr. Cottonbush judicially, ‘I should -stick to the cattle, for every one of them, down to the smallest calf, -will be good money when the rain comes. The sheep also you may as well -keep: they’ll pay their own wages if you put ’em out on a bit of spare -back country, and there’s plenty that your cattle never go near. You -could bring ’em in to shear them, and they’ll increase and grow into -money fast enough. You might have ten thousand sheep on Rainbar and -never know it.’ - -‘I don’t like sheep much,’ said Ernest; ‘but these are very cheap, if -they live, and there is plenty of room, as you say. And the horses?’ - -‘Sell every three-cornered wretch of ’em—a set of upright-shouldered, -useless mongrels—directly you get a chance,’ said Mr. Cottonbush with -unusual energy of speech. ‘And now you’re able to clear the run of -’em, being your own, which you never could have done if they remained -theirs. You’d have had young fellows coming for this colt or that filly -till your head was gray.’ - -‘I hope not,’ said Ernest, laughing; ‘but I am glad to have all the -stock and land of Rainbar in my own hands once more.’ - -Mr. Cottonbush departed at dawn, and once more Ernest was alone in the -gray-stricken, accursed waste, wherein nor grass grew nor water ran, -nor did any of these everyday miracles of Nature appear likely again to -be witnessed by despairing man. - -Still passed by the hungry hordes of travelling sheep, still the bony -skeletons of the passing cattle herds. No rain, no sign of rain! All -pastoral nature, brute and human, appeared to have been struck with the -same blight, and to be forlorn and moribund. The station cattle became -weaker and less capable of exertion; ‘lower,’ as Charley Banks called -it, as the cold autumn nights commenced to exhibit their keenness. The -Freemans relinquished all control over their cattle, and chuckled over -the weakly state of the Rainbar herd. - -The autumn had commenced, a peerless season in all respects save in the -vitally indispensable condition of moisture. The mornings were crisp, -with a suggestive tinge of frost, the nights absolutely cold, the days, -as usual, cloudless, bright, and warm. If there was any variation it -was in the direction of a lowering, overcast, cloudy interval, when the -bleak winds moaned bodingly, but led to no other effect than to sweep -the dead leaves and dry sticks, which had so long passed for earth’s -usual covering, into heaps and eddying circular lines. The roughening -coats on the feeble frames of the stock, now enduring the slow torture -of the cold in the lengthening nights, told a tale of coming collapse, -of consummated, unquestioned ruin. Daily did Ernest Neuchamp dread -to rise, to pass hours of hopeless despondency among these perishing -forms, dying creatures roaming over a dead earth during their brief -term of survival! Daily did he almost come to loathe the sight of the -unpitying sun, which, like a remorseless enemy, spared not one beam of -his burning rays, veiled not one glare of his deadly glance. He had an -occasional reminiscence of the steady, reassuring tones, the unwavering -purpose of which abode with the very presence of Abstinens Levison. -But for these he felt at times as though he could have distrusted the -justice of an overruling Power, have cursed the hour of his birth, and -delivered himself over to despair and reprobation. - -While Mr. Neuchamp was not far removed from this most unusual and -decidedly unphilosophical state of mind, it so chanced on a certain -afternoon (it was that of Wednesday, the eighteenth day of May, as was -long after remembered) that he and Jack Windsor were out together, -a few miles from home, upon the ironical but necessary mission of -procuring a ‘fat beast.’ This form of speech may be thought to have -savoured too much of the wildly improbable. The real quest was, of -course, for an animal in such a state of comparative emaciation -as should not preclude his carcass for being converted into human -food. The meat was not palatable, but it supported life in the hardy -Anglo-Saxon frame. It was all they had, and they were constrained to -make the best of it. - -‘Look at these poor devils of cattle,’ said Jack, pointing to a number -of hide-bearing anatomies moving their jaws mechanically over the -imperceptible pasture. ‘They have water, but what the deuce they find -to eat I can’t see. There’s that white steer, that red cow, and one or -two more, with their jaws swelled up. There’s plenty of ’em like that.’ - -‘From what cause?’ asked Mr. Neuchamp. ‘Cancer is not becoming -epidemic, I hope.’ - -‘It comes from the shortness of the feed, _I_ think,’ returned Jack; -‘you see the poor creatures keep licking and picking every time they -see a blade of grass, if it’s only a quarter of an inch long; half -their time they miss their aim and rattle their jaws together with -nothing between them. That’s what hurts ’em, I expect, and after a bit -it makes their heads swell.’ - -‘I wonder what they would think in England of such an injury, occurring -in what we always believed to be a rich pastoral country.’ - -‘So it is, sir, when the season’s right. I expect in England you have -your bad seasons in another way, and get smothered and flooded out with -rain; and the crops are half rotten; and the poor man (I suppose he is -_really_ a poor man there, no coasting up one side of a river and down -the other for six months, with free rations all the time) gets tucked -up a bit.’ - -‘As you say, Jack, there are bad seasons, which mean bad harvests, -in England,’ answered Ernest, always inclined to the diversion of -philosophical inquiry; ‘and the poor man there, as you say, properly so -called, inasmuch as he requires more absolute shelter, more sufficient -clothes in the terrible winter of the north, than our friends who -pursue the ever-lengthening but not arduous track of the wallaby in -Australia. They may in England, and do occasionally, I grieve to say, -if unemployed and therefore unfed, actually _starve to death_. But what -are those cattle just drawing in?’ - -‘Those belong to a lot that keeps pretty well back,’ answered Jack, -‘and they’re different in their way from these cripples we’ve been -looking at, as they’ve had something to _eat_, but they’re pretty well -choked for a drink. I don’t know when they’ve had one. That’s how it -is, you see, sir; half the cattle’s afraid to go away for the water, -and the rest won’t leave what little feed there is till they’re nearly -mad with drouth. It’s cruel work either way. I’m blest if that wasn’t a -drop of rain!’ - -This sudden and rare phenomenon caused Ernest to take a cursory -examination of the sky, which he had long forborne to regard with -hope or fear. It was clouded over. But such had been the appearance -of the firmament scores of times during the last six months. The -air was still, sultry, and full of the boding calm which precedes -a storm. Such signs had been successfully counterfeited, as Ernest -bitterly termed it, once a month since the last half-forgotten showery -spring. He had observed a halo round the moon on the previous night. -There had been dozens of dim circular rings round that planet all the -long summer through. The rain was certainly falling now. So had it -commenced, on precisely such a day, with the same low banks of clouds, -many a time and oft, and stopped abruptly in about twenty minutes, the -clouds disappearing, and the old presentment reverting to a staring -blue sky, a mocking, unveiled sun therein, with the suddenness of a -transformation scene in a pantomime. - -‘I think that spotted cow looks as near meat as anything we’re likely -to get, sir,’ said Jack Windsor, interrupting the train of distrustful -reverie. ‘It begins to look as if it meant it. Lord send we may get -well soaked before we get home!’ - -Mr. Windsor’s pious aspiration was appropriate this time. They reaped -the benefit of a genuine and complete saturation before they reached -the yard with the small lot of cattle they were compelled to take in -for companionship to their ‘fat beast.’ There was no appearance of -haste about the rain, no tropical violence, no waterspout business. It -trickled down in slow, monotonous, still, and settled drizzle, much as -it might have done in North Britain. It only did not stop; that was -all. It was hopefully continuous all the evening. And when Mr. Neuchamp -opened his casement at midnight he thankfully listened to the soaking, -ceaseless downpour, which seemed no nearer a sudden conclusion than -during the first hour. - -Before dawn Mr. Neuchamp was pacing his verandah, having darted out -from his couch the very moment that he awoke. The temperature had -sensibly fallen; so had the clouds, which were low and black; and still -the rain streamed down more heavily than at first. There was apparently -no alteration likely to take place during the day. The water commenced -to flow in the small channels. The minor watercourses, the gullies, -and creeks were filling. Wonder of wonders—it was a settled, set-in, -hopelessly wet day! What a blessed and wonderful change from last week! -Ernest had a colloquy with Charley Banks about things in general, and -then permitted himself a whole day’s rest—reading a little, ciphering a -little, and looking up his correspondence, which had fallen much into -arrear. As the day wore on the rain commenced to show determination, -heavily, hour after hour, with steady fall, saturating the darkened -earth, no longer dusty, desolate, hopelessly barren. The gaping -fissures were filled. The long disused ruts and gutters ran full and -foaming down to their ultimate destination, the river. That great -stream refused to acknowledge any immediate change of level from so -inconsiderable a cause as a rainfall so far from its source. But, -doubtless, as Charley Banks pointed out, in a week or more it would -‘come down’ in might and majesty, when the freshets at the head waters -should have time to gather forces and swell the yellow tide. It was -well if there was not then a regular flood, but that would do them no -harm; might swamp out the Freemans, perhaps, but as long as Tottie -wasn’t drowned, and the old woman, the rest of the family might be -swept down to Adelaide for all he, Charley, cared. So let it rain till -all was blue. There was no mistake this time. It was a general rain. -We should have forty-eight hours of it before it stopped. Every hoof -of stock was off the frontage now and away back, where there was good -shelter and a trifle of feed. In a fortnight after this there would be -good ‘bite’ all over Rainbar run. We should have a little comfort in -our lives now. What a pull it was, that old Cottonbush had branded up -those last stores before the rain came. - -Thus Mr. Charles Banks, jubilantly prophetic, with the elasticity of -youth, having thrown off at one effort all the annoyance and privation -of the famine year, was fully prepared for an epoch of marvels and -general prosperity. - -The day ended as it had commenced. There was not a moment’s cessation -from the soaking, pouring, saturating, dripping downpour of heaven’s -precious rain. ‘As the shower upon the mown grass,’ saith the olden -Scripture of the day of David the King. Doubtless the great City of -Palaces was erst surrounded by shaven lawns, by irrigated fields and -gardens. But on the skirts of the far-stretching yellow deserts, -tenanted then as now by the wild tribes, to whom pasture for their -camels and asses, and horses and sheep, was as the life-blood of their -veins, doubtless there were thousands of leagues all barren, baked -sterility, until the long-desired rain set in, when, as if by magic, -herbs and waving grains and flowerets fair sprang up, and rejoiced the -hearts of the tribe, from the silver-bearded sheik to the laughing -child. - -So it would be at Rainbar. Ernest knew this from many a conversation -which he had had upon the subject with Jack Windsor and Charley -Banks. In this warm, dry-soiled country, the growth of pasture under -favourable circumstances is well-nigh incredible. Nature adapts herself -to the most widely differing conditions of existence with amazing -fertility of resource. In more temperate zones the partial heat which -withers the flower and the green herb when cut down, slays the plant -and destroys germination in the seed for evermore. Here, in the wild -waste, when the fierce and burning blast revels over scorched brown -prairies, and the whirlwind and the sand column dance together over -heated sands, the plant life is well and truly adapted to the strange -soil, the stranger clime. The tall grasses grow hard and gray, or faint -yellow, under the daily desiccation which spares no tender growth; but -they remain nutritive and life-sustaining for an incredible period, if -but the necessary cloud water can be supplied at long intervals. Then -the hard-pushed pastoral colonist, when he found that his flocks had -bared to famine pitch the pastures within reach of the watercourses, -which were his sole dependence in the earlier days, was compelled to -resort to the most ancient practice of well-digging, of which he might -have gained the idea from the familiar records of a hard-set pastoral -people in the sandy wastes of Judea. Receding to the wide plains and -waterless forests of the vast region which lay cruelly distant from -any known stream or fountain, which was in summer regularly abandoned -by the aboriginal denizens of the land, he sank, at much expense, wells -of great depth—at first with uncertain result; but, though much of the -water thus painfully obtained—for from three to five hundred pounds for -two to three hundred feet sinking was no uncommon expense in a single -well—was brackish, much salt, still progress was made. The stock was -enabled in the midst of summer heat or protracted autumn drought to -feed upon these previously locked-up pastures, upon the saline herbs -and plants, the nutritious, aromatic shrubs peculiar to this land, -where no white man had ever before seen stock except in winter. - -By degrees it began to be asserted that ‘back country,’ _i.e._ the -lands remote from all visible means of subsistence for flocks and -herds, as far as water was concerned, paid the speculative pastoral -occupier better than the ‘frontage,’ or land in the neighbourhood of -permanent creeks, and of the few well-known rivers. _There_ roamed -that unconscionable beast of prey, the all-devouring free selector. He -could select the choicest bends, the richest flats, the deepest river -reaches, even where the squatter had fenced or enclosed. For were -not the waters free to all? He naturally appropriated the best and -most tempting conjunctions of ‘land and water.’ These were precisely -those which were most profitable, most necessary, occasionally most -indispensable to the proprietor of the run. - -But it was not so with the back blocks. There capital yet retained much -of its ancient supremacy. The wielder of that implement or weapon was -enabled to cause his long-silent wilderness to blossom as the rose, by -means of dams and wells. He was in a position also to drive off, keep -out, and withstand the invading pseudo-grazier, with his sham purchases -and his wrongful grass rights. - -Thus, by a wise provision of the Land Act, all improvements of a -value exceeding forty pounds sterling, when placed by the pastoral -tenant upon the Crown lands which he was facetiously supposed to rent, -protect the lands upon which they stand, or which, in the case of a -well, they underlie; that is to say, a five-hundred-guinea well or a -hundred-pound dam cannot be free-selected or taken cool possession of -as a conditional purchase by the land marauder of the period. Some -people might see a slight flavour of fairness in this provision which -has not always in other colonies, Victoria notably, been granted by the -democratic wolf to the conservative lamb. However the Government of -New South Wales may have erred in other respects, it has in the main -so far ruled the outnumbered pastoralists with a courtesy, fairness, -and freedom from small greed such as might be expected from one body of -gentlemen in responsible dealing with a class of similar social rank. - -One successful well or dam, therefore, converted a block of country -hitherto useless for nine months out of the twelve into a run capable -of carrying ten thousand sheep all the year round. Of course, any -portion of the Crown estate the conditional purchaser might ‘take up,’ -or, without notice, occupy. But where was he to procure his water from? -He had not often five hundred pounds, or if so, did not ‘believe’ -in such solemn disbursement for ‘mere improvements.’ Therefore he -still haunted, cormorant-like, the rivers and creeks—the ‘permanent -water’ of the colonist. To the younger sons of ancient houses, scions -of Howards, Somersets, and of the untitled nobility of Britain, he -conceded the right to live like hermits in the Thebaid, upon their -artificially and expensively watered back blocks. - -A special peculiarity of the ocean-like plains of inmost Australia is -the miraculous growth of vegetation after the profuse irrigation which -invariably succeeds a drought. In the warm dry earth, now converted -into a bed of red or black mud, saturated to its lowest inch, and rich -for procreation of every green thing, lies a hoard of seeds of wondrous -number and variety of species. Broad and green, in a few days, as the -vivid growth from the aged, still fruitful bosom of mysterious Nile, -along with the ordinary pasture appear the seed leaves of unknown, -half-forgotten grasses, reeds, plants, flowers, never noticed except -in an abnormally wet season. In cycles of ordinary moisture, the true -degree of saturation not having been reached, they lie death-like year -after year, until, aroused by Nature’s unerring signal, they arise and -burst forth into full vitality. In such a time an astonishing variety -of herbs, plants, and flowers is to be seen mingling with gigantic -grasses, such as Charley Banks described to Mr. Neuchamp when he -prophesied, after forty-eight hours of steady rain had fallen, that -on the Back Lake Plains this year he would be able to tie the grass -tops together before him, _as he sat on horseback_. Mr. Neuchamp had -never before discovered his lieutenant in a wilful exaggeration; but on -this occasion he felt mortified that he should still be supposed a fit -subject upon which to foist humorous fabrications. - -‘I see you don’t believe me,’ said Charley, rather put out in turn at -not being credited. ‘Let’s call Jack. You ask him the height of the -tallest grass he ever saw in this part of the country in a real wet -season. There he goes. Here, Jack, Mr. Neuchamp wants to ask you a -question.’ - -‘I wish to know,’ said Ernest gravely, ‘to what height you have ever -known the grass grow up here in a firstrate season?’ - -‘Well, I don’t know about measurement,’ said Jack, ‘but I remember at -Wardree one year we had to muster up all the old screws on the run to -give the shepherds to ride.’ - -‘Why was that?’ - -‘Because they couldn’t _see_ their sheep in the long grass; and out on -a plain where the grass was over their own heads, it was hard work not -to lose themselves. Of course it was an out-and-out year; something -like this is going to be, I expect. Why, I’ve tied the grass over my -horse’s shoulder in the spring, as _I’ve been riding along_, many a -time and often.’ - -Charley Banks smiled. - -‘That will do, John,’ said Mr. Neuchamp. - -‘I apologise fully,’ said Ernest, as soon as they were alone. ‘I -promise never to lack that confidence in your statements, my dear -fellow, which I must say I have hitherto found in every way deserved. -How are the cattle doing? You have been out all day, and must have been -soaked through and through.’ - -‘I didn’t put on anything that water could hurt,’ said Charley, ‘or -very much in the way of quantity either. Jack and I only wanted to be -sure of the line the cattle took, so as to get after them to-morrow. We -could track them as if they had been walking in batter pudding. If they -got off the run now we should have no horses to fetch them back with, -and if we left them away till they got strong, they’d be broken in to -some other man’s run, which would be so much time lost. Luckily they -all made for the Back Lake, where there’s some sandy ridges and good -bedding ground. Freeman’s cattle are mixed up with the “circle dots,” -which is all the better, as they know the run well, and can’t be got -off it. Lucky they’re branded.‘ - -‘And how about the old herd?’ - -‘We didn’t tire our horses going after them, but, by the main run of -the tracks, the nearest of them will stop at the Outer Lake timber; and -the head cattle will go slap back to the very outside boundary. We’ve -no neighbours at the back, so the farther back they go the fresher the -feed will be. _They’re_ right.’ - -‘I suppose they will begin to improve in a few months?’ - -‘Improve?’ echoed Mr. Banks; ‘if this weather is followed up, every -beast on Rainbar run, down to a three-months-old calf, will be mud fat -_in three months_, and you may begin to take away the first draft of -a thousand head of fat cattle that we can send to market—and a rising -market, too—before next winter.’ - -Mr. Neuchamp did not shout aloud, nor cast any part of his clothing -into the air, like Jack Windsor: his way of receiving sudden tidings of -weal or woe was not demonstrative. But he grasped Charley Banks’s hand, -and looked into the face of the pleased youngster with a gleam in his -eye and a look of triumph such as the latter had rarely witnessed there. - -‘We have had to wait—“to suffer and be strong,”—Charley, my boy,‘ he -said, ‘but I think the battle is won now. You shall have your share of -the spoils.’ - -When Mr. Neuchamp sallied forth on the second day after the rain, he -could not but consider himself in a somewhat similar position to one -of the Noachian family taking an excursion after the flood. True, his -flood had been of a temporary and wholly beneficial nature, but not the -less had it entirely altered the expression upon the face of Nature. -Aqueous effects and results were prominently apparent everywhere. Mud -and hardened sandy spaces, already flushed with green, had succeeded to -the pale, dusty, monotoned landscape. - -Thus, once more, short as had been the time of change, the eye was -relieved by the delicate but distinct shade of green which commenced -to drape the long-sleeping, spellbound frame of the mighty Mother. -Even in the driest seasons, except on river flats, there are minute -green spikelets of grass at or just below the surface. Let but one -shower of rain fall, softly cherishing, and on the morrow it is -marvellous to perceive what an approach to verdure has been made. Then -the family of clovers, long dead and buried, but having bequeathed -myriads of burr-protected, oleaginous seed vessels to the kind keeping -of the baked and powdered soil, reappear in countless hosts of minute -leaflets, which grow with incredible rapidity. It is not too much to -say that in little more than a week after the ‘drought broke up’ at -Rainbar there was grass several inches high over the entire run. The -salt bushes commenced to put forth tender and succulent leaves. All -nature drew one great sigh of relief, every living creature—from the -small fur-covered rodents and marsupials which pattered along their -minute but well-beaten paths when the sun was low to the water, from -the wild mare that galloped in snorting through the midnight, with -her lean, tireless offspring, to sink her head to the very eyes in -the river when she reached it, to the thirsty merino flock at the -well-trough, or the impoverished herd that struggled in hungered and -athirst to muddy creek or treacherous river bank—every living creature -did sensibly rejoice and give thanks, audibly or otherwise, for this -merciful termination to the long agony of the Great Drought. - -That morning of the 18th May was a fateful morn to many a struggling -beginner like Ernest Neuchamp; to many a grizzled veteran of pioneer -campaigns and long wars of exploration, of peril of body and anguish of -mind; to many a burdened sire with boys at school to pay for, and the -girls’ governess to consider, whom the next year’s losses, if _the rain -held off_, would compel the family to dispense with. - -On the night which preceded that day of deliverance Ernest Neuchamp -went to bed utterly ruined and hopelessly insolvent; he arose a rich -man, able within six months to pay off double the amount of every debt -he owed in the world, and possessed beside of a run and stock the -market value of which exceeded at least four-fold what he had paid for -it. - -This was a change, sudden as an earthquake, swift as a revolution, -almost awe-striking in its shower of sudden benefits, dazzling in its -abrupt change from the dim light of poverty, self-denial, and anxiety, -to an unquestioned position of wealth, reputation, and undreamed-of -success. - -How differently passed the days now! What variety, what hope, what -renewed pleasure in the superintendence of details ever leading upward -to profit and satisfaction in a hundred different directions! - -Day by day the grass grew and bourgeoned and clothed the flats with a -meadow-like growth akin to that of his native country. None of this -amazing crop, however, was used except by the flocks of travelling -sheep returning strong and well-doing to their long-abandoned homes. -These passing hosts made so little impression upon the wonderfully -rapid growth that, as Mr. Banks averred, ‘you could not see where they -had been.’ The station cattle, and even the small flock of sheep were -‘well out back,’ and, presumably, were content to leave the ‘frontage’ -as a reserve for summer needs. - -Concurrently with this plenty and profusion, in which every head of the -Rainbar stock revelled, from Mr. Levison’s ‘BI,’ whose skin now shone -with recovered condition, and who snorted and kicked up his heels as he -galloped into the yard with the working horses, to the most dejected -weaner of the Freeman ‘crawlers,’ came strangely exciting news of the -wondrous discovery of gold in Victoria, and the rapid rise in the price -of meat. - -Fat stock were higher and higher in each succeeding market, until -the previously unknown and, as the democratic newspapers said, -unjustifiable and improper price of ten pounds per head for fat cattle -was reached, with a corresponding advance for sheep. As this astounding -but by no means dismaying intelligence was conveyed to Mr. Neuchamp in -the hastily-torn-open newspaper which he was glancing at outside, just -as Jack Windsor had directed his attention to the gambols of ‘BI,’ who, -with arched neck and perfect outline, fully justified Mr. Levison’s -encomium upon his shape, that gentleman’s prophecy as to the enhanced -value of Rainbar reaching twenty thousand pounds when ‘BI’ kicked up -his heels seemed likely to be fulfilled to the letter. - -Mr. Windsor, in his enthusiasm concerning the condition of the horse -left in his charge, and that of the stud generally, had for the moment -omitted to open an unpretending missive delivered by the same post -which lay in his hand. As Ernest turned to walk towards the house he -was stopped by the sound of a deep and bitter curse, most infrequent -now upon the lips of his much altered follower. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVIII - - -As Mr. Neuchamp turned, he saw an expression so fell and deadly upon -Jack’s changed face that he instinctively recalled the day when he -first stood before him with levelled weapon and the same stern brow. - -‘What is the matter, John?’ said Ernest kindly. ‘Any had news?’ - -‘Bad enough,’ said the man gloomily. ‘Never mind me, sir, for a minute -or two. I’ll come to the house, and tell you all about it directly I’ve -saddled Ben Bolt.’ - -Then, repressing with an effort all trace of previous emotion, and -permitting his features to regain their usual expression, he proceeded -to catch and lead to the stable that determined animal, whose spirit -had by no means been permanently softened by adversity, as was -exhibited by his snorting and trembling as usual when the rein was -passed over his neck and the bridle put on. Having done this, Mr. -Windsor carefully saddled up, and shortly afterwards appearing in his -best suit of clothes, strapped a small roll to the saddle, and rode -quietly up to the verandah of the cottage. - -‘I see that something unusual has happened,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, with -sympathy in his voice. ‘Tell me all about it.’ - -‘You’ll see it here,’ said his retainer, handing over a short and -simple letter from Carrie Walton, in which the impending tragedy of -a woman’s life-drama was briefly told. In a few sorrowful words the -girl told how that worked upon by the continuous persuasions and -reproaches of her parents, she had consented to marry Mr. Homminey on -the following Friday week. She had not heard from him, John Windsor, -for a long time—perhaps he had forgotten her. In a few days it would be -too late, etc. But she was always his sincere friend and well-wisher, -Caroline Walton. - -‘You see, sir,’ began Mr. Windsor, with something of his old confidence -and cool calculation of difficulties in an emergency which required -instant bodily exertion, ‘it’s been this way. I’ve been so taken up -with these new cattle, and the way everything’s been changed lately, -since the weather broke, that I’ve forgot to write to the poor thing. I -was expecting to go down with the first lot of fat cattle next month, -and I laid it out to square the whole matter, and bring her back with -me, if you’ll give us the hut by the river bank to live in. I’ve been a -little late—or it looks like it—and they’ve persuaded her into marrying -that pumpkin-headed, corn-eating Hawkesbury hog, just because he’s got -a good farm and some money in the bank. But if I can get down before -the time, if it’s only half an hour, she’ll come to me, and I think I -can win the heat if Ben Bolt doesn’t crack up.’ - -‘What time have you to spare between this and the day of the wedding?’ -inquired Ernest. - -‘It’s to be on Friday week,’ said Jack. - -‘You can never be there in time—it is impossible!’ cried Ernest in a -tone of voice which showed his sympathy with his faithful servant. ‘I -pity you sincerely, John!’ - -‘Pity be hanged, sir. You’ll excuse my way of talking. I’m a little off -my head, I know; what I mean to say is, I ain’t one of those chaps that -can grub upon pity, and the likes of it. But I _can_ do it, if the old -horse holds out, and luckily Joe’s been riding him regular since the -feed came, and he’s fit to race a mile, or travel a hundred, any day.’ - -‘Why, it is a hundred and eighty miles to the mail-coach station, and -unless you get there by to-morrow night, you can’t get down for another -week.’ - -‘I _shall_ get there,’ replied Jack slowly and with settled -determination. ‘Ben can do a hundred miles a day, for two days at a -pinch, and I have a good bit of the second night thrown in. The mail -don’t start until midnight. If we’re not there, I’ll turn shepherd -again, and sell Ben to a thrashing machine; we won’t have any call -to be thought horse or man again. I shall get to Mindai some time -to-night—that’s eighty miles—and save the old horse all I can; then -start about three in the morning, and polish off the hundred miles, if -he’s the horse I take him to be. He’ll have easy times after, if he -does it, for I’ll never sell him. Good-bye, sir.’ - -‘Good-bye, John; I wish you good fortune, as I really believe my young -friend Carry’s happiness is at stake. Here are some notes to take with -you—money is always handy in elopements, I am informed.’ - -‘You have my real thanks, sir,’ said Jack, pocketing the symbols of -power; ‘I’ve been a good servant to you, sir, though I say it. I -shan’t be any the worse if I’ve a good wife to keep me straight—that is -if I get her.’ - -Here Mr. Windsor gave a short groan, followed by an equally brief -imprecation, as he pictured the shining-faced giant, in a wondrous suit -of colonial tweed, leading Carry away captive to his Flemish farm, -evermore to languish, or grow unromantically plump, in a wilderness of -maize-field varied by mountains of pumpkins. - -Ernest watched him as he mounted Ben Bolt, whose ears lay back, whose -white-cornered eyes stared, whose uneasy tail waved in the old feline -fashion, sufficient to scare any stranger about to mount. He saw him -take the long trail across the plain at a bounding canter, which was -not changed until horse and rider travelled out of the small Rainbar -world of vision, and were lost amid the mysteries of the far sky-line. -Much he marvelled at this Australian edition of ‘Young Lochinvar,’ only -convinced that if that enterprising gallant had been riding Ben Bolt, -when - - On to his croupe the fair ladye he swung, - -the layers of the odds might have confidently wagered on a very -different ending to the ballad. He did not anticipate that the reckless -bushman would attempt to ‘cut out’ his sweetheart from the assembled -company of friends and kinsfolk. Yet he could not clearly see how he -proposed, so close was the margin left, to possess himself of the fair -Carry. But that, if Ben Bolt did not break down, Jack Windsor would, -in some shape or form, effect his purpose, and defeat the intended -disposal of the Maid of the Inn, he was as certain as if he had -witnessed their arrival at Rainbar. - -It is not placed beyond the reach of doubt whether or not this -matrimonial adventure in any way led Mr. Neuchamp to considerations -involving similar possibilities. It may, however, be looked upon as an -authenticated legend that although several letters of a congratulatory -nature had passed between Paul Frankston and Mr. Neuchamp, ‘since the -weather broke,’ the latter thought it necessary to write once more and -acquaint him with the fact that early next month he should commence to -send off fat cattle, and that he would come down himself in charge of -the first drove. - -In the austere boreal regions of the Old World all nature, dormant -or pulsating, dumb or informed with speech, waits and hopes, prays -and fears, until the unseen relaxation of the grasp of the winter -god. Then the ice-fetters break, the river becomes once more a joyous -highway, echoing with boat and song, and gay with ensigns. Once more -the unlocked earth receives the plough; once more the leaf buds, the -flower all blushing steals forth in woodland and meadow; once more -the carol of bird, the whistle of the ploughman, the song of sturdy -raftsmen, proclaim that the war of Nature with man is ended. So beneath -the Southern Cross the unkind strife which Nature ever and anon wages -with her children is accented not by wintry blast and iron frost-chain, -but by burning heat and the long-protracted water famine. The windows -of heaven are locked fast. The thirsty earth looks anguished and -sorrow-stricken, daily, hourly, witnessing the torture, the death of -her perishing children. - -Then, wafted by unseen, unheard messengers, as in the frozen North, the -fiat goes forth in the burning South. The soft touch of the Daughter of -the Mist is felt upon plant and soil, pool and streamlet. They listen -to the sound of softly-falling tear-drops from the sky, and, lo! they -arise, rejoicing, to regain life and vigour, as the sick from the -physician, as the babe from the mother’s tendance. - -Once more was there joy in the broad Australian steppes and pastures, -from the apple orchards of the south to the boundless ocean-plains of -the far north-west, where the saltbush grows, and the myall and the -mulgah, where the willowy coubah weeps over the dying streamlet, where -the wild horse snorts at dawn on the lonely sandhill, where the emu -stalks stately through the golden clear moonlight. - -Now had arisen in good sooth for Ernest Neuchamp a day of prosperity -and triumph. By every post came news of that uprising of prices -which Mr. Levison had foretold, in stock and stations, in horses and -in cattle, in land and in houses, in corn and in labour. This last -consideration, though serious enough to the owners of sheep, in the -comparatively unenlightened days which preceded the grand economy of -fencing runs, was not of much weight with Ernest. His adherents were -tried and trusty, and neither Charley Banks nor Jack Windsor would -have abandoned him for all the gold in Ballarat and all the silver in -Nevada. Piambook and Boinmaroo, incurious and taking no thought for the -morrow, with the characteristic childishness of their race, dreamed -of no adequate motive which should sever them from the light work and -regularly-dispensed tobacco of Misser Noochum. With his own assistance -they were amply sufficient for all the work of the establishment, -now that the ‘circle dot’ cattle, thoroughly broken to the run, had -taken up regular beats, and divided themselves by consent into mobs or -subdivisions, each with its own leader. - -Many a pleasant ride had Ernest now that all things ‘had suffered,’ -not ‘a sea-change,’ but none the less an astounding metamorphosis, into -‘something rich and strange.’ - -Daily he made long-disused excursions into the mysterious, half-unknown -land of ‘the Back,’ only to find, after each fresh day’s exploring, -richer pasture, fuller watercourses, stronger, more frolicsome cattle. -These last had grown and thriven on the over-abundant pasture, ‘out -of knowledge,’ as Charley Banks averred. Again were the old triumphs -and glories of a cattle-station re-enacted. Again he saw the heavy -rolling droves of bullocks come panting and teeming into camp. Again he -witnessed the reckless speed and practised wheel of the trained stock -horses. All things, indeed, were changed. - -Charley Banks was never tired of sounding the praises of the glorious -season, and of the splendid fattening qualities of Rainbar, with its -extraordinary variety of plant-wealth, herbs, grasses, saltbushes, -clovers, every green thing, from wild carrots to crowsfoot, which the -heart of man, devoted to the welfare of his herd, could desire. - -‘I never saw anything like those “circle dot” cattle for laying it on,‘ -he would say. ‘They’re as big again as they were. And those crawlers of -Freemans’—they’ll pay out and out. We’ve branded as many calves from -’em as will come to half the purchase money, at present prices. It will -soon be time to move the fat cattle; in another month or two Rainbar -will be full of ’em.’ - -The only persons to whom the rain had not brought joy and gladness were -Freeman Brothers. These worthy yeomen began to consider that after -all this hard work, as they expressed it, they had been shamefully -outwitted and deceived. The travel-worn cattle-dealer, who had driven -so hard a bargain with them, had turned out to be the great Abstinens -Levison, no less. Their stock had been handed over to Mr. Neuchamp, -with whom, doubtless, he had been in league. Now they were growing and -fattening fast, prices rising faster, and not a shilling for _them_, -out of it all. Then they had to wait idle on their land till November, -or less lose the cash agreed on. - -‘Then to hand everything over—most likely for the benefit of a young -fellow who knew nothing about the country—a —— blessed “new chum”—hang -him. The country was getting too full of the likes of him. It was -enough to make a man turn digger.‘ - -Abraham Freeman and his wife were the only contented individuals of -the once peaceful co-operative community. They would have secured -sufficient capital upon the payment of the coming instalments to -purchase a well-improved farm in their old neighbourhood, to which they -proposed immediately to return, and there spend the remainder of an -unambitious existence. - -‘They had seen quite enough of this far-out life,’ they said. -‘Free-selecting here might be very well for some people; it didn’t suit -them. They liked a quiet place in a cool climate, where the crops grew, -and the cows gave them milk all the year round—not a feast or a famine. -If they had the chance, please God, they would know _next time_ when -they were well off.’ - -One afternoon Charley Banks came tearing in, displaying in triumph -a provincial journal, the _Parramatta Postboy_, directed to him -in unknown handwriting. Pointing to a column, headed ‘Elopement -extraordinary,’ he commenced with great difficulty, owing to the -frequency of his ejaculations and bursts of laughter, to read aloud to -Mr. Neuchamp the following extract, from which it may be gathered that -Mr. Windsor ‘was on time,’ in spite of all apparent obstacles: - - It is seldom that we have to chronicle so dramatic an incident as - that which has just occurred in our midst, and which was fraught with - deep interest to one of our most respected residents of old standing - in the neighbourhood. We refer to the sudden and wholly unexpected - matrimonial arrangement made by Miss C—y W—n, the daughter of mine - host of the old-established well-known family hotel, the ‘Cheshire - Cheese.’ It would appear that Mr. Henry Homminey, the successful - Hawkesbury agriculturist, was about to lead the blushing fair one, - with the full consent of the family, to the hymeneal altar, on Friday - last. ‘All went merry as a marriage bell,’ till on Thursday evening - Mr. John Windsor, cattle manager at Rainbar for Ernest Neuchamp, Esq., - appeared at the ‘Cheshire Cheese,’ and joined the family party. He had - been formerly acquainted with the bride-elect, but stated that he had - merely come to offer his congratulations, and pass a pleasant hour. - He was warmly welcomed, and the evening passed off successfully. At - the appointed hour next morning the happy bridegroom appeared with his - friends, who had mustered strongly for the occasion, but, to their - dismay and disappointment, they were informed by Mr. W—n that the - bride’s chamber was empty, and that she had not attended the family - matutinal repast. Mr. Homminey’s feelings may be imagined but cannot - be described. He at once started in pursuit of the fugitives, but - after riding a few miles at a furious pace, his horse showed signs of - distress, and he was persuaded by his personal friends to wend his - steps in the direction of Richmond. Much sympathy is felt for his loss - and disappointment. But, since the days of earliest classic records, - the man of solid worth has occasionally been eclipsed, in the eyes of - the fair, by the possessor of the more ornamental qualities with which - Mr. Windsor is credited. - -‘Well done, Jack!’ shouted Mr. Banks, as he finished the concluding -editorial reflection; ‘and well done, Ben Bolt! He must have polished -off that hundred and eighty miles, or else Jack would never have been -up to time. It’s a good deal to depend on a horse’s legs. Well, Carry -Walton’s a stunning girl, and it will be the making of Jack. He’ll go -as straight as a die now.’ - -‘I must say I feel much gratified also,’ assented Ernest. ‘I should -have been afraid of some of the old reckless spirit prevailing over -him, if he had lost our friend Carry. How I feel assured of his future -prosperity. He is a fine, manly, intelligent fellow, and wants nothing -but a sufficient object in life to make him put out his best energies.’ - -‘Jack’s as smart an all-round man as ever stepped,’ said Mr. Banks, -‘and with a real good headpiece too, though there’s not much -book-learning in it. He’d fight for you to the last drop of his blood, -too. I know that.’ - -‘It is well to have a faithful retainer at times,’ said Mr. Neuchamp -thoughtfully. ‘It carries a mutual benefit, often lost sight of in -these days of selfish realism. - -‘How shall we manage with the cattle without him?’ queried Mr. Banks. - -‘I must take the two black boys,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, ‘and you must -do the best you can on the run by yourself; for business renders it -absolutely necessary that I should visit Sydney.’ - -‘I daresay I’ll manage, somehow,’ said Mr. Banks. ‘I must get Tottie -Freeman to help me, if I’m hard pushed. She’s the smartest hand with -cattle of the lot.’ - -‘I do not think that arrangement would quite answer,’ quoth Mr. -Neuchamp gravely. - - * * * * * - -Within a fortnight after this conversation Mr. Neuchamp and his sable -retainers might have been observed making the usual stages with a -most satisfactory drove of fat cattle in front of them. They were -not, perhaps, equal to the first lot he recollected despatching from -Rainbar; but ‘cattle were cattle’ now, in the language of the butchers. -There were plenty more coming on, and it was not thought advisable to -wait longer for the ultimate ‘topping up’ of the beeves. They were good -enough. The demand was prodigious; and purchasers did not make half the -critical objections that were used in the old days, when cattle were -not half the price. - -In the appointed time the important draft reached Sydney, and before -Mr. Neuchamp could look round, it seemed to him, they were snapped up -at eight-pounds-ten a head, no allusions made to ‘rough cattle,’ or -‘very plain on the back,’ ‘old cows,‘ ‘light weights,’ or any of the -usual strong depreciations customary on former occasions. No; a new era -seemed to have set in. All was right as long as the count was accurate. -So satisfactory was the settling that Mr. Neuchamp at once wrote to -Charley Banks to muster and send down another draft, even if he _had_ -to put Tottie Freeman in charge of Rainbar while he was on the road. - -Then came the immediate rush to the office of Frankston and Co., and a -meeting with old Paul, that made up for much of enforced privation and -protracted self-denial. - -‘My dear boy! most glad to see you, at last; thought that we should -never see your face again. Knew you couldn’t come before the rain did. -Can’t leave the ship until tide serves and the wind’s fair. But _now_ -the voyage is over, first mate’s in charge of the ship, and the skipper -can put on his long-shore toggery and cruise for a spell. Of course -you’re on your way out to dine with us?’ - -Ernest mentioned that, presuming upon old acquaintance, such had been -his intention. - -‘Antonia will be ever so glad to see you; but she must tell you all the -news herself. You will find your cousin at Morahmee. She and Antonia -are wonderful friends—that is——’ - -‘That is,’ said Ernest, completing Paul’s sentence, over which the -worthy merchant appeared to hesitate somewhat—‘that is, as close as two -people very widely dissimilar in taste and temperament can ever be.’ - -‘Perhaps there _may_ be a slightly different way of looking at things, -and so on,’ said his old friend cautiously; ‘but all crafts are not -built out of the same sort of timber, or on the same lines. Some are -oak, some of American pine, some of teak, some of white gum; some with -a smart shear, some with a good allowance of beam; and they can’t be -altered over much. As the keel’s laid down, so the boat’s bound to -float.’ - -‘H—m!’ replied Ernest thoughtfully, ‘that involves a large -question—several large questions, in fact. Good-bye for the present.’ - -How many memories crowded upon the brain of Ernest Neuchamp as he -once more trod the massive sandstone flags underneath the portico of -the verandah at Morahmee! The freshly raked gravel walks, the boscage -of glowing green which formed the living walls of the renovated -shrubberies, the well-remembered murmur of the low-toned restless -surge, the odour of the unchanged deep, all these sharply contrasted -sights and sounds after his weary sojourn in the desert composed for -him a page of Boccaccio, framed a panel of Watteau-painting. He was a -knight in an enchanted Armida garden. And as Antonia, freshly attired -in evening dress, radiant with unmistakable welcome, appeared to greet -him on the threshold of the open door, he felt as if the knight who -had done his devoir was about to receive the traditional guerdon, so -necessary to the perfect equilibrium of the world of chivalry and -romance. - -‘Welcome from Palestine!’ she said, unconsciously following out his -train of thought, as she ran forward and clasped him by the hand. ‘I -don’t know whether one can call any part of the bush the Holy Land; but -you have been away quite long enough to have gone there. Had you vowed -a vow never to come back till rain fell? People may stay away too long -sometimes.’ Here she gazed at Ernest with a long, searching, humbled -gaze, which suddenly brightened as when the summer cloud catches the -partially obscured sun-ray. ‘But here is Augusta, coming to ask you if -Rainbar won’t be swallowed up in a second deluge now that the drought -has broken up, as she is credibly informed is always the case in -Australia!’ A mischievous twinkle in her mirthful eye informed Ernest -that his cousin’s peculiarities had been accurately measured by the -prepossessing reviewer before him. - -As Miss Neuchamp, also attired in full evening costume, approached, -while not far behind, with the air of a confirmed _habitué_, sauntered -Mr. Jermyn Croker, Ernest thought he had never seen that young lady -look to greater advantage. Something had evidently occurred with -power to revive an attention to the details of dress which had been -suffered of late to lie in abeyance. There was also a novel expression -of not unbecoming doubt upon her resolute features which Ernest had -never observed before. It soon appeared, however, that her essential -characteristics were unchanged. - -‘I am truly glad to see you, my dear Ernest,’ she said, offering him -her cheek with proper cousinly coolness. ‘I hear that a beneficial -change has taken place in your shocking climate. Mr. Croker says that -prices have risen to their outside limit, and cannot possibly last. Of -course you will sell out at once and go home?’ - -‘Of course I shall do no such thing,’ returned Ernest, with such -unusual animation that Antonia could not help smiling. ‘I should -consider it most ungrateful, as well as impolitic, to quit the land -which has already done much for me, and may possibly do more.’ - -‘Well done, Ernest, my boy!’ said Mr. Frankston, who had just joined -the party. ‘Never quit the ship that has weathered the storm with you -while a plank is left in her. Now that we have our country filled with -the sweepings of every port under the sun, we want the captain and -first officer to act like men, and show the stuff they’re made of.’ - -‘I take quite a different view of my duty to Jermyn Croker, about whom -I have felt much anxiety of late,’ drawled out that gentleman. ‘I see -before me a chance of selling out at an absurdly high price, and taking -my passage by next mail for one of the few countries that is worth -living in. A madman might neglect such an opportunity for the sake of a -few thousand roughs scrambling for gold at California, or Ballarat, but -not Jermyn Croker, if I know him.’ - -‘And suppose stock rise higher still?’ queried Mr. Frankston, smiling -at the magnificent dogmatism of his unsentimental friend. - -‘My dear Frankston, how a man of your age and experience can so blind -himself to the real state of affairs is a marvel to me. Cattle _can’t_ -rise. Five pounds all round for young and old on the station is a price -never before reached in Australia. You _must_ see the crash that is -coming. Really, now, without humbug, don’t you know that there will be -a change before Christmas?’ - -‘So there will,’ answered Paul, ‘but it will be for the better. We have -not half the stock in the country to feed the great multitude that are, -even now, on the sea. But if you _will_ sell, you might give me the -offer.’ - -‘Sold out of every hoof to Parklands this morning!’ answered Mr. -Croker, looking round with a triumphant air. ‘I was standing on the -club steps before breakfast when he came in from the northern steamer, -and made me an offer before he got out of his hansom.’ - -‘And you took it?’ - -‘Took it? of course. We went into the library, where he wrote me out a -cheque then and there for twenty thousand pounds, and I gave him the -delivery note. Booroo-booroo and Chatsworth, with four thousand head -of cattle, taken, without muster, by the book, everything given in. -Something like a sale, wasn’t it?’ - -‘First-rate for some one—I don’t say who. But I’ll take three to one -that Parklands knocks five thousand pounds profit out of it before the -year is over.’ - -‘I take you, provided he doesn’t sell to Neuchamp,’ answered Croker. ‘I -must say I think one bargain with him ought to satisfy any man, except -Selmore.’ - -‘I’ll bet you a level hundred,’ said Paul, a little quickly, ‘that in -five years Ernest here will be able to buy you up—horse, foot, and -dragoons—without feeling the amount.’ - -‘Particularly if he has the invaluable aid and counsel of Paul -Frankston,’ sneered Mr. Jermyn Croker. However, I shan’t be here to -see, as I never intend to cross the Nepean again, or to see Sydney -Heads except in an engraving.‘ - -‘We’ll all go and see you off,’ said Antonia, who with Ernest suddenly -appeared as if they had not been listening to the conversation, which -indeed they had not, but had taken a quiet walk down ‘an alley Titanic’ -with glorious araucarias. ‘But whoever goes or stays, we must have -dinner. I really _do_ believe that it’s past seven o’clock.’ - -At this terrible announcement Paul’s ever robust punctuality asserted -itself with a rebound. Seizing upon the fair Augusta he hurried her to -the dining-room, where all conversation bordering upon business was -banished for the present. - -After the ladies had retired, the fascinating topic of the changed -social aspect of the country since the gold crop had alternated with -those of wheat, maize, wool, and tallow, which formerly absorbed so -large a share of interest, again came uppermost. Upon this point Mr. -Croker was grandly didactic. - -‘Mark my words, Frankston,’ said he, throwing himself back in his -chair, ‘in two years you will see this country a perfect hell upon -earth! What’s to hinder it? Even now there’s hardly a shepherd to be -got; people are talking of turning their sheep loose—that, of course, -means ruin to wool-growing. Cattle will soon overtake the temporary -demand; all the new buyers—nothing personal intended, Neuchamp—will -be ruined. Tallow will fall directly the Russians have settled their -difficulty. I know this from private sources. Flour will be a hundred -pounds a ton again; of course there will be no ploughing for want of -hands. These digger fellows will take to cutting their own throats -first, and when in good practice those of the propertied classes for a -change; and lastly, you’ll have universal suffrage. The scum will be -uppermost, and you’ll end suitably with an unparalleled Jacquerie.’ - -Mr. Croker, having completed this pleasing patriotic sketch, filled his -glass and looked round with the air of a man who had just demonstrated -to inquiring youth that two and two make four. - -‘Australia was always a beastly hole,’ he continued; ‘but really, I -think, when—even before—it comes to what I have outlined, it will cease -to be fit for a gentleman to live in.’ - -‘You must pardon me for expressing a directly contrary opinion,’ -replied Ernest, who had been gradually girding himself up to answer -Mr. Croker according to his humour. ‘I hold that this is precisely the -time, and these are the exact circumstances, which render it a point of -honour for every gentleman who has past or present interest in the land -to live in it, to stand by his colours and lead his regiment in the -battle which is so imminent. Now is the time for those who have felt -or asserted an interest in this glorious last-discovered Eldorado, far -down in the list of English provinces which have a way of changing into -nations, to uphold with all the manhood that is in them her righteous -laws, her goodly customs, her pure yet untrammelled liberty. In my -mind, he who takes advantage of the rise in prices to quit Australia -for ever at this hour of her social need, deserts his duty, abandons -his post, and confesses himself to be less a true colonist than a -sordid huckster!’ - -As Mr. Neuchamp delivered himself of this perhaps slightly coloured -estimate of the duty of a pastoral tenant, unheeding of the implied -rebuke to the last speaker, he raised his head and confronted the -company with the air of the captain of a sinking ship who has vowed to -stand by her while a plank floats. - -Jermyn Croker coloured, but did not immediately reply, while the host -took occasion to interfere, as became his position of mediator between -over-hasty disputants. - -‘I think you are both a little beyond the mark,’ he said; ‘if you will -allow me, who have lived here since Sydney was a small seaside village, -to give you my ideas. No doubt, as Croker says, we shall have a queer -crew, with every kind of lubber and every known sort of blackguard to -deal with. But what of that? Discipline has always been kept up in old -New South Wales,—in times, too, when matters looked black enough. The -same men, or their sons, are here now who showed themselves equal to -the occasion before. We have Old England at our backs; and though she -doesn’t bother us with much advice or short leading strings, she has a -ship or two and a regiment left which are at the service of any of her -colonies when need is.’ - -‘Every country where gold has been discovered up to this time has -gradually degenerated and come to grief,’ asserted Croker, recovering -from his dissatisfied silence; ‘not that much degeneration is possible -here.’ - -‘You are thinking of the Spaniards, the Mexicans, and so on,’ said -Paul. ‘I’ve been among them, and know all about their ways. They are -not so much worse than other people. But even so: English people have -always managed to govern themselves under all circumstances, and will -again, I venture to bet.’ - -‘I came out here thinking Australia a good place to make money. I -always knew England was a good place to spend it in,’ averred Mr. -Croker. ‘I’m a man of few ideas, I confess. But I have stuck to these -few, and I think I see my way.’ - -‘I suppose we all do,’ said Mr. Frankston; ‘but some have more luck or -better eyesight than others. Our friend Levison wouldn’t make a bad man -at the “look-out” in dirty weather, eh, Ernest? What do you think of -him, Croker?‘ - -‘Think? why, that he’s an immensely overrated man; he has made a few -hits by straightforward blundering and kept what he has got. I give him -credit for that. But who’s to know whether all this station property -that stands in his name is _really_ his? The banks may have the lion’s -share for all anybody knows.’ - -‘Highly probable,’ assented Ernest, with fierce sarcasm; ‘and Levison’s -steady prophecy that the season was going to break just before it did -was an accidental guess! His purchasing stock, stations, and town -property for the rise, which no one else believed in, was a chance hit! -His uniformly good sales when every one else was holding! His large -purchases when all the world was selling! His unostentatious gifts, -at the rate of two to a thousand pounds, to church buildings were -unredeemed parsimony! His advice to me to buy and his actual purchases -of stock for my benefit, every pound invested in which has furnished -a profit of ten, were selfish mistakes! You must excuse me, Croker, -for saying that I think you have reared a larger crop of prejudices in -Australia than any man I have seen here.’ - -‘It’s a fine climate!’ quoth Paul; ‘everything grows and develops; -even experience, like Madeira in the voyage round the Cape, ripens -twice as fast here as anywhere else. A whitewasher, Croker? I really -believe this is a bottle of the Manzanares you prefer, and we’ll join -the ladies, which means adjourn to the verandah.’ - - * * * * * - -If happiness, at any period or season, did dwell upon the earth, she -must have sojourned, about the month of September 185—, so near to -the New Holland Club, so near to the person of Ernest Neuchamp, as -to have been occasionally visible to the naked eye. Had a company -of _savans_ been told off to view the goddess, as in the far less -important matter of the transit of Venus, success had been certain. But -society never recognises its real wonders—its absolute and imperious -miracles. Therefore for a little space that earthly maid glorified -the dwelling and precincts of the untrammelled, rejoicing, successful -proprietor. She sat by Mr. Neuchamp at the daintily prepared refections -of the club, and gave an added flavour to his moderate but intense -enjoyment of viand and vintage, so wondrous in variety, so miraculous -of aroma, after his long endurance of the unpalatable monotony of the -Rainbar cuisine. She whispered in the mystic tones of the many-voiced -sea-breezes, as they murmured around his steps when, with Antonia at -his side, he roamed through the mimic woods of Morahmee, or gazed with -never-ending contemplative joy on the pale moon’s silver tracery o’er -wave and strand. She rose with him in the joyous morn, telling him the -ever-welcome tale that all cause for anxiety had fled, that a new ukase -had gone forth, bringing unmixed joy to every man of his order, always -excepting the sheepholders and Jermyn Croker. She sat behind him, on -Osmund, displacing ‘the sad companion ghastly pale’ even ‘atra Cura,’ -who had been the occupant of a croup seat on that gallant steed for -many a day. Once more the rattle of flying hoofs was heard upon the -sandy downs and red hill-roads which, near Bondi’s ceaseless surge, -overlook the city’s mingled mass, the ocean’s fresh eternal glory. In -this season of joy and pride—the natural and becoming pride of him who -has suffered and struggled, waited and warred for no mean reward, which -at length he has been permitted to grasp—the bright goddess smiled on -every act, thought, and hope of Ernest Neuchamp. In that fair brief -bygone day of unalloyed triumph, of unclouded hope, it is a truth most -absolute and indisputable that she stood by his side in serene and -awful beauty; but, like her austere sister of old who cried aloud in -the streets to a heedless generation, ‘no man regarded her.’ - -Through all this halcyon time no definite pledge or vow had passed -between him and the woman whom he had slowly, but with all the force -of an inflexibly tenacious nature, come to consider as the embodied -essence of that mysterious complement to man’s nature, at once the -vital necessity, the crowning glory, of this mortal state, the vision -of female perfection! Proud, fastidious, a searcher after ideals, -prone to postpone the irrevocable decision by which man’s fate here -below is for ever sealed, he was now face to face with Destiny. Even -now he felt so utterly fascinated, so supremely content, with the -graduated intimacies of which the daily process which draws two human -hearts together into indescribable union is composed, so charmed with -the undreamed-of treasures of mind and heart which each fresh casket -unlocked displayed to his gaze, that he felt no desire to change the -mode of bliss. Why hurry to an end this sojourn in the land of Faerye, -while the bridle-reins of the Queen of Elf-land and her troop were -ringing still through the haunted woods, while feast and tournament -still went merrily on, while stream and emerald turf and bosky glade -were still touched with the glory of successful love, while the glamour -still held sea and sky and far-enpurpled mounts, upon which, let but -once the knell of disenchantment sound, no mortal may again gaze _while -life endures_? - -During all this time of joy and consolation Mr. Neuchamp had regular -advices from his lieutenant, Charley Banks. That young gentleman -complained piteously of his lonely state and solitary lodging in -the wilderness, for which nothing compensated, it would appear, but -the increasing beauty of the season (pastorally considered) and an -occasional gossip with Tottie Freeman. - -Now that the rain had found out the way to saltbush land, there seemed -to be but little variety of weather. It rained every other day, -sometimes for nearly a week, incredible to relate, without stopping. -The creeks were full, the flats were soaked, spongy, and knee-deep in -clover. The river was high, had come down ‘a banker,’ and any further -rainfall at the head waters, or even the melting of the snow, might -bring down a flood such as the dwellers in those parts had not seen for -many a day. The Freemans were uncomfortable enough. They had found that -their huts and fencing had been placed on land too low for comfort in -a wet season, and even for safety if the threatened floods rose higher -than usual. - -In November, the third spring month of the Australians, another -despatch of greater weight and importance reached Mr. Neuchamp, who -apparently was not hasting to quit the land of French cooks and Italian -singers, of pleasant day saunterings, of cheerful lunch parties, and -moonlight rambles by the murmuring sea. Mr. Banks had the distinguished -honour of entertaining Mr. Levison, but lately returned from Melbourne, -and engaged in starting two or three thousand head of fat cattle for -that market. He had come round by Rainbar, he said, on purpose to take -delivery of the Freemans‘land, but he, Charley Banks, thought it more -likely that he wanted to see old ‘BI’ (who looked splendid, with a -crest like a lion), and whom he rode away in triumph. He handed over -the deeds of all the Freemans‘conditional purchases to him to give to -Mr. Neuchamp, saying that he hoped he wouldn’t do that sort of thing -again, as he might not come out of it right another time. - -Mr. Banks further related that he had volunteered as his deliberate -opinion, from what he had noticed about the Victorian gold mines, -that the yield of gold would last many years, during which time stock -would continue to be high in price, although there might be temporary -depressions. As a consequence of which state of things, the sooner -every one bought all the store stock they could lay hands on the -better. ‘“My word,” he said, “it was a lucky drop-in—not for them -though—that I picked you up those Freeman cattle, not to speak of the -‘circle dots.’ There will be no more eight-and-sixpenny store cattle, -or fifteen-bob ones either—two pounds for cows, and fifty shillings -and three pounds for good steers and bullocks will be more like it, -and they will pay at that price too. But what I want you to tell Mr. -Neuchamp is this. I’d write to him, but I’m in a hurry off, and you can -do it quite as well, if you’re careful and attend to what I tell you. - -‘“I’ve just had information that the Sydney people who have got the -agency of the Mildool run, that joins you, are going to sell. They’ve -got it into their wise heads that cattle have seen their top, because -they’re worth five pounds all round, that is, with stations; and -because they’re old-fashioned Sydney-siders that never heard of such a -price since the days when they used to bring buffaloes from India. - -‘“They believe that Victoria is choke-full of Yankees and diggers, -stowaways and emigrants, and that the whole thing will ‘bust up’ -directly, and let down prices everywhere to what they were before the -gold. - -‘“People that travel, and keep their eyes open, know what foolishness -all this sort of thing is. A regular Sydney man thinks all Victorians -are blowers and speculators. A regular Victorian thinks all Sydney -men are old-fashioned, slow prigs who wouldn’t spend a guinea to save -five pounds. The truth is pretty near the middle. Don’t you stick at -home all your life, like a mallee scrubber, that has only one dart, on -the plain and back to his scrub, and then you won’t run away with the -notion that because a man is born on one side of a river and not on the -other, he ain’t as clever, or as sensible, or as good a hand at making -money or saving it, as you are. It’s only country-bred, country-reared -folks that think that way. - -‘“What I want you to tell the boss is this. He’d better set old Paul -Frankston to get a quiet offer of this Mildool with four thousand -odd head—it will carry about seven or eight—and if they’ll take -four-fifteen or five pound all round, ram ’em with it at once. Tell -Neuchamp he can send that native chap to manage it, and it will be the -best day’s work he’s done for some time. Tell him Ab. Levison said -so. Good-bye. You take a run down to Melbourne next chance you get -of a holiday, and don’t stay out here till you get the Darling rot. -Good-bye.” - -‘And so he cantered off on old “BI.” Levison don’t go in for much talk -in a general way, but when he once begins he don’t leave off so easy. -I thought he was going to talk all night, and so lose a day. But catch -him at that. I think I’ve told you every word he said, for I went and -wrote it down as soon as he went away.‘ - -So far Mr. Banks. Upon the receipt of his artless missive, Ernest went -at once to Paul Frankston, and communicated to him the substance of the -message of Mr. Levison. - -‘This is putting on the pot, my dear boy,’ said he. ‘If anything -happens to shake stock, Rainbar and Mildool will tumble down like a -house of cards. But now the wind is dead fair, and we may venture on -studding-sails—crowd on below and aloft. I back Levison’s opinion that -it is the right time to buy before Sticker and Pugsley’s notion that it -is the right time to sell.’ - -‘What sort of terms do you think they will require?’ asked Ernest, who -was fired with the idea of consolidating into one magnificent property -the two crack cattle runs of Rainbar and Mildool, the latter a grandly -watered, splendidly grassed station, but wofully mismanaged according -to old custom. - -‘Half cash at least, and not very long dated bills either,’ said Paul, -‘but we can manage the cash on your security, as your name now stands -high in the money market. As to the bills, tell them that I will -endorse them. They won’t make any objection then.’ - -‘How much heavier is the load of my obligations to you to become?’ -asked Ernest. ‘I feel as if I should never live to free myself from -the debt I owe you already.’ - -‘Don’t trouble yourself, my dear boy,’ said the liberal endorser. ‘If -things go well, nothing’s easier for you than to clear off every stiver -of debt. See how you have been able to pay off Levison, principal -and interest, out of that last lot of cattle, without a shade of -difficulty. If the rise takes place which Levison and I and some more -of us anticipate, why you, I, and he stand to win something very -respectable. You can then give us all a cheque for the amount advanced, -and the whole thing is over and finished. Until the drought broke up, I -don’t deny that we all had to be very close-hauled, and lay-to a good -deal from time to time; but now, with bullocks eight pounds a head, and -fat sheep ten shillings—wool up too, and real property rising,—not to -mention the shipping trade doubling every month,—why, if we can’t clap -on sail, my boy, we never can, and what the ship can’t carry she may -drag.’ - -The old man looked so thoroughly convinced of the truth of his -convictions as he spoke, with the kindling eye and elevated visage of -one resolved upon a hazardous but honourable enterprise, that Ernest -Neuchamp, always prone to be influenced by contagious exaltation of -sentiment, caught fire from his ardent mien and tone. - -‘Well, so be it,’ he said; ‘I am content to sink or swim in the same -boat with you and yours. We have Ab. Levison for a pilot, and he knows -all the rocks and soundings of the pastoral deep sea from Penrith to -Carpentaria, I should say. As you say there’s a time for all things, I -think this is the time to back one’s opinion in reason and moderation. -I will go and confront the agents for Mildool.’ - -Messrs. Sticker and Pugsley were steady-going, precise men of business -of the old school. As stock and station agents they had always steadily -set their faces against all outlay except for the merest necessaries -of life. Bred to their business in the old times when stock were -plentiful, labour cheap, and cash extremely hard to lay hold of in any -shape or form, they struggled desperately against these new-fangled -notions of ‘throwing away money uselessly,’ as they termed the -comparatively large outlay which they occasionally heard of upon dams, -wells, fencing, woolsheds, and washpens. Large profits had been made in -the good old times, when such speculations would have gone nigh to have -furnished a warrant _de lunatico inquirendo_. They did not see how it -was all to be repaid. They doubted the management which comprehended -such sinful extravagance; and they proposed to continue their -time-honoured system, which made it imperative upon all stockholders -who were unlucky enough to be in debt to them, to spend nothing, to -live upon shepherds‘wages, and not to think of coming to town until -times improved. - -One wonders if it ever occurred to these snug-comfort loving cits, as -daily they drove home to pleasant villas and luxurious surroundings—did -it ever occur to them, after the second glass of old port, to what a -life of wretchedness, solitude, and sordid surroundings their griping -parsimony was condemning the unlucky exile from civilisation, who -was hopelessly chained to their ledger? For him no beeswing port, no -claret of Bordeaux. He drank his ‘Jack the Painter’ tea milkless, most -probably, and flavoured with blackest sugar, occasionally stimulating -his ideality with ration rum or villainous dark brandy. Though his the -brain that planned, the hand that carried out long desert wayfarings -of exploration—long, toilsome drudgeries of stock travelling to lone -untrodden wilds; his the frame that withered, the eye that dimmed, -the health that failed, the blood that flowed, ere the process of -colonising, progression, and commercial extension was complete. -Thus land was occupied, villages sprang up, inter-communication was -established, and the wilderness subdued. All the magnificent results of -civilisation were brought about over territories of incredible area by -the intelligence, enterprise, and energy of one individual. And he, too -often, when the battle was won, the standard hoisted, and the multitude -pouring over the breach, found himself a beggared and a broken man. - -Mr. Neuchamp, after due preliminaries, entered the office of Messrs. -Sticker and Pugsley, with whom he had an interview by no means of a -disagreeable character. The senior partner, an elderly, gray-haired -personage, showed much of the formal politeness which is commonly -thought to distinguish the gentleman of ‘the old school.’ He received -Ernest courteously, begged that he would take a chair, alluded to the -weather, deplored the arrival of the mosquitoes, to which the rain -and the spring in conjunction had been jointly favourable, requested -to know whom he had the honour of receiving, and finally desired -information as to the particular mode in which he could be of service -to him. - -‘I have been informed,’ said Ernest, ‘that your firm are agents for the -Mildool station, and that it is in the market. I have come to request -that you will put it under offer to me, as I have some intention of -purchasing a property of that sort.’ - -‘We have not as yet advertised it,’ replied Mr. Sticker; ‘still, you -have been rightly informed that the station and stock are for sale. But -we do not think of offering it upon the usual terms; our own opinion -is, I do not disguise it from you, that present prices will not last. I -have been many years in the colony, and such is my belief. Mr. Pugsley, -whose opinion of the permanence of present high rates is better than -mine, also believes that, with the properties entrusted to us, it is as -well to be safe, and to take advantage of an opportunity that may never -occur again. Our terms for Mildool are briefly these: We offer four -thousand head of mixed cattle, above six months old, with, of course, -the M[Ḋ] brand, at five pounds per head, everything given in. I am -informed that the improvements are scanty and in bad repair; there are -twenty stock horses, and a team of bullocks and dray, two huts, and a -stockyard. But, perhaps, you know the property, and the appearance of -the buildings.’ - -‘The huts _are_ old and bad,’ said Ernest, smiling; ‘and as for the -stockyard, the Mildool stockmen have for the last few years brought -their cattle to our yard for safety, as you could kick down the Mildool -yard anywhere. But what is your idea of terms?’ - -‘Half cash, and the balance in approved bills, at one and two years, -secured upon the stock and station.’ - -‘Rather stiff,’ said Ernest; ‘but will you put the offer in writing, -and leave it open for a week? I will before that time give you a -decided answer.’ - -Mr. Sticker would have much pleasure in doing so. As Ernest preferred -to wait for the important document, it was soon prepared, and he -finally marched away with a fortune, as it turned out (fate and -opportunity are queer things), in his waistcoat pocket. He was not too -quick in his conditional annexation of this desirable territory. Ten -minutes afterwards Mr. Hardy Baldacre dashed into the office on the -same errand, quitting it with a curse which shocked Mr. Sticker, and -provoked Mr. Pugsley, who was young and athletic, to inform him that -he must not suppose that his money provided him the permission to be -rude, though it did procure him consideration far beyond his deserts. -Altogether, Mr. Baldacre felt as if his brandy-and-soda had been -scarcely so efficacious as usual that morning. - -When Mr. Neuchamp produced this small but important document to Paul -Frankston, that commercial mentor rubbed his hands with unconcealed -satisfaction. - -‘You’ve got ’em, Ernest, my boy, hard and fast. I believe you might -make a pound a head, say four thousand pounds out of it, in a month. -Sticker is a good man, according to his light, and Pug’s a sharp -fellow. But they don’t see, and won’t see, the signs of the times. -They’re always remembering the old boiling-down days, and they fancy -that the least change in markets will send us back to it. You did right -to get the offer in writing, and for a deferred time. We’ll keep it a -day or two, and then you shall go and accept the terms like a man.’ - -‘But how about the money?’ inquired Mr. Neuchamp with a shade of -natural anxiety. ‘Twenty thousand pounds are no nutshells, however -little it may sound in these extravagant days.’ - -‘Look here,’ said Paul, ‘find this ten thousand down; any agent will -give you five thousand on the security of your year’s draft of fat -stock from the two runs; it will come to more, I daresay, but we must -be as careful as we can. I think that you will have to give a mortgage -over Rainbar and Mildool—a second one—and then you may draw a cheque -for the ten thousand as soon as you like.’ - -‘And what about the “approved” bills?‘ - -‘Well, the day after to-morrow you can go to old Sticker and pay him -the half cash. I’ll put the cash part of it through; ask him to make -out the bills, with interest added at 8 per cent; bring them to me, -and I will put a name on the back which will render them legal tender, -whatever may come of them after.’ - -‘The old story since I came to Australia,’ said Ernest. ‘It seems that -I can do nothing without your advice; and that your help follows me as -a natural consequence—whatever I do, and whatever I buy.’ - -‘Well, if this shot turns out badly,’ said Paul, ‘I’ll promise not -to _back your bills any more_. Will that satisfy you? But Levison -seems quite determined, “just this once,” as the children say, and I -generally take his tip if I see a chance. I think our money is on the -right horse.‘ - -‘I hope so,’ said Ernest, thinking, respectfully, of the lovely -condition of Rainbar at the moment, and fearing lest, by any financial -legerdemain, it might be taken away from him in time to come. - -Before the week was ended, during which the offer of Mildool was open -for his acceptance, Mr. Neuchamp had the satisfaction of handing Mr. -Sticker a cheque for ten thousand pounds, which he had been obligingly -permitted by his banker to draw against certain securities, and also -two bills, with interest added at the rate of 8 per cent, for the -balance. Upon which somewhat important documents being well scanned -and examined, and further submitted to Mr. Pugsley, who was on that -occasion introduced, Ernest received an order to obtain delivery of -the Mildool station, having twenty-four miles frontage to the river, -and going thirty miles back, with four thousand head of cattle, more or -less, depasturing thereon, the same to be mustered and counted over in -six weeks; any cattle deficient to be paid for by Sticker and Pugsley, -at the rate of two-pounds-ten per head, and all cattle in excess to -be taken by the purchaser at that price. When this transaction was -concluded—on paper, Mr. Neuchamp began to realise that he was having -pastoral greatness thrust upon him. - -Speculation is a grandly exciting occupation, when all goes well. -When the bark is launched, mayhap with tremulous hope, perchance -with the reckless pride of youth, there is a wondrously intoxicating -triumph in noting the gradual, ever-deep, engine-flowing tide, the -steady, favourable gale before which the galley which carried Cæsar -and his fortunes ‘walks the waters like a thing of life,’ and finally -conveys the illustrious freight to one of the fair havens of the -gracious goddess Success. A triumph is decreed to Cæsar. Immediately -Cæsar’s critics become bland, his enemies fangless, his friends are -pacified—_they_ are always the most difficult personages to assuage; -his detractors go and detract from others; his creditors burn incense -before him; his feminine acquaintances dress at him, talk at him, sing -at him, and _look_ at him—oh! so differently. - -Cæsar needs all of his unusually powerful mental attributes if he does -not become abominably conceited, and straightway refer the kindness of -circumstance to his own inherent talent for calculation and brilliant -combination. Let him haste to place yet higher stakes upon the tables, -and after the usual fluctuation and flattery of the Fiend, he arises -one day ruined, undone, and despised by himself, neglected by others. - -The fate of Ernest Neuchamp could never thus be told. Naturally too -prudent in pecuniary matters to go much further than he had good -warrant for, he was even alarmed at his present comparatively risky -position. But he had adopted the advice of his best friend, whose -former counsels had been accurately borne out in successful practice. -He had taken time to consider. Wiser heads than his own were committed -to the same results; and he was according to his custom, prepared to -dismiss anxiety, and to await the issue. - -Nor was he minded on this account to cut short his stay in Sydney. -He determined, in accordance with his own feelings and Mr. Levison’s -suggestion, to give the management of the new station to his faithful -henchman Jack Windsor, who, now that he was married and settled, would -be all the better fitted to undertake a position of responsibility. As -for Charley Banks, he should retain him as general manager of Rainbar. -He ought not even to live there always himself. If it kept on raining -and elevating the fat cattle market _ad infinitum_, the place could be -managed with a ‘long arm.’ No reason to bury himself there for ever. He -might even run home to England for a year or so. - -Meanwhile it was not unpleasant to be congratulated at the club upon -his improved prospects, and his spirited purchase of so extensive and -well-known a property as Mildool. He commenced to divide the honour of -rapid operation with Mr. Parklands, and found from day to day offers -awaiting him of desirable properties situated north, south, east, and -west, with any quantity and variety of stock, and of every sort and -description of climate and ‘country.’ Mr. Parklands, to the ineffable -disgust of Jermyn Croker, had already sold Booroo-booroo and Chatsworth -at a profit of six thousand pounds, which Mr. Croker said he regarded -as being taken out of his pocket, so to speak. Parklands had, moreover, -the coolness to say that, if it had been worth his while to keep two -such small stations on hand for a longer time, he could have made ten -thousand as easily as the six. Mr. Croker objected to the claret and -cookery more pointedly than usual that day, and the committee and the -house steward had an evil time of it; that is, as far as contemptuous -reference may have affected them. - -Mr. Parklands, now truly in his element, indulged his fancy for -unlimited speculation and locomotion to the fullest extent. He filled -the Melbourne markets with store stock and fat stock, horses and -sheep, working bullocks and milch cows, every possible variety of -animal, except goats and swine. It was asserted that he _did_ consider -the nanny question, and calculated roughly whether a steamer-load -of those miniature milchers would not pay decently. He ransacked -Tasmania for oats, palings, and jam, and, no doubt, would have largely -imported that other interesting product, of which the sister island -has always yielded so bounteous a supply, could he have seen his way -to a clearing-off sale when he landed the cargo. Finally, he dashed -off to Adelaide for a slap at copper, and having taken a contract for -‘ship cattle’ for New Zealand, paused, like another Alexander, awaiting -the discovery of fresh colonies in which he might revel in still more -colossal operations. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIX - - -A letter had been despatched to Mr. Windsor’s address, of which -his master had knowledge, requesting him to proceed to Sydney upon -important business. Accordingly, at an early hour next day he presented -himself at the club steps and greeted his employer with a subdued air -of satisfaction, as if doubtful how far his recent decided action had -met with approval. - -‘I am very glad to see you, John,’ said Mr. Neuchamp; ‘I hope Mrs. -Windsor is well. I congratulate you both heartily. Yours was a spirited -plan, and your success in the carrying out, or rather the carrying -off, of my old friend Carry most enviable. I was afraid there might be -obstacles. How did you arrange it all? Suppose you walk over to the -Domain with me, and tell me all about it.’ - -Mr. Windsor, much doubting if this were the important business upon -which he had been summoned to town, but not unwilling to relate the -tale of his victory to so sympathising an auditor as he knew his master -to be, thus commenced— - -‘You know, sir, I had a tightish ride to get over before I caught the -mail. I felt very queer, I tell you, as if I didn’t meet that identical -coach I should never get down in time. I was horrid frightened every -time I thought about it, there’s no mistake. I saved Ben Bolt as much -as I could the first day and bandaged his legs when I got to the stable -late at night. I did eighty miles that day, and dursn’t go farther for -fear I might crack him at the first burst. I was up with the stars and -fed him. I didn’t sleep much, you’re sure, and at three in the morning -I was off for a hundred mile ride! and that heat, _a man’s life_! Mine -wouldn’t have mattered much afterwards, if I’d lost. I didn’t feel gay -just then, and I thought Ben Bolt walked out rather stiff. However, -he put his ears back, and switched his tail sideways, as I mounted. -That was a good sign. It was all plains, of course, soft, sandy -road—couldn’t be beat for smoothness, and firm, too. I kept him going -in a steady hand-gallop, pulling him up only now and again during the -forenoon. In the middle of the day I stopped for three good hours, gave -him a middling feed—not too much, and got a little water; but he got -a real good strapping. I stood over the feller doing it, and gave him -half-a-crown. - -‘I’d done fifty miles between three and eleven—I wasn’t going fast, you -see—but of course the second fifty makes all the difference. I began -to be afraid he was too big. The feed at Rainbar was awfully good, you -know, sir; but as luck would have it, I’d given him some stiffish days -after the farthest out cattle, and that had hardened him a bit. - -‘About two o’clock I cleared out again; saddled him myself; saw that -his back was all right, and felt his legs, which were as cool and clean -as if he hadn’t gone a yard. I had the second fifty to do before twelve -at night. That was the time the coach passed, and hardly waited a -moment, either. - -‘Off again, and I kept on steady at first, trusting to six miles an -hour to do it in, and something to spare; but every now and again -I kept thinking, thinking, suppose he goes lame all of a sudden! -suppose he jacks up! suppose he falls, put his foot into a hole, or -anything—rolls over me and gallops off, all the men in the world -wouldn’t catch him! suppose I’m stopped by bushrangers—Red Cap’s out, -you know;—why don’t they hang every scoundrel that turns out the moment -he hoists his flag?’ - -‘Because they might reform, John,’ mildly interposed Mr. Neuchamp. - -‘No fear—that is, mostly, sir,’ continued Jack apologetically; ‘but -they wouldn’t have had the heart to stop me; and besides, I expect I -could have dusted any of ’em with Ben. - -‘Well, bushrangers or not, I got within twenty miles of Boree; and then -my head got so full of fancies, that I settled to make a call on Ben -Bolt, and do it in two hours. Suppose the coach was earlier than usual! -No passengers, or only some young squatter, who wanted to go faster -and to stop nowhere—and tipped the driver! I’ve seen these things done -before now. - -‘So I took the old horse by the head, gave him a hustle and a pull, -and, by George, if you’ll believe me, sir, he went away with his mouth -open, as if he hadn’t only been out to the Back Lake. The sun was down -then, and the night air was coolish. But I knew the track well, and as -we sailed along, Ben Bolt giving a kind of snort every now and then, -same as he used to do when he didn’t know the place he was going to, I -felt that I had the field beat, and the race as good as won. I thought -I could see Carry a-beckonin’ to me at the winning-post. I hardly -think I pulled up three times, I felt that eager, and bound to win or -die, before I saw the light of the Boree Inn, and the coach stables -across the plain. - -‘“Has the coach from down the river come in yet, Joe?” says I to the -ostler, trembling all over. - -‘“No, nor won’t be this hours yet; you needn’t have rode so fast.” - -‘“I couldn’t afford to be late,” says I. “Lend us a rug while I cool -my old horse a bit. He’s carried me well this day, if he never does -another.” - -‘Ben didn’t look beat—nor yet half beat. My belief is he could have -done another twenty or thirty miles without cracking up. But a hundred -miles is a hundred miles, and no foolish ride, even in this country -where horses are as plenty as wallabies, such as they are, so I did -my best for him. I let him rinse his mouth, and then I walked him up -and down, with the rug on, for a solid hour. Of course he broke out -at first, but he gradually dried and come all right. Before the coach -started with me on board, he was doing nicely for the night, littered -down (for we foraged some straw out of the bottled ale casks) and -eating his feed just as he would after a longish day’s muster out back -at Rainbar.’ - -‘I am very glad he carried you so well, John,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, at -the conclusion of this antipodean Turpin’s ride; ‘but how did you speed -in the last and most momentous stage?’ - -‘Oh, _that_ was easy drafting enough,’ replied Mr. Windsor, who -apparently had considered that portion of his matrimonial adventure -which depended upon horseflesh as the really important and exciting -part of the transaction. ‘I was safe and sound in Parramatta on the -Thursday afternoon. I heard enough about the grand wedding for next -day—but I never let on. Said I was off by sea to Queensland to look at -some store cattle, and hired a trap, with a fairish horse, and a boy to -mind it, which I drove down to the cross-roads, just about a mile from -the “Cheshire Cheese.” There was an old woodcutter’s hut just inside -the fence at the corner. So I left the boy there, and told him to hold -the horse among the trees, and not to go away till I came—if it wasn’t -till dinner-time to-morrow. Of course, I squared him right. He was -sharp enough; them Parramatta boys mostly are. - -‘Down I goes to the old house, and marched in quite free and pleasant -like, to spend the evening for the sake of old times. There was Carry -looking half dull, half desperate, like a mountain filly three days in -the pound—as I told her afterwards—though she was among her own people, -in a manner of speaking. - -‘There was Homminey, and some other Hawkesbury chaps, full of their -jokes and fun—my word! if I could only have gone in at him and his -best man, a great, slab-sided, six-foot-three fellow, just about as -scraggy as he was tallowy, I think I could have spoilt both their -figure-heads—one up and the other down. - -‘However, there wouldn’t have been any sense in charging the whole -family, like a knocked-up bullock meeting a picnic party—as I once saw, -and didn’t he scatter ’em!—so I put on all the side I could, and laid -by for a chance. - -‘First of all, I shook hands with ’em all round, and came the -warm-hearted fakement. Said “I’d come to say good-bye; they mustn’t -think I bore any ill-will—just on my way to the north for store cattle, -passage taken and all—happened to hear of the wedding to-morrow, and -thought I’d look in and wish ’em joy.” - -‘Then, of course, I threw my money about—must have a round of drinks -for luck. I never saw a publican yet that could refuse to serve a -“shout.” Then, of course, _they_ must treat me, seeing I was behaving -so handsome. Then I must have another round for all hands; and last -of all, I gammoned to be a bit “sprung,” and must propose the bride’s -health. So I made ’em fill up. Homminey’s little round eyes was -beginning to twinkle a bit, and old Walton was getting affectionate, -but Carry’s mother watched us both like a cat. I said, “I knowed the -bride these two years or more, and I proposed her health, and that of -the good-hearted, honest, straightforward chap as was going to marry -her to-morrow morning.” This fetched ’em about a bit. I said, “I’d -knowed him a goodish while, and heard tell of him, too, and a better -feller couldn’t be. After he was married he’d be still better,—a deal -better, _that_ I could safely go bail for. He couldn’t help it, with -such a wife. I therefore gave the health of Miss Carry Walton and her -husband that was to be, to-morrow, and no heel-taps.” I never proposed -my own health before. - -‘Well, Homminey, after this, came over and squeezed my hand in his -great mutton fist, and looked at me, as if he wasn’t quite sure; then -he bust out and said I was a real good-natured chap, as didn’t bear -malice, and I’d always be welcome at Richmond Point. - -‘“Right you are, old corn-cob,” says I; “I’ll come and see you the -very first time you ask me. And now let’s have a bit of a dance to -finish up with, for my time’s short, and I must be off. The steamer -leaves at daylight.” - -‘Well, between the grog, and being that glad to get rid of me, that -they’d have done anything to see my back, they all agreed to it. There -were three or four other girls there; one of ’em, his cousin, was -fourteen stone if she was a pound. I gave her a few turns when the -music struck up, and then turned to Carry, quite promiskus, directly -the tune was altered. - -‘“Oh dear, oh dear, why did you come?” she said in a low tone; “wasn’t -I miserable enough before?” - -‘“You know the cross-roads?” I says, knocking against the tall chap’s -partner to drown the words. “There’s no time for talking. If you’re as -true to me as I am to you, will you do as I tell you?” - -‘“You know I will,” she said; “what can I do?” - -‘“Can you get out of your bedroom?” I says. - -‘“No. I don’t know. Yes—perhaps. I think I can,” she said in a strange -voice, not a bit like her own. - -‘“Then get away the moment you get to bed—don’t stop to take anything -with you, but make straight for the cross-roads. Inside the trees -you’ll see a buggy with a boy. Stay with him till I come. It will be -there till daylight and long afterwards. Will you come, Carry?” - -‘“If I don’t come I shall be mad, or locked up, or dead,” she said, -with such a miserable look on her face that I could hardly help kissing -her and comforting her before them all. - -‘Now, the old woman helped us, without wanting to, for she says, -“Carry, you’re looking like a washed-out print frock; do, for gracious -sake, go to bed, and sleep away your headache. She’s not been well -lately, Mr. Windsor, and she’s flustered like at seeing strangers, not -but what you’ve behaved most gentlemanly.” - -‘“I’m afraid she’s thinkin‘about her wedding-dress or her veil, -or something,” says I. “I wish I could stay and see how she looks -to-morrow, but I can’t, and business is business.” - -‘Poor Carry was off before this, with just “Good-night all,” which made -Homminey look rather glum. I ordered another round, saying I must be -off; but when it was drunk and paid for, I stayed half an hour before I -shook hands, most hearty, and walked out. - -‘The moment I turned the corner of the garden-fence I started off, and -ran that mile up to the cross-roads as if all the blacks on Cooper’s -Creek was after me. Just as I got to the trap I overtook a woman, with -a large bundle, labouring along. It never could be—yes _it was_—Carry! - -‘I first kissed her and then scolded her. “Never a woman born,” I said, -“that could do without a bundle. Why didn’t you leave all that rubbish? -ain’t you good enough for me as you are?” - -‘“Oh, John,” says she, “would you have me come to you in my—in my one -frock? Nonsense! every woman must have a little dress.” - -‘“Suppose you had been caught?” - -‘“But I’m not caught, except by a bushranger, or some wild character,” -says she, smiling for the first time. “I’m afraid poor Harry will not -enjoy his dinner to-morrow.” - -‘“Hang him and his dinner!” said I. “He’s all dinner. I’ve half a mind -to go back and murder him now.” - -‘But instead of that, we made haste for Appin, after giving the boy a -pound. And, to make a long story short, were married there _that day_, -for it was past twelve o’clock. And Carry’s there with my old mother -now, and very proud she is of her.’ - -‘I see, John,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, ‘that you have carried out one -enterprise with your usual success. The other one I want you for, now, -is to start at once for Rainbar, and to take delivery of Mildool run -and stock, which I bought last week. They agree to muster in six weeks. -And you can tell Carry—Mrs. Windsor, I beg her pardon—that she is the -overseer’s wife at Mildool. I have decided to give you the management -of that run, and I look for wonderful profits from it all this season.’ - -‘And you’ll get ’em, sir,’ said Mr. Windsor, ‘if there’s any faith in a -fust chop season, and right-down hard work. God Almighty’s given us the -fust, and if Jake Windsor don’t find the second, he wishes his right -arm may rot off to the shoulder.’ - -‘I have no doubt that you will do your best, John,’ answered Mr. -Neuchamp, much gratified by the warm gratitude exhibited by one whose -fate at one time lay in his hand; whose after-career had done so much -to justify his anxiety for the welfare of his fellow-man. ‘I have no -doubt that Mildool will be the best-managed station on the river—after -Rainbar, of course; and that there will be a splendid increase this -year,—always providing that no calf bears my brand—and never mistake -me on that score—that cannot be honestly provided with a mother of the -same ownership.’ - -Mr. Windsor made a slight gesture of compulsory resignation, as of -one who feels himself bound down to superhuman purity; but he said, -‘You shall be obeyed in that, sir; and in every other thing you choose -to order; though it will come queer to the old hands at Mildool, if -all tales are true, to kill their own beef, let alone mothering their -calves. But _your word’s my law_! And I see now that going straight -is the best in the end, whether in big things or little. We’ll be off -to-morrow, Carry and I, and she can hang it out at Rainbar and have -Tot Freeman to talk to—those chaps ain’t left yet, I believe—while I’m -taking over the cattle at Mildool.’ - -‘That will do very well, John. Meanwhile you can let a contract for a -neat six-roomed cottage at Mildool, as there isn’t a place there fit -for Piambook and his gin to live in. You must consult your wife about -the site of it, though, as she will have to live in it and spend many a -day by herself there. Don’t let her regret the snug parlour and the old -orchard at the “Cheshire Cheese,” eh, John?‘ - -‘Well, it _is_ a great change, now I come to think of it,’ said Mr. -Windsor, the first expression of distrust coming over his bold features -that had been there exhibited since his successful raid upon the -lowlanders. ‘I daresay she _would_ feel struck all of a heap if she -was to come upon Mildool old station sudden-like, with the dog-holes -of huts, and every tree cut down on the sandhill because the men were -too lazy to go out for firewood, or for fear the blacks might sneak on -them, and the pile of bones, like a boiling down round the gallows. -But, thank God! there’s grass now, and there’s fat cattle enough in -Mildool by this time—for they’ve never sent away a beast this season, I -hear—to build an Exhibition, if it’s wanted. Carry’s got me, and I’ve -got her, that’s the main thing; and I think we shall make shift to jog -along. We’ve got to do it, and no two ways about it. So, good-bye, sir. -When shall we see you at Rainbar?’ - -‘I am afraid that business will detain me in Sydney for some weeks -longer,’ said Mr. Neuchamp thoughtfully, as if mentally calculating -the exact day on which he might quit the metropolis. ‘But you and Mr. -Banks will be able to manage the muster easy enough.’ - -‘Not a bit of bother there need be about it, that I can see, sir. We -shall have lots of help; every stockman within a hundred miles will be -there. There’ll be an awful big mob of strangers; and the Drewarrina -poundkeeper hasn’t had such a lift for many a day as he’ll get. We must -square the tails of every beast that’s counted, that’s one thing, so as -not to have ’em played on to us twice over. I think Mr. Banks is down -to most moves about cattle work, and what he don’t know I can tell him. -Good-bye, sir.’ - -‘By the way, John,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, ‘I shall want you to stay in -town this evening, if you can spare so much time away from Carry. I -have to see about the draft copy of the sale agreement, which you -will take up with you and give to Mr. Banks. Mr. Frankston informs me -that these agreements need to be very strictly carried out, and that -advantageous purchases _have_ been evaded from neglect in doing so. -So come out to Morahmee this afternoon, when you can have my final -instructions.’ - -Mr. Neuchamp spent the morning in tolerably close attendance upon -lawyers and persons addicted to the drawing up of those paper and -parchment promises which, if honour were binding, need never to have -troubled penman or engrosser. Nathless, human nature being what it is, -and retaining simian tendencies to steal, hide, falsely chatter and -closely clutch, the sheepskin may not be safely relinquished. Before -Mr. Neuchamp bethought himself of the mid-day solace of lunch he was -possessed of a legal document, wherein the exact time granted for -mustering and several other leading conditions were set forth with -such clearness that evasion or misunderstanding seemed impossible. - -A copy of this all-important document was posted to Charley Banks; he -brought with him another for the use of Mr. Windsor, who might employ -his leisure time on the journey up in learning it by heart, and so -render himself able to meet all comers respecting its provisions. - -Antonia had expressed a wish to see Jack Windsor, and to send a message -to his wife before he left town. For this reason chiefly Ernest had -appointed Morahmee as the rendezvous on this particular afternoon. As -the shadows lengthened, Mr. Neuchamp betook himself in that direction, -as indeed he had done daily for weeks past. - -It so chanced that, on the evening before, Antonia had received a pink -triangular note from Miss Harriet Folleton, who was more or less a -friend of hers, to say that she intended to come and lunch with her -next day at Morahmee, and would be there, unless her dear Antonia wrote -to say she couldn’t have her. There was not any great similitude of -taste or disposition between the two girls—one indeed much disapproved -of the other. But those who have noted the ways of their _monde_ will -not decide from this statement that Antonia Frankston and Harriet -Folleton did any the less greet one another with kisses and effusion -when meeting, or say farewell with lavish use of endearing epithets. - -Such being the state of matters, it was by no means surprising that -Harriet Folleton, a girl of great beauty and soft, enthralling manner, -but of so moderate a development of intellect that she might have been -called, if any one had been so rudely uncompromising as to speak the -unvarnished truth about so pretty a creature, ‘a fool proper,’ should -arrive in the paternal brougham before mid-day, and therefore share -luncheon with her dear Antonia in much innocence and peace. - -It would have been even less surprising to any one who had possessed -the requisite leisure and opportunity to study that fair girl’s ways, -that, as the two friends were strolling near the strand, where a giant -fig-tree shadowed half the little bay, a boat should pull round the -adjoining headland, manned by four man-of-war-looking yachtsmen, with -the _White Falcon_ on their breasts and hat-ribbons, while from the -boat, as she ran up to the jetty, stepped the gracious form of Count -von Schätterheims. - -‘Why, you naughty girl,’ said Antonia, instantly divining the ruse, ‘I -do believe you planned to meet the Count here, and disobey your father. -So this coming to see me was all deception! How dare you treat me like -this? I have a great mind to tell your father, and never speak to you -again.’ - -‘Oh, pray don’t, Antonia dearest,’ whimpered the softly insincere one, -‘I only said I _might_ be here this afternoon; and he said he was -going off to Batavia, or Russia, or India, or somewhere. And papa was -so dreadful, that I thought there was no harm in it. I shall never -see him again—oh!’ Here the despairingly undecided damsel commenced -to weep, and so interfere with the natural charms of her fine and -uncommon complexion, that Antonia, inwardly resolving to restrict the -acquaintance to conventional limits in future, was constrained to -soothe and console her. Meanwhile the Count, who had been engaged in an -earnest colloquy with his crew, advanced with his customary gallantry -to meet them. - - ‘My boad is on de zhore - And my barg is on de zea; - -is not dat the voord of your boet? I come to make farevell to you, Miss -Frankstein; to you, Miss Folledon, to lay at your veet dis hertz—mein -hertz—vich is efer for dee so vondly beating.’ - -‘And are you really going to leave us, Count?’ asked Antonia, without -any particular interest or otherwise in the noble foreigner, of whom -she was becoming wearied and increasingly distrustful. Then happening -to look at Harriet Folleton’s face, she saw that she was deathly pale, -and trembled as if about to fall. The Count, too, though complimentary -as usual, seemed annoyed and uneasy at her presence. - -The Count, in answer to the question, pointed to his yacht, a beautiful -schooner, more fair than honest of aspect, and of marvellous sailing -powers, which had, perhaps, more than any of his reported possessions, -tended to sustain his prestige since his arrival in Sydney. - -Antonia’s practised eye at once discerned that she was fully equipped -for sea. With sails ready to be unfurled at a moment’s notice, she -could sweep out unchallenged and trackless as the falcon on her ensign, -before the freshening south wind which was even now curling the waves -with playful but increasing power. - -With lightning rapidity she divined the full extent of the girl’s -imprudence and the Count’s villainy. In the same sudden mental -effort she resolved, at all hazards, to save her companion from the -consequences of her inconceivable folly. - -‘I did vorm de resolution dat I shall bezeegh you and Miss Folledon -to honour me by paying me von last leetle visit on board de -_Valgon_, dis afdernoon. Mine goot friend Paul, he was goming, but -de business—dat pete noir—he brevent him. He ask me to peg Miss -Frankstein if she vill, zo also Miss Folledon, vizout her fader, to my -so-poor-yet-highly-to-be-honoured graft go. Dere is izes, one small -collation, a few friend. Surely you will join dem?’ - -Here the Count beamed the irresistible smile which had through life -served him well, and advancing, held out both hands to the young ladies. - -‘Oh, do let us go!’ said the reassured weakling. ‘It would be so -pleasant. It is such a delightful afternoon. I should like it of all -things.’ - -But Antonia more than ever distrusted the Count, _et dona ferentes_. -She disliked his eye, his wily words, the appearance of his swarthy -crew, the evidently sea-fitted appearance of the yacht. She felt more -than ever convinced that he had matured a deliberate plot to carry off -an unsuspecting girl. - -Such in truth was the unpardonable sin with which the Herr von -Schätterheims had resolved to conclude his Australian career. Unable to -meet the many pressing claims upon his finances, the holders of which, -he had reason to know, were meditating an advance in line; having -failed in the daring speculations in which, by means of humble foreign -agents, he had invested the small capital with which he had arrived, -and the incredibly large loans which his assurance and reputation for -wealth had enabled him to procure,—he had conceived the desperate plan -which Antonia’s quick intuition had discovered. He had determined, -by force or fraud, to carry off Harriet Folleton, trusting that the -irrevocable _coup_ once made, time and other considerations would tend -to the ultimate wresting of her immense fortune from her father’s hands. - -Hunted by his creditors and threatened with imprisonment, the Count -was now desperate. In such a position he had, more than once during -his career, showed no disposition to stick at trifles. His yacht lay -within hail—a seabird with her great wings plumed for instant flight, a -Norway falcon looking on ocean from a low-placed rocky ridge. His crew -of mixed nationality, who had followed him through many a clime, were -lawless and devoted. The hour had come when Albert von Schätterheims -would stand forth with front unveiled, and show these simple dwellers -by the shore of the southern main what manner of man they had dared to -drive to bay. - -Therefore, when Antonia Frankston stepped forward, and with head erect -and flashing eye interposed between the Count and his sacrifice, she -confronted a different man from the silky, graceful _serviteur des -dames_ with whom she had often wished, for some instinctive reason, to -quarrel. - -‘I cannot go with you now, nor shall Miss Folleton, Count -Schätterheims; it would not be right, in my father’s absence. Permit us -to return to the house.’ - -‘Beholt me desoladed if Miss Frankstein will not honour my poor boad,’ -said the Count, as he barred the progress of the two young ladies -on the somewhat narrow green-walled alley which led to the house; -‘but’—fixing his eye steadily upon Harriet Folleton—‘I go not forth -alone; Miss Harriet Folledon, you bromised me. I haf your vord. You -vill come with me now; is it not so, belofet one? Ja! you vill follow -de fortunes of Albert von Schätterheims, for efer.’ - -He strode forward a pace, and seizing the wrist of the frightened girl, -spoke rapidly in Spanish, while two of his sailors ran up from the -boat, to whom he committed the half-insensible form of the fainting -girl. - -Antonia Frankston did not faint or swoon. With sudden movement she -confronted the Count, with so fierce an air and so unblenching a brow -that he involuntarily stepped back a pace, and made as though to -protect himself from the onset of a foe. - -‘Coward and robber that you are, release her this instant,’ she cried. - -The Count smiled sardonically. ‘You will parton me, mademoiselle, if I -redurn you with my complimend for your goot opinion. My engachemends is -more pressing, as you gan pelief.’ - -On the girl’s face, as she stood with threatening aspect—a young -Bellona, as yet unversed in battles—burned a deeper glow; in her eye -flashed a fiercer light as she marked the smile on the calm features of -the Count, which, in her heated fancy, seemed the mocking regard of a -fiend. - -‘She shall _not_ go!’ cried she, springing forward and throwing her -arms round the neck of the helpless maid. ‘Oh that my father were -here—or Ernest —— Robbers, villains, assassins that you are, release -her—don’t dare to touch _me_!’ - -But at this moment, at a signal from their chief, the dark-browed, -swarthy seamen laid their rude hands upon the sacred form of the -deliverer herself, and rapidly hurried both damsels towards the gig. -With one wild look to heaven, one frantic gesture of wrath, despair, -and abandonment, Antonia Frankston betook herself to one of the best -weapons in her sex’s armoury, and shrieked till every rock and tree -within a mile of Morahmee echoed again. - -‘_Carambo!_’ said one of the men, ‘we shall have half Sydney here -before we are clear with these shrieking senoritas; have you no muffler -for her cursed mouth?’ - -‘_Paciencia_, Diego!’ said the Count, ‘harm her not. A few minutes will -suffice—and then——’ - -But before further infraction of the liberty of the subject could be -carried out, Miss Frankston had exhibited for some moments the full -force of a very vigorous pair of lungs. The party had nearly reached -the little pier, whence so many joyous bands had taken the water, when -a man came crashing through the shrubbery, and rushed furiously at Von -Schätterheims. - -‘Stand back, Neuchamp!’ shouted the Count, levelling a revolver, ‘or -you die.’ - -‘Scoundrel and pirate that you are,’ said Ernest, facing him with -steady eye, ‘fire! do your worst. By heaven, I will tear you limb from -limb if you do not instantly order your ruffians to desist.’ - -This rather melodramatic threat was used by Mr. Neuchamp, who was cool -enough to take in the precise aspect of the fray at a glance, more with -the intention of gaining time than of intimidating five armed men. - -He was eminently at a disadvantage as matters stood. He was, so to -speak, at the Count’s mercy, being at the wrong end of his revolver, -and that experienced soldier, sailor, tinker, tailor, or whatever, -indeed, in time past might have been his true designation, was far too -wary to permit him a chance of closing. - -The sailors in whose grasp were Antonia and her guest had drawn their -knives, and were prepared for an affray _à l’outrance_. The two seamen -in the boat carried sheath-knives at least. He could not but admit -to himself, grinding his teeth the while, that he had the hazard of -beholding his love torn from her home by the rude hands of lawless men, -or of dying vainly in her defence. - -To this latter alternative, could it but avert her peril, he was -willing, nay anxious, to yield himself. But if—if only a short respite -could be gained—even now—the issue was uncertain. His resolution was -taken. - -‘Stop your men, Count, while we parley,’ he said, ‘or, by the God above -us, you shall shoot me down the next second, and I tear the false heart -out of your breast, if you miss. Choose!’ And he stepped forward in the -face of the levelled weapon. - -‘You are mat, like every dummer Englander, I pelief,’ said the -nineteenth-century buccaneer. ‘Why should I not kill you for your -insults to my honour? But I revrain. I would not meddle with the -Fräulein Frankstein—she dell you herselve, but she try to rop me of my -shpirit-star—my schatz—bromised prite—I presend her to you. I know your -sendimend for her. I make you my complimend. Her dempers is angelig.’ - -Here the Count wreathed his face into such a smile as the companion of -Faust may have worn when Marguerite implores the Mater Dolorosa, and -spoke rapidly with commanding gesture to his myrmidons, who released -their hold upon Miss Frankston. But Antonia still clung with desperate -tenacity to the cold hands, the corpse-like form of Harriet Folleton. - -‘You see she is obstinade—to the death,’ said the Count, whose -moustache seemed to curl with wrath. ‘It is not her affair, or yours; -go in beace, gross not my path more furder.’ - -‘I cannot abandon Miss Folleton, nor will Antonia,’ said Mr. Neuchamp, -raising his voice so as to drown a peculiar crackling noise in the -shrubbery which his ear had caught. ‘Do _you_ go in peace, Von -Schätterheims? Wrong not further the kind hearts that have trusted -you; betray not hospitality free and open as ever man received. I will -return with both, or not at all.’ - -‘Then die, fool!’ hissed the Count, as he raised his weapon and fired -full at the head of Ernest Neuchamp, who at the same moment rushed in -and closed, while his blood flowed freely from a wound in the forehead, -and ensanguined his adversary as they grappled in deadly conflict. - -The accuracy of the Count’s aim, faultless and unerring in gallery -practice, or at the _poupée_, of which he could drill heart, head, or -limb, five times out of six, may or may not have been shaken by the -sudden apparition of Jack Windsor, or by the portentous yell which that -gentleman emitted, worthy of Piambook or Boinmaroo, as he observed the -Count in the act of firing at the sacred head of his benefactor. - -Too late to interpose with effect as he stood on a block of sandstone -overlooking the scene of conflict, he raised his voice in one of the -half-Indian cries with which the horsemen of the Central Desert are -wont to intimidate the unwilling herd at the stockyard-gates. The -sailors started and gazed with astonishment as Mr. Windsor sprang -recklessly from his elevated post, and cleared the rough declivity with -a succession of bounds, emulating, not unworthily, the hard-pressed -‘flyer’ of his country’s forests when the grim gazehounds are close on -haunch and flank. - -Straight as a line for the men that held the captive maids went the -henchman, and as they hurriedly released their prey and stood on -guard, Mr. Neuchamp could have offered a votary’s prayer to the patron -saint of old England’s weaponless gladiators, as he marked the unarmed -Anglo-Saxon’s rapid unswerving onset. - - Though there, the western mountaineer - Rushed with bare bosom on the spear, - And flung the feeble targe aside, - And with both hands the broadsword plied. - -Mr. Windsor so far resembled Donald at Flodden Field, that he trusted -chiefly to natural strength and courage. But none the less did he -display an amount of coolness and cunning of fence characteristically -Australian. - -Charging the nearest Frenchman, as he took him to be, and indeed in -all future relation so described him, with the velocity of a mallee -three-year-old, he feinted with his right hand at the forehead of his -foe, and as the Mexican-Spaniard, for such he was, raised his arm for -a deadly stab, he suddenly gripped his wrist, catching him full in the -face with the ‘terrible left,’ and stretched him senseless and bleeding -at his feet. Snatching up the knife, he had but time to parry a stroke -which shrewdly scored his right arm, when his other antagonist was upon -him. Both men glared at one another with uplifted knives—for a moment; -in the next Mr. Windsor swept his antagonist’s outstretched foot from -under him with a Cornish wrestler’s trick—a lift—a dull thud, and he -lay on his back, with Jack’s knee on his chest and the dangerous knife -in the bushman’s belt. - -In the meanwhile Miss Frankston, perceiving that the men who had charge -of the boat showed no disposition to quit their station, half dragged, -half raised Miss Folleton along the path to the verandah steps, halting -just within sight of the combatants. - -‘Now, do you prefer being dragged up to the house, Von -Schätterheims?—by Jove! I shoot you where you stand if you resist,’ -inquired Ernest of that nobleman, whom he had mastered after a severe -struggle, and whose revolver he now pointed at those classical -features, ‘or will you depart in God’s name, and rid us of your -presence for ever?’ - -‘It is Fade,’ said the Count gloomily. ‘He is too strong. My shtar is -under an efil influence. I will quid dese accurset lants. Let your -man—teufel dat he is with his boxanglais—release my grew, and I go; but -stay—I am guildy by your laws; why should you release me?’ - -‘You deserve death for your outrage,’ replied Ernest sternly. ‘You -could hardly escape lifelong imprisonment. But I would not willingly -see the man, at whose board I have sat, in the felon’s cell. Go, and -repent. Also—and this is my chief reason—I would willingly evade the -_esclandre_ which your public trial for this day’s proceedings would -cause.’ - -‘Ha! not the deet. But the fama—what you call “scandall,”’ said the -Count wonderingly. ‘But you English, you are as efer, a strange—a so -wunderlich beoples. Still, I go. It is all that is left to Albert von -Schätterheims in this hemis-vahr—to steal away, like the hund, beaden, -disgraced, dishonoured. Fahrwohl. Dell to the Fräulein my regret, my -despair, my shames. Under another schtar Albert von Schätterheims mighd -haf geliebt und gelebt—but all dings is now ofer.’ - -Ernest stepped back and motioned him to arise, still keeping guard. -The Count called aloud to his men, one of whom still lay beneath Mr. -Windsor’s thrall, and the other sitting up, all blood-stained, swayed -backward and forward, as only half recovered from a swoon. - -‘Let your men go, John,’ said Mr. Neuchamp. ‘The treaty of Morahmee is -arranged between the high contracting powers. They will not renew the -war,’ he continued, as the Count and Jack’s last antagonist between -them raised the fainting man and led him down to the gig, which in the -briefest period was seen heading for the yacht as fast as oars could -drive her. - -‘My word, sir,’ said Mr. Windsor, ‘it looked very crooked when I come -on the ground. I saw that frog-eating mounseer potting you with his -squirt like a tree’d ’possum—both the young ladies, too, being run off -to sea with, clean and clear against their wills. I don’t hold with -that sea business at all—it’s dangerous—let alone with a boss like -the Count, who’s wanted in his own country, like as not. However, we -euchred ’em this time, whoever plays next game.’ - -‘You behaved like a trump, Jack. You were my genuine “right bower,”’ -said Mr. Neuchamp with unwonted humour and heartiness. ‘Without you we -should never have won the odd trick. I knew that you were just behind -me at Woolloomooloo; but I was terribly afraid that you could not be up -in time.’ - -‘If one John Windsor’s anyways handy when you’re in trouble, sir, -you’ll mostly find him there or thereabouts, as long as he’s alive, -that is. I can’t say afterwards. What do you think, sir, about what -comes after all this rough-and-tumble that we coves call life?’ -demanded Jack with sudden interest. - -‘I don’t think too much about it, which is perhaps the best wisdom. But -of this we may be sure, John, that no man will fare worse in the other -world for doing his duty as a man and a Christian in this.’ - -When the house was reached, it appeared that Miss Folleton had -been handed over to the good offices of her friend’s maid, and was -recovering her nervous system in the seclusion of a guest-chamber. -Antonia, having smoothed her hair, and rearranged herself generally, -awaited the victor in the verandah. She stood gazing seawards with a -haughty air of defiance, which still savoured of the fray. The light of -battle had not faded from her eye; a bright flush embellished with rare -and wondrous beauty the untinted marble of her delicate features. - -As she stood, unconsciously statuesque, and gazed half unheeding in her -rapt regard of the flying bark, the long-loved, fast-thronging, magical -glories of the evening ocean-pageant, - - ... the day was dying: - Sudden the sun shone forth; its beams were lying - Like boiling gold on ocean, strange to see; - And on the shattered vapours, which defying - The power of light in vain, tossed restlessly - In the red heaven like wrecks in a tempestuous sea. - -‘It is you,’ she said, suddenly turning towards Ernest with a look of -praise and gratitude almost childlike in its absence of reserve. ‘How -can I, how will my father, ever thank you for this day’s deeds? I had -given up all for lost; that is, as far as that foolish Harriet was -concerned. They should have torn me limb from limb before they should -have placed us in their boat. Then I determined to fight for Harriet, -to—yes! I believe that is the word, for I really felt the real fighting -spirit all over—it is not such a very unpleasant sensation as one would -think. I was quite _exaltée_, and if I had had a revolver, I think the -Count would have paid forfeit with his life, whatever might have come -after. Papa would kill him now if they met.’ - -‘Is there no fear of such a meeting?’ - -‘None, thank Heaven!’ said Antonia, ‘though he deserves the worst in -the shape of punishment. Sydney has seen the last of him. Look!’ she -cried, as every sail on the long, low, beautiful schooner filled as -if by magic, and the graceful craft, leaning to the full force of the -strong south wind, swept forth towards the sea-way. - -‘He is safe from pursuit,’ she continued, ‘even if tidings could have -been sent at the instant. With this breeze behind him, there is nothing -in Sydney which would not be hull down behind the _White Falcon_ -before day broke. Of course he will steer for one of the northern -ports, or else for the Islands. They must have had every sail tied -with spun-yarn, so as to be ready to unfurl at a moment’s notice. To -you alone, and to that brave Jack Windsor, it is due that we are not -miserable captives in yonder flying bark. I shudder to think of it.’ - -‘I should have done little without John,’ said Mr. Neuchamp. ‘He came -up like Blücher at Waterloo, and I was as impatiently awaiting his -arrival as the Duke. Here—receive Miss Frankston’s thanks, John; then, -with her permission, you can go and ask the butler for some beer. I -daresay you feel equal to it.’ - -‘You have behaved this day, John Windsor, like a brave man and a true -Australian,’ said Antonia, giving her hand to Jack, which he shook -carefully and with much caution, relinquishing the dainty palm with -evident relief. ‘My father will know how to thank the rescuer of his -daughter; and she will remember you as a gallant fellow and a friend in -need all the days of her life.’ - -‘Thank you, miss,’ said Mr. Windsor, with a respectful yet puzzled air. -‘I’ve had many a worse shindy than this in my time, and got no thanks -either—’tother way on, ‘ndeed. But of course I couldn’t help rolling -in, seeing the master double-banked, and you young ladies being made -to join a water-party against your wills. Don’t you have no more truck -with them boats, miss; they’re too uncertain altogether. Nothing like -dry land to my taste; even if the season’s bad, there’s a something to -hang on by. My respects, miss, and I’ll try that beer; my throat’s like -a bark chimney with the soot afire.’ - -‘And now I must order you, Mr. Neuchamp, to betake yourself to your -room. Look in the glass and see if your complexion hasn’t suffered. -Was it the Count’s blood which flowed, or did you scratch your face -with the prickly pear hedge? Let me look! Merciful heaven!’ exclaimed -the girl, with a half scream, as she narrowly scanned her deliverer’s -face; ‘why, there is the deep trace of a bullet on your temple. How -providential that it was the least bit wide—a slight turn of your -head—a shade nearer the temple, and you would have been lying there -dead—dead! How awful to think of!’ - -Here she covered her face with her hands. Tears trickled through the -slender palms as her overwrought feelings found relief in a sudden -burst of weeping. - -Mr. Neuchamp’s attempts at consolation would appear not to have been -wholly ineffectual, if one may judge from the concluding sentences -of rather a long-whispered conversation, all carried on prior to the -lavation of his gory countenance. - -‘I always thought,’ said Antonia, smiling through her tears, with as -much satirical emphasis as could coexist with so sudden an access of -happiness, ‘that you wanted some one to take care of you in Australia. -I fear I have been led into undertaking a very serious responsibility.’ - -‘May it not be the other way?’ very naturally inquired Ernest. ‘If I -had not been, as Jack would say, “there or thereabouts” to-day, some -one might have been a pirate’s bride, after all. Miss Folleton, of -course, had prior claims, but——‘ - -‘But—please to go and render yourself presentable, this instant. We -shall have such an amount of talking to do before we can put poor dear -old pappy in possession of all the news. Good gracious, how can we ever -tell him? How furious he will be!’ - -‘Will he?’ inquired Ernest, with affected apprehension; ‘perhaps we had -better defer our——’ - -‘I don’t mean _that_—and you know it, sir; but, unless you wish to be -taken for a pirate yourself, or an escaped I-don’t-know-what, you will -do as I tell you.’ - -So Ernest was fain to do as he was bid, commencing, unconsciously -indeed, that period of servitude to which every son of Adam, all -unheeding, is pledged who rivets on himself the flower-wreathed -adamantine fetters of matrimony. He sought Mr. Frankston’s extremely -comfortable dressing-room, at the behest of his beloved _châtelaine_; -and very glad he was to find himself there. - -His sense of relief and general congratulation was, however, slightly -alloyed by the thought of the stupendous amount of explanation and -narrative due to Paul Frankston, when this now fast-approaching hour of -dinner should arrive. - -‘I would it were bedtime, and all well,’ groaned he, in old Falstaff’s -words, as he addressed himself to the rather serious duties of the -toilette. - -Mr. Frankston arrived from town but a few minutes before the -dinner-hour, and, like a wise man, made at once for his room. - -‘Only just time to dress, darling,’ said he to his daughter. ‘Got such -a budget of news; met Croker just as I was coming out, tell Ernest. No -end of news—quite unparalleled. You will be surprised, and so will he.’ - -‘And so will you,’ thought Mr. Neuchamp, who just came into the hall in -time to hear the concluding sentence. But he darkly bided his time. - -As the dinner-bell rang, forth issued Mr. Frankston, radiant with snowy -waistcoat and renovated _personnel_, having the air at once of a man in -good hope and expectation of dinner, also conscious of the possession -of news which, however sensationally disastrous, does not prejudicially -affect himself. - -‘Now then,’ he said, the soup having been disposed of, and the mildly -stimulating Amontillado imbibed, ‘what do you think has become of our -friend—or, rather, your friend, Antonia, for you never would let me -abuse him—the Count von Schätterheims?’ - -‘What indeed?’ replied Antonia, looking at her plate. - -‘Well, he has bolted, levanted, cleared out, on board his famous yacht, -the _White Falcon_, for some northern port—Batavia, the Islands, New -Guinea—no one knows.’ - -‘How about money matters?’ inquired Ernest. - -‘Well, you both take it coolly, I must say,’ said Paul, hurt at the -small effect of his great piece of ordnance. ‘As to money, all Sydney, -in the legitimate credit way, is left lamenting. He had been operating -very largely of late, and his losses and defalcations are immense. -Yorick and Co.’s bill for wines and liqueurs is something awful.’ - -‘Alas, poor Yorick!’ said Ernest, with so pathetic an emphasis that -Antonia could not help laughing. - -‘You two seem very facetious to-night,’ quoth Paul with dignity. ‘It -is no laughing matter, I can tell you. But you won’t laugh at _this_, -I fancy. Croker told me that it was everywhere believed that he had -persuaded that unhappy, infatuated girl Harriet Folleton to accompany -him in his flight.’ - -Mr. Frankston uttered these last words with a deep solemnity, imparted -to his voice by the heartfelt pity which, at any time, he could have -felt for the victim in such a case. - -His daughter and Ernest were sufficiently ill-bred to laugh. - -‘Hang me if I understand this!’ he commenced, in tones of righteous -indignation; and then, softening, ‘Why Antonia, dearest, surely you -must pity——’ - -‘Papa, she is upstairs and in bed at this very moment, so she can’t -have run away with the Count. There must be a mistake somewhere.’ - -‘So there must, so there must,’ said Paul, instantly mollified, and -addressing himself to his dinner. ‘I’m a hot-tempered old idiot, I -know. But there’s no mistake about the Count’s debts, or the Count’s -flight. He was sighted by No. 4 pilot cutter that brought in the -English liner, the _Cumberland_, this evening, steering nor’-nor’-east, -and before such a breeze as will see him clear of anything from this -port before daylight.’ - -‘He has gone, safe enough,’ said Ernest; ‘indeed, we watched him go -through the Heads from the verandah—a most fortunate migration, in -my opinion. He has conferred an immense benefit upon the country by -leaving it, which I trust he will confirm by never returning.’ - -‘Then you saw him go from here?’ inquired Mr. Frankston. ‘Was he close -enough for you to see him?’ - -‘Well,’ admitted Ernest, ‘he certainly _was_ close enough to see, and, -indeed, to feel; but it’s rather a long story, and if you’re going to -smoke this evening, we can have it all out on the verandah.’ - -‘I think I must go and see how my visitor is getting on,’ said Antonia; -‘and as I feel tired, I will make my farewell for the evening.’ - -Was there in the outwardly formal handshaking a sudden instinctive -pressure? Was there in the hasty glance a lighting up of hitherto -lambent fires in the clear depths of Antonia’s deep-hued eyes—an added, -half-remorseful, half-clinging tenderness in the never-omitted caress -which marked her evening parting with her father? If so, that father -was all unconscious, and the outward tokens were so faint as to have -been invisible to all but one deeply interested, near-sighted observer. - -‘I am much relieved to find that poor girl Harriet Folleton has not -been carried off, after all, by that scoundrel, who has taken us all in -so splendidly,’ growled Paul. ‘Of course, now the mischief is done, -all kinds of reports are going about the city as to his real character. -People say he was a valet, or a courier; others, a supercargo, who ran -away with that pretty boat he brought here. He certainly had a very -good notion of handling a yacht.’ - -‘Let me tell you, then, that it is chiefly owing to your daughter’s -courage and unselfish determination to save her friend at all hazards, -that Harriet Folleton is not now a captive in yonder yacht, hopelessly -lost and disgraced,’ announced Mr. Neuchamp, commencing his broadside. - -‘Why, you don’t tell me that the scoundrel came _here_ and attempted -any violence?’ said the old man, rising excitedly and performing the -regulation quarter-deck walk up and down the verandah, while he dashed -his ignited cigar excitedly out over the lawn. ‘If I knew—if I had -known this day that he dared to set his foot upon these grounds with a -lawless purpose towards any guest of Antonia’s, I’d have followed him -to the Line and hanged him at his own yardarm.’ - -As the old man uttered these very decided sentiments, somewhat at -variance with the Navigation Act and international usage, his brow -darkened, his eye gleamed with pitiless light, and his arm was raised -with a gesture which indicated familiarity with the cutlass and the -boarding-pike. - -‘You must not excite yourself,’ said Ernest, laying his hand kindly on -the old man’s arm. ‘Remember, first of all, that the offender is beyond -pursuit; that he was baulked in his evil purpose, and that he suffered -ignominious defeat, chiefly through the timely help of Jack Windsor, -who assisted me to rout the attacking force.’ - -‘Good God!’ exclaimed the old man. ‘Attack—defeat; what has happened? -and I sat gossiping at the club, while you were defending my home and -my honour!’ - -‘Could I do less? However, you had better hear the whole story straight -out. No harm has been done, and the enemy was routed with loss.’ - -The story was told. Full justice was done to Antonia’s heroism. Jack -Windsor’s prowess received its meed of praise. His own fortunate -overthrow of the Count by good luck and a little more practice in -wrestling than continental usages render familiar, was slightly alluded -to. Finally, he explained his reasons for assisting the escape of Von -Schätterheims, and thereby confining the scandal of his attempted -abduction to the narrow limit of the actual participators in the affray. - -Mr. Frankston walked the deck of a long-departed imaginary vessel so -long without speaking that Ernest feared some rending typhoon of wrath -after the enforced calm. But the event justified his best surmises. -Placing his hand upon his guest’s arm, Paul said, in a voice vibrating -with emotion— - -‘I see in you, Ernest Neuchamp, a man who this day has saved my honour -and my life—hers, to whom this poor remnant of existence is but as -this worthless weed.’ (Here he cast from him the half-consumed cigar.) -‘From this day forth you are my son—take everything that I can give. -Paul Frankston holds nothing back from the man who has done what you -have done this day. I am but your steward—your manager, my dear boy, -henceforward.’ - -‘There is _one_ of your possessions—the most precious, the most -priceless among them,’ answered Ernest, holding up his head with a -do-or-die sort of air, ‘and that one I now ask of you. We are past -phrases with each other. But you will understand that I at least do not -undervalue the worth of Antonia Frankston’s heart, of your daughter’s -hand!’ - -Mr. Frankston once more paced the long-faded deck and communed with -the broad and heaving deep. Then he turned. His eyes, from which the -strange fire had faded wholly out, had a softened, perhaps somewhat -clouded light. - -‘Ernest Neuchamp,’ he said, ‘if this day has witnessed, perhaps, the -most bitter insult, the deepest humiliation to which Paul Frankston -has ever been subjected, it has also witnessed his greatest joy. Take -her—with her old father’s blessing. You have, what he considers, -earth’s greatest treasure; and it is no flattery, but honest liking, -when he swears that you are worthy of her. As far as human look-out can -see over life’s course, Paul Frankston’s troubles and anxieties are -over. Now I can take my cigar again.’ - -More than one cigar was needed to allay the old man’s overstrained -nervous system. Long they sat and talked, and saw the moon rise higher -in the star-gemmed sky, casting a broader silver flame across the -tremulous illumined deep; while between Ernest Neuchamp and the old man -again stood a shadowy, diaphanous, divinely-moulded form, turning into -an elysian aroma the scent of Paul’s cigars, and echoing the secret -gladness of each thought, which in that hour of supernal loveliness and -unutterable joy flowed from the bared heart of Ernest Neuchamp. - - * * * * * - -On the next morning Aurora in person must have attended to the proper -arrangement of the dawn, the breakfast-hour, and other small matters -which, apparently trivial, tend unquestionably to that due equilibrium -of the nervous system, without which comfort is impossible and -exhilaration hopeless. - -Thus, Miss Folleton, having slept well, appeared renovated and just -becomingly repentant. Antonia was severely happy, Mr. Neuchamp calmly -superior to fate, and Mr. Frankston so hilarious that his daughter had -to interpose more than once. - -That ambrosial repast concluded, Antonia departed for town in the -carriage, and straightway delivered up Miss Folleton to her rejoicing -relatives, who had suffered anxiety in her absence. Hers was an -impressionable, shallow nature, recovering easily from moral risks and -disasters—even from physical ills. Her appetite reasserted itself; her -love of life’s frivolities, temporarily obscured, brightened afresh; -and long before the legend of the debts, the daring, the disappearance -of the Count von Schätterheims had been supplanted by newer scandal, -her cheek had recovered its wonted bloom, her step its lightness in the -dance, and her mien its touchingly dependent grace. - -In due time she had her reward; for she captured, after a short but -brilliant campaign, consisting of an oratorio, a lawn party, and three -dances, an immensely opulent northern squatter. She looks fair and pure -as the blue sky above her, as she rolls by, dressed _à merveille_, in -the best-appointed carriage in Sydney. But for happiness—who shall say? - -In the meanwhile, unlimited pleasure-seeking and universal admiration -supply a reasonable substitute. - - - - -CHAPTER XXX - - -Mr. Neuchamp, having now occasional leisure to reflect, discovered -that he was provided with an extensive and valuable property which he -_had_ partly come to Australia to seek, and with an affianced bride, -whom he had not at all included among his probable possessions. As -for the great project of Colonial Reform, which had stood out grandly -dominating the landscape in the future of his dreams, with the solitary -exception of the conversion of Jack Windsor, he could not aver that he -had accomplished anything. - -His co-operative community had notably failed in practice. But for -the aid and counsel of Mr. Levison, it might have overthrown his own -fortune, without particularly benefiting the individuals of this -society. - -Whenever he had acted upon his own discretion, and in furtherance of -advanced views, he had been conspicuously wrong. Where he had followed -the ideas of others, or been forced into them by circumstances, he -had been invariably right. Where he had been generous, he had been -deceived; where he had been cautious, he had found himself extravagant -in loss; where he had been rash, riches had rolled in upon him with -flowing tide. His most elaborate estimates of character had been -ludicrously erroneous. His advice had been inapplicable, his theories -unsound. Practice—mostly blindfold—had alone given him a glimmering -knowledge of the relatively component parts of this most contradictory, -unintelligible antipodean world. - -Mr. Neuchamp, having reached the very visible landmark of an engagement -in his pilgrimage of love, was much minded to press for an immediate -union, believing, now that the rain had come, there existed no rational -impediments in the way of this last supreme success. Well-informed -persons will know that no such outrage upon _les convenances_ could for -a moment be tolerated. Baffled but not despondent, he returned to the -charge with such determination that the event was fixed to take place -in about two months, as being the earliest hour anything so dreadful -could be thought of. - -So much being gained, Ernest became speedily aware that being at all -hours and seasons subject to the raids of milliners‘attendants and -others was a state of existence out of harmony with a poet’s soul. -Thus, after divers unsatisfactory and interrupted interviews with -Antonia, he took his passage by the mail, and heroically started for -Rainbar. - -This brilliant combination of business with necessity would, he -thought, serve to while away the weary hours between the scorned -present and the beautiful future. Rainbar and Mildool had to be visited -at some time or other. Although the luxurious life of the metropolis -had gained upon him, Ernest Neuchamp always arose, Antæus-like, fresh -to the call of duty. - -When he quitted the railway terminus and entered the mail-coach which -was to convey him to his destination, the full magnitude of the mighty -change of season burst upon him. During his stay in Sydney the short, -bright southern spring-time had been born and was ripening into summer, -with what effect upon plant life it was now a marvel of marvels to see. - -Mr. Neuchamp’s novitiate had been served during the latter years of a -‘dry cycle.’ He had seen fair growth of pasture towards Christmas time, -but of the amazing crop of grass and herbage uncared for, wasted, or -burned, in what Mr. Windsor called ‘an out-and-out wet season,’ he had -no previous experience. - -From the moment that the coach cleared the forest parks which skirted -the plains, Ernest found himself embarked upon a ‘measureless prairie,’ -where the tall green grass waved far as eye could see in the summer -breeze. A millennium of peace and plenty had apparently arrived for -all manner of graminivorous creatures. How different was the aspect of -these ‘happy hunting grounds,’ velvet-green of hue, flower-bespangled, -brook-traversed, with the forgotten sound of falling waters ever and -anon breaking on the ear, with hum of bee and carol blithe of bird, -as the sleek-coated, high-conditioned coach-horses rattled the light -drag merrily over the long long road! What a wondrous transformation! -Would Augusta, _la belle cousine_, have believed that all this glorious -natural beauty had been born, grown, and developed ‘since the rain -came’? - -When at length the journey was over, and the proprietor of Rainbar and -Mildool was deposited, with his portmanteau, at the garden gate of -the former station, Mr. Neuchamp was constrained to confess that he -hardly knew his own place. There had been much growth and greenery when -he left with the fat cattle; but the riotous extravagance of nature -in that direction could not have been credited by him without actual -eye-witness. - -Around the buildings, the garden fence, the stockyard, the cowshed, -was a growth of giant herbage, composed of wild oats, wild barley, -marsh-mallows, clover, and fodder plants unnamed, that almost smothered -these humble buildings and enclosures. A few milch cows fed lazily, -looking as if they had been employed in testing the comparative merits -of oilcake and Thorley’s cattle-food, for an agricultural experiment. -The river-flats below the house were knee-deep in clover and meadow -grasses, causing Mr. Neuchamp to wonder whether or no it would be worth -while to go in for a mowing-machine and a few horse-rakes, for the easy -conversion of a fraction of it into a few hundred tons of meadow hay, -to be stored against the next, ‘dry year.’ The mixed grasses, as he had -tested in a small way, made excellent hay. But how far off looked such -a calamity! Thus ever with ‘youth at the prow and pleasure at the helm’ -do we lightly measure the future, recking neither of stormy sky nor of -the ravening deep. - -After Mr. Neuchamp had sufficiently admired the grassy wilderness, -thoughts arose respecting dinner, and also a feeling of wonder where -everybody was. The station appeared to be minding itself. The cook was -absent, though recent indications of his presence were visible in the -kitchen. Charley Banks was away and Jack Windsor, probably at Mildool; -also Piambook, whose open countenance and dazzling teeth would have -been better than nothing. Where was Mrs. Windsor, _née_ Walton? He had -rather looked forward to having a talk with her under new conditions -of life. She could not be at Mildool, as there was no shelter for a -decent woman there. What in the name of wonder had become of them -all? There were no Indians in this country, or he might have turned -his thoughts in the direction of Blackfeet or Comanches, the ‘wolf -Apaché and the cannibal Navajo.’ Not even a Mormon settlement handy -enough to organise a ‘mountain-meadows massacre’! He never thought -Rainbar so lonely before. He went into the cottage, and in a leisurely -way unpacked his portmanteau in the snug bedroom which he had so long -inhabited—where he had so often, before the rain came, lain down in -sorrow and arisen in despair. What a tiny wooden box it seemed! Yet he -had thought it comfortable, even luxurious. Like those of many other -distinguished travellers and heroes long absent from the scene of early -conflict or youthful habitation, the eyes of Mr. Neuchamp had altered -their focus. - -After three months’ familiarity with the lodging of clubs and villas, -the neat but necessarily contracted apartments of his bush cottage -appeared like cupboards, or even akin to a watch-box which he had once -dwelt in at Garrandilla. - -However, he knew by former experience that a week or two of station -life would restore his vision, his appetite, and his contentment with -the district. Further than that he did not go. At the present price -of cattle, it was not likely that he would need ever again to spend -as many months consecutively at Rainbar as he had devoted to that -desirable but isolated abode before the ‘drought broke up.’ - -Having had ample time for comparison and appropriate reflections, he -was at length set free from the apprehension that he was the sole -inhabitant of Rainbar by the appearance of old Johnny, the cook, -who expressed great delight and satisfaction at seeing him, and, -explaining his absence by the statement that he had taken a walk of -five miles down the river in order to buy a bag of potatoes from a dray -loaded with those rare esculents, proceeded to place him in possession -of facts. - -‘Every one about the place was away mustering at Mildool,’ he said, -‘including Mr. Banks, both the blackfellows, Jack Windsor, and even -Mrs. Windsor, who, finding that there was an unoccupied hut formerly -belonging to a dairyman at Mildool, had joined the mustering party. He -(Johnny) hadn’t had a soul to talk to for three weeks since the muster -began, and was as miserable as a bandicoot.’ - -The old man bustled about, laid the cloth neatly, and cooked and -served an inviting meal, which Ernest, after the reckless preparations -supplied to coach passengers, really enjoyed. It was far into the night -when the sound of horses‘hoofs was heard, and Mr. Banks, carrying -his saddle and bridle, which he placed upon the verandah, let go his -courser to graze at ease, entered the spare bedroom, undressed, and was -in bed and asleep all in the space of about two minutes and a half, as -it seemed to Mr. Neuchamp, from the first sound of his arrival. He did -not care to make himself known to the wearied youngster, and reserved -that sensation, very wisely, as might be many other pieces of news and -matters of business, until morning light. - -With the new day arising, the active youth was much astonished, and -even more gratified, to find his employer again under the same roof. At -the daylight breakfast of the bush—_de rigueur_ when unusual work of -any kind is going forward—he favoured Ernest with a full recital of all -the exciting news. - -‘Everything was well as could possibly be. All the cattle at Rainbar -were fat as pigs—all the “circle dot” cattle, all Freemans‘lot, which -had really turned out a famous bargain. A dealer from Ballarat had been -up a week since, and to him he had sold the whole of the Freeman horses -at fifteen pounds a head, cash, young and old. He didn’t think, when -old Cottonbush put the brand on them, that they’d ever see a ten-pound -note for the whole boiling. He had the dealer’s cheque—a good one too, -or he wouldn’t have taken it—for twelve hundred and fifteen pounds! -There were just eighty-one head. - -‘As for the back country, it looked lovely. Grass and water everywhere. -The Back Lake was full; the river was bank high, and if there was a -flood—a regular big one—he wouldn’t say but what the water might flow -into the canal after all and fill the Outer Lake. By the way, there -were some back blocks for sale at the back of Rainbar and Mildool, and -if he had his way they should be bought, as it would give them the -command of all the back country as far as Barra Creek, and keep other -people from coming in by and by, and perhaps giving trouble; nothing -like securing all your back country while it is cheap. - -‘With regard to Mildool, it was the best bargain he (Charley Banks) had -ever seen. All unbranded stock were to be given in, and there would be -calves and yearlings enough to brand to pay two years’ wages to every -man employed on both runs. They had pretty well got through the count; -there would be a two or three hundred head over the muster number, -which would be no harm, and it was only ordinary store price for half -fat cattle broken in to the run. As to fat stock, you might go on to -any camp and cut out with your eyes shut; you couldn’t go wrong; they -were all fat together, young and old. Mooney, the dealer, stayed a -night last week, and said he would give seven pounds all round for a -thousand head, half cows, to be taken in three months. He thought it -was a fair offer. It saved all the bother of sending men on the roads, -and when you let the mob out of your yard you get your cheque, or -draft, as the case might be. He was always for selling on the run, as -long as the buyers were known men.‘ - -‘How was Mrs. Windsor?’ - -‘Oh, she was a brick—a regular trump—something like a woman! When she -found Jack would only come back from Mildool once a week, she inquired -whether there was any sort of a hut that could hold a small family -at Mildool; was told there was the old dairyman’s hut at Green Bend, -about a mile from the station. So she said she would rather live in a -packing-case than be separated from her husband; and as Mildool was to -be their home, they might as well go there at once. The end of it was -that she made Jack take her traps over, and she has got the old place -so neat and comfortable that any one might live there, small as it is, -and enjoy life. She was a downright sensible woman, as well as a deuced -good-looking one, and she would make Jack a rich man before he died.’ - -‘Was there anything else to tell?’ - -‘Well, not much. He was going to let Jack have Boinmaroo at Mildool, -and keep Piambook here; when they mustered at either place they could -join forces. Oh! the Freemans. Well, they had all gone a month back. -Joe and Bill had gone to take up more land in the Albury district. Wish -them joy wherever they go. We’re quit of them, that’s one comfort. -Abraham Freeman and his lot cleared out for his old place at Bowning. -They’ll do well there in a quiet way. Poor Tottie was sorry to leave -Rainbar, and cried like fun. Had to comfort her a bit when the old -woman wasn’t looking. It’s a beastly nuisance having other people’s -stock on your run, and other people’s boys galloping about all over the -country, whether you like it or not. Was deuced glad to see their teams -yoked and their furniture on, I can tell you. Suppose you’d like to -ride over to Mildool, now you are here?’ - -Mr. Neuchamp thought he might as well, although fully satisfied that -the muster would have been satisfactorily completed without him. So the -two men rode over that day and had a look at the humours of a delivery -muster. - -There was, as usual, great skirmishing about the ownership of calves -temporarily separated from their maternal parents, one stockman -averring that he remembered every spot on a certain calf’s hide since -its early infancy, others corroborating his assertion that it ‘belonged -to,’ or was the progeny of, his old black ‘triangle-bar’ cow; Mr. -Windsor, as counsel for the Crown, declaring, on the other hand, that -no calf should leave the Mildool run unless provided with a manifest -mother, then and there substantiating her claim to maternity by such -personal attentions or privileges as could not be fabricated or -misunderstood. To him the adverse stockman would remark that, if he was -going to talk like that, he might stick to every blessed clear-skin on -the river. Mr. Windsor retorting that he doesn’t say for that, but if -people think they can collar calves for the asking, they’ve come to the -wrong shop when they ride to Mildool muster. And so on, and so on. - -Nathless, in course of time all things are arranged, in some shape, -with or without a proportionate allowance of growling, as the men -say. It being apparent that Mr. Windsor, now full-fledged overseer -of Mildool, knows a thing or two, and will stand up stoutly for his -master’s rights, fewer encroachments are, let us suppose, attempted. - -The cattle are counted and finally gathered, and are discovered to -exceed, by three hundred odd, the station number. The former manager -feels complimented that he has been able to muster beyond his books. -The purchaser is satisfied, as the additional cattle are merely charged -to him at store cattle price, and, being ‘to the manor born,’ will -swiftly ‘grow into money.’ The strange stockmen depart, carrying with -them a large mixed drove of strayed cattle. The ex-overseer pays his -men and then leaves for down the country, there to wait on the agents, -and receive his _congé_ or further employment, as the case may be. -Charley Banks and the black boys, Jack Windsor, and Mr. Neuchamp are -left in undisputed possession of the new kingdom. - -With such a season, with such prices ruling, the management is the -merest routine work, a few hundred calves to brand, arrangements to -make for an early muster to show the herd to the great cattle-dealer, -who wants to buy a thousand head fat to be taken away in three months, -and paid for by his acceptance at that date. Mr. Mooney happens to come -before Ernest leaves for Sydney, and the negotiation being successful, -the new proprietor of Mildool sets out for the metropolis with a -negotiable bill in his pocket for seven thousand pounds—more than a -third of the purchase-money of the run. - -While Mr. Neuchamp was possessing his soul in tranquillity at Rainbar, -he was surprised at receiving a letter from his erstwhile Turonia -comrade, Mr. Bright. That cheerful financier wrote as follows: - - TURONIA, _10th December 18—_. - - MY DEAR NEUCHAMP—I hear you are to be married to the nicest girl in - Sydney. I thought it only reasonable, considering our two or three - larks here, to offer my congratulations; and, by the bye, talking of - things happening, that fellow Greffham, whom you remember my helping - to arrest, was hanged last Wednesday at Medhurst. - - The evidence, joined to his paying away the numbered notes, known to - be in the escort parcel, was awfully strong against him. He made no - confession, and was as cool and unconcerned to the very last, as you - and I ever saw him at the billiard-table. What a wonderful uphill - game he could play! It is just possible he might have got off; but - Merlin fished up additional evidence which fixed him, in the eyes of - the jury, I think—-the groom at the inn, who swore he saw a small - parcel covered with a gray rug on his saddle, as he returned from the - direction of Running Creek, which he had not when he passed up. You - ought to have seen him and Merlin look at each other when Merlin asked - the Crown prosecutor to have Carl Anderson called. It was a ‘duel with - eyes.’ But, even without that, I don’t see how he could have accounted - for the notes. - - I happened to be in Medhurst the day he was to be turned off. I - received a message that he wanted to see me, so I went to the gaol. I - knew the sheriff well. They showed me into his cell at once. - - When I got in, Greffham nearly had finished dressing, and had only to - put on his frock-coat to be better turned out, if possible, than he - was for the lawn party Branksome gave when the Governor came up. He - happened to be cleaning his teeth—you remember how white and even they - were—as I came through the door. - - ‘Sit down, old man,’ he said, just as usual, shying his toothbrush - into the corner of the cell. ‘I daresay they’ll do; and I suppose I - shan’t want _that_ any more. What should you say? ’Pon my soul, there - isn’t a chair to offer you; devilish close about furniture, aren’t - they now? But it’s very kind of you, Bright, to come and see a fellow, - when he’s—well—peculiarly situated, eh?’ - - Here he laughed quite naturally, I give you my word—not forced at - all. He certainly _was_ the coolest hand I ever saw; and he died as he - lived. - - ‘What I wanted to see you for, Bright, was this’—here his voice shook - and he _did_ appear to show a little feeling—‘you’ll take these two - letters for me, like a good fellow; one I want you to send to —— after - I am gone; the other you can open _then_. Make what use you like - of the contents. I shan’t care then; say nothing _now_ to gratify - curiosity. As to what I may have done, or not done, I hold myself the - best judge of my reasons. You know what my life has been. Open and - straightforward, if somewhat reckless. My cards have always been on - the table. I have risked all that man holds dear on a throw before. - This time I have lost. I pay the stakes; there is no more to be said. - Lionel Greffham is not the man to say “I repent.” He is what he is, - and will die as he has lived. My time on earth has not been spun out - much, but, measured by enjoyment, with a front seat mostly at life’s - opera, it adds up fairly. Give me a Havannah from your case. You - will see me pretty “fit” for the stage when they ring in the leading - performer. By the way, I told them to give you my revolver; and while - I think of it, just remember this, if you want to make _very close - shooting_ at any time, only put in three parts of the powder in the - cartridge.‘ - - I really believe these were his last words, except to the —— hang-man. - - He finished his cigar, and lounged up to the gallows, where he died in - the face of a tremendous crowd, calmly and scornfully, just as he was - accustomed to bear himself to them in life. Jack Ketch was a new hand, - and nervous. I heard Greffham say, just as if he was rowing a fellow - for awkwardness in saddling his horse, ‘You clumsy idiot, what are - you trembling for? Hang me, if I can see what there is to make a fuss - about! I’ll bet you a pound I tuck you up in ten minutes without any - baggling. _Now_, you’re right. Am _I_ standing quite square?’ - - ‘You’re all right, sir,’ the man said respectfully. The drop fell, - and poor Greffham (I can’t help saying it, although he was a precious - scoundrel) died without the least contrition. Showed perfectly good - taste to the last. Deuced rum people one meets on a goldfield, don’t - you, now? - - I suppose you’re not likely to come this way again. We’re not quite so - jolly as we were. The Colonel has gone back to India. Old De Bracy has - got a good Government appointment, for which he looks more suited than - market-gardening, though he was hard to beat at that, or anything - he tackled. I hear you’ve made pots of money. Parklands was here the - other day, and told me. I have a deuced good mind to turn squatter - myself. My regards to old Frankston, and ask him if he remembers the - last story I told him. Ha, ha!—Yours sincerely, - - JOHN WILDER BRIGHT. - -Now the great muster and delivery at Mildool was over and everyday -life at Rainbar had again to be faced, Ernest began to feel like one -Alexander, sometimes called Great, who had conquered his way into the -kingdom of Ennui. He was the possessor of a fortune and of a bride, -both above his utmost hopes, his loftiest aspirations; but he began -to fear that he had lost that which leaves life very destitute of -savour—he feared with a new and terrible dread that he had lost his -Occupation! - -For life seemed so much more easy, so much less necessary to take -thought about, now that he had two stations than when he had but -one—one likely to be wrested from him. So is it that Difficulty is -oft our friend in disguise, Success but the veiled foe which smiles -at our faltering footsteps and watches to destroy. He saw now, that -with Jack Windsor at Mildool, and Charley Banks, alert, energetic, -fully experienced, at Rainbar, his life henceforth would be that of -a visitor, a supernumerary—unless indeed he employed his mind in the -construction and organisation of ‘improvements’! Ha, ha! ’_Vade retro_, -Sathanas!‘ The Genie was safe immured in his brazen sealed-up vessel. -There should he remain. - -Still was there one ‘improvement’ in which he had never altogether lost -faith, long and dispiriting as had been the divorce between formation -and utility. This was the cutting the connecting channel between the -Back Lake and the ‘Outer Lake.’ Long had the ‘master’s ditch’ been as -useless as a fish-pond in the bosom of the Sahara, as a rose-garden in -a glacier, as an oyster-bed in a steppe. Cattle had walked over it; -grass had grown in it; stockmen and thoughtless souls had jeered at it, -and at the English stranger who had thrown away upon its construction -the money of which he possessed a quantity so greatly in excess of his -apparent intelligence. As long as he remained the proprietor of the -run, it would be hardly in keeping with the manner of the bush to call -it ‘Neuchamp’s Folly.’ But had failure or absence chanced to occur in -his case, the satirical nomenclature would not have been deferred for a -week. In the solitary rides and musings to which, in default of daily -work and labour, Mr. Neuchamp was fain to betake himself, it chanced -that he had repeatedly examined that portion of this great sheet of -water, which rang with the whistling wings of wild fowl, and on breezy -days surged with long rippling waves against its bank. - -While in Sydney a number of back blocks, at no greater distance from -this outer lake than it was from the former ‘frontage,’ had been put -under offer to him. What if he should accept the terms—the price was -low—and trust to the chance of the next great flood in the full-fed -chafing river sending the water leaping down his tiny canal, and thus -giving a value never before dreamed of to this splendidly grand but -unnatural region. In spite of his half-settled determination to accept -no other speculative risks, but, like a wise man, to rest contented -with proved success, the next post conveyed instructions to Messrs. -Paul Frankston and Co. to close for all the blocks, each five miles -square, from A to M, comprising all the unoccupied country at the back -of Rainbar and Mildool, at the price named. - -On the following morning the weather was misty and unusually cloudy, -with an apparent tendency to rain. No rain fell, however; but the raw -air, the unusual bleakness of the atmosphere, seemed abnormal to Ernest -Neuchamp. - -‘I should not wonder,’ said Mr. Banks, in explanation, ‘that it was -raining cats and dogs somewhere else, snowing, or something of that -sort. Perhaps at the head of the river. If that’s the case, we shall -have a flood and no mistake. Such a one as none of us has seen yet. -However, we’ve neither hoof nor horn nor fleece on the frontage. It -can’t hurt us, that’s one comfort.’ - -Mr. Banks’s prognostications were correct. Within three days— - - ... like a horse unbroken, - When first he feels the rein, - The furious river struggled hard, - And tossed his tawny mane, - And burst the curb and bounded, - Rejoicing to be free, - And whirling down in fierce career - Battlement and plank and pier, - Rushed headlong to the sea. - -Battlement and plank and pier were in this case represented by hut -slabs and rafters, haystacks and pumpkins, from the arable lands and -meadows through which the great river held its upper course; while -drowned stock and the posts and rails of many a mile of submerged -fencing represented the latter floating trifles. There was much that -was grand in the steadily deepening, broadening tide which slowly and -remorselessly crawled over the wide green flats, which undermined -the great waterworn precipices of the red-clayed bluffs, bringing -down enormous fragments and masses, many tons in weight, which fell, -foamed, and disappeared in the turbid, hurrying wave. Who could have -recognised in this fierce, swollen, tyrant river, yellow as the Tiber, -broad as the Danube, resistless as Ocean, the shallow, pellucid -streamlet, rippling over its sandy shallows, of the dead, bygone famine -year? - -On the larger flats it was miles wide. The white, straight tree-trunks -stood like colonnades with arches framed in foliage, disappearing in -endless perspective above a limitless plain of gliding waters. - -By night, as Mr. Neuchamp awoke in his cottage, which was built upon -an elevation said by tradition to be above the reach of floods, the -‘remorseless dash of billows’ sounded distinctly, unpleasantly close in -the darkness. - -On the following day, the flood still continuing to rise, Piambook was -despatched to the Back Lake to report, and upon his return stated that -‘water yan along that one picaninny blind creek like it Murray, make -haste longer Outer Lake.’ Full of hope and expectant of triumph, Mr. -Neuchamp started out for ‘Lake country,’ accompanied by Mr. Banks. - -When they arrived at the first lake the unusual fulness and volume of -the water in that reservoir showed that the main stream must have been -forced outwards along the course of the ancient, natural channel, by -which in years of exceptional high floods—and in those years only—the -lake had been filled. - -Now, thought Mr. Neuchamp, the hour, long delayed, long doubted, has -surely come. Who could have dreamed but a few short months since, when -our very souls were adust and athirst with perennial famine, that our -eyes should behold the sight which I see now? How should it teach us -to hoard the garnered gold of truth, the ‘eternal verity’ in our heart -of hearts! ‘My lord delayeth his coming.’ Was that held to be a reason, -an excuse for the unfaithful, self-indulgent? Truly this would seem to -some as great a miracle as the leaping water which followed the stroke -of the prophet’s staff in that other desert of which we read of old. - -And now his eyes did actually behold the first trickling, wondrous -motion of the brimming reservoir to advance, gravitation-led, along -the narrow path to its far-distant sister lake. Slowly the full waters -rose to the very lip of the vast natural cup or vase, and then, first -saturating the entrance, poured down the narrow outlet which the -forecasting mind of man had prepared for it. It trickled, it flowed, it -ran, it coursed, foaming and rushing, along the cutting, of which the -fall at first exceeded that of the general passage. It was done! It was -over! A proud success! - -Charley Banks threw up his hat. Together they rode recklessly onward -to the Outer Lake, and there Ernest Neuchamp enjoyed silently the deep -satisfaction—then known but to the projector and inventor—of witnessing -the waters of the Inner Lake, for the first time since the sea had -ceased to murmur over these boundless levels, flow fast and flashing -forward, driven by the pressure of the immense body behind, into the -vast, deep, grass-clothed basin of the Outer Lake. - -This was a triumph truly. For this alone it was worth while to have -journeyed across the long long ocean tide, to have toiled and suffered, -waited and watched, to have eaten his heart with fear and sickening -dread of the gaunt destroyer ‘Ruin,’ ever stalking nearer and nearer. -This was true life—real adventure—the hazard and the triumph which -alone constitute true manhood. - -In the ecstasy of the moment Ernest Neuchamp forgot the fortune he had -gained, the bride whom he had won, the home of his youth, the grand and -glorious future, the not uneventful past. All things seemed as dreams -and visions by the side of this grand and living Reality. - -As he sat on his horse and gazed, still flowed the glorious wave into -the century-dry basin by the channel which he, Ernest Neuchamp, had, -in defiance of Nature, opinion, and society, conceived, formed, and -successfully completed. Seasons might come and go; another dry time -might come; the water might periodically evaporate and disappear,—but -nothing could evade the great fact henceforth in the history of the -land, that he had established the connection between the river and this -distant, long-dry, unthought-of reservoir. There would be no more hint -or menace of Neuchamp’s Folly—more likely, Neuchamp’s River. - -Lake Neuchamp! Pshaw! it was an inland sea. Why not name it now? Why -not render immortal, not his own perhaps ancient patronymic, but the -lovely and beloved name of his soul’s divinity? Now was the hour, the -minute, when the virgin waters were falling for the first time in -creation into the flower-besprinkled lap of the green earth before -their eyes! - -‘Charley, my boy,’ he said to Mr. Banks, ‘take off your hat. Piambook, -do liket me,’ he said, removing his own. ‘I name this water, now -about to be filled for the first time within the memory of man, -“Lake Antonia.” So mote it be. Hip, hip, hurrah!‘ and the echoes of -the waste rang to the unfamiliar sounds of the great British shout -of welcome, of salutation, of battle-joy, of deathdefiance, which -England’s friends and England’s foes have had ere now just cause to -know. - -‘Hurrah!’ joined in Charley Banks with genuine feeling. ‘By George! I -never thought to see this sight—last year particularly; but, of course, -we might have known it wasn’t going to be dry always, as Levison said. -We don’t see far beyond our noses, most of us. But it _was_ hard to -conjure up any notion of a regular out-and-out waterfall like this with -a twelvemonth’s dust, and last year’s burnt feed keeping as black as -the day it took fire. I believe there will be thirty feet of water in -this when it’s full up, and it soon will be at this rate.’ - -‘Budgeree tumble down water that one,’ said Piambook. ‘Old man -blackfellow yabber, debil-debil, make a light here when he yan long -that one scrub.’ - -Another occasion of congratulation awaited Mr. Neuchamp, the pleasure -and pride accompanying which were perhaps only second in degree to -the feelings inspired by the engineering triumph of Lake Antonia. -His stud of Austral-Arabian horses had shared in the general advance -and development of the property; they were now a perfect marvel of -successful rearing. - -He had them brought in daily from the sandhills near the plain where -they ordinarily grazed, and passed hours in reviewing the colts and -fillies, the yearlings, the mares and the foals. Every grade and stage, -from the equine baby which gambolled and frisked by the side of its -dam, to the well-furnished three-year-old filly—‘Velut in latis equa -trima campis ludit exsultim, metuitque tangi,’—all were satin-coated, -sleek and round, fuller-fleshed, stronger, swifter; more riotously -healthy could they not have been had they been fed with golden oats in -an emperor’s stable. Daintily now they picked the half-ripened tops -from the fields of wild oats or barley which spread for leagues around. -They drank of the pure clear waters of every pool and brooklet. They -lay at night in the thickly-carpeted sandy knolls, and snuffed up the -free desert breeze, fresh wafted from inmost sands or farthest seas. -Partaking on one side of their parentage of the stately height and -generous scope of their southern dams, culled from the noble race of -island steeds which bear up the large frames of the modern Anglo-Saxon, -they inherited a strong, perhaps overpowering infusion of the priceless -blood of the courser of the desert. Their delicate heads, their wide -nostrils, their adamantine legs, their perfect symmetry, all told -of the ancient lineage of Omar the Keheilan, whose dam was Najima -Sabeh or the Morning Star, of the strain Seglawee Dzedran, which, as -every camel-driver of the Anezeh knows, dates back to El Kamsch, that -glorious equine constellation, the five mares of Mahomet! - -Here, again, was another instance of what Ernest could not but -acknowledge gratefully as the generosity of Fate. Had but the season -continued obdurate, his utter irrevocable ruin could not have been -stayed. As a consequence, this stud, so precious, so profitable, so -distinguished as it was apparently destined to be (for Mr. Banks told -him that numbers of offers had already been received for all available -surplus stock, while the agent of a large dealer had implored him to -put a price upon the whole stud), would doubtless have passed under the -hammer as most unconsidered trifles, to be sneered at, scattered, for -ever wasted and lost, as had been many a good fellow’s pet stud ere now. - -At length the day arrived when, having witnessed the satisfactory -conclusion of every conceivable business duty and task which could be -transacted at Rainbar or Mildool, Mr. Neuchamp took his place in the -mail for Sydney, which city he had calculated to reach within a week of -the dread ceremonial which was to seal his destiny. The coach did _not_ -break down or capsize, fracturing Mr. Neuchamp’s leg in two places. The -train fulfilled its appointed task, and the stern steam-giant did not -select that opportunity for running off the rails or equalising angles. -Something of the sort might have been reasonably expected to happen to -a hero so near the rapturous denouement of the third volume, in which, -indeed, every hero of average respectability is killed, mysteriously -imprisoned, or married. - -Mr. Neuchamp had undergone trials and troubles, risks and anxieties, -losses and crosses; but the season of tribulation was for ever past -for him. He had henceforth but to submit to the compulsory laurel -crown, to the caresses of Fortune’s favourite delegates, to listen to -the plaudits of the crowd, to withstand the whispers and glances of -beauty. He was now wise, beautiful, strong, and brave, a conqueror, an -Adonis—in a word, he was _rich_! - -He stood successful, and the world’s praises, grudgingly bestowed upon -struggling fortitude, were showered upon the obviously victorious -speculator. All kinds of rumours went forth about him. His possessions -were multiplied, so that Rainbar and Mildool stood sponsors for a tract -of country about as large as from Kashgar to Khiva. - -The canal was magnified into the dimensions of its namesake of Suez, -and a trade was prophesied which would overshadow Melbourne and -revolutionise Adelaide. He had contracted for the remount service for -the whole Madras Presidency, such a matter being quite within the scope -of his immense and high-bred studs. His herds of cattle were to supply -Ballarat and Sandhurst with fat stock, and Melbourne buyers were on -their way to secure everything he could deliver for the next two years! -Ernest Neuchamp of Rainbar was the man of the day; the popular idol. -Squatter though he might be, some of Jack Windsor’s grateful utterances -had been circulated, and a democratic but strongly appreciative and -generous populace adored him. Portraits of Mr. Neuchamp and his -faithful retainer, Jack Windsor, contending victoriously with a swarthy -piratical crowd, led on by the Count with a cutlass and a belt full -of revolvers, appeared in the windows of the print-shops. Heroism and -unselfish generosity, like murder, ‘will out.’ - -Whether accidentally or otherwise, the Morahmee conflict had -transpired. I make no reflections upon the well-known inviolable -secrecy which shrouds all postnuptial communications. I content myself -with stating a fact. Mr. Windsor was now a married man. - -Ernest was at first annoyed, then surprised, lastly, unaffectedly -amused, when a highly popular dramatic version of the incident appeared -at the Victoria Theatre, wherein he was represented as defying the -Count, and assuring him that ‘berlood should flow from Morahmee Jetty -to the South Head Lighthouse ere he relinquished the two maidens -to his lawless grasp,’ while Jack Windsor’s representative, with a -cabbage-tree hat and a hanging velvet band broad enough to make a sash -for Carry, placed himself in an exaggerated, pugilistic attitude, -and implored the foreign seamen to ‘come on and confront on his own -ground, by the shore of that harbour which was his country’s pride, a -true-born Sydney native!’ This brought down the house, and occasioned -Mr. Neuchamp such anguish of mind that he began to think Jermyn Croker -not such a bad fellow after all, and to feel unkindly towards the great -land and the warm-hearted people of his adoption. - -Incapable of being stimulated by flattery into a false estimate of -himself, these exaggerated symptoms of appreciation but pained him -acutely; they disturbed his philosophical mind, ever craving for the -performance of justice and intolerant of all lower standards of right. - -As for Antonia Frankston, like most women, she was gratified by these -tokens of the distinction which had been so profusely accorded to her -hero. He was a hero who, in her eyes, though worthy of triumphs and -processions, evaded his claims to such distinctions. He was too prone, -she thought, to be over Scriptural in his social habitudes, and unless -roused and incited, to take the lower rather than the higher seat at -the board. Now that the people, wavering and impulsive, but still a -mighty and tangible power, had endorsed and adopted him, Antonia’s -expansive mind recognised the brevet rank bestowed upon him. After all, -had he not done much and dared greatly? Was it not well for the world -to know it? If he was to be decorated, few deserved it more. So Antonia -accepted serenely and in good faith the plaudits and universal flattery -which now commenced to be showered upon the hero of her choice, the -idol of her heart, the image of all written manhood. - -The days which Mr. Neuchamp spent in Sydney after his return from -Mildool and Rainbar were certainly more tedious than any which he had -ever known in the pleasant city; but at length they passed away and -were no more—strange thought! those atoms from the mighty mass of -Time—drops from his flowing river—draughts, alas! quaffed or spilled -from life’s golden chalice. They were past, faded, dead, irrevocably -gone, as the days of the years before Pharaoh, before the shepherd -kings, before the dawn of human life, Eden, or the first gleam of light -which flashed upon a darkened, formless world! - -Sad, pathetic even, is the death of a day! Its circling hours have -known peace, joy, loving regard, social glee, charity, justice, mercy, -repose. The allotted task has been done. The parent’s smile, the -wife’s love, the babe’s prattle, have all glorified earth during its -short season. And now the day is done! its tiny term is over, lost in -the shoreless sea of past immensities! The brightly inconstant orb -shines tenderly on the new-born stranger, full of joyous hope or dread -expectancy. Who can tell what this, the new and garish day, may bring -forth? Let us weep for the loved, fast-fading Child of Time, in whose -golden tresses, at least, twined no cypress wreath. - -Then, heralded by calm and cloudless hours, did the wondrous unit, the -Day of Days, dawn for Ernest Neuchamp. Rarely—even in that matchless -clime, where the too ardent sun alone may be blamed by the husbandman, -rarely by the citizen or the tourist—did a more perfect, unrivalled, -wondrous day steal rosy through the ocean mists, the folded vapours, to -change into fretted gold and Tyrian dyes the tender tints of flushed -dawn. All nature visibly, audibly rejoiced. The tiny wavelets murmured -on the milk-white sands of the Morahmee beach, that their darling—she -who loved them and talked with them in many a hushed eve, in many a -solemn starry midnight—was this day to be wed. The strange foreign -pines and flower trees of the Morahmee plantation, brought from many -a distant land to please the lady of the mansion, echoed the sound -as they waved to and fro with oriental languor and tropical mystery. -The flowerets she daily tended turned imperceptibly their delicately -various sheen of petals to each other and sighed the tender secret. -With how many secrets are not the flowers entrusted? Have they not been -sworn to silence since those days of the great dead empires, when the -vows and pleadings, songs and laughter, beneath the rose-chaplets were -sacred evermore? - -Her gems, of which Antonia had great store—for there was more -difficulty in preventing Paul from overlading her caskets than of -replenishing them—even they knew it. They flashed and glittered, and -reddened, and sent out green and purple light, for they are envious, -hard, and remorseless of nature, as they noted the arrival of a -bediamonded necklace, and a brooch outshining in splendour any of their -rich and rare and very exclusive ‘set.’ - -The pensioners, her dependants, of the house, among the humble, and -the very poor, knew it and raised for her welfare the brief unstudied -prayer which comes from a thankful heart. The poor, in ordinary -acceptation, are, and have always been, in Australia, difficult -to discover and to distinguish. But to the earnest quest of the -unaffectedly charitable, anxious to do good to soul or body, to succour -the tempted, to help the needy, to save him that is ready to perish, -worthy occasions of ministration have never been absent from the -outskirts of every large city. - -The forlorn spinster, friendless and forsaken, the overworked -matron,—the shabby genteel sufferers too secure to starve, too poor to -enjoy, too proud to complain, and, occasionally, what seemed to be an -example of unmerciful disaster,—among these were the rich maiden’s -unobtrusive but unremittingly performed good works, of which none -heard, none knew, but the recipients, and perhaps the discreetest of -co-workers. - - * * * * * - -And thus, with the day just dawned, had the maiden life of Antonia -Frankston come to an end. From this day forth her being was to merge in -that of one who, falling with the suddenness of a shipwrecked mariner -into their society, had been, as would have been such a waif, treated -with every friendly office, with the ample up-springing kindness of -a princely heart, by her fond father. That father, no mean judge of -his fellow-man, had seen in his early career but the noble errors of -a lofty nature and an elevated ideal. Such disproportions between -judgment and experience but prove the natural dignity of the mind as -fully as the precocious wisdom of the gutter-bred urchin waif, his base -descent and companionship. - -Paul Frankston had long foreseen that, when the lessons of life should -have cleared the encrustation from the character of his _protégé_, it -would shine forth bright and burnished as Toledo steel—all-sufficient -for defence, nay, equal to spirited attack, should such need arise. He -saw that the future possessor and guardian of his soul’s treasure was -a ‘man’ as well as a ‘gentleman.’ On both of these essentials he laid -great weight. For the rest, his principles were high and unfaltering, -his habits unimpeachable. Whatever trifling defects there might be in -his character were merely such as were incident to mortality. They must -be left to the influence of time, experience, and of Antonia. - -‘If she doesn’t turn him out a perfect article,’ said Paul, -unconsciously quitting the mental for the actual soliloquy, ‘why, -nothing and no one can. If I had been any one else, and she had -commenced early enough at me, I really believe that she’d have changed -old Paul Frankston into a bishop, or, at any rate, a rural dean at -least; even Charley Carryall——’ - -But whether Captain Carryall’s utterances and anecdotes were scarcely -of a nature calculated to harmonise with bishops and deans, or whether -Mr. Frankston’s many engagements at this important crisis suddenly -engaged his attention, can never be known with that precision which -this chronicler is always anxious to supply. One thing only is certain, -that he looked at his watch, and hastily arising from his arm-chair, -departed into the city. - -For the information of a section of readers for whom we feel much -respect and gratitude, it may be mentioned that the wedding took place -at St. James’s, a venerable but architecturally imperfect pile in the -vicinity of Hyde Park. There be churches near Morahmee more replete -with ‘miserable sinners’ in robes of Worth and garments of Poole, but -Mr. Frankston would none of them. In the old church had he stood beside -his mother, a schoolboy, wondering and wearied, but acquiescent, after -the manner of British children; in the old church had he plighted his -troth to Antonia’s sainted mother; in the old church should his darling -utter her vows, and in no other. Are there any words which can fitly -interpret the deep joy and endless thankfulness which fill the heart -and humble the mind of him who, all unworthy, knows that the chalice -of life’s deepest joy is even then past all risk and danger, steadily -uplifted to his reverent lips? - -Doubts there have been, delays that fretted, fears that shook the soul, -clouds that dimmed, darkness that hid the sky of love. All these have -sped. Here is naught but the glad and gracious Present, that blue and -golden day which, pardoning and giving amnesty to the Past, beseeches, -well-nigh assures, the stern veiled form of the Future. - -Some of these reflections would doubtless have mingled with the -contemplations of Ernest Neuchamp at Aurora’s summons on that glad morn -but for an unimportant fact—that he was at that well-known poetical -period most soundly asleep. - -Restlessly wakeful during the earlier night-watches, he slept heavily -at length, and only awoke, terrible to relate, with barely time for a -careful toilet. Hastily disposing of a cup of coffee and a roll, he -betook himself, in company with Mr. Parklands, who, I grieve to relate, -had been playing loo all night, and was equally late and guilty, to the -ancient church, where they were, by the good fortune of Parklands‘watch -being rather fast—like all his movements—exactly, accurately the -canonical five minutes before the time. Both of the important -personages, being secretly troubled, looked slightly, becomingly pale. -But the pallor of Parklands, entirely due to an unprosperous week, -involving heavier disbursements and later sittings than ordinary, told -much in his favour with the bridesmaids, so much so, that he always -averred, in his customary irreverent speech, that ‘his flint was fixed’ -on the occasion. - -Probably owing to the calmly superior aspect of Mr. Hartley Selmore, -or the tonic supplied by Jermyn Croker’s patent disapprobation and -contempt of the whole proceedings, the protagonist and his acolouthos -went through the ordeal with that exact proportion of courage, -reverence, deftness, and satisfaction, the full rendering of which -is often hard upon him who makes necessarily ‘a first appearance.’ -As for Antonia’s loveliness on that day, when, radiant, white-robed, -and serene, she placed her hand in that of her lover, and greeted -him with the trustful smile in which the virgin-soul shines out o’er -the maiden-bride’s countenance, Ernest Neuchamp may be pardoned for -thinking that the angel of his dreams had been permitted to visit the -earth, to rehearse for his especial joy a premature beatific vision. - -Mr. Parklands effected a sensation by dropping the bridal-ring, -but as he displayed much quickness of eye and manual dexterity in -regaining it, the incident had rather a beneficial effect than -otherwise. Everything was happily concluded, even to the kissing of -the bridesmaids, Mr. Parklands, with his usual energy and daring, -having insisted on carrying out personally that pleasing portion of the -programme, supposed to appertain of right to the holder of the ancient -and honourable office of groomsman. This compelled the chasing of two -unwilling damsels half-way down the aisle, after which the slightly -scandalised spectators quitted the church, while the wedding-guests -betook themselves to Morahmee. - -There, as they arrived, Mr. Frankston, sweeping the bay mechanically -with long-practised eye, exclaimed, ‘What boat is that heading for our -jetty at such a pace?—a whaleboat, too, with a Kanaka crew. There’s a -tall man with the steer oar in his fist; by Jove! it’s Charley Carryall -for a thousand.’ - -And that cheerful mariner and successful narrator it proved to be when -the weather-beaten boat came foaming up to the little pier, drawn half -out of the water by her wild-looking, long-haired crew, encouraged by -their captain, who was backing up the stroke as if an eighty-barrel -whale depended upon their speed. - -‘Frantically glad to see you, Charley, my boy,’ shouted Paul; ‘never -hoped for such luck; the only man necessary to make the affair -perfect—absolutely perfect. Isn’t he, Antonia? But how did you guess -what we were about, and get here in time? I see the old _Banksia_ is -only creeping up the harbour now.’ - -‘_That_ guided me,’ said the Captain, pointing to the profusely -decorated Morahmee flagstaff—an invariable adjunct to a marine villa. -‘I was sure all that bunting wasn’t up for anything short of Antonia’s -wedding. So I dressed and came away. The operculums I was bringing our -little girl here will just come in appropriately. They’re the first any -of you have seen, I daresay.’ - -The faintly subdued tone which is usual and natural in the pre-banquet -stage could not be reasonably protracted after the first fusilade of -Paul’s wonderful Pommery and Veuve Clicquot, Steinberger and Roederer. - -The guests were many and joyous, the day brilliant, the occasion -fortunate and mirth-inspiring, the entertainment unparalleled, and -henceforth proverbial in a city of sumptuous and lavish hospitality. - -Small wonder, then, that the merriment was as free and unconstrained as -the welcome was cordial, and the banquet regal in its costly profusion. -How the jests circulated! how the silvery laughter rang! how the -bright eyes sparkled! how the fair cheeks glowed! how the soft breeze -whispered love! how the blue wave murmured joy! - -Did not Mr. Selmore propose the health of the bride and bridegroom with -such pathetic eloquence that the uninstructed were doubtful as to -whether he was Antonia’s uncle or Mr. Neuchamp’s father? He referred to -the mingled energy, foresight, acuteness, and originality displayed by -his valued, and, he might add, distinguished friend Ernest Neuchamp. -By utilising qualities of the highest order, joined with information -always yielded, he was proud to say, by himself and other pioneers, he -had achieved an unequalled, but, he must add, a most deserved success, -which placed him in the front rank of the pastoral proprietors of New -South Wales. - -Any one would have imagined from Mr. Hartley Selmore’s benevolent flow -of eulogy that he had carefully nursed the infancy of Mr. Neuchamp’s -fortunes instead of ruthlessly endeavouring to strangle the tender -nursling. He himself, by means of luck and much discount, had managed -to hang on, ostensible proprietor of his numerous stations, until the -tide turned. Now he was a wealthy man, and needed not to call the -governor of the Bank of England his cousin. - -With prosperity his character and estimation had much improved. -There were those yet who said he was an unprincipled remorseless old -humbug, and would none of him. But in a general way he was acceptable; -popular, in private and in public. His natural talents were great; his -acquirements above the average; his manner irresistible; it was no -one’s particular interest or business to bring him to book,—so he dined -and played billiards at the clubs, buttonholed officials, and greeted -illustrious strangers, as if the greater portion of the pastoral -interior of Australia belonged to him, or as though he were one of the -Conscript Fathers, distinguished for an excess of Roman virtues, of -this rising nation. - -Mr. Parklands indeed desired to throw some missile at him for his -‘cheek,’ as he confided to a young lady with sensational blue eyes, -but desisted from that practical criticism upon being implored by his -fair neighbour not to think of it, for her sake, and that of the ladies -generally. The speaker was pretty enough to speak with authority, and -so Hartley, like other fortunate conspirators and oppressors, departed -in triumph, with the plaudits and congratulations of the unthinking -public. For the rest, the affair went off much as such society -fireworks do. Augusta Neuchamp, in a Paris dress, looked so extremely -well that Jermyn Croker congratulated himself warmly, and mingled such -vitriolic scintillations with his pleasantries, that every one was awed -into admiration. The mail steamer was to sail in a few days, and he -flattered himself that he had contrived a surprise for all his friends, -which should contain an element of ignoring contempt so complete in -conception and execution, that his departure from the colony should -faithfully reflect the opinions and convictions formed during his -residence in it. - -Having, after considerable hesitation, finally determined to enter -upon the frightfully uncertain adventure of matrimony, he had offered -himself and heart, such as it was, in marriage to Miss Augusta, with -many apologies for the apparent necessity of the ceremony being -performed in a colony. That young lady had endeared herself to Mr. -Croker by her unsparing criticisms, by her ceaseless discontent -with all things Australian, by her unmistakable air of _ton_ and -distinction. He did not entirely overlook her possession of a moderate -but assured income. - -With his customary disregard for the feelings of others, he had -insisted upon being married, without the usual time-honoured ceremonies -and concomitants, on the morning upon which the mail steamer started -for Europe. By going on board directly afterwards, the Sydney people -would be precluded from hearing of the event until after their -departure; while their fellow-passengers, most of them strangers, would -be ignorant as to whether the newly-married couple were of a week’s -date or of six months. - -This arrangement, in which he had no great difficulty in persuading -Miss Augusta to acquiesce, would have excellently answered Mr. Croker’s -unselfish expectations but for one circumstance, which he doubtless -noted to the debit of colonial wrongs and shortcomings—he had neglected -to procure the co-operation of the elements. - -No sooner had the ceremony, unwitnessed save by Paul Frankston and Mr. -and Mrs. Neuchamp, taken place, and the happy pair been transferred -to the _Nubia_, their luggage having been safely deposited in that -magnificent ocean steamer days before,—no sooner had the great steamer -neared the limit of the harbour, when a southerly gale, an absolute -hurricane, broke upon the coast with such almost unprecedented fury -that till it abated no sane commander of the Peninsular and Oriental -Company’s service would have dreamed of quitting safe anchorage. - -For three days the ‘tempest howled and wailed,’ and most uncomfortably -the _Nubia_ lay at anchor, safe but most uneasy, and, as she was rather -crank, rolling and pitching nearly as wildly as she could have done in -the open sea. - -It so chanced that one of Mr. Croker’s few weak points was an -extraordinarily extreme susceptibility to _mal de mer_. On all -occasions upon which he had cleared the Heads, for years past, he had -suffered terribly. But never since his first outward-bound experience -in early life had he suffered torments, prostration, akin to this. He -lay in his cabin death-like, despairing, well-nigh in collapse. - -Miss Neuchamp, in spite of her much travelling, was always a martyr -during the first week of a voyage, if the weather chanced to be bad. -Now it certainly was bad, very bad; and in consequence Miss Augusta -lay, under the charge of a stewardess, in a stern cabin, well-nigh -sick unto death, heedless of life and its chequered presentments, and -as oblivious, not to say indifferent, to the fate of Jermyn Croker as -if she had yesterday sworn to love and obey the chief officer of the -_Nubia_. - -This was temporary anguish, mordant and keen, doubtless. But Time, the -healer, would certainly in a few days have set it straight. The fact -of an unknown lady and gentleman being indisposed at the commencement -of the voyage afflicts nobody. But here was apparently the finger of -the fiend. A ruffianly pilot, coming off in his hardy yawl, brought on -board a copy of the _Sydney Morning Herald_ of the day following their -attempted departure, in which it was duly set forth how, at St. James’s -Church, by Canon Druid, Jermyn, second son of Crusty Croker, Esq., of -Crankleye Hall, Cornwall, was then and there married to Augusta, only -daughter of the Rev. Cyril Neuchamp, incumbent of Neuchamp-Barton, -Buckinghamshire, England. Now the joke was out. Even under such -unpromising circumstances it told. Here were two mortals, passionately -devoted of course, and in that state of matrimonial experience when -all things tend to the wildest overrating, so cast down, so utterly -prostrated by the foul Sea Demon, that they positively did not care -a rush for each other. The great Jermyn lay, faintly ejaculating -‘Steward, Ste-w-a-ar-d,’ at intervals, and making neither lament nor -inquiry about his similarly suffering bride. As for Augusta, she had -scarce more strength of body or mind than permitted her to moan out, -‘I shall die, I shall die’; and apparently, for all she cared, in that -unreal, phantasmal, pseudo-existence, which only was not death, though -more dreadful, Jermyn Croker might have fallen overboard, or have been -changed into a Seedee stoker. Then for this to happen to Jermyn Croker, -of all people! The humour of the situation was inexhaustible! - -And though the fierce south wind departed and the _Nubia_ drove -swiftly majestic across the long seas that part Cape Otway from the -stormy Leuwin, though in due time the spice-laden gales blew ‘soft -from Ceylon’s isle,’ and the savage peaks of Aden, the lofty summit of -the Djebel Moussa rose to view in the grand succession of historical -landscapes; yet to the last day of the voyage a stray question in -reference to the precise effects of very bad cases of sea-sickness -would be directed, as to persons of proved knowledge and experience, to -Mr. and Mrs. Jermyn Croker, by their fellow-passengers. - -It is due to Mr. Croker, as a person of importance, to touch lightly -upon his after-career. His wife discovered too late that in reaching -England he had only changed the theme upon which his universal -depreciations were composed. ‘Non animam sed cœlum mutant qui trans -mare currunt.’ He abused the climate and the people of England with a -savage freedom only paralleled by his Australian practice. Becoming -tired of receiving 3 or 4 per cent for his money, he one day, in a fit -of wrath, embarked one-half of his capital in a somewhat uncertain -South American loan. His cash was absorbed, to reappear spasmodically -in the shape of interest, of which there was little, while of principal -it soon became apparent that there would be none. - -Reduced to the practice of marked though not distressing economy, -Mr. Croker enjoyed the peculiar pleasure which is yielded to men of -his disposition, of witnessing the possession of luxuries by others -and a style of living which they are debarred from emulating. He was -gladdened, too, by the occasional vision of an Australian with more -money than he could spend, who rallied him upon his grave air, and -bluntly asked why he was such a confounded fool as to sell out just as -prices were really rising. Finally, to aggravate his sufferings, long -unendurable by his own account, Mr. Parklands had the effrontery to -come home, and, in the very neighbourhood where he, Croker, was living -for economy, to buy a large estate which happened to be for sale. - -The unfailing flow of the new proprietor’s high spirits, his liberal -ways, and frank manners, combined with exceptional straight going in -the hunting-field, rendered him immensely popular, as indeed he had -always contrived to be wherever fate and speculation led his roving -steps. But it may be questioned whether his brother-colonist ever saw -his old friend spinning by behind a blood team, or heard of his being -among the select few in a ‘quick thing,’ without fulminating one of his -choicest anathemas, comprehending at once the order to which he and -Parklands had belonged, the country they had quitted, and the one in -which they now sojourned. - -Mr. Banks remained in the employment of Mr. Neuchamp at Rainbar until, -having saved and acquired by guarded investment a moderate capital, he -had a tempting offer of joining, as junior partner, in the purchase of -a large station in new country. Always a good-looking, manly fellow, -he managed to secure the affections of a niece of Mr. Middleton, whom -he met on one of his rare trips to Sydney, and, before he left for the -Tadmor Downs, Lower Barcoo, they were married. - -Mr. Joe Freeman had employed some of the compulsory leisure time -rendered necessary during his fulfilment of the residence clause for -Mr. Levison, in an exhaustive study of the Crown Lands Alienation Act. -From that important statute (20 Vic. No. 7, sec. 13) he discovered -that, provided a man had children enough, there is but little limit to -the quantity of the country’s soil that he can secure and occupy at a -rate of expenditure singularly small and favourable to the speculative -‘landist’ of the period. - -Thus Joe Freeman, after considerable ciphering, made out that he could -‘take up’ for himself and his three younger children a total of twelve -hundred and eighty acres of first-class land! He had determined that -as long as there was an alluvial flat in the colony his choice should -not consist of _bad_ land. Added to this would be a pre-emptive grazing -right of three times the extent. This would come to three thousand -eight hundred and forty acres, which, added to the freehold of twelve -hundred and eighty acres, gave a total of five thousand one hundred and -twenty acres. The entire use of this territory he could secure by a -payment of five shillings per acre for the _freehold portion_ only—say, -three hundred and twenty pounds. - -‘Of course his three children were compelled, by law, to reside on -their selections. As two of these were under five years old, some -difficulty in the carrying out of the apparently stringent section No. -18 might be anticipated. - -This difficulty was utterly obliterated by building his cottage -_exactly_ upon the intersecting lines of the four half-sections, thus: - -[Illustration: Diagram] - -By this clever contrivance Mary Ellen, the baby, as well as Bob, aged -three years, were ‘residing upon their selections’ when they were in -bed at night, inasmuch as that haven of rest (for the other members of -the family) was carefully placed across the south line which divided -the estates. - -Nor was this all. Bill Freeman took up a similar quantity of land in -precisely the same way, locating it about a mile from his brother’s -selection, so that as it was clearly not worth any other selector’s -while to come between them, they would probably have the use of another -section or two of land for nothing. The squatter on whose run this -little sum was worked out was a struggling, burdened man, unable to -buy out or borrow. He was ruined. But the individual, in all ages, has -suffered for the State. - -Mr. Neuchamp’s Australian career had now reached a point when life, -however heroic, is generally conceded to be less adventurous. His end, -in a literary sense, is near. We feel bound in honour, however, to add -the information, that upon the assurance of Mr. Frankston that they -could not leave New South Wales temporarily at a more prosperous time, -Ernest Neuchamp resolved once more to tempt the main, and to taste the -joy of revisiting, with his Australian bride, his ancestral home. - -Having taken the precaution to call a council of the most eminent -floriculturists of flower-loving Sydney to his aid, he procured and -shipped a case of orchidaceous plants, second to none that had ever -left the land, for the delectation of his brother Courtenay. He had -long since paid the timely remittance which had so lightened his load -of anxiety in the ‘dry season’ at Rainbar, with such an addition of -‘colonial interest’ as temporarily altered the views of the highly -conservative senior as to the soundness of Australian securities. - -Upon the genuine delight which Antonia experienced when the full glory -of British luxury, the garnered wealth of a thousand years, burst -upon her, it is not necessary here to dilate, nor, after a year’s -continental travel, upon the rejoicings which followed the birth of -Mr. Courtenay Frankston Neuchamp at the hall of his sires. His uncle -immediately foresaw a full and pleasing occupation provided for -his remaining years, in securing whatever lands in the vicinity of -Neuchampstead might chance to be purchasable. They would be needed for -the due territorial dignity of a gentleman, who, upon his accession -to the estate, would probably have thirty or forty thousand a year -additional to the present rental, to spend on one of the oldest -properties in the kingdom. - -‘He himself,’ he said, ‘was unhappily a bachelor. He humbly trusted -so to remain, but he was proud and pleased to think that the old House -would once more be worthily represented. He had never seen the remotest -possibility of such a state of matters taking place in his own time, -and had never dreamed, therefore, of the smallest self-assertion. - -‘The case was now widely different. The cadet of the House, against, -he would frankly own, his counsel and opinion, had chosen to seek his -fortune on distant shores, as had many younger sons unavailingly. He -had not only found it, but had returned, moreover, with the traditional -Princess, proper to the King’s younger son, in all legends and -romances. In his charming sister he recognised a princess in her own -right, and an undeniable confirmation of his firmly-held though not -expressed opinion, that his brother Ernest’s enthusiasm had always been -tempered by a foundation of prudence and unerring taste.’ - -Again in his native land, in his own county, Antonia had to submit -to the lionisation of her husband, who came to be looked upon as a -sort of compromise between Columbus and Sir Walter Raleigh, with a -dash of Francis Drake. The very handsome income which the flourishing -property of Rainbar and Mildool, _cum_ Back-blocks A to M, and the -unwearied rainy seasons and high markets, permitted him to draw, was -magnified tenfold. His liberal expenditure gratified the taste of the -lower class, among whom legends involving romantic discoveries and -annexations of goldfields received ready credence. - -Mr. Ernest Neuchamp was courteously distinguished by the county -magnates, popular among the country gentlemen who had been his friends -and those of his family from his youth, and the idol of the peasantry, -who instinctively discerned, as do children and pet animals, that he -viewed them with a sympathetic and considerate regard. - -When Mrs. Ernest Neuchamp, of Neuchampstead, was presented to her -Gracious Sovereign by ‘the Duchess,’ that exalted lady deigned to -express high approval of her very delicately beautiful and exquisitely -apparelled subject from the far southern land, and to inquire if all -Australian ladies were so lovely and so sweet of aspect and manner as -the very lovely young creature she saw before her. The Court Circular -was unprecedentedly enthusiastic; and in very high places was Ernest -assured that he was looked upon as having conferred lustre upon -his order and benefits upon his younger countrymen, to whom he had -exhibited so good and worthy an example. - -All this panegyrical demonstration Ernest Neuchamp received not -unsuitably, but with much of his old philosophical calmness of critical -attitude. What he really had ‘gone out into the wilderness’ to see, -and to do, he reflected he had neither seen nor done. What he found -himself elevated to high places for doing, was the presumable amassing -of a large fortune, a proceeding popular and always favourably looked -upon. But this was only a secondary feature in his programme, and one -in which he had taken comparatively little interest. He could not -help smiling to himself with humorous appreciation of the satiric -pleasantry of the position, conscious also that his depreciation of -great commercial shrewdness and boldness in speculation was held to -be but the proverbial modesty of a master mind; while the interest -which he could not restrain himself from taking in plans for the weal -and progress of his old friend and client, Demos, was considered to -be the dilettante distraction with which, as great statesmen take to -wood-chopping or poultry-rearing, the mighty hunter, the great operator -of the trackless waste, like Garibaldi at Caprera, occupied himself. It -was hardly worth while doing battle with the complimentary critics, -who would insist upon crediting him with all the sterner virtues of -their ideal colonist—a great and glorious personage who combined the -autocracy of a Russian with the _savoir faire_ of a Parisian, the -energy of an Englishman with the instinct of a Parsee and the rapidity -of an American; after a while, no doubt, they would find out their -god to have feet of clay. He would care little for that. But, in the -meanwhile, no misgivings mingled with their enthusiastic admiration. -The younger son of an ancient house, which possessed historic claims -to the consideration of the county, had returned laden with gold, -which he scattered with free and loving hand. That august magnate -‘the Duke’ had (vicariously, of course—he had long lost the habit of -personal action save in a few restricted modes) to look to his laurels. -There was danger, else, that his old-world star would pale before this -newly-arisen constellation, bright with the fresher lustre of the -Southern Cross. - -All these admitted luxuries and triumphs notwithstanding, a day came -when both Ernest Neuchamp, and Antonia his wife, began to approach, -with increasing eagerness and decision, the question of return. In -the three years which they had spent ‘at home’ they had, they could -not conceal from themselves, exhausted the resources of Britain—of -Europe—in their present state of sensation. - -Natural as was such a feeling in the heart of Antonia, with whom a -yearning for her birthland, her childhood’s home, for but once again -to hear the sigh of the summer wave from the verandah at Morahmee, was -gradually gaining intensity, one wonders that Ernest Neuchamp should -have fully shared her desire to return. Yet such was undoubtedly the -fact. - -Briton as he was to the core, he had, during the third year of their -furlough, been often impatient, often aweary, of an aimless life—that -of a gazer, a spectator, a dilettante. Truth to tell, the strong free -life of the new world had unfitted him for an existence of a mere -recipiency. - -A fox-hunter, a fisherman, a fair shot, and a lover of coursing, -he yet realised the curious fact that he was unable to satisfy his -personal needs by devoting the greater portion of his leisure to these -recreations, perfect in accessories and appointments, unrivalled in -social concomitants, as are these kingly sports when enjoyed in Britain. - -Passionately fond of art, a connoisseur, and erstwhile an amateur of -fair attainment, a haunter of libraries, a discriminating judge of old -editions and rare imprints, he yet commenced to become impatient of -days and weeks so spent. Such a life appeared to him now to be a waste -of time. In vain his brother Courtenay remonstrated. - -‘I feel, my dear Courtenay, and it is no use disguising the truth to -you or to myself, that I can no longer rest content in this little -England of yours. It is a snug nest, but the bird has flown over the -orchard wall, his wings have swept the waste and beat the foam; he can -never again, I fear, dwell there, as of old; never again, I fear.’ - -‘But why, in the name of all that is exasperating and eccentric, can -you not be quiet, and let well alone?’ asked Courtenay, not without -a flavour of just resentment. ‘You have money; an obedient, utterly -devoted father-in-law, of a species unknown in Britain; a charming -wife, who might lead me like a bear, were I so fortunate as to have -been appropriated by her; troops of friends, I might almost say -admirers—for you must own you are awfully overrated in the county. What -in the wide world can urge you to tempt fortune by re-embarkation and -this superfluous buccaneering?’ - -‘I suppose it is vain to try and knock it out of your old head, -Courtenay, that there is no more buccaneering in New South Wales than -in old South Wales. But, talking of buccaneers, I suppose I _am_ like -one of old Morgan’s men who had swung in a West Indian hammock, and -seen the sack of Panama; thereafter unable to content himself in his -native Devon. - -‘You might as well have asked of old Raoul de Neuchamp to go back -and make cider in Normandy, after he had fought shoulder to shoulder -with Taillefer and Rollo at Hastings, and tasted the stern delight -of harrying Saxon Franklins and burning monasteries. I have found a -land where deeds are to be done, and where conquest, though but of -the forces of Nature, is still possible. Here in this happy isle your -lances are only used in the tilt-yard and tournament, your swords hang -on the wall, your armour is rusty, your knights fight but over the -wine-cup, your ladye-loves are ever in the bowers. With us, across the -main, still the warhorse carries mail, the lances are not headless, and -many a shrewd blow on shield and helmet rings still. - -‘I am in the condition of “The Imprisoned Huntsman”— - - ‘My hawk is tired of perch and hood, - My idle greyhound loathes his food, - My steed is weary of his stall, - And I am sick of captive thrall; - I would I were, as I have been, - Hunting the roe in forest green, - With bended bow and bloodhound free, - For that is the life that is meet for me.’ - -‘I know from experience that it is as probable that a star should come -down from the sky and do duty in the kitchen grate,’ said Courtenay -Neuchamp sardonically, ‘as that you should listen to any one’s opinion -but your own, or I would suggest that the falcon, and greyhound, -and steed business is better if not exclusively performed in this -hemisphere. I never doubted you would go your own road. But what -does Antonia say to leaving the land of court circulars and Queen’s -drawing-rooms and Paris bonnets fresh once a week?’ - -‘She says’—and here Mrs. Neuchamp crept up to her husband’s side and -placed her hand in his—‘that she is tired of Paradise—tired of perfect -houses, unsurpassable servants and dinners, drives and drawing-rooms, -lawn parties and archery meetings, the Academy and the Park, Belgravia -and South Kensington—in fact, of everything and everybody except -Neuchampstead and dear old Courtenay. She wants, like some one else, to -go out into the world again, a real world, and not a sham one like the -one in which rich people live in England. She is _living_, not life. -Perhaps I am “_un peu_ Zingara”—who knows? It’s a mercy I’m not very -dark, like some other Australians I have seen. But it is now the time -to say, my dear Courtenay, that Ernest and I have grown tired of play, -and want to go back to that end of the world where work grows.‘ - -‘Please don’t smother me with wisdom and virtue,’ pleaded Courtenay, -with a look of pathetic entreaty. ‘I know we are very ignorant and -selfish, and so on, in this old-fashioned England of ours. I really -think I might have become a convert and a colonist myself, if taken up -early by a sufficiently zealous and prepossessing missionaress. I feel -now that it is too late. Club-worship is with me too strongly ingrained -in my nature. Clubs and idols are closely connected, you know. But are -we never to meet again?’ and here the rarely changed countenance of -Courtenay Neuchamp softened visibly. - -‘We will have another look at you in late years,’ said Antonia softly; -‘perhaps we may come altogether when—when—we are old.’ - -‘I think I may promise that,’ said Mr. Neuchamp. ‘When Frank is old -enough to set up for himself at Morahmee, with an occasional trip to -Rainbar and Mildool, to keep himself from forgetting how to ride, -then I think we may possibly make our last voyage to the old home, in -preparation for that journey on which I trust we three may set forth at -periods not very distantly divided.’ - -The brothers shook hands silently. Antonia bestowed a sister’s kiss -upon the calm brow of the elder brother, and quitted the room. No -more was said. But all needful preparations were made, and ere the -autumn leaves had commenced to fall from the aged woods which girdled -Neuchampstead, the _Massilia_ was steaming through the Straits of -Bonifacio with Ernest Neuchamp watching the snowy mountain-tops of -Corsica, while Antonia alternately enlivened the baby Frank or dipped -into _The Crescent and the Cross,_ which she had long intended to read -over again in a leisurely and considerate manner. - - * * * * * - -But little remains to tell of the after-life of Ernest Neuchamp. -Settled once more in ‘the sunny land,’ he found his time fully and not -unworthily occupied in the superintendence of his extensive properties -and investments. There was much necessary journeying between Rainbar -and Morahmee, at which latter place Paul Frankston had insisted upon -their taking up their permanent abode. ‘I am going down hill,’ he -said; ‘the old house will be yours when I am gone; why should I sit -here lonely in my age while my darling and her children are so near -me? Don’t be afraid of the nursery-racket bothering me. Every note -of their young voices is music in my ears, being what they are.’ So -in Ernest’s absence in the bush, or during the sitting of the House -of Assembly—having from a stern sense of duty permitted himself to -be elected as the representative of the electoral district of Lower -Oxley—Antonia had a guardian and a companion. She resolved upon -making the journey to Rainbar, indeed, in order that she might fully -comprehend the nature of the life which her husband had formerly led. -During her stay she formed a tolerably fair estimate of the value of -the property, being a lady of an observing turn of mind, and possessing -by inheritance a hitherto latent tendency towards the management of -affairs not generally granted to the sex. She visited Lake Antonia, -and warmly congratulated Mr. Neuchamp upon that grand achievement. -She patted Osmund and Ben Bolt, now bordering on the dignity of -pensioners. She drove over to Mrs. Windsor’s cottage at Mildool, where -she found Carry established as rather a _grande dame_, with the general -approbation of the district and of all the tourists and travellers who -shared the proverbial hospitality of Mildool. She caused the stud to be -driven in for inspection, when she had sufficient presence of mind to -choose a pair of phaeton horses for herself out of them. But she told -her husband that she could not perceive any advantage to be derived -from living at Rainbar as long as their income maintained its present -average, and that he could manage the interesting but exceedingly warm -and isolated territory equally well by proxy. - -Jack Windsor, upon Mr. Banks’s promotion and marriage, became manager -of the whole consolidated establishment, with a proportionate advance -in salary. He developed his leading qualities of shrewdness and energy -to their fullest capacity under the influence of prosperity. Being -perfectly satisfied with his position and duties, having a good home, a -contented wife, the means of educating his large family, the respect of -the whole country-side, and the habit of saving a large portion of his -liberal salary, besides an abundance of the exact species of occupation -and exercise which suited him, it is not probable that he will make -any attempt to ‘better himself.’ It is not certain that Mrs. Windsor -would not favour the investment of their savings in property ‘down the -country’ for the sake of the children, etc.; but Jack will not hear of -it. ‘I should feel first-rate,’ he says scornfully, ‘shouldn’t I, in -a place of my own, with a man and a boy, and forty or fifty head of -crawling cattle to stare at while they were getting fit for market? -That’s not my style. It wouldn’t suit any of us—not you either, old -woman, to be poking about, helping at the wash-tub or something, or -peelin’ potatoes for dinner. We couldn’t stand it after the life we’ve -had here. I couldn’t do without half-a-dozen stabled hacks and a lot -of smart men to keep up to the mark. Give me something _big_ to work -at, done well, and paying for good keep and good spending all round. -Five hundred and forty head of fat cattle cut out in two days like the -last Mildool lot, and all the country-side at the muster—that’s John -Windsor’s style—none of your Hawkesbury corn-shelling, butter-and-eggs -racket. You ought to have married old Homminey, Carry, if that’s what -you wanted. Besides, after thinking and saving and driving up to high -pressure for the master so long, it would feel unnatural-like to be -only working for myself.‘ So the argument was settled. Mr. Windsor -had, it seems, tasted too fully of the luxury of power and command to -relinquish it for humble independence. - -The undisputed sway over a large staff of working hands, the -unquestioned control of money and credit, within certain limits, had -become with him more and more an indispensable habitude. Accustomed -to the tone of the leader and the centurion, he could not endure the -thought of changing his wide eventful life into the decorous dulness of -the small landed proprietor. Mrs. Windsor, too, who dressed exceedingly -well, and was admitted on equal terms to the society of the district, -a position which, from her tact, good sense, and extremely agreeable -appearance, she suitably filled and fully deserved, would probably, as -her husband forcibly explained, have felt the change almost as much as -himself. So Mr. Neuchamp was spared the annoyance of looking out for a -new manager. - -Hardy Baldacre accumulated a very large fortune, but was prevented, -in middle life, from proving the exact amount of coin and property -which may be amassed by the consistent practice of grinding parsimony, -combined with an elimination of all the literary, artistic, social, and -sympathetic tendencies. He habitually condemned the entire section, -under the fatal _affiche_ of ‘don’t pay.’ To the surprise—we cannot -with accuracy affirm, to the regret—of the general public, this very -extensive proprietor fell a victim to a fit of _delirium tremens_, -supervening upon the practice of irregular and excessive alcoholism. -Into this vice of barren minds, the pitiless economist, guilty of so -few other recreations, was gradually but irresistibly drawn. - -The _White Falcon_ fled far and fast with the fugitive noble, whose -debts added the keenest edge among his late friends and creditors to -the memory of his treasons. He escaped, with his usual good fortune, -the civil and criminal tentacula in which the dread octopus of the law -would speedily have enveloped him. He laughed at British and Australian -warrants. But passing into one of the Dutch Indian settlements, he was -sufficiently imprudent to pursue there also the same career of reckless -expenditure. By an accident his character was disclosed, and his arrest -effected at the moment of premeditated flight. A severe logic, learned -in the strict commercial schools of Holland, where debt meets with no -favour, guards the commerce of her intertropical colonies. The _White -Falcon_ was promptly seized and sold to satisfy a small portion of the -princely liabilities of the owner, while for long years, in a dreary -dungeon, like another and a better sea-rover, Albert von Schätterheims -was doomed to eat his heart in the darksome solitude of an ignoble and -hopeless captivity. - -The Freeman family prospered in a general sense. Abraham Freeman -settled down upon a comfortable but not over-fertile farm in the -neighbourhood of Bowning. The thickness of the timber, and the -conversion of much of it into fencing-rails, served to provide him -with occupation, and therefore with good principles, as Tottie saucily -observed, to his life’s end. That high-spirited damsel grieved much -at first over the slowness and general fuss about trifles, which, -after her extended experience, seemed to her to characterise the whole -district, but was eventually persuaded by a thriving young miller -that there were worse places to reside in. He was resolute, however, -in forbidding the carrying of bags of flour, and as she was provided -with a smart buggy and unlimited bonnets, her taste for adventurous -excitement became modified in time, and the black ambling mare was -handed over to the boys. - -William and Joe Freeman made much money by nomadic agrarianism. After -years passed in arduously constructing sham improvements and ‘carrying -out the residence clause,’ with no intention of residing, they found -themselves able to purchase a station. - -Having paid down a large sum in cash, they entered into possession -of their property with feelings of much self-gratulation, as being -now truly squatters, just as much so, indeed, as Mr. Neuchamp, who -had thought himself so well able to patronise them. But, unluckily -for them, and in direct contravention of the saying, ‘Hawks winna -pike oot hawks’ een,‘ the ex-owner of the station, formerly indeed an -old acquaintance who had risen in life, displayed the most nefarious -keenness in plotting an unscrupled treachery. He settled down, under -the conditional purchase clause, section 13, upon the very best part -of the run, the goodwill of which he had the day before been paid for. -Having a large family, and the land laws having been recently altered -so that a double area could be selected by each ‘person,’ he, with -the Messrs. Freemans‘own cash, actually annexed, irrevocably, an area -which reduced the value of the grazing property by about one-third. -Shrewd and unscrupulous as themselves, he calmly informed the frantic -Freemans ‘that he had only complied with the law.’ He laughed at their -accusations of bad faith. ‘Every man for himself,’ he retorted, adding -that ‘if all stories were true, they hadn’t been very particular -themselves, but had sat down on the cove’s run that first helped ’em -when they was bull-punchers without credit for a bag of flour.’ - -Rendered furious by this very original application of their own -practice to the detriment of their own property, they wasted much of -their—well—we must say, legally acquired gains in endless suits and -actions for trespass against this most unprincipled free selector, -and others who shortly followed his example. The lawyers came to know -Freeman _versus_ Downey as a _cause célèbre_. It is just possible that -these brothers may come to comprehend, by individual suffering, the -harassed feeling which their action had, many a time and oft, tended to -produce in others. - -The later years of Mr. Neuchamp’s life have been stated by himself to -be only too well filled with prosperity and happiness as compared with -his deserts. Those who know him are aware that he could not become an -idler—either aimless or bored. He lives principally in Sydney. But if -ever he finds a course of unmitigated town-life commencing to assail -his nervous system, he runs off to a grazing station within easy rail, -where he has long superintended the production of the prize shorthorns, -Herefords, and Devons necessary for the keeping up the supply of pure -blood for his immense and distant herds. Here he revels in fresh -air—the priceless sense of pure country life—and that absolute leisure -and absolute freedom from interruption which the happiest paterfamilias -rarely experiences in the home proper. Here Ernest Neuchamp builds up -fresh stores of health, new reserves of animal spirits. Here Ernest -probably thinks out those theories of perfected representative -government in which, however, he fails at present to persuade an -impatient, perhaps illogical, democracy to concur. His children are -numerous, and all give promise, as, after a protracted and impartial -consideration of their character, he is led to believe, of worthily -carrying forward the temporarily modified but rarely relinquished -hereditary tenets of his ancient House. - -Time rolls on. The great city expanding beautifies the terraced slopes -and gardened promontories of the glorious haven. Old Paul Frankston -lies buried in no crowded cemetery, but in a rock-hewn family vault -under giant araucarias, within sound of the wave he loved so well. -Yet is Morahmee still celebrated for that unselfish, unrestricted -hospitality to the stranger-guest which made Paul Frankston’s name a -synonym for general sympathy and readiest aid. - -Assuredly Ernest Neuchamp, now one of the largest proprietors in -Australia, both of pastoral and urban property, has not suffered the -reputation to decline. He remembers too well the hearty open visage, -the kindly voice, the ready cheer of him who was so true at need, so -delicate in feeling, so stanch in deed. Succoured himself at the crisis -of fortune and happiness, he has vowed to help all whose inexperience -arouses a sympathetic memory. The opinion of a social leader and -eminent pastoralist may be considered to have exceptional weight and -value. However that may be, much of his time is taken up in honouring -the numberless letters of introduction showered upon him from Britain. -Young gentlemen arrive in scores who have been obligingly provided with -these valuable documents by sanguine ex-colonists. By the bearers they -were regarded as passports to an assured independence. Some of these -youthful squires, with spurs unwon, need restraining from imprudence, -others a gentle course of urging towards effort and self-denial. But -it has been noticed that the only occasions on which their respective -guide, philosopher, and friend speaks with decision bordering on -asperity, is when he exposes the fallacy of the reasoning upon which -any ardent neophyte aspires to the position of A Colonial Reformer. - - -THE END - - -_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, _Edinburgh_. - - - - - * * * * * - - - - -Transcriber's note: - -Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations -in hyphenation and all other spelling and punctuation remain unchanged. - -Italics are represented thus _italic_. - -In “the [Ǝ]NE brand” on page 106 [Ǝ] represent the character depressed -by half a line and in “the M[D] brand” on page 154 [D] represents a -reversed D depressed by half a line. - - - -***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A COLONIAL REFORMER, VOL. III (OF -3)*** - - -******* This file should be named 54366-0.txt or 54366-0.zip ******* - - -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: -http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/5/4/3/6/54366 - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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