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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/7065-0.txt b/7065-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..48f4f1f --- /dev/null +++ b/7065-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9757 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of Children of the Bush, by Henry Lawson + +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 +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: Children of the Bush + +Author: Henry Lawson + +Release Date: March 5, 2003 [eBook #7065] +[Most recently updated: May 27, 2022] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Geoffrey Cowling + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH *** + + + + +Children of the Bush + +by Henry Lawson + + +Contents + + SEND ROUND THE HAT + THAT PRETTY GIRL IN THE ARMY + “LORD DOUGLAS” + THE BLINDNESS OF ONE-EYED BOGAN + TWO SUNDOWNERS + A SKETCH OF MATESHIP + ON THE TUCKER TRACK: A STEELMAN STORY + A BUSH PUBLICAN’S LAMENT + THE SHEARER’S DREAM + THE LOST SOULS’ HOTEL + THE BOOZERS’ HOME + THE SEX PROBLEM AGAIN + THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAG + “BUCKOLTS’ GATE” + THE BUSH-FIRE + THE HOUSE THAT WAS NEVER BUILT + “BARNEY, TAKE ME HOME AGAIN” + A DROVING YARN + GETTIN’ BACK ON DAVE REGAN + “SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?” + HIS BROTHER’S KEEPER + THE STORY OF “GENTLEMAN ONCE” + THE GHOSTS OF MANY CHRISTMASES + + + + +SEND ROUND THE HAT + + +Now this is the creed from the Book of the Bush— +Should be simple and plain to a dunce: +“If a man’s in a hole you must pass round the hat +Were he jail-bird or gentleman once.” + + +“Is it any harm to wake yer?” + +It was about nine o’clock in the morning, and, though it was Sunday +morning, it was no harm to wake me; but the shearer had mistaken me for +a deaf jackaroo, who was staying at the shanty and was something like +me, and had good-naturedly shouted almost at the top of his voice, and +he woke the whole shanty. Anyway he woke three or four others who were +sleeping on beds and stretchers, and one on a shake-down on the floor, +in the same room. It had been a wet night, and the shanty was full of +shearers from Big Billabong Shed which had cut out the day before. My +room mates had been drinking and gambling overnight, and they swore +luridly at the intruder for disturbing them. + +He was six-foot-three or thereabout. He was loosely built, bony, +sandy-complexioned and grey eyed. He wore a good-humoured grin at most +times, as I noticed later on; he was of a type of bushman that I always +liked—the sort that seem to get more good-natured the longer they grow, +yet are hard-knuckled and would accommodate a man who wanted to fight, +or thrash a bully in a good-natured way. The sort that like to carry +somebody’s baby round, and cut wood, carry water and do little things +for overworked married bushwomen. He wore a saddle-tweed sac suit two +sizes too small for him, and his face, neck, great hands and bony +wrists were covered with sun-blotches and freckles. + +“I hope I ain’t disturbin’ yer,” he shouted, as he bent over my bunk, +“but there’s a cove—” + +“You needn’t shout!” I interrupted, “I’m not deaf.” + +“Oh—I beg your pardon!” he shouted. “I didn’t know I was yellin’. I +thought you was the deaf feller.” + +“Oh, that’s all right,” I said. “What’s the trouble?” + +“Wait till them other chaps is done swearin’ and I’ll tell yer,” he +said. He spoke with a quiet, good-natured drawl, with something of the +nasal twang, but tone and drawl distinctly Australian—altogether apart +from that of the Americans. + +“Oh, spit it out for Christ’s sake, Long’un!” yelled One-eyed Bogan, +who had been the worst swearer in a rough shed, and he fell back on his +bunk as if his previous remarks had exhausted him. + +“It’s that there sick jackaroo that was pickin’-up at Big Billabong,” +said the Giraffe. “He had to knock off the first week, an’ he’s been +here ever since. They’re sendin’ him away to the hospital in Sydney by +the speeshall train. They’re just goin’ to take him up in the wagonette +to the railway station, an’ I thought I might as well go round with the +hat an’ get him a few bob. He’s got a missus and kids in Sydney.” + +“Yer always goin’ round with yer gory hat!” growled Bogan. “Yer’d +blanky well take it round in hell!” + +“That’s what he’s doing, Bogan,” muttered Gentleman Once, on the +shake-down, with his face to the wall. + +The hat was a genuine “cabbage-tree,” one of the sort that “last a +lifetime.” It was well coloured, almost black in fact with weather and +age, and it had a new strap round the base of the crown. I looked into +it and saw a dirty pound note and some silver. I dropped in half a +crown, which was more than I could spare, for I had only been a +green-hand at Big Billabong. + +“Thank yer!” he said. “Now then, you fellers!” + +“I wish you’d keep your hat on your head, and your money in your +pockets and your sympathy somewhere else,” growled Jack Moonlight as he +raised himself painfully on his elbow, and felt under his pillow for +two half-crowns. “Here,” he said, “here’s two half-casers. Chuck ’em in +and let me sleep for God’s sake!” + +Gentleman Once, the gambler, rolled round on his shake-down, bringing +his good-looking, dissipated face from the wall. He had turned in in +his clothes and, with considerable exertion he shoved his hand down +into the pocket of his trousers, which were a tight fit. He brought up +a roll of pound notes and could find no silver. + +“Here,” he said to the Giraffe, “I might as well lay a quid. I’ll +chance it anyhow. Chuck it in.” + +“You’ve got rats this mornin’, Gentleman Once,” growled the Bogan. “It +ain’t a blanky horse race.” + +“P’r’aps I have,” said Gentleman Once, and he turned to the wall again +with his head on his arm. + +“Now, Bogan, yer might as well chuck in somethin,” said the Giraffe. + +“What’s the matter with the —— jackaroo?” asked the Bogan, tugging his +trousers from under the mattress. + +Moonlight said something in a low tone. + +“The —— he has!” said Bogan. “Well, I pity the ——! Here, I’ll chuck in +half a —— quid!” and he dropped half a sovereign into the hat. + +The fourth man, who was known to his face as “Barcoo-Rot,” and behind +his back as “The Mean Man,” had been drinking all night, and not even +Bogan’s stump-splitting adjectives could rouse him. So Bogan got out of +bed, and calling on us (as blanky female cattle) to witness what he was +about to do, he rolled the drunkard over, prospected his pockets till +he made up five shillings (or a “caser” in bush language), and +“chucked” them into the hat. + +And Barcoo-Rot is probably unconscious to this day that he was ever +connected with an act of charity. + +The Giraffe struck the deaf jackaroo in the next room. I heard the +chaps cursing “Long-’un” for waking them, and “Deaf-’un” for being, as +they thought at first, the indirect cause of the disturbance. I heard +the Giraffe and his hat being condemned in other rooms and cursed along +the veranda where more shearers were sleeping; and after a while I +turned out. + +The Giraffe was carefully fixing a mattress and pillows on the floor of +a wagonette, and presently a man, who looked like a corpse, was carried +out and lifted into the trap. + +As the wagonette started, the shanty-keeper—a fat, soulless-looking +man—put his hand in his pocket and dropped a quid into the hat which +was still going round, in the hands of the Giraffe’s mate, little Teddy +Thompson, who was as far below medium height as the Giraffe was above +it. + +The Giraffe took the horse’s head and led him along on the most level +parts of the road towards the railway station, and two or three chaps +went along to help get the sick man into the train. + +The shearing-season was over in that district, but I got a job of +house-painting, which was my trade, at the Great Western Hotel (a +two-story brick place), and I stayed in Bourke for a couple of months. + +The Giraffe was a Victorian native from Bendigo. He was well known in +Bourke and to many shearers who came through the great dry scrubs from +hundreds of miles round. He was stakeholder, drunkard’s banker, +peacemaker where possible, referee or second to oblige the chaps when a +fight was on, big brother or uncle to most of the children in town, +final court of appeal when the youngsters had a dispute over a +foot-race at the school picnic, referee at their fights, and he was the +stranger’s friend. + +“The feller as knows can battle around for himself,” he’d say. “But I +always like to do what I can for a hard-up stranger cove. I was a +green-hand jackaroo once meself, and I know what it is.” + +“You’re always bothering about other people, Giraffe,” said Tom Hall, +the shearers’ union secretary, who was only a couple of inches shorter +than the Giraffe. “There’s nothing in it, you can take it from me—I +ought to know.” + +“Well, what’s a feller to do?” said the Giraffe. “I’m only hangin’ +round here till shearin’ starts agen, an’ a cove might as well be doin’ +something. Besides, it ain’t as if I was like a cove that had old +people or a wife an’ kids to look after. I ain’t got no +responsibilities. A feller can’t be doin’ nothin’. Besides, I like to +lend a helpin’ hand when I can.” + +“Well, all I’ve got to say,” said Tom, most of whose screw went in +borrowed quids, etc. “All I’ve got to say is that you’ll get no thanks, +and you might blanky well starve in the end.” + +“There ain’t no fear of me starvin’ so long as I’ve got me hands about +me; an’ I ain’t a cove as wants thanks,” said the Giraffe. + +He was always helping someone or something. Now it was a bit of a +“darnce” that we was gettin’ up for the girls; again it was Mrs Smith, +the woman whose husban’ was drowned in the flood in the Bogan River +lars’ Crismas, or that there poor woman down by the Billabong—her +husband cleared out and left her with a lot o’ kids. Or Bill Something, +the bullocky, who was run over by his own wagon, while he was drunk, +and got his leg broke. + +Toward the end of his spree One-eyed Bogan broke loose and smashed +nearly all the windows of the Carriers’ Arms, and next morning he was +fined heavily at the police court. About dinner-time I encountered the +Giraffe and his hat, with two half-crowns in it for a start. + +“I’m sorry to trouble yer,” he said, “but One-eyed Bogan carn’t pay his +fine, an’ I thought we might fix it up for him. He ain’t half a bad +sort of feller when he ain’t drinkin’. It’s only when he gets too much +booze in him.” + +After shearing, the hat usually started round with the Giraffe’s own +dirty crumpled pound note in the bottom of it as a send-off, later on +it was half a sovereign, and so on down to half a crown and a shilling, +as he got short of stuff; till in the end he would borrow a “few +bob”—which he always repaid after next shearing-“just to start the +thing goin’.” + +There were several yarns about him and his hat. ’Twas said that the hat +had belonged to his father, whom he resembled in every respect, and it +had been going round for so many years that the crown was worn as thin +as paper by the quids, half-quids, casers, half-casers, bobs and +tanners or sprats—to say nothing of the scrums—that had been chucked +into it in its time and shaken up. + +They say that when a new governor visited Bourke the Giraffe happened +to be standing on the platform close to the exit, grinning +good-humouredly, and the local toady nudged him urgently and said in an +awful whisper, “Take off your hat! Why don’t you take off your hat?” + +“Why?” drawled the Giraffe, “he ain’t hard up, is he?” + +And they fondly cherish an anecdote to the effect that, when the +One-Man-One-Vote Bill was passed (or Payment of Members, or when the +first Labour Party went in—I forget on which occasion they said it was) +the Giraffe was carried away by the general enthusiasm, got a few beers +in him, “chucked” a quid into his hat, and sent it round. The boys +contributed by force of habit, and contributed largely, because of the +victory and the beer. And when the hat came back to the Giraffe, he +stood holding it in front of him with both hands and stared blankly +into it for a while. Then it dawned on him. + +“Blowed if I haven’t bin an’ gone an’ took up a bloomin’ collection for +meself!” he said. + +He was almost a teetotaller, but he stood his shout in reason. He +mostly drank ginger beer. + +“I ain’t a feller that boozes, but I ain’t got nothin’ agen chaps +enjoyin’ themselves, so long as they don’t go too far.” + +It was common for a man on the spree to say to him: + +“Here! here’s five quid. Look after it for me, Giraffe, will yer, till +I git off the booze.” + +His real name was Bob Brothers, and his bush names, “Long-’un,” “The +Giraffe,” “Send-round-the-hat,” “Chuck-in-a-bob,” and “Ginger-ale.” + +Some years before, camels and Afghan drivers had been imported to the +Bourke district; the camels did very well in the dry country, they went +right across country and carried everything from sardines to +flooring-boards. And the teamsters loved the Afghans nearly as much as +Sydney furniture makers love the cheap Chinese in the same line. They +love ’em even as union shearers on strike love blacklegs brought +up-country to take their places. + +Now the Giraffe was a good, straight unionist, but in cases of sickness +or trouble he was as apt to forget his unionism, as all bushmen are, at +all times (and for all time), to forget their creed. So, one evening, +the Giraffe blundered into the Carriers’ Arms—of all places in the +world—when it was full of teamsters; he had his hat in his hand and +some small silver and coppers in it. + +“I say, you fellers, there’s a poor, sick Afghan in the camp down there +along the—” + +A big, brawny bullock-driver took him firmly by the shoulders, or, +rather by the elbows, and ran him out before any damage was done. The +Giraffe took it as he took most things, good-humouredly; but, about +dusk, he was seen slipping down towards the Afghan camp with a billy of +soup. + +“I believe,” remarked Tom Hall, “that when the Giraffe goes to +heaven—and he’s the only one of us, as far as I can see, that has a +ghost of a show—I believe that when he goes to heaven, the first thing +he’ll do will be to take his infernal hat round amongst the +angels—getting up a collection for this damned world that he left +behind.” + +“Well, I don’t think there’s so much to his credit, after all,” said +Jack Mitchell, shearer. “You see, the Giraffe is ambitious; he likes +public life, and that accounts for him shoving himself forward with his +collections. As for bothering about people in trouble, that’s only +common curiosity; he’s one of those chaps that are always shoving their +noses into other people’s troubles. And, as for looking after sick +men—why! there’s nothing the Giraffe likes better than pottering round +a sick man, and watching him and studying him. He’s awfully interested +in sick men, and they’re pretty scarce out here. I tell you there’s +nothing he likes better—except, maybe, it’s pottering round a corpse. I +believe he’d ride forty miles to help and sympathize and potter round a +funeral. The fact of the matter is that the Giraffe is only enjoying +himself with other people’s troubles—that’s all it is. It’s only vulgar +curiosity and selfishness. I set it down to his ignorance; the way he +was brought up.” + +A few days after the Afghan incident the Giraffe and his hat had a run +of luck. A German, one of a party who were building a new wooden bridge +over the Big Billabong, was helping unload some girders from a truck at +the railway station, when a big log slipped on the skids and his leg +was smashed badly. They carried him to the Carriers’ Arms, which was +the nearest hotel, and into a bedroom behind the bar, and sent for the +doctor. The Giraffe was in evidence as usual. + +“It vas not that at all,” said German Charlie, when they asked him if +he was in much pain. “It vas not that at all. I don’t cares a damn for +der bain; but dis is der tird year—und I vas going home dis year—after +der gontract—und der gontract yoost commence!” + +That was the burden of his song all through, between his groans. There +were a good few chaps sitting quietly about the bar and veranda when +the doctor arrived. The Giraffe was sitting at the end of the counter, +on which he had laid his hat while he wiped his face, neck, and +forehead with a big speckled “sweatrag.” It was a very hot day. + +The doctor, a good-hearted young Australian, was heard saying +something. Then German Charlie, in a voice that rung with pain: + +“Make that leg right, doctor—quick! Dis is der tird pluddy year—und I +must go home!” + +The doctor asked him if he was in great pain. “Neffer mind der pluddy +bain, doctor! Neffer mind der pluddy bain! Dot vas nossing. Make dat +leg well quick, doctor. Dis vas der last gontract, and I vas going home +dis year.” Then the words jerked out of him by physical agony: “Der +girl vas vaiting dree year, und—by Got! I must go home.” + +The publican—Watty Braithwaite, known as “Watty Broadweight,” or, more +familiarly, “Watty Bothways”—turned over the Giraffe’s hat in a tired, +bored sort of way, dropped a quid into it, and nodded resignedly at the +Giraffe. + +The Giraffe caught up the hint and the hat with alacrity. The hat went +all round town, so to speak; and, as soon as his leg was firm enough +not to come loose on the road German Charlie went home. + +It was well known that I contributed to the Sydney _Bulletin_ and +several other papers. The Giraffe’s bump of reverence was very large, +and swelled especially for sick men and poets. He treated me with much +more respect than is due from a bushman to a man, and with an odd sort +of extra gentleness I sometimes fancied. But one day he rather +surprised me. + +“I’m sorry to trouble yer,” he said in a shamefaced way. “I don’t know +as you go in for sportin’, but One-eyed Bogan an’ Barcoo-Rot is goin’ +to have a bit of a scrap down the Billybong this evenin’, an’——” + +“A bit of a what?” I asked. + +“A bit of fight to a finish,” he said apologetically. “An’ the chaps is +tryin’ to fix up a fiver to put some life into the thing. There’s bad +blood between One-eyed Bogan and Barcoo-Rot, an’ it won’t do them any +harm to have it out.” + +It was a great fight, I remember. There must have been a couple of +score blood-soaked handkerchiefs (or “sweat-rags”) buried in a hole on +the field of battle, and the Giraffe was busy the rest of the evening +helping to patch up the principals. Later on he took up a small +collection for the loser, who happened to be Barcoo-Rot in spite of the +advantage of an eye. + +The Salvation Army lassie, who went round with the _War Cry_, nearly +always sold the Giraffe three copies. + +A new-chum parson, who wanted a subscription to build or enlarge a +chapel, or something, sought the assistance of the Giraffe’s influence +with his mates. + +“Well,” said the Giraffe, “I ain’t a churchgoer meself. I ain’t what +you might call a religious cove, but I’ll be glad to do what I can to +help yer. I don’t suppose I can do much. I ain’t been to church since I +was a kiddy.” + +The parson was shocked, but later on he learned to appreciate the +Giraffe and his mates, and to love Australia for the bushman’s sake, +and it was he who told me the above anecdote. + +The Giraffe helped fix some stalls for a Catholic Church bazaar, and +some of the chaps chaffed him about it in the union office. + +“You’ll be taking up a collection for a joss-house down in the +Chinamen’s camp next,” said Tom Hall in conclusion. + +“Well, I ain’t got nothin’ agen the Roming Carflics,” said the Giraffe. +“An’ Father O’Donovan’s a very decent sort of cove. He stuck up for the +unions all right in the strike anyway.” (“He wouldn’t be Irish if he +wasn’t,” someone commented.) “I carried swags once for six months with +a feller that was a Carflick, an’ he was a very straight feller. And a +girl I knowed turned Carflick to marry a chap that had got her into +trouble, an’ she was always jes’ the same to me after as she was +before. Besides, I like to help everything that’s goin’ on.” + +Tom Hall and one or two others went out hurriedly to have a drink. But +we all loved the Giraffe. + +He was very innocent and very humorous, especially when he meant to be +most serious and philosophical. + +“Some of them bush girls is regular tomboys,” he said to me solemnly +one day. “Some of them is too cheeky altogether. I remember once I was +stoppin’ at a place—they was sort of relations o’ mine—an’ they put me +to sleep in a room off the verander, where there was a glass door an’ +no blinds. An’ the first mornin’ the girls—they was sort o’ cousins o’ +mine—they come gigglin’ and foolin’ round outside the door on the +verander, an’ kep’ me in bed till nearly ten o’clock. I had to put me +trowsis on under the bed-clothes in the end. But I got back on ’em the +next night,” he reflected. + +“How did you do that, Bob?” I asked. + +“Why, I went to bed in me trowsis!” + +One day I was on a plank, painting the ceiling of the bar of the Great +Western Hotel. I was anxious to get the job finished. The work had been +kept back most of the day by chaps handing up long beers to me, and +drawing my attention to the alleged fact that I was putting on the +paint wrong side out. I was slapping it on over the last few boards +when: + +“I’m very sorry to trouble yer; I always seem to be troublin’ yer; but +there’s that there woman and them girls——” + +I looked down—about the first time I had looked down on him—and there +was the Giraffe, with his hat brim up on the plank and two half-crowns +in it. + +“Oh, that’s all right, Bob,” I said, and I dropped in half a crown. + +There were shearers in the bar, and presently there was some +barracking. It appeared that that there woman and them girls were +strange women, in the local as well as the Biblical sense of the word, +who had come from Sydney at the end of the shearing-season, and had +taken a cottage on the edge of the scrub on the outskirts of the town. +There had been trouble this week in connection with a row at their +establishment, and they had been fined, warned off by the police, and +turned out by their landlord. + +“This is a bit too red-hot, Giraffe,” said one of the shearers. “Them +——s has made enough out of us coves. They’ve got plenty of stuff, don’t +you fret. Let ’em go to ——! I’m blanked if I give a sprat.” + +“They ain’t got their fares to Sydney,” said the Giraffe. “An’, what’s +more, the little ’un is sick, an’ two of them has kids in Sydney.” + +“How the —— do you know?” + +“Why, one of ’em come to me an’ told me all about it.” + +There was an involuntary guffaw. + +“Look here, Bob,” said Billy Woods, the rouseabouts’ secretary, kindly. +“Don’t you make a fool of yourself. You’ll have all the chaps laughing +at you. Those girls are only working you for all you’re worth. I +suppose one of ’em came crying and whining to you. Don’t you bother +about ’em. _You_ don’t know ’em; they can pump water at a moment’s +notice. You haven’t had any experience with women yet, Bob.” + +“She didn’t come whinin’ and cryin’ to me,” said the Giraffe, dropping +his twanging drawl a little. “She looked me straight in the face an’ +told me all about it.” + +“I say, Giraffe,” said Box-o’-Tricks, “what have you been doin’? You’ve +bin down there on the nod. I’m surprised at yer, Giraffe.” + +“An’ he pretends to be so gory soft an’ innocent, too,” growled the +Bogan. “We know all about you, Giraffe.” + +“Look here, Giraffe,” said Mitchell the shearer. “I’d never have +thought it of you. We all thought you were the only virgin youth west +the river; I always thought you were a moral young man. You mustn’t +think that because your conscience is pricking you everyone else’s is.” + +“I ain’t had anythin’ to do with them,” said the Giraffe, drawling +again. “I ain’t a cove that goes in for that sort of thing. But other +chaps has, and I think they might as well help ’em out of their fix.” + +“They’re a rotten crowd,” said Billy Woods. “You don’t know them, Bob. +Don’t bother about them-they’re not worth it. Put your money in your +pocket. You’ll find a better use for it before next shearing.” + +“Better shout, Giraffe,” said Box-o’-Tricks. + +Now in spite of the Giraffe’s softness he was the hardest man in Bourke +to move when he’d decided on what he thought was “the fair thing to +do.” Another peculiarity of his was that on occasion, such for instance +as “sayin’ a few words” at a strike meeting, he would straighten +himself, drop the twang, and rope in his drawl, so to speak. + +“Well, look here, you chaps,” he said now. “I don’t know anything about +them women. I s’pose they’re bad, but I don’t suppose they’re worse +than men has made them. All I know is that there’s four women turned +out, without any stuff, and every woman in Bourke, an’ the police, an’ +the law agen ’em. An’ the fact that they is women is agenst ’em most of +all. You don’t expect ’em to hump their swags to Sydney! Why, only I +ain’t got the stuff I wouldn’t trouble yer. I’d pay their fares meself. +Look,” he said, lowering his voice, “there they are now, an’ one of the +girls is cryin’. Don’t let ’em see yer lookin’.” + +I dropped softly from the plank and peeped out with the rest. + +They stood by the fence on the opposite side of the street, a bit up +towards the railway station, with their portmanteaux and bundles at +their feet. One girl leant with her arms on the fence rail and her face +buried in them, another was trying to comfort her. The third girl and +the woman stood facing our way. The woman was good-looking; she had a +hard face, but it might have been made hard. The third girl seemed half +defiant, half inclined to cry. Presently she went to the other side of +the girl who was crying on the fence and put her arm round her +shoulder. The woman suddenly turned her back on us and stood looking +away over the paddocks. + +The hat went round. Billy Woods was first, then Box-o’-Tricks, and then +Mitchell. + +Billy contributed with eloquent silence. “I was only jokin’, Giraffe,” +said Box-o’-Tricks, dredging his pockets for a couple of shillings. It +was some time after the shearing, and most of the chaps were hard up. +“Ah, well,” sighed Mitchell. “There’s no help for it. If the Giraffe +would take up a collection to import some decent girls to this +God-forgotten hole there might be some sense in it.... It’s bad enough +for the Giraffe to undermine our religious prejudices, and tempt us to +take a morbid interest in sick Chows and Afghans, and blacklegs and +widows; but when he starts mixing us up with strange women it’s time to +buck.” And he prospected his pockets and contributed two shillings, +some odd pennies, and a pinch of tobacco dust. + +“I don’t mind helping the girls, but I’m damned if I’ll give a penny to +help the old ——,” said Tom Hall. + +“Well, she was a girl once herself,” drawled the Giraffe. + +The Giraffe went round to the other pubs and to the union offices, and +when he returned he seemed satisfied with the plate, but troubled about +something else. + +“I don’t know what to do for them for to-night,” he said. “None of the +pubs or boardin’-houses will hear of them, an’ there ain’t no empty +houses, an’ the women is all agen ’em.” + +“Not all,” said Alice, the big, handsome barmaid from Sydney. “Come +here, Bob.” She gave the Giraffe half a sovereign and a look for which +some of us would have paid him ten pounds—had we had the money, and had +the look been transferable. + +“Wait a minute, Bob,” she said, and she went in to speak to the +landlord. + +“There’s an empty bedroom at the end of the store in the yard,” she +said when she came back. “They can camp there for to-night if they +behave themselves. You’d better tell ’em, Bob.” + +“Thank yer, Alice,” said the Giraffe. + +Next day, after work, the Giraffe and I drifted together and down by +the river in the cool of the evening, and sat on the edge of the steep, +drought-parched bank. + +“I heard you saw your lady friends off this morning, Bob,” I said, and +was sorry I said it, even before he answered. + +“Oh, they ain’t no friends of mine,” he said. “Only four’ poor devils +of women. I thought they mightn’t like to stand waitin’ with the crowd +on the platform, so I jest offered to get their tickets an’ told ’em to +wait round at the back of the station till the bell rung.... An’ what +do yer think they did, Harry?” he went on, with an exasperatingly +unintelligent grin. “Why, they wanted to kiss me.” + +“Did they?” + +“Yes. An’ they would have done it, too, if I hadn’t been so long.... +Why, I’m blessed if they didn’t kiss me hands.” + +“You don’t say so.” + +“God’s truth. Somehow I didn’t like to go on the platform with them +after that; besides, they was cryin’, and I can’t stand women cryin’. +But some of the chaps put them into an empty carriage.” He thought a +moment. Then: + +“There’s some terrible good-hearted fellers in the world,” he +reflected. + +I thought so too. “Bob,” I said, “you’re a single man. Why don’t you +get married and settle down?” + +“Well,” he said, “I ain’t got no wife an’ kids, that’s a fact. But it +ain’t my fault.” + +He may have been right about the wife. But I thought of the look that +Alice had given him, and— + +“Girls seem to like me right enough,” he said, “but it don’t go no +further than that. The trouble is that I’m so long, and I always seem +to get shook after little girls. At least there was one little girl in +Bendigo that I was properly gone on.” + +“And wouldn’t she have you?” + +“Well, it seems not.” + +“Did you ask her?” + +“Oh, yes, I asked her right enough.” + +“Well, and what did she say?” + +“She said it would be redicilus for her to be seen trottin’ alongside +of a chimbley like me.” + +“Perhaps she didn’t mean that. There are any amount of little women who +like tall men.” + +“I thought of that too—afterwards. P’r’aps she didn’t mean it that way. +I s’pose the fact of the matter was that she didn’t cotton on to me, +and wanted to let me down easy. She didn’t want to hurt me feelin’s, if +yer understand—she was a very good-hearted little girl. There’s some +terrible tall fellers where I come from, and I know two as married +little girls.” + +He seemed a hopeless case. + +“Sometimes,” he said, “sometimes I wish that I wasn’t so blessed long.” + +“There’s that there deaf jackaroo,” he reflected presently. “He’s +something in the same fig about girls as I am. He’s too deaf and I’m +too long.” + +“How do you make that out?” I asked. “He’s got three girls, to my +knowledge, and, as for being deaf, why, he gasses more than any man in +the town, and knows more of what’s going on than old Mother Brindle the +washerwoman.” + +“Well, look at that now!” said the Giraffe, slowly. “Who’d have thought +it? He never told me he had three girls, an’ as for hearin’ news, I +always tell him anything that’s goin’ on that I think he doesn’t catch. +He told me his trouble was that whenever he went out with a girl people +could hear what they was sayin’—at least they could hear what she was +sayin’ to him, an’ draw their own conclusions, he said. He said he went +out one night with a girl, and some of the chaps foxed ’em an’ heard +her sayin’ ‘don’t’ to him, an’ put it all round town.” + +“What did she say ‘don’t’ for?” I asked. + +“He didn’t tell me that, but I s’pose he was kissin’ her or huggin’ her +or something.” + +“Bob,” I said presently, “didn’t you try the little girl in Bendigo a +second time?” + +“No,” he said. “What was the use. She was a good little girl, and I +wasn’t goin’ to go botherin’ her. I ain’t the sort of cove that goes +hangin’ round where he isn’t wanted. But somehow I couldn’t stay about +Bendigo after she gave me the hint, so I thought I’d come over an’ have +a knock round on this side for a year or two.” + +“And you never wrote to her?” + +“No. What was the use of goin’ pesterin’ her with letters? I know what +trouble letters give me when I have to answer one. She’d have only had +to tell me the straight truth in a letter an’ it wouldn’t have done me +any good. But I’ve pretty well got over it by this time.” + +A few days later I went to Sydney. The Giraffe was the last I shook +hands with from the carriage window, and he slipped something in a +piece of newspaper into my hand. + +“I hope yer won’t be offended,” he drawled, “but some of the chaps +thought you mightn’t be too flush of stuff—you’ve been shoutin’ a good +deal; so they put a quid or two together. They thought it might help +yer to have a bit of a fly round in Sydney.” + +I was back in Bourke before next shearing. On the evening of my arrival +I ran against the Giraffe; he seemed strangely shaken over something, +but he kept his hat on his head. + +“Would yer mind takin’ a stroll as fur as the Billerbong?” he said. “I +got something I’d like to tell yer.” + +His big, brown, sunburnt hands trembled and shook as he took a letter +from his pocket and opened it. + +“I’ve just got a letter,” he said. “A letter from that little girl at +Bendigo. It seems it was all a mistake. I’d like you to read it. +Somehow I feel as if I want to talk to a feller, and I’d rather talk to +you than any of them other chaps.” + +It was a good letter, from a big-hearted little girl. She had been +breaking her heart for the great ass all these months. It seemed that +he had left Bendigo without saying good-bye to her. “Somehow I couldn’t +bring meself to it,” he said, when I taxed him with it. She had never +been able to get his address until last week; then she got it from a +Bourke man who had gone south. She called him “an awful long fool,” +which he was, without the slightest doubt, and she implored him to +write, and come back to her. + +“And will you go back, Bob?” I asked. + +“My oath! I’d take the train to-morrer only I ain’t got the stuff. But +I’ve got a stand in Big Billerbong Shed an’ I’ll soon knock a few quid +together. I’ll go back as soon as ever shearin’s over. I’m goin’ to +write away to her to-night.” + +The Giraffe was the “ringer” of Big Billabong Shed that season. His +tallies averaged a hundred and twenty a day. He only sent his hat round +once during shearing, and it was noticed that he hesitated at first and +only contributed half a crown. But then it was a case of a man being +taken from the shed by the police for wife desertion. + +“It’s always that way,” commented Mitchell. “Those soft, good-hearted +fellows always end by getting hard and selfish. The world makes ’em so. +It’s the thought of the soft fools they’ve been that finds out sooner +or later and makes ’em repent. Like as not the Giraffe will be the +meanest man out back before he’s done.” + +When Big Billabong cut out, and we got back to Bourke with our dusty +swags and dirty cheques, I spoke to Tom Hall: + +“Look here, Tom,” I said. “That long fool, the Giraffe, has been +breaking his heart for a little girl in Bendigo ever since he’s been +out back, and she’s been breaking her heart for him, and the ass didn’t +know it till he got a letter from her just before Big Billabong +started. He’s going to-morrow morning.” + +That evening Tom stole the Giraffe’s hat. “I s’pose it’ll turn up in +the mornin’,” said the Giraffe. “I don’t mind a lark,” he added, “but +it does seem a bit red hot for the chaps to collar a cove’s hat and a +feller goin’ away for good, p’r’aps, in the mornin’.” + +Mitchell started the thing going with a quid. + +“It’s worth it,” he said, “to get rid of him. We’ll have some peace +now. There won’t be so many accidents or women in trouble when the +Giraffe and his blessed hat are gone. Any way, he’s an eyesore in the +town, and he’s getting on my nerves for one.... Come on, you sinners! +Chuck ’em in; we’re only taking quids and half-quids.” + +About daylight next morning Tom Hall slipped into the Giraffe’s room at +the Carriers’ Arms. The Giraffe was sleeping peacefully. Tom put the +hat on a chair by his side. The collection had been a record one, and, +besides the packet of money in the crown of the hat, there was a +silver-mounted pipe with case—the best that could be bought in Bourke, +a gold brooch, and several trifles—besides an ugly valentine of a long +man in his shirt walking the room with a twin on each arm. + +Tom was about to shake the Giraffe by the shoulder, when he noticed a +great foot, with about half a yard of big-boned ankle and shank, +sticking out at the bottom of the bed. The temptation was too great. +Tom took up the hair-brush, and, with the back of it, he gave a smart +rap on the point of an in-growing toe-nail, and slithered. + +We heard the Giraffe swearing good-naturedly for a while, and then +there was a pregnant silence. He was staring at the hat we supposed. + +We were all up at the station to see him off. It was rather a long +wait. The Giraffe edged me up to the other end of the platform. + +He seemed overcome. + +“There’s—there’s some terrible good-hearted fellers in this world,” he +said. “You mustn’t forgit ’em, Harry, when you make a big name writin’. +I’m—well, I’m blessed if I don’t feel as if I was jist goin’ to +blubber!” + +I was glad he didn’t. The Giraffe blubberin’ would have been a +spectacle. I steered him back to his friends. + +“Ain’t you going to kiss me, Bob?” said the Great Western’s big, +handsome barmaid, as the bell rang. + +“Well, I don’t mind kissin’ you, Alice,” he said, wiping his mouth. +“But I’m goin’ to be married, yer know.” And he kissed her fair on the +mouth. + +“There’s nothin’ like gettin’ into practice,” he said, grinning round. + +We thought he was improving wonderfully; but at the last moment +something troubled him. + +“Look here, you chaps,” he said, hesitatingly, with his hand in his +pocket, “I don’t know what I’m going to do with all this stuff. There’s +that there poor washerwoman that scalded her legs liftin’ the boiler of +clothes off the fire——” + +We shoved him into the carriage. He hung—about half of him—out the +window, wildly waving his hat, till the train disappeared in the scrub. + +And, as I sit here writing by lamplight at midday, in the midst of a +great city of shallow social sham, of hopeless, squalid poverty, of +ignorant selfishness, cultured or brutish, and of noble and heroic +endeavour frowned down or callously neglected, I am almost aware of a +burst of sunshine in the room, and a long form leaning over my chair, +and: + +“Excuse me for troublin’ yer; I’m always troublin’ yer; but there’s +that there poor woman....” + +And I wish I could immortalize him! + + + + +THAT PRETTY GIRL IN THE ARMY + + +Now I often sit at Watty’s, when the night is very near, +With a head that’s full of jingles—and the fumes of bottled beer; +For I always have a fancy that, if I am over there +When the Army prays for Watty, I’m included in the prayer. + +It would take a lot of praying, lots of thumping on the drum, +To prepare our sinful, straying, erring souls for Kingdom Come. +But I love my fellow-sinners! and I hope, upon the whole, +That the Army gets a hearing when it prays for Watty’s soul. + From _When the World was Wide_. + + +The Salvation Army does good business in some of the outback towns of +the great pastoral wastes of Australia. There’s the thoughtless, +careless generosity of the bushman, whose pockets don’t go far enough +down his trousers (that’s what’s the matter with him), and who +contributes to anything that comes along, without troubling to ask +questions, like long Bob Brothers of Bourke, who, chancing to be “a +Protestant by rights,” unwittingly subscribed towards the erection of a +new Catholic church, and, being chaffed for his mistake, said: + +“Ah, well, I don’t suppose it’ll matter a hang in the end, anyway it +goes. I ain’t got nothink agenst the Roming Carflicks.” + +There’s the shearer, fresh with his cheque from a cut-out shed, +gloriously drunk and happy, in love with all the world, and ready to +subscribe towards any creed and shout for all hands—including Old Nick +if he happened to come along. There’s the shearer, half-drunk and +inclined to be nasty, who has got the wrong end of all things with a +tight grip, and who flings a shilling in the face of out-back +conventionality (as he thinks) by chucking a bob into the Salvation +Army ring. Then he glares round to see if he can catch anybody winking +behind his back. There’s the cynical joker, a queer mixture, who +contributes generously and tempts the reformed boozer afterwards. +There’s the severe-faced old station-hand—in clean shirt and +neckerchief and white moleskins—in for his annual or semi-annual spree, +who contributes on principle, and then drinks religiously until his +cheque is gone and the horrors are come. There’s the shearer, feeling +mighty bad after a spree, and in danger of seeing things when he tries +to go to sleep. He has dropped ten or twenty pounds over bar counters +and at cards, and he now “chucks” a repentant shilling into the ring, +with a very private and rather vague sort of feeling that something +might come of it. There’s the stout, contented, good-natured publican, +who tips the Army as if it were a barrel-organ. And there are others +and other reasons—black sheep and ne’er-do-wells—and faint echoes of +other times in Salvation Army tunes. + +Bourke, the metropolis of the Great Scrubs, on the banks of the Darling +River, about five hundred miles from Sydney, was suffering from a long +drought when I was there in ninety-two; and the heat may or may not +have been another cause contributing to the success, from a business +point of view, of the Bourke garrison. There was much beer boozing—and, +besides, it was vaguely understood (as most things are vaguely +understood out there in the drought-haze) that the place the Army came +to save us from was hotter than Bourke. We didn’t hanker to go to a +hotter place than Bourke. But that year there was an extraordinary +reason for the Army’s great financial success there. + +She was a little girl, nineteen or twenty, I should judge, the +prettiest girl I ever saw in the Army, and one of the prettiest I’ve +ever seen out of it. She had the features of an angel, but her +expression was wonderfully human, sweet and sympathetic. Her big grey +eyes were sad with sympathy for sufferers and sinners, and her poke +bonnet was full of bunchy, red-gold hair. Her first appearance was +somewhat dramatic—perhaps the Army arranged it so. + +The Army used to pray, and thump the drum, and sing, and take up +collections every evening outside Watty Bothways’ Hotel, the Carriers’ +Arms. They performed longer and more often outside Watty’s than any +other pub in town—perhaps because Watty was considered the most +hopeless publican and his customers the hardest crowd of boozers in +Bourke. The band generally began to play about dusk. Watty would lean +back comfortably in a basket easy-chair on his wide veranda, and clasp +his hands, in a calm, contented way, while the Army banged the drum and +got steam up, and whilst, perhaps, there was a barney going on in the +bar, or a bloodthirsty fight in the backyard. On such occasions there +was something like an indulgent or fatherly expression on his fat and +usually emotionless face. And by and by he’d move his head gently and +doze. The banging and the singing seemed to soothe him, and the +praying, which was often very personal, never seemed to disturb him in +the least. + +Well, it was about dusk one day; it had been a terrible day, a hundred +and something startling in the shade, but there came a breeze after +sunset. There had been several dozen of buckets of water thrown on the +veranda floor and the ground outside. Watty was seated in his +accustomed place when the Army arrived. There was no barney in the bar +because there was a fight in the backyard, and that claimed the +attention of all the customers. + +The Army prayed for Watty and his clients; then a reformed drunkard +started to testify against publicans and all their works. Watty settled +himself comfortably, folded his hands, and leaned back and dozed. + +The fight was over, and the chaps began to drop round to the bar. The +man who was saved waved his arms, and danced round and howled. + +“Ye-es!” he shouted hoarsely. “The publicans, and boozers, and +gamblers, and sinners may think that Bourke is hot, but hell is a +thousand times hotter! I tell you” + +“Oh, Lord!” said Mitchell, the shearer, and he threw a penny into the +ring. + +“Ye-es! I tell you that hell is a million times hotter than Bourke! I +tell you——” + +“Oh, look here,” said a voice from the background, “that won’t wash. +Why, don’t you know that when the Bourke people die they send back for +their blankets?” + +The saved brother glared round. + +“I hear a freethinker speaking, my friends,” he said. Then, with sudden +inspiration and renewed energy, “I hear the voice of a freethinker. +Show me the face of a freethinker,” he yelled, glaring round like a +hunted, hungry man. “Show me the face of a freethinker, and I’ll tell +you what he is.” + +Watty hitched himself into a more comfortable position and clasped his +hands on his knee and closed his eyes again. + +“Ya-a-a-s!” shrieked the brand. “I tell you, my friends, I can tell a +freethinker by his face. Show me the face of a——” + +At this point there was an interruption. One-eyed, or Wall-eyed, Bogan, +who had a broken nose, and the best side of whose face was reckoned the +ugliest and most sinister—One-eyed Bogan thrust his face forward from +the ring of darkness into the torchlight of salvation. He had got the +worst of a drawn battle; his nose and mouth were bleeding, and his good +eye was damaged. + +“Look at my face!” he snarled, with dangerous earnestness. “Look at my +face! That’s the face of a freethinker, and I don’t care who knows it. +Now! what have you got to say against my face, ‘Man-without-a-Shirt?’” + +The brother drew back. He had been known in the northwest in his sinful +days as “Man-without-a-Shirt,” alias “Shirty,” or “The Dirty Man,” and +was flabbergasted at being recognized in speech. Also, he had been in a +shearing-shed and in a shanty orgy with One-eyed Bogan, and knew the +man. + +Now most of the chaps respected the Army, and, indeed, anything that +looked like religion, but the Bogan’s face, as representing +free-thought, was a bit too sudden for them. There were sounds on the +opposite side of the ring as from men being smitten repeatedly and +rapidly below the belt, and long Tom Hall and one or two others got +away into the darkness in the background, where Tom rolled helplessly +on the grass and sobbed. + +It struck me that Bogan’s face was more the result of free speech than +anything else. + +The Army was about to pray when the Pretty Girl stepped forward, her +eyes shining with indignation and enthusiasm. She had arrived by the +evening train, and had been standing shrinkingly behind an Army lass of +fifty Australian summers, who was about six feet high, flat and broad, +and had a square face, and a mouth like a joint in boiler plates. + +The Pretty Girl stamped her pretty foot on the gravel, and her eyes +flashed in the torchlight. + +“You ought to be ashamed of yourselves,” she said. “Great big men like +you to be going on the way you are. If you were ignorant or poor, as +I’ve seen people, there might be some excuse for you. Haven’t you got +any mothers, or sisters, or wives to think of? What sort of a life is +this you lead? Drinking, and gambling, and fighting, and swearing your +lives away! Do you ever think of God and the time when you were +children? Why don’t you make homes? Look at that man’s face!” (she +pointed suddenly at Bogan, who collapsed and sidled behind his mates +out of the light). “Look at that man’s face! Is it a face for a +Christian? And you help and encourage him to fight. You’re worse than +he is. Oh, it’s brutal. It’s—it’s wicked. Great big men like you, you +ought to be ashamed of yourselves.” + +Long Bob Brothers—about six-foot-four—the longest and most innocent +there, shrunk down by the wall and got his inquiring face out of the +light. The Pretty Girl fluttered on for a few moments longer, greatly +excited, and then stepped back, seemingly much upset, and was taken +under the wing of the woman with the boiler-plate mouth. + +It was a surprise, and very sudden. Bogan slipped round to the +backyard, and was seen bathing his battered features at the pump. The +rest wore the expression of men who knew that something unusual has +happened, but don’t know what, and are waiting vacantly for +developments.—Except Tom Hall, who had recovered and returned. He stood +looking over the head of the ring of bushmen, and apparently taking the +same critical interest in the girl as he would in a fight—his +expression was such as a journalist might wear who is getting exciting +copy. + +The Army had it all their own way for the rest of the evening, and made +a good collection. The Pretty Girl stood smiling round with shining +eyes as the bobs and tanners dropped in, and then, being shoved forward +by the flat woman, she thanked us sweetly, and said we were good +fellows, and that she was sorry for some things she’d said to us. Then +she retired, fluttering and very much flushed, and hid herself behind +the hard woman—who, by the way, had an excrescence on her upper lip +which might have stood for a rivet. + +Presently the Pretty Girl came from behind the big woman and stood +watching things with glistening eyes. Some of the chaps on the opposite +side of the ring moved a little to one side and all were careful not to +meet her eye—not to be caught looking at her—lest she should be +embarrassed. Watty had roused himself a little at the sound of a +strange voice in the Army (and such a clear, sweet voice too!) and had +a look; then he settled back peacefully again, but it was noticed that +he didn’t snore that evening. + +And when the Army prayed, the Pretty Girl knelt down with the rest on +the gravel. One or two tall bushmen bowed their heads as if they had +to, and One-eyed Bogan, with the blood washed from his face, stood with +his hat off, glaring round to see if he could catch anyone sniggering. + +Mitchell, the shearer, said afterwards that the whole business made him +feel for the moment like he felt sometimes in the days when he used to +feel things. + +The town discussed the Pretty Girl in the Army that night and for many +days thereafter, but no one could find out who she was or where she +belonged to—except that she came from Sydney last. She kept her secret, +if she had one, very close—or else the other S.-A. women were not to be +pumped. She lived in skillion-rooms at the back of the big +weather-board Salvation Army barracks with two other “lassies,” who did +washing and sewing and nursing, and went shabby, and half starved +themselves, and were baked in the heat, like scores of women in the +bush, and even as hundreds of women, suffering from religious mania, +slave and stint in city slums, and neglect their homes, husbands and +children—for the glory of Booth. + +The Pretty Girl was referred to as Sister Hannah by the Army people, +and came somehow to be known by sinners as “Miss Captain.” I don’t know +whether that was her real name or what rank she held in the Army, if +indeed she held any. + +She sold _War Crys_, and the circulation doubled in a day. One-eyed +Bogan, being bailed up unexpectedly, gave her “half a caser” for a +_Cry_, and ran away without the paper or the change. Jack Mitchell +bought a _Cry_ for the first time in his life, and read it. He said he +found some of the articles intensely realistic, and many of the +statements were very interesting. He said he read one or two things in +the _Cry_ that he didn’t know before. Tom Hall, taken unawares, bought +three _Crys_ from the Pretty Girl, and blushed to find it fame. + +Little Billy Woods, the Labourers’ Union secretary—who had a poetic +temperament and more than the average bushman’s reverence for higher +things—Little Billy Woods told me in a burst of confidence that he +generally had two feelings, one after the other, after encountering +that girl. One was that unfathomable far-away feeling of loneliness and +longing, that comes at odd times to the best of married men, with the +best of wives and children—as Billy had. The other feeling, which came +later on, and was a reaction in fact, was the feeling of a man who +thinks he’s been twisted round a woman’s little finger for the benefit +of somebody else. Billy said that he couldn’t help being reminded by +the shy, sweet smile and the shy, sweet “thank you” of the Pretty Girl +in the Army, of the shy, sweet smile and the shy, sweet gratitude of a +Sydney private barmaid, who had once roped him in, in the days before +he was married. Then he’d reckon that the Army lassie had been sent out +back to Bourke as a business speculation. + +Tom Hall was inclined to reckon so too—but that was after he’d been +chaffed for a month about the three _War Crys_. + +The Pretty Girl was discussed from psychological points of view; not +forgetting the sex problem. Donald Macdonald—shearer, union leader and +labour delegate to other colonies on occasion—Donald Macdonald said +that whenever he saw a circle of plain or ugly, dried-up women or girls +round a shepherd, evangelist or a Salvation Army drum, he’d say +“sexually starved!” They were hungry for love. Religious mania was +sexual passion dammed out of its course. Therefore he held that +morbidly religious girls were the most easily seduced. + +But this couldn’t apply to Pretty Girl in the Army. Mitchell reckoned +that she’d either had a great sorrow—a lot of trouble, or a +disappointment in love (the “or” is Mitchell’s); but they couldn’t see +how a girl like her could possibly be disappointed in love—unless the +chap died or got into jail for life. Donald decided that her soul had +been starved somehow. + +Mitchell suggested that it might be only a craving for notoriety, the +same thing that makes women and girls go amongst lepers, and out to the +battlefield, and nurse ugly pieces of men back to life again; the same +thing that makes some women and girls swear ropes round men’s necks. +The Pretty Girl might be the daughter of well-to-do people—even +aristocrats, said Mitchell—she was pretty enough and spoke well enough. +“Every woman’s a barmaid at heart,” as the _Bulletin_ puts it, said +Mitchell. + +But not even one of the haggard women of Bourke ever breathed a +suspicion of scandal against her. They said she was too good and too +pretty to be where she was. You see it was not as in an old settled +town where hags blacken God’s world with their tongues. Bourke was just +a little camping town in a big land, where free, good-hearted +democratic Australians, and the best of black sheep from the old world +were constantly passing through; where husband’s were often obliged to +be away from home for twelve months, and the storekeepers had to trust +the people, and mates trusted each other, and the folks were +broad-minded. The mind’s eye had a wide range. + +After her maiden speech the Pretty Girl seldom spoke, except to return +thanks for collections—and she never testified. She had a sweet voice +and used to sing. + +Now, if I were writing pure fiction, and were not cursed with an +obstinate inclination to write the truth, I might say that, after the +advent of the Pretty Girl, the morals of Bourke improved suddenly and +wonderfully. That One-eyed Bogan left off gambling and drinking and +fighting and swearing, and put on a red coat and testified and fought +the devil only; that Mitchell dropped his mask of cynicism; that Donald +Macdonald ate no longer of the tree of knowledge and ceased to worry +himself with psychological problems, and was happy; and that Tom Hall +was no longer a scoffer. That no one sneaked round through the scrub +after dusk to certain necessary establishments in weather-board +cottages on the outskirts of the town; and that the broad-minded and +obliging ladies thereof became Salvation Army lassies. + +But none of these things happened. Drunks quieted down or got out of +the way if they could when the Pretty Girl appeared on the scene, +fights and games of “headin’ ’em” were adjourned, and weak, ordinary +language was used for the time being, and that was about all. + +Nevertheless, most of the chaps were in love with that Pretty Girl in +the Army—all those who didn’t _worship_ her privately. Long Bob +Brothers hovered round in hopes, they said, that she’d meet with an +accident—get run over by a horse or something—and he’d have to carry +her in; he scared the women at the barracks by dropping firewood over +the fence after dark. Barcoo-Rot, the meanest man in the back country, +was seen to drop a threepenny bit into the ring, and a rumour was +industriously circulated (by Tom Hall) to the effect that One-eyed +Bogan intended to shave and join the Army disguised as a lassie. + +Handsome Jake Boreham (_alias_ Bore-’em), a sentimental shearer from +New Zealand, who had read Bret Harte, made an elaborate attempt for the +Pretty Girl, by pretending to be going to the dogs headlong, with an +idea of first winning her sorrowful interest and sympathy, and then +making an apparently hard struggle to straighten up for her sake. He +related his experience with the cheerful and refreshing absence of +reserve which was characteristic of him, and is of most bushmen. + +“I’d had a few drinks,” he said, “and was having a spell under a gum by +the river, when I saw the Pretty Girl and another Army woman coming +down along the bank. It was a blazing hot day. I thought of Sandy and +the Schoolmistress in Bret Harte, and I thought it would be a good idea +to stretch out in the sun and pretend to be helpless; so I threw my hat +on the ground and lay down, with my head in the blazing heat, in the +most graceful position I could get at, and I tried to put a look of +pained regret on my face, as if I was dreaming of my lost boyhood and +me mother. I thought, perhaps, the Girl would pity me, and I felt sure +she’d stoop and pick up my hat and put it gently over my poor troubled +head. Then I was going to become conscious for a moment, and look +hopelessly round, and into her eyes, and then start and look sorrowful +and ashamed, and stagger to my feet, taking off my hat like the Silver +King does to the audience when he makes his first appearance drunk on +the stage; and then I was going to reel off, trying to walk as straight +as I could. And next day I was going to clean up my teeth and nails and +put on a white shirt, and start to be a new man henceforth. + +“Well, as I lay there with my eyes shut, I heard the footsteps come up +and stop, and heard ’em whisper, and I thought I heard the Pretty Girl +say ‘Poor fellow!’ or something that sounded like that; and just then I +got a God-almighty poke in the ribs with an umbrella—at least I suppose +it was aimed for my ribs; but women are bad shots, and the point of the +umbrella caught me in the side, just between the bottom rib and the +hip-bone, and I sat up with a click, like the blade of a pocketknife. + +“The other lassie was the big square-faced woman. The Pretty Girl +looked rather more frightened and disgusted than sentimental, but she +had plenty of pluck, and soon pulled herself together. She said I ought +to be ashamed of myself, a great big man like me, lying there in the +dust like a drunken tramp—an eyesore and a disgrace to all the world. +She told me to go to my camp, wherever that was, and sleep myself +sober. The square-jawed woman said I looked like a fool sitting there. +I did feel ashamed, and I reckon I did look like a fool—a man generally +does in a fix like that. I felt like one, anyway. I got up and walked +away, and it hurt me so much that I went over to West Bourke and went +to the dogs properly for a fortnight, and lost twenty quid on a game of +draughts against a blindfold player. Now both those women had +umbrellas, but I’m not sure to this day which of ’em it was that gave +me the poke. It wouldn’t have mattered much anyway. I haven’t borrowed +one of Bret Harte’s books since.” + +Jake reflected a while. “The worst of it was,” he said ruefully, “that +I wasn’t sure that the girl or the woman didn’t see through me, and +that worried me a bit. You never can tell how much a woman suspects, +and that’s the worst of ’em. I found that out after I got married.” + +The Pretty Girl in the Army grew pale and thin and bigger-eyed. The +women said it was a shame, and that she ought to be sent home to her +friends, wherever they were. She was laid up for two or three days, and +some of the women cooked delicacies and handed ’em over the barracks +fence, and offered to come in and nurse her; but the square woman took +washing home and nursed the girl herself. + +The Pretty Girl still sold _War Crys_ and took up collections, but in a +tired, listless, half shamed-faced way. It was plain that she was tired +of the Army, and growing ashamed of the Salvationists. Perhaps she had +come to see things too plainly. + +You see, the Army does no good out back in Australia—except from a +business point of view. It is simply there to collect funds for hungry +headquarters. The bushmen are much too intelligent for the Army. There +was no poverty in Bourke—as it is understood in the city; there was +plenty of food; and camping out and roughing it come natural to the +bushmen. In cases of sickness, accident, widows or orphans, the chaps +sent round the hat, without banging a drum or testifying, and that was +all right. If a chap was hard up he borrowed a couple of quid from his +mate. If a strange family arrived without a penny, someone had to fix +’em up, and the storekeepers helped them till the man got work. For the +rest, we work out our own salvation, or damnation—as the case is—in the +bush, with no one to help us, except a mate, perhaps. The Army can’t +help us, but a fellow-sinner can, sometimes, who has been through it +all himself. The Army is only a drag on the progress of Democracy, +because it attracts many who would otherwise be aggressive +Democrats—and for other reasons. + +Besides, if we all reformed the Army would get deuced little from us +for its city mission. + +The Pretty Girl went to service for a while with the stock inspector’s +wife, who could get nothing out of her concerning herself or her +friends. She still slept at the barracks, stuck to the Army, and +attended its meetings. + +It was Christmas morning, and there was peace in Bourke and goodwill +towards all men. There hadn’t been a fight since yesterday evening, and +that had only been a friendly one, to settle an argument concerning the +past ownership, and, at the same time, to decide as to the future +possession of a dog. + +It had been a hot, close night, and it ended in a suffocating sunrise. +The free portion of the male population were in the habit of taking +their blankets and sleeping out in “the Park,” or town square, in hot +weather; the wives and daughters of the town slept, or tried to sleep, +with bedroom windows and doors open, while husbands lay outside on the +verandas. I camped in a corner of the park that night, and the sun woke +me. + +As I sat up I caught sight of a swagman coming along the white, dusty +road from the direction of the bridge, where the cleared road ran +across west and on, a hundred and thirty miles, through the barren, +broiling mulga scrubs, to Hungerford, on the border of Sheol. I knew +that swagman’s walk. It was John Merrick (Jack Moonlight), one-time +Shearers’ Union secretary at Coonamble, and generally “Rep” (shearers’ +representative) in any shed where he sheared. He was a “better-class +shearer,” one of those quiet, thoughtful men of whom there are +generally two or three in the roughest of rough sheds, who have great +influence, and give the shed a good name from a Union point of view. +Not quiet with the resentful or snobbish reserve of the educated +Englishman, but with a sad or subdued sort of quietness that has force +in it—as if they fully realized that their intelligence is much higher +than the average, that they have suffered more real trouble and +heartbreak than the majority of their mates, and that their mates +couldn’t possibly understand them if they spoke as they felt and +couldn’t see things as they do—yet men who understand and are intensely +sympathetic in their loneliness and sensitive reserve. + +I had worked in a shed with Jack Moonlight, and had met him in Sydney, +and to be mates with a bushman for a few weeks is to know him +well—anyway, I found it so. He had taken a trip to Sydney the Christmas +before last, and when he came back there was something wanting. He +became more silent, he drank more, and sometimes alone, and took to +smoking heavily. He dropped his mates, took little or no interest in +Union matters, and travelled alone, and at night. + +The Australian bushman is born with a mate who sticks to him through +life—like a mole. They may be hundreds of miles apart sometimes, and +separated for years, yet they are mates for life. A bushman may have +many mates in his roving, but there is always one his mate, “my mate;” +and it is common to hear a bushman, who is, in every way, a true mate +to the man he happens to be travelling with, speak of _his mate’s +mate_—“Jack’s mate”—who might be in Klondyke or South Africa. A bushman +has always a mate to comfort him and argue with him, and work and tramp +and drink with him, and lend him quids when he’s hard up, and call him +a b—— fool, and fight him sometimes; to abuse him to his face and +defend his name behind his back; to bear false witness and perjure his +soul for his sake; to lie to the girl for him if he’s single, and to +his wife if he’s married; to secure a “pen” for him at a shed where he +isn’t on the spot, or, if the mate is away in New Zealand or South +Africa, to write and tell him if it’s any good coming over this way. +And each would take the word of the other against all the world, and +each believes that the other is the straightest chap that ever lived-“a +white man!” And next best to your old mate is the man you’re tramping, +riding, working, or drinking with. + +About the first thing the cook asks you when you come along to a +shearers’ hut is, “Where’s your mate?” I travelled alone for a while +one time, and it seemed to me sometimes, by the tone of the inquiry +concerning the whereabouts of my mate, that the bush had an idea that I +might have done away with him and that the thing ought to be looked +into. + +When a man drops mateship altogether and takes to “hatting” in the +bush, it’s a step towards a convenient tree and a couple of +saddle-straps buckled together. + +I had an idea that I, in a measure, took the place of Jack Moonlight’s +mate about this time. + +“’Ullo, Jack!” I hailed as he reached the corner of the park. + +“Good morning, Harry!” said Jack, as if he’d seen me last yesterday +evening instead of three months ago. “How are you getting on?” + +We walked together towards the Union Office, where I had a camp in the +skillion-room at the back. Jack was silent. But there’s no place in the +world where a man’s silence is respected so much (within reasonable +bounds) as in the Australian bush, where every man has a past more or +less sad, and every man a ghost—perhaps from other lands that we know +nothing of, and speaking in a foreign tongue. They say in the bush, +“Oh, Jack’s only thinking!” And they let him think. Generally you want +to think as much as your mate; and when you’ve been together some time +it’s quite natural to travel all day without exchanging a word. In the +morning Jim says, “Well, I think I made a bargain with that horse, +Bill,” and some time late in the afternoon, say twenty miles farther +on, it occurs to Bill to “rejoin,” “Well, I reckon the blank as sold it +to you had yer proper!” + +I like a good thinking mate, and I believe that thinking in company is +a lot more healthy and more comfortable, as well as less risky, than +thinking alone. + +On the way to the Union Office Jack and I passed the Royal Hotel, and +caught a glimpse, through the open door, of a bedroom off the veranda, +of the landlord’s fresh, fair, young Sydney girl-wife, sleeping +prettily behind the mosquito-net, like a sleeping beauty, while the +boss lay on a mattress outside on the veranda, across the open door. +(He wasn’t necessary for publication, but an evidence of good faith.) + +I glanced at Jack for a grin, but didn’t get one. He wore the pained +expression of a man who is suddenly hit hard with the thought of +something that might have been. + +I boiled the billy and fried a pound of steak. + +“Been travelling all night, Tack?” I asked. + +“Yes,” said Jack. “I camped at Emus yesterday.” + +He didn’t eat. I began to reckon that he was brooding too much for his +health. He was much thinner than when I saw him last, and pretty +haggard, and he had something of the hopeless, haggard look that I’d +seen in Tom Hall’s eyes after the last big shearing strike, when Tom +had worked day and night to hold his mates up all through the hard, +bitter struggle, and the battle was lost. + +“Look here, Jack!” I said at last. “What’s up?” + +“Nothing’s up, Harry,” said Jack. “What made you think so?” + +“Have you got yourself into any fix?” I asked. “What’s the Hungerford +track been doing to you?” + +“No, Harry,” he said, “I’m all right. How are you?” And he pulled some +string and papers and a roll of dusty pound notes from his pocket and +threw them on the bunk. + +I was hard up just then, so I took a note and the billy to go to the +Royal and get some beer. I thought the beer might loosen his mind a +bit. + +“Better take a couple of quid,” said Jack. “You look as if you want +some new shirts and things.” But a pound was enough for me, and I think +he had reason to be glad of that later on, as it turned out. + +“Anything new in Bourke?” asked Jack as we drank the beer. + +“No,” I said, “not a thing—except there’s a pretty girl in the +Salvation Army.” + +“And it’s about time,” growled Jack. + +“Now, look here, Jack,” I said presently, “what’s come over you lately +at all? I might be able to help you. It’s not a bit of use telling me +that there’s nothing the matter. When a man takes to brooding and +travelling alone it’s a bad sign, and it will end in a leaning tree and +a bit of clothes-line as likely as not. Tell me what the trouble is. +Tell us all about it. There’s a ghost, isn’t there?” + +“Well, I suppose so,” said Jack. “We’ve all got our ghosts for that +matter. But never you mind, Harry; I’m all right. I don’t go +interfering with your ghosts, and I don’t see what call you’ve got to +come haunting mine. Why, it’s as bad as kicking a man’s dog.” And he +gave the ghost of a grin. + +“Tell me, Jack,” I said, “is it a woman?” + +“Yes,” said Jack, “it’s a woman. Now, are you satisfied?” + +“Is it a girl?” I asked. + +“Yes,” he said. + +So there was no more to be said. I’d thought it might have been a lot +worse than a girl. I’d thought he might have got married somewhere, +sometime, and made a mess of it. + +We had dinner at Billy Woods’s place, and a sensible Christmas dinner +it was—everything cold, except the vegetables, with the hose going on +the veranda in spite of the by-laws, and Billy’s wife and her sister, +fresh and cool-looking and jolly, instead of being hot and brown and +cross like most Australian women who roast themselves over a blazing +fire in a hot kitchen on a broiling day, all the morning, to cook +scalding plum pudding and redhot roasts, for no other reason than that +their grandmothers used to cook hot Christmas dinners in England. + +And in the afternoon we went for a row on the river, pulling easily up +the anabranch and floating down with the stream under the shade of the +river timber—instead of going to sleep and waking up helpless and +soaked in perspiration, to find the women with headaches, as many do on +Christmas Day in Australia. + +Mrs Woods tried to draw Jack out, but it was no use, and in the evening +he commenced drinking, and that made Billy uneasy. “I’m afraid Jack’s +on the wrong track,” he said. + +After tea most of us collected about Watty’s veranda. Most things that +happened in Bourke happened at Watty’s pub, or near it. + +If a horse bolted with a buggy or cart, he was generally stopped +outside Watty’s, which seemed to suggest, as Mitchell said, that most +of the heroes drank at Watty’s—also that the pluckiest men were found +amongst the hardest drinkers. (But sometimes the horse fetched up +against Watty’s sign and lamppost—which was a stout one of +“iron-bark”—and smashed the trap.) Then Watty’s was the Carriers’ Arms, +a union pub; and Australian teamsters are mostly hard cases: while +there was something in Watty’s beer which made men argue fluently, and +the best fights came off in his backyard. Watty’s dogs were the most +quarrelsome in town, and there was a dog-fight there every other +evening, followed as often as not by a man-fight. If a bushman’s horse +ran away with him the chances were that he’d be thrown on to Watty’s +veranda, if he wasn’t pitched into the bar; and victims of accidents, +and sick, hard-up shearers, were generally carried to Watty’s pub, as +being the most convenient and comfortable for them. Mitchell denied +that it was generosity or good nature on Watty’s part, he said it was +all business—advertisement. Watty knew what he was doing. He was very +deep, was Watty. Mitchell further hinted that if he was sick _he_ +wouldn’t be carried to Watty’s, for Watty knew what a thirsty business +a funeral was. Tom Hall reckoned that Watty bribed the Army on the +quiet. + +I was sitting on a stool along the veranda wall with Donald Macdonald, +Bob Brothers (the Giraffe) and Mitchell, and one or two others, and +Jack Moonlight sat on the floor with his back to the wall and his hat +well down over his eyes. The Army came along at the usual time, but we +didn’t see the Pretty Girl at first—she was a bit late. Mitchell said +he liked to be at Watty’s when the Army prayed and the Pretty Girl was +there; he had no objection to being prayed for by a girl like that, +though he reckoned that nothing short of a real angel could save him +now. He said his old grandmother used to pray for him every night of +her life and three times on Sunday, with Christmas Day extra when +Christmas Day didn’t fall on a Sunday; but Mitchell reckoned that the +old lady couldn’t have had much influence because he became more sinful +every year, and went deeper in ways of darkness, until finally he +embarked on a career of crime. + +The Army prayed, and then a thin “ratty” little woman bobbed up in the +ring; she’d gone mad on religion as women do on woman’s rights and +hundreds of other things. She was so skinny in the face, her jaws so +prominent, and her mouth so wide, that when she opened it to speak it +was like a ventriloquist’s dummy and you could almost see the cracks +open down under her ears. + +“They say I’m cracked!” she screamed in a shrill, cracked voice. “But +I’m not cracked—I’m only cracked on the Lord Jesus Christ! That’s all +I’m cracked on——.” And just then the Amen man of the Army—the Army +groaner we called him, who was always putting both feet in it—just then +he blundered forward, rolled up his eyes, threw his hands up and down +as if he were bouncing two balls, and said, with deep feeling: + +“Thank the Lord she’s got a crack in the right place!” + +Tom Hall doubled up, and most of the other sinners seemed to think +there was something very funny about it. And the Army, too, seemed +struck with an idea that there was something wrong somewhere, for they +started a hymn. + +A big American negro, who’d been a night watchman in Sydney, stepped +into the ring and waved his arms and kept time, and as he got excited +he moved his hands up and down rapidly, as if he was hauling down a +rope in a great hurry through a pulley block above, and he kept saying, +“Come down, Lord!” all through the hymn, like a bass accompaniment, +“Come down, Lord; come down, Lord; come down, Lord; come down, Lord!” +and the quicker be said it the faster he hauled. He was as good as a +drum. And, when the hymn was over, he started to testify. + +“My frens!” he said, “I was once black as der coals in der mined! I was +once black as der ink in der ocean of sin! But now—thank an’ bless the +Lord!—I am whiter dan der dribben snow!” + +Tom Hall sat down on the edge of the veranda and leaned his head +against a post and cried. He had contributed a bob this evening, and he +was getting his money’s worth. + +Then the Pretty Girl arrived and was pushed forward into the ring. She +looked thinner and whiter than I’d ever seen her, and there was a +feverish brightness in her eyes that I didn’t like. + +“Men!” she said, “this is Christmas Day-.” I didn’t hear any more for, +at the sound of her voice, Jack Moonlight jumped up as if he’d sat on a +baby. He started forward, stared at her for a moment as if he couldn’t +believe his eyes, and then said, “Hannah!” short and sharp. She started +as if she was shot, gave him a wild look, and stumbled forward; the +next moment he had her in his arms and was steering for the private +parlour. + +I heard Mrs Bothways calling for water and smelling-salts; she was as +fat as Watty, and very much like him in the face, but she was emotional +and sympathetic. Then presently I heard, through the open window, the +Pretty Girl say to Jack, “Oh, Jack, Jack! Why did you go away and leave +me like that? It was cruel!” + +“But you told me to go, Hannah,” said Jack. + +“That-that didn’t make any difference. Why didn’t you write?” she +sobbed. + +“Because you never wrote to me, Hannah,” he said. + +“That—that was no excuse!” she said. “It was so k-k-k-cruel of you, +Jack.” + +Mrs Bothways pulled down the window. A new-comer asked Watty what the +trouble was, and he said that the Army girl had only found her chap, or +husband, or long-lost brother or something, but the missus was looking +after the business; then he dozed again. + +And then we adjourned to the Royal and took the Army with us. + +“That’s the way of it,” said Donald Macdonald. “With a woman it’s love +or religion; with a man it’s love or the devil.” + +“Or with a man,” said Mitchell, presently, “it’s love and the devil +both, sometimes, Donald.” + +I looked at Mitchell hard, but for all his face expressed he might only +have said, “I think it’s going to rain.” + + + + +“LORD DOUGLAS” + + +“They hold him true, who’s true to one, +However false he be—” + _The Rouseabout of Rouseabouts_. + + +The Imperial Hotel was rather an unfortunate name for an out-back town +pub, for out back is the stronghold of Australian democracy; it was the +out-back vote and influence that brought about “One Man One Vote,” +“Payment of Members,” and most of the democratic legislation of late +years, and from out back came the overwhelming vote in favour of +Australian as Imperial Federation. + +The name Royal Hotel is as familiar as that of the Railway Hotel, and +passes unnoticed and ungrowled at, even by bush republicans. The Royal +Hotel at Bourke was kept by an Irishman, one O’Donohoo, who was Union +to the backbone, loudly in favour of “Australia for the Australians,” +and, of course, against even the democratic New South Wales Government +of the time. He went round town all one St Patrick’s morning with a +bunch of green ribbon fastened to his coat-tail with a large fish-hook, +and wasn’t aware of the fact till he sat down on the point of it. But +that’s got nothing to do with it. + +The Imperial Hotel at Bourke was unpopular from the first. It was said +that the very existence of the house was the result of a swindle. It +had been built with money borrowed on certain allotments in the centre +of the town and on the understanding that it should be built on the +mortgaged land, whereas it was erected on a free allotment. Which fact +was discovered, greatly to its surprise, by the building society when +it came to foreclose on the allotments some years later. While the +building was being erected the Bourke people understood, in a vague +way, that it was to be a convent (perhaps the building society thought +so, too), and when certain ornaments in brick and cement in the shape +of a bishop’s mitre were placed over the corners of the walls the +question seemed decided. But when the place was finished a bar was +fitted up, and up went the sign, to the disgust of the other publicans, +who didn’t know a licence had been taken out—for licensing didn’t go by +local option in those days. It was rumoured that the place belonged to, +and the whole business was engineered by, a priest. And priests are men +of the world. + +The Imperial Hotel was patronized by the pastoralists, the civil +servants, the bank manager and clerks—all the scrub aristocracy; it was +the headquarters of the Pastoralists’ Union in Bourke; a barracks for +blacklegs brought up from Sydney to take the place of Union shearers on +strike; and the new Governor, on his inevitable visit to Bourke, was +banqueted at the Imperial Hotel. The editor of the local “capitalistic +rag” stayed there; the pastoralists’ member was elected mostly by dark +ways and means devised at the Imperial Hotel, and one of its managers +had stood as a dummy candidate to split the Labour vote; the management +of the hotel was his reward. In short, it was there that most of the +plots were hatched to circumvent Freedom, and put away or deliver into +the clutches of law and order certain sons of Light and Liberty who +believed in converting blacklegs into jellies by force of fists when +bribes, gentle persuasion and pure Australian language failed to +convert them to clean Unionism. The Imperial Hotel was called the +“Squatters’ Pub,” the “Scabbery,” and other and more expressive names. + +The hotel became still more unpopular after Percy Douglas had managed +it for a while. He was an avowed enemy of Labour Unionists. He employed +Chinese cooks, and that in the height of the anti-Chinese agitation in +Australia, and he was known to have kindly feelings towards the Afghans +who, with their camels, were running white carriers off the roads. If +an excited Unionist called a man a “blackleg” or “scab” in the Imperial +bar he was run out—sometimes with great difficulty, and occasionally as +far as the lock-up. + +Percy Douglas was a fine-looking man, “wid a chest on him an’ well +hung—a fine fee-_gure_ of a man,” as O’Donohoo pronounced it. He was +tall and erect, he dressed well, wore small side-whiskers, had an eagle +nose, and looked like an aristocrat. Like many of his type, who start +sometimes as billiard-markers and suddenly become hotel managers in +Australia, nothing was known of his past. Jack Mitchell reckoned, by +the way he treated his employees and spoke to workmen, that he was the +educated son of an English farmer—gone wrong and sent out to Australia. +Someone called him “Lord Douglas,” and the nickname caught on. + +He made himself well hated. He got One-eyed Bogan “three months’ hard” +for taking a bottle of whisky off the Imperial bar counter because he +(Bogan) was drunk and thirsty and had knocked down his cheque, and +because there was no one minding the bar at the moment. + +Lord Douglas dismissed the barmaid, and, as she was leaving, he had her +boxes searched and gave her in charge for stealing certain articles +belonging to the hotel. The chaps subscribed to defend the case, and +subsequently put a few pounds together for the girl. She proved her +gratitude by bringing a charge of a baby against one of the chaps—but +that was only one of the little ways of the world, as Mitchell said. +She joined a Chinese camp later on. + +Lord Douglas employed a carpenter to do some work about the hotel, and +because the carpenter left before the job was finished, Lord Douglas +locked his tools in an outhouse and refused to give them up; and when +the carpenter, with the spirit of an Australian workman, broke the +padlock and removed his tool-chest, the landlord gave him in charge for +breaking and entering. The chaps defended the case and won it, and +hated Lord Douglas as much as if he were their elder brother. Mitchell +was the only one to put in a word for him. + +“I’ve been puzzling it out,” said Mitchell, as he sat nursing his best +leg in the Union Office, “and, as far as I can see, it all amounts to +this—we’re all mistaken in Lord Douglas. We don’t know the man. He’s +all right. We don’t understand him. He’s really a sensitive, +good-hearted man who’s been shoved a bit off the track by the world. +It’s the world’s fault—he’s not to blame. You see, when he was a +youngster he was the most good-natured kid in the school; he was always +soft, and, consequently, he was always being imposed upon, and bullied, +and knocked about. Whenever he got a penny to buy lollies he’d count +’em out carefully and divide ’em round amongst his schoolmates and +brothers and sisters. He was the only one that worked at home, and +consequently they all hated him. His father respected him, but didn’t +love him, because he wasn’t a younger son, and wasn’t bringing his +father’s grey hairs down in sorrow to the grave. If it was in +Australia, probably Lord Douglas was an elder son and had to do all the +hard graft, and teach himself at night, and sleep in a bark skillion +while his younger brothers benefited—they were born in the new brick +house and went to boarding-schools. His mother had a contempt for him +because he wasn’t a black sheep and a prodigal, and, when the old man +died, the rest of the family got all the stuff and Lord Douglas was +kicked out because they could do without him now. And the family hated +him like poison ever afterwards (especially his mother), and spread +lies about him—because they had treated him shamefully and because his +mouth was shut—they knew he wouldn’t speak. Then probably he went in +for Democracy and worked for Freedom, till Freedom trod on him once too +often with her hob-nailed boots. Then the chances are, in the end, he +was ruined by a girl or woman, and driven, against his will, to take +refuge in pure individualism. He’s all right, only we don’t appreciate +him. He’s only fighting against his old ideals—his old self that comes +up sometimes—and that’s what makes him sweat his barmaids and servants, +and hate us, and run us in; and perhaps when he cuts up extra rough +it’s because his conscience kicks him when he thinks of the damned soft +fool he used to be. He’s all right—take my word for it. It’s all a +mask. Why, he might be one of the kindest-hearted men in Bourke +underneath.” + +Tom Hall rubbed his head and blinked, as if he was worried by an idea +that there might be some facts in Mitchell’s theories. + +“You’re allers findin’ excuses for blacklegs an’ scabs, Mitchell,” said +Barcoo-Rot, who took Mitchell seriously (and who would have taken a +laughing jackass seriously). “Why, you’d find a white spot on a +squatter. I wouldn’t be surprised if you blacklegged yourself in the +end.” + +This was an unpardonable insult, from a Union point of view, and the +chaps half-unconsciously made room on the floor for Barcoo-Rot to fall +after Jack Mitchell hit him. But Mitchell took the insult +philosophically. + +“Well, Barcoo-Rot,” he said, nursing the other leg, “for the matter of +that, I did find a white spot on a squatter once. He lent me a quid +when I was hard up. There’s white spots on the blackest characters if +you only drop prejudice and look close enough. I suppose even +Jack-the-Ripper’s character was speckled. Why, I can even see spots on +your character, sometimes, Barcoo-Rot. I’ve known white spots to spread +on chaps’ characters until they were little short of saints. Sometimes +I even fancy I can feel my own wings sprouting. And as for turning +blackleg—well, I suppose I’ve got a bit of the crawler in my +composition (most of us have), and a man never knows what might happen +to his principles.” + +“Well,” said Barcoo-Rot, “I beg yer pardon—ain’t that enough?” + +“No,” said Mitchell, “you ought to wear a three-bushel bag and ashes +for three months, and drink water; but since the police would send you +to an asylum if you did that, I think the best thing we can do is to go +out and have a drink.” + +Lord Douglas married an Australian girl somewhere, somehow, and brought +her to Bourke, and there were two little girls—regular little fairies. +She was a gentle, kind-hearted little woman, but she didn’t seem to +improve him much, save that he was very good to her. + +“It’s mostly that way,” commented Mitchell. “When a boss gets married +and has children he thinks he’s got a greater right to grind his +fellowmen and rob their wives and children. I’d never work for a boss +with a big family—it’s hard enough to keep a single boss nowadays in +this country.” + +After one stormy election, at the end of a long and bitter shearing +strike, One-eyed Bogan, his trusty enemy, Barcoo-Rot, and one or two +other enthusiastic reformers were charged with rioting, and got from +one to three months’ hard. And they had only smashed three windows of +the Imperial Hotel and chased the Chinese cook into the river. + +“I used to have some hopes for Democracy,” commented Mitchell, “but +I’ve got none now. How can you expect Liberty, Equality or +Fraternity—how can you expect Freedom and Universal Brotherhood and +Equal Rights in a country where Sons of Light get three months’ hard +for breaking windows and bashing a Chinaman? It almost makes me long to +sail away in a gallant barque.” + +There were other cases in connection with the rotten-egging of +Capitalistic candidates on the Imperial Hotel balcony, and it was +partly on the evidence of Douglas and his friends that certain +respectable Labour leaders got heavy terms of imprisonment for rioting +and “sedition” and “inciting,” in connection with organized attacks on +blacklegs and their escorts. + +Retribution, if it was retribution, came suddenly and in a most +unexpected manner to Lord Douglas. + +It seems he employed a second carpenter for six months to repair and +make certain additions to the hotel, and put him off under various +pretences until he owed him a hundred pounds or thereabout. At last, +immediately after an exciting interview with Lord Douglas, the +carpenter died suddenly of heart disease. The widow, a strong-minded +bushwoman, put a bailiff in the hotel on a very short notice—and +against the advice of her lawyer, who thought the case hopeless—and the +Lord Douglas bubble promptly burst. He had somehow come to be regarded +as the proprietor of the hotel, but now the real proprietors or +proprietor—he was still said to be a priest—turned Douglas out and put +in a new manager. The old servants were paid after some trouble. The +local storekeepers and one or two firms in Sydney, who had large +accounts against the Imperial Hotel (and had trusted it, mainly because +it was patronized by Capitalism and Fat), were never paid. + +Lord Douglas cleared out to Sydney, leaving his wife and children, for +the present, with her brother, a hay-and-corn storekeeper, who also had +a large and hopeless account against the hotel; and when the brother +went broke and left the district she rented a two-roomed cottage and +took in dressmaking. + +Dressmaking didn’t pay so well in the bush then as it did in the old +diggings days when sewing-machines were scarce and the possession of +one meant an independent living to any girl—when diggers paid ten +shillings for a strip of “flannen” doubled over and sewn together, with +holes for arms and head, and called a shirt. Mrs Douglas had a hard +time, with her two little girls, who were still better and more +prettily dressed than any other children in Bourke. One grocer still +called on her for orders and pretended to be satisfied to wait “till Mr +Douglas came back,” and when she would no longer order what he +considered sufficient provisions for her and the children, and +commenced buying sugar, etc., by the pound, for cash, he one day sent a +box of groceries round to her. He pretended it was a mistake. + +“However,” he said, “I’d be very much obliged if you could use ’em, Mrs +Douglas. I’m overstocked now; haven’t got room for another tin of +sardines in the shop. Don’t you worry about bills, Mrs Douglas; I can +wait till Douglas comes home. I did well enough out of the Imperial +Hotel when your husband had it, and a pound’s worth of groceries won’t +hurt me now. I’m only too glad to get rid of some of the stock.” + +She cried a little, thought of the children, and kept the groceries. + +“I suppose I’ll be sold up soon meself if things don’t git brighter,” +said that grocer to a friend, “so it doesn’t matter much.” + +The same with Foley the butcher, who had a brogue with a sort of +drawling groan in it, and was a cynic of the Mitchell school. + +“You see,” he said, “she’s as proud as the devil, but when I send round +a bit o’ rawst, or porrk, or the undercut o’ the blade-bawn, she thinks +o’ the little gur-r-rls before she thinks o’ sendin’ it back to me. +That’s where I’ve got the pull on her.” + +The Giraffe borrowed a horse and tip-dray one day at the beginning of +winter and cut a load of firewood in the bush, and next morning, at +daylight, Mrs Douglas was nearly startled out of her life by a crash at +the end of the cottage, which made her think that the chimney had +fallen in, or a tree fallen on the house; and when she slipped on a +wrapper and looked out, she saw a load of short-cut wood by the +chimney, and caught a glimpse of the back view of the Giraffe, who +stood in the dray with his legs wide apart and was disappearing into +the edge of the scrub; and soon the rapid clock-clock-clock of the +wheels died away in the west, as if he were making for West Australia. + +The next we heard of Lord Douglas he had got two years’ hard for +embezzlement in connection with some canvassing he had taken up. Mrs +Douglas fell ill—a touch of brain-fever—and one of the labourers’ wives +took care of the children while two others took turns in nursing. While +she was recovering, Bob Brothers sent round the hat, and, after a +conclave in the Union Office—as mysterious as any meeting ever called +with the object of downing bloated Capitalism—it was discovered that +one of the chaps—who didn’t wish his name to be mentioned—had borrowed +just twenty-five pounds from Lord Douglas in the old days and now +wished to return it to Mrs Douglas. So the thing was managed, and if +she had any suspicions she kept them to herself. She started a little +fancy goods shop and got along fairly comfortable. + +Douglas, by the way, was, publicly, supposed, for her sake and because +of the little girls, to be away in West Australia on the goldfields. + +Time passes without much notice out back, and one hot day, when the sun +hung behind the fierce sandstorms from the northwest as dully lurid as +he ever showed in a London fog, Lord Douglas got out of the train that +had just finished its five-hundred-miles’ run, and not seeing a +new-chum porter, who started forward by force of habit to take his bag, +he walked stiffly off the platform and down the main street towards his +wife’s cottage. + +He was very gaunt, and his eyes, to those who passed him closely, +seemed to have a furtive, hunted expression. He had let his beard grow, +and it had grown grey. + +It was within a few days of Christmas—the same Christmas that we lost +the Pretty Girl in the Salvation Army. As a rule the big shearing-sheds +within a fortnight of Bourke cut out in time for the shearers to reach +the town and have their Christmas dinners and sprees—and for some of +them to be locked up over Christmas Day—within sound of a church-going +bell. Most of the chaps gathered in the Shearers’ Union Office on New +Year’s Eve and discussed Douglas amongst other things. + +“I vote we kick the cow out of the town!” snarled One-eyed Bogan, +viciously. + +“We can’t do that,” said Bob Brothers (the Giraffe), speaking more +promptly than usual. “There’s his wife and youngsters to consider, yer +know.” + +“He something well deserted his wife,” snarled Bogan, “an’ now he comes +crawlin’ back to her to keep him.” + +“Well,” said Mitchell, mildly, “but we ain’t all got as much against +him as you have, Bogan.” + +“He made a crimson jail-bird of me!” snapped Bogan. “Well,” said +Mitchell, “that didn’t hurt you much, anyway; it rather improved your +character if anything. Besides, he made a jail-bird of himself +afterwards, so you ought to have a fellow-feeling—a feathered feeling, +so to speak. Now you needn’t be offended, Bogan, we’re all jail-birds +at heart, only we haven’t all got the pluck.” + +“I’m in favour of blanky well tarrin’ an’ featherin’ him an’ kickin’ +him out of the town!” shouted Bogan. “It would be a good turn to his +wife, too; she’d be well rid of the——.” + +“Perhaps she’s fond of him,” suggested Mitchell; “I’ve known such cases +before. I saw them sitting together on the veranda last night when they +thought no one was looking.” + +“He deserted her,” said One-eyed Bogan, in a climbing-down tone, “and +left her to starve.” + +“Perhaps the police were to blame for that,” said Mitchell. “You know +you deserted all your old mates once for three months, Bogan, and it +wasn’t your fault.” + +“He seems to be a crimson pet of yours, Jack Mitchell,” said Bogan, +firing up. + +“Ah, well, all I know,” said Mitchell, standing up and stretching +himself wearily, “all I know is that he looked like a gentleman once, +and treated us like a gentleman, and cheated us like a gentleman, and +ran some of us in like a gentleman, and, as far as I can see, he’s +served his time like a gentleman and come back to face us and live +himself down like a man. I always had a sneaking regard for a +gentleman.” + +“Why, Mitchell, I’m beginning to think you are a gentleman yourself,” +said Jake Boreham. + +“Well,” said Mitchell, “I used to have a suspicion once that I had a +drop of blue blood in me somewhere, and it worried me a lot; but I +asked my old mother about it one day, and she scalded me—God bless +her!—and father chased me with a stockwhip, so I gave up making +inquiries.” + +“You’ll join the bloomin’ Capitalists next,” sneered One-eyed Bogan. + +“I wish I could, Bogan,” said Mitchell. “I’d take a trip to Paris and +see for myself whether the Frenchwomen are as bad as they’re made out +to be, or go to Japan. But what are we going to do about Douglas?” + +“Kick the skunk out of town, or boycott him!” said one or two. “He +ought to be tarred and feathered and hanged.” + +“Couldn’t do worse than hang him,” commented Jake Boreham, cheerfully. + +“Oh, yes, we could,” said Mitchell, sitting down, resting his elbows on +his knees, and marking his points with one forefinger on the other. +“For instance, we might boil him slow in tar. We might skin him alive. +We might put him in a cage and poke him with sticks, with his wife and +children in another cage to look on and enjoy the fun.” + +The chaps, who had been sitting quietly listening to Mitchell, and +grinning, suddenly became serious and shifted their positions uneasily. + +“But I can tell you what would hurt his feelings more than anything +else we could do,” said Mitchell. + +“Well, what is it, Jack?” said Tom Hall, rather impatiently. + +“Send round the hat and take up a collection for him,” said Mitchell, +“enough to let him get away with his wife and children and start life +again in some less respectable town than Bourke. You needn’t grin, I’m +serious about it.” + +There was a thoughtful pause, and one or two scratched their heads. +“His wife seems pretty sick,” Mitchell went on in a reflective tone. “I +passed the place this morning and saw him scrubbing out the floor. He’s +been doing a bit of house-painting for old Heegard to-day. I suppose he +learnt it in jail. I saw him at work and touched my hat to him.” + +“What!” cried Tom Hall, affecting to shrink from Mitchell in horror. + +“Yes,” said Mitchell, “I’m not sure that I didn’t take my hat off. Now +I know it’s not bush religion for a man to touch his hat, except to a +funeral, or a strange roof or woman sometimes; but when I meet a braver +man than myself I salute him. I’ve only met two in my life.” + +“And who were they, Jack?” asked Jake Boreham. + +“One,” said Mitchell—“one is Douglas, and the other—well, the other was +the man I used to be. But that’s got nothing to do with it.” + +“But perhaps Douglas thought you were crowing over him when you took +off your hat to him—sneerin’ at him, like, Mitchell,” reflected Jake +Boreham. + +“No, Jake,” said Mitchell, growing serious suddenly. “There are ways of +doing things that another man understands.” + +They all thought for a while. + +“Well,” said Tom Hall, “supposing we do take up a collection for him, +he’d be too damned proud to take it.” + +“But that’s where we’ve got the pull on him,” said Mitchell, +brightening up. “I heard Dr Morgan say that Mrs Douglas wouldn’t live +if she wasn’t sent away to a cooler place, and Douglas knows it; and, +besides, one of the little girls is sick. We’ve got him in a corner and +he’ll have to take the stuff. Besides, two years in jail takes a lot of +the pride out of a man.” + +“Well, I’m damned if I’ll give a sprat to help the man who tried his +best to crush the Unions!” said One-eyed Bogan. + +“Damned if I will either!” said Barcoo-Rot. + +“Now, look here, One-eyed Bogan,” said Mitchell, “I don’t like to harp +on old things, for I know they bore you, but when you returned to +public life that time no one talked of kicking you out of the town. In +fact, I heard that the chaps put a few pounds together to help you get +away for a while till you got over your modesty.” + +No one spoke. + +“I passed Douglas’s place on my way here from my camp to-night,” +Mitchell went on musingly, “and I saw him walking up and down in the +yard with his sick child in his arms. You remember that little girl, +Bogan? I saw her run and pick up your hat and give it to you one day +when you were trying to put it on with your feet. You remember, Bogan? +The shock nearly sobered you.” + +There was a very awkward pause. The position had become too +psychological altogether and had to be ended somehow. The awkward +silence had to be broken, and Bogan broke it. He turned up Bob +Brothers’s hat, which was lying on the table, and “chucked” in a +“quid,” qualifying the hat and the quid, and disguising his feelings +with the national oath of the land. + +“We’ve had enough of this gory, maudlin, sentimental tommy-rot,” he +said. “Here, Barcoo, stump up or I’ll belt it out of your hide! +I’ll—I’ll take yer to pieces!” + +But Douglas didn’t leave the town. He sent his wife and children to +Sydney until the heat wave was past, built a new room on to the +cottage, and started a book and newspaper shop, and a poultry farm in +the back paddock, and flourished. + +They called him Mr Douglas for a while, then Douglas, then Percy +Douglas, and now he is well-known as Old Daddy Douglas, and the Sydney +_Worker_, _Truth_, and _Bulletin_, and other democratic rags are on +sale at his shop. He is big with schemes for locking the Darling River, +and he gets his drink at O’Donohoo’s. He is scarcely yet regarded as a +straight-out democrat. He was a gentleman once, Mitchell said, and the +old blood was not to be trusted. But, last elections, Douglas worked +quietly for Unionism, and gave the leaders certain hints, and put them +up to various electioneering dodges which enabled them to return, in +the face of Monopoly, a Labour member who is as likely to go straight +as long as any other Labour member. + + + + +THE BLINDNESS OF ONE-EYED BOGAN + + +They judge not and they are not judged—’tis their philosophy— +(There’s something wrong with every ship that sails upon the sea). + _The Ballad of the Rouseabout_. + + +“And what became of One-eyed Bogan?” I asked Tom Hall when I met him +and Jack Mitchell down in Sydney with their shearing cheques the +Christmas before last. + +“You’d better ask Mitchell, Harry,” said Tom. “He can tell you about +Bogan better than I can. But first, what about the drink we’re going to +have?” + +We turned out of Pitt Street into Hunter Street, and across George +Street, where a double line of fast electric tramway was running, into +Margaret Street and had a drink at Pfahlert’s Hotel, where a counter +lunch—as good as many dinners you get for a shilling—was included with +a sixpenny drink. “Get a quiet corner,” said Mitchell, “I like to bear +myself cackle.” So we took our beer out in the fernery and got a cool +place at a little table in a quiet corner amongst the fern boxes. + +“Well, One-eyed Bogan was a hard case, Mitchell,” I said. “Wasn’t he?” + +“Yes,” said Mitchell, putting down his “long-beer” glass, “he was.” + +“Rather a bad egg?” + +“Yes, a regular bad egg,” said Mitchell, decidedly. + +“I heard he got caught cheating at cards,” I said. + +“Did you?” said Mitchell. “Well, I believe he did. Ah, well,” he added +reflectively, after another long pull, “One-eyed Bogan won’t cheat at +cards any more.” + +“Why?” I said. “Is he dead then?” + +“No,” said Mitchell, “he’s blind.” + +“Good God!” I said, “how did that happen?” + +“He lost the other eye,” said Mitchell, and he took another drink. “Ah, +well, he won’t cheat at cards any more—unless there’s cards invented +for the blind.” + +“How did it happen?” I asked. + +“Well,” said Mitchell, “you see, Harry, it was this way. Bogan went +pretty free in Bourke after the shearing before last, and in the end he +got mixed up in a very ugly-looking business: he was accused of doing +two new-chum jackaroos out of their stuff by some sort of confidence +trick.” + +“Confidence trick,” I said. “I’d never have thought that One-eyed Bogan +had the brains to go in for that sort of thing.” + +“Well, it seems he had, or else he used somebody else’s brains; there’s +plenty of broken-down English gentlemen sharpers knocking about out +back, you know, and Bogan might have been taking lessons from one. I +don’t know the rights of the case, it was hushed up, as you’ll see +presently; but, anyway, the jackaroos swore that Bogan had done ’em out +of ten quid. They were both Cockneys and I suppose they reckoned +themselves smart, but bushmen have more time to think. Besides, Bogan’s +one eye was in his favour. You see he always kept his one eye fixed +strictly on whatever business he had in hand; if he’d had another eye +to rove round and distract his attention and look at things on the +outside, the chances are he would never have got into trouble.” + +“Never mind that, Jack,” said Tom Hall. “Harry wants to hear the yarn.” + +“Well, to make it short, one of the jackaroos went to the police and +Bogan cleared out. His character was pretty bad just then, so there was +a piece of blue paper out for him. Bogan didn’t seem to think the thing +was so serious as it was, for he only went a few miles down the river +and camped with his horses on a sort of island inside an anabranch, +till the thing should blow over or the new chums leave Bourke. + +“Bogan’s old enemy, Constable Campbell, got wind of Bogan’s camp, and +started out after him. He rode round the outside track and came in on +to the river just below where the anabranch joins it, at the lower end +of the island and right opposite Bogan’s camp. You know what those +billabongs are: dry gullies till the river rises from the Queensland +rains and backs them up till the water runs round into the river again +and makes anabranches of ’em—places that you thought were hollows +you’ll find above water, and you can row over places you thought were +hills. There’s no water so treacherous and deceitful as you’ll find in +some of those billabongs. A man starts to ride across a place where he +thinks the water is just over the grass, and blunders into a deep +channel—that wasn’t there before—with a steady undercurrent with the +whole weight of the Darling River funnelled into it; and if he can’t +swim and his horse isn’t used to it—or sometimes if he can swim—it’s a +case with him, and the Darling River cod hold an inquest on him, if +they have time, before he’s buried deep in Darling River mud for ever. +And somebody advertises in the missing column for Jack Somebody who was +last heard of in Australia.” + +“Never mind that, Mitchell, go on,” I said. + +“Well, Campbell knew the river and saw that there was a stiff current +there, so he hailed Bogan. + +“‘Good day, Campbell,’ shouted Bogan. + +“‘I want you, Bogan,’ said Campbell. ‘Come across and bring your +horses.’ + +“‘I’m damned if I will,’ says Bogan. ‘I’m not going to catch me death +o’ cold to save your skin. If you want me you’ll have to bloody well +come and git me.’ Bogan was a good strong swimmer, and he had good +horses, but he didn’t try to get away—I suppose he reckoned he’d have +to face the music one time or another—and one time is as good as +another out back. + +“Campbell was no swimmer; he had no temptation to risk his life—you see +it wasn’t as in war with a lot of comrades watching ready to advertise +a man as a coward for staying alive—so he argued with Bogan and tried +to get him to listen to reason, and swore at him. ‘I’ll make it damned +hot for you, Bogan,’ he said, ‘if I have to come over for you.’ + +“‘Two can play at that game,’ says Bogan. + +“‘Look here, Bogan,” said Campbell, ‘I’ll tell you what I’ll do. If you +give me your word that you’ll come up to the police station to-morrow +I’ll go back and say nothing about it. You can say you didn’t know a +warrant was out after you. It will be all the better for you in the +end. Better give me your word, man.’ + +“Perhaps Campbell knew Bogan better than any of us. + +“‘Now then, Bogan,’ he said, ‘don’t be a fool. Give your word like a +sensible man, and I’ll go back. I’ll give you five minutes to make up +your mind.’ And he took out his watch. + +“But Bogan was nasty and wouldn’t give his word, so there was nothing +for it but for Campbell to make a try for him. + +“Campbell had plenty of pluck, or obstinacy, which amounts to the same +thing. He put his carbine and revolver under a log, out of the rain +that was coming on, saw to his handcuffs, and then spurred his horse +into the water. Bogan lit his pipe with a stick from his camp-fire—so +Campbell said afterwards—and sat down on his heels and puffed away, and +waited for him. + +“Just as Campbell’s horse floundered into the current Bogan shouted to +go back, but Campbell thought it was a threat and kept on. But Bogan +had caught sight of a log coming down the stream, end on, with a sharp, +splintered end, and before Campbell knew where he was, the sharp end of +the log caught the horse in the flank. The horse started to plunge and +struggle sideways, with all his legs, and Campbell got free of him as +quick as he could. Now, you know, in some of those Darling River +reaches the current will seem to run steadily far a while, and then +come with a rush. (I was caught in one of those rushes once, when I was +in swimming, and would have been drowned if I hadn’t been born to be +hanged.) Well, a rush came along just as Campbell got free from his +horse, and he went down-stream one side of a snag and his horse the +other. Campbell’s pretty stout, you know, and his uniform was tight, +and it handicapped him. + +“Just as he was being washed past the lower end of the snag he caught +hold of a branch that stuck out of the water and held on. He swung +round and saw Bogan running down to the point opposite him. Now, you +know there was always a lot of low cunning about Bogan, and I suppose +he reckoned that if he pulled Campbell out he’d stand a good show of +getting clear of his trouble; anyway, if he didn’t save Campbell it +might be said that he killed him—besides, Bogan was a good swimmer, so +there wasn’t any heroism about it anyhow. Campbell was only a few feet +from the bank, but Bogan started to strip—to make the job look as big +as possible, I suppose. He shouted to Campbell to say he was coming, +and to hold on. Campbell said afterwards that Bogan seemed an hour +undressing. The weight of the current was forcing down the bough that +Campbell was hanging on to, and suddenly, he said, he felt a great +feeling of helplessness take him by the shoulders. He yelled to Bogan +and let go. + +“Now, it happened that Jake Boreham and I were passing away the time +between shearings, and we were having a sort of fishing and shooting +loaf down the river in a boat arrangement that Jake had made out of +boards and tarred canvas. We called her the _Jolly Coffin_. We were +just poking up the bank in the slack water, a few hundred yards below +the billabong, when Jake said, ‘Why, there’s a horse or something in +the river.’ Then he shouted, ‘No, by God, it’s a man,’ and we poked the +_Coffin_ out into the stream for all she was worth. ‘Looks like two men +fighting in the water,’ Jake shouts presently. ‘Hurry up, or they’ll +drown each other.’ + +“We hailed ’em, and Bogan shouted for help. He was treading water and +holding Campbell up in front of him now in real professional style. As +soon as he heard us he threw up his arms and splashed a bit—I reckoned +he was trying to put as much style as he could into that rescue. But I +caught a crab, and, before we could get to them, they were washed past +into the top of a tree that stood well below flood-mark. I pulled the +boat’s head round and let her stern down between the branches. Bogan +had one arm over a limb and was holding Campbell with the other, and +trying to lift him higher out of the water. I noticed Bogan’s face was +bleeding—there was a dead limb stuck in the tree with nasty sharp +points on it, and I reckoned he’d run his face against one of them. +Campbell was gasping like a codfish out of water, and he was the +whitest man I ever saw (except one, and _he’d_ been drowned for a +week). Campbell had the sense to keep still. We asked Bogan if he could +hold on, and he said he could, but he couldn’t hold Campbell any +longer. So Jake took the oars and I leaned over the stern and caught +hold of Campbell, and Jake ran the boat into the bank, and we got him +ashore; then we went back for Bogan and landed him. + +“We had some whisky and soon brought Campbell round; but Bogan was +bleeding like a pig from a nasty cut over his good eye, so we bound wet +handkerchiefs round his eyes and led him to a log and he sat down for a +while, holding his hand to his eye and groaning. He kept saying, ‘I’m +blind, mates, I’m blind! I’ve lost me other eye!’ but we didn’t dream +it was so bad as that: we kept giving him whisky. We got some dry +boughs and made a big fire. Then Bogan stood up and held his arms stiff +down to his sides, opening and shutting his hands as if he was in great +pain. And I’ve often thought since what a different man Bogan seemed +without his clothes and with the broken bridge of his nose and his eyes +covered by the handkerchiefs. He was clean shaven, and his mouth and +chin are his best features, and he’s clean limbed and well hung. I +often thought afterwards that there was something of a blind god about +him as he stood there naked by the fire on the day he saved Campbell’s +life—something that reminded me of a statue I saw once in the Art +Gallery. (Pity the world isn’t blinder to a man’s worst points.) + +“Presently Jake listened and said, ‘By God, that’s lucky!’ and we heard +a steamer coming up-river and presently we saw her coming round the +point with a couple of wool-barges in tow. We got Bogan aboard and got +some clothes on him, and took him ashore at Bourke to the new hospital. +The doctors did all they knew, but Bogan was blind for life. He never +saw anything again—except ‘a sort of dull white blur,’ as he called +it—or his past life sometimes, I suppose. Perhaps he saw that for the +first time. Ah, well! + +“Bogan’s old enemy, Barcoo-Rot, went to see him in the hospital, and +Bogan said, ‘Well, Barcoo, I reckon we’ve had our last fight. I owe you +a hiding, but I don’t see how I’m going to pay you.’ ‘Never mind that, +Bogan, old man,’ says Barcoo. ‘I’ll take it from anyone yer likes to +appoint, if that worries yer; and, look here, Bogan, if I can’t fight +you I can fight for you—and don’t you forget it!’ And Barcoo used to +lead Bogan round about town in his spare time and tell him all that was +going on; and I believe he always had an ear cocked in case someone +said a word against Bogan—as if any of the chaps would say a word +against a blind man. + +“Bogan’s case was hushed up. The police told us to fix it up the best +way we could. One of the jackaroos, who reckoned that Bogan had +swindled him, was a gentleman, and he was the first to throw a quid in +the Giraffe’s hat when it went round for Bogan, but the other jackaroo +was a cur: he said he wanted the money that Bogan had robbed him of. +There were two witnesses, but we sent ’em away, and Tom Hall, there, +scared the jackaroo. You know Tom was always the best hand we had at +persuading witnesses in Union cases to go home to see their mothers.” + +“How did you scare that jackaroo, Tom?” I asked. + +“Tell you about it some other time,” said Tom. + +“Well,” said Mitchell, “Bogan was always a good woolsorter, so, next +shearing, old Baldy Thompson—(you know Baldy Thompson, Harry, of +West-o’-Sunday Station)—Baldy had a talk with some of the chaps, and +took Bogan out in his buggy with him to West-o’-Sunday. Bogan would sit +at the end of the rolling tables, in the shearing-shed, with a boy to +hand him the fleeces, and he’d feel a fleece and tell the boy what bin +to throw it into; and by and by he began to learn to throw the fleeces +into the bins himself. And sometimes Baldy would have a sheep brought +to him and get him to feel the fleece and tell him the quality of it. +And then again Baldy would talk, just loud enough for Bogan to +overhear, and swear that he’d sooner have Bogan, blind as he was, than +half a dozen scientific jackaroo experts with all their eyes about +them. + +“Of course Bogan wasn’t worth anything much to Baldy, but Baldy gave +him two pounds a week out of his own pocket, and another quid that we +made up between us; so he made enough to pull him through the rest of +the year. + +“It was curious to see how soon he learned to find his way about the +hut and manage his tea and tucker. It was a rough shed, but everybody +was eager to steer Bogan about—and, in fact, two of them had a fight +about it one day. Baldy and all of us——and especially visitors when +they came—were mighty interested in Bogan; and I reckon we were rather +proud of having a blind wool-sorter. I reckon Bogan had thirty or forty +pairs of eyes watching out for him in case he’d run against something +or fall. It irritated him to be messed round too much—he said a baby +would never learn to walk if it was held all the time. He reckoned he’d +learn more in a year than a man who’d served a lifetime to blindness; +but we didn’t let him wander much—for fear he’d fall into the big rocky +waterhole there, by accident. + +“And after the shearing-season Bogan’s wife turned up in Bourke——” + +“Bogan’s wife!” I exclaimed. “Why, I never knew Bogan was married.” + +“Neither did anyone else,” said Mitchell. “But he was. Perhaps that was +what accounted for Bogan. Sometimes, in his sober moods, I used to have +an idea that there must have been something behind the Bogan to account +for him. Perhaps he got trapped—or got married and found out that he’d +made a mistake—which is about the worst thing a man can find out——” + +“Except that his wife made the mistake, Mitchell,” said Tom Hall. + +“Or that both did,” reflected Mitchell. “Ah, well!—never mind—Bogan had +been married two or three years. Maybe he got married when he was on +the spree—I knew that he used to send money to someone in Sydney and I +suppose it was her. Anyway, she turned up after he was blind. She was a +hard-looking woman—just the sort that might have kept a third-rate pub +or a sly-grog shop. But you can’t judge between husband and wife, +unless you’ve lived in the same house with them—and under the same +roofs with their parents right back to Adam for that matter. Anyway, +she stuck to Bogan all right; she took a little two-roomed cottage and +made him comfortable—she’s got a sewing-machine and a mangle and takes +in washing and sewing. She brought a carrotty-headed youngster with +her, and the first time I saw Bogan sitting on the veranda with that +youngster on his knee I thought it was a good thing that he was blind.” + +“Why?” I asked. + +“Because the youngster isn’t his,” said Mitchell. + +“How do you know that?” + +“By the look of it—and by the look on her face, once, when she caught +me squinting from the kid’s face to Bogan’s.” + +“And whose was it?” I asked, without thinking. + +“How am I to know?” said Mitchell. “It might be yours for all I +know—it’s ugly enough, and you never had any taste in women. But you +mustn’t speak of that in Bourke. But there’s another youngster coming, +and I’ll swear that’ll be Bogan’s all right. + +“A curious thing about Bogan is that he’s begun to be fidgety about his +personal appearance—and you know he wasn’t a dood. He wears a collar +now, and polishes his boots; he wears elastic-sides, and polishes ’em +himself—the only thing is that he blackens over the elastic. He can do +many things for himself, and he’s proud of it. He says he can see many +things that he couldn’t see when he had his eyes. You seldom hear him +swear, save in a friendly way; he seems much gentler, but he reckons he +would stand a show with Barcoo-Rot even now, if Barcoo would stand up +in front of him and keep yelling——” + +“By the way,” I asked, “how did Bogan lose the sight of his other eye?” + +“Sleeping out in the rain when he was drunk,” said Mitchell. “He got a +cold in his eye.” Then he asked, suddenly: + +“Did you ever see a blind man cry?” + +“No,” I said. + +“Well, I have,” said Mitchell. + +“You know Bogan wears goggles to hide his eyes—his wife made him do +that. The chaps often used to drop round and have a yarn with Bogan and +cheer him up, and one evening I was sitting smoking with him, and +yarning about old times, when he got very quiet all of a sudden, and I +saw a tear drop from under one of his shutters and roll down his cheek. +It wasn’t the eye he lost saving Campbell—it was the old wall-eye he +used to use in the days before he was called ‘One-eyed Bogan.’ I +suppose he thought it was dark and that I couldn’t see his face. +(There’s a good many people in this world who think you can’t see +because they can’t.) It made me feel like I used to feel sometimes in +the days when I felt things——” + +“Come on, Mitchell,” said Tom Hall, “you’ve had enough beer.” + +“I think I have,” said Mitchell. “Besides, I promised to send a wire to +Jake Boreham to tell him that his mother’s dead. Jake’s shearing at +West-o’-Sunday; shearing won’t be over for three or four weeks, and +Jake wants an excuse to get away without offending old Baldy and come +down and have a fly round with us before the holidays are over.” + +Down at the telegraph-office Mitchell took a form and filled it in very +carefully: “Jacob Boreham. West-o’-Sunday Station. Bourke. Come home at +once. Mother is dead. In terrible trouble. Father dying.—MARY BOREHAM.” + +“I think that will do,” said Mitchell. “It ought to satisfy Baldy, and +it won’t give Jake too much of a shock, because he hasn’t got a sister +or sister-in-law, and his father and mother’s been dead over ten +years.” + +“Now, if I was running a theatre,” said Mitchell, as we left the +office, “I’d give five pounds a night for the face Jake’ll have on him +when he takes that telegram to Baldy Thompson.” + + + + +TWO SUNDOWNERS + + +Sheep stations in Australia are any distance from twenty to a hundred +miles apart, to keep well within the boundaries of truth and the great +pastoral country. Shearing at any one shed only lasts a few weeks in +the year; the number of men employed is according to the size of the +shed—from three to five men in the little bough-covered shed of the +small “cockatoo,” up to a hundred and fifty or two hundred hands all +told in the big corrugated iron machine shed of a pastoral company. + +Shearing starts early up in northern Queensland, where you can get a +“January shed;” and further south, in February, March or April sheds, +and so on down into New South Wales, where shearing often lasts over +Christmas. Shearers travel from shed to shed; some go a travel season +without getting a pen, and an unlucky shearer might ride or tramp for +several seasons and never get hands in wool; and all this explains the +existence of the “footman” with his swag and the horse man with his +packhorse. They have a rough life, and the Australian shearers are +certainly the most democratic and perhaps the most independent, +intelligent and generous body of workmen in the world. + +Shearers at a shed elect their own cook, pay him so much a head, and +they buy their rations in the lump from the station store; and +“travellers,” _i.e._ shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work, are +invited, as a matter of course, to sit down to the shearers’ table. +Also a certain allowance of tea, sugar, flour or meat is still made to +travellers at most Western station stores; so it would be rather +surprising if there weren’t some who travelled on the game. The swagman +loafer, or “bummer,” times himself, especially in bad weather, to +arrive at the shed just about sundown; he is then sure of “tea,” +shelter for the night, breakfast, and some tucker from the cook to take +him on along the track. Brummy and Swampy were sundowners. + +Swampy was a bummer born—and proud of it. Brummy had drifted down to +loaferdom, and his nature was soured and his spirit revengeful against +the world because of the memory of early years wasted at hard work and +in being honest. Both were short and stout, and both had scrubby +beards, but Brummy’s beard was a dusty black and Swampy’s fiery red—he +indulged in a monkey-shave sometimes, but his lower face was mostly +like a patch of coarse stubble with a dying hedge round it. They had +travelled together for a long time. They seemed at times to hate each +other with a murderous hatred, but they were too lazy to fight. +Sometimes they’d tramp side by side and growl at each other by the +hour, other times they’d sulk for days; one would push on ahead and the +other drop behind until there was a mile or two between them; but one +always carried the billy, or the sugar, or something that was necessary +to the comfort of the other, so they’d come together at sundown. They +had travelled together a long time, and perhaps that was why they hated +each other. They often agreed to part and take different tracks, and +sometimes they parted—for a while. They agreed in cadging, and cadged +in turn. They carried a spare set of tucker-bags, and if, for instance, +they were out of sugar and had plenty flour and tea, Brummy or Swampy +would go to the store, boundary-rider’s hut, or selector’s, with the +sugar-bag in his hand and the other bags in his shirt front on spec. +He’d get the sugar first, and then, if it looked good enough, the +flour-bag would come out, then the tea-bag. And before he left he’d +remark casually that he and his mate hadn’t had a smoke for two days. +They never missed a chance. And when they’d cadged more tucker than +they could comfortably carry, they’d camp for a day or two and eat it +down. Sometimes they’d have as much as a pound of tobacco, all in +little “borrowed” bits, cut from the sticks or cakes of honest +travellers. They never missed a chance. If a stranger gave Swampy his +cake of tobacco with instructions to “cut off a pipeful,” Swampy would +cut off as much as he thought judicious, talking to the stranger and +watching his eye all the time, and hiding his palm as much as +possible—and sometimes, when he knew he’d cut off more than he could +cram into his pipe, he’d put his hand in his pocket for the pipe and +drop some of the tobacco there. Then he’d hand the plug to his mate, +engage the stranger in conversation and try to hold his eye or detract +his attention from Brummy so as to give Brummy a chance of cutting off +a couple of pipefuls, and, maybe, nicking off a corner of the cake and +slipping it into his pocket. I once heard a bushman say that no one but +a skunk would be guilty of this tobacco trick—that it is about the +meanest trick a man could be capable of—_because it spoils the chances +of the next hard-up swaggy who asks the victim for tobacco._ + +When Brummy and Swampy came to a shed where shearing was in full swing, +they’d inquire, first thing, and with some show of anxiety, if there +was any chance of gettin’ on; if the shed was full-handed they’d growl +about hard times, wonder what the country was coming to; talk of their +missuses and kids that they’d left in Sydney, curse the squatters and +the Government, and, next morning, get a supply of rations from the +cook and depart with looks of gloom. If, on the other hand, there was +room in the shed for one or both of them, and the boss told them to go +to work in the morning, they’d keep it quiet from the cook if possible, +and depart, after breakfast, unostentatiously. + +Sometimes, at the beginning of a drought, when the tall dead grass was +like tinder for hundreds of miles and a carelessly-dropped match would +set the whole country on fire, Swampy would strike a hard-faced +squatter, manager or overseer with a cold eye, and the conversation +would be somewhat as follows: + +Swampy: “Good day, boss!” + +Boss (shortly): “’Day.” + +Swampy: “Any chance of a job?” + +Boss: “Naw. Got all I want and we don’t start for a fortnight.” + +Swampy: “Can I git a bit o’ meat?” + +Boss: “Naw! Don’t kill till Saturday.” + +Swampy: “Pint o’ flour?” + +Boss: “Naw. Short ourselves.” + +Swampy: “Bit o’ tea or sugar, boss?” + +Boss: “Naw—what next?” + +Swampy: “Bit o’ baccer, boss. Ain’t had a smoke for a week.” + +Boss: “Naw. Ain’t got enough for meself till the wagon comes out.” + +Swampy: “Ah, well! It’s hot, ain’t it, boss?” + +Boss: “Yes-it’s hot.” + +Swampy: “Country very dry?” + +Boss: “Yes. Looks like it.” + +Swampy: “A fire ’ud be very bad just now?” + +Boss: “Eh?” + +Swampy: “Yes. Now I’m allers very careful with matches an’ fire when +I’m on the track.” + +Boss “Are yer?” + +Swampy: “Yes. I never lights a fire near the grass—allers in the middle +of the track—it’s the safest place yer can get. An’ I allers puts the +fire out afore I leaves the camp. If there ain’t no water ter spare I +covers the ashes with dirt. An’ some fellers are so careless with +matches lightin’ their pipes.” (Reflective pause.) + +Boss: “Are they?” + +Swampy: “Yes. Now, when I lights me pipe on the track in dry weather I +allers rubs the match head up an’ drops it in the dust. I never drops a +burnin’ match. But some travellers is so careless. A chap might light +his pipe an’ fling the match away without thinkin’ an’ the match might +fall in a dry tuft, an’-there yer are!” (with a wave of his arms). +“Hundreds of miles o’ grass gone an’ thousands o’ sheep starvin’. Some +fellers is so careless—they never thinks.... An’ what’s more, they +don’t care if they burn the whole country.” + +Boss (scratching his head reflectively): “Ah-umph! You can go up to the +store and get a bit of tucker. The storekeeper might let yer have a bit +o’ tobacco.” + +On one occasion, when they were out of flour and meat; Brummy and +Swampy came across two other pilgrims camped on a creek, who were also +out of flour and meat. One of them had tried a surveyors’ camp a little +further down, but without success. The surveyors’ cook had said that he +was short of flour and meat himself. Brummy tried him—no luck. Then +Swampy said he’d go and have a try. As luck would have it, the +surveyors’ cook was just going to bake; he had got the flour out in the +dish, put in the salt and baking powder, mixed it up, and had gone to +the creek for a billy of water when Swampy arrived. While the cook was +gone Swampy slipped the flour out of the dish into his bag, _wiped_ the +dish, set it down again, and planted the bag behind a tree at a little +distance. Then he stood waiting, holding a spare empty bag in his hand. +When the cook came back he glanced at the dish, lowered the billy of +water slowly to the ground, scratched his head, and looked at the dish +again in a puzzled way. + +“Blanked if I didn’t think I got that flour out!” he said. + +“What’s that, mate?” asked Swampy. + +“Why! I could have sworn I got the flour out in the dish and mixed it +before I went for the water,” said the cook, staring at the dish again. +“It’s rum what tricks your memory plays on you sometimes.” + +“Yes,” said Swampy, showing interest, while the cook got some more +flour out into the dish from a bag in the back of the tent. “It is +strange. I’ve done the same, thing meself. I suppose it’s the heat that +makes us all a bit off at times.” + +“Do you cook, then?” asked the surveyors’ cook. + +“Well, yes. I’ve done a good bit of it in me time; but it’s about +played out. I’m after stragglers now.” (Stragglers are stray sheep +missed in the general muster and found about the out paddocks and shorn +after the general shearing.) + +They had a yarn and Swampy “bit the cook’s ear” for a “bit o’ meat an’ +tea an’ sugar,” not forgetting “a handful of flour if yer can spare +it.” + +“Sorry,” said the cook, “but I can only let you have about a pint. +We’re very short ourselves.” + +“Oh, that’s all right!” said Swampy, as he put the stuff into his spare +bags. “Thank you! Good day!” + +“Good day,” said the cook. The cook went on with his work and Swampy +departed, catching up the bag of flour from behind the tree as he +passed it, and keeping the clump of timber well between him and the +surveyors’ camp, lest the cook should glance round, and, noticing the +increased bulk of his load, get some new ideas concerning mental +aberration. + +Nearly every bushman has at least one superstition, or notion, that +lasts his time—as nearly every bushman has at least one dictionary word +which lasts him all his life. Brummy had a gloomy notion—Lord knows how +he got it!—that he should ’a’ gone on the boards if his people hadn’t +been so ignorant. He reckoned that he had the face and cut of an actor, +could mimic any man’s voice, and had wonderful control over his +features. They came to a notoriously “hungry” station, where there was +a Scottish manager and storekeeper. Brummy went up to “government +house” in his own proper person, had a talk with the storekeeper, spoke +of a sick mate, and got some flour and meat. They camped down the +creek, and next morning Brummy started to shave himself. + +“Whatever are you a-doin’ of, Brummy?” gasped Swampy in great +astonishment. + +“Wait and see,” growled Brummy, with awful impressiveness, as if he +were going to cut Swampy’s throat after he’d finished shaving. He +shaved off his beard and whiskers, put on a hat and coat belonging to +Swampy, changed his voice, dropped his shoulders, and went limping up +to the station on a game leg. He saw the cook and got some “brownie,” a +bit of cooked meat and a packet of baking powder. Then he saw the +storekeeper and approached the tobacco question. Sandy looked at him +and listened with some slight show of interest, then he said: + +“Oh that’s all right now! But ye needn’t ha’ troublt shavin’ yer +beard—the cold weather’s comin’ on! An’ yer mate’s duds don’t suit +ye—they’re too sma’; an’ yer game leg doesn’t fit ye either—it takes a +lot o’ practice. Ha’ ye got ony tea an’ sugar?” + +Brummy must have touched something responsive in that old Scot +somewhere, but his lack of emotion upset Brummy somewhat, or else an +old deep-rooted superstition had been severely shaken. Anyway he let +Swampy do the cadging for several days thereafter. + +But one bad season they were very hard up indeed—even for Brummy and +Swampy. They’d tramped a long hungry track and had only met a few +wretched jackaroos, driven out of the cities by hard times, and +tramping hopelessly west. They were out of tobacco, and their trousers +were so hopelessly “gone” behind that when they went to cadge at a +place where there was a woman they were moved to back and sidle and +edge away again—and neither Brummy nor Swampy was over fastidious in +matters of dress or personal appearance. It was absolutely necessary to +earn a pound or two, so they decided to go to work for a couple of +weeks. It wouldn’t hurt them, and then there was the novelty of it. + +They struck West-o’-Sunday Station, and the boss happened to want a +rouseabout to pick up wool and sweep the floor for the shearers. + +“I can put _one_ of you on,” he said. “Fix it up between yourselves and +go to work in the morning.” + +Brummy and Swampy went apart to talk it over. + +“Look here! Brum, old man,” said Swampy, with great heartiness, “we’ve +been mates for a long while now, an’ shared an’ shared alike. You’ve +allers acted straight to me an’ I want to do the fair thing by you. _I_ +don’t want to stand in _your_ light. You take the job an’ I’ll be +satisfied with a pair of pants out of it and a bit o’ tobacco now an’ +agen. There yer are! I can’t say no fairer than that.” + +“Yes,” said Brummy, resentfully, “an’ you’ll always be thrown’ it up to +me afterwards that I done you out of a job!” + +“I’ll swear I won’t,” said Swampy, hurriedly. “But since you’re so +blasted touchy and suspicious about it, _you_ take this job an’ I’ll +take the next that turns up. How’ll that suit you?” + +Brummy thought resentfully. + +“Look here!” he said presently, “let’s settle it and have done with +this damned sentimental tommy-rot. I’ll tell you what I’ll do—I’ll give +you the job and take my chance. The boss might want another man +to-morrow. Now, are you satisfied?” + +But Swampy didn’t look grateful or happy. + +“Well,” growled Brummy, “of all the —— I ever travelled with you’re the +——. What do you want anyway? What’ll satisfy you? That’s all I want to +know. Hey?—can’t yer speak?” + +“Let’s toss up for it,” said Swampy, sulkily. + +“All right,” said Brummy, with a big oath, and he felt in his pocket +for two old pennies he had. But Swampy had got a suspicion somehow that +one of those pennies had two heads on it, and he wasn’t sure that the +other hadn’t two tails—also, he suspected Brummy of some skill in +“palming,” so he picked up a chip from the wood-heap, spat on it, and +spun it into the air. “Sing out!” he cried, “wet or dry?” + +“Dry,” said Brummy, promptly. He had a theory that the wet side of the +chip, being presumably heaviest, was more likely to fall downwards; but +this time it was “wet” up three times in succession. Brummy ignored +Swampy’s hand thrown out in hearty congratulation; and next morning he +went to work in the shed. Swampy camped down the river, and Brummy +supplied him with a cheap pair of moleskin trousers, tucker and +tobacco. The shed cut out within three weeks and the two sundowners +took the track again, Brummy with two pounds odd in his pocket—he +having negotiated his cheque at the shed. + +But now there was suspicion, envy, and distrust in the hearts of those +two wayfarers. Brummy was now a bloated capitalist, and proud, and +anxious to get rid of Swampy—at least Swampy thought so. He thought +that the least that Brummy might have done was to have shared the +“stuff” with him. + +“Look here, Brummy,” he said reproachfully, “we’ve shared and shared +alike, and——” + +“We never shared money,” said Brummy, decidedly. + +“Do you think I want yer blasted money?” retorted Swampy, indignantly. +“When did I ever ask yer for a sprat? Tell me that!” + +“You wouldn’t have got it if you had asked,” said Brummy, +uncompromisingly. “Look here!” with vehemence. “Didn’t I keep yer in +tobacco and buy yer gory pants? What are you naggin’ about anyway?” + +“Well,” said Swampy, “all I was goin’ to say was that yer might let me +carry one of them quids in case you lost one—yer know you’re careless +and lose things; or in case anything happened to you.” + +“I ain’t going to lose it—if that’s all that’s fretting you,” said +Brummy, “and there ain’t nothing going to happen to me—and don’t you +forget it.” + +“That’s all the thanks I get for givin’ yer my gory job,” said Swampy, +savagely. “I won’t be sick a soft fool agen, I can tell yer.” + +Brummy was silent, and Swampy dropped behind. He brooded darkly, and +it’s a bad thing for a man to brood in the bush. He was reg’lar +disgusted with Brummy. He’d allers acted straight to him, and Brummy +had acted like a “cow.” He’d stand it no longer; but he’d have some +satisfaction. He wouldn’t be a fool. If Brummy was mean skunk enough to +act to a mate like that, Swampy would be even with him; he would wait +till Brummy was asleep, collar the stuff, and clear. It was his job, +anyway, and the money was his by rights. He’d have his rights. + +Brummy, who carried the billy, gave Swampy a long tramp before he +camped and made a fire. They had tea in silence, and smoked moodily +apart until Brummy turned in. They usually slept on the ground, with a +few leaves under them, or on the sand where there was any, each wrapped +in his own blankets, and with their spare clothes, or rags rather, for +pillows. Presently Swampy turned in and pretended to sleep, but he lay +awake watching, and listening to Brummy’s breathing. When he thought it +was safe he moved cautiously and slipped his hand under Brummy’s head, +but Brummy’s old pocket-book—in which he carried some dirty old letters +in a woman’s handwriting—was not there. All next day Swampy watched +Brummy sharply every time he put his hands into his pockets, to try and +find out in which pocket he kept his money. Brummy seemed very cheerful +and sociable, even considerate, to his mate all day, and Swampy +pretended to be happy. They yarned more than they had done for many a +day. Brummy was a heavy sleeper, and that night Swampy went over him +carefully and felt all his pockets, but without success. Next day +Brummy seemed in high spirits—they were nearing Bourke, where they +intended to loaf round the pubs for a week or two. On the third night +Swampy waited till about midnight, and then searched Brummy, every inch +of him he could get at, and tickled him, with a straw of grass till he +turned over, and ran his hands over the other side of him, and over his +feet (Brummy slept with his socks on), and looked in his boots, and in +the billy and in the tucker-bags, and felt in every tuft of grass round +the camp, and under every bush, and down a hollow stump, and up a +hollow log: but there was no pocket-book. Brummy couldn’t have lost the +money and kept it dark—he’d have gone back to look for it at once. +Perhaps he’d thrown away the book and sewn the money in his clothes +somewhere. Swampy crept back to him and felt the lining of his hat, and +was running his hand over Brummy’s chest when Brummy suddenly started +to snore, and Swampy desisted without loss of time. He crept back to +bed, breathing short, and thought hard. It struck him that there was +something aggressive about that snore. He began to suspect that Brummy +was up to his little game, and it pained him. + +Next morning Brummy was decidedly frivolous. At any other time Swampy +would have put it down to a “touch o’ the sun,” but now he felt a +growing conviction that Brummy knew what he’d been up to the last three +nights, and the more he thought of it the more it pained him—till at +last he could stand it no longer. + +“Look here, Brummy,” he said frankly, “where the hell do you keep that +flamin’ stuff o’ yourn? I been tryin’ to git at it ever since we left +West-o’-Sunday.” + +“I know you have, Swampy,” said Brummy, affectionately—as if he +considered that Swampy had done his best in the interests of mateship. + +“I _knowed_ yer knowed!” exclaimed Swampy, triumphantly. “But where the +blazes did yer put it?” + +“Under _your_ head, Swampy, old man,” said Brummy, cheerfully. + +Swampy was hurt now. He commented in the language that used to be used +by the bullock-punchers of the good days as they pranced up and down by +their teams and lammed into the bullocks with saplings and crow-bars, +and called on them to lift a heavy load out of a bog in the bed of a +muddy creek. + +“Never mind, Swampy!” said Brummy, soothingly, as his mate paused and +tried to remember worse oaths. “It wasn’t your fault.” + +But they parted at Bourke. Swampy had allers acted straight ter +Brummy—share ’n’ share alike. He’d do as much for a mate as any other +man, an’ put up with as much from a mate. He had put up with a lot from +Brummy: he’d picked him up on the track and learned him all he knowed; +Brummy would have starved many a time if it hadn’t been for Swampy; +Swampy had learned him how to “battle.” He’d stick to Brummy yet, but +he couldn’t stand ingratitude. He hated low cunnin’ an’ suspicion, and +when a gory mate got suspicious of his own old mate and wouldn’t trust +him, an’ took to plantin’ his crimson money—it was time to leave him. + + + + +A SKETCH OF MATESHIP + + +Bill and Jim, professional shearers, were coming into Bourke from the +Queensland side. They were horsemen and had two packhorses. At the last +camp before Bourke Jim’s packhorse got disgusted and home-sick during +the night and started back for the place where he was foaled. Jim was +little more than a new-chum jackaroo; he was no bushman and generally +got lost when he went down the next gully. Bill was a bushman, so it +was decided that he should go back to look for the horse. + +Now Bill was going to sell his packhorse, a well-bred mare, in Bourke, +and he was anxious to get her into the yards before the horse sales +were over; this was to be the last day of the sales. Jim was the best +“barracker” of the two; he had great imagination; he was a very +entertaining story-teller and conversationalist in social life, and a +glib and a most impressive liar in business, so it was decided that he +should hurry on into Bourke with the mare and sell her for Bill. Seven +pounds, reserve. + +Next day Bill turned up with the missing horse and saw Jim standing +against a veranda-post of the Carriers’ Arms, with his hat down over +his eyes, and thoughtfully spitting in the dust. Bill rode over to him. + +“’Ullo, Jim.” + +“’Ullo, Bill. I see you got him.” + +“Yes, I got him.” + +Pause. + +“Where’d yer find him?” + +“’Bout ten mile back. Near Ford’s Bridge. He was just feedin’ along.” + +Pause. Jim shifted his feet and spat in the dust. + +“Well,” said Bill at last. “How did you get on, Jim?” + +“Oh, all right,” said Jim. “I sold the mare.” + +“That’s right,” said Bill. “How much did she fetch?” + +“Eight quid;” then, rousing himself a little and showing some emotion, +“An’ I could ’a’ got ten quid for her if I hadn’t been a dam’ fool.” + +“Oh, that’s good enough,” said Bill. + +“I could ’a’ got ten quid if I’d ’a’ waited.” + +“Well, it’s no use cryin’. Eight quid is good enough. Did you get the +stuff?” + +“Oh, yes. They parted all right. If I hadn’t been such a dam’ fool an’ +rushed it, there was a feller that would ’a’ given ten quid for that +mare.” + +“Well, don’t break yer back about it,” said Bill. “Eight is good +enough.” + +“Yes. But I could ’a’ got ten,” said Jim, languidly, putting his hand +in his pocket. + +Pause. Bill sat waiting for him to hand over the money; but Jim +withdrew his hand empty, stretched, and said: + +“Ah, well, Bill, I done it in. Lend us a couple o’ notes.” + +Jim had been drinking and gambling all night and he’d lost the eight +pounds as well as his own money. + +Bill didn’t explode. What was the use? He should have known that Jim +wasn’t to be trusted with money in town. It was he who had been the +fool. He sighed and lent Jim a pound, and they went in to have a drink. + +Now it strikes me that if this had happened in a civilized country +(like England) Bill would have had Jim arrested and jailed for larceny +as a bailee, or embezzlement, or whatever it was. And would Bill or Jim +or the world have been any better for it? + + + + +ON THE TUCKER TRACK: A STEELMAN STORY + + +Steelman and Smith, professional wanderers from New Zealand, took a run +over to Australia one year to have a look at the country, and drifted +out back, and played cards and “headin’ ’em” at the shearing-sheds +(while pretending to be strangers to each other), and sold eye-water +and unpatented medicine, and worked the tucker tracks. They struck a +streak of bad luck at West-o’-Sunday Station, where they were advised +(by the boss and about fifty excited shearers) to go east, and not to +stop till they reached the coast. They were tramping along the track +towards Bourke; they were very hard up and had to “battle” for tucker +and tobacco along the track. They came to a lonely shanty, about two +camps west of Bourke. + +“We’ll turn off into the scrub and strike the track the other side of +the shanty and come back to it,” said Steelman. “You see, if they see +us coming into Bourke they’ll say to themselves, ‘Oh, we’re never +likely to see these chaps again,’ and they won’t give us anything, or, +perhaps, only a pinch of tea or sugar in a big lump of paper. There’s +some women that can never see a tucker-bag, even if you hold it right +under their noses. But if they see us going out back they’ll reckon +that we’ll get a shed likely as not, and we’ll be sure to call there +with our cheques coming back. I hope the old man’s got the lumbago, or +sciatica, or something.” + +“Why?” asked Smith. + +“Because whenever I see an old man poking round the place on a stick I +always make for him straight and inquire about his trouble; and no +matter what complaint he’s got, my old man suffered from it for years. +It’s pretty hard graft listening to an old man with a pet leg, but I +find it pays; and I always finish up by advising him to try St Jacob’s +oil. Perhaps he’s been trying it for years, but that doesn’t matter; +the consultation works out all right all the same, and there’s never +been a remedy tried yet but I’ve got another. + +“I’ve got a lot of Maori and blackfellow remedies in my mind, and when +they fail I can fall back on the Chinese; and if that isn’t enough I’ve +got a list of my grandmother’s remedies that she wrote down for me when +I was leaving home, and I kept it for a curiosity. It took her three +days to write them, and I reckon they’ll fill the bill. + +“You don’t want a shave. You look better with that stubble on. You +needn’t say anything; just stand by and wear your usual expression, and +if they ask me what’s the matter with my mate I’ll fix up a disease for +you to have, and get something extra on your account, poor beggar! + +“I wish we had a chap with us that could sing a bit and run the gamut +on a fiddle or something. With a sickly-looking fish like you to stand +by and look interesting and die slowly of consumption all the time, and +me to do the talking, we’d be able to travel from one end of the bush +to the other and live on the fat of the land. I wouldn’t cure you for a +hundred pounds:” + +They reached the shanty, and there, sure enough, was an old man +pottering round with a list to starboard. He was working with a hoe +inside a low paling fence round a sort of garden. Steelman and Smith +stopped outside the fence. + +“Good day, boss!” + +“’Day.” + +“It’s hot.” + +“It’s hot.” + +So far it was satisfactory. + +He was a little man, with a wiry, red beard. He might have been a +Scandinavian. + +“You seem to be a bit lame,” said Steelman. “Hurt your foot?” + +“Naw,” said the old man. “It’s an old thing.” + +“Ah!” said Steelman, “lumbago, I suppose? My father suffered cruel from +it for years.” + +“Naw,” said the old man, moving closer to the fence. “It ain’t in me +back; the trouble’s with me leg.” + +“Oh!” said Steelman. “One a bit shorter than the other?” + +“Well, yes. It seems to be wearin’ a bit shorter. I must see to it.” + +“Hip disease, perhaps?” said Steelman. “A brother o’ mine had——” + +“Naw, it’s not in the hip,” said the old man. “My leg’s gone at the +knee.” + +“Oh! stiff joint; I know what that is. Had a touch of it once myself. +An uncle of mine was nearly crippled with it. He used to use St Jacob’s +oil. Ever try St Jacob’s oil?” + +“Naw,” said the old man, “not that I know of. I’ve used linseed oil +though.” + +“Linseed oil!” said Steelman; “I’ve never heard of that for stiff knee. +How do you use it?” + +“Use it raw,” said the old man. “Raw linseed oil; I’ve rubbed it in, +and I’ve soaked me leg in it.” + +“Soaked your leg in it!” said Steelman. “And did it do it any good?” + +“Well, it seems to preserve it—keeps it from warping, and it wears +better—and it makes it heavier. It seemed a bit too light before.” + +Steelman nudged Smith under cover of the palings. The old man was +evidently a bit ratty. + +“Well, I hope your leg will soon be all right, boss,” said Steelman. + +“Thank you,” said the old man, “but I don’t think there’s much hope. I +suppose you want some tucker?” + +“Well, yes,” said Steelman, rather taken aback by the old man’s sudden +way of putting it. “We’re hard up.” + +“Well, come along to the house and I’ll see if I can get yer +something,” said the old man; and they walked along outside the fence, +and he hobbled along inside, till he came to a little gate at the +corner. He opened the gate and stumped out. He had a wooden leg. He +wore his trouser-leg down over it, and the palings had hidden the +bottom from Steelman and Smith. + +He wanted them to stay to dinner, but Steelman didn’t feel comfortable, +and thanked him, and said they’d rather be getting on (Steelman always +spoke for Smith); so the old man gave them some cooked meat, bread, and +a supply of tea and sugar. Steelman watched his face very close, but he +never moved a muscle. But when they looked back he was leaning on his +hoe, and seemed to be shaking. + +“Took you back a bit, Steely, didn’t it?” suggested Smith. + +“How do you make that out?” snorted Steelman, turning on him suddenly. +“I knew a carpenter who used to soak his planes in raw linseed oil to +preserve them and give them weight. There’s nothing funny about that.” + +Smith rubbed his head. + + + + +A BUSH PUBLICAN’S LAMENT + + +“... For thirst is long and throats is short +Among the sons o’ men.” + M. J. C. + + +I wish I was spifflicated before I ever seen a pub! + +You see, it’s this way. Suppose a cove comes along on a blazin’ hot day +in the drought—an’ _you_ ought to know how hell-hot it can be out +here—an’ he dumps his swag in the corner of the bar; an’ he turns round +an’ he ses ter me, “Look here boss, I ain’t got a lonely steever on me, +an’ God knows when I’ll git one. I’ve tramped ten mile this mornin’, +an’ I’ll have ter tramp another ten afore to-night. I’m expectin’ ter +git on shearin’ with of Baldy Thompson at West-o’-Sunday nex’ week. I +got a thirst on me like a sun-struck bone, an’, for God sake, put up a +couple o’ beers for me an’ my mate, an’ I’ll fix it up with yer when I +come back after shearin’.” + +An’ what’s a feller ter do? I bin there meself, an—I put it to you! +I’ve known what it is to have a thirst on me. + +An’ suppose a poor devil comes along in the jim-jams, with every inch +on him jumpin’ an’ a look in his eyes like a man bein’ murdered an’ +sent ter hell, an’ a whine in his voice like a whipped cur, an’ the +snakes a-chasing of him; an’ he hooks me with his finger ter the far +end o’ the bar—as if he was goin’ ter tell me that the world was +ended—an’ he hangs over the bar an’ chews me lug, an’ tries to speak, +an’ breaks off inter a sort o’ low shriek, like a terrified woman, an’ +he says, “For Mother o’ Christ’s sake, giv’ me a drink!” An’ what am I +to do? I bin there meself. I knows what the horrors is. He mighter +blued his cheque at the last shanty. But what am I ter do? I put it ter +you. If I let him go he might hang hisself ter the nex’ leanin’ tree. + +What’s a drink? yer might arst—I don’t mind a drink or two; but when it +comes to half a dozen in a day it mounts up, I can tell yer. Drinks is +sixpence here—I have to pay for it, an’ pay carriage on it. It’s all up +ter me in the end. I used sometimes ter think it was lucky I wasn’t +west o’ the sixpenny line, where I’d lose a shillin’ on every drink I +give away. + +An’ supposen a sundowner comes along smokin’ tea-leaves, an’ ses ter +me, “Look her, boss! me an’ my mate ain’t had a smoke for three days!” +What’s a man ter do? I put it ter you! I’m a heavy smoker meself, an’ +I’ve known what it is to be without a smoke on the track. But +“nail-rod” is ninepence a stick out here, an’ I have ter pay carriage. +It all mounts up, I can tell yer. + +An’ supposen Ole King Billy an’ his ole black gin comes round at +holiday time and squats on the verander, an’ blarneys an’ wheedles and +whines and argues like a hundred Jews an’ ole Irishwomen put tergether, +an’ accuses me o’ takin’ his blarsted country from him, an’ makes me +an’ the missus laugh; an’ we gives him a bottl’er rum an’ a bag of grub +ter get rid of him an’ his rotten ole scarecrow tribe—It all tells up. +I was allers soft on the blacks, an’, beside, a ole gin nursed me an’ +me mother when I was born, an’ saved me blessed life—not that that +mounts to much. But it all tells up, an’ I got me licence ter pay. An’ +some bloody skunk goes an’ informs on me for supplyin’ the +haboriginalls with intossicatin’ liquor, an’ I have ter pay a fine an’ +risk me licence. But what’s a man ter do? + +An’ three or four herrin’-gutted jackaroos comes along about +dinner-time, when the table’s set and the cookin’ smellin’ from the +kichen, with their belts done up three holes, an’ not the price of a +feed on ’em. What’s a man ter do? I’ve known what it is ter do a perish +on the track meself. It’s not the tucker I think on. I don’t care a +damn for that. When the shearers come every one is free to go inter the +kitchin an’ forage for hisself when he feels hungry—so long as he pays +for his drink. But the jackaroos can’t pay for drinks, an’ I have ter +pay carriage on the flour an’ tea an’ sugar an’ groceries—an’ it all +tells up by the end o’ the year. + +An’ a straight chap that knows me gets a job to take a flock o’ sheep +or a mob o’ cattle ter the bloomin’ Gulf, or South Australia, or +somewheers—an’ loses one of his horses goin’ out ter take charge, an’ +borrers eight quid from me ter buy another. He’ll turn up agen in a +year or two an’ most likely want ter make me take twenty quid for that +eight—an’ make everybody about the place blind drunk—but I’ve got ter +wait, an’ the wine an’ sperit merchants an’ the brewery won’t. They +know I can’t do without liquor in the place. + +An’ lars’ rains Jimmy Nowlett, the bullick-driver, gets bogged over his +axle-trees back there on the Blacksoil Plains between two flooded +billerbongs, an’ prays till the country steams an’ his soul’s busted, +an’ his throat like a lime-kiln. He taps a keg o’ rum or beer ter keep +his throat in workin’ order. I don’t mind that at all, but him an’ his +mates git flood-bound for near a week, an’ broach more kegs, an’ go on +a howlin’ spree in ther mud, an’ spill mor’n they swipe, an’ leave a +tarpaulin off a load, an’ the flour gets wet, an’ the sugar runs out of +the bags like syrup, an’— What’s a feller ter do? Do yer expect me to +set the law onter Jimmy? I’ve knowed him all my life, an’ he knowed my +father afore I was born. He’s been on the roads this forty year, till +he’s as thin as a rat, and as poor as a myall black; an’ he’s got a +family ter keep back there in Bourke. No, I have ter pay for it in the +end, an’ it all mounts up, I can tell yer. + +An’ suppose some poor devil of a new-chum black sheep comes along, +staggerin’ from one side of the track to the other, and spoutin’ +poetry; dyin’ o’ heat or fever, or heartbreak an’ home-sickness, or a +life o’ disserpation he’d led in England, an’ without a sprat on him, +an’ no claim on the bush; an’ I ketches him in me arms as he stumbles +inter the bar, an’ he wants me ter hold him up while he turns English +inter Greek for me. An’ I put him ter bed, an’ he gits worse, an’ I +have ter send the buggy twenty mile for a doctor—an’ pay him. An’ the +jackaroo gits worse, an’ has ter be watched an’ nursed an’ held down +sometimes; an’ he raves about his home an’ mother in England, an’ the +blarsted University that he was eddicated at—an’ a woman—an’ somethin’ +that sounds like poetry in French; an’ he upsets my missus a lot, an’ +makes her blubber. An’ he dies, an’ I have ter pay a man ter bury him +(an’ knock up a sort o’ fence round the grave arterwards ter keep the +stock out), an’ send the buggy agen for a parson, an’—Well, what’s a +man ter do? I couldn’t let him wander away an’ die like a dog in the +scrub, an’ be shoved underground like a dog, too, if his body was ever +found. The Government might pay ter bury him, but there ain’t never +been a pauper funeral from my house yet, an’ there won’t be one if I +can help it—except it be meself. + +An’ then there’s the bother goin’ through his papers to try an’ find +out who he was an’ where his friends is. An’ I have ter get the missus +to write a letter to his people, an’ we have ter make up lies about how +he died ter make it easier for ’em. An’ goin’ through his letters, the +missus comes across a portrait an’ a locket of hair, an’ letters from +his mother an’ sisters an’ girl; an’ they upset her, an’ she blubbers +agin, an’ gits sentimental—like she useter long ago when we was first +married. + +There was one bit of poetry—I forgit it now—that that there jackaroo +kep’ sayin’ over an’ over agen till it buzzed in me head; an’, weeks +after, I’d ketch the missus mutterin’ it to herself in the kitchen till +I thought she was goin’ ratty. + +An’ we gets a letter from the jackaroo’s friends that puts us to a lot +more bother. I hate havin’ anythin’ to do with letters. An’ someone’s +sure to say he was lambed down an’ cleaned out an’ poisoned with bad +bush liquor at my place. It’s almost enough ter make a man wish there +_was_ a recorin’ angel. + +An’ what’s the end of it? I got the blazin’ bailiff in the place now! I +can’t shot him out because he’s a decent, hard-up, poor devil from +Bourke, with consumption or somethin’, an’ he’s been talkin’ to the +missus about his missus an’ kids; an’ I see no chance of gittin’ rid of +him, unless the shearers come along with their cheques from +West-o’-Sunday nex’ week and act straight by me. Like as not I’ll have +ter roll up me swag an’ take the track meself in the end. They say +publicans are damned, an’ I think so, too; an’ I wish I’d bin operated +on before ever I seen a pub. + + + + +THE SHEARER’S DREAM + + +Mitchell and I rolled up our swags after New Year and started to tramp +west. It had been a very bad season after a long drought. Old Baldy +Thompson had only shorn a few bales of grass-seed and burrs, so he +said, and thought of taking the track himself; but we hoped to get on +shearing stragglers at West-o’-Sunday or one of the stations of the +Hungerford track. + +It was very hot weather, so we started after sunset, intending to +travel all night. We crossed the big billabong, and were ploughing +through the dust and sand towards West Bourke, when a buggy full of +city girls and swells passed by. They were part of a theatrical company +on tour in the Back-Blocks, and some local Johnnies. They’d been driven +out to see an artesian bore, or wool-shed, or something. The horses +swerved, and jerked a little squawk out of one of the girls. Then +another said: + +“Ow-w! Two old swaggies. He! he! he!” + +I glanced at Mitchell to see if he was hit, and caught his head down; +but he pulled himself up and pretended to hitch his swag into an easier +position. + +About a hundred yards further on he gave me a side look and said: + +“Did that touch you, Harry” + +“No,” I said, and I laughed. + +“You see,” reflected Mitchell, “they’re more to be pitied than blamed. +It’s their ignorance. In the first place, we’re not two old tramps, as +they think. We are professional shearers; and the Australian shearers +are about the most independent and intelligent class of men in the +world. We’ve got more genius in one of our little fingers than there is +in the whole of that wagonette-load of diddle-daddle and fiddle-faddle +and giggles. Their intellects are on a level with the rotten dramas +they travel with, and their lives about as false. They are slaves to +the public, and their home is the pub-parlour, with sickly, senseless +Johnnies to shout suppers and drink for them and lend their men money. +If one of those girls is above the average, how she must despise those +Johnnies—and the life! She must feel a greater contempt for them than +the private-barmaid does for the boozer she cleans out. He gets his +drink and some enjoyment, anyhow. And how she must loathe the life she +leads! And what’s the end of it as often as not? I remember once, when +I was a boy, I was walking out with two aunts of mine—they’re both dead +now. God rest their fussy, innocent old souls!—and one of ’em said +suddenly, ‘Look! Quick, Jack! There’s Maggie So-and-So, the great +actress.’ And I looked and saw a woman training vines in a porch. It +seemed like seeing an angel to me, and I never forgot her as she was +then. The diggers used to go miles out of town to meet the coach that +brought her, and take the horses out and drag it in, and throw gold in +her lap, and worship her. + +“The last time I was in Sydney I saw her sitting in the back parlour of +a third-rate pub. She was dying of dropsy and couldn’t move from her +chair. She showed me a portrait of herself as I remembered her, and +talked quite seriously about going on the stage again. + +“Now, our home is about two thousand miles wide, and the world’s our +stage. If the worst comes to the worst we can always get tucker and +wood and water for nothing. If we’re camping at a job in a tent there’s +no house-cleaning to bother us. All we’ve got to do when the camp gets +too dirty is to shift the tent to a fresh place. We’ve got time to +think and—we’re free. + +“But then, agen,” he reflected, “there’s the world’s point of view to +be considered. Some day I might be flashing past in a buggy or +saloon-carriage—or, the chances are it will be you—and you might look +out the window and see an old swaggy tramping along in the dust, or +camped under a strip of calico in the rain in the scrub. (And it might +be me—old Mitchell—that really wrote your books, only the world won’t +know it.) And then you’ll realize what a wretched, miserable life it +was. We never realize the miseries of life till we look back—the +mistakes and miseries that had to be and couldn’t be helped. It’s all +luck—luck and chance.” + +But those girls seemed to have gravelled Mitchell, and he didn’t seem +able to talk himself round. He tramped on, brooding for a while, and +then suddenly he said: + +“Look here, Harry! Those girls are giving a dance to-night, and if I +liked to go back to Bourke and tog up and go to the dance I could pick +out the prettiest, dance with her all the evening, and take her for a +stroll afterwards, old tramp as they thought me. I’ve lived—but it +wouldn’t be worth my while now.” + +I’d seen Jack in a mood like this before, and thought it best to say +nothing. Perhaps the terrible heat had affected him a little. We walked +on in silence until we came to the next billabong. “Best boil the billy +here, Harry,” said Mitchell, “and have some tea before we go any +further.” + +I got some sticks together and made a fire and put the billy on. The +country looked wretched—like the ghost of a burnt-out land—in the +moonlight. The banks of the creek were like ashes, the thin, gnarled +gum-bush seemed dry-rotting fast, and in many places the surface of the +ground was cracked in squares where it had shrunk in the drought. In +the bed of the creek was a narrow gutter of water that looked like bad +milk. + +Mitchell sat on his swag, with his pint of tea on the ground by his +foot, and chewed his pipe. + +“What’s up, Jack?” I asked. “Have you got the blues?” + +“Well, yes, Harry,” he said. “I’m generally dull the first day on the +track. The first day is generally the worst, anywhere or +anytime—except, perhaps, when you’re married.... I got—well, I got +thinking of the time when a woman’s word could have hurt me.” + +Just then one of the “travellers” who were camped a bit up the creek +suddenly commenced to sing. It was a song called “The Shearer’s Dream,” +and I suppose the buggy of girls, or the conversation they started, +reminded him of it. He started his verses and most of his lines with a +howl; and there were unexpected howls all through the song, and it +wailed off, just as unexpectedly, in places where there was no pathos +that I could see: + +Oh, I dreamt I shore in a shearer’s shed, and it was a dream of joy, +For every one of the rouseabouts was a girl dressed up as a boy— +Dressed up like a page in a pantomime, and the prettiest ever seen— +They had flaxen hair, they had coal-black hair—and every shade between. + + +“Every” with sudden and great energy, a long drop on to “shade,” and a +wail of intense sadness and regret running on into “between,” the dirge +reaching its wailsomest in the “tween” in every case. + +The shed was cooled by electric fans that was over every “shoot”; +The pens was of polished ma-ho-gany, and ev’rything else to suit; +The huts was fixed with spring-mattresses, and the tucker was simply +grand, +And every night by the biller-bong we darnced to a German band. + +“_Chorus, boys!”_ + +There was short, plump girls, there was tall, slim girls, and the +handsomest ever seen +They was four-foot-five, they was six-foot high, and hevery size +between. + +Our pay was the wool on the jumbucks’ backs, so we shore till all was +blue +The sheep was washed afore they was shore (and the rams was scented +too); +And we all of us cried when the shed cut out, in spite of the long, hot +days, +For hevery hour them girls waltzed in with whisky and beer on +tr-a-a-a-ys! + +“_Chorus_! _you_ ——!” + +They had kind grey eyes, they had coal-black eyes, and the grandest +ever seen +They had plump pink hands, they had slim white hands, and hevery shape +be-tw-e-e-n. + +There was three of them girls to every chap, and as jealous as they +could be— + + +“Ow! you ——” + +The singer’s voice or memory seemed suddenly to have failed him at this +point, but whether his mates hit him on the back of the head with a +tomahawk, or only choked him, I do not know. Mitchell was inclined to +think, from the sound of it, that they choked him. + + + + +THE LOST SOULS’ HOTEL + + +Hunqerford Road, February. One hundred and thirty miles of heavy +reddish sand, bordered by dry, hot scrubs. Dense cloud of hot dust. +Four wool-teams passing through a gate in a “rabbit proof” fence which +crosses the road. Clock, clock, clock of wheels and rattle and clink of +chains, crack of whips and explosions of Australian language. Bales and +everything else coated with dust. Stink of old axle-grease and +tarpaulins. Tyres hot enough to fry chops on: bows and chains so hot +that it’s a wonder they do not burn through the bullock’s hides. Water +lukewarm in blistered kegs slung behind the wagons. Bullocks dragging +along as only bullocks do. Wheels ploughing through the deep sand, and +the load lurching from side to side. Half-way on a “dry-stretch” of +seventeen miles. Big “tank” full of good water through the scrub to the +right, but it is a private tank and a boundary-rider is shepherding it. +Mulga scrub and sparse, spiky undergrowth. + +The carriers camp for dinner and boil their billies while the bullocks +droop under their yokes in the blazing heat; one or two lie down and +the leaders drag and twist themselves round under a dead tree, under +the impression that there is shade there. The carriers look like Red +Indians, with the masks of red dust “bound” with sweat on their faces, +but there is an unhealthy-looking, whitish space round their eyes, +caused by wiping away the blinding dust, sweat, and flies. The dry +sticks burn with a pale flame and an almost invisible thin pale blue +smoke. The sun’s heat dancing and dazzling across every white +fence-post, sandhill, or light-coloured object in the distance. + +One man takes off his boot and sock, empties half a pint of sand out of +them, and pulls up his trouser-leg. His leg is sheathed to the knee in +dust and sweat; he absently scrapes it with his knife, and presently he +amuses himself by moistening a strip with his forefinger and shaving +it, as if he were vaguely curious to see if he is still a white man. + +The Hungerford coach ploughs past in a dense cloud of dust. + +The teams drag on again like a “wounded snake that dies at sundown,” if +a wounded snake that dies at sundown could revive sufficiently next +morning to drag on again until another sun goes down. + +Hopeless-looking swagmen are met with during the afternoon, and one +carrier—he of the sanded leg—lends them tobacco; his mates contribute +“bits o’” tea, flour, and sugar. + +Sundown and the bullocks done up. The teamsters unyoke them and drive +them on to the next water—five miles—having previously sent a mate to +reconnoitre and see that boundary-rider is not round, otherwise, to +make terms with him, for it is a squatter’s bore. They hurry the +bullocks down to the water and back in the twilight, and then, under +cover of darkness, turn them into a clearing in the scrub off the road, +where a sign in the grass might be seen—if you look close. But the +“bullockies” are better off than the horse-teamsters, for bad chaff is +sold by the pound and corn is worth its weight in gold. + +Mitchell and I turned off the track at the rabbit-proof fence and made +for the tank in the mulga. We boiled the billy and had some salt mutton +and damper. We were making back for Bourke, having failed to get a cut +in any of the sheds on the Hungerford track. We sat under a clump of +mulga saplings, with our backs to the trunks, and got out our pipes. +Usually, when the flies were very bad on the track, we had to keep +twigs or wild-turkey=tail feathers going in front of our faces the +whole time to keep the mad flies out of our eyes; and, when we camped, +one would keep the feather going while the other lit his pipe—then the +smoke would keep them away. But the flies weren’t so bad in a good +shade or in a darkened hut. Mitchell’s pipe would have smoked out Old +Nick; it was an ancient string-bound meerschaum, and strong enough to +kill a blackfellow. I had one smoke out of it, once when I felt bad in +my inside and wanted to be sick, and the result was very satisfactory. + +Mitchell looked through his old pocket-book—more by force of habit than +anything else—and turned up a circular from Tattersall’s. And that +reminded him. + +“Do you know what I’d do, Harry,” he said, “if I won Tattersall’s big +sweep, or was to come into fifty or a hundred thousand pounds, or, +better still, a million?” + +“Nothing I suppose,” I said, “except to get away to Sydney or some +cooler place than this.” + +“I’ll tell you what I’d do,” said Mitchell, talking round his pipe. +“I’d build a Swagman’s Rest right here.” + +“A Swagman’s Rest?” + +“Yes. Right here on this very God-forsaken spot. I’d build a Swagman’s +Rest and call it the Lost Souls’ Hotel, or the Sundowners’ Arms, or the +Half-way House to ——, or some such name that would take the bushmen’s +fancy. I’d have it built on the best plans for coolness in a hot +country; bricks, and plenty of wide verandas with brick floors, and +balconies, and shingles, in the old Australian style. I wouldn’t have a +sheet of corrugated iron about the place. And I’d have old-fashioned +hinged sashes with small panes and vines round ’em; they look cooler +and more homely and romantic than the glaring sort that shove up. + +“And I’d dig a tank or reservoir for surface water as big as a lake, +and bore for artesian water—and get it, too, if I had to bore right +through to England; and I’d irrigate the ground and make it grow +horse-feed and fruit, and vegetables too, if I had to cart manure from +Bourke. And every teamster’s bullock or horse, and every shearer’s +hack, could burst itself free, but I’d make travelling stock pay—for it +belongs to the squatters and capitalists. All carriers could camp for +one night only. And I’d—no, I wouldn’t have any flowers; they might +remind some heart-broken, new-chum black sheep of the house where he +was born, and the mother whose heart he broke—and the father whose grey +hairs he brought down in sorrow to the grave—and break him up +altogether.” + +“But what about the old-fashioned windows and the vines?” I asked. + +“Oh!” said Mitchell, “I forgot them. On second thought, I think I would +have some flowers; and maybe a bit of ivy-green. The new chum might be +trying to work out his own salvation, and the sight of the roses and +ivy would show him that he hadn’t struck such a God-forgotten country +after all, and help strengthen the hope for something better that’s in +the heart of every vagabond till he dies.” + +Puff, puff, puff, slowly and reflectively. + +“Until he dies,” repeated Mitchell. “And, maybe,” he said, rousing +himself, “I’d have a little room fixed up like a corner of a swell +restaurant, with silver and napkins on the table, and I’d fix up a +waiter, so that when a broken-down University wreck came along he might +feel, for an hour or so, something like the man he used to be. But I +suppose,” Mitchell reflected, “he wouldn’t feel completely his old self +without a lady friend sitting opposite to him. I might fix up a black +gin for him, but I suppose he’d draw the colour line. But that’s +nonsense. + +“All teamsters and travellers could camp there for one night only. I’d +have shower-baths; but I wouldn’t force any man to have a bath against +his will. They could sit down to a table and have a feed off a +table-cloth, and sleep in sheets, and feel like they did before their +old mothers died, or before they ran away from home.” + +“Who? The mothers?” I asked. + +“Yes, in some cases,” said Mitchell. “And I’d have a nice, cool little +summer-house down near the artificial lake, out of earshot of the +house, where the bullock-drivers could sit with their pipes after tea, +and tell yarns, and talk in their own language. And I’d have boats on +the lake, too, in case an old Oxford or Cambridge man, or an old sailor +came along—it might put years on to his life to have a pull at the +oars. You remember that old sailor we saw in charge of the engine back +there at the government tank? You saw how he had the engine?—clean and +bright as a new pin—everything spick-and-span and shipshape, and his +hut fixed up like a ship’s cabin. I believe he thinks he’s at sea half +his time, and shoving her through it, instead of pumping muddy water +out of a hole in the baking scrubs for starving stock. Or maybe he +reckons he’s keeping her afloat.” + +“And would you have fish in this lake of yours?” I asked. + +“Oh, yes,” said Mitchell, “and any ratty old shepherd or sundowner, +that’s gone mad of heat and loneliness—like the old codger we met back +yonder—he could sit by the lagoon in the cool of the evening and fish +to his heart’s content with a string and a bent pin, and dream he’s +playing truant from school and fishing in the brook near his native +village in England about fifty years ago. It would seem more real than +fishing in the dust as some mad old bushmen do.” + +“But you’d draw the line somewhere?” I asked. + +“No,” said Mitchell, “not even at poets. I’d try to cure them, too, +with good wholesome food and plenty of physical exercise. The Lost +Souls’ Hotel would be a refuge for men who’d been jail-birds once as +well as men who were gentlemen once, and for physical wrecks and ruined +drunkards as well as healthy honest shearers. I’d sit down and talk to +the boozer or felon just as if I thought he was as good a man as me—and +he might be, for that matter—God knows. + +“The sick man would be kept till he recovered, or died; and the boozer, +suffering from a recovery, I’d keep him till he was on his legs again.” + +“Then you’d have to have a doctor,” I said. + +“Yes,” said Mitchell, “I’d fix that up all right. I wouldn’t bother +much about a respectable medical practitioner from the city. I’d get a +medical wreck who had a brilliant career before him once in England and +got into disgrace, and cleared out to the colonies—a man who knows what +the d.t.’s is—a man who’s been through it all and knows it all.” + +“Then you’d want a manager, or a clerk or secretary,” I suggested. + +“I suppose I would,” said Mitchell. “I’ve got no head for figures. I +suppose I’d have to advertise for him. If an applicant came with the +highest testimonials of character, and especially if one was signed by +a parson, I’d tell him to call again next week; and if a young man +could prove that he came of a good Christian family, and went to church +regularly, and sang in the choir, and taught Sunday-school, I’d tell +him that he needn’t come again, that the vacancy was filled, for I +couldn’t trust, him. The man who’s been extra religious and honest and +hard-working in his young days is most likely to go wrong afterwards. +I’d sooner trust some poor old devil of a clerk who’d got into the +hands of a woman or racing men when he was young, and went wrong, and +served his time for embezzlement; anyway, I’d take him out and give him +another chance.” + +“And what about woman’s influence?” I asked. + +“Oh, I suppose there’d have to be a woman, if only to keep the doctor +on the line. I’d get a woman with a past, one that hadn’t been any +better than she should have been, they’re generally the most +kind-hearted in the end. Say an actress who’d come down in the world, +or an old opera-singer who’d lost her voice but could still sing a +little. A woman who knows what trouble is. And I’d get a girl to keep +her company, a sort of housemaid, with a couple of black gins or +half-castes to help her. I’d get hold of some poor girl who’d been +deceived and deserted: and a baby or two wouldn’t be an objection—the +kids would amuse the chaps and help humanize the place.” + +“And what if the manageress fell in love with the doctor?” I asked. + +“Well, I couldn’t provide against love,” said Mitchell. “I fell in love +myself more than once—and I don’t suppose I’d have been any worse off +if I’d have stayed in love. Ah, well! But suppose she did fall in love +with the doctor and marry him, or suppose she fell in love with him and +didn’t marry him, for that matter—and suppose the girl fell in love +with the secretary? There wouldn’t be any harm done; it would only make +them more contented with the home and bind them to it. They’d be a +happy family, and the Lost Souls’ Hotel would be more cheerful and +homelike than ever.” + +“But supposing they all fell in love with each other and cleared out,” +I said. + +“I don’t see what they’d have to clear out for,” said Mitchell. “But +suppose they did. There’s more than one medical wreck in Australia, and +more than one woman with a past, and more than one broken old clerk who +went wrong and was found out, and who steadied down in jail, and +there’s more than one poor girl that’s been deceived. I could easily +replace ’em. And the Lost Souls’ Hotel might be the means of patching +up many wrecked lives in that way—giving people with pasts the chance +of another future, so to speak.” + +“I suppose you’d have music and books and pictures?” I said. + +“Oh, yes,” said Mitchell. “But I wouldn’t have any bitter or +sex-problem books. They do no good. Problems have been the curse of the +world ever since it started. I think one noble, kindly, cheerful +character in a book does more good than all the clever villains or +romantic adventurers ever invented. And I think a man ought to get rid +of his maudlin sentiment in private, or when he’s drunk. It’s a pity +that every writer couldn’t put all his bitterness into one book and +then burn it. + +“No; I’d have good cheerful books of the best and brightest sides of +human nature—Charles Dickens, and Mark Twain, and Bret Harte, and those +men. And I’d have all Australian pictures—showing the brightest and +best side of Australian life. And I’d have all Australian songs. I +wouldn’t have ‘Swannie Ribber,’ or ‘Home, Sweet Home,’ or ‘Annie +Laurie,’ or any of those old songs sung at the Lost Souls’ +Hotel—they’re the cause of more heartbreaks and drink and suicide in +the bush than anything else. And if a jackaroo got up to sing, ‘Just +before the battle, mother,’ or, ‘Mother bit me in me sleep,’ he’d find +it was just before the battle all right. He’d have to go out and sleep +in the scrub, where the mosquitoes and bulldog ants would bite him out +of his sleep. I hate the man who’s always whining about his mother +through his nose, because, as a rule, he never cared a rap for his old +mother, nor for anyone else, except his own paltry, selfish little +self. + +“I’d have intellectual and elevating conversation for those that——” + +“Who’d take charge of that department?” I inquired hurriedly. + +“Well,” reflected Mitchell, “I did have an idea of taking it on myself +for a while anyway; but, come to think of it, the doctor or the woman +with the past would have more experience; and I could look after that +part of the business at a pinch. Of course you’re not in a position to +judge as to my ability in the intellectual line; you see, I’ve had no +one to practise on since I’ve been with you. But no matter—— There’d be +intellectual conversation for the benefit of black-sheep new chums. And +any broken-down actors that came along could get up a play if they +liked—it would brighten up things and help elevate the bullock-drivers +and sundowners. I’d have a stage fixed up and a bit of scenery. I’d do +all I could to attract shearers to the place after shearing, and keep +them from rushing to the next shanty with their cheques, or down to +Sydney, to be cleaned out by barmaids. + +“And I’d have the hero squashed in the last act for a selfish sneak, +and marry the girl to the villain—he’d be more likely to make her happy +in the end.” + +“And what about the farm?” I asked. “I suppose you’d get some expert +from the agricultural college to manage that?” + +“No,” said Mitchell. “I’d get some poor drought-ruined selector and put +him in charge of the vegetation. Only, the worst of it is,” he +reflected, “if you take a selector who has bullocked all his life to +raise crops on dusty, stony patches in the scrubs, and put him on land +where there’s plenty of water and manure, and where he’s only got to +throw the seed on the ground and then light his pipe and watch it grow, +he’s apt to get disheartened. But that’s human nature. + +“And, of course, I’d have to have a ‘character’ about the place—a sort +of identity and joker to brighten up things. I wouldn’t get a man who’d +been happy and comfortable all his life; I’d get hold of some old +codger whose wife had nagged him till she died, and who’d been sold off +many times, and run in for drowning his sorrows, and who started as an +undertaker and failed at that, and finally got a job pottering +round—gardener, or gatekeeper, or something—in a lunatic asylum. I’d +get him. He’d most likely be a humorist and a philosopher, and he’d +help cheer up the Lost Souls’ Hotel. I reckon the lost souls would get +very fond of him.” + +“And would you have drink at Lost Souls’?” I asked. + +“Yes,” said Mitchell. “I’d have the best beer and spirits and wine to +be had. After tea I’d let every man have just enough to make him feel +comfortable and happy, and as good and clever, and innocent and honest +as any other man, but no more. But if a poor devil came along in the +horrors, with every inch of him jumping, and snakes, and green-eyed +yahoos, and flaming-nosed bunyips chasing him, we’d take him in and +give him soothing draughts, and nurse him, and watch him, and clear him +out with purgatives, and keep giving him nips of good whisky, and, +above all, we’d sympathize with him, and tell him that we were worse +than he was many a time. We wouldn’t tell him what a weak, selfish man +he was, or harp on his ruined life. We’d try to make him out a good +deal better morally than he really was. It’s remorse that hurries most +men to hell—especially in the Bush. When a man firmly believes he is a +hopeless case, then there’s no hope for him: but let him have doubts +and there’s a chance. Make him believe that there are far worse cases +than his. We wouldn’t preach the sin of dissipation to him, no—but we’d +try to show him the _folly_ of a wasted life. I ought to be able to +preach that, God knows. + +“And, above all, we’d try to drive out of his head the cursed old +popular idea that it’s hard to reform—that a man’s got to fight a hard +battle with himself to get away from drink—pity drunkards can’t believe +how easy it is. And we’d put it to him straight whether his few hours’ +enjoyment were worth the days he had to suffer hell for it.” + +“And, likely as not,” I said, “when you’d put him on his feet he’d take +the nearest track to the next shanty, and go on a howling spree, and +come back to Lost Souls’ in a week, raving aid worse than ever. What +would you do then?” + +“We’d take him in again, and build him up some more; and a third or +fourth time if necessary. I believe in going right on with a thing once +I take it in hand. And if he didn’t turn up after the last spree we’d +look for him up the scrub and bring him in and let him die on a bed, +and make his death as comfortable as possible. I’ve seen one man die on +the ground, and found one dead in the bush. We’d bury him under a gum +and put ‘Sacred to the Memory of a Man who Died. (Let him R.I.P.)’ over +him. I’d have a nice little graveyard, with gums for tombstones—and I’d +have some original epitaphs—I promise you.” + +“And how much gratitude would you expect to get out of the Lost Souls’ +Hotel?” I asked. + +“None,” said Mitchell, promptly. “It wouldn’t be a Gratitude Discovery +Syndicate. People might say that the Lost Souls’ Hotel was a den for +kidnapping women and girls to be used as decoys for the purpose of +hocussing and robbing bushmen, and the law and retribution might come +after me—but I’d fight the thing out. Or they might want to make a +K.C.M.G., or a god of me, and worship me before they hung me. I reckon +a philanthropist or reformer is lucky if he escapes with a whole skin +in the end, let alone his character— But there!— Talking of gratitude: +it’s the fear of ingratitude that keeps thousands from doing good. It’s +just as paltry and selfish and cowardly as any other fear that curses +the world—it’s rather more selfish than most fears, in fact—take the +fear of being thought a coward, or being considered eccentric, or +conceited, or affected, or too good, or too bad, for instance. The man +that’s always canting about the world’s ingratitude has no gratitude +owing to him as a rule—generally the reverse—he ought to be grateful to +the world for being let live. He broods over the world’s ingratitude +until he gets to be a cynic. He sees the world like the outside of a +window, as it were, with the blind drawn and the dead, cold moonlight +shining on it, and he passes on with a sour face; whereas, if he took +the trouble to step inside he’d most likely find a room full of ruddy +firelight, and sympathy and cheerfulness, and kindness, and love, and +gratitude. Sometimes, when he’s right down on his uppers, and forced to +go amongst people and hustle for bread, he gets a lot of surprises at +the amount of kindness he keeps running against in the world—and in +places where he’d never have expected to find it. But—ah, well! I’m +getting maudlin.” + +“And you’ve forgot all about the Lost Souls’ Hotel,” I said. + +“No, I haven’t,” said Mitchell; “I’d fix that up all right. As soon as +I’d got things going smoothly under a man I could trust, I’d tie up +every penny I had for the benefit of the concern; get some ‘white men’ +for trustees, and take the track again. I’m getting too old to stay +long in one place—(I’m a lost soul that always got along better in +another place). I’m so used to the track that if I was shut up in a +house I’d get walking up and down in my room of nights and disturb the +folk; and, besides, I’d feel lost and light-shouldered without the +swag.” + +“So you’d put all your money in the concern?” + +“Yes—except a pound or two to go on the track with—for, who knows, I +might come along there, dusty and tired, and ragged and hard up and +old, some day, and be very glad of a night’s rest at the Lost Souls’ +Hotel. But I wouldn’t let on that I was old Mitchell, the millionaire, +who founded Lost Souls’. They might be too officious, and I hate +fuss.... But it’s time to take the track, Harry.” + +There came a cool breeze with sunset; we stood up stiffly, shouldered +our swags and tucker-bags, and pushed on, for we had to make the next +water before we camped. We were out of tobacco, so we borrowed some +from one of the bullock-drivers. + + + + +THE BOOZERS’ HOME + + +“A dipsomaniac,” said Mitchell, “needs sympathy and commonsense +treatment. (Sympathy’s a grand and glorious thing, taking it all round +and looking at it any way you will: a little of it makes a man think +that the world’s a good world after all, and there’s room and hope for +sinners, and that life’s worth living; enough of it makes him sure of +it: and an overdose of sympathy makes a man _feel_ weak and ashamed of +himself, and so moves him to stop whining—and wining—and buck up.) + +“Now, I’m not taking the case of a workman who goes on the spree on pay +night and sweats the drink out of himself at work next day, nor a +slum-bred brute who guzzles for the love of it; but a man with brains, +who drinks to drown his intellect or his memory. He’s generally a man +under it all, and a sensitive, generous, gentle man with finer feelings +as often as not. The best and cleverest and whitest men in the world +seem to take to drink mostly. It’s an awful pity. Perhaps it’s because +they’re straight and the world’s crooked and they can see things too +plain. And I suppose in the bush the loneliness and the thoughts of the +girl-world they left behind help to sink ’em. + +“Now a drunkard seldom reforms at home, because he’s always surrounded +by the signs of the ruin and misery he has brought on the home; and the +sight and thought of it sets him off again before he’s had time to +recover from the last spree. Then, again, the noblest wife in the world +mostly goes the wrong way to work with a drunken husband—nearly +everything she does is calculated to irritate him. If, for instance, he +brings a bottle home from the pub, it shows that he wants to stay at +home and not go back to the pub any more; but the first thing the wife +does is to get hold of the bottle and plant it, or smash it before his +eyes, and that maddens him in the state he is in then. + +“No. A dipsomaniac needs to be taken away from home for a while. I knew +a man that got so bad that the way he acted at home one night +frightened him, and next morning he went into an inebriate home of his +own accord—to a place where his friends had been trying to get him for +a year past. For the first day or two he was nearly dead with remorse +and shame—mostly shame; and he didn’t know what they were going to do +to him next—and he only wanted them to kill him quick and be done with +it. He reckons he felt as bad as if he was in jail. But there were ten +other patients there, and one or two were worse than he was, and that +comforted him a lot. They compared notes and sympathized and helped +each other. They discovered that all their wives were noble women. He +struck one or two surprises too—one of the patients was a doctor who’d +attended him one time, and another was an old boss of his, and they got +very chummy. And there was a man there who was standing for +Parliament—he was supposed to be having a rest down the coast.... Yes, +my old mate felt very bad for the first day or two; it was all Yes, +Nurse, and Thank you, Nurse, and Yes, Doctor, and No, Doctor, and Thank +you, Doctor. But, inside a week, he was calling the doctor ‘Ol’ +Pill-Box’ behind his back, and making love to one of the nurses. + +“But he said it was pitiful when women relatives came to visit patients +the first morning. It shook the patients up a lot, but I reckon it did +’em good. There were well-bred old lady mothers in black, and +hard-working, haggard wives and loving daughters—and the expressions of +sympathy and faith and hope in those women’s faces! My old mate said it +was enough in itself to make a man swear off drink for ever.... Ah, +God—what a world it is! + +“Reminds me how I once went with the wife of another old mate of mine +to see him. He was in a lunatic asylum. It was about the worst hour I +ever had in my life, and I’ve had some bad ones. The way she tried to +coax him back to his old self. She thought she could do it when all the +doctors had failed. But I’ll tell you about him some other time. + +“The old mate said that the principal part of the treatment was +supposed to be injection of bi-chloride of gold or something, and it +was supposed to be a secret. It might have been water and sugar for all +he knew, and he thought it was. You see, when patients got better they +were allowed out, two by two, on their honour—one to watch the +other—and it worked. But it was necessary to have an extra hold on +them; so they were told that if they were a minute late for +‘treatment,’ or missed one injection, all the good would be undone. +This was dinged into their ears all the time. Same as many things are +done in the Catholic religion—to hold the people. My old mate said +that, as far as the medical treatment was concerned, he could do all +that was necessary himself. But it was the sympathy that counted, +especially the sympathy between the patients themselves. They always +got hold of a new patient and talked to him and cheered him up; he +nearly always came in thinking he was the most miserable wretch in this +world. And it comforts a man and strengthens him and makes him happier +to meet another man who’s worse off or sicker, or has been worse +swindled than he has been. That’s human nature.... And a man will take +draughts from a nurse and eat for her when he wouldn’t do it for his +own wife—not even though she had been a trained nurse herself. And if a +patient took a bad turn in the night at the Boozers’ Home and got up to +hunt the snakes out of his room, he wouldn’t be sworn at, or laughed +at, or held down; no, they’d help him shoo the snakes out and comfort +him. My old mate said that, when he got better, one of the new patients +reckoned that he licked St Pathrick at managing snakes. And when he +came out he didn’t feel a bit ashamed of his experience. The +institution didn’t profess to cure anyone of drink, only to mend up +shattered nerves and build up wrecked constitutions; give them back +some will-power if they weren’t too far gone. And they set my old mate +on his feet all right. When he went in his life seemed lost, he had the +horror of being sober, he couldn’t start the day without a drink or do +any business without it. He couldn’t live for more than two hours +without a drink; but when he came out he didn’t feel as if he wanted +it. He reckoned that those six weeks in the institution were the +happiest he’d ever spent in his life, and he wished the time had been +longer; he says he’d never met with so much sympathy and genius, and +humour and human nature under one roof before. And he said it was nice +and novel to be looked after and watched and physicked and bossed by a +pretty nurse in uniform—but I don’t suppose he told his wife that. And +when he came out he never took the trouble to hide the fact that he’d +been in. If any of his friends had a drunkard in the family, he’d +recommend the institution and do his best to get him into it. But when +he came out he firmly believed that if he took one drink he’d be a lost +man. He made a mania of that. One curious effect was that, for some +time after he left the institution, he’d sometimes feel suddenly in +high spirits—with nothing to account for it—something like he used to +feel when he had half a dozen whiskies in him; then suddenly he’d feel +depressed and sort of hopeless—with nothing to account for that +either—just as if he was suffering a recovery. But those moods never +lasted long and he soon grew out of them altogether. He didn’t flee +temptation. He’d knock round the pubs on Saturday nights with his old +mates, but never drank anything but soft stuff—he was always careful to +smell his glass for fear of an accident or trick. He drank gallons of +ginger beer, milk-and-soda, and lemonade; and he got very fond of +sweets, too—he’d never liked them before. He said he enjoyed the +novelty of the whole thing and his mates amused him at first; but he +found he had to leave them early in the evening, and, after a while, he +dropped them altogether. They seemed such fools when they were drunk +(they’d never seemed fools to him before). And, besides, as they got +full, they’d get suspicious of him, and then mad at him, because he +couldn’t see things as they could. That reminds me that it nearly +breaks a man’s heart when his old drinking chum turns teetotaller—it’s +worse than if he got married or died. When two mates meet and one is +drunk and the other sober there is only one of two things for them to +do if they want to hit it together—either the drunken mate must get +sober or the sober mate drunk. And that reminds me: Take the case of +two old mates who’ve been together all their lives, say they always had +their regular sprees together and went through the same stages of +drunkenness together, and suffered their recoveries and sobered up +together, and each could stand about the same quantity of drink and one +never got drunker than the other. Each, when he’s boozing, reckons his +mate the cleverest man and the hardest case in the world—second to +himself. But one day it happens, by a most extraordinary combination of +circumstances, that Bill, being sober, meets Jim very drunk, and pretty +soon Bill is the most disgusted man in this world. He never would have +dreamed that his old mate could make such a fool and such a public +spectacle of himself. And Bill’s disgust intensifies all the time he is +helping Jim home, and Jim arguing with him and wanting to fight him, +and slobbering over him and wanting to love him by turns, until Bill +swears he’ll give Jim a hammering as soon as ever he’s able to stand +steady on his feet.” + +“I suppose your old boozing mate’s wife was very happy when he +reformed,” I said to Mitchell. + +“Well, no,” said Mitchell, rubbing his head rather ruefully. “I suppose +it was an exceptional case. But I knew her well, and the fact is that +she got more discontented and thinner, and complained and nagged him +worse than she’d ever done in his drinking days. And she’d never been +afraid of him. Perhaps it was this way: She loved and married a +careless, good-natured, drinking scamp, and when he reformed and became +a careful, hard-working man, and an honest and respected +fellow-townsman, she was disappointed in him. He wasn’t the man that +won her heart when she was a girl. Or maybe he was only company for her +when he was half drunk. Or maybe lots of things. Perhaps he’d killed +the love in her before he reformed—and reformed too late. I wonder how +a man feels when he finds out for the first time that his wife doesn’t +love him any longer? But my old mate wasn’t the nature to find out that +sort of thing. Ah, well! If a woman caused all our trouble, my God! +women have suffered for it since—and they suffer like martyrs mostly +and with the patience of working bullocks. Anyway it goes, if I’m the +last man in the world, and the last woman is the worst, and there’s +only room for one more in Heaven, I’ll step down at once and take my +chances in Blazes.” + + + + +THE SEX PROBLEM AGAIN + + +It was Mitchell’s habit to take an evening off now and then from +yarning or reflecting, and proceed, in a most methodical manner, to +wash his spare shirts and patch his pants. I was in the habit of +contributing to some Sydney papers, and every man is an editor at +heart, so, at other times, Mitchell would take another evening off, and +root out my swag, and go through my papers in the same methodical +manner, and make alterations and additions without comment or reference +to me; and sometimes he’d read a little thing of my own which didn’t +meet his views, and accidentally drop it into the fire; and at other +times he’d get hold of some rhyme or sketch that was troubling me, and +wrap it up and give it to a passing mailman unbeknown to me. The +unexpected appearance of such articles in the paper, as well as the +effects of the involuntary collaboration in other pieces, gave me +several big surprises. + +It was in camp on a fencing contract west of Bourke. We had a book +which we’d borrowed from a library at Bourke for a year or two—never +mind the name of it—it was in ninety-one or ninety-two, and the sex +problem was booming then. I had been surreptitiously tearing some +carefully-written slips of manuscript—leaves taken from an old +pocket-book—into small pieces; I dropped them, with apparent +carelessness, into the fire and stood with my back to it. + +“I’ll bet five pounds,” said Mitchell, suddenly, “that you’ve been +trying your hand on a sex-problem story.” + +I shifted uneasily and brought my hands from behind me into my pockets. +“Well, to tell you the truth,” I admitted, “I have.” + +“I thought so,” exclaimed Mitchell. “We’ll be put to the expense of +sending you to Sydney for medical treatment yet. You’ve been having too +easy times lately, plenty of hard graft and no anxiety about tucker or +the future. What are the symptoms?” + +“Well,” I said, taking a hand out to scratch the back of my head, “the +plot looked all right—at first sight.” + +“So there’s a plot, is there? Well, in the first place, a plot is a +problem. Well, what’s the plot?... Come on, you needn’t be frightened +to tell an old mate like me.” + +“Well,” I said, “the yarn looked all right at first sight; that article +of ‘T’s’ in the _Bulletin_ turned me off it; listen and see what you +think of it: There was a young fellow, a bit of a genius——” + +“Just so, it’s the geniuses that build the sex problems. It’s an +autobiography. Go on.” + +“Well, he married a girl.” + +Mitchell (sotto voce): “God help her.” + +“He loved her, and she loved him: but after they’d been married a while +he found out that, although he understood her, she didn’t and couldn’t +possibly ever understand him.” + +“Yes,” commented Mitchell, “and if he hadn’t caught the sex problem, +nor been reading about it, he would never have found that out.” + +“It was a terrible disappointment,” I continued—I had got into the +habit of taking Mitchell’s interruptions and comments as matters of +course—“He saw that his life would be a hell with her——” + +Mitchell: “Didn’t strike him that her life would be a hell with him?” + +“They had no thought in common.” + +Mitchell: “She was in her right mind then.” + +“But he couldn’t leave her because he loved her, and because he knew +that she loved him and would break her heart if he left her.” + +“Must have been a pretty cocksure sort of a fellow,” remarked Mitchell, +“but all geniuses are.” + +“When he was with her he saw all her obstinacy, unreason, and +selfishness; but when he was away he only saw her good points.” + +Mitchell: “Pity such men don’t stop away.” + +“He thought and thought, and brooded over it till his life was a +hell——” + +Mitchell: “Jes-so: thanks to the problemaniacs.” + +“He thought of killing her and himself, and so taking her with him” + +“Where?” asked Mitchell. “He must have loved her a lot.... Good Lord! +That shows the awful effects of the sex problem on the mind of a +healthy young man like you;” and Mitchell stood up. + +“He lay awake by her side at nights thinking and fighting the thing +out.” + +“And you’ve been lying awake, thinking, with me and ‘the Oracle’ by +your side. We’ll have to plant the tommy-hawk, and watch you by turns +at night till you get over this.” + +“One night he rested on his elbow, and watched her sleeping, and tried +to reconstruct his ideal out of her, and, just when he was getting into +a happier frame of mind, her mouth fell open, and she snored.... I +didn’t get any further than the snore,” I said. + +“No, of course you didn’t,” said Mitchell, “and none of the sex +problemers ever will—unless they get as far as ‘blanky.’ You might have +made the snore cure him; did it?” + +“No, it was making things worse in my idea of the yarn. He fell back +and lay staring at the ceiling in a hopeless kind of a way.” + +“Then he was a fit case for the lunatic asylum.... Now, look here, +Harry, you’re a good-natured, soft old fool when you’re in your right +mind; just you go on being a good-natured, soft old fool, and don’t try +to make a problem out of yourself or anybody else, or you’ll come to a +bad end. A pocket-book’s to keep your accounts in, not to take notes in +(you take them in your head and use ’em in your arms), not to write +sex-problem rot in—that’s spoilt many a good pocket-book, and many a +good man. You’ve got a girl you’re talking about going back to as soon +as we’ve finished this contract. Don’t you make a problem of her; make +a happy wife and mother of her.... I was very clever when I was +young”—and here Mitchell’s voice took a tinge of bitterness, or +sadness. “I used to make problems out of things.... I ain’t much to +boast of now.... Seems to me that a good many men want to make angels +of their wives without first taking trouble of making saints of +themselves. We want to make women’s ways our ways—it would be just as +fair to make our ways theirs. Some men want to be considered gods in +their own homes; you’ll generally find that sort of men very small +potatoes outside; if they weren’t they wouldn’t bother so much about +being cocks on their own little dunghills.... And again, old mates +seldom quarrel, because they understand each other’s moods. Now, if you +went brooding round for any length of time I’d say to you. ‘Now then, +Harry, what have I been doing to you? Spit it out, old man.’ And you’d +do the same by me; but how many men would take even that much trouble +with their wives?” + +A breeze stirred the mulga and brought the sound of a good voice +singing in the surveyors’ camp: + +Should old acquaintance be forgot + And never brought to min’? +Should old acquaintance be forgot + And the days of Auld Lang Syne? + + +“That damned old tune will upset the Oracle for the rest of the night,” +I said. + +“Now, there’s the Oracle,” said Mitchell. “He was wronged by a woman as +few men are wronged; his life was ruined—but he isn’t the man to take +any stock in sex problems on account of her. He thinks he’s great on +problems, but he isn’t. It all amounts to this—that he’s sorry for most +men and all women and tries to act up to it to the best of his ability; +and if he ain’t a Christian, God knows what is—I don’t. No matter what +a woman does to you, or what you think she does to you, there come +times, sooner or later, when you feel sorry for her—deep down in your +heart—that is if you’re a man. And, no matter what action or course you +might take against her, and no matter how right or justified you might +seem in doing it, there comes a time when, deep down in your heart, you +feel mean and doubtful about your own part. You can take that as a +general thing as regards men against women, and man against man, I +think. And I believe that deep-down feeling of being doubtful, or mean, +or sorry, that comes afterwards, when you are cooler and know more +about the world, is a right and natural thing, and we ought to act more +in accordance with it.” + +Came the refrain from the surveyors’ camp: + +We twa hae run about the braes, + An’ pu’d the gowans fine; +But we’ve wandered mony a weary foot + Sin’ Auld Lang Syne. + + +“We feel sorry for our quarrels with our worst enemy when we see him +lying still and quiet—dead. Why can’t we try and feel a bit sorry +beforehand?” + + For Auld Lang Syne. +We twa ha’ padl’t i’ the burn, + Fra mornin’ sun till dine; +But seas between us braid ha’ roar’d + Sin’ Auld Lang Syne. + + +“I used to feel blazing bitter against things one time but it never +hurt anybody but myself in the end. I argued and quarrelled with a girl +once—and made a problem of the thing and went away. She’s married to a +brute now, and I’m what I am. I made a problem of a good home or the +world once, and went against the last man in God’s world that I should +have gone against, and turned my back on his hand, and left him. His +hand was very cold the next time I took it in mine. We don’t want +problems to make us more bitter against the world than we get +sometimes.” + +And here’s a han’ my trusty frien’, + An’ gie’s a han’ o’ thine, +We’ll tak’ a cup o’ kindness yet + For Auld Lang Syne. + + +“And that song’s the answer of all problems,” said Mitchell. But it was +I who lay awake and thought that night. + + + + +THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAG + + +The Australian swag fashion is the easiest way in the world of carrying +a load. I ought to know something about carrying loads: I’ve carried +babies, which are the heaviest and most awkward and heartbreaking loads +in this world for a boy or man to carry, I fancy. God remember mothers +who slave about the housework (and do sometimes a man’s work in +addition in the bush) with a heavy, squalling kid on one arm! I’ve +humped logs on the selection, “burning-off,” with loads of +fencing-posts and rails and palings out of steep, rugged gullies (and +was happier then, perhaps); I’ve carried a shovel, crowbar, heavy +“rammer,” a dozen insulators on an average (strung round my shoulders +with raw flax)-to say nothing of soldiering kit, tucker-bag, billy and +climbing spurs—all day on a telegraph line in rough country in New +Zealand, and in places where a man had to manage his load with one hand +and help himself climb with the other; and I’ve helped hump and drag +telegraph-poles up cliffs and sidings where the horses couldn’t go. +I’ve carried a portmanteau on the hot dusty roads in green old jackaroo +days. Ask any actor who’s been stranded and had to count railway +sleepers from one town to another! he’ll tell you what sort of an +awkward load a portmanteau is, especially if there’s a broken-hearted +man underneath it. I’ve tried knapsack fashion—one of the least healthy +and most likely to give a man sores; I’ve carried my belongings in a +three-bushel sack slung over my shoulder—blankets, tucker, spare boots +and poetry all lumped together. I tried carrying a load on my head, and +got a crick in my neck and spine for days. I’ve carried a load on my +mind that should have been shared by editors and publishers. I’ve +helped hump luggage and furniture up to, and down from, a top flat in +London. And I’ve carried swag for months out back in Australia—and it +was life, in spite of its “squalidness” and meanness and wretchedness +and hardship, and in spite of the fact that the world would have +regarded us as “tramps”—and a free life amongst _men_ from all the +world! + +The Australian swag was born of Australia and no other land—of the +Great Lone Land of magnificent distances and bright heat; the land of +self-reliance, and never-give-in, and help-your-mate. The grave of many +of the world’s tragedies and comedies—royal and otherwise. The land +where a man out of employment might shoulder his swag in Adelaide and +take the track, and years later walk into a hut on the Gulf, or never +be heard of any more, or a body be found in the bush and buried by the +mounted police, or never found and never buried—what does it matter? + +The land I love above all others—not because it was kind to me, but +because I was born on Australian soil, and because of the foreign +father who died at his work in the ranks of Australian pioneers, and +because of many things. Australia! My country! Her very name is music +to me. God bless Australia! for the sake of the great hearts of the +heart of her! God keep her clear of the old-world shams and social lies +and mockery, and callous commercialism, and sordid shame! And heaven +send that, if ever in my time her sons are called upon to fight for her +young life and honour, I die with the first rank of them and be buried +in Australian ground. + +But this will probably be called false, forced or “maudlin sentiment” +here in England, where the mawkish sentiment of the music-halls, and +the popular applause it receives, is enough to make a healthy man sick, +and is only equalled by music-hall vulgarity. So I’ll get on. + +In the old digging days the knapsack, or straps-across-the chest +fashion, was tried, but the load pressed on a man’s chest and impeded +his breathing, and a man needs to have his bellows free on long tracks +in hot, stirless weather. Then the “horse-collar,” or rolled military +overcoat style—swag over one shoulder and under the other arm—was +tried, but it was found to be too hot for the Australian climate, and +was discarded along with Wellington boots and leggings. Until recently, +Australian city artists and editors—who knew as much about the bush as +Downing Street knows about the British colonies in general—seemed to +think the horse-collar swag was still in existence; and some artists +gave the swagman a stick, as if he were a tramp of civilization with an +eye on the backyard and a fear of the dog. English artists, by the way, +seem firmly convinced that the Australian bushman is born in Wellington +boots with a polish on ’em you could shave yourself by. + +The swag is usually composed of a tent “fly” or strip of calico (a +cover for the swag and a shelter in bad weather—in New Zealand it is +oilcloth or waterproof twill), a couple of blankets, blue by custom and +preference, as that colour shows the dirt less than any other (hence +the name “bluey” for swag), and the core is composed of spare clothing +and small personal effects. To make or “roll up” your swag: lay the fly +or strip of calico on the ground, blueys on top of it; across one end, +with eighteen inches or so to spare, lay your spare trousers and shirt, +folded, light boots tied together by the laces toe to heel, books, +bundle of old letters, portraits, or whatever little knick-knacks you +have or care to carry, bag of needles, thread, pen and ink, spare +patches for your pants, and bootlaces. Lay or arrange the pile so that +it will roll evenly with the swag (some pack the lot in an old +pillowslip or canvas bag), take a fold over of blanket and calico the +whole length on each side, so as to reduce the width of the swag to, +say, three feet, throw the spare end, with an inward fold, over the +little pile of belongings, and then roll the whole to the other end, +using your knees and judgment to make the swag tight, compact and +artistic; when within eighteen inches of the loose end take an inward +fold in that, and bring it up against the body of the swag. There is a +strong suggestion of a roley-poley in a rag about the business, only +the ends of the swag are folded in, in rings, and not tied. Fasten the +swag with three or four straps, according to judgment and the supply of +straps. To the top strap, for the swag is carried (and eased down in +shanty bars and against walls or veranda-posts when not on the track) +in a more or less vertical position—to the top strap, and lowest, or +lowest but one, fasten the ends of the shoulder strap (usually a towel +is preferred as being softer to the shoulder), your coat being carried +outside the swag at the back, under the straps. To the top strap fasten +the string of the nose-bag, a calico bag about the size of a +pillowslip, containing the tea, sugar and flour bags, bread, meat, +baking-powder and salt, and brought, when the swag is carried from the +left shoulder, over the right on to the chest, and so balancing the +swag behind. But a swagman can throw a heavy swag in a nearly vertical +position against his spine, slung from one shoulder only and without +any balance, and carry it as easily as you might wear your overcoat. +Some bushmen arrange their belongings so neatly and conveniently, with +swag straps in a sort of harness, that they can roll up the swag in +about a minute, and unbuckle it and throw it out as easily as a roll of +wall-paper, and there’s the bed ready on the ground with the wardrobe +for a pillow. The swag is always used for a seat on the track; it is a +soft seat, so trousers last a long time. And, the dust being mostly +soft and silky on the long tracks out back, boots last marvellously. +Fifteen miles a day is the average with the swag, but you must travel +according to the water: if the next bore or tank is five miles on, and +the next twenty beyond, you camp at the five-mile water to-night and do +the twenty next day. But if it’s thirty miles you have to do it. +Travelling with the swag in Australia is variously and picturesquely +described as “humping bluey,” “walking Matilda,” “humping Matilda,” +“humping your drum,” “being on the wallaby,” “jabbing trotters,” and +“tea and sugar burglaring,” but most travelling shearers now call +themselves trav’lers, and say simply “on the track,” or “carrying +swag.” + +And there you have the Australian swag. Men from all the world have +carried it—lords and low-class Chinamen, saints and world martyrs, and +felons, thieves, and murderers, educated gentlemen and boors who +couldn’t sign their mark, gentlemen who fought for Poland and convicts +who fought the world, women, and more than one woman disguised as a +man. The Australian swag has held in its core letters and papers in all +languages, the honour of great houses, and more than one national +secret, papers that would send well-known and highly-respected men to +jail, and proofs of the innocence of men going mad in prisons, life +tragedies and comedies, fortunes and papers that secured titles and +fortunes, and the last pence of lost fortunes, life secrets, portraits +of mothers and dead loves, pictures of fair women, heart-breaking old +letters written long ago by vanished hands, and the pencilled +manuscript of more than one book which will be famous yet. + +The weight of the swag varies from the light rouseabout’s swag, +containing one blanket and a clean shirt, to the “royal Alfred,” with +tent and all complete, and weighing part of a ton. Some old sundowners +have a mania for gathering, from selectors’ and shearers’ huts, and +dust-heaps, heart-breaking loads of rubbish which can never be of any +possible use to them or anyone else. Here is an inventory of the +contents of the swag of an old tramp who was found dead on the track, +lying on his face on the sand, with his swag on top of him, and his +arms stretched straight out as if he were embracing the mother earth, +or had made, with his last movement, the sign of the cross to the +blazing heavens: + +Rotten old tent in rags. Filthy blue blanket, patched with squares of +red and calico. Half of “white blanket” nearly black now, patched with +pieces of various material and sewn to half of red blanket. +Three-bushel sack slit open. Pieces of sacking. Part of a woman’s +skirt. Two rotten old pairs of moleskin trousers. One leg of a pair of +trousers. Back of a shirt. Half a waistcoat. Two tweed coats, green, +old and rotting, and patched with calico. Blanket, etc. Large bundle of +assorted rags for patches, all rotten. Leaky billy-can, containing +fishing-line, papers, suet, needles and cotton, etc. Jam-tin, medicine +bottles, corks on strings, to hang to his hat to keep the flies off (a +sign of madness in the bush, for the corks would madden a sane man +sooner than the flies could). Three boots of different sizes, all +belonging to the right foot, and a left slipper. Coffee-pot, without +handle or spout, and quart-pot full of rubbish—broken knives and forks, +with the handles burnt off, spoons, etc., picked up on rubbish-heaps; +and many rusty nails, to be used as buttons, I suppose. + +Broken saw blade, hammer, broken crockery, old pannikins, small rusty +frying-pan without a handle, children’s old shoes, many bits of old +bootleather and greenhide, part of yellowback novel, mutilated English +dictionary, grammar and arithmetic book, a ready reckoner, a cookery +book, a bulgy anglo-foreign dictionary, part of a Shakespeare, book in +French and book in German, and a book on etiquette and courtship. A +heavy pair of blucher boots, with uppers parched and cracked, and soles +so patched (patch over patch) with leather, boot protectors, hoop iron +and hobnails that they were about two inches thick, and the boots +weighed over five pounds. (If you don’t believe me go into the +Melbourne Museum, where, in a glass case in a place of honour, you will +see a similar, perhaps the same, pair of bluchers labelled “An example +of colonial industry.”) And in the core of the swag was a sugar-bag +tied tightly with a whip-lash, and containing another old skirt, rolled +very tight and fastened with many turns of a length of clothes-line, +which last, I suppose, he carried to hang himself with if he felt that +way. The skirt was rolled round a small packet of old portraits and +almost indecipherable letters—one from a woman who had evidently been a +sensible woman and a widow, and who stated in the letter that she did +not intend to get married again as she had enough to do already, +slavin’ her finger-nails off to keep a family, without having a second +husband to keep. And her answer was “final for good and all,” and it +wasn’t no use comin’ “bungfoodlin’” round her again. If he did she’d +set Satan on to him. “Satan” was a dog, I suppose. + +The letter was addressed to “Dear Bill,” as were others. There were no +envelopes. The letters were addressed from no place in particular, so +there weren’t any means of identifying the dead man. The police buried +him under a gum, and a young trooper cut on the tree the words: + +SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF +BILL, +WHO DIED. + + + + +“BUCKOLTS’ GATE” +AN AUSTRALIAN STORY + + +PROLOGUE + +Old Abel Albury had a genius for getting the bull by the tail with a +tight grip, and holding on with both hands and an obstinacy born of +ignorance—and not necessarily for the sake of self-preservation or +selfishness—while all the time the bull might be, so to speak, rooting +up life-long friendships and neighbourly relations, and upsetting +domestic customs and traditions with his horns. + +Yes, Uncle Abel was always grasping the wrong end of things, and +sticking to it with that human mulishness which is often stronger, and +more often wearies and breaks down the opposition than an intelligent +man’s arguments. He was——or professed to be, the family said—unable for +a long time to distinguish between his two grand-nephews, one of whom +was short and fat, while the other was tall and thin, the only points +of resemblance between them being that each possessed the old family +nose and eyes. When they were boys he used to lay the strap about one +in mistake for the other. They had a saying that Uncle Abel saw with +ten squinting eyes. + +Also, he could never—or would not, as the family said—remember names. +He referred to Mrs Porter, a thin, haggard selector’s wife, as “Mrs +Stout” and he balanced matters by calling Mrs Southwick “Mrs +Porterwicket”—when he didn’t address her as “Mrs +What’s-the-woman’s-name”—and he succeeded in deeply offending both +ladies. + +Uncle Abel was Mrs Carey’s uncle. + +Down at the lower end of Carey’s selection at Rocky Rises, in the +extreme corner of the lower or outer paddock, were sliprails opening +into the main road, which ran down along the siding, round the foot of +a spur from ridge, and out west. These sliprails were called “The Lower +Sliprails” by the family, and it occurred to Uncle Abel to refer to +them as “Buckolts’ Gate,” for no other reason apparently than that +Buckolts’ farm lay in that direction. The farm was about a mile further +on, on the other side of the creek, and the gate leading to it from the +main road was round the spur, out of sight of Carey’s selection. It is +quite possible that Uncle Abel reasoned the thing out for days, for of +such material are some human brains. Sliprails, or a slip-panel, is a +panel of fencing of which the rails are made to be slipped out of the +mortise holes in the posts so as to give passage to horses, vehicles +and cattle. I suppose Abel called it a gate, because he was always +going to hang a proper gate there some day. The family were unaware of +his new name for the Lower Sliprails, and after he had, on one or two +occasions, informed the boys that they would find a missing cow or +horse at the Buckolts’ Gate, and they had found it calmly camped at the +Lower Sliprails, and after he had made several appointments to meet +parties at Buckolts’ Gate, and had been found leaning obstinately on +the fence by the Lower Sliprails with no explanation to offer other +than that he _was_ waiting at Buckolts’ Gate, they began to fear that +he was becoming weak in his mind. + +ACT I + +It was New Year’s Eve at Rocky Rises. There was no need for fireworks +nor bonfires, for the bush-fires were out all along the ranges to the +east, and, as night came on, lines and curves of lights—clear lights, +white lights, and, in the nearer distance, red lights and smoky +lights—marked the sidings and ridges of a western spur of the Blue +Mountain Range, and seemed suspended against a dark sky, for the stars +and the loom of the hills were hidden by smoke and drought haze. + +There was a dance at Careys’. Old Carey was a cheerful, broad-minded +bushman, haunted at times by the memories of old days, when he was the +beau of the bush balls, and so when he built his new slab-and-bark barn +he had it properly floored with hard-wood, and the floor well-faced “to +give the young people a show when they wanted a dance,” he said. The +floor had a spring in it, and bush boys and girls often rode twenty +miles and more to dance on that floor. The girls said it was a lovely +floor. + +On this occasion Carey had stacked his wheat outside until after the +New Year. Spring-carts, and men and girls on horseback came in from +miles round. “Sperm” candles had been cut up and thrown on the floor +during the afternoon, and rubbed over by feet cased tightly in +’lastic-sides; and hoops were hung horizontally from the tie-beams, +with candles stuck round them. There were fresh-faced girls, and sweet, +freckled-faced girls, and jolly girls, and shy girls—all sorts of girls +except sulky, “toney” girls—and lanky chaps, most of them sawney, and +weird, whiskered agriculturists, who watched the dancers with old, old +time-worn smiles, or stood, or sat on their heels yarning, with their +pipes, outside, where two boilers were slung over a log-fire to boil +water for tea; and there were leathery women, with complexions like +dried apples, who gossiped—for the first time in months perhaps—and +watched the young people, and thought at times, no doubt, of other +days—of other days when they were girls. (And not so far distant +either, in some cases, for women dry quickly in the bush.) + +And there were one or two old soldiers and their wives, whose eyes +glistened when Jim Bullock played “The Girl I Left Behind Me.” + +Jim Bullock was there with his concertina. He sat on a stool in front +of a bench, on which was a beer-keg, piles of teacups and saucers, +several big tin teapots, and plates of sandwiches, sponge-cakes, and +tarts. Jim sat in his shirt-sleeves, with his flat-brimmed, wire-bound, +“hard-hitter” hat on, slanting over his weaker eye. He held one leg +loosely and the other rigid, with the concertina on his knee, and +swanked away at the instrument by the hour, staring straight in front +of him with the expression of a cod-fish, and never moving a muscle +except the muscles of his great hairy arms and big chapped and +sun-blotched hands; while chaps in tight “larstins” (elastic-side +boots), slop suits of black, bound with braid, and with coats too short +in the neck and arms, and trousers bell-mouthed at the bottoms, and +some with paper collars, narrow red ribbon ties, or scarfs through +walnut shells, held their partners rigidly, and went round the room +with their eyes—most of them—cocked at the rafters in semi-idiotic +ecstasy. + +But there was tall, graceful, pink-and-white Bertha Buckolt, blue-eyed +and blue-black-haired, and little Mary Carey with the kind, grey eyes +and red-gold hair; there was Mary’s wild brother Jim, with curly black +hair and blue eyes and dimples of innocence; and there was Harry Dale, +the drover, Jim’s shearing and droving mate, a tall, good-looking, +brown-eyed and brown-haired young fellow, a “better-class” bushman and +the best dancer in the district. Uncle Abel usurped the position of +M.C., and roared “Now then! take yer partners!” and bawled instructions +and interrupted and tangled up the dancers, until they got used to +taking no notice of his bull voice. Mary Carey was too shy—because she +loved him, and secretly and fondly hoped and doubted that he cared for +her—to be seen dancing more than once with Harry Dale, so he shared +Bertha Buckolt, the best girl dancer there, with Jim Carey, who danced +with his sister when Harry was dancing with Bertha Buckolt, and who +seemed, for some reason best known to himself, to be perfectly +satisfied with the arrangement. Poor little Mary began to fret +presently, and feel a little jealous of Bertha, her old schoolmate. She +was little and couldn’t dance like Bertha, and she couldn’t help +noticing how well Bertha looked to-night, and what a well-matched pair +she and Harry made; and so, when twelve o’clock came and they all went +outside to watch the Old Year out and the New Year in—with a big +bonfire on the distant ridge where the grass fires had reached a +stretch of dry scrub—and to join hands all round and sing “Auld Lang +Syne,” little Mary was not to be found, for she was sitting on a log +round behind the cow-yard, crying softly to herself. + +And when about three o’clock they all started home, Mary gave Bertha +her cheek to kiss instead of her mouth, and that hurt Bertha, who had +_her_ cry riding home, to the astonishment and irritation of her +brother Jack, who rode home with her. But when they were all gone Mary +was missing again and when her mother called her, and, after a pause, +the voice of Harry Dale said, respectfully, in the darkness, “She’s +here, Mrs Carey, she’s all right,” the two were discovered sitting on a +convenient log of the wood-heap, with an awkward and overacted interval +of log between them. + +Old Carey liked Harry Dale, and seemed very well satisfied with the way +things appeared to be going. He pressed Harry to stay at the selection +overnight. “The missus will make you a shake-down on the floor,” he +said. Harry had no appointments, and stayed cheerfully, and old Carey, +having had a whisky or two, insisted on Mary making the shake-down, and +the old folks winked at each other behind the young folks’ backs to see +how poor little Mary spread a spare mattress, with redhot, averted +face, and found an extra pillow and a spare pair of ironed sheets for +the shake-down. + +At sunrise she stole out to milk the cows, which was her regular duty; +there was no other way out from her room than through the dining-room, +where Harry lay on his back, with his arms folded, resting peacefully. +He seemed sound asleep and safe for a good two hours, so she ventured. +As she passed out she paused a moment looking down on him with all the +lovelight in her eyes, and, obeying a sudden impulse, she stooped +softly and touched his forehead with her lips, then she slipped out. +Harry stretched, opened his eyes, winked solemnly at the ceiling, and +then, after a decent interval, he got up, dressed, and went out to help +her to milk. + +Harry Dale and Jim Carey were going out to take charge of a mob of +bullocks going north-west, away up in Queensland. And as they had lost +a day and night to be at the dance, they decided to start in the cool +of the evening and travel all night. Mary walked from the homestead to +the Lower Sliprails between her brother, who rode—because he was her +brother—and led a packhorse on the other side, and Harry, who walked +and led his horse—because he was her sweetheart, avowed only since last +night. + +There were thunderstorms about, and Mary had repented sufficiently with +regard to Bertha Buckolt to wear on her shoulders a cape which Bertha +had left behind her last night. + +When they reached the Lower Sliprails Jim said he’d go on and that +Harry needn’t hurry: he stooped over his horse’s neck, kissed his +sister, promised to keep away from the drink, not to touch a card, and +to leave off fighting, and rode on. And when he rounded the Spur he saw +a tall, graceful figure slipping through the trees from the creek +towards Buckolts’ Gate. + +Then came the critical time at the Lower Sliprails. The shadows from +the setting sun lengthened quickly on the siding, and then the sun +slipped out of sight over a “saddle” in the ridges, and all was soon +dusk save the sunlit peaks of the Blue Mountains away to the east over +the sweeps of blue-grey bush. + +“Ah, well! Mary,” said Harry, “I must make a start now.” + +“You’ll—you’ll look after Jim, won’t you, Harry?” said Mary. + +“I will, Mary, for your sake.” + +Her mouth began to twitch, her chin to tremble, and her eyes brimmed +suddenly. + +“You must cheer up, Mary,” he said with her in his arms. “I’ll be back +before you know where you are, and then we’ll be married right off at +once and settle down for life.” + +She smiled bravely. + +“Good-bye, Mary!” + +“Good-bye, Harry!” + +He led his horse through the rails and lifted them, with trembling +hands, and shot them home. Another kiss across the top rail and he got +on his horse. She mounted the lower rail, and he brought his horse +close alongside the fence and stooped to kiss her again. + +“Cheer up, Mary!” he said. “I’ll tell you what I’ll do—when I come back +I’ll whistle when I reach the Spur and you be here to let the sliprails +down for me. I’ll time myself to get here about sundown. I’ll whistle +‘Willie Riley,’ so you’ll know it’s me. Good-bye, little girl! I must +go now. Don’t fret—the time will soon go by.” + +He turned, swung his horse, and rode slowly down the track, turning now +and again to wave his hand to her, with a farewell flourish of his hat +as he rounded the Spur. His track, five hundred miles, or perhaps a +thousand, into the great north-west; his time, six months, or perhaps a +year. Hers a hundred yards or so back to the dusty, dreary drudgery of +selection life. The daylight faded into starlight, the sidings grew +very dim, and a faint white figure blurred against the bars of the +slip-panel. + +ACT II + +It was the last day of the threshing—shortly after New Year—at Rocky +Rises. The green boughs, which had been lashed to the veranda-posts on +Christmas Eve, had withered and been used for firewood. The travelling +steamer had gone with its gang of men, and the family sat down to tea, +the men tired with hard work and heat, and with prickly heat and +irritating wheaten chaff and dust under their clothes—and with smut +(for the crop had been a smutty one) “up their brains” as Uncle Abel +said—the women worn out with cooking for a big gang of shearers. + +Good-humoured Aunt Emma—who was Uncle Abel’s niece—recovered first, and +started the conversation. There were one or two neighbours’ wives who +bad lent crockery and had come over to help with the cooking in their +turns. Jim Carey’s name came up incidentally, but was quickly dropped, +for ill reports of Jim had come home. Then Aunt Emma mentioned Harry +Dale, and glanced meaningly at Mary, whose face flamed as she bent over +her plate. + +“Never mind, Mary,” said Aunt Emma, “it’s nothing to be ashamed of. We +were all girls once. There’s many a girl would jump at Harry.” + +“Who says I’m ashamed?” said Mary, straightening up indignantly. + +“Don’t tease her, Emma,” said Mrs Carey, mildly. + +“I’ll tell yer what,” said young Tom Carey, frankly, “Mary got a letter +from him to-day. I seen her reading it behind the house.” + +Mary’s face flamed again and went down over her plate. + +“Mary,” said her mother, with sudden interest, “did Harry say anything +of Jim?” + +“No, mother,” said Mary. “And that’s why I didn’t tell you about the +letter.” + +There was a pause. Then Tommy said, with that delightful tact which +usually characterizes young Tommies: + +“Well, Mary needn’t be so cocky about Harry Dale, anyhow. I seen him +New Year’s Eve when we had the dance. I seen him after the dance +liftin’ Bertha Buckolt onter her horse in the dark—as if she couldn’t +get on herself—she’s big enough. I seen him lift her on, an’ he took +her right up an’ lifted her right inter the saddle, ’stead of holdin’ +his hand for her to tread on like that new-chum jackaroo we had. An’, +what’s more, I seen him hug her an’ give her a kiss before he lifted +her on. He told her he was as good as her brother.” + +“What did he mean by that, Tommy?” asked Mrs Porter, to break an +awkward pause. + +“How’m I ter know what he means?” said Tommy, politely. + +“And, Tommy, I seen Harry Dale give young Tommy Carey a lick with a +strap the day before New Year’s Eve for throwing his sister’s cat into +the dam,” said Aunt Emma, coming to poor Mary’s rescue. “Never mind, +Mary, my dear, he said goodbye to you last.” + +“No, _he didn’t_!” roared Uncle Abel. + +They were used to Uncle Abel’s sudden bellowing, but it startled them +this time. + +“Why, Uncle Abel,” cried both Aunt Emma and Mrs Carey, “whatever do you +mean?” + +“What I means is that I ain’t a-goin’ to have the feelin’s of a niece +of mine trifled with. What I means is that I seen Harry Dale with +Bertha Buckolt on New Year’s night after he left here. That’s what I +means—” + +“Don’t speak so loud, Abel, we’re not deaf,” interrupted Carey, as Mary +started up white-faced. “What do you want to always shout for?” + +“I speak loud because I want people to hear me!” roared Uncle Abel, +turning on him. + +“Go on, Uncle Abel,” said Mary, “tell me what you mean.” + +“I mean,” said Uncle Abel, lowering his voice a little, “that I seen +Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts’ Gate that night—I seen it +all—” + +“At _Buckolts_’ Gate!” cried Mary. + +“_Yes_! at Buckolts’ Gate! Ain’t I speakin’ loud enough?” + +“And where were you?” + +“Never mind wheers I was. I was comin’ home along the ridges, and I +seen them. I seen them say good-bye; I seen them hug an’ kiss—” + +“Uncle Abel!” exclaimed Aunt Emma. + +“It’s no use Uncle Abelin’ me. What I sez I sez. I ain’t a-goin’ to +have a niece of mine bungfoodled—” + +“Uncle Abel,” cried Mary, staring at him wild-eyed, “do be careful what +you say. You must have made a mistake. Are you sure it was Bertha and +Harry?” + +“Am I sure my head’s on me neck?” roared Uncle Abel. “Would I see ’em +if I didn’t see ’em? I tell you—” + +“Now wait a moment, Uncle Abel,” interrupted Mary, with dangerous +calmness. “Listen to me. Harry Dale and I are engaged to be married, +and—” + +“Have you got the writings!” shouted Uncle Abel. + +“The what?” said Mary. + +“The writings.” + +“No, of course not.” + +“Then that’s where you are,” said Uncle Abel, triumphantly. “If you had +the writings you could sue him for breach of contract.” + +Uncle Abel, who couldn’t read, had no faith whatever in verbal +agreements (he wouldn’t sign one, he said), all others he referred to +as “writings.” + +“Now, listen to me, Uncle Abel,” said Mary, trembling now. “Are you +sure you saw Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts’ Gate after he +left here that night?” + +“Yes. An’ what’s more, I seen young Tommy there ridin’ on his pony +along by the Spur a little while after, an’ he muster seen them too, if +he’s got a tongue.” + +Mary turned quickly to her brother. + +“Well, all I can say,” said Tommy, quietened now, “is that I seen _her_ +at Buckolts’ Gate that night. I was comin’ home from Two-Mile Flat, and +I met Jim with his packhorse about a mile the other side of Buckolts’, +and while we was talkin’ Harry Dale caught up, so I jist said ‘So-long’ +an’ left ’em. And when I got to Buckolt’s Gate I seen Bertha Buckolt. +She was standin’ under a tree, and she looked as if she was cryin’.” + +But Mary got her bonnet and started out. + +“Where are you going to, Mary?” asked her mother, starting up +nervously. + +“I’m going across to Buckolts’ to find out the truth,” said Mary, and +she went out. + +“Better let her go, Lizzie,” said Aunt Emma, detaining her sister. + +“You’ve done it now, Uncle Abel.” + +“Well, why didn’t she get the writings?” retorted Uncle Abel. + +Half-way to Buckolts’ Mary met Bertha Buckolt herself, coming over to +the selection for the first time since the night of the party. Bertha +started forward to kiss Mary, but stopped short as Mary stood +stock-still and faced her, with her hands behind her back. + +“Why! whatever is the matter, Mary?” exclaimed Bertha. + +“You know very well, Bertha.” + +“Why! Whatever do you mean? What have I done?” + +“What haven’t you done? You’ve—you’ve broken my heart.” + +“Good gracious me! Whatever are you talking about? Tell me what it is, +Mary?” + +“You met him at your gate that night?” + +“I know I did.” + +“Oh, Bertha! How could you be so mean and deceitful?” + +“Mean and deceitful! What do you mean by that? Whatever are you talking +about? I suppose I’ve got as good a right to meet him as anyone else.” + +“No, you haven’t,” retorted Mary, “you’re only stringing him on. You +only did it to spite me. You helped him to deceive me. You ought to be +ashamed to look me in the face.” + +“Good gracious! Whatever are you talking about? Ain’t I good enough for +him! I ought to be, God knows! I suppose he can marry who he likes, and +if I’m poor fool enough to love him and marry him, what then? Mary, you +ought to be the last to speak—speak to—to me like that.” + +“Yes. He can marry all, the girls in the country for all I care. I +never want to see either him or you any more. You’re a cruel, +deceitful, brazen-faced hussy, and he’s a heartless, deceiving +blackguard.” + +“Mary! I believe you’re mad,” said Bertha, firmly. “How dare you speak +to me like that! And as for him being a blackguard. Why, you ought to +be the last in the world to say such a thing; you ought to be the last +to say a word against him. Why, I don’t believe you ever cared a rap +for him in spite of all your pretence. He could go to the devil for all +you cared.” + +“That’s enough, Bertha Buckolt!” cried Mary. “_You_—you! Why, you’re a +barefaced girl, that’s what you are! I don’t want to see your brazen +face again.” With that she turned and stumbled blindly in the direction +of home. + +“Send back my cape,” cried Bertha as she too turned away. + +Mary walked wildly home and fled to her room and locked the door. +Bertha did likewise. + +Mary let Aunt Emma in after a while, ceased sobbing and allowed herself +to be comforted a little. Next morning she was out milking at the usual +time, but there were dark hollows under her eyes, and her little face +was white and set. After breakfast she rolled the cape up very tight in +a brown-paper parcel, addressed it severely to + +MISS BERTHA BUCKOLT, +Eurunderee Creek, + + +and sent it home by one of the school-children. She wrote to Harry Dale +and told him that she knew all about it (not stating what), but she +forgave him and hoped he’d be happy. She never wanted to see his face +again, and enclosed his portrait. + +Harry, who was as true and straight as a bushman could be, puzzled it +out and decided that some one of his old love affairs must have come to +Mary’s ears, and wrote demanding an explanation. + +She never answered that letter. + +ACT III + +It was Christmas Day at Rocky Rises. The plum puddings had been made, +as usual, weeks beforehand, and hung in rags to the tie-beams and taken +down and boiled again. Poultry had been killed and plucked and cooked, +and all the toil had been gone through, and every preparation made for +a red-hot dinner on a blazing hot day—and for no other reason than that +our great-grandmothers used to do it in a cold climate at +Christmas-times that came in mid-winter. Merry men hadn’t gone forth to +the wood to gather in the mistletoe (if they ever did in England, in +the olden days, instead of sending shivering, wretched vassals in rags +to do it); but Uncle Abel had gone gloomily up the ridge on Christmas +Eve, with an axe on his shoulder (and Tommy unwillingly in tow, +scowling and making faces behind his back), and had cut young pines and +dragged them home and lashed them firmly to the veranda-posts, which +was the custom out there. + +There was little goodwill or peace between the three or four farms +round Rocky Rises that Christmas Day, and Uncle Abel had been the cause +of most of the ill-feeling, though they didn’t know, and he was least +aware of it of any. + +It all came about in this way. + +Shortly after last New Year Ryan’s bull had broken loose and gone +astray for two days and nights, breaking into neighbours’ paddocks and +filling himself with hay and damaging other bulls, and making love by +night and hiding in the scrub all day. On the second night he broke +through and jumped over Reid’s fences, and destroyed about an acre of +grape-vines and adulterated Reid’s stock, besides interfering with +certain heifers which were not of a marriageable age. There was a L5 +penalty on a stray bull. Reid impounded the bull and claimed heavy +damages. Ryan, a small selector of little account, was always pulling +some neighbour to court when he wasn’t being “pulled” himself, so he +went to court over this case. + +Now, it appears that the bull, on his holiday, had spent a part of the +first night in Carey’s lower paddock, and Uncle Abel (who was out +mooching about the bush at all hours, “havin’ a look at some timber” or +some “indercations” [of gold], or on some mysterious business or fad, +the mystery of which was of his own making)—Uncle Abel saw the bull in +the paddock at daylight and turned it out the sliprails, and talked +about it afterwards, referring to the sliprails as “Buckolts’ Gate,” of +course, and spoke mysteriously of the case, and put on an appearance of +great importance, and allowed people to get an idea that he knew a lot +if he only liked to speak; and finally he got himself “brought up” as a +witness for Ryan. + +He had a lot of beer in town before he went to the courthouse. All he +knew would have been of no use to either party, but he swore that he +had seen Ryan’s bull inside Buckolts’ Gate at daylight (on the day +which wasn’t in question) and had turned him out. Uncle Abel mixed up +the court a good deal, and roared like the bull, and became more +obstinate the more he was cross-examined, and narrowly escaped being +committed for contempt of court. + +Ryan, who had a high opinion of the breed of his bull, got an idea that +the Buckolts had enticed or driven the bull into their paddock for +stock-raising purposes, instead of borrowing it honestly or offering to +pay for the use of it. Then Ryan wanted to know why Abel had driven his +bull out of Buckolts’ Gate, and the Buckolts wanted to know what +business Abel Albury had to drive Ryan’s bull out of their paddock, if +the bull had really ever been there. And so it went on till Rocky Rises +was ripe for a tragedy. + +The breach between the Careys and the Buckolts was widened, the quarrel +between Ryan and Reid intensified. Ryan got a down on the Careys +because he reckoned that Uncle Abel had deliberately spoilt his case +with his evidence; and the Reids and Careys were no longer on speaking +terms, because nothing would convince old Reid that Abel hadn’t tried +to prove that Ryan’s bull had never been in Reid’s paddock at all. + +Well, it was Christmas Day, and the Carey family and Aunt Emma sat down +to dinner. Jim was present, having arrived overnight, with no money, as +usual, and suffering a recovery. The elder brother, Bob (who had a +selection up-country), and his wife were there. Mrs Carey moved round +with watchful eyes and jealous ears, lest there should be a word or a +look which might hurt the feelings of her wild son—for of such are +mothers. + +Dinner went on very moodily, in spite of Aunt Emma, until at last Jim +spoke—almost for the first time, save for a long-whispered and, on his +part, repentant conversation with his mother. + +“Look here, Mary!” said Jim. “What did you throw Harry Dale over for?” + +“Don’t ask me, Jim.” + +“Rot! What did he do to you? I’m your brother” (with a glance at Bob), +“and I ought to know.” + +“Well, then, ask Bertha Buckolt. She saw him last.” + +“What!” cried Jim. + +“Hold your tongue, Jim! You’ll make her cry,” said Aunt Emma. + +“Well, what’s it all about, anyway?” demanded Jim. “All I know is that +Mary wrote to Harry and threw him over, and he ain’t been the same man +since. He swears he’ll never come near the district again.” + +“Tell Jim, Aunt Emma,” said Mary. And Aunt Emma started to tell the +story as far as she knew. + +“Saw her at Buckolt’s sliprails!” cried Jim, starting up. “Well, he +couldn’t have had time to more than say good-bye to her, for I was with +her there myself, and Harry caught up to me within a mile of the +gate—and I rode pretty fast.” + +“He had a jolly long good-bye with her,” shouted Uncle Abel. “Look +here, Jim! I ain’t goin’ to stand by and see a nephew of mine +bungfoodled by no girl; an’, I tell you I seen ’em huggin’ and kissin’ +and canoodlin’ for half an hour at Buckolts’ Gate!” + +“It’s a—a— Look here, Uncle Abel, be careful what you say. You’ve got +the bull by the tail again, that’s what it is!” Jim’s face grew +whiter—and it had been white enough on account of the drink. “How did +you know it was them? You’re always mistaking people. It might have +been someone else.” + +“I know Harry Dale on horseback two miles off!” roared Uncle Abel. “And +I knowed her by her cape.” + +It was Mary’s turn to gasp and stare at Uncle Abel. + +“Uncle Abel,” she managed to say, “Uncle Abel! Wasn’t it at our Lower +Sliprails you saw them and not Buckolts’ Gate?” + +“Well!” bellowed Uncle Abel. “You might call ’em the ‘Lower Sliprails,’ +but I calls ’em Buckolts’ Gate! They lead to’r’ds Buckolts’, don’t +they? Hey? Them other sliprails”—jerking his arms in the direction of +the upper paddock “them theer other sliprails that leads outer Reid’s +lane I calls Reid’s Sliprails. I don’t know nothing about no upper or +lower, or easter or wester, or any other la-di-dah names you like to +call ’em.” + +“Oh, uncle,” cried Mary, trembling like a leaf, “why didn’t you explain +this before? Why didn’t you tell us?” + +“What cause have I got to tell any of you everything I sez or does or +thinks? It ’ud take me all me time. Ain’t you got any more brains than +Ryan’s bull, any of you? Hey!—You’ve got heads, but so has cabbages. +Explain! Why, if the world wasn’t stuffed so full of jumped-up fools +there’d be never no need for explainin’.” + +Mary left the table. + +“What is it, Mary?” cried Aunt Emma. + +“I’m going across to Bertha,” said Mary, putting on her hat with +trembling hands. “It was me Uncle Abel saw. I had Bertha’s cape on that +night.” + +“Oh, Uncle Abel,” cried Aunt Emma, “whatever have you done?” + +“Well,” said Uncle Abel, “why didn’t she get the writin’s as I told +her? It’s to be hoped she won’t make such a fool of herself next time.” + +Half an hour later, or thereabouts, Mary sat on Bertha Buckolt’s bed, +with Bertha beside her and Bertha’s arm round her, and they were crying +and laughing by turns. + +“But-but-why didn’t you _tell_ me it was Jim?” said Mary. + +“Why didn’t you tell me it was Harry, Mary?” asked Bertha. “It would +have saved all this year of misery. + +“I didn’t see Harry Dale at all that night,” said Bertha. “I was—I was +crying when Jim left me, and when Harry came along I slipped behind a +tree until he was past. And now, look here, Mary, I can’t marry Jim +until he steadies down, but I’ll give him another chance. But, Mary, +I’d sooner lose him than you.” + +Bertha walked home with Mary, and during the afternoon she took Jim +aside and said: + +“Look here, Jim, I’ll give you another chance—for a year. Now I want +you to ride into town and send a telegram to Harry Dale. How long would +it take him to get here?” + +“He couldn’t get here before New Year,” said Jim. + +“That will do,” said Bertha, and Jim went to catch his horse. Next day +Harry’s reply came: “Coming” + +ACT IV + +New Year’s Eve. The dance was at Buckolts’ this year, but Bertha didn’t +dance much; she was down by the gate most of the time with little Mary +Carey, waiting, and watching the long, white road, and listening for +horses’ feet, and disappointed often as other horsemen rode by or +turned up to the farm. + +And in the hot sunrise that morning, within a hundred miles of Rocky +Rises, a tired, dusty drover camped in the edge of a scrub, boiled his +quart-pot, broiled a piece of mutton on the coals, and lay down on the +sand to rest an hour or so before pushing on to a cattle station he +knew to try and borrow fresh horses. He had ridden all night. + +Old Buckolt and Carey and Reid smoked socially under the grape-vines, +with bottles of whisky and glasses, and nudged each other and coughed +when they wanted to laugh at Old Abel Albury, who was, for about the +first time in his life, condescending to explain. He was explaining to +them what thund’rin’ fools they had been. + +Later on they sent a boy on horseback with a bottle of whisky and a +message to Ryan, who turned up in time to see the New Year in with them +and contradict certain slanders concerning the breed of his bull. + +Meanwhile Bertha comforted Mary, and at last persuaded her to go home. +“He’s sure to be here to-morrow, Mary,” she said, “and you need to look +fresh and happy.” + +But Mary didn’t sleep that night; she was up before daylight, had the +kettle on and some chops ready to fry, and at daybreak she was down by +the sliprails again. She was turning away for the second time when she +heard a clear whistle round the Spur—then the tune of “Willie Riley,” +and the hobble-chains and camp-ware on the packhorse jingling to the +tune. + +She pulled out the rails with eager, trembling hands and leaned against +the tree. An hour later a tired drover lay on his back, in his ragged, +track-worn clothes and dusty leggings, on Mary’s own little bed in the +skillion off the living-room, and rested. Mary bustled round getting +breakfast ready, and singing softly to herself; once she slipped in, +bent over Harry and kissed him gently on the lips, and ran out as he +stirred. + +“Why, who’s that?” exclaimed Uncle Abel, poking round early and +catching a glimpse of Harry through the open door. + +“It’s only Harry, Uncle Abel,” said Mary. + +Uncle Abel peered in again to make sure. + +“Well, be sure you git the writin’s this time,” he said. + + + + +THE BUSH-FIRE + + +I.—SQUATTER AND SELECTOR + +Wall was a squatter and a hard man. There had been long years of +drought and loss, and then came the rabbit pest—the rabbits swarmed +like flies over his run, and cropped the ground bare where even the +poor grass might have saved thousands of sheep—and the rabbits cost the +squatter hundreds of pounds in “rabbit-proof” fences, trappers’ wages, +etc., just to keep them down. Then came arrangements with the bank. And +then Wall’s wife died. Wall started to brood over other days, and the +days that had gone between, and developed a temper which drove his +children from home one by one, till only Mary was left. She managed the +lonely home with the help of a half-caste. Then in good seasons came +the selectors. + +Men remembered Wall as a grand boss and a good fellow, but that was in +the days before rabbits and banks, and syndicates and “pastoralists” or +pastoral companies instead of good squatters. Runs were mostly pastoral +leases for which the squatter paid the Government so much per square +mile (almost a nominal rent). Selections were small holdings taken up +by farmers under residential and other conditions and paid for by +instalments. If you were not ruined by the drought, and paid up long +enough, the land became freehold. The writer is heir to a dusty patch +of three hundred acres or so in the scrub which was taken up thirty +years ago and isn’t freehold yet. + +Selectors were allowed to take up land on runs or pastoral leases as +well as on unoccupied Crown lands, and as they secured the best bits of +land, and on water frontages if they could, and as, of course, +selections reduced the area of the run, the squatters loved selectors +like elder brothers. One man is allowed to select only a certain amount +of land, and required by law to live on it, so the squatters bought as +much freehold about the homestead as they could afford, selected as +much as they are allowed to by law, and sometimes employed “dummy” +selectors to take up choice bits about the runs and hold them for them. +They fought selectors in many various ways, and, in some cases, annoyed +and persecuted them with devilish ingenuity. + +Ross was a selector, and a very hard man physically. He was a short, +nuggety man with black hair and frill beard (a little dusty), bushy +black eyebrows, piercing black eyes, horny knotted hands, and the +obstinacy or pluck of a dozen men to fight drought and the squatter. +Ross selected on Wall’s run, in a bend of Sandy Creek, a nice bit of +land with a black soil, flat and red soil sidings from the ridges, +which no one had noticed before, and with the help of his boys he got +the land cleared and fenced in a year or two—taking bush contracts +about the district between whiles to make “tucker” for the family until +he got his first crop off. + +Wall was never accused of employing dummies, or underhanded methods in +dealings with selectors, but he had been through so much and had +brooded so long that he had grown very hard and bitter and suspicious, +and the reverse of generous—as many men do who start out in life too +soft and goodhearted and with too much faith in human nature. He was a +tall, dark man. He ordered Ross’s boys off the run, impounded Ross’s +stock—before Ross had got his fencing finished, summoned Ross for +trespass, and Ross retaliated as well as he could, until at last it +mightn’t have been safe for one of those men to have met the other with +a gun. The impounding of the selector’s cattle led to the last bad +quarrel between Wall and his son Billy, who was a tall, good-natured +Cornstalk, and who reckoned that Australia was big enough for all of +us. One day in the drought, and in an extra bitter mood, Wall heard +that some of his sheep had been dogged in the vicinity of Ross’s +selection, and he ordered Billy to take a station-hand and watch Ross’s +place all night, and, if Ross’s cattle put their noses over the +boundary, to drive them to the pound, fifteen miles away; also to lay +poisoned baits for the dogs all round the selection. And Billy flatly +refused. + +“I know Ross and the boys,” he said, “and I don’t believe they dogged +the sheep. Why, they’ve only got a Newfoundland pup, and an old lame, +one-eyed sheep-dog that couldn’t hurt a flea. Now, father, this sort of +thing has been going on long enough. What difference does a few paltry +acres make to us? The country is big enough, God knows! Ross is a +straight man and—for God’s sake, give the man a chance to get his +ground fenced in; he’s doing it as fast as he can, and he can’t watch +his cattle day and night.” + +“Are you going to do as I tell you, or are you not?” shouted Wall. + +“Well, if it comes to that, I’m not,” said Billy. “I’m not going to +sneak round a place all night and watch for a chance to pound a poor +man’s cows.” + +It was an awful row, down behind the wool-shed, and things looked so +bad that old Peter, the station-hand, who was a witness, took off his +coat and rolled up his sleeves, ready, as he said afterwards, “to roll +into” either the father or the son if one raised a hand against the +other. + +“Father!” said Billy, though rather sobered by the sight of his +father’s trembling, choking passion, “do you call yourself an +Englishman?” + +“Yes!” yelled Wall, furiously. “What the hell do you call yourself?” + +“If it comes to that I’m an Australian,” said Billy, and he turned away +and went to catch his horse. He went up-country and knocked about in +the north-west for a year or two. + +II.—ROMEO AND JULIET + +Mary Wall was twenty-five. She was an Australian bush girl, every inch +of her five-foot-nine; she had a pink-and-white complexion, dark blue +eyes, blue-black hair, and “the finest figure in the district,” on +horseback or afoot. She was the best girlrider too (saddle or +bare-back), and they say that when she was a tomboy she used to tuck +her petticoats under her and gallop man-fashion through the scrub after +horses or cattle. She said she was going to be an old maid. + +There came a jackaroo on a visit to the station. He was related to the +bank with which Wall had relations. He was a dude, with an expensive +education and no brains. He was very vain of his education and +prospects. He regarded Mary with undisguised admiration, and her father +had secret hopes. One evening the jackaroo was down by the +homestead-gate when Mary came cantering home on her tall chestnut. The +gate was six feet or more, and the jackaroo raised his hat and hastened +to open it, but Mary reined her horse back a few yards and the “dood” +had barely time to jump aside when there was a scuffle of hoofs on the +road, a “Ha-ha-ha!” in mid-air, a landing thud, and the girl was away +up the home-track in a cloud of dust. + +A few days later the jackaroo happened to be at Kelly’s, a wayside +shanty, watching a fight between two bushmen, when Mary rode up. She +knew the men. She whipped her horse in between them and struck at first +one and then the other with her riding-whip. + +“You ought to be ashamed of yourselves!” she said; “and both married +men, too!” + +It evidently struck them that way, for after a bit they shook hands and +went home. + +“And I wouldn’t have married that girl for a thousand pounds,” said the +jackaroo, relating the incidents to some friends in Sydney. + +Mary said she wanted a man, if she could get one. + +There was no life at home nowadays, so Mary went to all the bush dances +in the district. She thought nothing of riding twenty or thirty miles +to a dance, dancing all night, and riding home again next morning. At +one of these dances she met young Robert Ross, a clean-limbed, +good-looking young fellow about her own age. She danced with him and +liked him, and danced with him again, and he rode part of the way home +with her. The subject of the quarrel between the two homes came up +gradually. + +“The boss,” said Robert, meaning his father, “the boss is always ready +to let bygones be bygones. It’s a pity it couldn’t be fixed up.” + +“Yes,” said Mary, looking at him (Bob looked very well on horseback), +“it is a pity.” + +They met several times, and next Prince of Wales’s birthday they rode +home from the races together. Both had good horses, and they happened +to be far ahead of the others on the wide, straight clear road that ran +between the walls of the scrub. Along, about dusk, they became very +confidential indeed—Mary had remarked what a sad and beautiful sunset +it was. The horses got confidential, too, and shouldered together, and +touched noses, and, after a long interval in the conversation, during +which Robert, for one, began to breathe quickly, he suddenly leaned +over, put his arm round her waist and made to kiss her. She jerked her +body away, threw up her whiphand, and Robert ducked instinctively; but +she brought her whip down on her horse’s flank instead, and raced +ahead. Robert followed—or, rather, his horse did: he thought it was a +race, and took the bit in his teeth. Robert kept calling, appealing: + +“Wait a while, Mary! I want to explain! I want to apologize! For God’s +sake listen to me, Mary!” + +But Mary didn’t hear him. Perhaps she misunderstood the reason of the +chase and gave him credit for a spice of the devil in his nature. But +Robert grew really desperate; he felt that the thing must be fixed up +now or never, and gave his horse a free rein. Her horse was the +fastest, and Robert galloped in the dust from his heels for about a +mile and a half; then at the foot of a rise Mary’s horse stumbled and +nearly threw her over his head, and then he stopped like the good horse +he was. + +Robert got down feeling instinctively that he might best make his peace +on foot, and approached Mary with a face of misery—she had dropped her +whip. + +“Oh, Bob!” she said, “I’m knocked out;” and she slipped down into his +arms and stayed there a while. + +They sat on a log and rested, while their horses made inquiries of each +other’s noses, and compared notes. + +And after a good while Mary said “No, Bob, it’s no use talking of +marrying just yet. I like you, Bob, but I could never marry you while +things are as they are between your father and mine. Now, that’ll do. +Let me get on my horse, Bob. I’ll be safer there.” + +“Why?” asked Bob. + +“Come on, Bob, and don’t be stupid.” + +She met him often and “liked” him. + +III.—A TRAMP’S MATCH AND WHAT IT DID + +It was Christmas Eve at Wall’s, but there was no score or so of buggies +and horses and dozens of strange dogs round the place as of old. The +glasses and decanters were dusty on the heavy old-fashioned sideboard +in the dining-room; and there was only a sullen, brooding man leaning +over the hurdles and looking at his rams in the yard, and a sullen, +brooding half-caste at work in the kitchen. Mary had ridden away that +morning to visit a girl chum. + +It was towards the end of a long drought, and the country was like +tinder for hundreds of miles round—the ground for miles and miles in +the broiling scrubs “as bare as your hand,” or covered with coarse, dry +tufts. There was feed grass in places, but you had to look close to see +it. + +Shearing had finished the day before, but there was a black boy and a +station-hand or two about the yards and six or eight shearers and +rouseabouts, and a teamster camped in the men’s huts—they were staying +over the holidays to shear stragglers and clean up generally. Old Peter +and a jackaroo were out on the run watching a bush-fire across Sandy +Creek. + +A swagman had happened to call at the station that morning; he asked +for work and then for tucker. He irritated Wall, who told him to clear +out. It was the first time that a swagman had been turned away from the +station without tucker. + +Swaggy went along the track some miles, brooding over his wrongs, and +crossed Sandy Creek. He struck a match and dropped it into a convenient +tuft of grass in a likely patch of tufts, with dead grass running from +it up into the scrubby ridges—then he hurried on. + +Did you ever see a bush-fire? Not sheets of flame sweeping and roaring +from tree-top to tree-top, but the snaky, hissing grass-fire of +hardwood country. + +The whole country covered with thin blue smoke so that you never know +in what direction the fire is travelling. At night you see it like the +lighted streets of cities, in the distant ranges. It roars up the +hollows of dead trees and gives them the appearance of factory chimneys +in the dusk. It climbs, by shreds of bark, the trunks of old dead +white-box and blue-gums—solid and hard as cast-iron—and cuts off the +limbs. And where there’s a piece of recently ringbarked country, with +the dead leaves still on the trees, the fire will roar from bough to +bough—a fair imitation of a softwood forest fire. The bush-fire travels +through the scrubs for hundreds of miles, taking the grass to the +roots, scorching the living bush but leaving it alive—for gumbush is +hardest of any to kill. Where there is no undergrowth, and the country +seems bare as a road for miles, the fire will cross, licking up +invisible straws of grass, dusty leaves, twigs and shreds of bark on +the hard ground already baking in the drought. You hear of a fire miles +away, and next day, riding across the head of a gully, you hear a +hissing and crackling and there is the fire running over the ground in +lines and curves of thin blue smoke, snakelike, with old logs blazing +on the blackened ground behind. Did you ever _hear_ a fire where a fire +should not be? There is something hellish in the sound of it. When the +breeze is, say, from the east the fire runs round western spurs, up +sheltered gullies—helped by an “eddy” in the wind perhaps—and appears +along the top of the ridge, ready, with a change in the wind, to come +down on farms and fields of ripe wheat, with a “front” miles long. + +A selector might be protected by a wide sandy creek in front and wide +cleared roads behind, and, any hour in the day or night, a shout from +the farther end of the wheat paddock, and—“Oh, my God! the wheat!” + +Wall didn’t mind this fire much; most of his sheep were on their way +out back, to a back run where there was young grass; and the dry ridges +along the creek would be better for a burning-off—only he had to watch +his fences. + +But, about dusk, Mary came galloping home in her usual breakneck +fashion. + +“Father,” she cried, “turn out the men and send them at once. The fire +is all down by Ross’s farm, and he has ten acres of wheat standing, and +no one at home but him and Bob.” + +“How do you know?” growled Wall. Then suddenly and suspiciously, “Have +you been there?” + +“I came home that way.” + +“Well—let Ross look after his own,” snarled the father. + +“But he can’t, father. They’re fighting the fire now, and they’ll be +burnt out before the morning if they don’t get help—for God’s sake, +father, act like a Christian and send the men. Remember it is +Christmas-time, father. You’re surely not going to see a neighbour +burnt out.” + +“Yes, I am,” shouted Wall. “I’d like to see every selector in the +country burnt out, hut and all! Get off that horse and go inside. If a +man leaves the station to-night he needn’t come back.” (This last for +the benefit of the men’s hut.) + +“But, father—” + +“Get off that horse and go inside,” roared Wall. + +“I—I won’t.” + +“What!” He darted forward as though to drag her from the saddle, but +she swung her horse away. + +“Stop! Where are you going?” + +“To help Ross,” said Mary. “He had no one to send for help.” + +“Then go the same way as your brother!” roared her father; “and if you +show your nose back again I’ll horse-whip you off the run!” + +“I’ll go, father,” said Mary, and she was away. + +IV.—THE FIRE AT ROSS’S FARM + +Ross’s farm was in a corner between the ridges and the creek. The fire +had come down from the creek, but the siding on that side was fairly +clear, and they had stopped the fire there. It went behind the ridge +and ran up and over. The ridge was covered thickly with scrub and dead +grass; the wheat-field went well up the siding, and along the top was a +bush face with only a narrow bridle-track between it and the long dead +grass. Everything depended on the wind. Mary saw Ross and Mrs Ross and +the daughter Jenny, well up the siding above the fence, working +desperately, running to and fro, and beating out the fire with green +boughs. Mary left her horse, ran into the hut, and looked hurriedly +round for something to wear in place of her riding-skirt. She only saw +a couple of light print dresses. She stepped into a skillion room, +which happened to be Bob’s room, and there caught sight of a pair of +trousers and a coat hanging on the wall. + +Bob Ross, beating desperately along a line of fire that curved +down-hill to his right, and half-choked and blinded with the smoke, +almost stumbled against a figure which was too tall to be his father. + +“Why! who’s that?” he gasped. + +“It’s only me, Bob,” said Mary, and she lifted her bough again. + +Bob stared. He was so astonished that he almost forgot the fire and the +wheat. Bob was not thin—but— + +“Don’t look at me, Bob!” said Mary, hurriedly. “We’re going to be +married, so it doesn’t matter. Let us save the wheat.” + +There was no time to waste; there was a breeze now from over the +ridges, light, but enough to bear the fire down on them. Once, when +they had breathing space, Mary ran to the creek for a billy of water. +They beat out the fire all along the siding to where a rib of granite +came down over the ridge to the fence, and then they thought the wheat +was safe. They came together here, and Ross had time to look and see +who the strange man was; then he stared at Mary from under his black, +bushy eyebrows. Mary, choking and getting her breath after her +exertions, suddenly became aware, said “Oh!” and fled round the track +beyond the point of granite. She felt a gust of wind and looked up the +ridge. The bush fence ended here in a corner, where it was met by a new +wire fence running up from the creek. It was a blind gully full of tall +dead grass, and, glancing up, Mary saw the flames coming down fast. She +ran back. + +“Come on!” she cried, “come on! The fire’s the other side of the +rocks!” + +Back at the station, Wall walked up and down till he cooled. He went +inside and sat down, but it was no use. He lifted his head and saw his +dead wife’s portrait on the wall. Perhaps his whole life ran before him +in detail—but this is not a psychological study. + +There were only two tracks open to him now: either to give in, or go on +as he was going—to shut himself out from human nature and become known +as “Mean Wall,” “Hungry Wall,” or “Mad Wall, the Squatter.” He was a +tall, dark man of strong imagination and more than ordinary +intelligence. And it was the great crisis of his ruined life. He walked +to the top of a knoll near the homestead and saw the fire on the ridges +above Ross’s farm. As he turned back he saw a horseman ride up and +dismount by the yard. + +“Is that you, Peter?” + +“Yes, boss. The fences is all right.” + +“Been near Ross’s?” + +“No. He’s burnt out by this time.” + +Wall walked to and fro for a few minutes longer. Then he suddenly +stopped and called, “Peter!” + +“Ay, ay!” from the direction of the huts. + +“Turn out the men!” and Wall went into a shed and came out with his +saddle on his arm. + +The fire rushed down the blind gully. Showers of sparks fell on the +bush fence, it caught twice, and they put it out, but the third time it +blazed and roared and a fire-engine could not have stopped it. + +“The wheat must go,” said Ross. “We’ve done our best,” and he threw +down the blackened bough and leaned against a tree, and covered his +eyes with a grimy hand. + +The wheat was patchy in that corner—there were many old stumps of +trees, and there were bare strips where the plough had gone on each +side of them. Mary saw a chance, and climbed the fence. + +“Come on, Bob,” she cried, “we might save it yet. Mr Ross, pull out the +fence along there,” and she indicated a point beyond the fire. They +tramped down and tore up the wheat where it ran between the stumps—the +fire was hissing and crackling round and through it, and just as it ran +past them in one place there was a shout, a clatter of horses’ hoofs on +the stones, and Mary saw her father riding up the track with a dozen +men behind him. She gave a shriek and ran straight down, through the +middle of the wheat, towards the hut. + +Wall and his men jumped to the ground, wrenched green boughs from the +saplings, and, after twenty minutes’ hard fighting, the crop was +saved—save for a patchy acre or so. When it was all over Ross sat down +on a log and rested his head on his hands, and his shoulders shook. +Presently he felt a hand on his shoulder, looked up, and saw Wall. + +“Shake hands, Ross,” he said. + +And it was Christmas Day. + +But in after years they used to nearly chaff the life out of Mary. “You +were in a great hurry to put on the breeches, weren’t you, Mary?” +“Bob’s best Sunday-go-meetin’s, too, wasn’t they, Mary?” “Rather tight +fit, wasn’t they, Mary?” “Couldn’t get ’em on now, could you, Mary?” + +“But,” reflected old Peter apart to some cronies, “it ain’t every young +chap as gits an idea of the shape of his wife afore he marries her—is +it? An’ that’s sayin’ somethin’.” + +And old Peter was set down as being an innercent sort of ole cove. + + + + +THE HOUSE THAT WAS NEVER BUILT + + +There had been heavy rain and landslips all along the branch railway +which left the Great Western Line from Sydney just beyond the Blue +Mountains, and ran through thick bush and scrubby ridgy country and +along great alluvial sidings—were the hills on the opposite side of the +wide valleys (misty in depths) faded from deep blue into the pale azure +of the sky—and over the ends of western spurs to the little farming, +mining and pastoral town of Solong, situated in a circle of blue hills +on the banks of the willow-fringed Cudgegong River. + +The line was hopelessly blocked, and some publicans at Solong had put +on the old coach-road a couple of buggies, a wagonette, and an old mail +coach—relic of the days of Cobb & Co., which had been resurrected from +some backyard and tinkered up—to bring the train passengers on from the +first break in the line over the remaining distance of forty miles or +so. Capertee Station (old time, “Capertee Camp”—a teamster’s camp) was +the last station before the first washout, and there the railway line +and the old road parted company for the last time before reaching +Solong—the one to run round by the ends of the western spurs that +spread fanlike, and the other to go through and over, the rough +country. + +The train reached Capertee about midnight in broad moonlight that was +misty in the valleys and round the blue of Crown Ridge. I got a +“box-seat” beside the driver on the old coach. It was a grand old +road—one of the old main coach-roads of New South Wales—broad and +white, metalled nearly all the way, and in nearly as good condition as +on the day when the first passenger train ran into Solong and the +last-used section of the old road was abandoned. It dated back to the +bushranging days—right back to convict times: it ran through tall dark +bush, up over gaps or “saddles” in high ridges, down across deep dark +gullies, and here and there across grey, marshy, curlew-haunted flats. +Cobb & Co’s coach-and-six, with “Royal Mail” gilded on the panels, had +dashed over it in ten and twelve-mile stages in the old days, the three +head-lamps flashing on the wild dark bush at night, and maybe +twenty-four passengers on board. The biggest rushes to richest +goldfields in the west had gone over this old road on coaches, on +carts, on drays, on horse and bullock wagons, on horseback, and on +foot; new chums from all the world and from all stations in life. + +When many a step was on the mountains, +Marching west to the land of gold. + + +And a few came back rich—red, round-faced and jolly—on the box-seat of +Cobb & Co’s, treating the driver and all hands, “going home” to +sweethearts or families. (Home people will never feel the meaning of +those two words, “going home,” as it is felt in a new land.) And many +came back broken men, tramping in rags, and carrying their swags +through the dusty heat of the drought in December or the bitter, +pelting rain in the mountains in June. Some came back grey who went as +boys; and there were many who never came back. + +I remembered the old mile-trees, with a section of bark cut away and +the distances cut in Roman letters in the hardened sap—the distance +from Bowenfels, the railway terminus then. It was a ghostly old road, +and if it wasn’t haunted it should have been. There was an old decaying +and nearly deserted coaching town or two; there were abandoned farms +and halfway inns, built of stone, with the roofs gone and nettles +growing high between the walls; the remains of an orchard here and +there—a few gnarled quince-trees—and the bush reclaiming its own again. +It was a haunted ride for me, because I had last ridden over this old +road long ago when I was young—going to see the city for the first +time—and because I was now on my way to attend the funeral of one of my +father’s blood from whom t had parted in anger. + +We slowly climbed, and almost as slowly descended, the steep siding of +a great hill called Aaron’s Pass, and about a mile beyond the foot of +the hill I saw a spot I remembered passing on the last journey down, +long ago. Rising back from the road, and walled by heavy bush, was a +square clearing, and in the background I saw plainly, by the broad +moonlight, the stone foundations for a large house; from the front an +avenue of grown pines came down to the road. + +“Why!” I exclaimed, turning to the driver, “was that house burnt down?” + +“No,” he said slowly. “That house was never built.” + +I stared at the place again and caught sight of a ghostly-looking light +between the lines of the foundations, which I presently made out to be +a light in a tent. + +“There’s someone camping there,” I said. + +“Yes,” said the driver, “some old swaggy or ‘hatter.’ I seen him comin’ +down. I don’t know nothing about that there place.” (I hadn’t “shouted” +for him yet.) + +I thought and remembered. I remembered myself, as a boy, being sent a +coach journey along this road to visit some relatives in Sydney. We +passed this place, and the women in the coach began to talk of the fine +house that was going to be built there. The ground was being levelled +for the foundations, and young pines had been planted, with stakes +round them to protect them from the cattle. I remembered being mightily +interested in the place, for the women said that the house was to be a +two-storied one. I thought it would be a wonderful thing to see a +two-storied house there in the bush. The height of my ambition was to +live in a house with stairs in it. The women said that this house was +being built for young Brassington, the son of the biggest squatter then +in the district, who was going to marry the daughter of the next +biggest squatter. That was all I remember hearing the women say. + +Three or four miles along the road was a public-house, with a post +office, general store, and blacksmith shop attached, as is usual in +such places—all that was left of the old pastoral and coaching town of +Ilford. I “shouted” for the driver at the shanty, but got nothing +further out of him concerning the fate of the house that was never +built. I wanted that house for a story. + +However, while yarning with some old residents at Solong, I mentioned +the Brassingtons, and picked up a few first links in the story. The +young couple were married and went to Sydney for their honeymoon. The +story went that they intended to take a trip to the old country and +Paris, to be away a twelve-month, and the house was to be finished and +ready for them on their return. Young Brassington himself had a big +sheep-run round there. The railway wasn’t thought of in those days, or +if it was, no Brassington could have dreamed that the line could have +been brought to Solong in any other direction than through the property +of the “Big Brassingtons,” as they were called. Well, the young couple +went to Sydney, but whether they went farther the old residents did not +know. All they knew was that within a few weeks, and before the stone +foundations for the brick walls of the house were completed, the +building contract was cancelled, the workmen were dismissed, and the +place was left as I last saw it; only the ornamental pines had now +grown to trees. The Brassingtons and the bride’s people were English +families and reserved. They kept the story, if there was a story, to +themselves. The girl’s people left the district and squatted on new +stations up-country. The Big Brassingtons came down in the world and +drifted to the city, as many smaller people do, more and more every +year. Neither young Brassington nor his wife was ever again seen or +heard of in the district. + +I attended my relative’s funeral, and next day started back for Sydney. + +Just as we reached Ilford, as it happened, the pin of the fore +under-carriage of the coach broke, and it took the blacksmith several +hours to set it right. The place was dull, the publican was not +communicative—or else he harped on the old local grievance of the +railway not having come that way—so about half an hour before I thought +the coach would be ready, I walked on along the road to stretch by +legs. I walked on and on until I came, almost unaware, to the site of +the house that was never built. The tent was still there, in fact, it +was a permanent camp, and I was rather surprised to see the man working +with a trowel on a corner of the unfinished foundations of the house. +At first I thought he was going to build a stone hut in the corner, but +when I got close to him I saw that he was working carefully on the +original plan of the building: he was building the unfinished parts of +the foundation walls up to the required height. He had bricklayer’s +tools, a bag of lime, and a heap of sand, and had worked up a +considerable quantity of mortar. It was a rubble foundation: he was +knocking off the thin end of a piece of stone to make it fit, and the +clanging of the trowel prevented his hearing my footsteps. + +“Good day, mate,” I said, close beside him. + +I half expected he’d start when I spoke, but he didn’t: he looked round +slowly, but with a haunted look in his eyes as if I might have been one +of his ghosts. He was a tall man, gaunt and haggard-eyed, as many men +are in the bush; he may have been but little past middle age, and grey +before his time. + +“Good day,” he said, and he set the stone in its place, carefully flush +with the outer edge of the wall, before he spoke again. Then he looked +at the sun, which was low, laid down his trowel, and asked me to come +to the tent-fire. “It’s turning chilly,” he said. It was a model camp, +everything clean and neat both inside the tent and out; he had made a +stone fireplace with a bark shelter over it, and a table and bench +under another little shed, with shelves for his tin cups and plates and +cooking utensils. He put a box in front of the fire and folded a +flour-bag on top of it for a seat for me, and hung the billy over the +fire. He sat on his heels and poked the burning sticks, abstractedly I +thought, or to keep his hands and thoughts steady. + +“I see you’re doing a bit of building,” I said. + +“Yes,” he said, keeping his eyes on the fire; “I’m getting on with it +slowly.” + +I don’t suppose he looked at me half a dozen times the whole while I +was in his camp. When he spoke he talked just as if he were sitting +yarning in a row of half a dozen of us. Presently he said suddenly, and +giving the fire a vicious dig with his poker: + +“That house must be finished by Christmas.” + +“Why?” I asked, taken by surprise. “What’s the hurry?” + +“Because,” he said, “I’m going to be married in the New Year—to the +best and dearest girl in the bush.” + +There was an awkward pause on my part, but presently I pulled myself +together. + +“You’ll never finish it by yourself,” I said. “Why don’t you put on +some men?” + +“Because,” he said, “I can’t trust them. Besides, how am I to get +bricklayers and carpenters in a place like this?” + +I noticed all through that his madness or the past in his mind was +mixed up with the real and the present. + +“Couldn’t you postpone the marriage?” I asked. + +“No!” he exclaimed, starting to his feet. “No!” and he looked round +wildly on the darkening bush. There was madness in his tone that time, +the last “No!” sounding as if from a man who was begging for his life. + +“Couldn’t you run up a shanty then, to live in until the house is +ready?” I suggested, to soothe him. + +He gave his arm an impatient swing. “Do you think I’d ask that girl to +live in a hut?” he said. “She ought to live in a palace!” + +There seemed no way out of it, so I said nothing: he turned his back +and stood looking away over the dark, low-lying sweep of bush towards +sunset. He folded his arms tight, and seemed to me to be holding +himself. After a while he let fall his arms and turned and blinked at +me and the fire like a man just woke from a doze or rousing himself out +of a deep reverie. + +“Oh, I almost forgot the billy!” he said. “I’ll make some tea—you must +be hungry.” + +He made the tea and fried a couple of slices of ham; he laid the +biggest slice on a thick slice of white baker’s bread on a tin plate, +and put it and a pint-pot full of tea on a box by my side. “Have it +here, by the fire,” he said; “it’s warmer and more comfortable.” + +I took the plate on my knee, and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed that +meal. The bracing mountain air and the walk had made me hungry. The +hatter had his meal standing up, cutting his ham on a slice of bread +with a clasp-knife. It was bush fashion, and set me thinking of some +old times. He ate very little, and, as far as I saw, he didn’t smoke. +Non-smokers are very scarce in the bush. + +I saw by the way his tent was pitched and his camp arranged generally, +and by the way he managed the cooking, that he must have knocked about +the bush for some years. + +He put the plates and things away and came and sat down on the other +empty gin-case by my side, and fell to poking the fire again. He never +showed the least curiosity as to who I was, or where I came from, or +what I was doing on this deserted track: he seemed to take me as a +matter of course—but all this was in keeping with bush life in general. + +Presently he got up and stood looking upwards over the place where the +house should have been. + +“I think now,” he said slowly, “I made a mistake in not having the +verandas carried all round the house.” + +“I—I beg pardon!” + +“I should have had the balcony all round instead of on two sides only, +as the man who made the plan suggested; it would have looked better and +made the house cooler in summer.” + +I thought as I listened, and presently I saw that it was a case of +madness within madness, so to speak: he was mad on the idea that he +could build the house himself, and then he had moods when he imagined +that the house had been built and he had been married and had reared a +family. + +“You could easily get the balcony carried round,” I said; “it wouldn’t +cost much—you can get good carpenters at Solong.” + +“Yes,” he said. “I’ll have it done after Christmas.” Then he turned +from the house and blinked down at me. “I am sorry,” he said, “that +there’s no one at home. I sent the wife and family to Sydney for a +change. I’ve got the two boys at the Sydney Grammar School. I think +I’ll send the eldest to King’s School at Parramatta. The girls will +have to get along with a governess at home and learn to help their +mother—” + +And so he went on talking away just as a man who has made money in the +bush, and is married and settled down, might yarn to an old bachelor +bush mate. + +“I suppose I’ll have to get a good piano,” he went on. “The girls must +have some amusement: there’ll be no end of balls and parties. I suppose +the boys will soon be talking of getting ‘fivers’ and ‘tenners’ out of +the ‘guvner’ or ‘old man.’ It’s the way of the world. And they’ll marry +and leave us. It’s the way of the world—” + +It was awful to hear him go on like this, the more so because he never +smiled—just talked on as if he had said the same thing over and over +again. Presently he stopped, and his eyes and hands began to wander: he +sat down on his heel to the fire again and started poking it. I began +to feel uneasy; I didn’t know what other sides there might be to his +madness, and wished the coach would come along. + +“You’ve knocked about the bush a good deal?” I asked. I couldn’t think +of anything else to say, and I thought he might break loose if I let +him brood too long. + +“Yes,” he said, “I have.” + +“Been in Queensland and the Gulf country, I suppose?” + +“I have.” + +His tone and manner seemed a bit more natural. He had knocked about +pretty well all over Australia, and had been in many places where I had +been. I had got him on the right track, and after a bit he started +telling bush yarns and experiences, some of them awful, some of them +very funny, and all of them short and good; and now and then, looking +at the side of his face, which was all he turned to me, I thought I +detected the ghost of a smile. + +One thing I noticed about him; when he spoke as a madman, he talked +like a man who had been fairly well educated (or sometimes, I fancied, +like a young fellow who was studying to be a school-teacher); his +speech was deliberate and his grammar painfully correct—far more so +than I have made it; but when he spoke as an old bushman, he dropped +his g’s and often turned his grammar back to front. But that reminds me +that I have met English college men who did the same thing after being +a few years in the bush; either they dropped their particular way of +speaking because it was mimicked, because they were laughed and chaffed +out of it, or they fell gradually into the habit of talking as rough +bushmen do (they learnt Australian), as clean-mouthed men fall, in +spite of themselves, into the habit of swearing in the heat and hurry +and rough life of a shearing-shed. And, coming back into civilized +life, these men, who had been well brought up, drop into their old +manner and style of speaking as readily as the foulest-mouthed man in a +shed or camp—who, amongst his fellows, cannot say three words without +an oath—can, when he finds himself in a decent home in the +woman-and-girl world, yarn by the hour without letting slip a solitary +little damn. + +The hatter warmed up the tea-billy again, got out some currant buns, +which he had baked himself in the camp-oven, and we were yarning +comfortably like two old bushmen, and I had almost forgotten that he +was “ratty,” when we heard the coach coming. I jumped up to hurry down +to the road. This seemed to shake him up. He gripped my hand hard and +glanced round in his frightened, haunted way. I never saw the eyes of a +man look so hopeless and helpless as his did just then. + +“I’m sorry you’re going,” he said, in a hurried way. “I’m sorry you’re +going. But—but they all go. Come again, come again—we’ll all be glad to +see you.” + +I had to hurry off and leave him. “We all,” I suppose, meant himself +and his ghosts. + +I ran down between the two rows of pines and reached the road just as +the coach came up. I found the publican from Ilford aboard—he was +taking a trip to Sydney. As the coach went on I looked up the clearing +and saw the hatter standing straight behind the fire, with his arms +folded and his face turned in our direction. He looked ghastly in the +firelight, and at that distance his face seemed to have an expression +of listening blindness. I looked round on the dark bush, with, away to +the left, the last glow of sunset fading from the bed of it, like a bed +of reddening coals, and I looked up at the black loom of Aaron’s Pass, +and thought that never a man, sane or mad, was left in such a depth of +gloomy loneliness. + +“I see you’ve been yarning with him yonder,” said the publican, who +seemed to have relaxed wonderfully. + +“Yes.” + +“You know these parts, don’t you?” + +“Yes. I was about here as a boy.” + +He asked me what my name might be. I told him it was Smith. He blinked +a while. + +“I never heard of anyone by the name of Smith in the district,” he +said. + +Neither had I. I told him that we lived at Solong, and didn’t stay +long. It saved time. + +“Ever heard of the Big Brassingtons?” + +“Yes.” + +“Ever heard the yarn of the house that wasn’t built?” + +I told him how much I had heard of it. + +“And that’s about all any on ’em knows. Have you any idea who that man +back yonder is?” + +“Yes, I have.” + +“Well, who do you think it is?” + +“He is, or rather he was, young Brassington.” + +“You’ve hit it!” said the publican. “I know—and a few others.” + +“And do you know what became of his wife?” I asked. + +“I do,” said the shanty-keeper, who had a generous supply of whisky +with him, and seemed to have begun to fill himself up for the trip. + +He said no more for a while, and when I had remained silent long +enough, he went on, very deliberately and impressively: + +“One yarn is that the girl wasn’t any good; that when she was married +to Brassington, and as soon as they got to Sydney, she met a chap she’d +been carrying on with before she married Brassington (or that she’d +been married to in secret), an’ she cleared off with him, leaving her +fortnight-old husband. That was one yarn.” + +“Was it?” I said. + +“Yes,” said the publican. “That yarn was a lie.” He opened a flask of +whisky and passed it round. + +“There was madness in the family,” he said, after a nip. + +“Whose?” I asked. “Brassington’s?” + +“No,” said the publican, in a tone that implied contempt at my +ignorance, in spite of its innocence, “the girl’s. Her mother had been +in a ’sylum, and so had her grandmother. It was—it was heridited. Some +madnesses is heridited, an’ some comes through worry and hard graft +(that’s mine), an’ some comes through drink, and some through worse, +and, but as far as I’ve heard, all madnesses is pretty much the same. +My old man was a warder in a ’sylum. They have their madnesses a bit +different, the same as boozers has their d.t.’s different; but, takin’ +it by the lump, it’s pretty much all the same. The difference is +accordin’ to their natures when they’re sane. All men are—” + +“But about young Mrs Brassington,” I interrupted. + +“Young Mrs Brassington? Rosy Webb she was, daughter of Webb the +squatter. Rosy was the brightest, best, good-heartedest, an’ most +ladylike little girl in the district, an’ the heriditry business come +on her in Sydney, about a week after she was married to young +Brassington. She was only twenty. Here—” He passed the flask round. + +“And what happened?” I asked. + +“What happened?” he repeated. Then he pulled himself together, as if +conscious that he had shown signs of whisky. “Everything was done, but +it was no use. She died in a year in a ’sylum.” + +“How do you know that?” + +“How do I know that?” he repeated in a tone of contempt. “How do I know +that? Well, I’ll tell you how. _My old wife_ was in service at +Brassington’s station at the time—the oldest servant—an’ young +Brassington wired to her from Sydney to come and help him in his +trouble. Old Mrs Brassington was bedridden, an’ they kep’ it from her.” + +“And about young Brassington?” + +“About young Brassington? He took a swag an’ wandered through the bush. +We’ve had him at our place several times all these years, but he always +wandered off again. My old woman tried everything with him, but it was +all no use. Years ago she used to get him to talk of things as they +was, in hopes of bringin’ his mind back, but he was always worse after. +She does all she can for him even now, but he’s mighty independent. The +last five or six years he’s been taken with the idea of buildin’ that +cursed house. He’ll stay there till he gets short of money, an’ then +he’ll go out back, shearin’, stock-ridin’, drovin’, cookin’, +fencin’—anything till he gets a few pounds. Then he’ll settle down and +build away at that bloody house. He’s knocked about so much that he’s a +regular old bushman. While he’s an old bushman he’s all right an’ +amusin’ an’ good company;—but when he’s Brassington he’s mad—Don’t you +ever let on to my old woman that I told you. I allers let my tongue run +a bit when I get out of that hole we’re living in. We’ve kept the +secret all these years, but what does it matter now?—I ask you.” + +“It doesn’t matter much,” I said. + +“Nothing matters much, it seems to me, nothing matters a damn. The Big +Brassingtons come down years ago; the old people’s gone, and the young +scattered God knows where or how. The Webbs (the girl’s people) are +away up in new country, an’ the girls (they was mostly all girls) are +married an’ settled down by this time. We kept the secret, an’ the +Webbs kept the secret—even when the dirty yarns was goin’ round—so’s +not to spoil the chances of the other girls. What about the chances of +their husbands? Some on ’em might be in the same hell as Brassington +for all I know. The Brassingtons kept the secret because I suppose they +reckoned it didn’t matter much. Nothing matters much in this world—” + +But I was thinking of another young couple who had married long ago, +whose married life was twenty long years of shameful quarrels, of +useless brutal recrimination—not because either was bad, but because +their natures were too much alike; of the house that was built, of the +family that was reared, of the sons and daughters who “went wrong,” of +the father and mother separated after twenty years, of the mother dead +of a broken heart, of the father (in a lunatic asylum), whose mania was +not to build houses, but to obtain and secrete matches for the purpose +of burning houses down. + + + + +“BARNEY, TAKE ME HOME AGAIN” + + +This is a sketch of one of the many ways in which a young married +woman, who is naturally thick-skinned and selfish—as most women are—and +who thinks she loves her husband, can spoil his life because he happens +to be good-natured, generous, sensitive, weak or soft, whichever you +like to call it. + +Johnson went out to Australia a good many years ago with his young wife +and two children, as assisted emigrants. He should have left his wife +and children with her mother, in a street off City Road, N., and gone +out by himself and got settled down comfortably and strengthened in the +glorious climate and democratic atmosphere of Australia, and in the +knowledge that he could worry along a while without his wife, before +sending for her. That bit of knowledge would have done her good also, +and it would have been better for both of them. But no man knows the +future, and few can prescribe for their own wives. If we saw our +married lives as others see them, half of us would get divorced. But +Johnson was sentimental, he could not bear to part from his wife for a +little while. Moreover, man is instinctively against leaving his wife +behind; it may be either a natural or a cowardly instinct-but we won’t +argue that. I don’t believe that Johnson was a coward in that +direction; I believe that he trusted his wife implicitly, or rather +that he never dreamed of such a thing—as is the way with most married +men. Sentiment is selfishness, perhaps, but we won’t argue that, such +arguments come to nothing. + +I heard from a fellow-passenger of Johnson’s that he had “a hell of a +voyage” because of his young wife’s ignorant selfishness and his own +sensitiveness; he bribed stewards for better food and accommodation for +his wife and children, paid the stewardess to help with the children, +got neither rest, nor peace, nor thanks for himself, and landed in +Sydney a nervous wreck, with five pounds out of the ten he started +with. + +Johnson was a carpenter. He got work from a firm of contractors in +Sydney, who, after giving him a fortnight’s trial, sent him up-country +to work on the railway station buildings, at the little pastoral mining +and farming town of Solong. The railway having come to Solong, things +were busy in the building line, and Johnson settled there. + +Johnson was thin when he came to Solong; he had landed a living +skeleton, he said, but he filled out later on. The democratic +atmosphere soothed his mind and he soon loved the place for its +unconventional hospitality. He worked hard and seemed to have plenty of +energy—he said he got it in Australia. He said that another year of the +struggle in London would have driven him mad. He fished in the river on +Saturday afternoons and Sundays, and, perhaps for the first month or +so, he thought that he had found peace. Johnson’s wife was a rather +stout, unsympathetic-looking young woman, with the knit of obstinacy in +her forehead; she had that stamp of “hardness” on her face which is the +rule amongst English and the exception amongst Australian women. We of +Solong thought her hard, selfish and narrow-minded, and paltry; later +on we thought she was a “bit touched;” but local people often think +that of strangers. + +By her voice and her habit of whining she should have been a thin, +sharp-faced, untidy, draggled-tailed woman in a back street in London, +or a worn-out selector’s wife in the bush. She whined about the +climate. “It will kill the children! It will kill the children! We’ll +never rear them here!” She whined about the “wretched hole in the bush” +that her husband had brought her to; and to the women whom she +condescended to visit—because a woman must have a woman to talk to—she +exaggerated the miseries of the voyage until the thing became a +sing-song from repetition. Later on she settled down to endless +accounts of her home in London, of her mother and sisters, of the way +they lived. “And I’ll never see it any more. I’ll never see them any +more.” + +The Solong climate was reckoned the best in Australia; the “wretched +hole” was a pretty little town on the banks of a clear, willow-bordered +river, with vineyards on the slopes, and surrounded by a circle of blue +hills and peaks. We knew nothing of London, so she had her own way +there. + +“She’ll feel a bit lonely at first, but she’ll soon get used to +Australia,” said Johnson. He seemed to me to go out of his way to +excuse his wife. + +Johnson had had a few contracts in England at one time; they had been +in “better circumstances”—that was the time she looked back to in +England; the last two years of bitter, black struggle at “home” seemed +a blank in her mind—but that’s how women jump over facts when they have +a selfish fad. + +Johnson rented a cottage and garden on the bank of the sunny river. He +said he took the place because there was ivy growing on the cottage, +and it might cheer his wife; but he had lost sight of the fact that, +while he had been born in an English village, his wife had been born +and bred in London, and had probably never noticed ivy. She said it was +worse than living in a slum. + +Johnson was clever at his trade, and at many other things, but his wife +didn’t seem aware of it. He was well liked, he grew to be popular, but +she didn’t seem proud of the fact; she never seemed interested in him +or his prospects. She only wanted him to take her home again. We +mustn’t forget that while he had a rush of work to occupy his mind she +had not. + +But Johnson grew stouter and prospered in spite of his wife—for a year +or so. New schools were being built in the district and the town was +practically re-built. Johnson took contracts for brickwork, plumbing +and house-painting, as well as carpentering, and had at one time as +many as ten men in his employ. He was making money. + +I was working at my trade then, house-painting, and worked for Johnson. +I lodged at his cottage for a while, but soon got tired of hearing +about London, and Mrs Johnson’s mother and sisters, and the house they +lived in, and the street it was in, and the parks where they used to +take their babies, and the shopping on Saturday afternoon. That woman +was terrible. She was at Johnson all the time about taking her home. +“We’ll surely be able to go home this year, Will.” “You promised to +take me home by the end of the year.” “Mother says in her last letter, +that Jack says there’s more building going on about London than ever.” +“You’ll do just as well in London as you’ll do here.” “What chance have +the children got in a hole like this?” And the rest of it—every night. +When he took a new contract, it would be, “What did you want to take +that new contract for, Will, when we’re going home? You know you +promised me you wouldn’t take any more contracts.” First he’d try to +cheer her, then he’d argue; but she’d only sit with the knit in her +forehead deep, looking as obstinate as a mule. Then she’d sit down to a +little harmonium he’d bought her and play and sing “Barney, take me +Home again,” and “The Old Folks at Home,” and “Swannie Ribber,” till I +felt like hanging myself—and I wasn’t an exile. Sometimes Johnson would +flare up and there’d be a row and he’d go to the pub. Gentle +persuasion, argument, or swearing, it was all the same with her. + +Bosses and men were different towards each other in Solong to what they +are in London; besides, when I wasn’t Johnson’s sub-contractor I was +his foreman—so we often had a few drinks together; and one night over a +beer (and after a breeze at home, I think) he said to me: + +“I can’t make it out, Harry; there was nothing but struggle and worry +and misery for us in England, and London was smothering me, my chest +was bad and the wife was always in ill-health; but I suppose I’ll have +to take her home in the end or else she’ll go melancholy mad!” And he +drew a breath that was more like a gasp than a sigh. + +“Why not send her home for a trip, or a year or so, boss?” I asked. “As +likely as not she’ll be just as eager to get back; and that will be the +end of it.” + +“I couldn’t do that, Harry,” said Johnson. “I couldn’t stay here and +work alone. It would be like beginning life again; I’ve started twice +and couldn’t start the third time. You’ll understand when you’re +married, Harry.” + +Well, in the end, she wore Johnson out—or wore into him rather. He +drank more, and once or twice I saw him drinking alone. Sometimes he’d +“round on us” at work for nothing at all, and at other times he’d take +no interest in the jobs—he’d let the work go on anyhow. Some thought +that Johnson was getting too big for his boots, that’s how men are +misjudged. He grew moody and melancholy and thin again. Johnson was +homesick himself. No doubt it was the misery of his domestic life in +Australia that made him so. + +Towards the end of the third or fourth year Johnson threw up a couple +of contracts he had on hand, sacrificed a piece of land which he had +bought and on which he had built a cottage in the short time he had +been in Solong, and, one lovely day in June, when the skies were their +fairest, the hills their bluest, the river its widest and clearest, and +the grass was waving waist high after rain—one blue and green and +golden day the Johnsons left Solong, with the trunks they had brought +out with them, for Sydney, _en route_ for smoky London. + +Mrs Johnson was a woman transformed—she was happy and looked it. The +last few weeks she had seemed in every way the opposite of the woman we +had known: cheerful, kind to neighbours in sickness and trouble, even +generous; she made many small presents in the way of mantelshelf +ornaments, pictures, and house-linen. But then it was Johnson who had +to pay for that in the end. + +He looked worn and worried at the railway station—more like himself as +he was when he first came to Solong—and as the train moved off I +thought he looked—well, frightened. + +That must have been nearly twenty years ago. + +London last winter. It was one of those days when London’s lurid sun +shows up for a little while like a smoky danger signal. The snow had +melted from the house-tops and the streets were as London streets are +after the first fall of snow of the season. But I could stand the flat +no longer, I had to go out and walk. I was sun-sick—I was heart-sick +for the sun, for the sunny South—for grassy plains, blue mountains, +sweeps of mountain bush and sunny ocean beaches. I walked hard; I +walked till I was mud-splashed to the shoulders; I walked through the +squalid, maddening sameness of miles of dingy, grimy-walled blocks and +rows of four-storied houses till I felt smothered—jailed, hopelessly. +“Best get home and in, and draw the blinds on it,” I said, “or my brain +will turn.” + +I was about to ask a policeman where I was when I saw, by the name on a +corner of the buildings, that I was in City Road, North. All the +willow-fringed rivers and the sunny hills of Solong flashed before me +at the sight of the name of that street. I had not been able to recall +the name of the street off City Road in which the Johnsons lived, +though I had heard it often enough in the old days from the tongue of +Mrs Johnson. + +I felt it would be a relief to see anyone who had been in Australia. +“Now,” I thought, “if I walk along City Road and see the name of that +street I’ll remember it”—and I did. It was a blind street, like the +long, narrow yard of a jail, walled by dark houses, all alike. The next +door but one to that at which I knocked to inquire was where the +Johnsons lived; they lived in a four-storied house, or rather a narrow +section of a four-storied terrace. I found later on that they paid the +land-lord, or nearly paid him, by letting lodgings. They lived in one +room with the use of the parlour and the kitchen when the lodgers +weren’t using them, and the son shared a room with a lodger. The back +windows looked out on the dead wall of a poorhouse of some kind, the +front on rows of similar windows opposite—rows of the same sort of +windows that run for miles and miles in London. In one a man sat +smoking in his shirtsleeves, from another a slavey leaned out watching +a fourwheeler that had stopped next door, in a third a woman sat +sewing, and in a fourth a woman was ironing, with a glimpse of a +bedstead behind her. And all outside was gloom and soot and slush. + +I would never have recognized the Johnsons. I have visited them several +times since and their faces are familiar to me now, but I don’t know +whether any traces of the old likenesses worked up in my memory. I +found Johnson an old man—old and grey before his time. He had a grizzly +stubble round his chin and cheeks towards the end of the week, because +he could only afford a shave on Saturday afternoon. He was working at +some branch of his trade “in the shop” I understood, but he said he +felt the work come heavier on him every winter. “I’ve felt very poorly +this last winter or two,” he said, “very poorly indeed.” He was very +sad and gentle. + +Mrs Johnson was old and thin-looking, but seemed cheerful and +energetic. Some chest trouble kept her within doors most of the winter. + +“I don’t mind so long as I can manage,” she said, “but Johnson gets so +depressed.” + +They seemed very kind towards each other; they spoke little of +Australia, and then only as an incident in their lives which was not of +any importance—had long been past and done with. It was all “before we +went to Australia” or “after we came back from Australia,” with Mrs +Johnson. + +The son, whom I remembered as a bright, robust little fellow, was now a +tall, white-faced, clean-shaven young man, a clerk on thirty shillings +a week. He wore, on Saturday afternoons and Sundays, a tall hat and a +frock coat and overcoat made cheaply in the latest fashion, so he +couldn’t afford to help the old folk much. + +“David is very extravagant,” said the old man, gently. “He won’t wear +anything when once the gloss is off it. But,” with a sad smile, “I get +the left-off overcoats.” + +He took me across to see his daughter. She had married a tradesman and +they were having a hard struggle in three rooms in a workman’s +dwelling. She was twenty-five, thin, yellow, and looking ten years +older. + +There were other children who had died. “I think we might have done +better for the children in Australia,” said the old man to me, sadly, +when we got outside, “but we did our best.” + +We went into a hotel and had a drink. Johnson had treated last +time—twenty years before. We call treating “shouting” in Australia. +Presently Johnson let fall a word or two of Australian slang, and +brightened up wonderfully; we got back out into Australia at once and +stayed there an hour or so. Being an old man, Johnson’s memory for the +long ago was better than mine, and I picked up links; and, in return, I +told him what Solong was like now, and how some men he knew, who were +going up, had gone down, and others, who were going to the dogs in his +time, had gone up—and we philosophized. About one he’d say, “Ah, well! +who’d have thought it! I never thought that boy would come to any +good;” about another, “Ah, well! and he might have been an independent +man.” How familiar that expression sounded!—I think it is used more +often in Australia than in any other country: “He might have been an +independent man.” + +When I left Johnson I felt less lonely in London, and rather humbled in +spirit. He seemed so resigned—I had never seen such gentle sadness in a +man’s eyes, nor heard it in a man’s voice. I could get back to +Australia somehow and start life again, but Johnson’s day had been dead +for many years. “Besides, assisted emigration’s done away with now,” he +said, with his sad, sad smile. + +I saw the Johnsons again later on. “Things have been going very sadly +with us, very sadly indeed,” said the old man, when we’d settled down. +He had broken down at the beginning of the winter, he had dragged +himself out of bed and to work and back again until he could do so no +longer; he had been laid up most of the winter. Mrs Johnson had not +been outside the door for months. + +“It comes very hard on us,” she said, “and I’m so poorly, and David out +of work, too. I wouldn’t mind if I could get about. But,” she went on +in her energetic manner, “we’ve had the house full all the winter; +we’ve had very good luck with the lodgers, all respectable people, and +one of them answers the door and that keeps me away from the draught—so +it might be worse, mightn’t it? But Johnson doesn’t seem to mend at +all, and he gets so terribly depressed. But the warm weather coming on, +etc.” + +They and the Lord only knew how they managed to live, for they are +honest people and the lodgers scarcely pay the rent of the house. There +was only David between them and the poorhouse, as far as I could see. + +Johnson came out with me a piece and we had a drink or two together—his +was gin hot. He talked a good deal about Australia, but sadly and +regretfully on this occasion. + +“We could have done well in Australia,” he said, “very well indeed. I +might have been independent and the children well started in life. But +we did things for the best. Mrs Johnson didn’t like Australia, you +know. It was a pity we didn’t stay there, a great pity. We would have +done far better than in England. I’d go out again now if I had the +money, but I’m getting too old.” + +“Would Mrs Johnson go out?” I asked. + +“Oh, yes. But I’m afraid she wouldn’t stand the voyage.... Things have +been very sad with us ever since we came back to England, very sad +indeed.” And after a while he suddenly caught his breath. + +“It takes me that way sometimes,” he said. “I catch my breath just as +if I was going to lose it.” + + + + +A DROVING YARN + + +Andy Maculloch had heard that old Bill Barker, the well-known overland +drover, had died over on the Westralian side, and Dave Regan told a +yarn about Bill. + +“Bill Barker,” said Dave, talking round his pipe stem, “was the +_quintessence_ of a drover—” + +“The whatter, Dave?” came the voice of Jim Bentley, in startled tones, +from the gloom on the far end of the veranda. + +“The quintessence,” said Dave, taking his pipe out of his mouth. “You +shut up, Jim. As I said, Bill Barker was the quintessence of a drover. +He’d been at the game ever since he was a nipper. He run away from home +when he was fourteen and went up into Queensland. He’s been all over +Queensland and New South Wales and most of South Australia, and a good +deal of the Western, too: over the great stock routes from one end to +the other, Lord knows how many times. No man could keep up with him +riding out, and no one could bring a mob of cattle or a flock of sheep +through like him. He knew every trick of the game; if there was grass +to be had Bill’d get it, no matter whose run it was on. One of his +games in a dry season was to let his mob get boxed with the station +stock on a run where there was grass, and before Bill’s men and the +station-hands could cut ’em out, the travelling stock would have a good +bellyful to carry them on the track. Billy was the daddy of the +drovers. Some said that he could ride in his sleep, and that he had one +old horse that could jog along in his sleep too, and that—travelling +out from home to take charge of a mob of bullocks or a flock of +sheep—Bill and his horse would often wake up at daylight and blink +round to see where they were and how far they’d got. Then Bill would +make a fire and boil his quart-pot, and roast a bit of mutton, while +his horse had a mouthful of grass and a spell. + +“You remember Bill, Andy? Big dark man, and a joker of the loud sort. +Never slept with a blanket over him—always folded under him on the sand +or grass. Seldom wore a coat on the route—though he always carried one +with him, in case he came across a bush ball or a funeral. Moleskins, +flannel waistcoat, cabbage-tree hat and ’lastic-side boots. When it was +roasting hot on the plains and the men swore at the heat, Jim would +yell, ‘Call this hot? Why, you blanks, I’m freezin’! Where’s me +overcoat?’ When it was raining and hailing and freezing on Bell’s Line +in the Blue Mountains in winter, and someone shivered and asked, ‘Is it +cold enough for yer now, Bill?’ ‘Cold!’ Bill would bellow, ‘I’m +sweatin’!’ + +“I remember it well. I was little more than a youngster then—Bill +Barker came past our place with about a thousand fat sheep for the +Homebush sale-yards at Sydney, and he gave me a job to help him down +with them on Bell’s Line over the mountains, and mighty proud I was to +go with him, I can tell you. One night we camped on the Cudgegong +River. The country was dry and pretty close cropped and we’d been +“sweating” the paddocks all along there for our horses. You see, where +there weren’t sliprails handy we’d just take the tomahawk and nick the +top of a straight-grained fence-post, just above the mortise, knock out +the wood there, lift the top rail out and down, and jump the horses in +over the lower one—it was all two-rail fences around there with sheep +wires under the lower rail. And about daylight we’d have the horses +out, lift back the rail, and fit in the chock that we’d knocked out. +Simple as striking matches, wasn’t it? + +“Well, the horses were getting a good bellyful in the police horse +paddock at night, and Bill took the first watch with the sheep. It was +very cold and frosty on the flat and he thought the sheep might make +back for the ridges, it’s always warmer up in the ridges in winter out +of the frost. Bill roused me out about midnight. ‘There’s the sheep,’ +he says, pointing to a white blur. ‘They’ve settled down. I think +they’ll be quiet till daylight. Don’t go round them; there’s no +occasion to go near ’em. You can stop by the fire and keep an eye on +’em.’ + +“The night seemed very long. I watched and smoked and toasted my shins, +and warmed the billy now and then, and thought up pretty much the same +sort of old things that fellers on night watch think over all over the +world. Bill lay on his blanket, with his back to the fire and his arm +under his head—freezing on one side and roasting on the other. He never +moved. I itched once or twice to turn him over and bake the front of +him—I reckoned he was about done behind. + +“At last daylight showed. I took the billy and started down to the +river to get some water to make coffee; but half-way down, near the +sheep camp, I stopped and stared, I was never so surprised in my life. +The white blur of sheep had developed into a couple of acres of long +dead silver grass! + +“I woke Bill, and he swore as I never heard a man swear before—nor +since. He swore at the sheep, and the grass, and at me; but it would +have wasted time, and besides I was too sleepy and tired to fight. But +we found those sheep scattered over a scrubby ridge about seven miles +back, so they must have slipped away back of the grass and started +early in Bill’s watch, and Bill must have watched that blessed grass +for the first half of the night and then set me to watch it. He +couldn’t get away from that. + +“I wondered what the chaps would say if it got round that Bill Barker, +the boss overland drover, had lost a thousand sheep in clear country +with fences all round; and I suppose he thought that way too, for he +kept me with him right down to Homebush, and when he paid me off he +threw in an extra quid, and he said: + +“‘Now, listen here, Dave! If I ever hear a word from anyone about +watching that gory grass, I’ll find you, Dave, and murder you, if +you’re in wide Australia. I’ll screw your neck, so look out.’ + +“But he’s dead now, so it doesn’t matter.” + +There was silence for some time after Dave had finished. The chaps made +no comment on the yarn, either one way or the other, but sat smoking +thoughtfully, and in a vague atmosphere as of sadness—as if they’d just +heard of their mother’s death and had not been listening to an +allegedly humorous yarn. + +Then the voice of old Peter, the station-hand, was heard to growl from +the darkness at the end of the hut, where he sat on a three-bushel bag +on the ground with his back to the slabs. + +“What’s old Peter growlin’ about?” someone asked. + +“He wants to know where Dave got that word,” someone else replied. + +“What word?” + +“_Quint-essents_.” + +There was a chuckle. + +“He got it out back, Peter,” said Mitchell, the shearer. “He got it +from a new chum.” + +“How much did yer give for it, Dave?” growled Peter. + +“Five shillings, Peter,” said Dave, round his pipe stem. “And stick of +tobacco thrown in.” + +Peter seemed satisfied, for he was heard no more that evening. + + + + +GETTIN’ BACK ON DAVE REGAN + +A RATHER FISHY YARN FROM THE BUSH + +(AS TOLD BY JAMES NOWLETT, BULLOCK-DRIVER) + + +You might work this yarn up. I’ve often thought of doin’ it meself, but +I ain’t got the words. I knowed a lot of funny an’ rum yarns about the +bush, an’ I often wished I had the gift o’ writin’. I could tell a lot +better yarns than the rot they put in books sometimes, but I never had +no eddication. But you might be able to work this yarn up—as yer call +it. + +There useter be a teamster’s camp six or seven miles out of Mudgee, at +a place called th’ Old Pipeclay, in the days before the railroad went +round to Dubbo, an’ most of us bullickies useter camp there for the +night. There was always good water in the crick, an’ sometimes we’d +turn the bullicks up in the ridge, an’ gullies behind for grass, an’ +camp there for a few days, and do our washin’ an’ mendin’, and make new +yokes perhaps, an tinker up the wagons. + +There was a woman livin’ on a farm there named Mrs Hardwick—an’ she +_was_ a hard wick. Her husban’, Jimmy Hardwick was throwed from his +horse agenst a stump one day when he was sober, an’ he was killed—an’ +she was a widder. She had a tidy bit o’ land, an’ a nice bit of a +orchard an’ vineyard, an some cattle, an’ they say she had a tidy bit +o’ money in the bank. She had the worst tongue in the district, no +one’s character was safe with her; but she wasn’t old, an’ she wasn’t +bad-lookin’—only hard—so there was some fellers hangin’ round arter +her. An’ Dave Regan’s horse was hangin’ up outside her place as often +as anybody else’s. Dave was a native an’ a bushy, an’ drover an’ a +digger, an’ he was a bit soft in them days—he got hard enough +arterwards. + +Mrs Hardwick hated bullick-drivers—she had a awful down on bullickies—I +dunno why. We never interfered with her fowls, an’ as for swearin’! +why, she could swear herself. Jimmy Hardwick was a bullick-driver when +she married him, an’ p’r’aps that helped to account for it. She +wouldn’t let us boil our billies at her kitchen fire, same as any other +bushwoman, an’ if one of our bullicks put his nose under her fence for +a mouthful of grass, she’d set her dogs onter him. An’ one of her dogs +got something what disagreed with him one day, an’ she accused us of +layin’ poisoned baits. An’, arter that, she ’pounded some of our +bullicks that got into her lucerne paddick one night when we was on the +spree in Mudgee, an’ put heavy damages on ’em. She’d left the sliprails +down on purpose, I believe. She talked of puttin’ the police onter us, +jest as if we was a sly-grog shop. (If _she’d_ kept a sly-grog shop +she’d have had a different opinion about bullick-drivers.) An’ all the +bullick-drivers hated her because she hated bullickies. + +Well, one wet season half a dozen of us chaps was camped there for a +fortnight, because the roads was too boggy to travel, an’ one night +they got up a darnce at Peter Anderson’s shanty acrost the ridges, an’ +a lot of gals an’ fellers turned up from all round about in spite of +the pourin’ rain. Someone had kidded Dave Regan that Mother Hardwick +was comin’, an’ he turned up, of course, in spite of a ragin’ toothache +he had. He was always ridin’ the high horse over us bullickies. It was +a very cold night, enough to cut the face an’ hands off yer, so we had +a roarin’ fire in the big bark-an’-slab kitchen where the darncin’ was. +It was one of them big, old-fashioned, clay-lined fire-places that goes +right acrost the end of the room, with a twenty-five foot slab-an’-tin +chimbly outside. + +Dave Regan was pretty wild about being had, an’ we copped all the gals +for darncin’; he couldn’t get one that night, an’ when he wasn’t +proddin’ out his tooth with a red-hot wire some one was chaffin’ him +about Mrs Hardwick. So at last he got disgusted an’ left; but before he +went he got a wet three-bushel flour-bag an’ climbed up very quietly +onter the roof by the battens an’ log weights an’ riders, an’ laid the +wet bag very carefully acrost the top of the chimbly flue. + +An’ we was a mortal hour tryin’ to find out what was the matter with +that infernal chimbly, and tackin’ bits o’ tin an’ baggin’ acrost the +top of the fire-place under the mantelshelf to try an’ stop it from +smokin’, an’ all the while the gals set there with the water runnin’ +out of their eyes. We took the green back log out an’ fetched in a dry +one, but that chimbly smoked worse than ever, an’ we had to put the +fire out altogether, an’ the gals set there shiverin’ till the rain +held up a bit an’ the sky cleared, an’ then someone goes out an’ looks +up an’ sings out, “Why, there’s somethin’ acrost the top of the blazin’ +chimbly!” an’ someone else climbs up an’ fetches down the bag. But the +darnce was spoilt, an’ the gals was so disgusted that they went off +with their fellers while the weather held up. They reckoned some of us +bullickies did it for a lark. + +An’ arter that Dave’d come ridin’ past, an’ sing out to know if we knew +of a good cure for a smokin’ chimbly, an’ them sorter things. But he +always got away before we could pull him off of his horse. Three of us +chased him on horseback one day, but we didn’t ketch him. + +So we made up our minds to git back on Dave some way or other, an’ it +come about this way. + +About six months arter the smoked-out darnce, four or five of us same +fellers was campin’ on th’ Pipeclay agen, an’ it was a dry season. It +was dryer an’ hotter than it was cold ’n’ wet the larst time. Dave was +still hangin’ round Mrs Hardwick’s an’ doin’ odd jobs for her. Well, +one very hot day we seen Dave ridin’ past into Mudgee, an’ we knowed +he’d have a spree in town that night, an’ call at Mrs Hardwick’s for +sympathy comin’ out next day; an’ arter he’d been gone an hour or two, +Tom Tarrant comes drivin’ past on his mail-coach, an’ drops some +letters an’ papers an’ a bag o’ groceries at our camp. + +Tom was a hard case. I remember wonst I was drivin’ along a lonely bit +o’ track, an’ it was a grand mornin’, an’ I felt great, an’ I got +singin’ an’ practisin’ a recitation that I allers meant to give at a +bush darnce some night. (I never sung or spouted poetry unless I was +sure I was miles away from anyone.) An’ I got worked up, an’ was wavin’ +me arms about an’ throwin’ it off of me chest, when Tom’s coach comes +up behind, round a bend in the road, an’ took me by surprise. An’ Tom +looked at me very hard an’ he says, “What are yer shoutin’ an’ swearin’ +an’ darncin’ an’ goin’ on at the bullicks like that for, Jimmy? They +seem to be workin’ all right.” It took me back, I can tell yer. The +coach was full of grinnin’ passengers, an’ the worst of it was that I +didn’t know how long Tom had been drivin’ slow behind me an’ takin’ me +out of windin’. There’s nothin’ upsets a cove as can’t sing so much as +to be caught singin’ or spoutin’ poetry when he thinks he’s privit’. + +An’ another time I remember Tom’s coach broke down on the track, an’ he +had to ride inter town with the mails on horseback; an’ he left a +couple of greenhides, for Skinner the tanner at Mudgee, for me to take +on in the wagon, an’ a bag of potatoes for Murphy the storekeeper at +Home Rule, an’ a note that said: “Render unto Murphy the things which +is murphies, and unto Skinner them things which is skins.” Tom was a +hard case. + +Well, this day, when Tom handed down the tucker an’ letters, he got +down to stretch his legs and give the horses a breathe. The coach was +full of passengers, an’ I noticed they all looked extra glum and sulky, +but I reckoned it was the heat an’ dust. Tom looked extra solemn, too, +an’ no one was talkin’. Then I suddenly began to notice something in +the atmosphere, as if there was a dead beast not far away, an’ my mates +started sniffin’ too. An’ that reminds me, it’s funny why some people +allers sniff hard instead of keepin’ their noses shut when there’s a +stink; the more it stinks the more they sniff. Tom spit in the dust an’ +thought a while; then he took a parcel out of the boot an’ put it on +the corner post of the fence. “There,” he said, “There’s some fresh +fish that come up from Sydney by train an’ Cobb & Co’s coach larst +night. They’re meant for White the publican at Gulgong, but they won’t +keep this weather till I git out there. Pity to waste them! you chaps +might as well have a feed of ’em. I’ll tell White they went bad an’ I +had to throw them out,” says Tom. Then he got on to the coach agen an’ +drove off in a cloud of dust. We undone the brown paper, an’ the fish +was in a small deal box, with a lid fastened by a catch. We nicked back +the catch an’ the lid flew open, an’ then we knowed where the smell +comed from all right. There wasn’t any doubt about that! We didn’t have +to put our noses in the box to see if the fish was bad. They was packed +in salt, but that made no difference. + +You know how a smell will start sudden in the bush on a hot, still day, +an’ then seem to take a spell, an’ then get to work agen stronger than +ever. You might be clost alongside of a horse that has been dead a +fortnight an’ smell nothin’ particular till you start to walk away, an’ +the further you go the worse it stinks. It seems to smell most round in +a circle of a hundred yards or so. But these fish smelt from the centre +right out. Tom Tarrant told us arterwards that them fish started to +smell as soon as he left Mudgee. At first they reckoned it was a dead +horse by the road; but arter a while the passengers commenced squintin’ +at each other suspicious like, an’ the conversation petered out, an’ +Tom thought he felt all their eyes on his back, an’ it was very +uncomfortable; an’ he sat tight an’ tried to make out where the smell +come from; an’ it got worse every hundred yards—like as if the track +was lined with dead horses, an’ every one dead longer than the +last—till it was like drivin’ a funeral. An’ Tom never thought of the +fish till he got down to stretch his legs and fetched his nose on a +level with the boot. + +Well, we shut down the lid of that box quick an’ took it an’ throwed it +in the bushes a good way away from the camp, but next mornin’, while we +was havin’ breakfast, Billy Grimshaw got an idea, an’ arter breakfast +he wetted a canvas bag he had an’ lit up his pipe, an’ went an’ got +that there box o’ fish, an’ put it in the wet bag, an’ wrapped it tight +round it an’ tied it up tight with string. Billy had a nipper of a +nephew with him, about fourteen, named Tommy, an’ he was a sharp kid if +ever there was one. So Billy says, “Look here, Tommy, you take this +fish up to Mrs Hardwick’s an’ tell her that Dave Regan sent ’em with +his compliments, an’ he hopes she’ll enjoy ’em. Tell her that Dave +fetched ’em from Mudgee, but he’s gone back to look for a pound note +that he dropped out of a hole in his pocket somewheers along the road, +an’ he asked you to take the fish up.” So Tommy takes the fish an’ goes +up to the house with ’em. When he come back he says that Mrs Hardwick +smiled like a parson an’ give him a shillin’—an’ he didn’t wait. We +watched the house, an’ about half an hour arterwards we seen her run +out of the kitchen with the open box in her hand, an’ run a good way +away from the house an’ throw the fish inter the bushes, an’ then go +back quick, holdin’ her nose. + +An’ jest then, as luck would have it, we seen Dave Regan ridin’ up from +the creek towards the house. He got down an’ went into the kitchen, an’ +then come backin’ out agen in a hurry with her in front of him. We +could hear her voice from where we was, but we couldn’t hear what she +said. But we could see her arms wavin’ as if she was drivin’ fowls, an’ +Dave backed all the way to his horse and gets on an’ comes ridin’ away +quick, she screamin’ arter him all the time. When he got down opposite +the camp we sung out to know what was the matter. “What have you been +doin’ to Mrs Hardwick, Dave?” we says. “We heerd her goin’ for yer +proper jest now.” “Damned if I know,” says Dave. “I ain’t done nothin’ +to her that I knows of. She’s called me everything she can lay her +tongue to, an’ she’s ravin’ about my stinkin’ fish, or somethin’. I +can’t make it out at all. I believe she’s gone ratty.” + +“But you _must_ have been doin’ somethin’ to the woman,” we says, “or +else she wouldn’t have gone on at yer like that.” + +But Dave swore he hadn’t, an’ we talked it over for a while an’ +couldn’t make head nor tail of it, an’ we come to the conclusion that +it was only a touch o’ the sun. + +“Never mind, Dave,” we says. “Go up agen in a day or two, when she’s +cooled down, an’ find out what the matter is. Or write to her. It might +only have been someone makin’ mischief. That’s what it is.” + +But Dave only sat an’ rubbed his head, an’ presently he started home to +wherever he was hangin’ out. He wanted a quiet week to think. + +“Her chimbly might have been smokin’, Dave,” we shouted arter him, but +he was too dazed like to ketch on. + +Well, in a month or two we was campin’ there agen, an’ we found she’d +fenced in a lane to the crick she had no right to, an’ we had to take +the bullicks a couple o’ miles round to grass an’ water. Well, the +first mornin’ we seen her down in the corner of her paddick near the +camp drivin’ some heifers, an’ Billy Grimshaw went up to the fence an’ +spoke to her. Billy was the only one of us that dared face her and he +was the only one she was ever civil to—p’r’aps because Billy had a +squint an’ a wall eye and that put her out of countenance. + +Billy took off his hat very respectful an’ sings out, “Mrs Hardwick.” +(It was Billy’s bullicks she’d “pounded,” by the way.) + +“What is it?” she says. + +“I want to speak to you, Mrs Hardwick,” says Billy. + +“Well, speak,” she says. “I’ve got no time to waste talkin’ to +bullick-drivers.” + +“Well, the fact is, Mrs Hardwick,” says Billy, “that I want to explain +somethin’, an’ apologize for that young scamp of a nephew o’ mine, +young Tommy. He ain’t here or I’d make him beg your pardon hisself, or +I’d cut him to pieces with the bullick-whip. I heard all about Dave +Regan sendin’ you that stinkin’ fish, an’ I think it was a damned mean, +dirty thing to do—to send stinkin’ fish to a woman, an’ especially to a +widder an’ an unprotected woman like you, Mrs Hardwick. I’ve had +mothers an’ sisters of me own. An’ I want to tell you that I’m sorry a +relation o’ mine ever had anythin’ to do with it. As soon as I heerd of +it I give young Tommy a lambastin’ he won’t forgot in a hurry.” + +“Did Tommy know the fish was bad?” she says. + +“It doesn’t matter a rap,” says Billy; “he had no right to go takin’ +messages from nobody to nobody.” + +Mrs Hardwick thought a while. Then she says: “P’r’aps arter all Dave +Regan didn’t know the fish was bad. I’ve often thought I might have +been in too much of a hurry. Things goes bad so quick out here in this +weather. An’ Dave was always very friendly. I can’t understand why he’d +do a dirty thing on me like that. I never done anything to Dave.” + +Now I forgot to tell you that Billy had a notion that Dave helped drive +his bullicks to pound that time, though I didn’t believe it. So Billy +says: + +“Don’t you believe that for a minute, Mrs Hardwick. Dave knew what he +was a-doin’ of all right; an’ if I ketch him _I’ll_ give him a beltin’ +for it if no one else is man enough to stand up for a woman!” says +Billy. + +“How d’yer know Dave knew?” says Mrs Hardwick. + +“Know!” says Billy. “Why, he talked about it all over the district.” + +“What!” she screamed out, an’ I moved away from that there fence, for +she had a stick to drive them heifers with. But Billy stood his ground. +“Is that the truth, Billy Grimshaw?” she screams. + +“Yes;” he says. “I’ll-take me oath on it. He blowed about it all over +the district, as if it was very funny, an’ he says—” An’ Billy stopped. + +“What did he say?” she shouted. + +“Well, the fact is,” says Billy, “that I hardly like to tell it to a +lady. I wouldn’t like to tell yer, Mrs Hardwick.” + +“But you’ll have to tell me, Billy Grimshaw,” she screams. “I have a +right to know. If you don’t tell me I’ll pull him next week an’ have it +dragged out of you in the witness-box!” she says. “An’ I’ll have +satisfaction out of him in the felon’s dock of a court of law!” she +says. “What did the villain say?” she screams. + +“Well,” says Billy, “if yer must have it—an’, anyway, I’m hanged if I’m +goin’ to stand by an’ see a woman scandalized behind her back—if yer +must have it I’ll tell yer. Dave said that the fish didn’t smell no +worse than your place anyway.” + +We got away from there then. She cut up too rough altogether. I can’t +tell you what she said—I ain’t got the words. She went up to the house, +an’ we seen the farm-hand harnessin’ up the horse, an’ we reckoned she +was goin’ to drive into town straight away an’ take out a summons +agenst Dave Regan. An’ jest then Dave hisself comes ridin’ past—jest +when he was most wanted, as usual. He always rode fast past Mrs +Hardwick’s nowadays, an’ never stopped there, but Billy shouted after +him: + +“Hullo, Dave! I want to speak to yer,” shouts Billy. An’ Dave yanks his +horse round. + +“What is it, Billy?” he says. + +“Look here, Dave,” says Billy. “You had your little joke about the +chimbly, an’ we had our little joke about the fish an’ Mrs Hardwick, so +now we’ll call it quits. A joke’s a joke, but it can go too far, an’ +this one’s gettin’ too red-hot altogether. So we’ve fixed it up with +Mrs Hardwick.” + +“What fish an’ what joke?” says Dave, rubbin’ his head. “An’ what have +yer fixed up with Mrs Hardwick? Whatever are yer talkin’ about, Billy?” + +So Billy told him all about us sendin’ the stinkin’ fish to Mrs +Hardwick by Tommy, an’ sayin’ Dave sent ’em—Dave rubbin’ the back of +his neck an’ starin’ at Billy all the time. “An’ now,” says Billy, “I +won’t say anything about them bullicks; but I went up and seen Mrs +Hardwick this mornin’, an’ told her the whole truth about them fish, +an’ how you knowed nothin’ about it, an’ I apologized an’ told her we +was very sorry; an’ she says she was very sorry too on your account, +an’ wanted to see yer. I promised to tell yer as soon as I seen yer. It +ought to be fixed up. You ought to go right up to the house an’ see her +now. She’s awfully cut up about it.” + +“All right,” says Dave, brightenin’ up. “It was a dirty, mean trick +anyway to play on a cove; but I’ll go up an’ see her.” An’ he went +there ’n’ then. + +An’ about fifteen minutes arterwards he comes boltin’ back from the +house one way an’ his horse the other. The horse acted as if it had a +big scare, an’ so did Dave. Billy went an’ ketched Dave’s horse for +him, an’ I got Dave a towel to wipe the dirty dish-water off of his +face an’ out of his hair an’ collar, an’ I give him a piece of soap to +rub on the places where he’d been scalded. + +“Why, the woman must be ravin’ mad,” I says. “Whatever did yer say to +her this time, Dave? Yer allers gettin’ inter hot water with her.” + +“I didn’t say nothin’,” says Dave. “I jest went up laughin’ like, an’ +says, ‘How are yer, Mrs Hardwick?’ an’ she ups an’ lets me have a dish +of dirty wash-up water, an’ then on top of that she let fly with a +dipper of scaldin’-hot, greasy water outer the boiler. She’s gone clean +ravin’ mad, I think.” + +“She’s as mad as a hatter, right enough, Dave,” says Billy Grimshaw. +“Don’t you go there no more, Dave, it ain’t safe.” An’ we lent Dave a +hat an’ a clean shirt, an’ he went on inter town. “You ought to have +humoured her,” says Billy, as Dave rode away. “You ought to have told +her to put a wet bag over her chimbly an’ hang the fish inside to +smoke.” But Dave was too stunned to ketch on. He went on inter the town +an’ got on a howlin’ spree. An’ while he was soberin’ up the thing +began to dawn on him. An’ the nex’ time he met Billy they had a fight. +An’ Dave got another woman to speak to Mrs Hardwick, an’ Mrs Hardwick +ketched young Tommy goin’ past her place one day an’ bailed him up an’ +scared the truth out of him. + +“Look here!” she says to him, “I want the truth, the whole truth, an’ +nothin’ but the truth about them fish, an’ if I don’t get it outer you +I’ll wring yer young neck for tryin’ to poison me, an’ save yer from +the gallust!” she says to Tommy. + +So he told her the whole truth, swelp him, an’ got away; an’ he +respected Mrs Hardwick arter that. + +An’ next time we come past with the teams we seen Dave’s horse hangin’ +up outside Mrs Hardwick’s, an’ we went some miles further along the +road an’ camped in a new place where we’d be more comfortable. An’ ever +arter that we used to always whip up an’ drive past her place as if we +didn’t know her. + + + + +“SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?” + + +TOLD BY JOE WILSON + +God’s preacher, of churches unheeded, +God’s vineyard, though barren the sod, +Plain spokesman where spokesman is needed, +Rough link ’twixt the Bushman and God. + _The Christ of the Never_. + + +I never told you about Peter M’Laughlan. He was a sort of bush +missionary up-country and out back in Australia, and before he died he +was known from Riverina down south in New South Wales to away up +through the Never-Never country in western Queensland. + +His past was a mystery, so, of course, there were all sorts of yarns +about him. He was supposed to be a Scotchman from London, and some said +that he had got into trouble in his young days and had had to clear out +of the old country; or, at least, that he had been a ne’e-er-do-well +and had been sent out to Australia on the remittance system. Some said +he’d studied for the law, some said he’d studied for a doctor, while +others believed that he was, or had been, an ordained minister. I +remember one man who swore (when he was drinking) that he had known +Peter M’Laughlan as a medical student in a big London hospital, and +that he had started in practice for himself somewhere near Gray’s Inn +Road in London. Anyway, as I got to know him he struck me as being a +man who had looked into the eyes of so much misery in his life that +some of it had got into his own. + +He was a tall man, straight and well built, and about forty or +forty-five, when I first saw him. He had wavy dark hair, and a close, +curly beard. I once heard a woman say that he had a beard like you see +in some Bible pictures of Christ. Peter M’Laughlan seldom smiled; there +was something in his big dark brown eyes that was scarcely misery, nor +yet sadness—a sort of haunted sympathy. + +He must have had money, or else he got remittances from home, for he +paid his way and helped many a poor devil. They said that he gave away +most of his money. Sometimes he worked for a while himself as +bookkeeper at a shearing-shed, wool-sorter, shearer, even rouseabout; +he’d work at anything a bushman could get to do. Then he’d go out back +to God-forgotten districts and preach to bushmen in one place, and get +a few children together in another and teach them to read. He could +take his drink, and swear a little when he thought it necessary. On one +occasion, at a rough shearing-shed, he called his beloved brethren +“damned fools” for drinking their cheques. + +Towards the end of his life if he went into a “rough” shed or shanty +west of the Darling River—and some of them _were_ rough—there would be +a rest in the language and drinking, even a fight would be interrupted, +and there would be more than one who would lift their hats to Peter +M’Laughlan. A bushman very rarely lifts his hat to a man, yet the worst +characters of the West have listened bareheaded to Peter when he +preached. + +It was said in our district that Peter only needed to hint to the +squatter that he wanted fifty or a hundred pounds to help someone or +something, and the squatter would give it to him without question or +hesitation. + +He’d nurse sick boundary-riders, shearers, and station-hands, often +sitting in the desolate hut by the bedside of a sick man night after +night. And, if he had time, he’d look up the local blacks and see how +they were getting on. Once, on a far outback sheep station, he sat for +three nights running, by the bedside of a young Englishman, a B.A. they +said he was, who’d been employed as tutor at the homestead and who died +a wreck, the result of five years of life in London and Paris. The poor +fellow was only thirty. And the last few hours of his life he talked to +Peter in French, nothing but French. Peter understood French and one or +two other languages, besides English and Australian; but whether the +young wreck was raving or telling the story of a love, or his life, +none of us ever knew, for Peter never spoke of it. But they said that +at the funeral Peter’s eyes seemed haunted more than usual. + +There’s the yarn about Peter and the dying cattle at Piora Station one +terrible drought, when the surface was as bare as your hand for +hundreds of miles, and the heat like the breath of a furnace, and the +sheep and cattle were perishing by thousands. Peter M’Laughlan was out +on the run helping the station-hands to pull out cattle that had got +bogged in the muddy waterholes and were too weak to drag themselves +out, when, about dusk, a gentlemanly “piano-fingered” parson, who had +come to the station from the next town, drove out in his buggy to see +the men. He spoke to Peter M’Laughlan. + +“Brother,” he said, “do you not think we should offer up a prayer?” + +“What for?” asked Peter, standing in his shirt sleeves, a rope in his +hands and mud from head to foot. + +“For? Why, for rain, brother,” replied the parson, a bit surprised. + +Peter held up his finger and said “Listen!” + +Now, with a big mob of travelling stock camped on the plain at night, +there is always a lowing, soughing or moaning sound, a sound like that +of the sea on the shore at a little distance; and, altogether, it might +be called the sigh or yawn of a big mob in camp. But the long, low +moaning of cattle dying of hunger and thirst on the hot barren plain in +a drought is altogether different, and, at night there is something +awful about it—you couldn’t describe it. This is what Peter M’Laughlan +heard. + +“Do you hear that?” he asked the other preacher. + +The little parson said he did. Perhaps _he_ only heard the weak lowing +of cattle. + +“Do you think that God will hear us when He does not hear _that_?” +asked Peter. + +The parson stared at him for a moment and then got into his buggy and +drove away, greatly shocked and deeply offended. But, later on, over +tea at the homestead, he said that he felt sure that that “unfortunate +man,” Peter M’Laughlan, was not in his right mind; that his wandering, +irregular life, or the heat, must have affected him. + +I well remember the day when I first heard Peter M’Laughlan preach. I +was about seventeen then. We used sometimes to attend service held on +Sunday afternoon, about once a month, in a little slab-and-bark +school-house in the scrub off the main road, three miles or so from our +selection, in a barren hole amongst the western ridges of the Great +Dividing Range. School was held in this hut for a few weeks or a few +months now and again, when a teacher could be got to stay there and +teach, and cook for himself, for a pound a week, more or less +contributed by the parents. A parson from the farming town to the east, +or the pastoral town over the ridges to the west, used to come in his +buggy when it didn’t rain and wasn’t too hot to hold the service. + +I remember this Sunday. It was a blazing hot day towards the end of a +long and fearful drought which ruined many round there. The parson was +expected, and a good few had come to “chapel” in spring-carts, on +horseback, and on foot; farmers and their wives and sons and daughters. +The children had been brought here to Sunday-school, taught by some of +the girls, in the morning. I can see it all now quite plain: The +one-roomed hut, for it was no more, with the stunted blue-grey gum, +scrub all round. The white, dusty road, so hot that you could cook eggs +in the dust. The horses tied up, across the road, in the supposed shade +under clumps of scraggy saplings along by the fence of a cattle-run. +The little crowd outside the hut: selectors in washed and mended +tweeds, some with paper collars, some wearing starched and ironed white +coats, and in blucher boots, greased or blackened, or the young men +wearing “larstins” (elastic-side boots). The women and girls in prints +and cottons (or cheap “alpaca,” etc.), and a bright bit of ribbon here +and there amongst the girls. The white heat blazed everywhere, and +“dazzled” across light-coloured surfaces—dead white trees, fence-posts, +and sand-heaps, like an endless swarm of bees passing in the sun’s +glare. And over above the dry boxscrub-covered ridges, the great +Granite Peak, glaring like a molten mass. + +The people didn’t like to go inside out of the heat and sit down before +the minister came. The wretched hut was a rough school, sometimes with +a clay fire-place where the teacher cooked, and a corner screened off +with sacking where he had his bunk; it was a camp for tramps at other +times, or lizards and possums, but to-day it was a house of God, and as +such the people respected it. + +The town parson didn’t turn up. Perhaps he was unwell, or maybe the +hot, dusty ten-mile drive was too much for him to face. One of the +farmers, who had tried to conduct service on a previous occasion on +which the ordained minister had failed us, had broken down in the +middle of it, so he was out of the question. We waited for about an +hour, and then who should happen to ride along but Peter M’Laughlan, +and one or two of the elder men asked him to hold service. He was on +his way to see a sick friend at a sheep station over the ridges, but he +said that he could spare an hour or two. (Nearly every man who was +sick, either in stomach or pocket, was a friend of Peter M’Laughlan.) +Peter tied up his horse under a bush shed at the back of the hut, and +we followed him in. + +The “school” had been furnished with a rough deal table and a wooden +chair for “the teacher,” and with a few rickety desks and stools cadged +from an old “provisional” school in town when the new public school was +built; and the desks and stools had been fastened to the floor to +strengthen them; they had been made for “infant” classes, and youth out +our way ran to length. But when grown men over six feet high squeezed +in behind the desks and sat down on the stools the effect struck me as +being ridiculous. In fact, I am afraid that on the first occasion it +rather took my attention from the sermon, and I remember being made +very uncomfortable by a school chum, Jack Barnes, who took a delight in +catching my eye and winking or grinning. He could wink without changing +a solemn line in his face and grin without exploding, and I couldn’t. +The boys usually sat on seats, slabs on blocks of wood, along the wall +at the far end of the room, which was comfortable, for they had a rest +for their backs. One or two of the boys were nearing six feet high, so +they could almost rest their chins on their knees as they sat. But I +squatted with some of my tribe on a stool along the wall by the +teacher’s table, and so could see most of the congregation. + +Above us bare tie-beams and the round sapling rafters (with the bark +still on), and the inner sides of the sheets of stringybark that formed +the roof. The slabs had been lined with sacking at one time, but most +of it had fallen or dry-rotted away; there were wide cracks between the +slabs and we could see the white glare of sunlight outside, with a +strip of dark shade, like a deep trench in the white ground, by the +back wall. Someone had brought a canvas water-bag and hung it to the +beam on the other side of the minister’s table, with a pint-pot over +the tap, and the drip, drip from the bag made the whole place seem +cooler. + +I studied Peter M’Laughlan first. He was dressed in washed and mended +tweed vest and trousers, and had on a long, lightcoloured coat of a +material which we called “Chinese silk.” He wore a “soft” cotton shirt +with collar attached, and blucher boots. He gave out a hymn in his +quiet, natural way, said a prayer, gave out another hymn, read a +chapter from the Bible, and then gave out another hymn. They liked to +sing, out in those places. The Southwicks used to bring a cranky little +harmonium in the back of their old dog-cart, and Clara Southwick used +to accompany the hymns. She was a very pretty girl, fair, and could +play and sing well. I used to think she had the sweetest voice I ever +heard. But—ah, well— + +Peter didn’t sing himself, at first. I got an idea that he couldn’t. +While they were singing he stood loosely, with one hand in his +trouser-pocket, scratching his beard with his hymn-book, and looking as +if he were thinking things over, and only rousing himself to give +another verse. He forgot to give it once or twice, but we got through +all right. I noticed the wife of one of the men who had asked Peter to +preach looking rather black at her husband, and I reckoned that he’d +get it hotter than the weather on the way home. + +Then Peter stood up and commenced to preach. He stood with both hands +in his pockets, at first, his coat ruffled back, and there was the stem +of a clay pipe sticking out of his waistcoat pocket. The pipe +fascinated me for a while, but after that I forgot the pipe and was +fascinated by the man. Peter’s face was one that didn’t strike you at +first with its full strength, it grew on you; it grew on me, and before +he had done preaching I thought it was the noblest face I had ever +seen. + +He didn’t preach much of hope in this world. How could he? The drought +had been blazing over these districts for nearly a year, with only a +shower now and again, which was a mockery—scarcely darkening the baked +ground. Wheat crops came up a few inches and were parched by the sun or +mown for hay, or the cattle turned on them; and last year there had +been rust and smut in the wheat. And, on top of it all, the dreadful +cattle plague, pleuro-pneumonia, had somehow been introduced into the +district. One big farmer had lost fifty milkers in a week. + +Peter M’Laughlan didn’t preach much of hope in this world; how could +he? There were men there who had slaved for twenty, thirty, forty +years; worked as farmers have to work in few other lands—first to clear +the stubborn bush from the barren soil, then to fence the ground, and +manure it, and force crops from it—and for what? There was Cox, the +farmer, starved off his selection after thirty years and going out back +with his drays to work at tank-sinking for a squatter. There was his +eldest son going shearing or droving—anything he could get to do—a +stoop-shouldered, young-old man of thirty. And behind them, in the end, +would be a dusty patch in the scrub, a fencepost here and there, and a +pile of chimney-stones and a hardwood slab or two where the but was—for +thirty hard years of the father’s life and twenty of the son’s. + +I forget Peter’s text, if he had a text; but the gist of his sermon was +that there was a God—there was a heaven! And there were men there +listening who needed to believe these things. There was old Ross from +across the creek, old, but not sixty, a hard man. Only last week he had +broken down and fallen on his knees on the baked sods in the middle of +his ploughed ground and prayed for rain. His frightened boys had taken +him home, and later on, the same afternoon, when they brought news of +four more cows down with “the pleuro” in an outer paddock, he had stood +up outside his own door and shaken his fist at the brassy sky and +cursed high heaven to the terror of his family, till his brave, +sun-browned wife dragged him inside and soothed him. And Peter +M’Laughlan knew all about this. + +Ross’s family had the doctor out to him, and persuaded him to come to +church this Sunday. The old man sat on the front seat, stooping +forward, with his elbow resting on the desk and his chin on his hand, +bunching up his beard over his mouth with his fingers and staring +gloomily at Peter with dark, piercing eyes from under bushy eyebrows, +just as I’ve since seen a Scotchman stare at Max O’Rell all through a +humorous lecture called “A nicht wi’ Sandy.” + +Ross’s right hand resting on the desk was very eloquent: horny, scarred +and knotted at every joint, with broken, twisted nails, and nearly +closed, as though fitted to the handle of an axe or a spade. Ross was +an educated man (he had a regular library of books at home), and +perhaps that’s why he suffered so much. + +Peter preached as if he were speaking quietly to one person only, but +every word was plain and every sentence went straight to someone. I +believe he looked every soul in the eyes before he had done. Once he +said something and caught my eye, and I felt a sudden lump in my +throat. There was a boy there, a pale, thin, sensitive boy who was +eating his heart out because of things he didn’t understand. He was +ambitious and longed for something different from this life; he’d +written a story or two and some rhymes for the local paper; his +companions considered him a “bit ratty” and the grown-up people thought +him a “bit wrong in his head,” idiotic, or at least “queer.” And during +his sermon Peter spoke of “unsatisfied longings,” of the hope of +something better, and said that one had to suffer much and for long +years before he could preach or write; and then he looked at that boy. +I knew the boy very well; he has risen in the world since then. + +Peter spoke of the life we lived, of the things we knew, and used names +and terms that we used. “I don’t know whether it was a blanky sermon or +a blanky lecture,” said long swanky Jim Bullock afterwards, “but it was +straight and hit some of us hard. It hit me once or twice, I can tell +yer.” Peter spoke of our lives: “And there is beauty—even in this life +and in this place,” he said. “Nothing is wasted—nothing is without +reason. There is beauty even in this place——” + +I noticed something like a hint of a hard smile on Ross’s face; he +moved the hand on the desk and tightened it. + +“Yes,” said Peter, as if in answer to Ross’s expression and the +movement of his hand, “there is beauty in this life here. After a good +season, and when the bush is tall and dry, when the bush-fires threaten +a man’s crop of ripened wheat, there are tired men who run and ride +from miles round to help that man, and who fight the fire all night to +save his wheat—and some of them may have been wrangling with him for +years. And in the morning, when the wheat is saved and the danger is +past, when the fire is beaten out or turned, there are blackened, grimy +hands that come together and grip-hands that have not joined for many a +long day.” + +Old Palmer, Ross’s neighbour, moved uneasily. He had once helped Ross +to put a fire out, but they had quarrelled again since. Ross still sat +in the same position, looking the hard man he was. Peter glanced at +Ross, looked down and thought a while, and then went on again: + +“There is beauty even in this life and in this place. When a man loses +his farm, or his stock, or his crop, through no fault of his own, there +are poor men who put their hands into their pockets to help him.” + +Old Kurtz, over the ridge, had had his stacked crop of wheat in sheaf +burned—some scoundrel had put a match to it at night—and the farmers +round had collected nearly fifty pounds for him. + +“There is beauty even in this life and in this place. In the blazing +drought, when the cattle lie down and cannot rise from weakness, +neighbours help neighbours to lift them. When one man has hay or chaff +and no stock, he gives it or sells it cheaply to the poor man who has +starving cattle and no fodder.” + +I only knew one or two instances of this kind; but Peter was preaching +of what man should do as well as what they did. + +“When a man meets with an accident, or dies, there are young men who go +with their ploughs and horses and plough the ground for him or his +widow and put in the crop.” + +Jim Bullock and one or two other young men squirmed. They had ploughed +old Leonard’s land for him when he met with an accident in the shape of +a broken leg got by a kick from a horse. They had also ploughed the +ground for Mrs Phipps when her husband died, working, by the way, all +Saturday afternoon and Sunday, for they were very busy at home at that +time. + +“There is beauty even in this life and in this place. There are women +who were friends in girlhood and who quarrelled bitterly over a +careless word, an idle tale, or some paltry thing, who live within a +mile of each other and have not spoken for years; yet let one fall ill, +or lose husband or child, and the other will hurry across to her place +and take off her bonnet and tuck up her sleeves, and set to work to +help straighten things, and they will kiss, and cry in each other’s +arms, and be sisters again.” + +I saw tears in the eyes of two hard and hard-faced women I knew; but +they were smiling to each other through their tears. + +“And now,” said Peter, “I want to talk to you about some other things. +I am not preaching as a man who has been taught to preach comfortably, +but as a man who has learned in the world’s school. I know what trouble +is. Men,” he said, still speaking quietly, “and women too! I have been +through trouble as deep as any of yours—perhaps deeper. I know how you +toil and suffer, I know what battles you fight, I know. I too fought a +battle, perhaps as hard as any you fight. I carry a load and am +fighting a battle still.” His eyes were very haggard just them. “But +this is not what I wanted to talk to you about. I have nothing to say +against a young man going away from this place to better himself, but +there are young men who go out back shearing or droving, young men who +are goodhearted but careless, who make cheques, and spend their money +gambling or drinking and never think of the old folk at home until it +is too late. They never think of the old people, alone, perhaps, in a +desolate but on a worked-out farm in the scrub.” + +Jim Bullock squirmed again. He had gone out back last season and made a +cheque, and lost most of it on horse-racing and cards. + +“They never think—they cannot think how, perhaps, long years agone in +the old days, the old father, as a young man, and his brave young wife, +came out here and buried themselves in the lonely bush and toiled for +many years, trying—it does not matter whether they failed or not—trying +to make homes for their children; toiled till the young man was bowed +and grey, and the young wife brown and wrinkled and worn out. Exiles +they were in the early days—boy-husbands and girl-wives some of them, +who left their native lands, who left all that was dear, that seemed +beautiful, that seemed to make life worth living, and sacrificed their +young lives in drought and utter loneliness to make homes for their +children. I want you young men to think of this. Some of them came from +England, Ireland, Bonnie Scotland.” Ross straightened up and let his +hands fall loosely on his knees. “Some from Europe—your foreign +fathers—some from across the Rhine in Germany.” We looked at old Kurtz. +He seemed affected. + +Then Peter paused for a moment and blinked thoughtfully at Ross, then +he took a drink of water. I can see now that the whole thing was a +battle between Peter M’Laughlan and Robert Ross—Scot met Scot. “It +seemed to me,” Jim Bullock said afterwards, “that Peter was only tryin’ +to make some of us blanky well blubber.” + +“And there are men,” Peter went on, “who have struggled and suffered +and failed, and who have fought and failed again till their tempers are +spoiled, until they grow bitter. They go in for self-pity, and +self-pity leads to moping and brooding and madness; self-pity is the +most selfish and useless thing on the face of God’s earth. It is cruel, +it is deadly, both to the man and to those who love him, and whom he +ought to love. His load grows heavier daily in his imagination, and he +sinks down until it is in him to curse God and die. He ceases to care +for or to think of his children who are working to help him.” (Ross’s +sons were good, steady, hard-working boys.) “Or the brave wife who has +been so true to him for many hard years, who left home and friends and +country for his sake. Who bears up in the blackest of times, and +persists in looking at the bright side of things for his sake; who has +suffered more than he if he only knew it, and suffers now, through him +and because of him, but who is patient and bright and cheerful while +her heart is breaking. He thinks she does not suffer, that she cannot +suffer as a man does. My God! he doesn’t know. He has forgotten in her +the bright, fresh-faced, loving lassie he loved and won long years +agone—long years agone——” + +There was a sob, like the sob of an over-ridden horse as it sinks down +broken-hearted, and Ross’s arms went out on the desk in front of him, +and his head went down on them. He was beaten. + +He was steered out gently with his wife on one side of him and his +eldest son on the other. + +“Don’t be alarmed, my friends,” said Peter, standing by the water-bag +with one hand on the tap and the pannikin in the other. “Mr Ross has +not been well lately, and the heat has been too much for him.” And he +went out after Ross. They took him round under the bush shed behind the +hut, where it was cooler. + +When Peter came back to his place he seemed to have changed his whole +manner and tone. “Our friend, Mr Ross, is much better,” he said. “We +will now sing”—he glanced at Clara Southwick at the harmonium—“we will +now sing ‘Shall We Gather at the River?’” We all knew that hymn; it was +an old favourite round there, and Clara Southwick played it well in +spite of the harmonium. + +And Peter sang—the first and last time I ever heard him sing. I never +had an ear for music; but I never before nor since heard a man’s voice +that stirred me as Peter M’Laughlan’s. We stood like emus, listening to +him all through one verse, then we pulled ourselves together. + +Shall we gather at the River, +Where bright angels’ feet have trod— + + +The only rivers round there were barren creeks, the best of them only +strings of muddy waterholes, and across the ridge, on the sheep-runs, +the creeks were dry gutters, with baked banks and beds, and perhaps a +mudhole every mile or so, and dead beasts rotting and stinking every +few yards. + +Gather with the saints at the River, +That flows by the throne of God. + + +Peter’s voice trembled and broke. He caught his breath, and his eyes +filled. But he smiled then—he stood smiling at us through his tears. + +The beautiful, the beautiful River, +That flows by the throne of God. + + +Outside I saw women kiss each other who had been at daggers drawn ever +since I could remember, and men shake hands silently who had hated each +other for years. Every family wanted Peter to come home to tea, but he +went across to Ross’s, and afterwards down to Kurtz’s place, and bled +and inoculated six cows or so in a new way, and after tea he rode off +over the gap to see his friend. + + + + +HIS BROTHER’S KEEPER + + +By his paths through the parched desolation, + Hot rides and the terrible tramps; +By the hunger, the thirst, the privation + Of his work in the furthermost camps; + +By his worth in the light that shall search men + And prove—ay! and justify each— +I place him in front of all Churchmen + Who feel not, who _know_ not—but preach! + _The Christ of the Never_. + + +I told you about Peter M’Laughlan, the bush missionary, and how he +preached in the little slab-and-bark school-house in the scrub on +Ross’s Creek that blazing hot Sunday afternoon long ago, when the +drought was ruining the brave farmers all round there and breaking +their hearts. And how hard old Ross, the selector, broke down at the +end of the sermon, and blubbered, and had to be taken out of church. + +I left home and drifted to Sydney, and “back into the Great North-West +where all the rovers go,” and knocked about the country for six or +seven years before I met Peter M’Laughlan again. I was young yet, but +felt old at times, and there were times, in the hot, rough, greasy +shearing-shed on blazing days, or in the bare “men’s hut” by the +flicker of the stinking slush-lamp at night, or the wretched wayside +shanty with its drink-madness and blasphemy, or tramping along the +dusty, endless track—there were times when I wished I could fall back +with all the experience I’d got, and sit once more in the little +slab-and-bark “chapel” on Ross’s Creek and hear Peter M’Laughlan and +the poor, struggling selectors sing “Shall We Gather at the River?” and +then go out and start life afresh. + +My old school chum and bush mate, Jack Barnes, had married pretty +little Clara Southwick, who used to play the portable harmonium in +chapel. I nearly broke my heart when they were married, but then I was +a young fool. Clara was a year or so older than I, and I could never +get away from a boyish feeling of reverence for her, as if she were +something above and out of my world. And so, while I was worshipping +her in chapel once a month, and at picnics and parties in between, and +always at a distance, Jack used to ride up to Southwick’s place on +Saturday and Sunday afternoons, and on other days, and hang his horse +up outside, or turn it in the paddock, and argue with old Southwick, +and agree with the old woman, and court Clara on the sly. And he got +her. + +It was at their wedding that I first got the worse for drink. + +Jack was a blue-eyed, curly black-haired, careless, popular young +scamp; as good-hearted as he was careless. He could ride like a circus +monkey, do all kinds of bush work, add two columns of figures at once, +and write like copper-plate. + +Jack was given to drinking, gambling and roving. He steadied up when he +got married and started on a small selection of his own; but within the +year Clara was living in a back skillion of her father’s house and Jack +was up-country shearing. He was “ringer” of the shed at Piora Station +one season and made a decent cheque; and within a fortnight after the +shed “cut out” he turned up at home in a very bad state from drink and +with about thirty shillings in his pockets. He had fallen from his +horse in the creek near Southwick’s, and altogether he was a nice sort +of young husband to go home to poor, heart-broken Clara. + +I remember that time well. She stopped me one day as I was riding past +to ask me if I’d seen Jack, and I got off my horse. Her chin and mouth +began to twitch and tremble and I saw her eyes filling with tears. She +laid her hand on my arm and asked me to promise not to drink with Jack +if I met him, but to try and persuade him to come home. And—well, have +you, as a man, ever, with the one woman that you can’t have, and no +matter at what time or place, felt a sudden mad longing to take her in +your arms and kiss her—and damn the world? I got on my horse again. She +must have thought me an ignorant brute, but I felt safer there. And +when I thought how I had nearly made a fool of myself, and been a +cowardly brute, and a rotten mate to my mate, I rode ten miles to find +Jack and get him home. + +He straightened up again after a bit and went out and got another shed, +and they say that Peter M’Laughlan got hold of him there. I don’t know +what Peter did to him then—Jack never spoke of it, even to me, his old +mate; but, anyway, at the end of the shearing season Jack’s cheque came +home to Clara in a registered envelope, addressed in Peter’s +hand-writing, and about a week later Jack turned up a changed man. + +He got work as a temporary clerk in the branch government land office +at Solong, a pretty little farming town in a circle of blue hills on +the banks of a clear, willow-fringed river, where there were rich, +black-soil, river-flat farms, and vineyards on the red soil slopes, and +blue peaks in the distance. It was a great contrast to Ross’s Creek. +Jack paid a deposit on an allotment of land, a bit out of town, on the +river bank, and built a little weather-board box of a cottage in spare +times, and planted roses and grape-vines to hide its ugliness by and +by. It wasn’t much of a place, but Clara was mighty proud of it because +it was “our house.” They were very happy, and she was beginning to feel +sure of Jack. She seemed to believe that the miserable old time was all +past and gone. + +When the work at the land’s office gave out, Jack did all sorts of jobs +about town, and at last, one shearing season, when there was a heavy +clip of wool, and shearers were getting L1 a hundred, he decided to go +out back. I know that Clara was against it, but he argued that it was +the only chance for him, and she persuaded herself that she could trust +him. I was knocking about Solong at the time, and Jack and I decided to +go out together and share his packhorse between us. He wrote to +Beenaway Shed, about three hundred: miles north-west in the Great +Scrubs, and got pens for both of us. + +It was a fine fresh morning when we started; it was in a good season +and the country looked grand. When I rode up to Jack’s place I saw his +horse and packhorse tied up outside the gate. He had wanted me to come +up the evening before and have tea with them and camp at his place for +the night. “Come up! man alive!” he said. “We’ll make you a +shake-down!” But I wouldn’t; I said I had to meet a chap. Jack wouldn’t +have understood. I had been up before, but when I saw him and Clara so +happy and comfortable, and thought of the past and my secret, and +thought of myself, a useless, purposeless, restless, homeless sort of +fellow, hanging out at a boarding-house, it nearly broke me up, and I +had to have a drink or two afterwards. I often wonder if Clara guessed +and understood. You never know how much a woman knows; but—ah, well! + +Jack had taken my things home with him and he and Clara had packed +them. I found afterwards that she had washed, dried and ironed some +collars and handkerchiefs of mine during the night. Clara and Jack came +out to the gate, and as I wouldn’t go in to have a cup of tea there was +nothing for it but to say good-bye. She was dressed in a fresh-looking +print blouse and dark skirt, and wore a white hood that fell back from +her head; she was a little girl, with sweet, small, freckled features, +and red-gold hair, and kind, sympathetic grey eyes. I thought her the +freshest, and fairest, and daintiest little woman in the district. + +I was Jack’s mate, so she always treated me as a sort of +brother-in-law, and called me by my Christian name. Mates are closer +than brothers in the bush. + +I turned my back and pretended to tighten the straps and girths on the +packhorse while she said good-bye to Jack. I heard her speaking +earnestly to him, and once I heard her mention Peter M’Laughlan’s name. +I thought Jack answered rather impatiently. “Oh, that’s all right, +Clara,” he said, “that’s all over—past and gone. I wish you would +believe it. You promised never to speak of that any more.” + +I know how it was. Jack never cared to hear about Peter; he was too +ashamed of the past, perhaps; besides, deep down, we feel a sort of +resentment towards any reference to a man who has helped or saved us in +the past. It’s human nature. + +Then they spoke in low tones for a while, and then Jack laughed, and +kissed her, and said, “Oh, I’ll be back before the time’s up.” Then he +ran into the house to say good-bye to Mary’s sister, who was staying +with her, and who was laid up with a sprained ankle. + +Then Clara stepped up to me and laid her fingers on my shoulder. I +trembled from head to foot and hoped she didn’t notice it. + +“Joe,” she said, looking at me with her big, searching grey eyes, “I +believe I can trust you. I want you to look after Jack. You know why. +Never let him have one drink if you can help it. One drink—the first +drink will do it. I want you to promise me that you will never have a +drink with Jack, no matter what happens or what he says.” + +“I never will,” I said, and I meant it. + +“It’s the first time he’s been away from me since he gave up drinking, +and if he comes back all right this time I will be sure of him and +contented. But, Joe, if he comes back wrong it will kill me; it will +break my heart. I want you to promise that if anything happens you will +ride or wire for Peter M’Laughlan. I hear he’s wool-sorting this year +at Beenaway Station. Promise me that if anything happens you will ride +for Peter M’Laughlan and tell him, no matter what Jack says.” + +“I promise,” I said. + +She half-held out her hand to me, but I kept both mine behind my back. +I suppose she thought I didn’t notice that she wanted to shake hands on +the bargain; but the truth was that my hands shook so, and I didn’t +want her to notice _that_. + +I got on my horse and felt steadier. Then, “Good-bye, Clara”—“Good-bye, +Jack.” She bore up bravely, but I saw her eyes brimming. Jack got on +his horse, and I bent over and shook hands with her. Jack bent down and +kissed her while she stood on tiptoe. “Good-bye, little woman,” he +said. “Cheer up, and I’ll be back before you know where you are! You +mustn’t fret—you know why.” + +“Good-bye, Jack!”—she was breaking down. + +“Come on, Jack!” I said, and we rode off, turning and waving our hats +to her as she stood by the gate, looking a desolate little thing, I +thought, till we turned down a bend of the road into the river. + +As we jogged along with the packhorse trotting behind us, and the +quart-pots and hobble-chains jingling on the packsaddle, I pictured +Clara running inside, to cry a while in her sister’s arms, and then to +bustle round and cheer up, for Jack’s sake—and for the sake of +something else. + +“I’ll christen him after you, Joe,” said Jack, later on, when we’d got +confidential over our pipes after tea in our first camp. It never +seemed to enter his head that there was the ghost of a chance that it +might be a girl. “I’m glad he didn’t come along when I was drinking,” +he said. + +And as we lay rolled in our blankets under the stars I swore a big oath +to myself. + +We got along comfortably and reached Beenaway Station in about a week, +the day before the shearers’ roll-call. Jack never showed the slightest +inclination to go into a shanty; and several times we talked about old +times and what damned fools we’d been throwing away our money over +shanty bars shouting for loafers and cadgers. “Isn’t this ever so-much +better, Joe!” said Jack, as we lay on our blankets smoking one +moonlight night. “There’s nothing in boozing, Joe, you can take it from +me. Just you sling it for a year and then look back; you won’t want to +touch it again. You’ve been straight for a couple of months. Sling it +for good, Joe, before it gets a hold on you, like it did on me.” + +It was the morning after cut-out at Beenaway Shed, and we were glad. We +were tired of the rush and roar and rattle and heat and grease and +blasphemy of the big, hot, iron machine shed in that dusty patch in the +barren scrubs. Swags were rolled up, saddle-bags packed, horses had +been rounded up and driven in, the shearers’ cook and his mate had had +their fight, and about a hundred men—shearers, rouseabouts, and +wool-washers—were waiting round the little iron office to get their +cheques. + +We were about half through when one bushman said to another: “Stop your +damned swearin’, Jim. Here’s Peter M’Laughlan!” Peter walked up and the +men made way for him and he went into the office. There was always +considerably less swearing for a few feet round about where Peter +M’Laughlan happened to be working in a shearing-shed. It seemed to be +an understood thing with the men. He took no advantages, never +volunteered to preach at a shed where he was working, and only spoke on +union subjects when the men asked him to. He was “rep.” (Shearers’ +Union representative) at this shed, but squatters and station managers +respected him as much as the men did. + +He seemed much greyer now, but still stood square and straight. And his +eyes still looked one through. + +When Peter came out and the crowd had cleared away he took Jack aside +and spoke to him in a low voice for a few minutes. I heard Jack say, +“Oh, that’s all right, Peter! You have my word for it,” and he got on +his horse. I heard Peter say the one word, “Remember!” “Oh, that’s all +right,” said Jack, and he shook hands with Peter, shouted, “Come on, +Joe!” and started off with the packhorse after him. + +“I wish I were going down with you, Joe,” said Peter to me, “but I +can’t get away till to-morrow. I’ve got that sick rouseabout on my +hands, and I’ll have to see him fixed up somehow and started off to the +hospital” (the nearest was a hundred miles away). “And, by the way, +I’ve taken up a collection for him; I want a few shillings from you, +Joe. I nearly forgot you. The poor fellow only got in about a +fortnight’s work, and there’s a wife and youngsters in Sydney. I’ll be +down after you to-morrow. I promised to go to Comesomehow[1] and get +the people together and start an agitation for a half-time school +there. Anyway, I’ll be there by the end of the week. Good-bye, Joe. I +must get some more money for the rouser from some of those chaps before +they start.” + +[1] There is a postal district in new South Wales called +“Come-by-Chance.” + + +Comesomehow was a wretched cockatoo settlement, a bit off the track, +about one hundred and fifty miles on our road home, where the settlers +lived like savages and the children ran wild. I reckoned that Peter +would have his work cut out to start a craving for education in that +place. + +By saying he’d be there I think he intended to give me a hint, in case +anything happened. I believe now that Jack’s wife had got anxious and +had written to him. + +We jogged along comfortably and happily for three or four days, and as +we passed shanty after shanty, and town after town, without Jack +showing the slightest inclination to pull up at any of them, I began to +feel safe about him. + +Then it happened, in the simplest way, as most things of this sort +happen if you don’t watch close. + +The third night it rained, rained heavens-hard, and rainy nights can be +mighty cold out on those plains, even in midsummer. Jack and I rigged +up a strip of waterproof stuff we had to cover the swags on the +packhorse, but the rain drove in, almost horizontally, and we got wet +through, blankets, clothes and all. Jack got a bad cold and coughed fit +to break himself; so about daylight, when the rain held up a bit, we +packed up and rode on to the next pub, a wretched little weather-board +place in the scrub. + +Jack reckoned he’d get some stuff for his cold there. I didn’t like to +speak, but before we reached the place I said, “You won’t touch a +drink, Jack.” + +“Do you think I’m a blanky fool?” said Jack, and I shut up. + +The shanty was kept by a man who went by the name of Thomas, a +notorious lamber-down,[2] as I found out afterwards. He was a big, +awkward bullock of a man, a selfish, ignorant brute, as anyone might +have seen by his face; but he had a loud voice, and adopted a careless, +rollicking, hail-fellow-well-met! come-in-and-sit-down-man-alive! +clap-you-on-the-back style, which deceived a good many, or which a good +many pretended to believe in. His “missus” was an animal of his own +species, but she was duller and didn’t bellow. + +[2] “Lamber-down,” a shanty keeper who entices cheque-men to drink. + + +He had a rather good-looking girl there—I don’t know whether she was +his daughter or not. They said that when he saw the shearers coming +he’d say, “Run and titivate yourself, Mary; here comes the shearers!” + +But what surprised me was that Jack Barnes didn’t seem able to see +through Thomas; he thought that he was all right, “a bit of a rough +diamond.” There are any amount of scoundrels and swindlers knocking +about the world disguised as rough diamonds. + +Jack had a fit of coughing when we came in. + +“Why, Jack!” bellowed Thomas, “that’s a regular churchyarder you’ve +got. Go in to the kitchen fire and I’ll mix you a stiff toddy.” + +“No, thank you, Thomas,” said Jack, glancing at me rather sheepishly, I +thought. “I’ll have a hot cup of coffee presently, that’ll do me more +good.” + +“Why, man alive, one drink won’t hurt you!” said Thomas. “I know you’re +on the straight, and you know I’m the last man that ’ud try to get you +off it. But you want something for that cold. You don’t want to die on +the track, do you? What would your missus say? That cough of yours is +enough to bust a bullock.” + +“Jack isn’t drinking, Thomas,” I said rather shortly, “and neither am +I.” + +“I’ll have a cup of coffee at breakfast,” said Jack; “thank you all the +same, Thomas.” + +“Right you are, Jack!” said Thomas. “Mary!” he roared at the girl, +“chuck yerself about and get breakfast, and make a strong cup of +coffee; and I say, missus” (to his wife), “git some honey and vinegar +in a cup, will yer? or see if there’s any of that cough stuff left in +the bottle. Go into the kitchen, you chaps, and dry yourselves at the +fire, you’re wringing wet.” + +Jack went through into the kitchen. I stepped out to see if the horses +were all right, and as I came in again through the bar, Thomas, who had +slipped behind the counter, crooked his finger at me and poured out a +stiff whisky. “I thought you might like to have it on the quiet,” he +whispered, with a wink. + +Now, there was this difference between Jack and me. When I was on the +track, and healthy and contented, I could take a drink, or two drinks, +and then leave it; or at other times I could drink all day, or all +night, and be as happy as a lord, and be mighty sick and repentant all +next day, and then not touch drink for a week; but if Jack once +started, he was a lost man for days, for weeks, for, months—as long as +his cash or credit lasted. I felt a cold coming on me this morning, and +wanted a whisky, so I had a drink with Thomas. Then, of course, I +shouted in my turn, keeping an eye out in case Jack should come in. I +went into the kitchen and steamed with Jack for a while in front of a +big log fire, taking care to keep my breath away from him. Then we went +in to breakfast. Those two drinks were all I meant to have, and we were +going right on after breakfast. + +It was a good breakfast, ham and eggs, and we enjoyed it. The two +whiskies had got to work. I hadn’t touched drink for a long time. I +shouldn’t like to say that Thomas put anything in the drink he gave me. +Before we started breakfast he put a glass down in front of me and +said: + +“There’s a good ginger-ale, it will warm you up.” + +I tasted it; it was rum, hot. I said nothing. What could I say? + +There was some joke about Jack being married and settled and steadied +down, and me, his old mate, still on the wallaby; and Mrs Thomas said +that I ought to follow Jack’s example. And just then I felt a touch of +that loneliness that some men feel when an old drinking mate turns +teetotaller. + +Jack started coughing again, like an old cow with the pleuro. + +“That cough will kill you, Jack,” said Thomas. “Let’s put a drop of +brandy in your coffee, that won’t start you, anyhow; it’s real ‘Three +Star.’” And he reached a bottle from the side-table. + +I should have stood up then, for my manhood, for my mate, and for +little Clara, but I half rose from my chair, and Jack laughed and said, +“Sit down, Joe, you old fool, you’re tanked. I know all about your +seeing about the horses and your ginger-ales. It’s all right, old man. +Do you think I’m going on the booze? Why, I’ll have to hold you on the +horse all day.” + +“Here’s luck, Joe!” said Jack, laughing, and lifting up his cup of +coffee with the brandy in it. “Here’s luck, Joe.” + +Then suddenly, and as clearly as I ever heard it, came Clara’s voice to +my ear: “Promise me, whatever you do, that you will never have a drink +with Jack.” And I felt cold and sick to the stomach. + +I got up and went out. They thought that the drink had made me sick, +but if I’d stayed there another minute I would have tackled Thomas; and +I knew that I needed a clear head to tackle a bullock like him. I +walked about a bit, and when I came in again Jack and Thomas were in +the bar, and Jack had a glass before him. + +“Come on, Joe, you old bounder,” said Jack, “come and have a +whisky-and-soda; it will straighten you up.” + +“What’s that you’re drinking, Jack?” I asked. + +“Oh, don’t be a fool!” said Jack. “One drink won’t hurt me. Do you +think I’m going on the booze? Have a soda and straighten up; we must +make a start directly.” + +I remember we had two or three whiskies, and then suddenly I tackled +Thomas, and Jack was holding me back, and laughing and swearing at me +at the same time, and I had a tussle with him; and then I was suddenly +calmer and sensible, and we were shaking hands all round, and Jack was +talking about just one more spree for the sake of old times. + +“A bit of a booze won’t hurt me, Joe, you old fool,” he said. “We’ll +have one more night of it, for the sake of Auld Lang Syne, and start at +daylight in the morning. You go and see to the horses, it will +straighten you up. Take the saddle off and hobble ’em out.” + +But I insisted on starting at once, and Jack promised he would. We were +gloriously happy for an hour or so, and then I went to sleep. + +When I woke it was late in the afternoon. I was very giddy and shaky; +the girl brought me a whisky-and-soda, and that steadied me. Some more +shearers had arrived, and Jack was playing cards with two of them on +top of a cask in the bar. Thomas was dead drunk on the floor, or +pretending to be so, and his wife was behind the bar. I went out to see +to the horses; I found them in a bush yard at the back. The packhorse +was rolling in the mud with the pack-saddle and saddlebags on. One of +the chaps helped me take off the saddles and put them in the +harness-room behind the kitchen. + +I’ll pass over that night. It wouldn’t be very edifying to the great, +steady-living, sober majority, and the others, the never-do-wells, the +rovers, wrecks and failures, will understand only too well without +being told—only too well, God help them! + +When I woke in the morning I couldn’t have touched a drink to save my +life. I was fearfully shaky, and swimming about the head, but I put my +head over a tub under the pump and got the girl to pump for a while, +and then I drank a pint of tea and managed to keep it down, and felt +better. + +All through the last half of the night I’d kept saying, in a sort of +drink nightmare, “I’ll go for Peter M’Laughlan in the morning. I’ll go +for Peter as soon as I can stand!” and repeating Clara Barnes’s words, +“Ride for Peter if anything happens. Ride for Peter M’Laughlan.” + +There were drunken shearers, horsemen and swagmen sleeping all over the +place, and in all sorts of odd positions; some on the veranda with +their heads on their swags, one sitting back against the wall, and one +on the broad of his back with his head on the bare boards and his mouth +open. There was another horse rolling in its saddle, and I took the +saddle off. The horse belonged to an English University man. + +I went in to see how Jack was. He was lying in the parlour on a little, +worn-out, horse-hair sofa, that might have seen better days in some +clean home in the woman-and-girl world. He had been drinking and +playing cards till early that morning, and he looked awful—he looked as +if he’d been boozing for a month. + +“See what you’ve done!” he said, sitting up and glaring at me; then he +said, “Bring me a whisky-and-soda, Joe, for God’s sake!” + +I got a whisky-and-soda from the girl and took it to him. + +I talked to him for a while, and at last he said, “Well, go and get the +horses and we’ll start.” + +I got the horses ready and brought them round to the front, but by that +time he’d had more drink, and he said he wanted to sleep before he +started. Next he was playing cards with one of the chaps, and asked me +to wait till he’d finished that game. I knew he’d keep promising and +humbugging me till there was a row, so at last I got him aside and +said: + +“Look here, Jack, I’m going for Peter M’Laughlan——” + +“Go to hell!” said Jack. + +I put the other horses back in the yard, the saddles in the skillion, +got on my horse and rode off. Thomas and the others asked me no +questions, they took no notice. In a place like that a man could almost +do anything, short of hanging himself, without anyone interfering or +being surprised. And probably, if he did hang himself, they’d let him +swing for a while to get a taste of it. + +Comesomehow was about fifteen miles back on a track off the main road. +I reckoned that I could find Peter and bring him on by the afternoon, +and I rode hard, sick as I was. I was too sick to smoke. + +As it happened, Peter had started early from his last camp and I caught +him just as he was turning off into Comesomehow track. + +“What’s up, Joe?” he asked as I rode up to him—but he could see. + +“Jack Barnes is on the booze at Thomas’s,” I said. + +Peter just looked right through me. Then he turned his horse’s head +without a word, and rode back with me. And, after a while, he said, as +if to himself: + +“Poor Clara! Poor little lassie!” + +By the time we reached the shanty it was well on in the afternoon. A +fight was stopped in the first round and voices lowered when the chaps +caught sight of us. As Peter walked into the bar one or two drunks +straightened themselves and took off their hats with drunken sentiment. + +“Where is Jack Barnes, Thomas?” asked Peter, quietly. + +“He’s in there if you want to see him,” said Thomas, jerking his head +towards the parlour. + +We went in, and when Peter saw Jack lying there I noticed that swift, +haunted look came into his eyes, as if he’d seen a ghost of the past. +He sat down by the sofa to wait until Jack woke. I thought as he sat +there that his eyes were like a woman’s for sympathy and like a dog’s +for faithfulness. I was very shaky. + +Presently Thomas looked in. “Is there anything I can do for you, +M’Laughlan?” he asked in as civil a tone as he could get to. + +“Yes,” said Peter, “bring me a flask of your best whisky—your own, +mind—and a glass. + +“We shall need the whisky for him on the track, Joe,” said Peter, when +the flask came. “Get another glass and a bottle of soda; you want a +nip.” He poured out a drink for himself. + +“The first thing we’ve got to do is to get him away; then I’ll soon put +him on his feet. But we’ll let him sleep a while longer. I find I’ve +got business near Solong, and I’m going down with you.” + +By and by Jack woke up and glared round, and when he caught sight of +Peter he just reached for his hands and said, “Peter! Thank God you’ve +come!” Then he said, “But I must have a drink first, Peter.” + +“All right, Jack, you shall have a drink,” said Peter; and he gave him +a stiff nobblerq. It steadied Jack a bit. + +“Now listen to me, Jack,” said Peter. “How much money have you got +left?” + +“I—I can’t think,” said Jack. “I’ve got a cheque for twenty pounds +here, sewn inside my shirt.” + +“Yes; but you drew thirty-six in three cheques. Where’s the rest?” + +“Thomas has ten,” said Jack, “and the six—well, the six is gone. I was +playing cards last night.” + +Peter stepped out into the bar. + +“Look here, Thomas,” he said quietly, “you’ve got a ten-pound cheque +from Barnes.” + +“I know I have.” + +“Well, how much of it does he owe you?” + +“The whole, and more.” + +“Do you mean to tell me that? He has only been here since yesterday +morning.” + +“Yes; but he’s been shoutin’ all round. Look at all these chaps here.” + +“They only came yesterday afternoon,” said Peter. “Here, you had best +take this and give me the cheque;” and Peter laid a five-pound note on +the bar. Thomas bucked at first, but in the end he handed over the +cheque—he had had several warnings from the police. Then he suddenly +lost all control over himself; he came round from behind the bar and +faced Peter. + +“Now, look here, you mongrel parson!” he said. “What the —— do you mean +by coming into my bar and, interfering with me. Who the —— are you +anyway? A ——!” He used the worst oaths that were used in the bush. +“Take off your —— coat!” he roared at last, shaping up to Peter. + +Peter stepped back a pace and buttoned his coat and threw back his +head. + +“No need to take off my coat, Thomas,” he said, “I am ready.” + +He said it very quietly, but there was a danger-signal—a red light in +his eyes. He was quiet-voiced but hard-knuckled, as some had reason to +know. + +Thomas balked like a bull at a spread umbrella. Jack lurched past me as +I stood in the parlour door, but I caught him and held him back; and +almost at the same moment a wretched old boozer that we called “Awful +Example,” who had been sitting huddled, a dirty bundle of rags and +beard and hair, in the corner of the bar, struggled to his feet, +staggered forward and faced Thomas, looking once again like something +that might have been a man. He snatched a thick glass bottle from the +counter and held it by the neck in his right hand. + +“Stand back, Thomas!” he shouted. “Lay a hand—lay a finger on Peter +M’Laughlan, and I’ll smash your head, as sure as there’s a God above us +and I’m a ruined man!” + +Peter took “Awful” gently by the shoulders and sat him down. “You keep +quiet, old man,” he said; “nothing is going to happen.” Thomas went +round behind the bar muttering something about it not being worth his +while to, etc. + +“You go and get the horses ready, Joe,” said Peter to me; “and you sit +down, Jack, and keep quiet.” + +“He can get the horses,” growled Thomas, from behind the bar, “but I’m +damned if he gets the saddles. I’ve got them locked up, and I’ll +something well keep them till Barnes is sober enough to pay me what he +owes me.” + +Just then a tall, good-looking chap, with dark-blue eyes and a long, +light-coloured moustache, stepped into the bar from the crowd on the +veranda. + +“What’s all this, Thomas?” he asked. + +“What’s that got to do with you, Gentleman Once?” shouted Thomas. + +“I think it’s got something to do with me,” said Gentleman Once. “Now, +look here, Thomas; you can do pretty well what you like with us poor +devils, and you know it, but we draw the line at Peter M’Laughlan. If +you really itch for the thrashing, you deserve you must tempt someone +else to give it to you.” + +“What the —— are you talking about?” snorted Thomas. “You’re drunk or +ratty!” + +“What’s the trouble, M’Laughlan?” asked Gentleman Once, turning to +Peter. “No trouble at all, Gentleman Once,” said Peter; “thank you all +the same. I’ve managed worse men than our friend Thomas. Now, Thomas, +don’t you think it would pay you best to hand over the key of the +harness-room and have done with this nonsense? I’m a patient man—a very +patient man—but I’ve not always been so, and the old blood comes up +sometimes, you know.” + +Thomas couldn’t stand this sort of language, because he couldn’t +understand it. He threw the key on the bar and told us to clear out. + +We were all three very quiet riding along the track that evening. Peter +gave Jack a nip now and again from the flask, and before we turned in +in camp he gave him what he called a soothing draught from a little +medicine chest that he carried in his saddle-bag. Jack seemed to have +got rid of his cough; he slept all night, and in the morning, after +he’d drunk a pint of mutton-broth that Peter had made in one of the +billies, he was all right—except that he was quiet and ashamed. I had +never known him to be so quiet, and for such a length of time, since we +were boys together. He had learned his own weakness; he’d lost all his +cocksureness. I know now just exactly how he felt. He felt as if his +sober year had been lost and he would have to live it all over again. + +Peter didn’t preach. He just jogged along and camped with us as if he +were an ordinary, every-day mate. He yarned about all sorts of things. +He could tell good yarns, and when he was fairly on you could listen to +him all night. He seemed to have been nearly all over the world. Peter +never preached except when he was asked to hold service in some bush +pub, station-homestead or bush church. But in a case like ours he had a +way of telling a little life story, with something in it that hit the +young man he wanted to reform, and hit him hard. He’d generally begin +quietly, when we were comfortable with our pipes in camp after tea, +with “I once knew a young man—” or “That reminds me of a young fellow I +knew—” and so on. You never knew when he was going to begin; or when he +was going to hit you. In our last camp, before we reached Solong, he +told two of his time-fuse yarns. I haven’t time to tell them now, but +one stuffed up my pipe for a while, and made Jack’s hand tremble when +he tried to light his. I’m glad it was too dark to see our faces. We +lay a good while afterwards, rolled in our blankets, and couldn’t get +to sleep for thinking; but Peter seemed to fall asleep as soon as he +turned in. + +Next day he told Jack not to tell Clara that he’d come down with us. He +said he wouldn’t go right into Solong with us; he was going back along +another road to stay a day or two with an old friend of his. + +When we reached Solong we stopped on the river-bank just out of sight +of Jack’s house. Peter took the ten-pound cheque from his pocket and +gave it to Jack. Jack hadn’t seen Peter give the shanty-keeper the +five-pound note. + +“But I owed Thomas something,” said Jack, staring. “However did you +manage to get the cheque out of him?” + +“Never mind, Jack, I managed,” said Peter. + +Jack sat silent for a while, then he began to breathe hard. + +“I don’t know what to say, Peter.” + +“Say nothing, Jack. Only promise me that you will give Clara the +cheques as soon as you go home, and let her take care of the cash for a +while.” + +“I will,” said Jack. + +Jack looked down at the ground for a while, then he lifted his head and +looked Peter in the eyes. + +“Peter,” he said, “I can’t speak. I’m ashamed to make a promise; I’ve +broken so many. I’ll try to thank you in a year’s time from now.” + +“I ask for no promises,” said Peter, and he held out his hand. Jack +gripped it. + +“Aren’t you coming home with me, Joe?” he asked. + +“No,” I said; “I’ll go into town. See you in the morning.” + +Jack rode on. When he got along a piece Peter left his horse and moved +up to the head of the lane to watch Jack, and I followed. As Jack +neared the cottage we saw a little figure in a cloak run out to the +front gate. She had heard the horses and the jingle of the camp-ware on +the pack-saddle. We saw Jack jump down and take her in his arms. I +looked at Peter, and as he watched them, something, that might have +been a strange look of the old days, came into his eyes. + +He shook hands with me. “Good-bye, Joe.” + +He rode across the river again. He took the track that ran along the +foot of the spurs by the river, and up over a gap in the curve of blue +hills, and down and out west towards the Big Scrubs. And as he rounded +the last spur, with his packhorse trotting after him, I thought he must +have felt very lonely. And I felt lonely too. + + + + +THE STORY OF “GENTLEMAN ONCE” + + +They learn the world from black-sheep, +Who know it all too well.—_Out Back_. + + +Peter M’Laughlan, bush missionary, Joe Wilson and his mate, Jack +Barnes, shearers for the present, and a casual swagman named Jack +Mitchell, were camped at Cox’s Crossing in a bend of Eurunderee Creek. + +It was a grassy little flat with gum-trees standing clear and clean +like a park. At the back was the steep grassy siding of a ridge, and +far away across the creek to the south a spur from the Blue Mountain +range ran west, with a tall, blue granite peak showing clear in the +broad moonlight, yet dream-like and distant over the sweeps of dark +green bush. + +There was the jingle of hobble-chains and a crunching at the grass +where the horses moved in the soft shadows amongst the trees. Up the +creek on the other side was a surveyors’ camp, and from there now and +again came the sound of a good voice singing verses of old songs; and +later on the sound of a violin and a cornet being played, sometimes +together and sometimes each on its own. + +Wilson and Barnes were on their way home from shearing out back in the +great scrubs at Beenaway Shed. They had been rescued by Peter +M’Laughlan from a wayside shanty where they had fallen, in spite of +mutual oaths and past promises, sacred and profane, because they had +got wringing wet in a storm on the track and caught colds, and had been +tempted to take just one drink. + +They were in a bad way, and were knocking down their cheques +beautifully when Peter M’Laughlan came along. He rescued them and some +of their cash from the soulless shanty keeper, and was riding home with +them, on some pretence, because he had known them as boys, because Joe +Wilson had a vein of poetry in him—a something in sympathy with +something in Peter; because Jack Barnes had a dear little girl-wife who +was much too good for him, and who was now anxiously waiting for him in +the pretty little farming town of Solong amongst the western spurs. +Because, perhaps, of something in Peter’s early past which was a +mystery. Simply and plainly because Peter M’Laughlan was the kindest, +straightest and truest man in the West—a “white man.” + +They all knew Mitchell and welcomed him heartily when he turned up in +their camp, because he was a pathetic humorist and a kindly cynic—a +“joker” or “hard case” as the bushmen say. + +Peter was about fifty and the other three were young men. + +There was another man in camp who didn’t count and was supposed to be +dead. Old Danny Quinn, champion “beer-chewer” of the district, was on +his way out, after a spree, to one of Rouse’s stations, where, for the +sake of past services—long past—and because of old times, he was +supposed to be working. He had spent his last penny a week before and +had clung to his last-hope hotel until the landlord had taken him in +one hand and his swag in the other and lifted them clear of the +veranda. Danny had blundered on, this far, somehow; he was the last in +the world who could have told how, and had managed to light a fire; +then he lay with his head on his swag and enjoyed nips of whisky in +judicious doses and at reasonable intervals, and later on a tot of +mutton-broth, which he made in one of the billies. + +It was after tea. Peter sat on a log by the fire with Joe and Jack +Mitchell on one side and Jack Barnes on the other. Jack Mitchell sat on +the grass with his back to the log, his knees drawn up, and his arms +abroad on them: his most comfortable position and one which seemed to +favour the flow of his philosophy. They talked of bush things or +reflected, sometimes all three together, sometimes by turns. + +From the surveyors’ camp: + +I remember, I remember, + The house where I was born, +The little window where the sun + Came peeping in at morn— + + +The breeze from the west strengthened and the voice was blown away. + +“That chap seems a bit sentimental but he’s got a good voice,” said +Mitchell. Then presently he remarked, round his pipe: + +“I wonder if old Danny remembers?” And presently Peter said quietly, as +if the thought had just occurred to him: + +“By the way, Mitchell, I forgot to ask after your old folk. I knew your +father, you know.” + +“Oh, they’re all right, Peter, thank you.” + +“Heard from them lately?” asked Peter, presently, in a lazy tone. + +Mitchell straightened himself up. “N—no. To tell the truth, Peter, I +haven’t written for—I don’t know how long.” + +Peter smoked reflectively. + +“I remember your father well, Jack,” he said. “He was a big-hearted +man.” + +Old Danny was heard remonstrating loudly with spirits from a warmer +clime than Australia, and Peter stepped over to soothe him. + +“I thought I’d get it, directly after I opened my mouth,” said +Mitchell. “I suppose it will be your turn next, Joe.” + +“I suppose so,” said Joe, resignedly. + +The wind fell. + +I remember, I remember, + And it gives me little joy, +To think I’m further off from heaven, + Than when I was a boy! + + +When Peter came back another thought seemed to have occurred to him. + +“How’s your mother getting on, Joe?” he asked. “She shifted to Sydney +after your father died, didn’t she?” + +“Oh, she’s getting on all right!” said Joe, without elaboration. + +“Keeping a boarding-house, isn’t she?” + +“Yes,” said Joe. + +“Hard to make ends meet, I suppose?” said Peter. “It’s almost a harder +life than it could have been on the old selection, and there’s none of +the old independence about it. A woman like your mother must feel it, +Joe.” + +“Oh, she’s all right,” said Joe. “She’s used to it by this time. I +manage to send her a few pounds now and again. I send her all I can,” +he added resentfully. + +Peter sat corrected for a few moments. Then he seemed to change the +subject. + +“It’s some time since you were in Sydney last, isn’t it, Joe?’ + +“Yes, Peter,” said Joe. “I haven’t been there for two years. I never +did any good there. I’m far better knocking about out back.” + +There was a pause. + +“Some men seem to get on better in one place, some in another,” +reflected Mitchell, lazily. “For my part, I seem to get on better in +another.” + +Peter blinked, relit his pipe with a stick from the fire and reflected. + +The surveyor’s song had been encored: + +I remember, I remember— + + +Perhaps Peter remembered. Joe did, but there were no vines round the +house where he was born, only drought and dust, and raspy voices raised +in recrimination, and hardship most times. + +“I remember,” said Peter, quietly, “I remember a young fellow at home +in the old country. He had every advantage. He had a first-class +education, a great deal more money than he needed—almost as much as he +asked for, and nearly as much freedom as he wanted. His father was an +English gentleman and his mother an English lady. They were titled +people, if I remember rightly. The old man was proud, but fond of his +son; he only asked him to pay a little duty or respect now and again. +We don’t understand these things in Australia—they seem formal and cold +to us. The son paid his respects to his father occasionally—a week or +so before he’d be wanting money, as a rule. The mother was a dear lady. +She idolized her son. She only asked for a little show of affection +from him, a few days or a week of his society at home now and then—say +once in three months. But he couldn’t spare her even that—his time was +taken up so much in fashionable London and Paris and other places. He +would give the world to be able to take his proud, soft old father’s +hand now and look into his eyes as one man who understands another. He +would be glad and eager to give his mother twelve months out of the +year if he thought it would make her happier. It has been too late for +more than twenty years.” + +Old Danny called for Peter. + +Mitchell jerked his head approvingly and gave a sound like a sigh and +chuckle conjoined, the one qualifying the other. + +“I told you you’d get it, Joe,” he said. + +“I don’t see how it hits me,” said Joe. + +“But it hit all the same, Joe.” + +“Well, I suppose it did,” said Joe, after a short pause. + +“He wouldn’t have hit you so hard if you hadn’t tried to parry,” +reflected Mitchell. “It’s your turn now, Jack.” + +Jack Barnes said nothing. + +“Now I know that Peter would do anything for a woman or child, or an +honest, straight, hard-up chap,” said Mitchell, straightening out his +legs and folding his arms, “but I can’t quite understand his being so +partial to drunken scamps and vagabonds, black sheep and +never-do-wells. He’s got a tremendous sympathy for drunks. He’d do +anything to help a drunken man. Ain’t it marvellous? It’s my private +opinion that Peter must have been an awful boozer and scamp in his +time.” + +The other two only thought. Mitchell was privileged. He was a young man +of freckled, sandy complexion, and quizzical grey eyes. “Sly Joker” +“could take a rise out of anyone on the quiet;” “You could never tell +when he was getting at you;” “Face of a born comedian,” as bushmen said +of Mitchell. But he would probably have been a dead and dismal failure +on any other stage than that of wide Australia. + +Peter came back and they sat and smoked, and maybe they reflected along +four very different back-tracks for a while. + +The surveyor started to sing again: + +I have heard the mavis singing + Her love-song to the morn. +I have seen the dew-drop clinging + To the rose just newly born. + + +They smoked and listened in silence all through to the end. It was very +still. The full moon was high. The long white slender branches of a +box-tree stirred gently overhead; the she-oaks in the creek sighed as +they are always sighing, and the southern peak seemed ever so far away. + +That has made me thine for ever! +Bonny Mary of Argyle. + + +“Blarst my pipe!” exclaimed Mitchell, suddenly. “I beg your pardon, +Peter. My pipe’s always getting stuffed up,” and he proceeded to shell +out and clear his pipe. + +The breeze had changed and strengthened. They heard the violin playing +“Annie Laurie.” + +“They must be having a Scotch night in that camp tonight,” said +Mitchell. The voice came again: + +Maxwelton Braes are bonny— + Where early fa’s the dew, +For ’twas there that Annie Laurie + Gie me her promise true— + + +Mitchell threw out his arm impatiently. “I wish they wouldn’t play and +sing those old songs,” he said. “They make you think of damned old +things. I beg your pardon, Peter.” + +Peter sat leaning forward, his elbows resting on his knees and his +hands fingering his cold pipe nervously. His sad eyes had grown haggard +and haunted. It is in the hearts of exiles in new lands that the old +songs are felt. + +“Take no thought of the morrow, Mitchell,” said Peter, abstractedly. “I +beg your pardon, Mitchell. I mean——” + +“That’s all right, Peter,” said Mitchell. “You’re right; to-morrow is +the past, as far as I’m concerned.” + +Peter blinked down at him as if he were a new species. + +“You’re an odd young man, Mitchell,” he said. “You’ll have to take care +of that head of yours or you’ll be found hanging by a saddle-strap to a +leaning tree on a lonely track, or find yourself in a lunatic asylum +before you’re forty-five.” + +“Or else I’ll be a great man,” said Mitchell. “But—ah, well!” + +Peter turned his eyes to the fire and smiled sadly. “Not enjoyment and +not sorrow, is our destined end or way,” he repeated to the fire. + +“But we get there just the same,” said Mitchell, “destined or not.” + +But to live, that each to-morrow, +Finds us further than to-day! + + +“Why, that just fits my life, Peter,” said Mitchell. “I might have to +tramp two or three hundred miles before I get a cut[3] or a job, and if +to-morrow didn’t find me nearer than to-day I’d starve or die of thirst +on a dry stretch.” + +[3] Cut—a pen or “stand” in a shearing shed. + + +“Why don’t you get married and settle down, Mitchell?” asked Peter, a +little tired. “You’re a teetotaller.” + +“If I got married I couldn’t settle down,” said Mitchell. “I reckon I’d +be the loneliest man in Australia.” Peter gave him a swift glance. “I +reckon I’d be single no matter how much married I might be. I couldn’t +get the girl I wanted, and—ah, well!” + +Mitchell’s expression was still quaintly humorous round the lower part +of his face, but there was a sad light in his eyes. The strange light +as of the old dead days, and he was still young. + +The cornet had started in the surveyors’ camp. + +“Their blooming tunes seem to fit in just as if they knew what we were +talking about,” remarked Mitchell. + +The cornet: + +You’ll break my heart, you little bird, +That sings upon the flowering thorn +Thou mind’st me of departed joys, +Departed never to return. + + +“Damn it all,” said Mitchell, sitting up, “I’m getting sentimental.” +Then, as if voicing something that was troubling him, “Don’t you think +a woman pulls a man down as often as she lifts him up, Peter?” + +“Some say so,” said Peter. + +“Some say so, and they write it, too,” said Mitchell. + +“Sometimes it seems to me as if women were fated to drag a man down +ever since Adam’s time. If Adam hadn’t taken his wife’s advice—but +there, perhaps he took her advice a good many times and found it good, +and, just because she happened to be wrong this time, and to get him +into a hole, the sons of Adam have never let the daughters of Eve hear +the last of it. That’s human nature.” + +Jack Barnes, the young husband, who was suffering a recovery, had been +very silent all the evening. “I think a man’s a fool to always listen +to his wife’s advice,” he said, with the unreasonable impatience of a +man who wants to think while others are talking. “She only messes him +up, and drives him to the devil as likely as not, and gets a contempt +for him in the end.” + +Peter gave him a surprised, reproachful look, and stood up. He paced +backwards and forwards on the other side of the fire, with his hands +behind his back for a while; then he came and settled himself on the +log again and filled his pipe. + +“Yes,” he said, “a man can always find excuses for himself when his +conscience stings him. He puts mud on the sting. Man at large is +beginning all over the world to rake up excuses for himself; he +disguises them as ‘Psychological studies,’ and thinks he is clean and +clever and cultured, or he calls ’em problems—the sex problem, for +instance, and thinks he is brave and fearless.” + +Danny was in trouble again, and Peter went to him. He complained that +when he lay down he saw the faces worse, and he wanted to be propped up +somehow, so Peter got a pack-saddle and propped the old man’s shoulders +up with that. + +“I remember,” Peter began, when he came back to the fire, “I remember a +young man who got married——” + +Mitchell hugged himself. He knew Jack Barnes. He knew that Jack had a +girl-wife who was many times too good for him; that Jack had been wild, +and had nearly broken her heart, and he had guessed at once that Jack +had broken out again, and that Peter M’Laughlan was shepherding him +home. Mitchell had worked as mates with Jack, and liked him because of +the good heart that was in him in spite of all; and, because he liked +him, he was glad that Jack was going to get a kicking, so to speak, +which might do him good. Mitchell saw it coming, as he said afterwards, +and filled his pipe, and settled himself comfortably to listen. + +“I remember the case of a naturally selfish young man who got married” +said Peter. “He didn’t know he was selfish; in fact, he thought he was +too much the other way—but that doesn’t matter now. His name was—well, +we’ll call him—we’ll call him, ‘Gentleman Once.’” + +“Do you mean Gentleman Once that we saw drinking back at Thomas’s +shanty?” asked Joe. + +“No,” said Peter, “not him. There have been more than one in the bush +who went by the nickname of ‘Gentleman Once.’ I knew one or two. It’s a +big clan, the clan of Gentleman Once, and scattered all over the +world.” + +“By the way,” said Mitchell—“excuse me for interrupting, Peter—but +wasn’t old Danny, there, a gentleman once? I’ve heard chaps say he +was.” + +“I know he was,” said Peter. + +“Gentleman Once! Who’s talking about Gentleman Once?” said an awful +voice, suddenly and quickly. “About twenty or thirty years ago I was +called Gentleman Once or Gentleman Jack, I don’t know which—Get out! +_Get out_, I say! It’s all lies, and you’re the devil. There’s four +devils sitting by the fire. I see them.” + +Two of the four devils by the fire looked round, rather startled. + +Danny was sitting up, his awful bloodshot eyes glaring in the +firelight, and his ruined head looking like the bloated head of a hairy +poodle that had been drowned and dried. Peter went to the old man and +soothed him by waving off the snakes and devils with his hands, and +telling them to go. + +“I’ve heard Danny on the Gentleman Once racket before,” remarked +Mitchell. + +“Seems funny, doesn’t it, for a man to be proud of the fact that he was +called ‘Gentleman Once’ about twenty years ago?” + +“Seems more awful than funny to me,” said Joe. + +“You’re right, Joe,” said Mitchell. “But the saddest things are often +funny.” + +When Peter came back he went on with his story, and was only +interrupted once or twice by Danny waking up and calling him to drive +off the snakes, and green and crimson dogs with crocodile heads, and +devils with flaming tails, and those unpleasant sorts of things that +force their company on boozers and madmen. + +“Gentleman Once,” said Peter, “he came from the old country with a good +education and no character. He disgraced himself and family once too +often and came, or was sent, out to Australia to reform. It’s a great +mistake. If a man is too far gone, or hasn’t the strength to live the +past down and reform at home, he won’t do it in a new country, unless a +combination of circumstances compels him to it. A man rises by chance; +just as often he falls by chance. Some men fall into the habit of +keeping steady and stick to it, for the novelty of it, until they are +on their feet and in their sane minds and can look at the past, present +and future sensibly. I knew one case—But that’s got nothing to do with +the story. + +“Gentleman Once came out on the remittance system. That system is fatal +in nine cases out of ten. The remittance system is an insult to any +manhood that may be left in the black sheep, and an insult to the land +he is sent to. The cursed quarterly allowance is a stone round his neck +which will drag him down deeper in a new land than he would have fallen +at home. You know that remittance men are regarded with such contempt +in the bush that a man seldom admits he is one, save when he’s drunk +and reckless and wants money or credit. When a ne’er-do-well lands in +Melbourne or Sydney without a penny he will probably buck-up and do +something for himself. When he lands with money he will probably spend +it all in the first few months and then straighten up, because he has +to. But when he lands on the remittance system he drinks, first to +drown homesickness. He decides that he’ll wait till he gets his next +quarter’s allowance and then look round. He persuades himself that it’s +no use trying to do anything: that, in fact, he can’t do anything until +he gets his money. When he gets it he drifts into one ‘last’ night with +chums he has picked up in second and third-rate hotels. He drinks from +pure selfishness. No matter what precautions his friends at home take, +he finds means of getting credit or drawing on his allowance before it +is due—until he is two or three quarters behind. He drinks because he +feels happy and jolly and clever and good-natured and brave and honest +while he is drinking. Later on he drinks because he feels the reverse +of all these things when he is sober. He drinks to drown the past and +repentance. He doesn’t know that a healthy-minded man doesn’t waste +time in repenting. He doesn’t know how easy it is to reform, and is too +weak-willed to try. He gets a muddled idea that the past can’t be +mended. He finds it easy to get drink and borrow money on the strength +of his next quarter’s allowance, so he soon gets a quarter or two +behind, and sometimes gets into trouble connected with borrowed money. +He drifts to the bush and drinks, to drown the past only. The past +grows blacker and blacker until it is a hell without repentance; and +often the black sheep gets to that state when a man dreads his sober +hours. And the end? Well, you see old Danny there, and you saw old +Awful Example back at Thomas’s shanty—he’s worse than Danny, if +anything. Sometimes the end comes sooner. I saw a young +new-land-new-leaf man dying in a cheap lodging-house in Sydney. He was +a schoolmate of mine, by the way. For six weeks he lay on his back and +suffered as I never saw a man suffer in this world; and I’ve seen some +bad cases. They had to chloroform him every time they wanted to move +him. He had affected to be hard and cynical, and I must say that he +played it out to the end. It was a strong character, a strong mind +sodden and diseased with drink. He never spoke of home and his people +except when he was delirious. He never spoke, even to me, of his mental +agony. That was English home training. You young Australians wouldn’t +understand it; most bushmen are poets and emotional. + +“My old schoolmate was shifted to the Sydney Hospital at last, and +consented to the amputation of one leg. But it was too late. He was +gone from the hips down. Drink—third-rate hotel and bush shanty +drink—and low debauchery.” + +Jack Barnes drew up his leg and rubbed it surreptitiously. He had “pins +and needles.” Mitchell noticed and turned a chuckle into a grunt. + +“Gentleman Once was a remittance man,” continued Peter. “But before he +got very far he met an Australian girl in a boarding-house. Her mother +was the landlady. They were bush people who had drifted to the city. +The girl was pretty, intelligent and impulsive. She pitied him and +nursed him. He wasn’t known as Gentleman Once then, he hadn’t got far +enough to merit the nickname.” + +Peter paused. Presently he jerked his head, as if he felt a spasm of +pain, and leaned forward to get a stick from the fire to light his +pipe. + +“Now, there’s the girl who marries a man to reform him, and when she +has reformed him never lets him hear the last of it. Sometimes, as a +woman, she drives him back again. But this was not one of that sort of +girls. I once held a theory that sometimes a girl who has married a man +and reformed him misses in the reformed man the something which +attracted her in the careless scamp, the something which made her love +him—and so she ceases to love him, and their married life is a far more +miserable one than it would have been had he continued drinking. I hold +no theory of that kind now. Such theories ruin many married lives.” + +Peter jerked his head again as if impatient with a thought, and reached +for a fire-stick. + +“But that’s got nothing to do with the story. When Gentleman Once +reformed his natural selfishness came back. He saw that he had made a +mistake. It’s a terrible thing for a young man, a few months, perhaps a +few weeks after his marriage, to ask himself the question, ‘Have I made +a mistake?’ But Gentleman Once wasn’t to be pitied. He discovered that +he had married beneath him in intellect and education. Home training +again. He couldn’t have discovered that he had married beneath him as +far as birth was concerned, for his wife’s father had been a younger +son of an older and greater family than his own—But Gentleman Once +wouldn’t have been cad enough to bother about birth. I’ll do him that +much justice. He discovered, or thought he did, that he and his wife +could never have one thought in common; that she couldn’t possibly +understand him. I’ll tell you later on whether he was mistaken or not. +He was gloomy most times, and she was a bright, sociable, busy little +body. When she tried to draw him out of himself he grew irritable. +Besides, having found that they couldn’t have a thought in common he +ceased to bother to talk to her. There are many men who don’t bother +talking to their wives; they don’t think their wives feel it—because +the wives cease to complain after a while; they grow tired of trying to +make the man realize how they suffer. Gentleman Once tried his +best—according to his lights—and weakness. Then he went in for +self-pity and all the problems. He liked to brood, and his poor little +wife’s energy and cheerfulness were wearying to him. He wanted to be +left alone. They were both high-spirited, in different ways; she was +highly strung and so was he—because of his past life mostly. They +quarrelled badly sometimes. Then he drank again and she stuck to him. +Perhaps the only time he seemed cheerful and affectionate was when he +had a few drinks in him. It was a miserable existence—a furnished room +in a cheap lodging-house, and the use of the kitchen. + +“He drank alone. + +“Now a dipsomaniac mostly thinks he is in the right—except, perhaps, +after he has been forced to be sober for a week. The noblest woman in +the world couldn’t save him—everything she does to reform him irritates +him; but a strong friend can save him sometimes—a man who has been +through it himself. The poor little wife of Gentleman Once went through +it all. And she stuck to him. She went into low pubs after him.” + +Peter shuddered again. “She went through it all. He swore promises. +He’d come home sober and fill her with hope of future happiness, and +swear that he’d never take another glass. ‘And we’ll be happy yet, my +poor boy,’ she’d say, ‘we’ll be happy yet. I believe you, I trust you’ +(she used to call him her ‘bonny boy’ when they were first married). +And next night he’d come home worse than ever. And one day he—he struck +her!” + +Peter shuddered, head and shoulders, like a man who had accidentally +smashed his finger. + +“And one day he struck her. He was sober when he did it—anyhow he had +not taken drink for a week. A man is never sober who gets drunk more +than once a week, though he might think he is. I don’t know how it +happened, but anyway he struck her, and that frightened him. He got a +billet in the Civil Service up-country. No matter in what town it was. +The little wife hoped for six months. + +“I think it’s a cruel thing that a carelessly selfish young man cannot +realize how a sensitive young wife suffers for months after he has +reformed. How she hopes and fears, how she dreads the moment he has to +leave her, and frets every hour he is away from home—and suffers mental +agony when he is late. How the horror of the wretched old past time +grows upon her until she dares not think of it. How she listens to his +step and voice and watches his face, when he comes home, for a sign of +drink. A young man, a mate of mine, who drank hard and reformed, used +to take a delight in pretending for a few minutes to be drunk when he +came home. He was good-hearted, but dense. He said he only did it to +give his wife a pleasant surprise afterwards. I thought it one of the +most cruel things I had ever seen. + +“Gentleman Once found that he could not stand the routine of office +work and the dull life in that place. He commenced to drink again, and +went on till he lost his billet. They had a little boy, a bright little +boy, yet the father drank. + +“The last spree was a terrible one. He was away from home a fortnight, +and in that fortnight he got down as deep as a man could get. Then +another man got hold of him and set him on his feet, and straightened +him up. The other man was a ruined doctor, a wreck whose devil was +morphia. I don’t hold that a man’s salvation is always in his own +hands; I’ve seen mates pull mates out of hell too often to think that. + +“Then Gentleman Once saw the past as he had never seen it before—he saw +hope for the future with it. And he swore an oath that he felt he would +keep. + +“He suffered from reaction on his way home, and, as he neared the town, +a sudden fear, born of his nervous state, no doubt, sent a cold, sick +emptiness through him: ‘Was it too late?’ + +“As he turned into the street where he lived, he noticed a little group +of bush larrikins standing at the corner. And they moved uneasily when +they caught sight of him, and, as he passed, they touched and lifted +their hats to him. Now he knew that he had lost the respect even of +bush larrikins; and he knew enough of the bush to know that a bushman +never lifts his hat to a man—only to death, and a woman sometimes. He +hurried home and read the truth in his wife’s eyes. His little boy was +dead. He went down under the blow, and she held his head to her breast +and kept saying. ‘My poor boy, my poor boy!’ + +“It was he that she meant, not the boy she had lost. She knew him, she +understood him better than he did himself, and, heart-broken as she +was, she knew how he was going to suffer, and comforted him. ‘My poor +boy, my poor, foolish boy!’ + +“He mended the past, as far as he could, during the next two years, and +she seemed happy. He was very gentle, he was very kind to her. He was +happy, too, in a new, strange way. But he had learned what it was to +suffer through his own fault, and now he was to learn what it was to +suffer through no fault of his own, and without the consolation of +saying ‘I was wrong! I was to blame!’ At the end of the two years there +was another child, and his wife died.” + +The four sat silently smoking until Jack Barnes asked: + +“And what did he do then, Peter?” + +“Who?” said Peter, abstractedly. + +“Why, Gentleman Once.” + +Peter roused himself. + +“Well, I’ve told the story, and it is about time to turn in,” he said. +“I can’t say exactly what Gentleman Once did when his wife died. He +might have gone down to a deeper depth than Danny’s. He might have +risen higher than he had ever been before. From what I knew of his +character he would never have gone down an easy slope as Danny has +done. He might have dropped plump at first and then climbed up. Anyway, +he had the memory of the last two years to help him. + +“Then there’s the reformed drunkard who has trained himself to take a +drink when he needs it, to drink in moderation—he’s the strongest +character of all, I think—but it’s time to turn in.” + +The cornet up the creek was playing a march. + +Peter walked across and looked at Danny, who seemed to be sleeping as +peacefully as could be expected of him. + +Jack Barnes got up and walked slowly down the creek in the moonlight. +He wanted to think. + +Peter rolled out his blankets on the grass and arranged his saddle-bags +for a pillow. Before he turned in Mitchell shook hands with him, a most +unusual and unnecessary proceeding in camp. But there’s something in +the bush grip which means “I know,” or “I understand.” + +Joe Wilson rolled out his blankets close to Mitchell’s camp; he wanted +to enjoy some of Mitchell’s quiet humour before he went to sleep, but +Mitchell wasn’t in a philosophical mood. He wanted to reflect. + +“I wonder who Gentleman Once was?” said Joe to Mitchell. “Could he have +been Danny, or old Awful Example back there at the shanty?” + +“Dunno,” said Mitchell. He puffed three long puffs at his pipe, and +then said, reflectively: + +“I’ve heard men tell their own stories before to-night Joe.” + +It was Joe who wanted to think now. + +About four o’clock Mitchell woke and stood up. Peter was lying rolled +in his blanket with his face turned to the west. The moon was low, the +shadows had shifted back, and the light was on Peter’s face. Mitchell +stood looking at him reverently, as a grown son might who sees his +father asleep for the first time. Then Mitchell quietly got some boughs +and stuck them in the ground at a little distance from Peter’s head, to +shade his face from the bright moonlight; and then he turned in again +to sleep till the sun woke him. + + + + +THE GHOSTS OF MANY CHRISTMASES + + +Did you ever trace back your Christmas days?—right back to the days +when you were innocent and Santa Claus was real. At times you thought +you were very wicked, but you never realize how innocent you were until +you’ve grown up and knocked about the world. + +Let me think! + +Christmas in an English village, with bare hedges and trees, and leaden +skies that lie heavy on our souls as we walk, with overcoat and +umbrella, sons of English exiles and exiles in England, and think of +bright skies and suns overhead, and sweeps of country disappearing into +the haze, and blue mountain ranges melting into the azure of distant +lower skies, and curves of white and yellow sand beaches, and runs of +shelving yellow sandstone sea-walls—and the glorious Pacific! Sydney +Harbour at sunrise, and the girls we took to Manly Beach. + +Christmas in a London flat. Gloom and slush and soot. It is not the +cold that affects us Australians so much, but the horrible gloom. We +get heart-sick for the sun. + +Christmas at sea—three Christmases, in fact—one going saloon from +Sydney to Westralia early in the Golden Nineties with funds; and one, +the Christmas after next, coming back steerage with nothing but the +clothes we’d slept in. All of which was bad judgment on our part—the +order and manner of our going and coming should have been reversed. + +Christmas in a hessian tent in “th’ Westren,” with so many old mates +from the East that it was just old times over again. We had five pounds +of corned beef and a kerosene-tin to boil it in; and while we were +talking of old things the skeleton of a kangaroo-dog grabbed the beef +out of the boiling water and disappeared into the scrub—which made it +seem more like old times than ever. + +Christmas going to New Zealand, with experience, by the s.s. +_Tasmania_. We had plum duff, but it was too “soggy” for us to eat. We +dropped it overboard, lest it should swamp the boat—and it sank to the +ooze. The Tasmania was saved on that occasion, but she foundered next +year outside Gisborne. Perhaps the cook had made more duff. There was a +letter from a sweetheart of mine amongst her mails when she went down; +but that’s got nothing to do with it, though it made some difference in +my life. + +Christmas on a new telegraph line with a party of lining gangmen in New +Zealand. There was no duff nor roast because there was no firewood +within twenty miles. The cook used to pile armfuls of flax-sticks under +the billies, and set light to them when the last man arrived in camp. + +Christmas in Sydney, with a dozen invitations out to dinner. The one we +accepted was to a sensible Australian Christmas dinner; a typical one, +as it should be, and will be before the Commonwealth is many years old. +Everything cold except the vegetables, the hose playing on the veranda +and vines outside, the men dressed in sensible pyjama-like suits, and +the women and girls fresh and cool and jolly, instead of being hot and +cross and looking like boiled carrots, and feeling like boiled rags, +and having headaches after dinner, as would have been the case had they +broiled over the fire in a hot kitchen all the blazing forenoon to cook +a scalding, indigestible dinner, as many Australian women do, and for +no other reason than that it was the fashion in England. One of those +girls was very pretty and—ah, well!— + +Christmas dinner in a greasy Sydney sixpenny restaurant, that opened a +few days before with brass band going at full blast at the door by way +of advertisement. “Roast-beef, one! Cabbage and potatoes, one! Plum +pudding, two!” (That was the first time I dined to music.) The +Christmas dinner was a good one, but my appetite was spoilt by the +expression of the restaurant keeper, a big man with a heavy jowl, who +sat by the door with a cold eye on the sixpences, and didn’t seem to +have much confidence in human nature. + +Christmas—no, that was New Year—on the Warrego River, out back (an +alleged river with a sickly stream that looked like bad milk). We spent +most of that night hunting round in the dark and feeling on the ground +for camel and horse droppings with which to build fires and make smoke +round our camp to keep off the mosquitoes. The mosquitoes started at +sunset and left off at daybreak, when the flies got to work again. + +Christmas dinner under a brush shearing-shed. Mutton and plum +pudding—and fifty miles from beer! + +An old bush friend of mine, one Jimmy Nowlett, who ranked as a +bullock-driver, told me of a Christmas time he had. He was cut off by +the floods with his team, and had nothing to eat for four days but +potatoes and honey. He said potatoes dipped in honey weren’t so bad; +but he had to sleep on bullock yokes laid on the ground to keep him out +of the water, and he got a toothache that paralysed him all down one +side. + +And speaking of plum pudding, I consider it one of the most barbarous +institutions of the British. It is a childish, silly, savage +superstition; it must have been a savage inspiration, looking at it all +round—but then it isn’t so long since the British were savages. + +I got a letter last year from a mate of mine in Western +Australia—prospecting the awful desert out beyond White Feather—telling +me all about a “perish” he did on plum pudding. He and his mates were +camped at the Boulder Soak with some three or four hundred miles—mostly +sand and dust—between them and the nearest grocer’s shop. They ordered +a case of mixed canned provisions from Perth to reach them about +Christmas. They didn’t believe in plum pudding—there are a good many +British institutions that bushmen don’t believe in but the cook was a +new chum, and he said he’d go home to his mother if he didn’t have plum +pudding for Christmas, so they ordered a can for him. Meanwhile, they +hung out on kangaroo and damper and the knowledge that it couldn’t last +for ever. It was in a terrible drought, and the kangaroos used to come +into the “Soak” for water, and they were too weak to run. Later on, +when wells were dug, the kangaroos used to commit suicide in them—there +was generally a kangaroo in the well in the morning. + +The storekeeper packed the case of tinned dog, etc., but by some +blunder he or his man put the label on the wrong box, and it went per +rail, per coach, per camel, and the last stage per boot, and reached my +friends’ camp on Christmas Eve, to their great joy. My friend broke the +case open by the light of the camp-fire. + +“Here, Jack!” he said, tossing out a can, “here’s your plum pudding.” + +He held the next can in his hand a moment longer and read the label +twice. + +“Why! he’s sent two,” he said, “and I’m sure I only ordered one. Never +mind—Jack’ll have a tuck-out.” + +He held the next can close to the fire and blinked at it hard. “I’m +damned if he hasn’t sent three tins of plum pudding. Never mind, we’ll +manage to scoff some of it between us. You’re in luck’s way this trip, +Jack, and no mistake.” + +He looked harder still at the fourth can; then he read the labels on +the other tins again to see if he’d made a mistake. + +He didn’t tell me what he said then, but a milder mate suggested that +the storekeeper had sent half a dozen tins by mistake. But when they +reached the seventh can the language was not even fit to be written +down on a piece of paper and handed up to the magistrate. The +storekeeper had sent them an unbroken case of canned plum pudding, and +probably by this time he was wondering what had become of that blanky +case of duff. + +The kangaroos disappeared about this time and my friend tells me that +he and his mates had to live for a mortal fortnight on canned plum +pudding. They tried it cold and they tried it boiled, they tried it +baked, they had it fried, and they had it toasted, they had it for +breakfast, dinner and tea. They had nothing else to think, or talk, or +argue and quarrel about; and they dreamed about it every night, my +friend says. It wasn’t a joke—it gave them the nightmare and +day-horrors. + +They tried it with salt. They picked as many of the raisins out as they +could and boiled it with salt kangaroo. They tried to make Yorkshire +pudding out of it; but it was too rich. + +My friend was experimenting and trying to discover a simple process for +separating the ingredients of plum pudding when a fresh supply of +provisions came along. He says he was never so sick of anything in his +life, and he has had occasion to be sick of a good many things. + +The new-chum jackaroo is still alive, but he won’t ever eat plum +pudding any more, he says. It cured him of homesickness. He wouldn’t +eat it even if his bride made it. + +Christmas on the goldfields in the last of the roaring days, in the +palmy days of Gulgong and those fields. Let’s see! it must be nearly +thirty years ago! Oh, how the time goes by! + +Santa Claus, young, fresh-faced and eager; Santa Claus, blonde and +flaxen; Santa Claus, dark; Santa Claus with a brogue and Santa Claus +speaking broken English; Santa Claus as a Chinaman (Sun Tong Lee & Co. +storekeepers), with strange, delicious sweets that melted in our +mouths, and rum toys and Chinese dolls for the children. + +Lucky diggers who were with difficulty restrained from putting pound +notes and nuggets and expensive lockets and things into the little +ones’ stockings. Santa Claus in flannel shirt and clay-covered +moleskins. Diggers who bought lollies by the pound and sent the little +ones home with as much as they could carry. + +Diggers who gave a guinea or more for a toy for a child that reminded +them of some other child at home. Diggers who took as many children as +they could gather on short notice into a store, slapped a five-pound +note down on the counter and told the little ones to call for whatever +they wanted. Who set a family of poor children side by side on the +counter and called for a box of mixed children’s boots—the best—and +fitted them on with great care and anxiety and frequent inquiries as to +whether they pinched. Who stood little girls and boys on the counter +and called for the most expensive frocks, the latest and best in sailor +suits, and the brightest ribbons; and things came long distances by +bullock dray and were expensive in those days. Impressionable +diggers—and most of them were—who threw nuggets to singers, and who, +sometimes, slipped a parcel into the hands of a little boy or girl, +with instructions to give it to an elder sister (or young mother, +perhaps) whom the digger had never spoken to, only worshipped from afar +off. And the elder sister or young mother, opening the parcel, would +find a piece of jewellery or a costly article of dress, and wonder who +sent it. + +Ah, the wild generosity of luck-intoxicated diggers of those days! and +the reckless generosity of the drinkers. “We thought it was going to +last for ever!” + +“If I don’t spend it on the bairns I’ll spend it on the drink,” Sandy +Burns used to say. “I ha’ nane o’ me own, an’ the lass who was to gi’ +me bairns, she couldn’t wait.” + +Sandy had kept steady and travelled from one end of the world to the +other, and roughed it and toiled for five years, and the very day he +bottomed his golden hole on the Brown Snake Lead at Happy Valley he got +a letter from his girl in Scotland to say she had grown tired of +waiting and was married. Then he drank, and drink and luck went +together. + +Gulgong on New Year’s Eve! Rows and rows of lighted tents and +camp-fires, with a clear glow over it all. Bonfires on the hills and +diggers romping round them like big boys. Tin kettling—gold dishes and +spoons, and fiddles, and hammers on pointing anvils, and sticks and +empty kerosene-tins (they made a row); concertinas and cornets, +shot-guns, pistols and crackers, all sorts of instruments, and “Auld +Lang Syne” in one mighty chorus. And now—a wretched little pastoral +town; a collection of glaring corrugated-iron hip-roofs, and maybe a +rotting propped-up bark or weather-board humpy or two—relics of the +roaring days; a dried-up storekeeper and some withered hags; a waste of +caved-in holes with rain-washed mullock heaps and quartz and gravel +glaring in the sun; thistles and burrs where old bars were; drought, +dryness, desolation and goats. + +Lonely graves in the bush and grey old diggers here and there, anywhere +in the world, doing anything for a living, lonely yet because of the +girls who couldn’t wait, but prospecting and fossicking here and there, +and dreaming still. + +They thought it was going to last for ever. + +Christmas at Eurunderee Creek, amongst the old selection farms in the +western spurs of the Blue Mountains. They used to call it “Th’ +Pipeclay” thirty years ago, but the old black names have been restored. +They make plum puddings yet, weeks beforehand, and boil them for hours +and hang them in cloths to the rafters to petrify; then they take them +down and boil them again. On Christmas Eve the boys cut boughs or young +pines on the hills, and drag them home and lash them to the +veranda-posts. + +Ted has turned up with his wife and children from his selection out +back. The wheat is in and shearing is over on the big stations. +Tom—steady-going old Tom—clearing or fencing or dam-sinking up-country, +hides his tools in the scrub and gets his horse and rides home. Aunt +Emma (to everyone’s joy) has arrived from Sydney with presents +(astonishing bargains in frocks, etc.) and marvellous descriptions of +town life. + +Joe, “poor” Mary’s husband, who has been droving in Queensland since +the Christmas before last—while poor Mary, who is afraid to live alone, +shared a skillion and the family quarrels at home—Joe rides day and +night and reaches home at sunrise on Christmas morning, tired and +dusty, gaunt and haggard, but with his last cheque intact. He kisses +his wife and child and throws himself on the bed to sleep till +dinner-time, while Mary moves round softly, hushes the baby, dresses it +and herself, lays out Joe’s clean things, and bends over him now and +then, and kisses him, perhaps, as he sleeps. + +In the morning the boys and some of the men go down to the creek for a +swim in the big shady pool, under the she-oaks and take their Sunday +clothes with them and dress there. + +Some of them ride into town to church, and some of the women and +children drive in in spring-carts—the children to go to Sunday school, +leaving mother and the eldest daughter—usually a hard-worked, +disappointed, short-tempered girl—at home to look after the cooking. + +There is some anxiety (mostly on mother’s part) about Jim, who is +“wild,” and is supposed to be somewhere out back. There was “a piece of +blue paper” out for Jim on account of sweating (illegally using) a +horse, but his mother or father has got a hint—given in a kindly way by +the police-sergeant—that Jim is free to come home and stay at home if +he behaves himself. (There is usually a horse missing when Jim goes out +back.) + +Jim turns up all right—save that he has no money—and is welcomed with +tearful affection by his favourite sister Mary, shakes hands silently +with his father, and has a long whispered conversation with his mother, +which leaves him very subdued. His brothers forbear to sneer at him, +partly because it is Christmas, partly on mother’s account, and +thirdly, because Jim can use his hands. Aunt Emma, who is fond of him, +cheers him up wonderfully. + +The family sit down to dinner. “An old mate of your father’s”—a bearded +old digger—has arrived and takes the place of honour. (“I knowed yer +father, sonny, on the diggings long afore any of you was ever thought +on.”) + +The family have only been a few hours together, yet there is an +undercurrent of growling, that, to the stranger, mysterious yet evident +undercurrent of nastiness and resentment which goes on in all families +and drags many a promising young life down. But Aunt Emma and the old +mate make things brighter, and so the dinner—of hot roast and red-hot +plum pudding—passes off fairly well. + +The men sleep the afternoon away and wake up bathed in perspiration and +helpless; some of the women have headaches. After tea they gather on +the veranda in the cool of the evening, and that’s the time when the +best sides of their natures and the best parts of the past have a +chance of coming uppermost, and perhaps they begin to feel a bit sorry +that they are going to part again. + +The local races or “sports” on Boxing Day. There is nothing to keep the +boys home over New Year. Ted and his wife go back to their lonely life +on their selection; Tom returns to his fencing or tank-sinking +contract; Jim, who has borrowed “a couple of quid” from Tom, goes out +back with strong resolutions for the New Year, and shears “stragglers,” +breaks in horses, cooks and clerks for survey parties, and gambles and +drinks, and gets into trouble again. Maybe Joe “knocks about” the farm +a bit before going into the Great North-West with another mob of +cattle. + +The last time I saw the Old Year out at Eurunderee the bushfires were +burning all over the ranges, and looked like great cities lighted up. +No need for bonfires then. Christmas in Bourke, the metropolis of the +great pastoral scrubs and plains, five hundred miles west, with the +thermometer one-hundred-and-something-scarey in the shade. The rough, +careless shearers come in from stations many dusty miles out in the +scrubs to have their Christmas sprees, to drink and “shout” and +fight—and have the horrors some of them—and be run in and locked up +with difficulty, within sound of a church-going bell. + +The Bourke Christmas is a very beery and exciting one. The hotels shut +up in front on Christmas Day to satisfy the law (or out of +consideration for the feelings of the sergeant in charge of the police +station), and open behind to satisfy the public, who are supposed to +have made the law. + +Sensible cold dinners are the fashion in Bourke, I think, with the hose +going, and free-and-easy costumes. + +The free males take their blankets and sleep in the “park;” the women +sleep with doors and windows open, and the married men on mattresses on +the verandas across the open doors—in case of accidents. + +Christmas in Sydney, though Christmas holidays are not so popular as +Easter, or even Anniversary Day, in the Queen city of the South. Buses, +electric, cable and the old steam trams crowded with holiday-makers +with baskets. Harbour boats loaded down to the water’s edge with +harbour picnic-parties. “A trip round the harbour and to the head of +Middle Harbour one shilling return!” Strings of tourist trains running +over the Blue Mountains and the Great Zigzag, and up the coast to +Gosford and Brisbane Water, and down the south coast to beautiful +Illawarra, until after New Year. Hundreds of young fellows going out +with tents to fish in lonely bays or shoot in the mountains, and rough +it properly like bushmen—not with deck chairs, crockery, a piano and +servants. For you can camp in the grand and rugged solitude of the bush +within a stone’s throw of the city, so to speak. + +Jolly camps and holiday parties all round the beautiful bays of the +harbour, and up and down the coast, and all close to home. Camps in the +moonlight on sandy beaches under great dark bluffs and headlands, where +yellow, shelving, sandstone cliffs run, broken only by sandy-beached +bays, and where the silver-white breakers leap and roar. + +And Manly Beach on a holiday! Thousands of people in fresh summer +dress, hundreds of bare-legged, happy children running where the “blue +sea over the white sand rolls,” racing in and out with the rollers, +playing with the glorious Pacific. Manly—“Our Village”—Manly Beach, +where we used to take our girls, with the most beautiful harbour in the +world on one side, and the width of the grandest ocean on the other. +Ferny gullies and “fairy dells” to north and south, and every shady +nook its merry party or happy couple. + +Manly Beach—I remember five years ago (oh, how the time goes by!)—and +two names that were written together in the sand when the tide was +coming in. And the boat home in the moonlight, past the Heads, where we +felt the roll of the ocean, and the moonlit harbour—and the harbour +lights of Sydney—the grandest of them all. + + + + +Transcriber’s Notes: + + +Henry Lawson 17th June 1867 — 2nd September 1922. + +These stories were first published as a collection in 1902. Republished +as “Send Round the Hat” and “The Romance of the Swag” in 1907. + +Notes on Australianisms. Based on my own speech over the years, with +some checking in the dictionaries, e.g. “Macquarie Book of Slang” +(2000), Oxford English Dictionary. Not all of these are peculiar to +Australian slang, but are important in Lawson’s stories, and carry +overtones. + +anabranch: A bend in a river that has been cut through by the stream. +The main current now runs straight, the anabranch diverges and then +rejoins. See billabong. + +Barcoo-rot. “Persistent ulceration of the skin, chiefly on the hands, +and often originating in abrasions”. (Morris, Australian English). +Barcoo is a river in Queensland. + +billabong. Based on an aboriginal word. Sometimes used for an +anabranch, but more often used for one that, in dry season or droughts +especially, is cut off at either or both ends from the main stream. It +is often just a muddy pool, and may indeed dry up completely. + +blackfellow: condescending for Australian Aboriginal + +blackleg: someone who is employed to cross a union picket line to break +a workers’ strike. As Molly Ivins said, she was brought up on the three +great commandments: do not lie; do not steal; never cross a picket +line. Also scab. + +blanky or ——: Fill in your own favourite word. Usually however used for +“bloody”—see crimson/gory. + +blooming: actually used in speech instead of “bloody” (see crimson). + +bluey: swag. Explanation in Lawson’s “The romance of the Swag” here. + +bob: one shilling + +bullocky: Bullock driver. A man who drove teams of bullocks yoked to +wagons carrying e.g. wool bales or provisions. Proverbially rough and +foul mouthed. + +bummer: A cadger or bludger. Someone who begs for food. Interesting +Americanism already. Also, tramp. (Different meaning today) + +bush: originally referred to the low tangled scrubs of the semi-desert +regions (cf. ‘mulga’ and ‘mallee’), and hence equivalent to “outback”. +Now used generally for remote rural areas (“the bush”) and scrubby +forest. + +bushfire: wild fires: whether forest fires or grass fires. + +bushman/bushwoman: someone who lives an isolated existence, far from +cities, “in the bush”. (today: a “bushy”) + +bushranger: an Australian “highwayman”, who lived in the ‘bush’— +scrub—and attacked especially gold carrying coaches and banks. +Romanticised as anti-authoritarian Robin Hood figures—cf. Ned Kelly—but +usually very violent. + +bunyip: Aboriginal monster, inhabiting waterholes, billabongs +particularly. Adopted into European legends. + +caser: Five shillings (12 pence to the shilling, 20 shillings to the +pound (“quid”)). As a coin, a crown piece. + +chaffing: teasing, mocking good-humouredly + +churchyarder: Sounding as if dying—ready for the churchyard = cemetery + +crimson = gory: literary substitutes for “bloody”—the “colonial oath”, +unacceptable in polite company. Why, is a complete mystery. Popularly +explained as contraction of “by Our Lady”. Unproved. In reproducing +(badly) a German’s pronunciation of Australian, Lawson retains the +word, but spells it “pluddy”. + +dood: Dude. A classy/cool dresser. + +drover: one who “droves” droving: driving on horseback cattle or sheep +from where they were fattened to a a city, or later, a rail-head. + +fiver: a five pound note + +gory, see crimson + +Homebush: Saleyard, market area in Sydney + +humpy: rough shack + +half-caser: Two shillings and sixpence. As a coin, a half-crown. + +jackaroo: (Jack + kangaroo; sometimes jackeroo)—someone, in early days +a new immigrant from England, learning to work on a sheep/cattle +station (U.S. “ranch”.) + +jim-jams: the horrors, d.t.’s + +jumbuck: a sheep (best known from Waltzing Matilda: “where’s that jolly +jumbuck, you’ve got in your tucker bag”.) + +larrikin: anything from a disrespectful young man to a violent member +of a gang (“push”). Was considered a major social problem in Sydney of +the 1880’s to 1900. The _Bulletin_, a magazine in which much of Lawson +was published, spoke of the “aggressive, soft-hatted stoush brigade”. +Anyone today who is disrespectful of authority or convention is said to +show the larrikin element in the Australian character. + +lucerne: Alfalfa in US + +mallee: dwarfed eucalyptus trees growing in very poor soil and under +harsh rainfall conditions. Usually many stems emerging from the ground, +creating a low thicket. + +mateship: See Lawson story, “Mateship”. A heavily romanticised, but +nevertheless very practical form of (male) loyalty to a (male) +companion who travels with/works with him. A “mate” provides not only +companionship, but help in emergencies. Typical of an Australian in the +“outback”—or “Never-Never”, or under war conditions. A man without a +mate was a “hatter”—“his hat covers his family”. Such a person might go +“ratty” (see further in The romance of the Swag). Equivalent to the +“buddy system” in SCUBA diving. + +metalled: of a road, covered in crushed rock (e.g. “blue metal”) + +mulga: Acacia sp. (“wattle” in Australian) especially Acacia aneura; +growing in semi-desert conditions. Used as a description of such a +harsh region. + +mullock: the tailings left after gold has been removed. In Lawson +generally mud (alluvial) rather than rock + +myall: aboriginal living in a traditional—pre-conquest—manner + +nobbler: a drink + +nuggety: compact but strong physique; small but well-muscled + +pastoralist: OED sees it a equivalent to “squatter”, but in Lawson +someone often someone managing a large cattle/sheep “station” for a +“pastoral company” rather than an individual. Seen as ultimate +capitalist oppression. + +pluddy: see crimson + +quid: monetary unit; one pound + +ratty: insane—or, very eccentric, “cranky”. + +ringer: the champion sheep shearer in a shed that season + +rouseabout: Labourer in a (sheep) shearing shed. Considered to be, as +far as any work is, unskilled labour. + +sawney: silly, gormless + +scab: see blackleg + +shout: In a group; to stand (pay for) a round of drinks. Bad form to +leave before your turn comes around. Much peer pressure to drink more +than one wished. One can also “shout” for everyone in the pub. + +skillion(-room): A “lean-to”, a room built up against the back of some +other building, with separate roof. + +spifflicated: punished, thrashed without mercy. + +spree: prolonged drinking bout—days, weeks. + +squatter: Someone who took up large areas of land, originally without +official permission (“squatted”), for sheep especially. Became the +“landed aristocracy” of Australia. (“Up rode the squatter, mounted on +his thoroughbred”) steever: Originally a Dutch coin. Used here like +“penny”—or brass razoo. + +sundowner: a swagman (see) who is NOT looking for work, but a +“handout”. Lawson explains the term as referring to someone who turns +up at a station at sundown, just in time for “tea” i.e. the evening +meal. Line (2494) of actual text (not counting P.G. matter). + +swagman (swaggy): Generally, anyone who is walking in the “outback” +with a swag. (See “The Romance of the Swag”.) Lawson also restricts it +at times to those whom he considers to be tramps, not looking for work +but for “handouts”. In view of the Great Depression (1890—. In 1892 it +was reckoned 1/3 men were out of work) perhaps unfairly. Perhaps +because he _was_ there. See ‘travellers’. + +Tattersalls: The earliest public lottery in Australia. (1881) + +tenner: a ten pound note. + +tin-kettling: making noise by striking metal pots/pans. May be +celebratory (weddings—in this collection, New Year’s Eve), or may +indicate extreme social disapproval of someone. + +travellers: “shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work” (Lawson). + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH *** + +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. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. 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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 <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Children of the Bush</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Henry Lawson</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: March 5, 2003 [eBook #7065]<br /> +[Most recently updated: May 27, 2022]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Geoffrey Cowling</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH ***</div> + +<h1>Children of the Bush</h1> + +<h2 class="no-break">by Henry Lawson</h2> + +<hr /> + +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0001">SEND ROUND THE HAT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0002">THAT PRETTY GIRL IN THE ARMY</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0003">“LORD DOUGLAS”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0004">THE BLINDNESS OF ONE-EYED BOGAN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0005">TWO SUNDOWNERS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0006">A SKETCH OF MATESHIP</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0007">ON THE TUCKER TRACK: A STEELMAN STORY</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0008">A BUSH PUBLICAN’S LAMENT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0009">THE SHEARER’S DREAM</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0010">THE LOST SOULS’ HOTEL</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0011">THE BOOZERS’ HOME</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0012">THE SEX PROBLEM AGAIN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0013">THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAG</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0014">“BUCKOLTS’ GATE”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0016">THE BUSH-FIRE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0017">THE HOUSE THAT WAS NEVER BUILT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0018">“BARNEY, TAKE ME HOME AGAIN”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0019">A DROVING YARN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0020">GETTIN’ BACK ON DAVE REGAN</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0021">“SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0022">HIS BROTHER’S KEEPER</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0023">THE STORY OF “GENTLEMAN ONCE”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#link2H_4_0024">THE GHOSTS OF MANY CHRISTMASES</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"></a> +SEND ROUND THE HAT</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +Now this is the creed from the Book of the Bush—<br/> +Should be simple and plain to a dunce:<br/> +“If a man’s in a hole you must pass round the hat<br/> +Were he jail-bird or gentleman once.” +</p> + +<p> +“Is it any harm to wake yer?” +</p> + +<p> +It was about nine o’clock in the morning, and, though it was Sunday +morning, it was no harm to wake me; but the shearer had mistaken me for a deaf +jackaroo, who was staying at the shanty and was something like me, and had +good-naturedly shouted almost at the top of his voice, and he woke the whole +shanty. Anyway he woke three or four others who were sleeping on beds and +stretchers, and one on a shake-down on the floor, in the same room. It had been +a wet night, and the shanty was full of shearers from Big Billabong Shed which +had cut out the day before. My room mates had been drinking and gambling +overnight, and they swore luridly at the intruder for disturbing them. +</p> + +<p> +He was six-foot-three or thereabout. He was loosely built, bony, +sandy-complexioned and grey eyed. He wore a good-humoured grin at most times, +as I noticed later on; he was of a type of bushman that I always +liked—the sort that seem to get more good-natured the longer they grow, +yet are hard-knuckled and would accommodate a man who wanted to fight, or +thrash a bully in a good-natured way. The sort that like to carry +somebody’s baby round, and cut wood, carry water and do little things for +overworked married bushwomen. He wore a saddle-tweed sac suit two sizes too +small for him, and his face, neck, great hands and bony wrists were covered +with sun-blotches and freckles. +</p> + +<p> +“I hope I ain’t disturbin’ yer,” he shouted, as he bent +over my bunk, “but there’s a cove—” +</p> + +<p> +“You needn’t shout!” I interrupted, “I’m not +deaf.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh—I beg your pardon!” he shouted. “I didn’t +know I was yellin’. I thought you was the deaf feller.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that’s all right,” I said. “What’s the +trouble?” +</p> + +<p> +“Wait till them other chaps is done swearin’ and I’ll tell +yer,” he said. He spoke with a quiet, good-natured drawl, with something +of the nasal twang, but tone and drawl distinctly Australian—altogether +apart from that of the Americans. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, spit it out for Christ’s sake, Long’un!” yelled +One-eyed Bogan, who had been the worst swearer in a rough shed, and he fell +back on his bunk as if his previous remarks had exhausted him. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s that there sick jackaroo that was pickin’-up at Big +Billabong,” said the Giraffe. “He had to knock off the first week, +an’ he’s been here ever since. They’re sendin’ him away +to the hospital in Sydney by the speeshall train. They’re just +goin’ to take him up in the wagonette to the railway station, an’ I +thought I might as well go round with the hat an’ get him a few bob. +He’s got a missus and kids in Sydney.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yer always goin’ round with yer gory hat!” growled Bogan. +“Yer’d blanky well take it round in hell!” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s what he’s doing, Bogan,” muttered Gentleman +Once, on the shake-down, with his face to the wall. +</p> + +<p> +The hat was a genuine “cabbage-tree,” one of the sort that +“last a lifetime.” It was well coloured, almost black in fact with +weather and age, and it had a new strap round the base of the crown. I looked +into it and saw a dirty pound note and some silver. I dropped in half a crown, +which was more than I could spare, for I had only been a green-hand at Big +Billabong. +</p> + +<p> +“Thank yer!” he said. “Now then, you fellers!” +</p> + +<p> +“I wish you’d keep your hat on your head, and your money in your +pockets and your sympathy somewhere else,” growled Jack Moonlight as he +raised himself painfully on his elbow, and felt under his pillow for two +half-crowns. “Here,” he said, “here’s two half-casers. +Chuck ’em in and let me sleep for God’s sake!” +</p> + +<p> +Gentleman Once, the gambler, rolled round on his shake-down, bringing his +good-looking, dissipated face from the wall. He had turned in in his clothes +and, with considerable exertion he shoved his hand down into the pocket of his +trousers, which were a tight fit. He brought up a roll of pound notes and could +find no silver. +</p> + +<p> +“Here,” he said to the Giraffe, “I might as well lay a quid. +I’ll chance it anyhow. Chuck it in.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve got rats this mornin’, Gentleman Once,” growled +the Bogan. “It ain’t a blanky horse race.” +</p> + +<p> +“P’r’aps I have,” said Gentleman Once, and he turned to +the wall again with his head on his arm. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, Bogan, yer might as well chuck in somethin,” said the +Giraffe. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s the matter with the —— jackaroo?” asked +the Bogan, tugging his trousers from under the mattress. +</p> + +<p> +Moonlight said something in a low tone. +</p> + +<p> +“The —— he has!” said Bogan. “Well, I pity the +——! Here, I’ll chuck in half a —— quid!” +and he dropped half a sovereign into the hat. +</p> + +<p> +The fourth man, who was known to his face as “Barcoo-Rot,” and +behind his back as “The Mean Man,” had been drinking all night, and +not even Bogan’s stump-splitting adjectives could rouse him. So Bogan got +out of bed, and calling on us (as blanky female cattle) to witness what he was +about to do, he rolled the drunkard over, prospected his pockets till he made +up five shillings (or a “caser” in bush language), and +“chucked” them into the hat. +</p> + +<p> +And Barcoo-Rot is probably unconscious to this day that he was ever connected +with an act of charity. +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe struck the deaf jackaroo in the next room. I heard the chaps +cursing “Long-’un” for waking them, and +“Deaf-’un” for being, as they thought at first, the indirect +cause of the disturbance. I heard the Giraffe and his hat being condemned in +other rooms and cursed along the veranda where more shearers were sleeping; and +after a while I turned out. +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe was carefully fixing a mattress and pillows on the floor of a +wagonette, and presently a man, who looked like a corpse, was carried out and +lifted into the trap. +</p> + +<p> +As the wagonette started, the shanty-keeper—a fat, soulless-looking +man—put his hand in his pocket and dropped a quid into the hat which was +still going round, in the hands of the Giraffe’s mate, little Teddy +Thompson, who was as far below medium height as the Giraffe was above it. +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe took the horse’s head and led him along on the most level +parts of the road towards the railway station, and two or three chaps went +along to help get the sick man into the train. +</p> + +<p> +The shearing-season was over in that district, but I got a job of +house-painting, which was my trade, at the Great Western Hotel (a two-story +brick place), and I stayed in Bourke for a couple of months. +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe was a Victorian native from Bendigo. He was well known in Bourke +and to many shearers who came through the great dry scrubs from hundreds of +miles round. He was stakeholder, drunkard’s banker, peacemaker where +possible, referee or second to oblige the chaps when a fight was on, big +brother or uncle to most of the children in town, final court of appeal when +the youngsters had a dispute over a foot-race at the school picnic, referee at +their fights, and he was the stranger’s friend. +</p> + +<p> +“The feller as knows can battle around for himself,” he’d +say. “But I always like to do what I can for a hard-up stranger cove. I +was a green-hand jackaroo once meself, and I know what it is.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’re always bothering about other people, Giraffe,” said +Tom Hall, the shearers’ union secretary, who was only a couple of inches +shorter than the Giraffe. “There’s nothing in it, you can take it +from me—I ought to know.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, what’s a feller to do?” said the Giraffe. +“I’m only hangin’ round here till shearin’ starts agen, +an’ a cove might as well be doin’ something. Besides, it +ain’t as if I was like a cove that had old people or a wife an’ +kids to look after. I ain’t got no responsibilities. A feller can’t +be doin’ nothin’. Besides, I like to lend a helpin’ hand when +I can.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, all I’ve got to say,” said Tom, most of whose screw +went in borrowed quids, etc. “All I’ve got to say is that +you’ll get no thanks, and you might blanky well starve in the end.” +</p> + +<p> +“There ain’t no fear of me starvin’ so long as I’ve got +me hands about me; an’ I ain’t a cove as wants thanks,” said +the Giraffe. +</p> + +<p> +He was always helping someone or something. Now it was a bit of a +“darnce” that we was gettin’ up for the girls; again it was +Mrs Smith, the woman whose husban’ was drowned in the flood in the Bogan +River lars’ Crismas, or that there poor woman down by the +Billabong—her husband cleared out and left her with a lot o’ kids. +Or Bill Something, the bullocky, who was run over by his own wagon, while he +was drunk, and got his leg broke. +</p> + +<p> +Toward the end of his spree One-eyed Bogan broke loose and smashed nearly all +the windows of the Carriers’ Arms, and next morning he was fined heavily +at the police court. About dinner-time I encountered the Giraffe and his hat, +with two half-crowns in it for a start. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m sorry to trouble yer,” he said, “but One-eyed +Bogan carn’t pay his fine, an’ I thought we might fix it up for +him. He ain’t half a bad sort of feller when he ain’t +drinkin’. It’s only when he gets too much booze in him.” +</p> + +<p> +After shearing, the hat usually started round with the Giraffe’s own +dirty crumpled pound note in the bottom of it as a send-off, later on it was +half a sovereign, and so on down to half a crown and a shilling, as he got +short of stuff; till in the end he would borrow a “few +bob”—which he always repaid after next shearing-“just to +start the thing goin’.” +</p> + +<p> +There were several yarns about him and his hat. ’Twas said that the hat +had belonged to his father, whom he resembled in every respect, and it had been +going round for so many years that the crown was worn as thin as paper by the +quids, half-quids, casers, half-casers, bobs and tanners or sprats—to say +nothing of the scrums—that had been chucked into it in its time and +shaken up. +</p> + +<p> +They say that when a new governor visited Bourke the Giraffe happened to be +standing on the platform close to the exit, grinning good-humouredly, and the +local toady nudged him urgently and said in an awful whisper, “Take off +your hat! Why don’t you take off your hat?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” drawled the Giraffe, “he ain’t hard up, is +he?” +</p> + +<p> +And they fondly cherish an anecdote to the effect that, when the +One-Man-One-Vote Bill was passed (or Payment of Members, or when the first +Labour Party went in—I forget on which occasion they said it was) the +Giraffe was carried away by the general enthusiasm, got a few beers in him, +“chucked” a quid into his hat, and sent it round. The boys +contributed by force of habit, and contributed largely, because of the victory +and the beer. And when the hat came back to the Giraffe, he stood holding it in +front of him with both hands and stared blankly into it for a while. Then it +dawned on him. +</p> + +<p> +“Blowed if I haven’t bin an’ gone an’ took up a +bloomin’ collection for meself!” he said. +</p> + +<p> +He was almost a teetotaller, but he stood his shout in reason. He mostly drank +ginger beer. +</p> + +<p> +“I ain’t a feller that boozes, but I ain’t got nothin’ +agen chaps enjoyin’ themselves, so long as they don’t go too +far.” +</p> + +<p> +It was common for a man on the spree to say to him: +</p> + +<p> +“Here! here’s five quid. Look after it for me, Giraffe, will yer, +till I git off the booze.” +</p> + +<p> +His real name was Bob Brothers, and his bush names, +“Long-’un,” “The Giraffe,” +“Send-round-the-hat,” “Chuck-in-a-bob,” and +“Ginger-ale.” +</p> + +<p> +Some years before, camels and Afghan drivers had been imported to the Bourke +district; the camels did very well in the dry country, they went right across +country and carried everything from sardines to flooring-boards. And the +teamsters loved the Afghans nearly as much as Sydney furniture makers love the +cheap Chinese in the same line. They love ’em even as union shearers on +strike love blacklegs brought up-country to take their places. +</p> + +<p> +Now the Giraffe was a good, straight unionist, but in cases of sickness or +trouble he was as apt to forget his unionism, as all bushmen are, at all times +(and for all time), to forget their creed. So, one evening, the Giraffe +blundered into the Carriers’ Arms—of all places in the +world—when it was full of teamsters; he had his hat in his hand and some +small silver and coppers in it. +</p> + +<p> +“I say, you fellers, there’s a poor, sick Afghan in the camp down +there along the—” +</p> + +<p> +A big, brawny bullock-driver took him firmly by the shoulders, or, rather by +the elbows, and ran him out before any damage was done. The Giraffe took it as +he took most things, good-humouredly; but, about dusk, he was seen slipping +down towards the Afghan camp with a billy of soup. +</p> + +<p> +“I believe,” remarked Tom Hall, “that when the Giraffe goes +to heaven—and he’s the only one of us, as far as I can see, that +has a ghost of a show—I believe that when he goes to heaven, the first +thing he’ll do will be to take his infernal hat round amongst the +angels—getting up a collection for this damned world that he left +behind.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I don’t think there’s so much to his credit, after +all,” said Jack Mitchell, shearer. “You see, the Giraffe is +ambitious; he likes public life, and that accounts for him shoving himself +forward with his collections. As for bothering about people in trouble, +that’s only common curiosity; he’s one of those chaps that are +always shoving their noses into other people’s troubles. And, as for +looking after sick men—why! there’s nothing the Giraffe likes +better than pottering round a sick man, and watching him and studying him. +He’s awfully interested in sick men, and they’re pretty scarce out +here. I tell you there’s nothing he likes better—except, maybe, +it’s pottering round a corpse. I believe he’d ride forty miles to +help and sympathize and potter round a funeral. The fact of the matter is that +the Giraffe is only enjoying himself with other people’s +troubles—that’s all it is. It’s only vulgar curiosity and +selfishness. I set it down to his ignorance; the way he was brought up.” +</p> + +<p> +A few days after the Afghan incident the Giraffe and his hat had a run of luck. +A German, one of a party who were building a new wooden bridge over the Big +Billabong, was helping unload some girders from a truck at the railway station, +when a big log slipped on the skids and his leg was smashed badly. They carried +him to the Carriers’ Arms, which was the nearest hotel, and into a +bedroom behind the bar, and sent for the doctor. The Giraffe was in evidence as +usual. +</p> + +<p> +“It vas not that at all,” said German Charlie, when they asked him +if he was in much pain. “It vas not that at all. I don’t cares a +damn for der bain; but dis is der tird year—und I vas going home dis +year—after der gontract—und der gontract yoost commence!” +</p> + +<p> +That was the burden of his song all through, between his groans. There were a +good few chaps sitting quietly about the bar and veranda when the doctor +arrived. The Giraffe was sitting at the end of the counter, on which he had +laid his hat while he wiped his face, neck, and forehead with a big speckled +“sweatrag.” It was a very hot day. +</p> + +<p> +The doctor, a good-hearted young Australian, was heard saying something. Then +German Charlie, in a voice that rung with pain: +</p> + +<p> +“Make that leg right, doctor—quick! Dis is der tird pluddy +year—und I must go home!” +</p> + +<p> +The doctor asked him if he was in great pain. “Neffer mind der pluddy +bain, doctor! Neffer mind der pluddy bain! Dot vas nossing. Make dat leg well +quick, doctor. Dis vas der last gontract, and I vas going home dis year.” +Then the words jerked out of him by physical agony: “Der girl vas vaiting +dree year, und—by Got! I must go home.” +</p> + +<p> +The publican—Watty Braithwaite, known as “Watty Broadweight,” +or, more familiarly, “Watty Bothways”—turned over the +Giraffe’s hat in a tired, bored sort of way, dropped a quid into it, and +nodded resignedly at the Giraffe. +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe caught up the hint and the hat with alacrity. The hat went all +round town, so to speak; and, as soon as his leg was firm enough not to come +loose on the road German Charlie went home. +</p> + +<p> +It was well known that I contributed to the Sydney <i>Bulletin</i> and several +other papers. The Giraffe’s bump of reverence was very large, and swelled +especially for sick men and poets. He treated me with much more respect than is +due from a bushman to a man, and with an odd sort of extra gentleness I +sometimes fancied. But one day he rather surprised me. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m sorry to trouble yer,” he said in a shamefaced way. +“I don’t know as you go in for sportin’, but One-eyed Bogan +an’ Barcoo-Rot is goin’ to have a bit of a scrap down the Billybong +this evenin’, an’——” +</p> + +<p> +“A bit of a what?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“A bit of fight to a finish,” he said apologetically. +“An’ the chaps is tryin’ to fix up a fiver to put some life +into the thing. There’s bad blood between One-eyed Bogan and Barcoo-Rot, +an’ it won’t do them any harm to have it out.” +</p> + +<p> +It was a great fight, I remember. There must have been a couple of score +blood-soaked handkerchiefs (or “sweat-rags”) buried in a hole on +the field of battle, and the Giraffe was busy the rest of the evening helping +to patch up the principals. Later on he took up a small collection for the +loser, who happened to be Barcoo-Rot in spite of the advantage of an eye. +</p> + +<p> +The Salvation Army lassie, who went round with the <i>War Cry</i>, nearly +always sold the Giraffe three copies. +</p> + +<p> +A new-chum parson, who wanted a subscription to build or enlarge a chapel, or +something, sought the assistance of the Giraffe’s influence with his +mates. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said the Giraffe, “I ain’t a churchgoer meself. +I ain’t what you might call a religious cove, but I’ll be glad to +do what I can to help yer. I don’t suppose I can do much. I ain’t +been to church since I was a kiddy.” +</p> + +<p> +The parson was shocked, but later on he learned to appreciate the Giraffe and +his mates, and to love Australia for the bushman’s sake, and it was he +who told me the above anecdote. +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe helped fix some stalls for a Catholic Church bazaar, and some of +the chaps chaffed him about it in the union office. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll be taking up a collection for a joss-house down in the +Chinamen’s camp next,” said Tom Hall in conclusion. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I ain’t got nothin’ agen the Roming Carflics,” +said the Giraffe. “An’ Father O’Donovan’s a very decent +sort of cove. He stuck up for the unions all right in the strike anyway.” +(“He wouldn’t be Irish if he wasn’t,” someone +commented.) “I carried swags once for six months with a feller that was a +Carflick, an’ he was a very straight feller. And a girl I knowed turned +Carflick to marry a chap that had got her into trouble, an’ she was +always jes’ the same to me after as she was before. Besides, I like to +help everything that’s goin’ on.” +</p> + +<p> +Tom Hall and one or two others went out hurriedly to have a drink. But we all +loved the Giraffe. +</p> + +<p> +He was very innocent and very humorous, especially when he meant to be most +serious and philosophical. +</p> + +<p> +“Some of them bush girls is regular tomboys,” he said to me +solemnly one day. “Some of them is too cheeky altogether. I remember once +I was stoppin’ at a place—they was sort of relations o’ +mine—an’ they put me to sleep in a room off the verander, where +there was a glass door an’ no blinds. An’ the first mornin’ +the girls—they was sort o’ cousins o’ mine—they come +gigglin’ and foolin’ round outside the door on the verander, +an’ kep’ me in bed till nearly ten o’clock. I had to put me +trowsis on under the bed-clothes in the end. But I got back on ’em the +next night,” he reflected. +</p> + +<p> +“How did you do that, Bob?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, I went to bed in me trowsis!” +</p> + +<p> +One day I was on a plank, painting the ceiling of the bar of the Great Western +Hotel. I was anxious to get the job finished. The work had been kept back most +of the day by chaps handing up long beers to me, and drawing my attention to +the alleged fact that I was putting on the paint wrong side out. I was slapping +it on over the last few boards when: +</p> + +<p> +“I’m very sorry to trouble yer; I always seem to be troublin’ +yer; but there’s that there woman and them girls——” +</p> + +<p> +I looked down—about the first time I had looked down on him—and +there was the Giraffe, with his hat brim up on the plank and two half-crowns in +it. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that’s all right, Bob,” I said, and I dropped in half a +crown. +</p> + +<p> +There were shearers in the bar, and presently there was some barracking. It +appeared that that there woman and them girls were strange women, in the local +as well as the Biblical sense of the word, who had come from Sydney at the end +of the shearing-season, and had taken a cottage on the edge of the scrub on the +outskirts of the town. There had been trouble this week in connection with a +row at their establishment, and they had been fined, warned off by the police, +and turned out by their landlord. +</p> + +<p> +“This is a bit too red-hot, Giraffe,” said one of the shearers. +“Them ——s has made enough out of us coves. They’ve got +plenty of stuff, don’t you fret. Let ’em go to ——! +I’m blanked if I give a sprat.” +</p> + +<p> +“They ain’t got their fares to Sydney,” said the Giraffe. +“An’, what’s more, the little ’un is sick, an’ +two of them has kids in Sydney.” +</p> + +<p> +“How the —— do you know?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, one of ’em come to me an’ told me all about it.” +</p> + +<p> +There was an involuntary guffaw. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Bob,” said Billy Woods, the rouseabouts’ +secretary, kindly. “Don’t you make a fool of yourself. You’ll +have all the chaps laughing at you. Those girls are only working you for all +you’re worth. I suppose one of ’em came crying and whining to you. +Don’t you bother about ’em. <i>You</i> don’t know ’em; +they can pump water at a moment’s notice. You haven’t had any +experience with women yet, Bob.” +</p> + +<p> +“She didn’t come whinin’ and cryin’ to me,” said +the Giraffe, dropping his twanging drawl a little. “She looked me +straight in the face an’ told me all about it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I say, Giraffe,” said Box-o’-Tricks, “what have you +been doin’? You’ve bin down there on the nod. I’m surprised +at yer, Giraffe.” +</p> + +<p> +“An’ he pretends to be so gory soft an’ innocent, too,” +growled the Bogan. “We know all about you, Giraffe.” +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Giraffe,” said Mitchell the shearer. “I’d +never have thought it of you. We all thought you were the only virgin youth +west the river; I always thought you were a moral young man. You mustn’t +think that because your conscience is pricking you everyone else’s +is.” +</p> + +<p> +“I ain’t had anythin’ to do with them,” said the +Giraffe, drawling again. “I ain’t a cove that goes in for that sort +of thing. But other chaps has, and I think they might as well help ’em +out of their fix.” +</p> + +<p> +“They’re a rotten crowd,” said Billy Woods. “You +don’t know them, Bob. Don’t bother about them-they’re not +worth it. Put your money in your pocket. You’ll find a better use for it +before next shearing.” +</p> + +<p> +“Better shout, Giraffe,” said Box-o’-Tricks. +</p> + +<p> +Now in spite of the Giraffe’s softness he was the hardest man in Bourke +to move when he’d decided on what he thought was “the fair thing to +do.” Another peculiarity of his was that on occasion, such for instance +as “sayin’ a few words” at a strike meeting, he would +straighten himself, drop the twang, and rope in his drawl, so to speak. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, look here, you chaps,” he said now. “I don’t +know anything about them women. I s’pose they’re bad, but I +don’t suppose they’re worse than men has made them. All I know is +that there’s four women turned out, without any stuff, and every woman in +Bourke, an’ the police, an’ the law agen ’em. An’ the +fact that they is women is agenst ’em most of all. You don’t expect +’em to hump their swags to Sydney! Why, only I ain’t got the stuff +I wouldn’t trouble yer. I’d pay their fares meself. Look,” he +said, lowering his voice, “there they are now, an’ one of the girls +is cryin’. Don’t let ’em see yer lookin’.” +</p> + +<p> +I dropped softly from the plank and peeped out with the rest. +</p> + +<p> +They stood by the fence on the opposite side of the street, a bit up towards +the railway station, with their portmanteaux and bundles at their feet. One +girl leant with her arms on the fence rail and her face buried in them, another +was trying to comfort her. The third girl and the woman stood facing our way. +The woman was good-looking; she had a hard face, but it might have been made +hard. The third girl seemed half defiant, half inclined to cry. Presently she +went to the other side of the girl who was crying on the fence and put her arm +round her shoulder. The woman suddenly turned her back on us and stood looking +away over the paddocks. +</p> + +<p> +The hat went round. Billy Woods was first, then Box-o’-Tricks, and then +Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +Billy contributed with eloquent silence. “I was only jokin’, +Giraffe,” said Box-o’-Tricks, dredging his pockets for a couple of +shillings. It was some time after the shearing, and most of the chaps were hard +up. “Ah, well,” sighed Mitchell. “There’s no help for +it. If the Giraffe would take up a collection to import some decent girls to +this God-forgotten hole there might be some sense in it.... It’s bad +enough for the Giraffe to undermine our religious prejudices, and tempt us to +take a morbid interest in sick Chows and Afghans, and blacklegs and widows; but +when he starts mixing us up with strange women it’s time to buck.” +And he prospected his pockets and contributed two shillings, some odd pennies, +and a pinch of tobacco dust. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t mind helping the girls, but I’m damned if I’ll +give a penny to help the old ——,” said Tom Hall. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, she was a girl once herself,” drawled the Giraffe. +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe went round to the other pubs and to the union offices, and when he +returned he seemed satisfied with the plate, but troubled about something else. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know what to do for them for to-night,” he said. +“None of the pubs or boardin’-houses will hear of them, an’ +there ain’t no empty houses, an’ the women is all agen +’em.” +</p> + +<p> +“Not all,” said Alice, the big, handsome barmaid from Sydney. +“Come here, Bob.” She gave the Giraffe half a sovereign and a look +for which some of us would have paid him ten pounds—had we had the money, +and had the look been transferable. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a minute, Bob,” she said, and she went in to speak to the +landlord. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s an empty bedroom at the end of the store in the +yard,” she said when she came back. “They can camp there for +to-night if they behave themselves. You’d better tell ’em, +Bob.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thank yer, Alice,” said the Giraffe. +</p> + +<p> +Next day, after work, the Giraffe and I drifted together and down by the river +in the cool of the evening, and sat on the edge of the steep, drought-parched +bank. +</p> + +<p> +“I heard you saw your lady friends off this morning, Bob,” I said, +and was sorry I said it, even before he answered. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, they ain’t no friends of mine,” he said. “Only +four’ poor devils of women. I thought they mightn’t like to stand +waitin’ with the crowd on the platform, so I jest offered to get their +tickets an’ told ’em to wait round at the back of the station till +the bell rung.... An’ what do yer think they did, Harry?” he went +on, with an exasperatingly unintelligent grin. “Why, they wanted to kiss +me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did they?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. An’ they would have done it, too, if I hadn’t been so +long.... Why, I’m blessed if they didn’t kiss me hands.” +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t say so.” +</p> + +<p> +“God’s truth. Somehow I didn’t like to go on the platform +with them after that; besides, they was cryin’, and I can’t stand +women cryin’. But some of the chaps put them into an empty +carriage.” He thought a moment. Then: +</p> + +<p> +“There’s some terrible good-hearted fellers in the world,” he +reflected. +</p> + +<p> +I thought so too. “Bob,” I said, “you’re a single man. +Why don’t you get married and settle down?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” he said, “I ain’t got no wife an’ kids, +that’s a fact. But it ain’t my fault.” +</p> + +<p> +He may have been right about the wife. But I thought of the look that Alice had +given him, and— +</p> + +<p> +“Girls seem to like me right enough,” he said, “but it +don’t go no further than that. The trouble is that I’m so long, and +I always seem to get shook after little girls. At least there was one little +girl in Bendigo that I was properly gone on.” +</p> + +<p> +“And wouldn’t she have you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, it seems not.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did you ask her?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, I asked her right enough.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, and what did she say?” +</p> + +<p> +“She said it would be redicilus for her to be seen trottin’ +alongside of a chimbley like me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps she didn’t mean that. There are any amount of little women +who like tall men.” +</p> + +<p> +“I thought of that too—afterwards. P’r’aps she +didn’t mean it that way. I s’pose the fact of the matter was that +she didn’t cotton on to me, and wanted to let me down easy. She +didn’t want to hurt me feelin’s, if yer understand—she was a +very good-hearted little girl. There’s some terrible tall fellers where I +come from, and I know two as married little girls.” +</p> + +<p> +He seemed a hopeless case. +</p> + +<p> +“Sometimes,” he said, “sometimes I wish that I wasn’t +so blessed long.” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s that there deaf jackaroo,” he reflected presently. +“He’s something in the same fig about girls as I am. He’s too +deaf and I’m too long.” +</p> + +<p> +“How do you make that out?” I asked. “He’s got three +girls, to my knowledge, and, as for being deaf, why, he gasses more than any +man in the town, and knows more of what’s going on than old Mother +Brindle the washerwoman.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, look at that now!” said the Giraffe, slowly. +“Who’d have thought it? He never told me he had three girls, +an’ as for hearin’ news, I always tell him anything that’s +goin’ on that I think he doesn’t catch. He told me his trouble was +that whenever he went out with a girl people could hear what they was +sayin’—at least they could hear what she was sayin’ to him, +an’ draw their own conclusions, he said. He said he went out one night +with a girl, and some of the chaps foxed ’em an’ heard her +sayin’ ‘don’t’ to him, an’ put it all round +town.” +</p> + +<p> +“What did she say ‘don’t’ for?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“He didn’t tell me that, but I s’pose he was kissin’ +her or huggin’ her or something.” +</p> + +<p> +“Bob,” I said presently, “didn’t you try the little +girl in Bendigo a second time?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” he said. “What was the use. She was a good little girl, +and I wasn’t goin’ to go botherin’ her. I ain’t the +sort of cove that goes hangin’ round where he isn’t wanted. But +somehow I couldn’t stay about Bendigo after she gave me the hint, so I +thought I’d come over an’ have a knock round on this side for a +year or two.” +</p> + +<p> +“And you never wrote to her?” +</p> + +<p> +“No. What was the use of goin’ pesterin’ her with letters? I +know what trouble letters give me when I have to answer one. She’d have +only had to tell me the straight truth in a letter an’ it wouldn’t +have done me any good. But I’ve pretty well got over it by this +time.” +</p> + +<p> +A few days later I went to Sydney. The Giraffe was the last I shook hands with +from the carriage window, and he slipped something in a piece of newspaper into +my hand. +</p> + +<p> +“I hope yer won’t be offended,” he drawled, “but some +of the chaps thought you mightn’t be too flush of +stuff—you’ve been shoutin’ a good deal; so they put a quid or +two together. They thought it might help yer to have a bit of a fly round in +Sydney.” +</p> + +<p> +I was back in Bourke before next shearing. On the evening of my arrival I ran +against the Giraffe; he seemed strangely shaken over something, but he kept his +hat on his head. +</p> + +<p> +“Would yer mind takin’ a stroll as fur as the Billerbong?” he +said. “I got something I’d like to tell yer.” +</p> + +<p> +His big, brown, sunburnt hands trembled and shook as he took a letter from his +pocket and opened it. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve just got a letter,” he said. “A letter from that +little girl at Bendigo. It seems it was all a mistake. I’d like you to +read it. Somehow I feel as if I want to talk to a feller, and I’d rather +talk to you than any of them other chaps.” +</p> + +<p> +It was a good letter, from a big-hearted little girl. She had been breaking her +heart for the great ass all these months. It seemed that he had left Bendigo +without saying good-bye to her. “Somehow I couldn’t bring meself to +it,” he said, when I taxed him with it. She had never been able to get +his address until last week; then she got it from a Bourke man who had gone +south. She called him “an awful long fool,” which he was, without +the slightest doubt, and she implored him to write, and come back to her. +</p> + +<p> +“And will you go back, Bob?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“My oath! I’d take the train to-morrer only I ain’t got the +stuff. But I’ve got a stand in Big Billerbong Shed an’ I’ll +soon knock a few quid together. I’ll go back as soon as ever +shearin’s over. I’m goin’ to write away to her +to-night.” +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe was the “ringer” of Big Billabong Shed that season. His +tallies averaged a hundred and twenty a day. He only sent his hat round once +during shearing, and it was noticed that he hesitated at first and only +contributed half a crown. But then it was a case of a man being taken from the +shed by the police for wife desertion. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s always that way,” commented Mitchell. “Those +soft, good-hearted fellows always end by getting hard and selfish. The world +makes ’em so. It’s the thought of the soft fools they’ve been +that finds out sooner or later and makes ’em repent. Like as not the +Giraffe will be the meanest man out back before he’s done.” +</p> + +<p> +When Big Billabong cut out, and we got back to Bourke with our dusty swags and +dirty cheques, I spoke to Tom Hall: +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Tom,” I said. “That long fool, the Giraffe, has +been breaking his heart for a little girl in Bendigo ever since he’s been +out back, and she’s been breaking her heart for him, and the ass +didn’t know it till he got a letter from her just before Big Billabong +started. He’s going to-morrow morning.” +</p> + +<p> +That evening Tom stole the Giraffe’s hat. “I s’pose +it’ll turn up in the mornin’,” said the Giraffe. “I +don’t mind a lark,” he added, “but it does seem a bit red hot +for the chaps to collar a cove’s hat and a feller goin’ away for +good, p’r’aps, in the mornin’.” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell started the thing going with a quid. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s worth it,” he said, “to get rid of him. +We’ll have some peace now. There won’t be so many accidents or +women in trouble when the Giraffe and his blessed hat are gone. Any way, +he’s an eyesore in the town, and he’s getting on my nerves for +one.... Come on, you sinners! Chuck ’em in; we’re only taking quids +and half-quids.” +</p> + +<p> +About daylight next morning Tom Hall slipped into the Giraffe’s room at +the Carriers’ Arms. The Giraffe was sleeping peacefully. Tom put the hat +on a chair by his side. The collection had been a record one, and, besides the +packet of money in the crown of the hat, there was a silver-mounted pipe with +case—the best that could be bought in Bourke, a gold brooch, and several +trifles—besides an ugly valentine of a long man in his shirt walking the +room with a twin on each arm. +</p> + +<p> +Tom was about to shake the Giraffe by the shoulder, when he noticed a great +foot, with about half a yard of big-boned ankle and shank, sticking out at the +bottom of the bed. The temptation was too great. Tom took up the hair-brush, +and, with the back of it, he gave a smart rap on the point of an in-growing +toe-nail, and slithered. +</p> + +<p> +We heard the Giraffe swearing good-naturedly for a while, and then there was a +pregnant silence. He was staring at the hat we supposed. +</p> + +<p> +We were all up at the station to see him off. It was rather a long wait. The +Giraffe edged me up to the other end of the platform. +</p> + +<p> +He seemed overcome. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s—there’s some terrible good-hearted fellers in +this world,” he said. “You mustn’t forgit ’em, Harry, +when you make a big name writin’. I’m—well, I’m blessed +if I don’t feel as if I was jist goin’ to blubber!” +</p> + +<p> +I was glad he didn’t. The Giraffe blubberin’ would have been a +spectacle. I steered him back to his friends. +</p> + +<p> +“Ain’t you going to kiss me, Bob?” said the Great +Western’s big, handsome barmaid, as the bell rang. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I don’t mind kissin’ you, Alice,” he said, +wiping his mouth. “But I’m goin’ to be married, yer +know.” And he kissed her fair on the mouth. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s nothin’ like gettin’ into practice,” he +said, grinning round. +</p> + +<p> +We thought he was improving wonderfully; but at the last moment something +troubled him. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, you chaps,” he said, hesitatingly, with his hand in his +pocket, “I don’t know what I’m going to do with all this +stuff. There’s that there poor washerwoman that scalded her legs +liftin’ the boiler of clothes off the fire——” +</p> + +<p> +We shoved him into the carriage. He hung—about half of him—out the +window, wildly waving his hat, till the train disappeared in the scrub. +</p> + +<p> +And, as I sit here writing by lamplight at midday, in the midst of a great city +of shallow social sham, of hopeless, squalid poverty, of ignorant selfishness, +cultured or brutish, and of noble and heroic endeavour frowned down or +callously neglected, I am almost aware of a burst of sunshine in the room, and +a long form leaning over my chair, and: +</p> + +<p> +“Excuse me for troublin’ yer; I’m always troublin’ yer; +but there’s that there poor woman....” +</p> + +<p> +And I wish I could immortalize him! +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"></a> +THAT PRETTY GIRL IN THE ARMY</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +Now I often sit at Watty’s, when the night is very near,<br/> +With a head that’s full of jingles—and the fumes of bottled beer;<br/> +For I always have a fancy that, if I am over there<br/> +When the Army prays for Watty, I’m included in the prayer.<br/> +<br/> +It would take a lot of praying, lots of thumping on the drum,<br/> +To prepare our sinful, straying, erring souls for Kingdom Come.<br/> +But I love my fellow-sinners! and I hope, upon the whole,<br/> +That the Army gets a hearing when it prays for Watty’s soul.<br/> + From <i>When the World was Wide</i>. +</p> + +<p> +The Salvation Army does good business in some of the outback towns of the great +pastoral wastes of Australia. There’s the thoughtless, careless +generosity of the bushman, whose pockets don’t go far enough down his +trousers (that’s what’s the matter with him), and who contributes +to anything that comes along, without troubling to ask questions, like long Bob +Brothers of Bourke, who, chancing to be “a Protestant by rights,” +unwittingly subscribed towards the erection of a new Catholic church, and, +being chaffed for his mistake, said: +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, well, I don’t suppose it’ll matter a hang in the end, +anyway it goes. I ain’t got nothink agenst the Roming Carflicks.” +</p> + +<p> +There’s the shearer, fresh with his cheque from a cut-out shed, +gloriously drunk and happy, in love with all the world, and ready to subscribe +towards any creed and shout for all hands—including Old Nick if he +happened to come along. There’s the shearer, half-drunk and inclined to +be nasty, who has got the wrong end of all things with a tight grip, and who +flings a shilling in the face of out-back conventionality (as he thinks) by +chucking a bob into the Salvation Army ring. Then he glares round to see if he +can catch anybody winking behind his back. There’s the cynical joker, a +queer mixture, who contributes generously and tempts the reformed boozer +afterwards. There’s the severe-faced old station-hand—in clean +shirt and neckerchief and white moleskins—in for his annual or +semi-annual spree, who contributes on principle, and then drinks religiously +until his cheque is gone and the horrors are come. There’s the shearer, +feeling mighty bad after a spree, and in danger of seeing things when he tries +to go to sleep. He has dropped ten or twenty pounds over bar counters and at +cards, and he now “chucks” a repentant shilling into the ring, with +a very private and rather vague sort of feeling that something might come of +it. There’s the stout, contented, good-natured publican, who tips the +Army as if it were a barrel-organ. And there are others and other +reasons—black sheep and ne’er-do-wells—and faint echoes of +other times in Salvation Army tunes. +</p> + +<p> +Bourke, the metropolis of the Great Scrubs, on the banks of the Darling River, +about five hundred miles from Sydney, was suffering from a long drought when I +was there in ninety-two; and the heat may or may not have been another cause +contributing to the success, from a business point of view, of the Bourke +garrison. There was much beer boozing—and, besides, it was vaguely +understood (as most things are vaguely understood out there in the +drought-haze) that the place the Army came to save us from was hotter than +Bourke. We didn’t hanker to go to a hotter place than Bourke. But that +year there was an extraordinary reason for the Army’s great financial +success there. +</p> + +<p> +She was a little girl, nineteen or twenty, I should judge, the prettiest girl I +ever saw in the Army, and one of the prettiest I’ve ever seen out of it. +She had the features of an angel, but her expression was wonderfully human, +sweet and sympathetic. Her big grey eyes were sad with sympathy for sufferers +and sinners, and her poke bonnet was full of bunchy, red-gold hair. Her first +appearance was somewhat dramatic—perhaps the Army arranged it so. +</p> + +<p> +The Army used to pray, and thump the drum, and sing, and take up collections +every evening outside Watty Bothways’ Hotel, the Carriers’ Arms. +They performed longer and more often outside Watty’s than any other pub +in town—perhaps because Watty was considered the most hopeless publican +and his customers the hardest crowd of boozers in Bourke. The band generally +began to play about dusk. Watty would lean back comfortably in a basket +easy-chair on his wide veranda, and clasp his hands, in a calm, contented way, +while the Army banged the drum and got steam up, and whilst, perhaps, there was +a barney going on in the bar, or a bloodthirsty fight in the backyard. On such +occasions there was something like an indulgent or fatherly expression on his +fat and usually emotionless face. And by and by he’d move his head gently +and doze. The banging and the singing seemed to soothe him, and the praying, +which was often very personal, never seemed to disturb him in the least. +</p> + +<p> +Well, it was about dusk one day; it had been a terrible day, a hundred and +something startling in the shade, but there came a breeze after sunset. There +had been several dozen of buckets of water thrown on the veranda floor and the +ground outside. Watty was seated in his accustomed place when the Army arrived. +There was no barney in the bar because there was a fight in the backyard, and +that claimed the attention of all the customers. +</p> + +<p> +The Army prayed for Watty and his clients; then a reformed drunkard started to +testify against publicans and all their works. Watty settled himself +comfortably, folded his hands, and leaned back and dozed. +</p> + +<p> +The fight was over, and the chaps began to drop round to the bar. The man who +was saved waved his arms, and danced round and howled. +</p> + +<p> +“Ye-es!” he shouted hoarsely. “The publicans, and boozers, +and gamblers, and sinners may think that Bourke is hot, but hell is a thousand +times hotter! I tell you” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Lord!” said Mitchell, the shearer, and he threw a penny into +the ring. +</p> + +<p> +“Ye-es! I tell you that hell is a million times hotter than Bourke! I +tell you——” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, look here,” said a voice from the background, “that +won’t wash. Why, don’t you know that when the Bourke people die +they send back for their blankets?” +</p> + +<p> +The saved brother glared round. +</p> + +<p> +“I hear a freethinker speaking, my friends,” he said. Then, with +sudden inspiration and renewed energy, “I hear the voice of a +freethinker. Show me the face of a freethinker,” he yelled, glaring round +like a hunted, hungry man. “Show me the face of a freethinker, and +I’ll tell you what he is.” +</p> + +<p> +Watty hitched himself into a more comfortable position and clasped his hands on +his knee and closed his eyes again. +</p> + +<p> +“Ya-a-a-s!” shrieked the brand. “I tell you, my friends, I +can tell a freethinker by his face. Show me the face of a——” +</p> + +<p> +At this point there was an interruption. One-eyed, or Wall-eyed, Bogan, who had +a broken nose, and the best side of whose face was reckoned the ugliest and +most sinister—One-eyed Bogan thrust his face forward from the ring of +darkness into the torchlight of salvation. He had got the worst of a drawn +battle; his nose and mouth were bleeding, and his good eye was damaged. +</p> + +<p> +“Look at my face!” he snarled, with dangerous earnestness. +“Look at my face! That’s the face of a freethinker, and I +don’t care who knows it. Now! what have you got to say against my face, +‘Man-without-a-Shirt?’” +</p> + +<p> +The brother drew back. He had been known in the northwest in his sinful days as +“Man-without-a-Shirt,” alias “Shirty,” or “The +Dirty Man,” and was flabbergasted at being recognized in speech. Also, he +had been in a shearing-shed and in a shanty orgy with One-eyed Bogan, and knew +the man. +</p> + +<p> +Now most of the chaps respected the Army, and, indeed, anything that looked +like religion, but the Bogan’s face, as representing free-thought, was a +bit too sudden for them. There were sounds on the opposite side of the ring as +from men being smitten repeatedly and rapidly below the belt, and long Tom Hall +and one or two others got away into the darkness in the background, where Tom +rolled helplessly on the grass and sobbed. +</p> + +<p> +It struck me that Bogan’s face was more the result of free speech than +anything else. +</p> + +<p> +The Army was about to pray when the Pretty Girl stepped forward, her eyes +shining with indignation and enthusiasm. She had arrived by the evening train, +and had been standing shrinkingly behind an Army lass of fifty Australian +summers, who was about six feet high, flat and broad, and had a square face, +and a mouth like a joint in boiler plates. +</p> + +<p> +The Pretty Girl stamped her pretty foot on the gravel, and her eyes flashed in +the torchlight. +</p> + +<p> +“You ought to be ashamed of yourselves,” she said. “Great big +men like you to be going on the way you are. If you were ignorant or poor, as +I’ve seen people, there might be some excuse for you. Haven’t you +got any mothers, or sisters, or wives to think of? What sort of a life is this +you lead? Drinking, and gambling, and fighting, and swearing your lives away! +Do you ever think of God and the time when you were children? Why don’t +you make homes? Look at that man’s face!” (she pointed suddenly at +Bogan, who collapsed and sidled behind his mates out of the light). “Look +at that man’s face! Is it a face for a Christian? And you help and +encourage him to fight. You’re worse than he is. Oh, it’s brutal. +It’s—it’s wicked. Great big men like you, you ought to be +ashamed of yourselves.” +</p> + +<p> +Long Bob Brothers—about six-foot-four—the longest and most innocent +there, shrunk down by the wall and got his inquiring face out of the light. The +Pretty Girl fluttered on for a few moments longer, greatly excited, and then +stepped back, seemingly much upset, and was taken under the wing of the woman +with the boiler-plate mouth. +</p> + +<p> +It was a surprise, and very sudden. Bogan slipped round to the backyard, and +was seen bathing his battered features at the pump. The rest wore the +expression of men who knew that something unusual has happened, but don’t +know what, and are waiting vacantly for developments.—Except Tom Hall, +who had recovered and returned. He stood looking over the head of the ring of +bushmen, and apparently taking the same critical interest in the girl as he +would in a fight—his expression was such as a journalist might wear who +is getting exciting copy. +</p> + +<p> +The Army had it all their own way for the rest of the evening, and made a good +collection. The Pretty Girl stood smiling round with shining eyes as the bobs +and tanners dropped in, and then, being shoved forward by the flat woman, she +thanked us sweetly, and said we were good fellows, and that she was sorry for +some things she’d said to us. Then she retired, fluttering and very much +flushed, and hid herself behind the hard woman—who, by the way, had an +excrescence on her upper lip which might have stood for a rivet. +</p> + +<p> +Presently the Pretty Girl came from behind the big woman and stood watching +things with glistening eyes. Some of the chaps on the opposite side of the ring +moved a little to one side and all were careful not to meet her eye—not +to be caught looking at her—lest she should be embarrassed. Watty had +roused himself a little at the sound of a strange voice in the Army (and such a +clear, sweet voice too!) and had a look; then he settled back peacefully again, +but it was noticed that he didn’t snore that evening. +</p> + +<p> +And when the Army prayed, the Pretty Girl knelt down with the rest on the +gravel. One or two tall bushmen bowed their heads as if they had to, and +One-eyed Bogan, with the blood washed from his face, stood with his hat off, +glaring round to see if he could catch anyone sniggering. +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell, the shearer, said afterwards that the whole business made him feel +for the moment like he felt sometimes in the days when he used to feel things. +</p> + +<p> +The town discussed the Pretty Girl in the Army that night and for many days +thereafter, but no one could find out who she was or where she belonged +to—except that she came from Sydney last. She kept her secret, if she had +one, very close—or else the other S.-A. women were not to be pumped. She +lived in skillion-rooms at the back of the big weather-board Salvation Army +barracks with two other “lassies,” who did washing and sewing and +nursing, and went shabby, and half starved themselves, and were baked in the +heat, like scores of women in the bush, and even as hundreds of women, +suffering from religious mania, slave and stint in city slums, and neglect +their homes, husbands and children—for the glory of Booth. +</p> + +<p> +The Pretty Girl was referred to as Sister Hannah by the Army people, and came +somehow to be known by sinners as “Miss Captain.” I don’t +know whether that was her real name or what rank she held in the Army, if +indeed she held any. +</p> + +<p> +She sold <i>War Crys</i>, and the circulation doubled in a day. One-eyed Bogan, +being bailed up unexpectedly, gave her “half a caser” for a +<i>Cry</i>, and ran away without the paper or the change. Jack Mitchell bought +a <i>Cry</i> for the first time in his life, and read it. He said he found some +of the articles intensely realistic, and many of the statements were very +interesting. He said he read one or two things in the <i>Cry</i> that he +didn’t know before. Tom Hall, taken unawares, bought three <i>Crys</i> +from the Pretty Girl, and blushed to find it fame. +</p> + +<p> +Little Billy Woods, the Labourers’ Union secretary—who had a poetic +temperament and more than the average bushman’s reverence for higher +things—Little Billy Woods told me in a burst of confidence that he +generally had two feelings, one after the other, after encountering that girl. +One was that unfathomable far-away feeling of loneliness and longing, that +comes at odd times to the best of married men, with the best of wives and +children—as Billy had. The other feeling, which came later on, and was a +reaction in fact, was the feeling of a man who thinks he’s been twisted +round a woman’s little finger for the benefit of somebody else. Billy +said that he couldn’t help being reminded by the shy, sweet smile and the +shy, sweet “thank you” of the Pretty Girl in the Army, of the shy, +sweet smile and the shy, sweet gratitude of a Sydney private barmaid, who had +once roped him in, in the days before he was married. Then he’d reckon +that the Army lassie had been sent out back to Bourke as a business +speculation. +</p> + +<p> +Tom Hall was inclined to reckon so too—but that was after he’d been +chaffed for a month about the three <i>War Crys</i>. +</p> + +<p> +The Pretty Girl was discussed from psychological points of view; not forgetting +the sex problem. Donald Macdonald—shearer, union leader and labour +delegate to other colonies on occasion—Donald Macdonald said that +whenever he saw a circle of plain or ugly, dried-up women or girls round a +shepherd, evangelist or a Salvation Army drum, he’d say “sexually +starved!” They were hungry for love. Religious mania was sexual passion +dammed out of its course. Therefore he held that morbidly religious girls were +the most easily seduced. +</p> + +<p> +But this couldn’t apply to Pretty Girl in the Army. Mitchell reckoned +that she’d either had a great sorrow—a lot of trouble, or a +disappointment in love (the “or” is Mitchell’s); but they +couldn’t see how a girl like her could possibly be disappointed in +love—unless the chap died or got into jail for life. Donald decided that +her soul had been starved somehow. +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell suggested that it might be only a craving for notoriety, the same +thing that makes women and girls go amongst lepers, and out to the battlefield, +and nurse ugly pieces of men back to life again; the same thing that makes some +women and girls swear ropes round men’s necks. The Pretty Girl might be +the daughter of well-to-do people—even aristocrats, said +Mitchell—she was pretty enough and spoke well enough. “Every +woman’s a barmaid at heart,” as the <i>Bulletin</i> puts it, said +Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +But not even one of the haggard women of Bourke ever breathed a suspicion of +scandal against her. They said she was too good and too pretty to be where she +was. You see it was not as in an old settled town where hags blacken +God’s world with their tongues. Bourke was just a little camping town in +a big land, where free, good-hearted democratic Australians, and the best of +black sheep from the old world were constantly passing through; where +husband’s were often obliged to be away from home for twelve months, and +the storekeepers had to trust the people, and mates trusted each other, and the +folks were broad-minded. The mind’s eye had a wide range. +</p> + +<p> +After her maiden speech the Pretty Girl seldom spoke, except to return thanks +for collections—and she never testified. She had a sweet voice and used +to sing. +</p> + +<p> +Now, if I were writing pure fiction, and were not cursed with an obstinate +inclination to write the truth, I might say that, after the advent of the +Pretty Girl, the morals of Bourke improved suddenly and wonderfully. That +One-eyed Bogan left off gambling and drinking and fighting and swearing, and +put on a red coat and testified and fought the devil only; that Mitchell +dropped his mask of cynicism; that Donald Macdonald ate no longer of the tree +of knowledge and ceased to worry himself with psychological problems, and was +happy; and that Tom Hall was no longer a scoffer. That no one sneaked round +through the scrub after dusk to certain necessary establishments in +weather-board cottages on the outskirts of the town; and that the broad-minded +and obliging ladies thereof became Salvation Army lassies. +</p> + +<p> +But none of these things happened. Drunks quieted down or got out of the way if +they could when the Pretty Girl appeared on the scene, fights and games of +“headin’ ’em” were adjourned, and weak, ordinary +language was used for the time being, and that was about all. +</p> + +<p> +Nevertheless, most of the chaps were in love with that Pretty Girl in the +Army—all those who didn’t <i>worship</i> her privately. Long Bob +Brothers hovered round in hopes, they said, that she’d meet with an +accident—get run over by a horse or something—and he’d have +to carry her in; he scared the women at the barracks by dropping firewood over +the fence after dark. Barcoo-Rot, the meanest man in the back country, was seen +to drop a threepenny bit into the ring, and a rumour was industriously +circulated (by Tom Hall) to the effect that One-eyed Bogan intended to shave +and join the Army disguised as a lassie. +</p> + +<p> +Handsome Jake Boreham (<i>alias</i> Bore-’em), a sentimental shearer from +New Zealand, who had read Bret Harte, made an elaborate attempt for the Pretty +Girl, by pretending to be going to the dogs headlong, with an idea of first +winning her sorrowful interest and sympathy, and then making an apparently hard +struggle to straighten up for her sake. He related his experience with the +cheerful and refreshing absence of reserve which was characteristic of him, and +is of most bushmen. +</p> + +<p> +“I’d had a few drinks,” he said, “and was having a +spell under a gum by the river, when I saw the Pretty Girl and another Army +woman coming down along the bank. It was a blazing hot day. I thought of Sandy +and the Schoolmistress in Bret Harte, and I thought it would be a good idea to +stretch out in the sun and pretend to be helpless; so I threw my hat on the +ground and lay down, with my head in the blazing heat, in the most graceful +position I could get at, and I tried to put a look of pained regret on my face, +as if I was dreaming of my lost boyhood and me mother. I thought, perhaps, the +Girl would pity me, and I felt sure she’d stoop and pick up my hat and +put it gently over my poor troubled head. Then I was going to become conscious +for a moment, and look hopelessly round, and into her eyes, and then start and +look sorrowful and ashamed, and stagger to my feet, taking off my hat like the +Silver King does to the audience when he makes his first appearance drunk on +the stage; and then I was going to reel off, trying to walk as straight as I +could. And next day I was going to clean up my teeth and nails and put on a +white shirt, and start to be a new man henceforth. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, as I lay there with my eyes shut, I heard the footsteps come up +and stop, and heard ’em whisper, and I thought I heard the Pretty Girl +say ‘Poor fellow!’ or something that sounded like that; and just +then I got a God-almighty poke in the ribs with an umbrella—at least I +suppose it was aimed for my ribs; but women are bad shots, and the point of the +umbrella caught me in the side, just between the bottom rib and the hip-bone, +and I sat up with a click, like the blade of a pocketknife. +</p> + +<p> +“The other lassie was the big square-faced woman. The Pretty Girl looked +rather more frightened and disgusted than sentimental, but she had plenty of +pluck, and soon pulled herself together. She said I ought to be ashamed of +myself, a great big man like me, lying there in the dust like a drunken +tramp—an eyesore and a disgrace to all the world. She told me to go to my +camp, wherever that was, and sleep myself sober. The square-jawed woman said I +looked like a fool sitting there. I did feel ashamed, and I reckon I did look +like a fool—a man generally does in a fix like that. I felt like one, +anyway. I got up and walked away, and it hurt me so much that I went over to +West Bourke and went to the dogs properly for a fortnight, and lost twenty quid +on a game of draughts against a blindfold player. Now both those women had +umbrellas, but I’m not sure to this day which of ’em it was that +gave me the poke. It wouldn’t have mattered much anyway. I haven’t +borrowed one of Bret Harte’s books since.” +</p> + +<p> +Jake reflected a while. “The worst of it was,” he said ruefully, +“that I wasn’t sure that the girl or the woman didn’t see +through me, and that worried me a bit. You never can tell how much a woman +suspects, and that’s the worst of ’em. I found that out after I got +married.” +</p> + +<p> +The Pretty Girl in the Army grew pale and thin and bigger-eyed. The women said +it was a shame, and that she ought to be sent home to her friends, wherever +they were. She was laid up for two or three days, and some of the women cooked +delicacies and handed ’em over the barracks fence, and offered to come in +and nurse her; but the square woman took washing home and nursed the girl +herself. +</p> + +<p> +The Pretty Girl still sold <i>War Crys</i> and took up collections, but in a +tired, listless, half shamed-faced way. It was plain that she was tired of the +Army, and growing ashamed of the Salvationists. Perhaps she had come to see +things too plainly. +</p> + +<p> +You see, the Army does no good out back in Australia—except from a +business point of view. It is simply there to collect funds for hungry +headquarters. The bushmen are much too intelligent for the Army. There was no +poverty in Bourke—as it is understood in the city; there was plenty of +food; and camping out and roughing it come natural to the bushmen. In cases of +sickness, accident, widows or orphans, the chaps sent round the hat, without +banging a drum or testifying, and that was all right. If a chap was hard up he +borrowed a couple of quid from his mate. If a strange family arrived without a +penny, someone had to fix ’em up, and the storekeepers helped them till +the man got work. For the rest, we work out our own salvation, or +damnation—as the case is—in the bush, with no one to help us, +except a mate, perhaps. The Army can’t help us, but a fellow-sinner can, +sometimes, who has been through it all himself. The Army is only a drag on the +progress of Democracy, because it attracts many who would otherwise be +aggressive Democrats—and for other reasons. +</p> + +<p> +Besides, if we all reformed the Army would get deuced little from us for its +city mission. +</p> + +<p> +The Pretty Girl went to service for a while with the stock inspector’s +wife, who could get nothing out of her concerning herself or her friends. She +still slept at the barracks, stuck to the Army, and attended its meetings. +</p> + +<p> +It was Christmas morning, and there was peace in Bourke and goodwill towards +all men. There hadn’t been a fight since yesterday evening, and that had +only been a friendly one, to settle an argument concerning the past ownership, +and, at the same time, to decide as to the future possession of a dog. +</p> + +<p> +It had been a hot, close night, and it ended in a suffocating sunrise. The free +portion of the male population were in the habit of taking their blankets and +sleeping out in “the Park,” or town square, in hot weather; the +wives and daughters of the town slept, or tried to sleep, with bedroom windows +and doors open, while husbands lay outside on the verandas. I camped in a +corner of the park that night, and the sun woke me. +</p> + +<p> +As I sat up I caught sight of a swagman coming along the white, dusty road from +the direction of the bridge, where the cleared road ran across west and on, a +hundred and thirty miles, through the barren, broiling mulga scrubs, to +Hungerford, on the border of Sheol. I knew that swagman’s walk. It was +John Merrick (Jack Moonlight), one-time Shearers’ Union secretary at +Coonamble, and generally “Rep” (shearers’ representative) in +any shed where he sheared. He was a “better-class shearer,” one of +those quiet, thoughtful men of whom there are generally two or three in the +roughest of rough sheds, who have great influence, and give the shed a good +name from a Union point of view. Not quiet with the resentful or snobbish +reserve of the educated Englishman, but with a sad or subdued sort of quietness +that has force in it—as if they fully realized that their intelligence is +much higher than the average, that they have suffered more real trouble and +heartbreak than the majority of their mates, and that their mates +couldn’t possibly understand them if they spoke as they felt and +couldn’t see things as they do—yet men who understand and are +intensely sympathetic in their loneliness and sensitive reserve. +</p> + +<p> +I had worked in a shed with Jack Moonlight, and had met him in Sydney, and to +be mates with a bushman for a few weeks is to know him well—anyway, I +found it so. He had taken a trip to Sydney the Christmas before last, and when +he came back there was something wanting. He became more silent, he drank more, +and sometimes alone, and took to smoking heavily. He dropped his mates, took +little or no interest in Union matters, and travelled alone, and at night. +</p> + +<p> +The Australian bushman is born with a mate who sticks to him through +life—like a mole. They may be hundreds of miles apart sometimes, and +separated for years, yet they are mates for life. A bushman may have many mates +in his roving, but there is always one his mate, “my mate;” and it +is common to hear a bushman, who is, in every way, a true mate to the man he +happens to be travelling with, speak of <i>his mate’s +mate</i>—“Jack’s mate”—who might be in Klondyke +or South Africa. A bushman has always a mate to comfort him and argue with him, +and work and tramp and drink with him, and lend him quids when he’s hard +up, and call him a b—— fool, and fight him sometimes; to abuse him +to his face and defend his name behind his back; to bear false witness and +perjure his soul for his sake; to lie to the girl for him if he’s single, +and to his wife if he’s married; to secure a “pen” for him at +a shed where he isn’t on the spot, or, if the mate is away in New Zealand +or South Africa, to write and tell him if it’s any good coming over this +way. And each would take the word of the other against all the world, and each +believes that the other is the straightest chap that ever lived-“a white +man!” And next best to your old mate is the man you’re tramping, +riding, working, or drinking with. +</p> + +<p> +About the first thing the cook asks you when you come along to a +shearers’ hut is, “Where’s your mate?” I travelled +alone for a while one time, and it seemed to me sometimes, by the tone of the +inquiry concerning the whereabouts of my mate, that the bush had an idea that I +might have done away with him and that the thing ought to be looked into. +</p> + +<p> +When a man drops mateship altogether and takes to “hatting” in the +bush, it’s a step towards a convenient tree and a couple of saddle-straps +buckled together. +</p> + +<p> +I had an idea that I, in a measure, took the place of Jack Moonlight’s +mate about this time. +</p> + +<p> +“’Ullo, Jack!” I hailed as he reached the corner of the park. +</p> + +<p> +“Good morning, Harry!” said Jack, as if he’d seen me last +yesterday evening instead of three months ago. “How are you getting +on?” +</p> + +<p> +We walked together towards the Union Office, where I had a camp in the +skillion-room at the back. Jack was silent. But there’s no place in the +world where a man’s silence is respected so much (within reasonable +bounds) as in the Australian bush, where every man has a past more or less sad, +and every man a ghost—perhaps from other lands that we know nothing of, +and speaking in a foreign tongue. They say in the bush, “Oh, Jack’s +only thinking!” And they let him think. Generally you want to think as +much as your mate; and when you’ve been together some time it’s +quite natural to travel all day without exchanging a word. In the morning Jim +says, “Well, I think I made a bargain with that horse, Bill,” and +some time late in the afternoon, say twenty miles farther on, it occurs to Bill +to “rejoin,” “Well, I reckon the blank as sold it to you had +yer proper!” +</p> + +<p> +I like a good thinking mate, and I believe that thinking in company is a lot +more healthy and more comfortable, as well as less risky, than thinking alone. +</p> + +<p> +On the way to the Union Office Jack and I passed the Royal Hotel, and caught a +glimpse, through the open door, of a bedroom off the veranda, of the +landlord’s fresh, fair, young Sydney girl-wife, sleeping prettily behind +the mosquito-net, like a sleeping beauty, while the boss lay on a mattress +outside on the veranda, across the open door. (He wasn’t necessary for +publication, but an evidence of good faith.) +</p> + +<p> +I glanced at Jack for a grin, but didn’t get one. He wore the pained +expression of a man who is suddenly hit hard with the thought of something that +might have been. +</p> + +<p> +I boiled the billy and fried a pound of steak. +</p> + +<p> +“Been travelling all night, Tack?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Jack. “I camped at Emus yesterday.” +</p> + +<p> +He didn’t eat. I began to reckon that he was brooding too much for his +health. He was much thinner than when I saw him last, and pretty haggard, and +he had something of the hopeless, haggard look that I’d seen in Tom +Hall’s eyes after the last big shearing strike, when Tom had worked day +and night to hold his mates up all through the hard, bitter struggle, and the +battle was lost. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Jack!” I said at last. “What’s up?” +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing’s up, Harry,” said Jack. “What made you think +so?” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you got yourself into any fix?” I asked. “What’s +the Hungerford track been doing to you?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, Harry,” he said, “I’m all right. How are +you?” And he pulled some string and papers and a roll of dusty pound +notes from his pocket and threw them on the bunk. +</p> + +<p> +I was hard up just then, so I took a note and the billy to go to the Royal and +get some beer. I thought the beer might loosen his mind a bit. +</p> + +<p> +“Better take a couple of quid,” said Jack. “You look as if +you want some new shirts and things.” But a pound was enough for me, and +I think he had reason to be glad of that later on, as it turned out. +</p> + +<p> +“Anything new in Bourke?” asked Jack as we drank the beer. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” I said, “not a thing—except there’s a +pretty girl in the Salvation Army.” +</p> + +<p> +“And it’s about time,” growled Jack. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, look here, Jack,” I said presently, “what’s come +over you lately at all? I might be able to help you. It’s not a bit of +use telling me that there’s nothing the matter. When a man takes to +brooding and travelling alone it’s a bad sign, and it will end in a +leaning tree and a bit of clothes-line as likely as not. Tell me what the +trouble is. Tell us all about it. There’s a ghost, isn’t +there?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I suppose so,” said Jack. “We’ve all got our +ghosts for that matter. But never you mind, Harry; I’m all right. I +don’t go interfering with your ghosts, and I don’t see what call +you’ve got to come haunting mine. Why, it’s as bad as kicking a +man’s dog.” And he gave the ghost of a grin. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me, Jack,” I said, “is it a woman?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Jack, “it’s a woman. Now, are you +satisfied?” +</p> + +<p> +“Is it a girl?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +So there was no more to be said. I’d thought it might have been a lot +worse than a girl. I’d thought he might have got married somewhere, +sometime, and made a mess of it. +</p> + +<p> +We had dinner at Billy Woods’s place, and a sensible Christmas dinner it +was—everything cold, except the vegetables, with the hose going on the +veranda in spite of the by-laws, and Billy’s wife and her sister, fresh +and cool-looking and jolly, instead of being hot and brown and cross like most +Australian women who roast themselves over a blazing fire in a hot kitchen on a +broiling day, all the morning, to cook scalding plum pudding and redhot roasts, +for no other reason than that their grandmothers used to cook hot Christmas +dinners in England. +</p> + +<p> +And in the afternoon we went for a row on the river, pulling easily up the +anabranch and floating down with the stream under the shade of the river +timber—instead of going to sleep and waking up helpless and soaked in +perspiration, to find the women with headaches, as many do on Christmas Day in +Australia. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Woods tried to draw Jack out, but it was no use, and in the evening he +commenced drinking, and that made Billy uneasy. “I’m afraid +Jack’s on the wrong track,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +After tea most of us collected about Watty’s veranda. Most things that +happened in Bourke happened at Watty’s pub, or near it. +</p> + +<p> +If a horse bolted with a buggy or cart, he was generally stopped outside +Watty’s, which seemed to suggest, as Mitchell said, that most of the +heroes drank at Watty’s—also that the pluckiest men were found +amongst the hardest drinkers. (But sometimes the horse fetched up against +Watty’s sign and lamppost—which was a stout one of +“iron-bark”—and smashed the trap.) Then Watty’s was the +Carriers’ Arms, a union pub; and Australian teamsters are mostly hard +cases: while there was something in Watty’s beer which made men argue +fluently, and the best fights came off in his backyard. Watty’s dogs were +the most quarrelsome in town, and there was a dog-fight there every other +evening, followed as often as not by a man-fight. If a bushman’s horse +ran away with him the chances were that he’d be thrown on to +Watty’s veranda, if he wasn’t pitched into the bar; and victims of +accidents, and sick, hard-up shearers, were generally carried to Watty’s +pub, as being the most convenient and comfortable for them. Mitchell denied +that it was generosity or good nature on Watty’s part, he said it was all +business—advertisement. Watty knew what he was doing. He was very deep, +was Watty. Mitchell further hinted that if he was sick <i>he</i> wouldn’t +be carried to Watty’s, for Watty knew what a thirsty business a funeral +was. Tom Hall reckoned that Watty bribed the Army on the quiet. +</p> + +<p> +I was sitting on a stool along the veranda wall with Donald Macdonald, Bob +Brothers (the Giraffe) and Mitchell, and one or two others, and Jack Moonlight +sat on the floor with his back to the wall and his hat well down over his eyes. +The Army came along at the usual time, but we didn’t see the Pretty Girl +at first—she was a bit late. Mitchell said he liked to be at +Watty’s when the Army prayed and the Pretty Girl was there; he had no +objection to being prayed for by a girl like that, though he reckoned that +nothing short of a real angel could save him now. He said his old grandmother +used to pray for him every night of her life and three times on Sunday, with +Christmas Day extra when Christmas Day didn’t fall on a Sunday; but +Mitchell reckoned that the old lady couldn’t have had much influence +because he became more sinful every year, and went deeper in ways of darkness, +until finally he embarked on a career of crime. +</p> + +<p> +The Army prayed, and then a thin “ratty” little woman bobbed up in +the ring; she’d gone mad on religion as women do on woman’s rights +and hundreds of other things. She was so skinny in the face, her jaws so +prominent, and her mouth so wide, that when she opened it to speak it was like +a ventriloquist’s dummy and you could almost see the cracks open down +under her ears. +</p> + +<p> +“They say I’m cracked!” she screamed in a shrill, cracked +voice. “But I’m not cracked—I’m only cracked on the +Lord Jesus Christ! That’s all I’m cracked on——.” +And just then the Amen man of the Army—the Army groaner we called him, +who was always putting both feet in it—just then he blundered forward, +rolled up his eyes, threw his hands up and down as if he were bouncing two +balls, and said, with deep feeling: +</p> + +<p> +“Thank the Lord she’s got a crack in the right place!” +</p> + +<p> +Tom Hall doubled up, and most of the other sinners seemed to think there was +something very funny about it. And the Army, too, seemed struck with an idea +that there was something wrong somewhere, for they started a hymn. +</p> + +<p> +A big American negro, who’d been a night watchman in Sydney, stepped into +the ring and waved his arms and kept time, and as he got excited he moved his +hands up and down rapidly, as if he was hauling down a rope in a great hurry +through a pulley block above, and he kept saying, “Come down, +Lord!” all through the hymn, like a bass accompaniment, “Come down, +Lord; come down, Lord; come down, Lord; come down, Lord!” and the quicker +be said it the faster he hauled. He was as good as a drum. And, when the hymn +was over, he started to testify. +</p> + +<p> +“My frens!” he said, “I was once black as der coals in der +mined! I was once black as der ink in der ocean of sin! But now—thank +an’ bless the Lord!—I am whiter dan der dribben snow!” +</p> + +<p> +Tom Hall sat down on the edge of the veranda and leaned his head against a post +and cried. He had contributed a bob this evening, and he was getting his +money’s worth. +</p> + +<p> +Then the Pretty Girl arrived and was pushed forward into the ring. She looked +thinner and whiter than I’d ever seen her, and there was a feverish +brightness in her eyes that I didn’t like. +</p> + +<p> +“Men!” she said, “this is Christmas Day-.” I +didn’t hear any more for, at the sound of her voice, Jack Moonlight +jumped up as if he’d sat on a baby. He started forward, stared at her for +a moment as if he couldn’t believe his eyes, and then said, +“Hannah!” short and sharp. She started as if she was shot, gave him +a wild look, and stumbled forward; the next moment he had her in his arms and +was steering for the private parlour. +</p> + +<p> +I heard Mrs Bothways calling for water and smelling-salts; she was as fat as +Watty, and very much like him in the face, but she was emotional and +sympathetic. Then presently I heard, through the open window, the Pretty Girl +say to Jack, “Oh, Jack, Jack! Why did you go away and leave me like that? +It was cruel!” +</p> + +<p> +“But you told me to go, Hannah,” said Jack. +</p> + +<p> +“That-that didn’t make any difference. Why didn’t you +write?” she sobbed. +</p> + +<p> +“Because you never wrote to me, Hannah,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“That—that was no excuse!” she said. “It was so +k-k-k-cruel of you, Jack.” +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Bothways pulled down the window. A new-comer asked Watty what the trouble +was, and he said that the Army girl had only found her chap, or husband, or +long-lost brother or something, but the missus was looking after the business; +then he dozed again. +</p> + +<p> +And then we adjourned to the Royal and took the Army with us. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s the way of it,” said Donald Macdonald. “With a +woman it’s love or religion; with a man it’s love or the +devil.” +</p> + +<p> +“Or with a man,” said Mitchell, presently, “it’s love +and the devil both, sometimes, Donald.” +</p> + +<p> +I looked at Mitchell hard, but for all his face expressed he might only have +said, “I think it’s going to rain.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"></a> +“LORD DOUGLAS”</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +“They hold him true, who’s true to one,<br/> +However false he be—”<br/> + <i>The Rouseabout of Rouseabouts</i>. +</p> + +<p> +The Imperial Hotel was rather an unfortunate name for an out-back town pub, for +out back is the stronghold of Australian democracy; it was the out-back vote +and influence that brought about “One Man One Vote,” “Payment +of Members,” and most of the democratic legislation of late years, and +from out back came the overwhelming vote in favour of Australian as Imperial +Federation. +</p> + +<p> +The name Royal Hotel is as familiar as that of the Railway Hotel, and passes +unnoticed and ungrowled at, even by bush republicans. The Royal Hotel at Bourke +was kept by an Irishman, one O’Donohoo, who was Union to the backbone, +loudly in favour of “Australia for the Australians,” and, of +course, against even the democratic New South Wales Government of the time. He +went round town all one St Patrick’s morning with a bunch of green ribbon +fastened to his coat-tail with a large fish-hook, and wasn’t aware of the +fact till he sat down on the point of it. But that’s got nothing to do +with it. +</p> + +<p> +The Imperial Hotel at Bourke was unpopular from the first. It was said that the +very existence of the house was the result of a swindle. It had been built with +money borrowed on certain allotments in the centre of the town and on the +understanding that it should be built on the mortgaged land, whereas it was +erected on a free allotment. Which fact was discovered, greatly to its +surprise, by the building society when it came to foreclose on the allotments +some years later. While the building was being erected the Bourke people +understood, in a vague way, that it was to be a convent (perhaps the building +society thought so, too), and when certain ornaments in brick and cement in the +shape of a bishop’s mitre were placed over the corners of the walls the +question seemed decided. But when the place was finished a bar was fitted up, +and up went the sign, to the disgust of the other publicans, who didn’t +know a licence had been taken out—for licensing didn’t go by local +option in those days. It was rumoured that the place belonged to, and the whole +business was engineered by, a priest. And priests are men of the world. +</p> + +<p> +The Imperial Hotel was patronized by the pastoralists, the civil servants, the +bank manager and clerks—all the scrub aristocracy; it was the +headquarters of the Pastoralists’ Union in Bourke; a barracks for +blacklegs brought up from Sydney to take the place of Union shearers on strike; +and the new Governor, on his inevitable visit to Bourke, was banqueted at the +Imperial Hotel. The editor of the local “capitalistic rag” stayed +there; the pastoralists’ member was elected mostly by dark ways and means +devised at the Imperial Hotel, and one of its managers had stood as a dummy +candidate to split the Labour vote; the management of the hotel was his reward. +In short, it was there that most of the plots were hatched to circumvent +Freedom, and put away or deliver into the clutches of law and order certain +sons of Light and Liberty who believed in converting blacklegs into jellies by +force of fists when bribes, gentle persuasion and pure Australian language +failed to convert them to clean Unionism. The Imperial Hotel was called the +“Squatters’ Pub,” the “Scabbery,” and other and +more expressive names. +</p> + +<p> +The hotel became still more unpopular after Percy Douglas had managed it for a +while. He was an avowed enemy of Labour Unionists. He employed Chinese cooks, +and that in the height of the anti-Chinese agitation in Australia, and he was +known to have kindly feelings towards the Afghans who, with their camels, were +running white carriers off the roads. If an excited Unionist called a man a +“blackleg” or “scab” in the Imperial bar he was run +out—sometimes with great difficulty, and occasionally as far as the +lock-up. +</p> + +<p> +Percy Douglas was a fine-looking man, “wid a chest on him an’ well +hung—a fine fee-<i>gure</i> of a man,” as O’Donohoo +pronounced it. He was tall and erect, he dressed well, wore small +side-whiskers, had an eagle nose, and looked like an aristocrat. Like many of +his type, who start sometimes as billiard-markers and suddenly become hotel +managers in Australia, nothing was known of his past. Jack Mitchell reckoned, +by the way he treated his employees and spoke to workmen, that he was the +educated son of an English farmer—gone wrong and sent out to Australia. +Someone called him “Lord Douglas,” and the nickname caught on. +</p> + +<p> +He made himself well hated. He got One-eyed Bogan “three months’ +hard” for taking a bottle of whisky off the Imperial bar counter because +he (Bogan) was drunk and thirsty and had knocked down his cheque, and because +there was no one minding the bar at the moment. +</p> + +<p> +Lord Douglas dismissed the barmaid, and, as she was leaving, he had her boxes +searched and gave her in charge for stealing certain articles belonging to the +hotel. The chaps subscribed to defend the case, and subsequently put a few +pounds together for the girl. She proved her gratitude by bringing a charge of +a baby against one of the chaps—but that was only one of the little ways +of the world, as Mitchell said. She joined a Chinese camp later on. +</p> + +<p> +Lord Douglas employed a carpenter to do some work about the hotel, and because +the carpenter left before the job was finished, Lord Douglas locked his tools +in an outhouse and refused to give them up; and when the carpenter, with the +spirit of an Australian workman, broke the padlock and removed his tool-chest, +the landlord gave him in charge for breaking and entering. The chaps defended +the case and won it, and hated Lord Douglas as much as if he were their elder +brother. Mitchell was the only one to put in a word for him. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve been puzzling it out,” said Mitchell, as he sat nursing +his best leg in the Union Office, “and, as far as I can see, it all +amounts to this—we’re all mistaken in Lord Douglas. We don’t +know the man. He’s all right. We don’t understand him. He’s +really a sensitive, good-hearted man who’s been shoved a bit off the +track by the world. It’s the world’s fault—he’s not to +blame. You see, when he was a youngster he was the most good-natured kid in the +school; he was always soft, and, consequently, he was always being imposed +upon, and bullied, and knocked about. Whenever he got a penny to buy lollies +he’d count ’em out carefully and divide ’em round amongst his +schoolmates and brothers and sisters. He was the only one that worked at home, +and consequently they all hated him. His father respected him, but didn’t +love him, because he wasn’t a younger son, and wasn’t bringing his +father’s grey hairs down in sorrow to the grave. If it was in Australia, +probably Lord Douglas was an elder son and had to do all the hard graft, and +teach himself at night, and sleep in a bark skillion while his younger brothers +benefited—they were born in the new brick house and went to +boarding-schools. His mother had a contempt for him because he wasn’t a +black sheep and a prodigal, and, when the old man died, the rest of the family +got all the stuff and Lord Douglas was kicked out because they could do without +him now. And the family hated him like poison ever afterwards (especially his +mother), and spread lies about him—because they had treated him +shamefully and because his mouth was shut—they knew he wouldn’t +speak. Then probably he went in for Democracy and worked for Freedom, till +Freedom trod on him once too often with her hob-nailed boots. Then the chances +are, in the end, he was ruined by a girl or woman, and driven, against his +will, to take refuge in pure individualism. He’s all right, only we +don’t appreciate him. He’s only fighting against his old +ideals—his old self that comes up sometimes—and that’s what +makes him sweat his barmaids and servants, and hate us, and run us in; and +perhaps when he cuts up extra rough it’s because his conscience kicks him +when he thinks of the damned soft fool he used to be. He’s all +right—take my word for it. It’s all a mask. Why, he might be one of +the kindest-hearted men in Bourke underneath.” +</p> + +<p> +Tom Hall rubbed his head and blinked, as if he was worried by an idea that +there might be some facts in Mitchell’s theories. +</p> + +<p> +“You’re allers findin’ excuses for blacklegs an’ scabs, +Mitchell,” said Barcoo-Rot, who took Mitchell seriously (and who would +have taken a laughing jackass seriously). “Why, you’d find a white +spot on a squatter. I wouldn’t be surprised if you blacklegged yourself +in the end.” +</p> + +<p> +This was an unpardonable insult, from a Union point of view, and the chaps +half-unconsciously made room on the floor for Barcoo-Rot to fall after Jack +Mitchell hit him. But Mitchell took the insult philosophically. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Barcoo-Rot,” he said, nursing the other leg, “for the +matter of that, I did find a white spot on a squatter once. He lent me a quid +when I was hard up. There’s white spots on the blackest characters if you +only drop prejudice and look close enough. I suppose even +Jack-the-Ripper’s character was speckled. Why, I can even see spots on +your character, sometimes, Barcoo-Rot. I’ve known white spots to spread +on chaps’ characters until they were little short of saints. Sometimes I +even fancy I can feel my own wings sprouting. And as for turning +blackleg—well, I suppose I’ve got a bit of the crawler in my +composition (most of us have), and a man never knows what might happen to his +principles.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Barcoo-Rot, “I beg yer pardon—ain’t +that enough?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Mitchell, “you ought to wear a three-bushel bag +and ashes for three months, and drink water; but since the police would send +you to an asylum if you did that, I think the best thing we can do is to go out +and have a drink.” +</p> + +<p> +Lord Douglas married an Australian girl somewhere, somehow, and brought her to +Bourke, and there were two little girls—regular little fairies. She was a +gentle, kind-hearted little woman, but she didn’t seem to improve him +much, save that he was very good to her. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s mostly that way,” commented Mitchell. “When a +boss gets married and has children he thinks he’s got a greater right to +grind his fellowmen and rob their wives and children. I’d never work for +a boss with a big family—it’s hard enough to keep a single boss +nowadays in this country.” +</p> + +<p> +After one stormy election, at the end of a long and bitter shearing strike, +One-eyed Bogan, his trusty enemy, Barcoo-Rot, and one or two other enthusiastic +reformers were charged with rioting, and got from one to three months’ +hard. And they had only smashed three windows of the Imperial Hotel and chased +the Chinese cook into the river. +</p> + +<p> +“I used to have some hopes for Democracy,” commented Mitchell, +“but I’ve got none now. How can you expect Liberty, Equality or +Fraternity—how can you expect Freedom and Universal Brotherhood and Equal +Rights in a country where Sons of Light get three months’ hard for +breaking windows and bashing a Chinaman? It almost makes me long to sail away +in a gallant barque.” +</p> + +<p> +There were other cases in connection with the rotten-egging of Capitalistic +candidates on the Imperial Hotel balcony, and it was partly on the evidence of +Douglas and his friends that certain respectable Labour leaders got heavy terms +of imprisonment for rioting and “sedition” and +“inciting,” in connection with organized attacks on blacklegs and +their escorts. +</p> + +<p> +Retribution, if it was retribution, came suddenly and in a most unexpected +manner to Lord Douglas. +</p> + +<p> +It seems he employed a second carpenter for six months to repair and make +certain additions to the hotel, and put him off under various pretences until +he owed him a hundred pounds or thereabout. At last, immediately after an +exciting interview with Lord Douglas, the carpenter died suddenly of heart +disease. The widow, a strong-minded bushwoman, put a bailiff in the hotel on a +very short notice—and against the advice of her lawyer, who thought the +case hopeless—and the Lord Douglas bubble promptly burst. He had somehow +come to be regarded as the proprietor of the hotel, but now the real +proprietors or proprietor—he was still said to be a priest—turned +Douglas out and put in a new manager. The old servants were paid after some +trouble. The local storekeepers and one or two firms in Sydney, who had large +accounts against the Imperial Hotel (and had trusted it, mainly because it was +patronized by Capitalism and Fat), were never paid. +</p> + +<p> +Lord Douglas cleared out to Sydney, leaving his wife and children, for the +present, with her brother, a hay-and-corn storekeeper, who also had a large and +hopeless account against the hotel; and when the brother went broke and left +the district she rented a two-roomed cottage and took in dressmaking. +</p> + +<p> +Dressmaking didn’t pay so well in the bush then as it did in the old +diggings days when sewing-machines were scarce and the possession of one meant +an independent living to any girl—when diggers paid ten shillings for a +strip of “flannen” doubled over and sewn together, with holes for +arms and head, and called a shirt. Mrs Douglas had a hard time, with her two +little girls, who were still better and more prettily dressed than any other +children in Bourke. One grocer still called on her for orders and pretended to +be satisfied to wait “till Mr Douglas came back,” and when she +would no longer order what he considered sufficient provisions for her and the +children, and commenced buying sugar, etc., by the pound, for cash, he one day +sent a box of groceries round to her. He pretended it was a mistake. +</p> + +<p> +“However,” he said, “I’d be very much obliged if you +could use ’em, Mrs Douglas. I’m overstocked now; haven’t got +room for another tin of sardines in the shop. Don’t you worry about +bills, Mrs Douglas; I can wait till Douglas comes home. I did well enough out +of the Imperial Hotel when your husband had it, and a pound’s worth of +groceries won’t hurt me now. I’m only too glad to get rid of some +of the stock.” +</p> + +<p> +She cried a little, thought of the children, and kept the groceries. +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose I’ll be sold up soon meself if things don’t git +brighter,” said that grocer to a friend, “so it doesn’t +matter much.” +</p> + +<p> +The same with Foley the butcher, who had a brogue with a sort of drawling groan +in it, and was a cynic of the Mitchell school. +</p> + +<p> +“You see,” he said, “she’s as proud as the devil, but +when I send round a bit o’ rawst, or porrk, or the undercut o’ the +blade-bawn, she thinks o’ the little gur-r-rls before she thinks o’ +sendin’ it back to me. That’s where I’ve got the pull on +her.” +</p> + +<p> +The Giraffe borrowed a horse and tip-dray one day at the beginning of winter +and cut a load of firewood in the bush, and next morning, at daylight, Mrs +Douglas was nearly startled out of her life by a crash at the end of the +cottage, which made her think that the chimney had fallen in, or a tree fallen +on the house; and when she slipped on a wrapper and looked out, she saw a load +of short-cut wood by the chimney, and caught a glimpse of the back view of the +Giraffe, who stood in the dray with his legs wide apart and was disappearing +into the edge of the scrub; and soon the rapid clock-clock-clock of the wheels +died away in the west, as if he were making for West Australia. +</p> + +<p> +The next we heard of Lord Douglas he had got two years’ hard for +embezzlement in connection with some canvassing he had taken up. Mrs Douglas +fell ill—a touch of brain-fever—and one of the labourers’ +wives took care of the children while two others took turns in nursing. While +she was recovering, Bob Brothers sent round the hat, and, after a conclave in +the Union Office—as mysterious as any meeting ever called with the object +of downing bloated Capitalism—it was discovered that one of the +chaps—who didn’t wish his name to be mentioned—had borrowed +just twenty-five pounds from Lord Douglas in the old days and now wished to +return it to Mrs Douglas. So the thing was managed, and if she had any +suspicions she kept them to herself. She started a little fancy goods shop and +got along fairly comfortable. +</p> + +<p> +Douglas, by the way, was, publicly, supposed, for her sake and because of the +little girls, to be away in West Australia on the goldfields. +</p> + +<p> +Time passes without much notice out back, and one hot day, when the sun hung +behind the fierce sandstorms from the northwest as dully lurid as he ever +showed in a London fog, Lord Douglas got out of the train that had just +finished its five-hundred-miles’ run, and not seeing a new-chum porter, +who started forward by force of habit to take his bag, he walked stiffly off +the platform and down the main street towards his wife’s cottage. +</p> + +<p> +He was very gaunt, and his eyes, to those who passed him closely, seemed to +have a furtive, hunted expression. He had let his beard grow, and it had grown +grey. +</p> + +<p> +It was within a few days of Christmas—the same Christmas that we lost the +Pretty Girl in the Salvation Army. As a rule the big shearing-sheds within a +fortnight of Bourke cut out in time for the shearers to reach the town and have +their Christmas dinners and sprees—and for some of them to be locked up +over Christmas Day—within sound of a church-going bell. Most of the chaps +gathered in the Shearers’ Union Office on New Year’s Eve and +discussed Douglas amongst other things. +</p> + +<p> +“I vote we kick the cow out of the town!” snarled One-eyed Bogan, +viciously. +</p> + +<p> +“We can’t do that,” said Bob Brothers (the Giraffe), speaking +more promptly than usual. “There’s his wife and youngsters to +consider, yer know.” +</p> + +<p> +“He something well deserted his wife,” snarled Bogan, +“an’ now he comes crawlin’ back to her to keep him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Mitchell, mildly, “but we ain’t all got as +much against him as you have, Bogan.” +</p> + +<p> +“He made a crimson jail-bird of me!” snapped Bogan. +“Well,” said Mitchell, “that didn’t hurt you much, +anyway; it rather improved your character if anything. Besides, he made a +jail-bird of himself afterwards, so you ought to have a fellow-feeling—a +feathered feeling, so to speak. Now you needn’t be offended, Bogan, +we’re all jail-birds at heart, only we haven’t all got the +pluck.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m in favour of blanky well tarrin’ an’ +featherin’ him an’ kickin’ him out of the town!” +shouted Bogan. “It would be a good turn to his wife, too; she’d be +well rid of the——.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps she’s fond of him,” suggested Mitchell; +“I’ve known such cases before. I saw them sitting together on the +veranda last night when they thought no one was looking.” +</p> + +<p> +“He deserted her,” said One-eyed Bogan, in a climbing-down tone, +“and left her to starve.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps the police were to blame for that,” said Mitchell. +“You know you deserted all your old mates once for three months, Bogan, +and it wasn’t your fault.” +</p> + +<p> +“He seems to be a crimson pet of yours, Jack Mitchell,” said Bogan, +firing up. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, well, all I know,” said Mitchell, standing up and stretching +himself wearily, “all I know is that he looked like a gentleman once, and +treated us like a gentleman, and cheated us like a gentleman, and ran some of +us in like a gentleman, and, as far as I can see, he’s served his time +like a gentleman and come back to face us and live himself down like a man. I +always had a sneaking regard for a gentleman.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, Mitchell, I’m beginning to think you are a gentleman +yourself,” said Jake Boreham. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Mitchell, “I used to have a suspicion once that +I had a drop of blue blood in me somewhere, and it worried me a lot; but I +asked my old mother about it one day, and she scalded me—God bless +her!—and father chased me with a stockwhip, so I gave up making +inquiries.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll join the bloomin’ Capitalists next,” sneered +One-eyed Bogan. +</p> + +<p> +“I wish I could, Bogan,” said Mitchell. “I’d take a +trip to Paris and see for myself whether the Frenchwomen are as bad as +they’re made out to be, or go to Japan. But what are we going to do about +Douglas?” +</p> + +<p> +“Kick the skunk out of town, or boycott him!” said one or two. +“He ought to be tarred and feathered and hanged.” +</p> + +<p> +“Couldn’t do worse than hang him,” commented Jake Boreham, +cheerfully. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes, we could,” said Mitchell, sitting down, resting his +elbows on his knees, and marking his points with one forefinger on the other. +“For instance, we might boil him slow in tar. We might skin him alive. We +might put him in a cage and poke him with sticks, with his wife and children in +another cage to look on and enjoy the fun.” +</p> + +<p> +The chaps, who had been sitting quietly listening to Mitchell, and grinning, +suddenly became serious and shifted their positions uneasily. +</p> + +<p> +“But I can tell you what would hurt his feelings more than anything else +we could do,” said Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, what is it, Jack?” said Tom Hall, rather impatiently. +</p> + +<p> +“Send round the hat and take up a collection for him,” said +Mitchell, “enough to let him get away with his wife and children and +start life again in some less respectable town than Bourke. You needn’t +grin, I’m serious about it.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a thoughtful pause, and one or two scratched their heads. “His +wife seems pretty sick,” Mitchell went on in a reflective tone. “I +passed the place this morning and saw him scrubbing out the floor. He’s +been doing a bit of house-painting for old Heegard to-day. I suppose he learnt +it in jail. I saw him at work and touched my hat to him.” +</p> + +<p> +“What!” cried Tom Hall, affecting to shrink from Mitchell in +horror. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Mitchell, “I’m not sure that I didn’t +take my hat off. Now I know it’s not bush religion for a man to touch his +hat, except to a funeral, or a strange roof or woman sometimes; but when I meet +a braver man than myself I salute him. I’ve only met two in my +life.” +</p> + +<p> +“And who were they, Jack?” asked Jake Boreham. +</p> + +<p> +“One,” said Mitchell—“one is Douglas, and the +other—well, the other was the man I used to be. But that’s got +nothing to do with it.” +</p> + +<p> +“But perhaps Douglas thought you were crowing over him when you took off +your hat to him—sneerin’ at him, like, Mitchell,” reflected +Jake Boreham. +</p> + +<p> +“No, Jake,” said Mitchell, growing serious suddenly. “There +are ways of doing things that another man understands.” +</p> + +<p> +They all thought for a while. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Tom Hall, “supposing we do take up a collection +for him, he’d be too damned proud to take it.” +</p> + +<p> +“But that’s where we’ve got the pull on him,” said +Mitchell, brightening up. “I heard Dr Morgan say that Mrs Douglas +wouldn’t live if she wasn’t sent away to a cooler place, and +Douglas knows it; and, besides, one of the little girls is sick. We’ve +got him in a corner and he’ll have to take the stuff. Besides, two years +in jail takes a lot of the pride out of a man.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I’m damned if I’ll give a sprat to help the man who +tried his best to crush the Unions!” said One-eyed Bogan. +</p> + +<p> +“Damned if I will either!” said Barcoo-Rot. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, look here, One-eyed Bogan,” said Mitchell, “I +don’t like to harp on old things, for I know they bore you, but when you +returned to public life that time no one talked of kicking you out of the town. +In fact, I heard that the chaps put a few pounds together to help you get away +for a while till you got over your modesty.” +</p> + +<p> +No one spoke. +</p> + +<p> +“I passed Douglas’s place on my way here from my camp +to-night,” Mitchell went on musingly, “and I saw him walking up and +down in the yard with his sick child in his arms. You remember that little +girl, Bogan? I saw her run and pick up your hat and give it to you one day when +you were trying to put it on with your feet. You remember, Bogan? The shock +nearly sobered you.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a very awkward pause. The position had become too psychological +altogether and had to be ended somehow. The awkward silence had to be broken, +and Bogan broke it. He turned up Bob Brothers’s hat, which was lying on +the table, and “chucked” in a “quid,” qualifying the +hat and the quid, and disguising his feelings with the national oath of the +land. +</p> + +<p> +“We’ve had enough of this gory, maudlin, sentimental +tommy-rot,” he said. “Here, Barcoo, stump up or I’ll belt it +out of your hide! I’ll—I’ll take yer to pieces!” +</p> + +<p> +But Douglas didn’t leave the town. He sent his wife and children to +Sydney until the heat wave was past, built a new room on to the cottage, and +started a book and newspaper shop, and a poultry farm in the back paddock, and +flourished. +</p> + +<p> +They called him Mr Douglas for a while, then Douglas, then Percy Douglas, and +now he is well-known as Old Daddy Douglas, and the Sydney <i>Worker</i>, +<i>Truth</i>, and <i>Bulletin</i>, and other democratic rags are on sale at his +shop. He is big with schemes for locking the Darling River, and he gets his +drink at O’Donohoo’s. He is scarcely yet regarded as a straight-out +democrat. He was a gentleman once, Mitchell said, and the old blood was not to +be trusted. But, last elections, Douglas worked quietly for Unionism, and gave +the leaders certain hints, and put them up to various electioneering dodges +which enabled them to return, in the face of Monopoly, a Labour member who is +as likely to go straight as long as any other Labour member. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"></a> +THE BLINDNESS OF ONE-EYED BOGAN</h2> + +<p class="letter"> +They judge not and they are not judged—’tis their philosophy—<br/> +(There’s something wrong with every ship that sails upon the sea).<br/> + <i>The Ballad of the Rouseabout</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“And what became of One-eyed Bogan?” I asked Tom Hall when I met +him and Jack Mitchell down in Sydney with their shearing cheques the Christmas +before last. +</p> + +<p> +“You’d better ask Mitchell, Harry,” said Tom. “He can +tell you about Bogan better than I can. But first, what about the drink +we’re going to have?” +</p> + +<p> +We turned out of Pitt Street into Hunter Street, and across George Street, +where a double line of fast electric tramway was running, into Margaret Street +and had a drink at Pfahlert’s Hotel, where a counter lunch—as good +as many dinners you get for a shilling—was included with a sixpenny +drink. “Get a quiet corner,” said Mitchell, “I like to bear +myself cackle.” So we took our beer out in the fernery and got a cool +place at a little table in a quiet corner amongst the fern boxes. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, One-eyed Bogan was a hard case, Mitchell,” I said. +“Wasn’t he?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Mitchell, putting down his “long-beer” +glass, “he was.” +</p> + +<p> +“Rather a bad egg?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, a regular bad egg,” said Mitchell, decidedly. +</p> + +<p> +“I heard he got caught cheating at cards,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Did you?” said Mitchell. “Well, I believe he did. Ah, +well,” he added reflectively, after another long pull, “One-eyed +Bogan won’t cheat at cards any more.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” I said. “Is he dead then?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Mitchell, “he’s blind.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good God!” I said, “how did that happen?” +</p> + +<p> +“He lost the other eye,” said Mitchell, and he took another drink. +“Ah, well, he won’t cheat at cards any more—unless +there’s cards invented for the blind.” +</p> + +<p> +“How did it happen?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Mitchell, “you see, Harry, it was this way. +Bogan went pretty free in Bourke after the shearing before last, and in the end +he got mixed up in a very ugly-looking business: he was accused of doing two +new-chum jackaroos out of their stuff by some sort of confidence trick.” +</p> + +<p> +“Confidence trick,” I said. “I’d never have thought +that One-eyed Bogan had the brains to go in for that sort of thing.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, it seems he had, or else he used somebody else’s brains; +there’s plenty of broken-down English gentlemen sharpers knocking about +out back, you know, and Bogan might have been taking lessons from one. I +don’t know the rights of the case, it was hushed up, as you’ll see +presently; but, anyway, the jackaroos swore that Bogan had done ’em out +of ten quid. They were both Cockneys and I suppose they reckoned themselves +smart, but bushmen have more time to think. Besides, Bogan’s one eye was +in his favour. You see he always kept his one eye fixed strictly on whatever +business he had in hand; if he’d had another eye to rove round and +distract his attention and look at things on the outside, the chances are he +would never have got into trouble.” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind that, Jack,” said Tom Hall. “Harry wants to hear +the yarn.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, to make it short, one of the jackaroos went to the police and +Bogan cleared out. His character was pretty bad just then, so there was a piece +of blue paper out for him. Bogan didn’t seem to think the thing was so +serious as it was, for he only went a few miles down the river and camped with +his horses on a sort of island inside an anabranch, till the thing should blow +over or the new chums leave Bourke. +</p> + +<p> +“Bogan’s old enemy, Constable Campbell, got wind of Bogan’s +camp, and started out after him. He rode round the outside track and came in on +to the river just below where the anabranch joins it, at the lower end of the +island and right opposite Bogan’s camp. You know what those billabongs +are: dry gullies till the river rises from the Queensland rains and backs them +up till the water runs round into the river again and makes anabranches of +’em—places that you thought were hollows you’ll find above +water, and you can row over places you thought were hills. There’s no +water so treacherous and deceitful as you’ll find in some of those +billabongs. A man starts to ride across a place where he thinks the water is +just over the grass, and blunders into a deep channel—that wasn’t +there before—with a steady undercurrent with the whole weight of the +Darling River funnelled into it; and if he can’t swim and his horse +isn’t used to it—or sometimes if he can swim—it’s a +case with him, and the Darling River cod hold an inquest on him, if they have +time, before he’s buried deep in Darling River mud for ever. And somebody +advertises in the missing column for Jack Somebody who was last heard of in +Australia.” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind that, Mitchell, go on,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Campbell knew the river and saw that there was a stiff current +there, so he hailed Bogan. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Good day, Campbell,’ shouted Bogan. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I want you, Bogan,’ said Campbell. ‘Come across and +bring your horses.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I’m damned if I will,’ says Bogan. ‘I’m +not going to catch me death o’ cold to save your skin. If you want me +you’ll have to bloody well come and git me.’ Bogan was a good +strong swimmer, and he had good horses, but he didn’t try to get +away—I suppose he reckoned he’d have to face the music one time or +another—and one time is as good as another out back. +</p> + +<p> +“Campbell was no swimmer; he had no temptation to risk his life—you +see it wasn’t as in war with a lot of comrades watching ready to +advertise a man as a coward for staying alive—so he argued with Bogan and +tried to get him to listen to reason, and swore at him. ‘I’ll make +it damned hot for you, Bogan,’ he said, ‘if I have to come over for +you.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Two can play at that game,’ says Bogan. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Look here, Bogan,” said Campbell, ‘I’ll tell +you what I’ll do. If you give me your word that you’ll come up to +the police station to-morrow I’ll go back and say nothing about it. You +can say you didn’t know a warrant was out after you. It will be all the +better for you in the end. Better give me your word, man.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps Campbell knew Bogan better than any of us. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Now then, Bogan,’ he said, ‘don’t be a fool. +Give your word like a sensible man, and I’ll go back. I’ll give you +five minutes to make up your mind.’ And he took out his watch. +</p> + +<p> +“But Bogan was nasty and wouldn’t give his word, so there was +nothing for it but for Campbell to make a try for him. +</p> + +<p> +“Campbell had plenty of pluck, or obstinacy, which amounts to the same +thing. He put his carbine and revolver under a log, out of the rain that was +coming on, saw to his handcuffs, and then spurred his horse into the water. +Bogan lit his pipe with a stick from his camp-fire—so Campbell said +afterwards—and sat down on his heels and puffed away, and waited for him. +</p> + +<p> +“Just as Campbell’s horse floundered into the current Bogan shouted +to go back, but Campbell thought it was a threat and kept on. But Bogan had +caught sight of a log coming down the stream, end on, with a sharp, splintered +end, and before Campbell knew where he was, the sharp end of the log caught the +horse in the flank. The horse started to plunge and struggle sideways, with all +his legs, and Campbell got free of him as quick as he could. Now, you know, in +some of those Darling River reaches the current will seem to run steadily far a +while, and then come with a rush. (I was caught in one of those rushes once, +when I was in swimming, and would have been drowned if I hadn’t been born +to be hanged.) Well, a rush came along just as Campbell got free from his +horse, and he went down-stream one side of a snag and his horse the other. +Campbell’s pretty stout, you know, and his uniform was tight, and it +handicapped him. +</p> + +<p> +“Just as he was being washed past the lower end of the snag he caught +hold of a branch that stuck out of the water and held on. He swung round and +saw Bogan running down to the point opposite him. Now, you know there was +always a lot of low cunning about Bogan, and I suppose he reckoned that if he +pulled Campbell out he’d stand a good show of getting clear of his +trouble; anyway, if he didn’t save Campbell it might be said that he +killed him—besides, Bogan was a good swimmer, so there wasn’t any +heroism about it anyhow. Campbell was only a few feet from the bank, but Bogan +started to strip—to make the job look as big as possible, I suppose. He +shouted to Campbell to say he was coming, and to hold on. Campbell said +afterwards that Bogan seemed an hour undressing. The weight of the current was +forcing down the bough that Campbell was hanging on to, and suddenly, he said, +he felt a great feeling of helplessness take him by the shoulders. He yelled to +Bogan and let go. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, it happened that Jake Boreham and I were passing away the time +between shearings, and we were having a sort of fishing and shooting loaf down +the river in a boat arrangement that Jake had made out of boards and tarred +canvas. We called her the <i>Jolly Coffin</i>. We were just poking up the bank +in the slack water, a few hundred yards below the billabong, when Jake said, +‘Why, there’s a horse or something in the river.’ Then he +shouted, ‘No, by God, it’s a man,’ and we poked the +<i>Coffin</i> out into the stream for all she was worth. ‘Looks like two +men fighting in the water,’ Jake shouts presently. ‘Hurry up, or +they’ll drown each other.’ +</p> + +<p> +“We hailed ’em, and Bogan shouted for help. He was treading water +and holding Campbell up in front of him now in real professional style. As soon +as he heard us he threw up his arms and splashed a bit—I reckoned he was +trying to put as much style as he could into that rescue. But I caught a crab, +and, before we could get to them, they were washed past into the top of a tree +that stood well below flood-mark. I pulled the boat’s head round and let +her stern down between the branches. Bogan had one arm over a limb and was +holding Campbell with the other, and trying to lift him higher out of the +water. I noticed Bogan’s face was bleeding—there was a dead limb +stuck in the tree with nasty sharp points on it, and I reckoned he’d run +his face against one of them. Campbell was gasping like a codfish out of water, +and he was the whitest man I ever saw (except one, and <i>he’d</i> been +drowned for a week). Campbell had the sense to keep still. We asked Bogan if he +could hold on, and he said he could, but he couldn’t hold Campbell any +longer. So Jake took the oars and I leaned over the stern and caught hold of +Campbell, and Jake ran the boat into the bank, and we got him ashore; then we +went back for Bogan and landed him. +</p> + +<p> +“We had some whisky and soon brought Campbell round; but Bogan was +bleeding like a pig from a nasty cut over his good eye, so we bound wet +handkerchiefs round his eyes and led him to a log and he sat down for a while, +holding his hand to his eye and groaning. He kept saying, ‘I’m +blind, mates, I’m blind! I’ve lost me other eye!’ but we +didn’t dream it was so bad as that: we kept giving him whisky. We got +some dry boughs and made a big fire. Then Bogan stood up and held his arms +stiff down to his sides, opening and shutting his hands as if he was in great +pain. And I’ve often thought since what a different man Bogan seemed +without his clothes and with the broken bridge of his nose and his eyes covered +by the handkerchiefs. He was clean shaven, and his mouth and chin are his best +features, and he’s clean limbed and well hung. I often thought afterwards +that there was something of a blind god about him as he stood there naked by +the fire on the day he saved Campbell’s life—something that +reminded me of a statue I saw once in the Art Gallery. (Pity the world +isn’t blinder to a man’s worst points.) +</p> + +<p> +“Presently Jake listened and said, ‘By God, that’s +lucky!’ and we heard a steamer coming up-river and presently we saw her +coming round the point with a couple of wool-barges in tow. We got Bogan aboard +and got some clothes on him, and took him ashore at Bourke to the new hospital. +The doctors did all they knew, but Bogan was blind for life. He never saw +anything again—except ‘a sort of dull white blur,’ as he +called it—or his past life sometimes, I suppose. Perhaps he saw that for +the first time. Ah, well! +</p> + +<p> +“Bogan’s old enemy, Barcoo-Rot, went to see him in the hospital, +and Bogan said, ‘Well, Barcoo, I reckon we’ve had our last fight. I +owe you a hiding, but I don’t see how I’m going to pay you.’ +‘Never mind that, Bogan, old man,’ says Barcoo. ‘I’ll +take it from anyone yer likes to appoint, if that worries yer; and, look here, +Bogan, if I can’t fight you I can fight for you—and don’t you +forget it!’ And Barcoo used to lead Bogan round about town in his spare +time and tell him all that was going on; and I believe he always had an ear +cocked in case someone said a word against Bogan—as if any of the chaps +would say a word against a blind man. +</p> + +<p> +“Bogan’s case was hushed up. The police told us to fix it up the +best way we could. One of the jackaroos, who reckoned that Bogan had swindled +him, was a gentleman, and he was the first to throw a quid in the +Giraffe’s hat when it went round for Bogan, but the other jackaroo was a +cur: he said he wanted the money that Bogan had robbed him of. There were two +witnesses, but we sent ’em away, and Tom Hall, there, scared the +jackaroo. You know Tom was always the best hand we had at persuading witnesses +in Union cases to go home to see their mothers.” +</p> + +<p> +“How did you scare that jackaroo, Tom?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell you about it some other time,” said Tom. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Mitchell, “Bogan was always a good woolsorter, +so, next shearing, old Baldy Thompson—(you know Baldy Thompson, Harry, of +West-o’-Sunday Station)—Baldy had a talk with some of the chaps, +and took Bogan out in his buggy with him to West-o’-Sunday. Bogan would +sit at the end of the rolling tables, in the shearing-shed, with a boy to hand +him the fleeces, and he’d feel a fleece and tell the boy what bin to +throw it into; and by and by he began to learn to throw the fleeces into the +bins himself. And sometimes Baldy would have a sheep brought to him and get him +to feel the fleece and tell him the quality of it. And then again Baldy would +talk, just loud enough for Bogan to overhear, and swear that he’d sooner +have Bogan, blind as he was, than half a dozen scientific jackaroo experts with +all their eyes about them. +</p> + +<p> +“Of course Bogan wasn’t worth anything much to Baldy, but Baldy +gave him two pounds a week out of his own pocket, and another quid that we made +up between us; so he made enough to pull him through the rest of the year. +</p> + +<p> +“It was curious to see how soon he learned to find his way about the hut +and manage his tea and tucker. It was a rough shed, but everybody was eager to +steer Bogan about—and, in fact, two of them had a fight about it one day. +Baldy and all of us——and especially visitors when they +came—were mighty interested in Bogan; and I reckon we were rather proud +of having a blind wool-sorter. I reckon Bogan had thirty or forty pairs of eyes +watching out for him in case he’d run against something or fall. It +irritated him to be messed round too much—he said a baby would never +learn to walk if it was held all the time. He reckoned he’d learn more in +a year than a man who’d served a lifetime to blindness; but we +didn’t let him wander much—for fear he’d fall into the big +rocky waterhole there, by accident. +</p> + +<p> +“And after the shearing-season Bogan’s wife turned up in +Bourke——” +</p> + +<p> +“Bogan’s wife!” I exclaimed. “Why, I never knew Bogan +was married.” +</p> + +<p> +“Neither did anyone else,” said Mitchell. “But he was. +Perhaps that was what accounted for Bogan. Sometimes, in his sober moods, I +used to have an idea that there must have been something behind the Bogan to +account for him. Perhaps he got trapped—or got married and found out that +he’d made a mistake—which is about the worst thing a man can find +out——” +</p> + +<p> +“Except that his wife made the mistake, Mitchell,” said Tom Hall. +</p> + +<p> +“Or that both did,” reflected Mitchell. “Ah, +well!—never mind—Bogan had been married two or three years. Maybe +he got married when he was on the spree—I knew that he used to send money +to someone in Sydney and I suppose it was her. Anyway, she turned up after he +was blind. She was a hard-looking woman—just the sort that might have +kept a third-rate pub or a sly-grog shop. But you can’t judge between +husband and wife, unless you’ve lived in the same house with +them—and under the same roofs with their parents right back to Adam for +that matter. Anyway, she stuck to Bogan all right; she took a little two-roomed +cottage and made him comfortable—she’s got a sewing-machine and a +mangle and takes in washing and sewing. She brought a carrotty-headed youngster +with her, and the first time I saw Bogan sitting on the veranda with that +youngster on his knee I thought it was a good thing that he was blind.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Because the youngster isn’t his,” said Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +“How do you know that?” +</p> + +<p> +“By the look of it—and by the look on her face, once, when she +caught me squinting from the kid’s face to Bogan’s.” +</p> + +<p> +“And whose was it?” I asked, without thinking. +</p> + +<p> +“How am I to know?” said Mitchell. “It might be yours for all +I know—it’s ugly enough, and you never had any taste in women. But +you mustn’t speak of that in Bourke. But there’s another youngster +coming, and I’ll swear that’ll be Bogan’s all right. +</p> + +<p> +“A curious thing about Bogan is that he’s begun to be fidgety about +his personal appearance—and you know he wasn’t a dood. He wears a +collar now, and polishes his boots; he wears elastic-sides, and polishes +’em himself—the only thing is that he blackens over the elastic. He +can do many things for himself, and he’s proud of it. He says he can see +many things that he couldn’t see when he had his eyes. You seldom hear +him swear, save in a friendly way; he seems much gentler, but he reckons he +would stand a show with Barcoo-Rot even now, if Barcoo would stand up in front +of him and keep yelling——” +</p> + +<p> +“By the way,” I asked, “how did Bogan lose the sight of his +other eye?” +</p> + +<p> +“Sleeping out in the rain when he was drunk,” said Mitchell. +“He got a cold in his eye.” Then he asked, suddenly: +</p> + +<p> +“Did you ever see a blind man cry?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I have,” said Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +“You know Bogan wears goggles to hide his eyes—his wife made him do +that. The chaps often used to drop round and have a yarn with Bogan and cheer +him up, and one evening I was sitting smoking with him, and yarning about old +times, when he got very quiet all of a sudden, and I saw a tear drop from under +one of his shutters and roll down his cheek. It wasn’t the eye he lost +saving Campbell—it was the old wall-eye he used to use in the days before +he was called ‘One-eyed Bogan.’ I suppose he thought it was dark +and that I couldn’t see his face. (There’s a good many people in +this world who think you can’t see because they can’t.) It made me +feel like I used to feel sometimes in the days when I felt +things——” +</p> + +<p> +“Come on, Mitchell,” said Tom Hall, “you’ve had enough +beer.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think I have,” said Mitchell. “Besides, I promised to send +a wire to Jake Boreham to tell him that his mother’s dead. Jake’s +shearing at West-o’-Sunday; shearing won’t be over for three or +four weeks, and Jake wants an excuse to get away without offending old Baldy +and come down and have a fly round with us before the holidays are over.” +</p> + +<p> +Down at the telegraph-office Mitchell took a form and filled it in very +carefully: “Jacob Boreham. West-o’-Sunday Station. Bourke. Come +home at once. Mother is dead. In terrible trouble. Father dying.—MARY +BOREHAM.” +</p> + +<p> +“I think that will do,” said Mitchell. “It ought to satisfy +Baldy, and it won’t give Jake too much of a shock, because he +hasn’t got a sister or sister-in-law, and his father and mother’s +been dead over ten years.” +</p> + +<p> +“Now, if I was running a theatre,” said Mitchell, as we left the +office, “I’d give five pounds a night for the face Jake’ll +have on him when he takes that telegram to Baldy Thompson.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"></a> +TWO SUNDOWNERS</h2> + +<p> +Sheep stations in Australia are any distance from twenty to a hundred miles +apart, to keep well within the boundaries of truth and the great pastoral +country. Shearing at any one shed only lasts a few weeks in the year; the +number of men employed is according to the size of the shed—from three to +five men in the little bough-covered shed of the small “cockatoo,” +up to a hundred and fifty or two hundred hands all told in the big corrugated +iron machine shed of a pastoral company. +</p> + +<p> +Shearing starts early up in northern Queensland, where you can get a +“January shed;” and further south, in February, March or April +sheds, and so on down into New South Wales, where shearing often lasts over +Christmas. Shearers travel from shed to shed; some go a travel season without +getting a pen, and an unlucky shearer might ride or tramp for several seasons +and never get hands in wool; and all this explains the existence of the +“footman” with his swag and the horse man with his packhorse. They +have a rough life, and the Australian shearers are certainly the most +democratic and perhaps the most independent, intelligent and generous body of +workmen in the world. +</p> + +<p> +Shearers at a shed elect their own cook, pay him so much a head, and they buy +their rations in the lump from the station store; and “travellers,” +<i>i.e.</i> shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work, are invited, as a +matter of course, to sit down to the shearers’ table. Also a certain +allowance of tea, sugar, flour or meat is still made to travellers at most +Western station stores; so it would be rather surprising if there weren’t +some who travelled on the game. The swagman loafer, or “bummer,” +times himself, especially in bad weather, to arrive at the shed just about +sundown; he is then sure of “tea,” shelter for the night, +breakfast, and some tucker from the cook to take him on along the track. Brummy +and Swampy were sundowners. +</p> + +<p> +Swampy was a bummer born—and proud of it. Brummy had drifted down to +loaferdom, and his nature was soured and his spirit revengeful against the +world because of the memory of early years wasted at hard work and in being +honest. Both were short and stout, and both had scrubby beards, but +Brummy’s beard was a dusty black and Swampy’s fiery red—he +indulged in a monkey-shave sometimes, but his lower face was mostly like a +patch of coarse stubble with a dying hedge round it. They had travelled +together for a long time. They seemed at times to hate each other with a +murderous hatred, but they were too lazy to fight. Sometimes they’d tramp +side by side and growl at each other by the hour, other times they’d sulk +for days; one would push on ahead and the other drop behind until there was a +mile or two between them; but one always carried the billy, or the sugar, or +something that was necessary to the comfort of the other, so they’d come +together at sundown. They had travelled together a long time, and perhaps that +was why they hated each other. They often agreed to part and take different +tracks, and sometimes they parted—for a while. They agreed in cadging, +and cadged in turn. They carried a spare set of tucker-bags, and if, for +instance, they were out of sugar and had plenty flour and tea, Brummy or Swampy +would go to the store, boundary-rider’s hut, or selector’s, with +the sugar-bag in his hand and the other bags in his shirt front on spec. +He’d get the sugar first, and then, if it looked good enough, the +flour-bag would come out, then the tea-bag. And before he left he’d +remark casually that he and his mate hadn’t had a smoke for two days. +They never missed a chance. And when they’d cadged more tucker than they +could comfortably carry, they’d camp for a day or two and eat it down. +Sometimes they’d have as much as a pound of tobacco, all in little +“borrowed” bits, cut from the sticks or cakes of honest travellers. +They never missed a chance. If a stranger gave Swampy his cake of tobacco with +instructions to “cut off a pipeful,” Swampy would cut off as much +as he thought judicious, talking to the stranger and watching his eye all the +time, and hiding his palm as much as possible—and sometimes, when he knew +he’d cut off more than he could cram into his pipe, he’d put his +hand in his pocket for the pipe and drop some of the tobacco there. Then +he’d hand the plug to his mate, engage the stranger in conversation and +try to hold his eye or detract his attention from Brummy so as to give Brummy a +chance of cutting off a couple of pipefuls, and, maybe, nicking off a corner of +the cake and slipping it into his pocket. I once heard a bushman say that no +one but a skunk would be guilty of this tobacco trick—that it is about +the meanest trick a man could be capable of—<i>because it spoils the +chances of the next hard-up swaggy who asks the victim for tobacco.</i> +</p> + +<p> +When Brummy and Swampy came to a shed where shearing was in full swing, +they’d inquire, first thing, and with some show of anxiety, if there was +any chance of gettin’ on; if the shed was full-handed they’d growl +about hard times, wonder what the country was coming to; talk of their missuses +and kids that they’d left in Sydney, curse the squatters and the +Government, and, next morning, get a supply of rations from the cook and depart +with looks of gloom. If, on the other hand, there was room in the shed for one +or both of them, and the boss told them to go to work in the morning, +they’d keep it quiet from the cook if possible, and depart, after +breakfast, unostentatiously. +</p> + +<p> +Sometimes, at the beginning of a drought, when the tall dead grass was like +tinder for hundreds of miles and a carelessly-dropped match would set the whole +country on fire, Swampy would strike a hard-faced squatter, manager or overseer +with a cold eye, and the conversation would be somewhat as follows: +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Good day, boss!” +</p> + +<p> +Boss (shortly): “’Day.” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Any chance of a job?” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Naw. Got all I want and we don’t start for a +fortnight.” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Can I git a bit o’ meat?” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Naw! Don’t kill till Saturday.” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Pint o’ flour?” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Naw. Short ourselves.” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Bit o’ tea or sugar, boss?” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Naw—what next?” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Bit o’ baccer, boss. Ain’t had a smoke for a +week.” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Naw. Ain’t got enough for meself till the wagon comes +out.” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Ah, well! It’s hot, ain’t it, boss?” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Yes-it’s hot.” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Country very dry?” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Yes. Looks like it.” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “A fire ’ud be very bad just now?” +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Eh?” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Yes. Now I’m allers very careful with matches an’ +fire when I’m on the track.” +</p> + +<p> +Boss “Are yer?” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Yes. I never lights a fire near the grass—allers in the +middle of the track—it’s the safest place yer can get. An’ I +allers puts the fire out afore I leaves the camp. If there ain’t no water +ter spare I covers the ashes with dirt. An’ some fellers are so careless +with matches lightin’ their pipes.” (Reflective pause.) +</p> + +<p> +Boss: “Are they?” +</p> + +<p> +Swampy: “Yes. Now, when I lights me pipe on the track in dry weather I +allers rubs the match head up an’ drops it in the dust. I never drops a +burnin’ match. But some travellers is so careless. A chap might light his +pipe an’ fling the match away without thinkin’ an’ the match +might fall in a dry tuft, an’-there yer are!” (with a wave of his +arms). “Hundreds of miles o’ grass gone an’ thousands +o’ sheep starvin’. Some fellers is so careless—they never +thinks.... An’ what’s more, they don’t care if they burn the +whole country.” +</p> + +<p> +Boss (scratching his head reflectively): “Ah-umph! You can go up to the +store and get a bit of tucker. The storekeeper might let yer have a bit +o’ tobacco.” +</p> + +<p> +On one occasion, when they were out of flour and meat; Brummy and Swampy came +across two other pilgrims camped on a creek, who were also out of flour and +meat. One of them had tried a surveyors’ camp a little further down, but +without success. The surveyors’ cook had said that he was short of flour +and meat himself. Brummy tried him—no luck. Then Swampy said he’d +go and have a try. As luck would have it, the surveyors’ cook was just +going to bake; he had got the flour out in the dish, put in the salt and baking +powder, mixed it up, and had gone to the creek for a billy of water when Swampy +arrived. While the cook was gone Swampy slipped the flour out of the dish into +his bag, <i>wiped</i> the dish, set it down again, and planted the bag behind a +tree at a little distance. Then he stood waiting, holding a spare empty bag in +his hand. When the cook came back he glanced at the dish, lowered the billy of +water slowly to the ground, scratched his head, and looked at the dish again in +a puzzled way. +</p> + +<p> +“Blanked if I didn’t think I got that flour out!” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s that, mate?” asked Swampy. +</p> + +<p> +“Why! I could have sworn I got the flour out in the dish and mixed it +before I went for the water,” said the cook, staring at the dish again. +“It’s rum what tricks your memory plays on you sometimes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Swampy, showing interest, while the cook got some more +flour out into the dish from a bag in the back of the tent. “It is +strange. I’ve done the same, thing meself. I suppose it’s the heat +that makes us all a bit off at times.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you cook, then?” asked the surveyors’ cook. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, yes. I’ve done a good bit of it in me time; but it’s +about played out. I’m after stragglers now.” (Stragglers are stray +sheep missed in the general muster and found about the out paddocks and shorn +after the general shearing.) +</p> + +<p> +They had a yarn and Swampy “bit the cook’s ear” for a +“bit o’ meat an’ tea an’ sugar,” not forgetting +“a handful of flour if yer can spare it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Sorry,” said the cook, “but I can only let you have about a +pint. We’re very short ourselves.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that’s all right!” said Swampy, as he put the stuff into +his spare bags. “Thank you! Good day!” +</p> + +<p> +“Good day,” said the cook. The cook went on with his work and +Swampy departed, catching up the bag of flour from behind the tree as he passed +it, and keeping the clump of timber well between him and the surveyors’ +camp, lest the cook should glance round, and, noticing the increased bulk of +his load, get some new ideas concerning mental aberration. +</p> + +<p> +Nearly every bushman has at least one superstition, or notion, that lasts his +time—as nearly every bushman has at least one dictionary word which lasts +him all his life. Brummy had a gloomy notion—Lord knows how he got +it!—that he should ’a’ gone on the boards if his people +hadn’t been so ignorant. He reckoned that he had the face and cut of an +actor, could mimic any man’s voice, and had wonderful control over his +features. They came to a notoriously “hungry” station, where there +was a Scottish manager and storekeeper. Brummy went up to “government +house” in his own proper person, had a talk with the storekeeper, spoke +of a sick mate, and got some flour and meat. They camped down the creek, and +next morning Brummy started to shave himself. +</p> + +<p> +“Whatever are you a-doin’ of, Brummy?” gasped Swampy in great +astonishment. +</p> + +<p> +“Wait and see,” growled Brummy, with awful impressiveness, as if he +were going to cut Swampy’s throat after he’d finished shaving. He +shaved off his beard and whiskers, put on a hat and coat belonging to Swampy, +changed his voice, dropped his shoulders, and went limping up to the station on +a game leg. He saw the cook and got some “brownie,” a bit of cooked +meat and a packet of baking powder. Then he saw the storekeeper and approached +the tobacco question. Sandy looked at him and listened with some slight show of +interest, then he said: +</p> + +<p> +“Oh that’s all right now! But ye needn’t ha’ troublt +shavin’ yer beard—the cold weather’s comin’ on! +An’ yer mate’s duds don’t suit ye—they’re too +sma’; an’ yer game leg doesn’t fit ye either—it takes a +lot o’ practice. Ha’ ye got ony tea an’ sugar?” +</p> + +<p> +Brummy must have touched something responsive in that old Scot somewhere, but +his lack of emotion upset Brummy somewhat, or else an old deep-rooted +superstition had been severely shaken. Anyway he let Swampy do the cadging for +several days thereafter. +</p> + +<p> +But one bad season they were very hard up indeed—even for Brummy and +Swampy. They’d tramped a long hungry track and had only met a few +wretched jackaroos, driven out of the cities by hard times, and tramping +hopelessly west. They were out of tobacco, and their trousers were so +hopelessly “gone” behind that when they went to cadge at a place +where there was a woman they were moved to back and sidle and edge away +again—and neither Brummy nor Swampy was over fastidious in matters of +dress or personal appearance. It was absolutely necessary to earn a pound or +two, so they decided to go to work for a couple of weeks. It wouldn’t +hurt them, and then there was the novelty of it. +</p> + +<p> +They struck West-o’-Sunday Station, and the boss happened to want a +rouseabout to pick up wool and sweep the floor for the shearers. +</p> + +<p> +“I can put <i>one</i> of you on,” he said. “Fix it up between +yourselves and go to work in the morning.” +</p> + +<p> +Brummy and Swampy went apart to talk it over. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here! Brum, old man,” said Swampy, with great heartiness, +“we’ve been mates for a long while now, an’ shared an’ +shared alike. You’ve allers acted straight to me an’ I want to do +the fair thing by you. <i>I</i> don’t want to stand in <i>your</i> light. +You take the job an’ I’ll be satisfied with a pair of pants out of +it and a bit o’ tobacco now an’ agen. There yer are! I can’t +say no fairer than that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Brummy, resentfully, “an’ you’ll +always be thrown’ it up to me afterwards that I done you out of a +job!” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll swear I won’t,” said Swampy, hurriedly. +“But since you’re so blasted touchy and suspicious about it, +<i>you</i> take this job an’ I’ll take the next that turns up. +How’ll that suit you?” +</p> + +<p> +Brummy thought resentfully. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here!” he said presently, “let’s settle it and +have done with this damned sentimental tommy-rot. I’ll tell you what +I’ll do—I’ll give you the job and take my chance. The boss +might want another man to-morrow. Now, are you satisfied?” +</p> + +<p> +But Swampy didn’t look grateful or happy. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” growled Brummy, “of all the —— I ever +travelled with you’re the ——. What do you want anyway? +What’ll satisfy you? That’s all I want to know. +Hey?—can’t yer speak?” +</p> + +<p> +“Let’s toss up for it,” said Swampy, sulkily. +</p> + +<p> +“All right,” said Brummy, with a big oath, and he felt in his +pocket for two old pennies he had. But Swampy had got a suspicion somehow that +one of those pennies had two heads on it, and he wasn’t sure that the +other hadn’t two tails—also, he suspected Brummy of some skill in +“palming,” so he picked up a chip from the wood-heap, spat on it, +and spun it into the air. “Sing out!” he cried, “wet or +dry?” +</p> + +<p> +“Dry,” said Brummy, promptly. He had a theory that the wet side of +the chip, being presumably heaviest, was more likely to fall downwards; but +this time it was “wet” up three times in succession. Brummy ignored +Swampy’s hand thrown out in hearty congratulation; and next morning he +went to work in the shed. Swampy camped down the river, and Brummy supplied him +with a cheap pair of moleskin trousers, tucker and tobacco. The shed cut out +within three weeks and the two sundowners took the track again, Brummy with two +pounds odd in his pocket—he having negotiated his cheque at the shed. +</p> + +<p> +But now there was suspicion, envy, and distrust in the hearts of those two +wayfarers. Brummy was now a bloated capitalist, and proud, and anxious to get +rid of Swampy—at least Swampy thought so. He thought that the least that +Brummy might have done was to have shared the “stuff” with him. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Brummy,” he said reproachfully, “we’ve +shared and shared alike, and——” +</p> + +<p> +“We never shared money,” said Brummy, decidedly. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you think I want yer blasted money?” retorted Swampy, +indignantly. “When did I ever ask yer for a sprat? Tell me that!” +</p> + +<p> +“You wouldn’t have got it if you had asked,” said Brummy, +uncompromisingly. “Look here!” with vehemence. “Didn’t +I keep yer in tobacco and buy yer gory pants? What are you naggin’ about +anyway?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Swampy, “all I was goin’ to say was that +yer might let me carry one of them quids in case you lost one—yer know +you’re careless and lose things; or in case anything happened to +you.” +</p> + +<p> +“I ain’t going to lose it—if that’s all that’s +fretting you,” said Brummy, “and there ain’t nothing going to +happen to me—and don’t you forget it.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all the thanks I get for givin’ yer my gory +job,” said Swampy, savagely. “I won’t be sick a soft fool +agen, I can tell yer.” +</p> + +<p> +Brummy was silent, and Swampy dropped behind. He brooded darkly, and it’s +a bad thing for a man to brood in the bush. He was reg’lar disgusted with +Brummy. He’d allers acted straight to him, and Brummy had acted like a +“cow.” He’d stand it no longer; but he’d have some +satisfaction. He wouldn’t be a fool. If Brummy was mean skunk enough to +act to a mate like that, Swampy would be even with him; he would wait till +Brummy was asleep, collar the stuff, and clear. It was his job, anyway, and the +money was his by rights. He’d have his rights. +</p> + +<p> +Brummy, who carried the billy, gave Swampy a long tramp before he camped and +made a fire. They had tea in silence, and smoked moodily apart until Brummy +turned in. They usually slept on the ground, with a few leaves under them, or +on the sand where there was any, each wrapped in his own blankets, and with +their spare clothes, or rags rather, for pillows. Presently Swampy turned in +and pretended to sleep, but he lay awake watching, and listening to +Brummy’s breathing. When he thought it was safe he moved cautiously and +slipped his hand under Brummy’s head, but Brummy’s old +pocket-book—in which he carried some dirty old letters in a woman’s +handwriting—was not there. All next day Swampy watched Brummy sharply +every time he put his hands into his pockets, to try and find out in which +pocket he kept his money. Brummy seemed very cheerful and sociable, even +considerate, to his mate all day, and Swampy pretended to be happy. They yarned +more than they had done for many a day. Brummy was a heavy sleeper, and that +night Swampy went over him carefully and felt all his pockets, but without +success. Next day Brummy seemed in high spirits—they were nearing Bourke, +where they intended to loaf round the pubs for a week or two. On the third +night Swampy waited till about midnight, and then searched Brummy, every inch +of him he could get at, and tickled him, with a straw of grass till he turned +over, and ran his hands over the other side of him, and over his feet (Brummy +slept with his socks on), and looked in his boots, and in the billy and in the +tucker-bags, and felt in every tuft of grass round the camp, and under every +bush, and down a hollow stump, and up a hollow log: but there was no +pocket-book. Brummy couldn’t have lost the money and kept it +dark—he’d have gone back to look for it at once. Perhaps he’d +thrown away the book and sewn the money in his clothes somewhere. Swampy crept +back to him and felt the lining of his hat, and was running his hand over +Brummy’s chest when Brummy suddenly started to snore, and Swampy desisted +without loss of time. He crept back to bed, breathing short, and thought hard. +It struck him that there was something aggressive about that snore. He began to +suspect that Brummy was up to his little game, and it pained him. +</p> + +<p> +Next morning Brummy was decidedly frivolous. At any other time Swampy would +have put it down to a “touch o’ the sun,” but now he felt a +growing conviction that Brummy knew what he’d been up to the last three +nights, and the more he thought of it the more it pained him—till at last +he could stand it no longer. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Brummy,” he said frankly, “where the hell do you +keep that flamin’ stuff o’ yourn? I been tryin’ to git at it +ever since we left West-o’-Sunday.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know you have, Swampy,” said Brummy, affectionately—as if +he considered that Swampy had done his best in the interests of mateship. +</p> + +<p> +“I <i>knowed</i> yer knowed!” exclaimed Swampy, triumphantly. +“But where the blazes did yer put it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Under <i>your</i> head, Swampy, old man,” said Brummy, cheerfully. +</p> + +<p> +Swampy was hurt now. He commented in the language that used to be used by the +bullock-punchers of the good days as they pranced up and down by their teams +and lammed into the bullocks with saplings and crow-bars, and called on them to +lift a heavy load out of a bog in the bed of a muddy creek. +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind, Swampy!” said Brummy, soothingly, as his mate paused +and tried to remember worse oaths. “It wasn’t your fault.” +</p> + +<p> +But they parted at Bourke. Swampy had allers acted straight ter +Brummy—share ’n’ share alike. He’d do as much for a +mate as any other man, an’ put up with as much from a mate. He had put up +with a lot from Brummy: he’d picked him up on the track and learned him +all he knowed; Brummy would have starved many a time if it hadn’t been +for Swampy; Swampy had learned him how to “battle.” He’d +stick to Brummy yet, but he couldn’t stand ingratitude. He hated low +cunnin’ an’ suspicion, and when a gory mate got suspicious of his +own old mate and wouldn’t trust him, an’ took to plantin’ his +crimson money—it was time to leave him. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"></a> +A SKETCH OF MATESHIP</h2> + +<p> +Bill and Jim, professional shearers, were coming into Bourke from the +Queensland side. They were horsemen and had two packhorses. At the last camp +before Bourke Jim’s packhorse got disgusted and home-sick during the +night and started back for the place where he was foaled. Jim was little more +than a new-chum jackaroo; he was no bushman and generally got lost when he went +down the next gully. Bill was a bushman, so it was decided that he should go +back to look for the horse. +</p> + +<p> +Now Bill was going to sell his packhorse, a well-bred mare, in Bourke, and he +was anxious to get her into the yards before the horse sales were over; this +was to be the last day of the sales. Jim was the best “barracker” +of the two; he had great imagination; he was a very entertaining story-teller +and conversationalist in social life, and a glib and a most impressive liar in +business, so it was decided that he should hurry on into Bourke with the mare +and sell her for Bill. Seven pounds, reserve. +</p> + +<p> +Next day Bill turned up with the missing horse and saw Jim standing against a +veranda-post of the Carriers’ Arms, with his hat down over his eyes, and +thoughtfully spitting in the dust. Bill rode over to him. +</p> + +<p> +“’Ullo, Jim.” +</p> + +<p> +“’Ullo, Bill. I see you got him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I got him.” +</p> + +<p> +Pause. +</p> + +<p> +“Where’d yer find him?” +</p> + +<p> +“’Bout ten mile back. Near Ford’s Bridge. He was just +feedin’ along.” +</p> + +<p> +Pause. Jim shifted his feet and spat in the dust. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Bill at last. “How did you get on, Jim?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, all right,” said Jim. “I sold the mare.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s right,” said Bill. “How much did she +fetch?” +</p> + +<p> +“Eight quid;” then, rousing himself a little and showing some +emotion, “An’ I could ’a’ got ten quid for her if I +hadn’t been a dam’ fool.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, that’s good enough,” said Bill. +</p> + +<p> +“I could ’a’ got ten quid if I’d ’a’ +waited.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, it’s no use cryin’. Eight quid is good enough. Did you +get the stuff?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes. They parted all right. If I hadn’t been such a dam’ +fool an’ rushed it, there was a feller that would ’a’ given +ten quid for that mare.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, don’t break yer back about it,” said Bill. +“Eight is good enough.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. But I could ’a’ got ten,” said Jim, languidly, +putting his hand in his pocket. +</p> + +<p> +Pause. Bill sat waiting for him to hand over the money; but Jim withdrew his +hand empty, stretched, and said: +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, well, Bill, I done it in. Lend us a couple o’ notes.” +</p> + +<p> +Jim had been drinking and gambling all night and he’d lost the eight +pounds as well as his own money. +</p> + +<p> +Bill didn’t explode. What was the use? He should have known that Jim +wasn’t to be trusted with money in town. It was he who had been the fool. +He sighed and lent Jim a pound, and they went in to have a drink. +</p> + +<p> +Now it strikes me that if this had happened in a civilized country (like +England) Bill would have had Jim arrested and jailed for larceny as a bailee, +or embezzlement, or whatever it was. And would Bill or Jim or the world have +been any better for it? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"></a> +ON THE TUCKER TRACK: A STEELMAN STORY</h2> + +<p> +Steelman and Smith, professional wanderers from New Zealand, took a run over to +Australia one year to have a look at the country, and drifted out back, and +played cards and “headin’ ’em” at the shearing-sheds +(while pretending to be strangers to each other), and sold eye-water and +unpatented medicine, and worked the tucker tracks. They struck a streak of bad +luck at West-o’-Sunday Station, where they were advised (by the boss and +about fifty excited shearers) to go east, and not to stop till they reached the +coast. They were tramping along the track towards Bourke; they were very hard +up and had to “battle” for tucker and tobacco along the track. They +came to a lonely shanty, about two camps west of Bourke. +</p> + +<p> +“We’ll turn off into the scrub and strike the track the other side +of the shanty and come back to it,” said Steelman. “You see, if +they see us coming into Bourke they’ll say to themselves, ‘Oh, +we’re never likely to see these chaps again,’ and they won’t +give us anything, or, perhaps, only a pinch of tea or sugar in a big lump of +paper. There’s some women that can never see a tucker-bag, even if you +hold it right under their noses. But if they see us going out back +they’ll reckon that we’ll get a shed likely as not, and we’ll +be sure to call there with our cheques coming back. I hope the old man’s +got the lumbago, or sciatica, or something.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” asked Smith. +</p> + +<p> +“Because whenever I see an old man poking round the place on a stick I +always make for him straight and inquire about his trouble; and no matter what +complaint he’s got, my old man suffered from it for years. It’s +pretty hard graft listening to an old man with a pet leg, but I find it pays; +and I always finish up by advising him to try St Jacob’s oil. Perhaps +he’s been trying it for years, but that doesn’t matter; the +consultation works out all right all the same, and there’s never been a +remedy tried yet but I’ve got another. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve got a lot of Maori and blackfellow remedies in my mind, and +when they fail I can fall back on the Chinese; and if that isn’t enough +I’ve got a list of my grandmother’s remedies that she wrote down +for me when I was leaving home, and I kept it for a curiosity. It took her +three days to write them, and I reckon they’ll fill the bill. +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t want a shave. You look better with that stubble on. You +needn’t say anything; just stand by and wear your usual expression, and +if they ask me what’s the matter with my mate I’ll fix up a disease +for you to have, and get something extra on your account, poor beggar! +</p> + +<p> +“I wish we had a chap with us that could sing a bit and run the gamut on +a fiddle or something. With a sickly-looking fish like you to stand by and look +interesting and die slowly of consumption all the time, and me to do the +talking, we’d be able to travel from one end of the bush to the other and +live on the fat of the land. I wouldn’t cure you for a hundred +pounds:” +</p> + +<p> +They reached the shanty, and there, sure enough, was an old man pottering round +with a list to starboard. He was working with a hoe inside a low paling fence +round a sort of garden. Steelman and Smith stopped outside the fence. +</p> + +<p> +“Good day, boss!” +</p> + +<p> +“’Day.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s hot.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s hot.” +</p> + +<p> +So far it was satisfactory. +</p> + +<p> +He was a little man, with a wiry, red beard. He might have been a Scandinavian. +</p> + +<p> +“You seem to be a bit lame,” said Steelman. “Hurt your +foot?” +</p> + +<p> +“Naw,” said the old man. “It’s an old thing.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ah!” said Steelman, “lumbago, I suppose? My father suffered +cruel from it for years.” +</p> + +<p> +“Naw,” said the old man, moving closer to the fence. “It +ain’t in me back; the trouble’s with me leg.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!” said Steelman. “One a bit shorter than the +other?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, yes. It seems to be wearin’ a bit shorter. I must see to +it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Hip disease, perhaps?” said Steelman. “A brother o’ +mine had——” +</p> + +<p> +“Naw, it’s not in the hip,” said the old man. “My +leg’s gone at the knee.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh! stiff joint; I know what that is. Had a touch of it once myself. An +uncle of mine was nearly crippled with it. He used to use St Jacob’s oil. +Ever try St Jacob’s oil?” +</p> + +<p> +“Naw,” said the old man, “not that I know of. I’ve used +linseed oil though.” +</p> + +<p> +“Linseed oil!” said Steelman; “I’ve never heard of that +for stiff knee. How do you use it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Use it raw,” said the old man. “Raw linseed oil; I’ve +rubbed it in, and I’ve soaked me leg in it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Soaked your leg in it!” said Steelman. “And did it do it any +good?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, it seems to preserve it—keeps it from warping, and it wears +better—and it makes it heavier. It seemed a bit too light before.” +</p> + +<p> +Steelman nudged Smith under cover of the palings. The old man was evidently a +bit ratty. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I hope your leg will soon be all right, boss,” said +Steelman. +</p> + +<p> +“Thank you,” said the old man, “but I don’t think +there’s much hope. I suppose you want some tucker?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, yes,” said Steelman, rather taken aback by the old +man’s sudden way of putting it. “We’re hard up.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, come along to the house and I’ll see if I can get yer +something,” said the old man; and they walked along outside the fence, +and he hobbled along inside, till he came to a little gate at the corner. He +opened the gate and stumped out. He had a wooden leg. He wore his trouser-leg +down over it, and the palings had hidden the bottom from Steelman and Smith. +</p> + +<p> +He wanted them to stay to dinner, but Steelman didn’t feel comfortable, +and thanked him, and said they’d rather be getting on (Steelman always +spoke for Smith); so the old man gave them some cooked meat, bread, and a +supply of tea and sugar. Steelman watched his face very close, but he never +moved a muscle. But when they looked back he was leaning on his hoe, and seemed +to be shaking. +</p> + +<p> +“Took you back a bit, Steely, didn’t it?” suggested Smith. +</p> + +<p> +“How do you make that out?” snorted Steelman, turning on him +suddenly. “I knew a carpenter who used to soak his planes in raw linseed +oil to preserve them and give them weight. There’s nothing funny about +that.” +</p> + +<p> +Smith rubbed his head. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"></a> +A BUSH PUBLICAN’S LAMENT</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +“... For thirst is long and throats is short<br/> +Among the sons o’ men.”<br/> + M. J. C. +</p> + +<p> +I wish I was spifflicated before I ever seen a pub! +</p> + +<p> +You see, it’s this way. Suppose a cove comes along on a blazin’ hot +day in the drought—an’ <i>you</i> ought to know how hell-hot it can +be out here—an’ he dumps his swag in the corner of the bar; +an’ he turns round an’ he ses ter me, “Look here boss, I +ain’t got a lonely steever on me, an’ God knows when I’ll git +one. I’ve tramped ten mile this mornin’, an’ I’ll have +ter tramp another ten afore to-night. I’m expectin’ ter git on +shearin’ with of Baldy Thompson at West-o’-Sunday nex’ week. +I got a thirst on me like a sun-struck bone, an’, for God sake, put up a +couple o’ beers for me an’ my mate, an’ I’ll fix it up +with yer when I come back after shearin’.” +</p> + +<p> +An’ what’s a feller ter do? I bin there meself, an—I put it +to you! I’ve known what it is to have a thirst on me. +</p> + +<p> +An’ suppose a poor devil comes along in the jim-jams, with every inch on +him jumpin’ an’ a look in his eyes like a man bein’ murdered +an’ sent ter hell, an’ a whine in his voice like a whipped cur, +an’ the snakes a-chasing of him; an’ he hooks me with his finger +ter the far end o’ the bar—as if he was goin’ ter tell me +that the world was ended—an’ he hangs over the bar an’ chews +me lug, an’ tries to speak, an’ breaks off inter a sort o’ +low shriek, like a terrified woman, an’ he says, “For Mother +o’ Christ’s sake, giv’ me a drink!” An’ what am I +to do? I bin there meself. I knows what the horrors is. He mighter blued his +cheque at the last shanty. But what am I ter do? I put it ter you. If I let him +go he might hang hisself ter the nex’ leanin’ tree. +</p> + +<p> +What’s a drink? yer might arst—I don’t mind a drink or two; +but when it comes to half a dozen in a day it mounts up, I can tell yer. Drinks +is sixpence here—I have to pay for it, an’ pay carriage on it. +It’s all up ter me in the end. I used sometimes ter think it was lucky I +wasn’t west o’ the sixpenny line, where I’d lose a +shillin’ on every drink I give away. +</p> + +<p> +An’ supposen a sundowner comes along smokin’ tea-leaves, an’ +ses ter me, “Look her, boss! me an’ my mate ain’t had a smoke +for three days!” What’s a man ter do? I put it ter you! I’m a +heavy smoker meself, an’ I’ve known what it is to be without a +smoke on the track. But “nail-rod” is ninepence a stick out here, +an’ I have ter pay carriage. It all mounts up, I can tell yer. +</p> + +<p> +An’ supposen Ole King Billy an’ his ole black gin comes round at +holiday time and squats on the verander, an’ blarneys an’ wheedles +and whines and argues like a hundred Jews an’ ole Irishwomen put +tergether, an’ accuses me o’ takin’ his blarsted country from +him, an’ makes me an’ the missus laugh; an’ we gives him a +bottl’er rum an’ a bag of grub ter get rid of him an’ his +rotten ole scarecrow tribe—It all tells up. I was allers soft on the +blacks, an’, beside, a ole gin nursed me an’ me mother when I was +born, an’ saved me blessed life—not that that mounts to much. But +it all tells up, an’ I got me licence ter pay. An’ some bloody +skunk goes an’ informs on me for supplyin’ the haboriginalls with +intossicatin’ liquor, an’ I have ter pay a fine an’ risk me +licence. But what’s a man ter do? +</p> + +<p> +An’ three or four herrin’-gutted jackaroos comes along about +dinner-time, when the table’s set and the cookin’ smellin’ +from the kichen, with their belts done up three holes, an’ not the price +of a feed on ’em. What’s a man ter do? I’ve known what it is +ter do a perish on the track meself. It’s not the tucker I think on. I +don’t care a damn for that. When the shearers come every one is free to +go inter the kitchin an’ forage for hisself when he feels hungry—so +long as he pays for his drink. But the jackaroos can’t pay for drinks, +an’ I have ter pay carriage on the flour an’ tea an’ sugar +an’ groceries—an’ it all tells up by the end o’ the +year. +</p> + +<p> +An’ a straight chap that knows me gets a job to take a flock o’ +sheep or a mob o’ cattle ter the bloomin’ Gulf, or South Australia, +or somewheers—an’ loses one of his horses goin’ out ter take +charge, an’ borrers eight quid from me ter buy another. He’ll turn +up agen in a year or two an’ most likely want ter make me take twenty +quid for that eight—an’ make everybody about the place blind +drunk—but I’ve got ter wait, an’ the wine an’ sperit +merchants an’ the brewery won’t. They know I can’t do without +liquor in the place. +</p> + +<p> +An’ lars’ rains Jimmy Nowlett, the bullick-driver, gets bogged over +his axle-trees back there on the Blacksoil Plains between two flooded +billerbongs, an’ prays till the country steams an’ his soul’s +busted, an’ his throat like a lime-kiln. He taps a keg o’ rum or +beer ter keep his throat in workin’ order. I don’t mind that at +all, but him an’ his mates git flood-bound for near a week, an’ +broach more kegs, an’ go on a howlin’ spree in ther mud, an’ +spill mor’n they swipe, an’ leave a tarpaulin off a load, an’ +the flour gets wet, an’ the sugar runs out of the bags like syrup, +an’— What’s a feller ter do? Do yer expect me to set the law +onter Jimmy? I’ve knowed him all my life, an’ he knowed my father +afore I was born. He’s been on the roads this forty year, till he’s +as thin as a rat, and as poor as a myall black; an’ he’s got a +family ter keep back there in Bourke. No, I have ter pay for it in the end, +an’ it all mounts up, I can tell yer. +</p> + +<p> +An’ suppose some poor devil of a new-chum black sheep comes along, +staggerin’ from one side of the track to the other, and spoutin’ +poetry; dyin’ o’ heat or fever, or heartbreak an’ +home-sickness, or a life o’ disserpation he’d led in England, +an’ without a sprat on him, an’ no claim on the bush; an’ I +ketches him in me arms as he stumbles inter the bar, an’ he wants me ter +hold him up while he turns English inter Greek for me. An’ I put him ter +bed, an’ he gits worse, an’ I have ter send the buggy twenty mile +for a doctor—an’ pay him. An’ the jackaroo gits worse, +an’ has ter be watched an’ nursed an’ held down sometimes; +an’ he raves about his home an’ mother in England, an’ the +blarsted University that he was eddicated at—an’ a +woman—an’ somethin’ that sounds like poetry in French; +an’ he upsets my missus a lot, an’ makes her blubber. An’ he +dies, an’ I have ter pay a man ter bury him (an’ knock up a sort +o’ fence round the grave arterwards ter keep the stock out), an’ +send the buggy agen for a parson, an’—Well, what’s a man ter +do? I couldn’t let him wander away an’ die like a dog in the scrub, +an’ be shoved underground like a dog, too, if his body was ever found. +The Government might pay ter bury him, but there ain’t never been a +pauper funeral from my house yet, an’ there won’t be one if I can +help it—except it be meself. +</p> + +<p> +An’ then there’s the bother goin’ through his papers to try +an’ find out who he was an’ where his friends is. An’ I have +ter get the missus to write a letter to his people, an’ we have ter make +up lies about how he died ter make it easier for ’em. An’ +goin’ through his letters, the missus comes across a portrait an’ a +locket of hair, an’ letters from his mother an’ sisters an’ +girl; an’ they upset her, an’ she blubbers agin, an’ gits +sentimental—like she useter long ago when we was first married. +</p> + +<p> +There was one bit of poetry—I forgit it now—that that there +jackaroo kep’ sayin’ over an’ over agen till it buzzed in me +head; an’, weeks after, I’d ketch the missus mutterin’ it to +herself in the kitchen till I thought she was goin’ ratty. +</p> + +<p> +An’ we gets a letter from the jackaroo’s friends that puts us to a +lot more bother. I hate havin’ anythin’ to do with letters. +An’ someone’s sure to say he was lambed down an’ cleaned out +an’ poisoned with bad bush liquor at my place. It’s almost enough +ter make a man wish there <i>was</i> a recorin’ angel. +</p> + +<p> +An’ what’s the end of it? I got the blazin’ bailiff in the +place now! I can’t shot him out because he’s a decent, hard-up, +poor devil from Bourke, with consumption or somethin’, an’ +he’s been talkin’ to the missus about his missus an’ kids; +an’ I see no chance of gittin’ rid of him, unless the shearers come +along with their cheques from West-o’-Sunday nex’ week and act +straight by me. Like as not I’ll have ter roll up me swag an’ take +the track meself in the end. They say publicans are damned, an’ I think +so, too; an’ I wish I’d bin operated on before ever I seen a pub. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"></a> +THE SHEARER’S DREAM</h2> + +<p> +Mitchell and I rolled up our swags after New Year and started to tramp west. It +had been a very bad season after a long drought. Old Baldy Thompson had only +shorn a few bales of grass-seed and burrs, so he said, and thought of taking +the track himself; but we hoped to get on shearing stragglers at +West-o’-Sunday or one of the stations of the Hungerford track. +</p> + +<p> +It was very hot weather, so we started after sunset, intending to travel all +night. We crossed the big billabong, and were ploughing through the dust and +sand towards West Bourke, when a buggy full of city girls and swells passed by. +They were part of a theatrical company on tour in the Back-Blocks, and some +local Johnnies. They’d been driven out to see an artesian bore, or +wool-shed, or something. The horses swerved, and jerked a little squawk out of +one of the girls. Then another said: +</p> + +<p> +“Ow-w! Two old swaggies. He! he! he!” +</p> + +<p> +I glanced at Mitchell to see if he was hit, and caught his head down; but he +pulled himself up and pretended to hitch his swag into an easier position. +</p> + +<p> +About a hundred yards further on he gave me a side look and said: +</p> + +<p> +“Did that touch you, Harry” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” I said, and I laughed. +</p> + +<p> +“You see,” reflected Mitchell, “they’re more to be +pitied than blamed. It’s their ignorance. In the first place, we’re +not two old tramps, as they think. We are professional shearers; and the +Australian shearers are about the most independent and intelligent class of men +in the world. We’ve got more genius in one of our little fingers than +there is in the whole of that wagonette-load of diddle-daddle and fiddle-faddle +and giggles. Their intellects are on a level with the rotten dramas they travel +with, and their lives about as false. They are slaves to the public, and their +home is the pub-parlour, with sickly, senseless Johnnies to shout suppers and +drink for them and lend their men money. If one of those girls is above the +average, how she must despise those Johnnies—and the life! She must feel +a greater contempt for them than the private-barmaid does for the boozer she +cleans out. He gets his drink and some enjoyment, anyhow. And how she must +loathe the life she leads! And what’s the end of it as often as not? I +remember once, when I was a boy, I was walking out with two aunts of +mine—they’re both dead now. God rest their fussy, innocent old +souls!—and one of ’em said suddenly, ‘Look! Quick, Jack! +There’s Maggie So-and-So, the great actress.’ And I looked and saw +a woman training vines in a porch. It seemed like seeing an angel to me, and I +never forgot her as she was then. The diggers used to go miles out of town to +meet the coach that brought her, and take the horses out and drag it in, and +throw gold in her lap, and worship her. +</p> + +<p> +“The last time I was in Sydney I saw her sitting in the back parlour of a +third-rate pub. She was dying of dropsy and couldn’t move from her chair. +She showed me a portrait of herself as I remembered her, and talked quite +seriously about going on the stage again. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, our home is about two thousand miles wide, and the world’s +our stage. If the worst comes to the worst we can always get tucker and wood +and water for nothing. If we’re camping at a job in a tent there’s +no house-cleaning to bother us. All we’ve got to do when the camp gets +too dirty is to shift the tent to a fresh place. We’ve got time to think +and—we’re free. +</p> + +<p> +“But then, agen,” he reflected, “there’s the +world’s point of view to be considered. Some day I might be flashing past +in a buggy or saloon-carriage—or, the chances are it will be +you—and you might look out the window and see an old swaggy tramping +along in the dust, or camped under a strip of calico in the rain in the scrub. +(And it might be me—old Mitchell—that really wrote your books, only +the world won’t know it.) And then you’ll realize what a wretched, +miserable life it was. We never realize the miseries of life till we look +back—the mistakes and miseries that had to be and couldn’t be +helped. It’s all luck—luck and chance.” +</p> + +<p> +But those girls seemed to have gravelled Mitchell, and he didn’t seem +able to talk himself round. He tramped on, brooding for a while, and then +suddenly he said: +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Harry! Those girls are giving a dance to-night, and if I +liked to go back to Bourke and tog up and go to the dance I could pick out the +prettiest, dance with her all the evening, and take her for a stroll +afterwards, old tramp as they thought me. I’ve lived—but it +wouldn’t be worth my while now.” +</p> + +<p> +I’d seen Jack in a mood like this before, and thought it best to say +nothing. Perhaps the terrible heat had affected him a little. We walked on in +silence until we came to the next billabong. “Best boil the billy here, +Harry,” said Mitchell, “and have some tea before we go any +further.” +</p> + +<p> +I got some sticks together and made a fire and put the billy on. The country +looked wretched—like the ghost of a burnt-out land—in the +moonlight. The banks of the creek were like ashes, the thin, gnarled gum-bush +seemed dry-rotting fast, and in many places the surface of the ground was +cracked in squares where it had shrunk in the drought. In the bed of the creek +was a narrow gutter of water that looked like bad milk. +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell sat on his swag, with his pint of tea on the ground by his foot, and +chewed his pipe. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s up, Jack?” I asked. “Have you got the +blues?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, yes, Harry,” he said. “I’m generally dull the +first day on the track. The first day is generally the worst, anywhere or +anytime—except, perhaps, when you’re married.... I got—well, +I got thinking of the time when a woman’s word could have hurt me.” +</p> + +<p> +Just then one of the “travellers” who were camped a bit up the +creek suddenly commenced to sing. It was a song called “The +Shearer’s Dream,” and I suppose the buggy of girls, or the +conversation they started, reminded him of it. He started his verses and most +of his lines with a howl; and there were unexpected howls all through the song, +and it wailed off, just as unexpectedly, in places where there was no pathos +that I could see: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Oh, I dreamt I shore in a shearer’s shed, and it was a dream of joy,<br/> +For every one of the rouseabouts was a girl dressed up as a boy—<br/> +Dressed up like a page in a pantomime, and the prettiest ever seen—<br/> +They had flaxen hair, they had coal-black hair—and every shade between. +</p> + +<p> +“Every” with sudden and great energy, a long drop on to +“shade,” and a wail of intense sadness and regret running on into +“between,” the dirge reaching its wailsomest in the +“tween” in every case. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +The shed was cooled by electric fans that was over every “shoot”;<br/> +The pens was of polished ma-ho-gany, and ev’rything else to suit;<br/> +The huts was fixed with spring-mattresses, and the tucker was simply grand,<br/> +And every night by the biller-bong we darnced to a German band.<br/> +<br/> +“<i>Chorus, boys!”</i><br/> +<br/> +There was short, plump girls, there was tall, slim girls, and the handsomest +ever seen<br/> +They was four-foot-five, they was six-foot high, and hevery size between.<br/> +<br/> +Our pay was the wool on the jumbucks’ backs, so we shore till all was +blue<br/> +The sheep was washed afore they was shore (and the rams was scented too);<br/> +And we all of us cried when the shed cut out, in spite of the long, hot +days,<br/> +For hevery hour them girls waltzed in with whisky and beer on tr-a-a-a-ys!<br/> +<br/> +“<i>Chorus</i>! <i>you</i> ——!”<br/> +<br/> +They had kind grey eyes, they had coal-black eyes, and the grandest ever +seen<br/> +They had plump pink hands, they had slim white hands, and hevery shape +be-tw-e-e-n.<br/> +<br/> +There was three of them girls to every chap, and as jealous as they could +be— +</p> + +<p> +“Ow! you ——” +</p> + +<p> +The singer’s voice or memory seemed suddenly to have failed him at this +point, but whether his mates hit him on the back of the head with a tomahawk, +or only choked him, I do not know. Mitchell was inclined to think, from the +sound of it, that they choked him. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"></a> +THE LOST SOULS’ HOTEL</h2> + +<p> +Hunqerford Road, February. One hundred and thirty miles of heavy reddish sand, +bordered by dry, hot scrubs. Dense cloud of hot dust. Four wool-teams passing +through a gate in a “rabbit proof” fence which crosses the road. +Clock, clock, clock of wheels and rattle and clink of chains, crack of whips +and explosions of Australian language. Bales and everything else coated with +dust. Stink of old axle-grease and tarpaulins. Tyres hot enough to fry chops +on: bows and chains so hot that it’s a wonder they do not burn through +the bullock’s hides. Water lukewarm in blistered kegs slung behind the +wagons. Bullocks dragging along as only bullocks do. Wheels ploughing through +the deep sand, and the load lurching from side to side. Half-way on a +“dry-stretch” of seventeen miles. Big “tank” full of +good water through the scrub to the right, but it is a private tank and a +boundary-rider is shepherding it. Mulga scrub and sparse, spiky undergrowth. +</p> + +<p> +The carriers camp for dinner and boil their billies while the bullocks droop +under their yokes in the blazing heat; one or two lie down and the leaders drag +and twist themselves round under a dead tree, under the impression that there +is shade there. The carriers look like Red Indians, with the masks of red dust +“bound” with sweat on their faces, but there is an +unhealthy-looking, whitish space round their eyes, caused by wiping away the +blinding dust, sweat, and flies. The dry sticks burn with a pale flame and an +almost invisible thin pale blue smoke. The sun’s heat dancing and +dazzling across every white fence-post, sandhill, or light-coloured object in +the distance. +</p> + +<p> +One man takes off his boot and sock, empties half a pint of sand out of them, +and pulls up his trouser-leg. His leg is sheathed to the knee in dust and +sweat; he absently scrapes it with his knife, and presently he amuses himself +by moistening a strip with his forefinger and shaving it, as if he were vaguely +curious to see if he is still a white man. +</p> + +<p> +The Hungerford coach ploughs past in a dense cloud of dust. +</p> + +<p> +The teams drag on again like a “wounded snake that dies at +sundown,” if a wounded snake that dies at sundown could revive +sufficiently next morning to drag on again until another sun goes down. +</p> + +<p> +Hopeless-looking swagmen are met with during the afternoon, and one +carrier—he of the sanded leg—lends them tobacco; his mates +contribute “bits o’” tea, flour, and sugar. +</p> + +<p> +Sundown and the bullocks done up. The teamsters unyoke them and drive them on +to the next water—five miles—having previously sent a mate to +reconnoitre and see that boundary-rider is not round, otherwise, to make terms +with him, for it is a squatter’s bore. They hurry the bullocks down to +the water and back in the twilight, and then, under cover of darkness, turn +them into a clearing in the scrub off the road, where a sign in the grass might +be seen—if you look close. But the “bullockies” are better +off than the horse-teamsters, for bad chaff is sold by the pound and corn is +worth its weight in gold. +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell and I turned off the track at the rabbit-proof fence and made for the +tank in the mulga. We boiled the billy and had some salt mutton and damper. We +were making back for Bourke, having failed to get a cut in any of the sheds on +the Hungerford track. We sat under a clump of mulga saplings, with our backs to +the trunks, and got out our pipes. Usually, when the flies were very bad on the +track, we had to keep twigs or wild-turkey=tail feathers going in front of our +faces the whole time to keep the mad flies out of our eyes; and, when we +camped, one would keep the feather going while the other lit his +pipe—then the smoke would keep them away. But the flies weren’t so +bad in a good shade or in a darkened hut. Mitchell’s pipe would have +smoked out Old Nick; it was an ancient string-bound meerschaum, and strong +enough to kill a blackfellow. I had one smoke out of it, once when I felt bad +in my inside and wanted to be sick, and the result was very satisfactory. +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell looked through his old pocket-book—more by force of habit than +anything else—and turned up a circular from Tattersall’s. And that +reminded him. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know what I’d do, Harry,” he said, “if I won +Tattersall’s big sweep, or was to come into fifty or a hundred thousand +pounds, or, better still, a million?” +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing I suppose,” I said, “except to get away to Sydney or +some cooler place than this.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll tell you what I’d do,” said Mitchell, talking +round his pipe. “I’d build a Swagman’s Rest right +here.” +</p> + +<p> +“A Swagman’s Rest?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. Right here on this very God-forsaken spot. I’d build a +Swagman’s Rest and call it the Lost Souls’ Hotel, or the +Sundowners’ Arms, or the Half-way House to ——, or some such +name that would take the bushmen’s fancy. I’d have it built on the +best plans for coolness in a hot country; bricks, and plenty of wide verandas +with brick floors, and balconies, and shingles, in the old Australian style. I +wouldn’t have a sheet of corrugated iron about the place. And I’d +have old-fashioned hinged sashes with small panes and vines round ’em; +they look cooler and more homely and romantic than the glaring sort that shove +up. +</p> + +<p> +“And I’d dig a tank or reservoir for surface water as big as a +lake, and bore for artesian water—and get it, too, if I had to bore right +through to England; and I’d irrigate the ground and make it grow +horse-feed and fruit, and vegetables too, if I had to cart manure from Bourke. +And every teamster’s bullock or horse, and every shearer’s hack, +could burst itself free, but I’d make travelling stock pay—for it +belongs to the squatters and capitalists. All carriers could camp for one night +only. And I’d—no, I wouldn’t have any flowers; they might +remind some heart-broken, new-chum black sheep of the house where he was born, +and the mother whose heart he broke—and the father whose grey hairs he +brought down in sorrow to the grave—and break him up altogether.” +</p> + +<p> +“But what about the old-fashioned windows and the vines?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh!” said Mitchell, “I forgot them. On second thought, I +think I would have some flowers; and maybe a bit of ivy-green. The new chum +might be trying to work out his own salvation, and the sight of the roses and +ivy would show him that he hadn’t struck such a God-forgotten country +after all, and help strengthen the hope for something better that’s in +the heart of every vagabond till he dies.” +</p> + +<p> +Puff, puff, puff, slowly and reflectively. +</p> + +<p> +“Until he dies,” repeated Mitchell. “And, maybe,” he +said, rousing himself, “I’d have a little room fixed up like a +corner of a swell restaurant, with silver and napkins on the table, and +I’d fix up a waiter, so that when a broken-down University wreck came +along he might feel, for an hour or so, something like the man he used to be. +But I suppose,” Mitchell reflected, “he wouldn’t feel +completely his old self without a lady friend sitting opposite to him. I might +fix up a black gin for him, but I suppose he’d draw the colour line. But +that’s nonsense. +</p> + +<p> +“All teamsters and travellers could camp there for one night only. +I’d have shower-baths; but I wouldn’t force any man to have a bath +against his will. They could sit down to a table and have a feed off a +table-cloth, and sleep in sheets, and feel like they did before their old +mothers died, or before they ran away from home.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who? The mothers?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, in some cases,” said Mitchell. “And I’d have a +nice, cool little summer-house down near the artificial lake, out of earshot of +the house, where the bullock-drivers could sit with their pipes after tea, and +tell yarns, and talk in their own language. And I’d have boats on the +lake, too, in case an old Oxford or Cambridge man, or an old sailor came +along—it might put years on to his life to have a pull at the oars. You +remember that old sailor we saw in charge of the engine back there at the +government tank? You saw how he had the engine?—clean and bright as a new +pin—everything spick-and-span and shipshape, and his hut fixed up like a +ship’s cabin. I believe he thinks he’s at sea half his time, and +shoving her through it, instead of pumping muddy water out of a hole in the +baking scrubs for starving stock. Or maybe he reckons he’s keeping her +afloat.” +</p> + +<p> +“And would you have fish in this lake of yours?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes,” said Mitchell, “and any ratty old shepherd or +sundowner, that’s gone mad of heat and loneliness—like the old +codger we met back yonder—he could sit by the lagoon in the cool of the +evening and fish to his heart’s content with a string and a bent pin, and +dream he’s playing truant from school and fishing in the brook near his +native village in England about fifty years ago. It would seem more real than +fishing in the dust as some mad old bushmen do.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you’d draw the line somewhere?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Mitchell, “not even at poets. I’d try to +cure them, too, with good wholesome food and plenty of physical exercise. The +Lost Souls’ Hotel would be a refuge for men who’d been jail-birds +once as well as men who were gentlemen once, and for physical wrecks and ruined +drunkards as well as healthy honest shearers. I’d sit down and talk to +the boozer or felon just as if I thought he was as good a man as me—and +he might be, for that matter—God knows. +</p> + +<p> +“The sick man would be kept till he recovered, or died; and the boozer, +suffering from a recovery, I’d keep him till he was on his legs +again.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then you’d have to have a doctor,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Mitchell, “I’d fix that up all right. I +wouldn’t bother much about a respectable medical practitioner from the +city. I’d get a medical wreck who had a brilliant career before him once +in England and got into disgrace, and cleared out to the colonies—a man +who knows what the d.t.’s is—a man who’s been through it all +and knows it all.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then you’d want a manager, or a clerk or secretary,” I +suggested. +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose I would,” said Mitchell. “I’ve got no head +for figures. I suppose I’d have to advertise for him. If an applicant +came with the highest testimonials of character, and especially if one was +signed by a parson, I’d tell him to call again next week; and if a young +man could prove that he came of a good Christian family, and went to church +regularly, and sang in the choir, and taught Sunday-school, I’d tell him +that he needn’t come again, that the vacancy was filled, for I +couldn’t trust, him. The man who’s been extra religious and honest +and hard-working in his young days is most likely to go wrong afterwards. +I’d sooner trust some poor old devil of a clerk who’d got into the +hands of a woman or racing men when he was young, and went wrong, and served +his time for embezzlement; anyway, I’d take him out and give him another +chance.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what about woman’s influence?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I suppose there’d have to be a woman, if only to keep the +doctor on the line. I’d get a woman with a past, one that hadn’t +been any better than she should have been, they’re generally the most +kind-hearted in the end. Say an actress who’d come down in the world, or +an old opera-singer who’d lost her voice but could still sing a little. A +woman who knows what trouble is. And I’d get a girl to keep her company, +a sort of housemaid, with a couple of black gins or half-castes to help her. +I’d get hold of some poor girl who’d been deceived and deserted: +and a baby or two wouldn’t be an objection—the kids would amuse the +chaps and help humanize the place.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what if the manageress fell in love with the doctor?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I couldn’t provide against love,” said Mitchell. +“I fell in love myself more than once—and I don’t suppose +I’d have been any worse off if I’d have stayed in love. Ah, well! +But suppose she did fall in love with the doctor and marry him, or suppose she +fell in love with him and didn’t marry him, for that matter—and +suppose the girl fell in love with the secretary? There wouldn’t be any +harm done; it would only make them more contented with the home and bind them +to it. They’d be a happy family, and the Lost Souls’ Hotel would be +more cheerful and homelike than ever.” +</p> + +<p> +“But supposing they all fell in love with each other and cleared +out,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t see what they’d have to clear out for,” said +Mitchell. “But suppose they did. There’s more than one medical +wreck in Australia, and more than one woman with a past, and more than one +broken old clerk who went wrong and was found out, and who steadied down in +jail, and there’s more than one poor girl that’s been deceived. I +could easily replace ’em. And the Lost Souls’ Hotel might be the +means of patching up many wrecked lives in that way—giving people with +pasts the chance of another future, so to speak.” +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose you’d have music and books and pictures?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes,” said Mitchell. “But I wouldn’t have any +bitter or sex-problem books. They do no good. Problems have been the curse of +the world ever since it started. I think one noble, kindly, cheerful character +in a book does more good than all the clever villains or romantic adventurers +ever invented. And I think a man ought to get rid of his maudlin sentiment in +private, or when he’s drunk. It’s a pity that every writer +couldn’t put all his bitterness into one book and then burn it. +</p> + +<p> +“No; I’d have good cheerful books of the best and brightest sides +of human nature—Charles Dickens, and Mark Twain, and Bret Harte, and +those men. And I’d have all Australian pictures—showing the +brightest and best side of Australian life. And I’d have all Australian +songs. I wouldn’t have ‘Swannie Ribber,’ or ‘Home, +Sweet Home,’ or ‘Annie Laurie,’ or any of those old songs +sung at the Lost Souls’ Hotel—they’re the cause of more +heartbreaks and drink and suicide in the bush than anything else. And if a +jackaroo got up to sing, ‘Just before the battle, mother,’ or, +‘Mother bit me in me sleep,’ he’d find it was just before the +battle all right. He’d have to go out and sleep in the scrub, where the +mosquitoes and bulldog ants would bite him out of his sleep. I hate the man +who’s always whining about his mother through his nose, because, as a +rule, he never cared a rap for his old mother, nor for anyone else, except his +own paltry, selfish little self. +</p> + +<p> +“I’d have intellectual and elevating conversation for those +that——” +</p> + +<p> +“Who’d take charge of that department?” I inquired hurriedly. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” reflected Mitchell, “I did have an idea of taking it +on myself for a while anyway; but, come to think of it, the doctor or the woman +with the past would have more experience; and I could look after that part of +the business at a pinch. Of course you’re not in a position to judge as +to my ability in the intellectual line; you see, I’ve had no one to +practise on since I’ve been with you. But no matter—— +There’d be intellectual conversation for the benefit of black-sheep new +chums. And any broken-down actors that came along could get up a play if they +liked—it would brighten up things and help elevate the bullock-drivers +and sundowners. I’d have a stage fixed up and a bit of scenery. I’d +do all I could to attract shearers to the place after shearing, and keep them +from rushing to the next shanty with their cheques, or down to Sydney, to be +cleaned out by barmaids. +</p> + +<p> +“And I’d have the hero squashed in the last act for a selfish +sneak, and marry the girl to the villain—he’d be more likely to +make her happy in the end.” +</p> + +<p> +“And what about the farm?” I asked. “I suppose you’d +get some expert from the agricultural college to manage that?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Mitchell. “I’d get some poor drought-ruined +selector and put him in charge of the vegetation. Only, the worst of it +is,” he reflected, “if you take a selector who has bullocked all +his life to raise crops on dusty, stony patches in the scrubs, and put him on +land where there’s plenty of water and manure, and where he’s only +got to throw the seed on the ground and then light his pipe and watch it grow, +he’s apt to get disheartened. But that’s human nature. +</p> + +<p> +“And, of course, I’d have to have a ‘character’ about +the place—a sort of identity and joker to brighten up things. I +wouldn’t get a man who’d been happy and comfortable all his life; +I’d get hold of some old codger whose wife had nagged him till she died, +and who’d been sold off many times, and run in for drowning his sorrows, +and who started as an undertaker and failed at that, and finally got a job +pottering round—gardener, or gatekeeper, or something—in a lunatic +asylum. I’d get him. He’d most likely be a humorist and a +philosopher, and he’d help cheer up the Lost Souls’ Hotel. I reckon +the lost souls would get very fond of him.” +</p> + +<p> +“And would you have drink at Lost Souls’?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Mitchell. “I’d have the best beer and +spirits and wine to be had. After tea I’d let every man have just enough +to make him feel comfortable and happy, and as good and clever, and innocent +and honest as any other man, but no more. But if a poor devil came along in the +horrors, with every inch of him jumping, and snakes, and green-eyed yahoos, and +flaming-nosed bunyips chasing him, we’d take him in and give him soothing +draughts, and nurse him, and watch him, and clear him out with purgatives, and +keep giving him nips of good whisky, and, above all, we’d sympathize with +him, and tell him that we were worse than he was many a time. We wouldn’t +tell him what a weak, selfish man he was, or harp on his ruined life. +We’d try to make him out a good deal better morally than he really was. +It’s remorse that hurries most men to hell—especially in the Bush. +When a man firmly believes he is a hopeless case, then there’s no hope +for him: but let him have doubts and there’s a chance. Make him believe +that there are far worse cases than his. We wouldn’t preach the sin of +dissipation to him, no—but we’d try to show him the <i>folly</i> of +a wasted life. I ought to be able to preach that, God knows. +</p> + +<p> +“And, above all, we’d try to drive out of his head the cursed old +popular idea that it’s hard to reform—that a man’s got to +fight a hard battle with himself to get away from drink—pity drunkards +can’t believe how easy it is. And we’d put it to him straight +whether his few hours’ enjoyment were worth the days he had to suffer +hell for it.” +</p> + +<p> +“And, likely as not,” I said, “when you’d put him on +his feet he’d take the nearest track to the next shanty, and go on a +howling spree, and come back to Lost Souls’ in a week, raving aid worse +than ever. What would you do then?” +</p> + +<p> +“We’d take him in again, and build him up some more; and a third or +fourth time if necessary. I believe in going right on with a thing once I take +it in hand. And if he didn’t turn up after the last spree we’d look +for him up the scrub and bring him in and let him die on a bed, and make his +death as comfortable as possible. I’ve seen one man die on the ground, +and found one dead in the bush. We’d bury him under a gum and put +‘Sacred to the Memory of a Man who Died. (Let him R.I.P.)’ over +him. I’d have a nice little graveyard, with gums for tombstones—and +I’d have some original epitaphs—I promise you.” +</p> + +<p> +“And how much gratitude would you expect to get out of the Lost +Souls’ Hotel?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“None,” said Mitchell, promptly. “It wouldn’t be a +Gratitude Discovery Syndicate. People might say that the Lost Souls’ +Hotel was a den for kidnapping women and girls to be used as decoys for the +purpose of hocussing and robbing bushmen, and the law and retribution might +come after me—but I’d fight the thing out. Or they might want to +make a K.C.M.G., or a god of me, and worship me before they hung me. I reckon a +philanthropist or reformer is lucky if he escapes with a whole skin in the end, +let alone his character— But there!— Talking of gratitude: +it’s the fear of ingratitude that keeps thousands from doing good. +It’s just as paltry and selfish and cowardly as any other fear that +curses the world—it’s rather more selfish than most fears, in +fact—take the fear of being thought a coward, or being considered +eccentric, or conceited, or affected, or too good, or too bad, for instance. +The man that’s always canting about the world’s ingratitude has no +gratitude owing to him as a rule—generally the reverse—he ought to +be grateful to the world for being let live. He broods over the world’s +ingratitude until he gets to be a cynic. He sees the world like the outside of +a window, as it were, with the blind drawn and the dead, cold moonlight shining +on it, and he passes on with a sour face; whereas, if he took the trouble to +step inside he’d most likely find a room full of ruddy firelight, and +sympathy and cheerfulness, and kindness, and love, and gratitude. Sometimes, +when he’s right down on his uppers, and forced to go amongst people and +hustle for bread, he gets a lot of surprises at the amount of kindness he keeps +running against in the world—and in places where he’d never have +expected to find it. But—ah, well! I’m getting maudlin.” +</p> + +<p> +“And you’ve forgot all about the Lost Souls’ Hotel,” I +said. +</p> + +<p> +“No, I haven’t,” said Mitchell; “I’d fix that up +all right. As soon as I’d got things going smoothly under a man I could +trust, I’d tie up every penny I had for the benefit of the concern; get +some ‘white men’ for trustees, and take the track again. I’m +getting too old to stay long in one place—(I’m a lost soul that +always got along better in another place). I’m so used to the track that +if I was shut up in a house I’d get walking up and down in my room of +nights and disturb the folk; and, besides, I’d feel lost and +light-shouldered without the swag.” +</p> + +<p> +“So you’d put all your money in the concern?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes—except a pound or two to go on the track with—for, who +knows, I might come along there, dusty and tired, and ragged and hard up and +old, some day, and be very glad of a night’s rest at the Lost +Souls’ Hotel. But I wouldn’t let on that I was old Mitchell, the +millionaire, who founded Lost Souls’. They might be too officious, and I +hate fuss.... But it’s time to take the track, Harry.” +</p> + +<p> +There came a cool breeze with sunset; we stood up stiffly, shouldered our swags +and tucker-bags, and pushed on, for we had to make the next water before we +camped. We were out of tobacco, so we borrowed some from one of the +bullock-drivers. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"></a> +THE BOOZERS’ HOME</h2> + +<p> +“A dipsomaniac,” said Mitchell, “needs sympathy and +commonsense treatment. (Sympathy’s a grand and glorious thing, taking it +all round and looking at it any way you will: a little of it makes a man think +that the world’s a good world after all, and there’s room and hope +for sinners, and that life’s worth living; enough of it makes him sure of +it: and an overdose of sympathy makes a man <i>feel</i> weak and ashamed of +himself, and so moves him to stop whining—and wining—and buck up.) +</p> + +<p> +“Now, I’m not taking the case of a workman who goes on the spree on +pay night and sweats the drink out of himself at work next day, nor a slum-bred +brute who guzzles for the love of it; but a man with brains, who drinks to +drown his intellect or his memory. He’s generally a man under it all, and +a sensitive, generous, gentle man with finer feelings as often as not. The best +and cleverest and whitest men in the world seem to take to drink mostly. +It’s an awful pity. Perhaps it’s because they’re straight and +the world’s crooked and they can see things too plain. And I suppose in +the bush the loneliness and the thoughts of the girl-world they left behind +help to sink ’em. +</p> + +<p> +“Now a drunkard seldom reforms at home, because he’s always +surrounded by the signs of the ruin and misery he has brought on the home; and +the sight and thought of it sets him off again before he’s had time to +recover from the last spree. Then, again, the noblest wife in the world mostly +goes the wrong way to work with a drunken husband—nearly everything she +does is calculated to irritate him. If, for instance, he brings a bottle home +from the pub, it shows that he wants to stay at home and not go back to the pub +any more; but the first thing the wife does is to get hold of the bottle and +plant it, or smash it before his eyes, and that maddens him in the state he is +in then. +</p> + +<p> +“No. A dipsomaniac needs to be taken away from home for a while. I knew a +man that got so bad that the way he acted at home one night frightened him, and +next morning he went into an inebriate home of his own accord—to a place +where his friends had been trying to get him for a year past. For the first day +or two he was nearly dead with remorse and shame—mostly shame; and he +didn’t know what they were going to do to him next—and he only +wanted them to kill him quick and be done with it. He reckons he felt as bad as +if he was in jail. But there were ten other patients there, and one or two were +worse than he was, and that comforted him a lot. They compared notes and +sympathized and helped each other. They discovered that all their wives were +noble women. He struck one or two surprises too—one of the patients was a +doctor who’d attended him one time, and another was an old boss of his, +and they got very chummy. And there was a man there who was standing for +Parliament—he was supposed to be having a rest down the coast.... Yes, my +old mate felt very bad for the first day or two; it was all Yes, Nurse, and +Thank you, Nurse, and Yes, Doctor, and No, Doctor, and Thank you, Doctor. But, +inside a week, he was calling the doctor ‘Ol’ Pill-Box’ +behind his back, and making love to one of the nurses. +</p> + +<p> +“But he said it was pitiful when women relatives came to visit patients +the first morning. It shook the patients up a lot, but I reckon it did +’em good. There were well-bred old lady mothers in black, and +hard-working, haggard wives and loving daughters—and the expressions of +sympathy and faith and hope in those women’s faces! My old mate said it +was enough in itself to make a man swear off drink for ever.... Ah, +God—what a world it is! +</p> + +<p> +“Reminds me how I once went with the wife of another old mate of mine to +see him. He was in a lunatic asylum. It was about the worst hour I ever had in +my life, and I’ve had some bad ones. The way she tried to coax him back +to his old self. She thought she could do it when all the doctors had failed. +But I’ll tell you about him some other time. +</p> + +<p> +“The old mate said that the principal part of the treatment was supposed +to be injection of bi-chloride of gold or something, and it was supposed to be +a secret. It might have been water and sugar for all he knew, and he thought it +was. You see, when patients got better they were allowed out, two by two, on +their honour—one to watch the other—and it worked. But it was +necessary to have an extra hold on them; so they were told that if they were a +minute late for ‘treatment,’ or missed one injection, all the good +would be undone. This was dinged into their ears all the time. Same as many +things are done in the Catholic religion—to hold the people. My old mate +said that, as far as the medical treatment was concerned, he could do all that +was necessary himself. But it was the sympathy that counted, especially the +sympathy between the patients themselves. They always got hold of a new patient +and talked to him and cheered him up; he nearly always came in thinking he was +the most miserable wretch in this world. And it comforts a man and strengthens +him and makes him happier to meet another man who’s worse off or sicker, +or has been worse swindled than he has been. That’s human nature.... And +a man will take draughts from a nurse and eat for her when he wouldn’t do +it for his own wife—not even though she had been a trained nurse herself. +And if a patient took a bad turn in the night at the Boozers’ Home and +got up to hunt the snakes out of his room, he wouldn’t be sworn at, or +laughed at, or held down; no, they’d help him shoo the snakes out and +comfort him. My old mate said that, when he got better, one of the new patients +reckoned that he licked St Pathrick at managing snakes. And when he came out he +didn’t feel a bit ashamed of his experience. The institution didn’t +profess to cure anyone of drink, only to mend up shattered nerves and build up +wrecked constitutions; give them back some will-power if they weren’t too +far gone. And they set my old mate on his feet all right. When he went in his +life seemed lost, he had the horror of being sober, he couldn’t start the +day without a drink or do any business without it. He couldn’t live for +more than two hours without a drink; but when he came out he didn’t feel +as if he wanted it. He reckoned that those six weeks in the institution were +the happiest he’d ever spent in his life, and he wished the time had been +longer; he says he’d never met with so much sympathy and genius, and +humour and human nature under one roof before. And he said it was nice and +novel to be looked after and watched and physicked and bossed by a pretty nurse +in uniform—but I don’t suppose he told his wife that. And when he +came out he never took the trouble to hide the fact that he’d been in. If +any of his friends had a drunkard in the family, he’d recommend the +institution and do his best to get him into it. But when he came out he firmly +believed that if he took one drink he’d be a lost man. He made a mania of +that. One curious effect was that, for some time after he left the institution, +he’d sometimes feel suddenly in high spirits—with nothing to +account for it—something like he used to feel when he had half a dozen +whiskies in him; then suddenly he’d feel depressed and sort of +hopeless—with nothing to account for that either—just as if he was +suffering a recovery. But those moods never lasted long and he soon grew out of +them altogether. He didn’t flee temptation. He’d knock round the +pubs on Saturday nights with his old mates, but never drank anything but soft +stuff—he was always careful to smell his glass for fear of an accident or +trick. He drank gallons of ginger beer, milk-and-soda, and lemonade; and he got +very fond of sweets, too—he’d never liked them before. He said he +enjoyed the novelty of the whole thing and his mates amused him at first; but +he found he had to leave them early in the evening, and, after a while, he +dropped them altogether. They seemed such fools when they were drunk +(they’d never seemed fools to him before). And, besides, as they got +full, they’d get suspicious of him, and then mad at him, because he +couldn’t see things as they could. That reminds me that it nearly breaks +a man’s heart when his old drinking chum turns +teetotaller—it’s worse than if he got married or died. When two +mates meet and one is drunk and the other sober there is only one of two things +for them to do if they want to hit it together—either the drunken mate +must get sober or the sober mate drunk. And that reminds me: Take the case of +two old mates who’ve been together all their lives, say they always had +their regular sprees together and went through the same stages of drunkenness +together, and suffered their recoveries and sobered up together, and each could +stand about the same quantity of drink and one never got drunker than the +other. Each, when he’s boozing, reckons his mate the cleverest man and +the hardest case in the world—second to himself. But one day it happens, +by a most extraordinary combination of circumstances, that Bill, being sober, +meets Jim very drunk, and pretty soon Bill is the most disgusted man in this +world. He never would have dreamed that his old mate could make such a fool and +such a public spectacle of himself. And Bill’s disgust intensifies all +the time he is helping Jim home, and Jim arguing with him and wanting to fight +him, and slobbering over him and wanting to love him by turns, until Bill +swears he’ll give Jim a hammering as soon as ever he’s able to +stand steady on his feet.” +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose your old boozing mate’s wife was very happy when he +reformed,” I said to Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, no,” said Mitchell, rubbing his head rather ruefully. +“I suppose it was an exceptional case. But I knew her well, and the fact +is that she got more discontented and thinner, and complained and nagged him +worse than she’d ever done in his drinking days. And she’d never +been afraid of him. Perhaps it was this way: She loved and married a careless, +good-natured, drinking scamp, and when he reformed and became a careful, +hard-working man, and an honest and respected fellow-townsman, she was +disappointed in him. He wasn’t the man that won her heart when she was a +girl. Or maybe he was only company for her when he was half drunk. Or maybe +lots of things. Perhaps he’d killed the love in her before he +reformed—and reformed too late. I wonder how a man feels when he finds +out for the first time that his wife doesn’t love him any longer? But my +old mate wasn’t the nature to find out that sort of thing. Ah, well! If a +woman caused all our trouble, my God! women have suffered for it +since—and they suffer like martyrs mostly and with the patience of +working bullocks. Anyway it goes, if I’m the last man in the world, and +the last woman is the worst, and there’s only room for one more in +Heaven, I’ll step down at once and take my chances in Blazes.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"></a> +THE SEX PROBLEM AGAIN</h2> + +<p> +It was Mitchell’s habit to take an evening off now and then from yarning +or reflecting, and proceed, in a most methodical manner, to wash his spare +shirts and patch his pants. I was in the habit of contributing to some Sydney +papers, and every man is an editor at heart, so, at other times, Mitchell would +take another evening off, and root out my swag, and go through my papers in the +same methodical manner, and make alterations and additions without comment or +reference to me; and sometimes he’d read a little thing of my own which +didn’t meet his views, and accidentally drop it into the fire; and at +other times he’d get hold of some rhyme or sketch that was troubling me, +and wrap it up and give it to a passing mailman unbeknown to me. The unexpected +appearance of such articles in the paper, as well as the effects of the +involuntary collaboration in other pieces, gave me several big surprises. +</p> + +<p> +It was in camp on a fencing contract west of Bourke. We had a book which +we’d borrowed from a library at Bourke for a year or two—never mind +the name of it—it was in ninety-one or ninety-two, and the sex problem +was booming then. I had been surreptitiously tearing some carefully-written +slips of manuscript—leaves taken from an old pocket-book—into small +pieces; I dropped them, with apparent carelessness, into the fire and stood +with my back to it. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll bet five pounds,” said Mitchell, suddenly, “that +you’ve been trying your hand on a sex-problem story.” +</p> + +<p> +I shifted uneasily and brought my hands from behind me into my pockets. +“Well, to tell you the truth,” I admitted, “I have.” +</p> + +<p> +“I thought so,” exclaimed Mitchell. “We’ll be put to +the expense of sending you to Sydney for medical treatment yet. You’ve +been having too easy times lately, plenty of hard graft and no anxiety about +tucker or the future. What are the symptoms?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” I said, taking a hand out to scratch the back of my head, +“the plot looked all right—at first sight.” +</p> + +<p> +“So there’s a plot, is there? Well, in the first place, a plot is a +problem. Well, what’s the plot?... Come on, you needn’t be +frightened to tell an old mate like me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” I said, “the yarn looked all right at first sight; +that article of ‘T’s’ in the <i>Bulletin</i> turned me off +it; listen and see what you think of it: There was a young fellow, a bit of a +genius——” +</p> + +<p> +“Just so, it’s the geniuses that build the sex problems. It’s +an autobiography. Go on.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, he married a girl.” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell (sotto voce): “God help her.” +</p> + +<p> +“He loved her, and she loved him: but after they’d been married a +while he found out that, although he understood her, she didn’t and +couldn’t possibly ever understand him.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” commented Mitchell, “and if he hadn’t caught the +sex problem, nor been reading about it, he would never have found that +out.” +</p> + +<p> +“It was a terrible disappointment,” I continued—I had got +into the habit of taking Mitchell’s interruptions and comments as matters +of course—“He saw that his life would be a hell with +her——” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell: “Didn’t strike him that her life would be a hell with +him?” +</p> + +<p> +“They had no thought in common.” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell: “She was in her right mind then.” +</p> + +<p> +“But he couldn’t leave her because he loved her, and because he +knew that she loved him and would break her heart if he left her.” +</p> + +<p> +“Must have been a pretty cocksure sort of a fellow,” remarked +Mitchell, “but all geniuses are.” +</p> + +<p> +“When he was with her he saw all her obstinacy, unreason, and +selfishness; but when he was away he only saw her good points.” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell: “Pity such men don’t stop away.” +</p> + +<p> +“He thought and thought, and brooded over it till his life was a +hell——” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell: “Jes-so: thanks to the problemaniacs.” +</p> + +<p> +“He thought of killing her and himself, and so taking her with him” +</p> + +<p> +“Where?” asked Mitchell. “He must have loved her a lot.... +Good Lord! That shows the awful effects of the sex problem on the mind of a +healthy young man like you;” and Mitchell stood up. +</p> + +<p> +“He lay awake by her side at nights thinking and fighting the thing +out.” +</p> + +<p> +“And you’ve been lying awake, thinking, with me and ‘the +Oracle’ by your side. We’ll have to plant the tommy-hawk, and watch +you by turns at night till you get over this.” +</p> + +<p> +“One night he rested on his elbow, and watched her sleeping, and tried to +reconstruct his ideal out of her, and, just when he was getting into a happier +frame of mind, her mouth fell open, and she snored.... I didn’t get any +further than the snore,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“No, of course you didn’t,” said Mitchell, “and none of +the sex problemers ever will—unless they get as far as +‘blanky.’ You might have made the snore cure him; did it?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, it was making things worse in my idea of the yarn. He fell back and +lay staring at the ceiling in a hopeless kind of a way.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then he was a fit case for the lunatic asylum.... Now, look here, Harry, +you’re a good-natured, soft old fool when you’re in your right +mind; just you go on being a good-natured, soft old fool, and don’t try +to make a problem out of yourself or anybody else, or you’ll come to a +bad end. A pocket-book’s to keep your accounts in, not to take notes in +(you take them in your head and use ’em in your arms), not to write +sex-problem rot in—that’s spoilt many a good pocket-book, and many +a good man. You’ve got a girl you’re talking about going back to as +soon as we’ve finished this contract. Don’t you make a problem of +her; make a happy wife and mother of her.... I was very clever when I was +young”—and here Mitchell’s voice took a tinge of bitterness, +or sadness. “I used to make problems out of things.... I ain’t much +to boast of now.... Seems to me that a good many men want to make angels of +their wives without first taking trouble of making saints of themselves. We +want to make women’s ways our ways—it would be just as fair to make +our ways theirs. Some men want to be considered gods in their own homes; +you’ll generally find that sort of men very small potatoes outside; if +they weren’t they wouldn’t bother so much about being cocks on +their own little dunghills.... And again, old mates seldom quarrel, because +they understand each other’s moods. Now, if you went brooding round for +any length of time I’d say to you. ‘Now then, Harry, what have I +been doing to you? Spit it out, old man.’ And you’d do the same by +me; but how many men would take even that much trouble with their wives?” +</p> + +<p> +A breeze stirred the mulga and brought the sound of a good voice singing in the +surveyors’ camp: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Should old acquaintance be forgot<br/> + And never brought to min’?<br/> +Should old acquaintance be forgot<br/> + And the days of Auld Lang Syne? +</p> + +<p> +“That damned old tune will upset the Oracle for the rest of the +night,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, there’s the Oracle,” said Mitchell. “He was +wronged by a woman as few men are wronged; his life was ruined—but he +isn’t the man to take any stock in sex problems on account of her. He +thinks he’s great on problems, but he isn’t. It all amounts to +this—that he’s sorry for most men and all women and tries to act up +to it to the best of his ability; and if he ain’t a Christian, God knows +what is—I don’t. No matter what a woman does to you, or what you +think she does to you, there come times, sooner or later, when you feel sorry +for her—deep down in your heart—that is if you’re a man. And, +no matter what action or course you might take against her, and no matter how +right or justified you might seem in doing it, there comes a time when, deep +down in your heart, you feel mean and doubtful about your own part. You can +take that as a general thing as regards men against women, and man against man, +I think. And I believe that deep-down feeling of being doubtful, or mean, or +sorry, that comes afterwards, when you are cooler and know more about the +world, is a right and natural thing, and we ought to act more in accordance +with it.” +</p> + +<p> +Came the refrain from the surveyors’ camp: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +We twa hae run about the braes,<br/> + An’ pu’d the gowans fine;<br/> +But we’ve wandered mony a weary foot<br/> + Sin’ Auld Lang Syne. +</p> + +<p> +“We feel sorry for our quarrels with our worst enemy when we see him +lying still and quiet—dead. Why can’t we try and feel a bit sorry +beforehand?” +</p> + +<p class="poem"> + For Auld Lang Syne.<br/> +We twa ha’ padl’t i’ the burn,<br/> + Fra mornin’ sun till dine;<br/> +But seas between us braid ha’ roar’d<br/> + Sin’ Auld Lang Syne. +</p> + +<p> +“I used to feel blazing bitter against things one time but it never hurt +anybody but myself in the end. I argued and quarrelled with a girl +once—and made a problem of the thing and went away. She’s married +to a brute now, and I’m what I am. I made a problem of a good home or the +world once, and went against the last man in God’s world that I should +have gone against, and turned my back on his hand, and left him. His hand was +very cold the next time I took it in mine. We don’t want problems to make +us more bitter against the world than we get sometimes.” +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +And here’s a han’ my trusty frien’,<br/> + An’ gie’s a han’ o’ thine,<br/> +We’ll tak’ a cup o’ kindness yet<br/> + For Auld Lang Syne. +</p> + +<p> +“And that song’s the answer of all problems,” said Mitchell. +But it was I who lay awake and thought that night. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"></a> +THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAG</h2> + +<p> +The Australian swag fashion is the easiest way in the world of carrying a load. +I ought to know something about carrying loads: I’ve carried babies, +which are the heaviest and most awkward and heartbreaking loads in this world +for a boy or man to carry, I fancy. God remember mothers who slave about the +housework (and do sometimes a man’s work in addition in the bush) with a +heavy, squalling kid on one arm! I’ve humped logs on the selection, +“burning-off,” with loads of fencing-posts and rails and palings +out of steep, rugged gullies (and was happier then, perhaps); I’ve +carried a shovel, crowbar, heavy “rammer,” a dozen insulators on an +average (strung round my shoulders with raw flax)-to say nothing of soldiering +kit, tucker-bag, billy and climbing spurs—all day on a telegraph line in +rough country in New Zealand, and in places where a man had to manage his load +with one hand and help himself climb with the other; and I’ve helped hump +and drag telegraph-poles up cliffs and sidings where the horses couldn’t +go. I’ve carried a portmanteau on the hot dusty roads in green old +jackaroo days. Ask any actor who’s been stranded and had to count railway +sleepers from one town to another! he’ll tell you what sort of an awkward +load a portmanteau is, especially if there’s a broken-hearted man +underneath it. I’ve tried knapsack fashion—one of the least healthy +and most likely to give a man sores; I’ve carried my belongings in a +three-bushel sack slung over my shoulder—blankets, tucker, spare boots +and poetry all lumped together. I tried carrying a load on my head, and got a +crick in my neck and spine for days. I’ve carried a load on my mind that +should have been shared by editors and publishers. I’ve helped hump +luggage and furniture up to, and down from, a top flat in London. And +I’ve carried swag for months out back in Australia—and it was life, +in spite of its “squalidness” and meanness and wretchedness and +hardship, and in spite of the fact that the world would have regarded us as +“tramps”—and a free life amongst <i>men</i> from all the +world! +</p> + +<p> +The Australian swag was born of Australia and no other land—of the Great +Lone Land of magnificent distances and bright heat; the land of self-reliance, +and never-give-in, and help-your-mate. The grave of many of the world’s +tragedies and comedies—royal and otherwise. The land where a man out of +employment might shoulder his swag in Adelaide and take the track, and years +later walk into a hut on the Gulf, or never be heard of any more, or a body be +found in the bush and buried by the mounted police, or never found and never +buried—what does it matter? +</p> + +<p> +The land I love above all others—not because it was kind to me, but +because I was born on Australian soil, and because of the foreign father who +died at his work in the ranks of Australian pioneers, and because of many +things. Australia! My country! Her very name is music to me. God bless +Australia! for the sake of the great hearts of the heart of her! God keep her +clear of the old-world shams and social lies and mockery, and callous +commercialism, and sordid shame! And heaven send that, if ever in my time her +sons are called upon to fight for her young life and honour, I die with the +first rank of them and be buried in Australian ground. +</p> + +<p> +But this will probably be called false, forced or “maudlin +sentiment” here in England, where the mawkish sentiment of the +music-halls, and the popular applause it receives, is enough to make a healthy +man sick, and is only equalled by music-hall vulgarity. So I’ll get on. +</p> + +<p> +In the old digging days the knapsack, or straps-across-the chest fashion, was +tried, but the load pressed on a man’s chest and impeded his breathing, +and a man needs to have his bellows free on long tracks in hot, stirless +weather. Then the “horse-collar,” or rolled military overcoat +style—swag over one shoulder and under the other arm—was tried, but +it was found to be too hot for the Australian climate, and was discarded along +with Wellington boots and leggings. Until recently, Australian city artists and +editors—who knew as much about the bush as Downing Street knows about the +British colonies in general—seemed to think the horse-collar swag was +still in existence; and some artists gave the swagman a stick, as if he were a +tramp of civilization with an eye on the backyard and a fear of the dog. +English artists, by the way, seem firmly convinced that the Australian bushman +is born in Wellington boots with a polish on ’em you could shave yourself +by. +</p> + +<p> +The swag is usually composed of a tent “fly” or strip of calico (a +cover for the swag and a shelter in bad weather—in New Zealand it is +oilcloth or waterproof twill), a couple of blankets, blue by custom and +preference, as that colour shows the dirt less than any other (hence the name +“bluey” for swag), and the core is composed of spare clothing and +small personal effects. To make or “roll up” your swag: lay the fly +or strip of calico on the ground, blueys on top of it; across one end, with +eighteen inches or so to spare, lay your spare trousers and shirt, folded, +light boots tied together by the laces toe to heel, books, bundle of old +letters, portraits, or whatever little knick-knacks you have or care to carry, +bag of needles, thread, pen and ink, spare patches for your pants, and +bootlaces. Lay or arrange the pile so that it will roll evenly with the swag +(some pack the lot in an old pillowslip or canvas bag), take a fold over of +blanket and calico the whole length on each side, so as to reduce the width of +the swag to, say, three feet, throw the spare end, with an inward fold, over +the little pile of belongings, and then roll the whole to the other end, using +your knees and judgment to make the swag tight, compact and artistic; when +within eighteen inches of the loose end take an inward fold in that, and bring +it up against the body of the swag. There is a strong suggestion of a +roley-poley in a rag about the business, only the ends of the swag are folded +in, in rings, and not tied. Fasten the swag with three or four straps, +according to judgment and the supply of straps. To the top strap, for the swag +is carried (and eased down in shanty bars and against walls or veranda-posts +when not on the track) in a more or less vertical position—to the top +strap, and lowest, or lowest but one, fasten the ends of the shoulder strap +(usually a towel is preferred as being softer to the shoulder), your coat being +carried outside the swag at the back, under the straps. To the top strap fasten +the string of the nose-bag, a calico bag about the size of a pillowslip, +containing the tea, sugar and flour bags, bread, meat, baking-powder and salt, +and brought, when the swag is carried from the left shoulder, over the right on +to the chest, and so balancing the swag behind. But a swagman can throw a heavy +swag in a nearly vertical position against his spine, slung from one shoulder +only and without any balance, and carry it as easily as you might wear your +overcoat. Some bushmen arrange their belongings so neatly and conveniently, +with swag straps in a sort of harness, that they can roll up the swag in about +a minute, and unbuckle it and throw it out as easily as a roll of wall-paper, +and there’s the bed ready on the ground with the wardrobe for a pillow. +The swag is always used for a seat on the track; it is a soft seat, so trousers +last a long time. And, the dust being mostly soft and silky on the long tracks +out back, boots last marvellously. Fifteen miles a day is the average with the +swag, but you must travel according to the water: if the next bore or tank is +five miles on, and the next twenty beyond, you camp at the five-mile water +to-night and do the twenty next day. But if it’s thirty miles you have to +do it. Travelling with the swag in Australia is variously and picturesquely +described as “humping bluey,” “walking Matilda,” +“humping Matilda,” “humping your drum,” “being on +the wallaby,” “jabbing trotters,” and “tea and sugar +burglaring,” but most travelling shearers now call themselves +trav’lers, and say simply “on the track,” or “carrying +swag.” +</p> + +<p> +And there you have the Australian swag. Men from all the world have carried +it—lords and low-class Chinamen, saints and world martyrs, and felons, +thieves, and murderers, educated gentlemen and boors who couldn’t sign +their mark, gentlemen who fought for Poland and convicts who fought the world, +women, and more than one woman disguised as a man. The Australian swag has held +in its core letters and papers in all languages, the honour of great houses, +and more than one national secret, papers that would send well-known and +highly-respected men to jail, and proofs of the innocence of men going mad in +prisons, life tragedies and comedies, fortunes and papers that secured titles +and fortunes, and the last pence of lost fortunes, life secrets, portraits of +mothers and dead loves, pictures of fair women, heart-breaking old letters +written long ago by vanished hands, and the pencilled manuscript of more than +one book which will be famous yet. +</p> + +<p> +The weight of the swag varies from the light rouseabout’s swag, +containing one blanket and a clean shirt, to the “royal Alfred,” +with tent and all complete, and weighing part of a ton. Some old sundowners +have a mania for gathering, from selectors’ and shearers’ huts, and +dust-heaps, heart-breaking loads of rubbish which can never be of any possible +use to them or anyone else. Here is an inventory of the contents of the swag of +an old tramp who was found dead on the track, lying on his face on the sand, +with his swag on top of him, and his arms stretched straight out as if he were +embracing the mother earth, or had made, with his last movement, the sign of +the cross to the blazing heavens: +</p> + +<p> +Rotten old tent in rags. Filthy blue blanket, patched with squares of red and +calico. Half of “white blanket” nearly black now, patched with +pieces of various material and sewn to half of red blanket. Three-bushel sack +slit open. Pieces of sacking. Part of a woman’s skirt. Two rotten old +pairs of moleskin trousers. One leg of a pair of trousers. Back of a shirt. +Half a waistcoat. Two tweed coats, green, old and rotting, and patched with +calico. Blanket, etc. Large bundle of assorted rags for patches, all rotten. +Leaky billy-can, containing fishing-line, papers, suet, needles and cotton, +etc. Jam-tin, medicine bottles, corks on strings, to hang to his hat to keep +the flies off (a sign of madness in the bush, for the corks would madden a sane +man sooner than the flies could). Three boots of different sizes, all belonging +to the right foot, and a left slipper. Coffee-pot, without handle or spout, and +quart-pot full of rubbish—broken knives and forks, with the handles burnt +off, spoons, etc., picked up on rubbish-heaps; and many rusty nails, to be used +as buttons, I suppose. +</p> + +<p> +Broken saw blade, hammer, broken crockery, old pannikins, small rusty +frying-pan without a handle, children’s old shoes, many bits of old +bootleather and greenhide, part of yellowback novel, mutilated English +dictionary, grammar and arithmetic book, a ready reckoner, a cookery book, a +bulgy anglo-foreign dictionary, part of a Shakespeare, book in French and book +in German, and a book on etiquette and courtship. A heavy pair of blucher +boots, with uppers parched and cracked, and soles so patched (patch over patch) +with leather, boot protectors, hoop iron and hobnails that they were about two +inches thick, and the boots weighed over five pounds. (If you don’t +believe me go into the Melbourne Museum, where, in a glass case in a place of +honour, you will see a similar, perhaps the same, pair of bluchers labelled +“An example of colonial industry.”) And in the core of the swag was +a sugar-bag tied tightly with a whip-lash, and containing another old skirt, +rolled very tight and fastened with many turns of a length of clothes-line, +which last, I suppose, he carried to hang himself with if he felt that way. The +skirt was rolled round a small packet of old portraits and almost +indecipherable letters—one from a woman who had evidently been a sensible +woman and a widow, and who stated in the letter that she did not intend to get +married again as she had enough to do already, slavin’ her finger-nails +off to keep a family, without having a second husband to keep. And her answer +was “final for good and all,” and it wasn’t no use +comin’ “bungfoodlin’” round her again. If he did +she’d set Satan on to him. “Satan” was a dog, I suppose. +</p> + +<p> +The letter was addressed to “Dear Bill,” as were others. There were +no envelopes. The letters were addressed from no place in particular, so there +weren’t any means of identifying the dead man. The police buried him +under a gum, and a young trooper cut on the tree the words: +</p> + +<p class="center"> +S<small>ACRED TO THE</small> M<small>EMORY OF</small><br/> +<big>BILL</big>,<br/> +W<small>HO DIED</small>. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"></a> +“BUCKOLTS’ GATE”<br/> +AN AUSTRALIAN STORY</h2> + +<h3>PROLOGUE</h3> + +<p> +Old Abel Albury had a genius for getting the bull by the tail with a tight +grip, and holding on with both hands and an obstinacy born of +ignorance—and not necessarily for the sake of self-preservation or +selfishness—while all the time the bull might be, so to speak, rooting up +life-long friendships and neighbourly relations, and upsetting domestic customs +and traditions with his horns. +</p> + +<p> +Yes, Uncle Abel was always grasping the wrong end of things, and sticking to it +with that human mulishness which is often stronger, and more often wearies and +breaks down the opposition than an intelligent man’s arguments. He +was——or professed to be, the family said—unable for a long +time to distinguish between his two grand-nephews, one of whom was short and +fat, while the other was tall and thin, the only points of resemblance between +them being that each possessed the old family nose and eyes. When they were +boys he used to lay the strap about one in mistake for the other. They had a +saying that Uncle Abel saw with ten squinting eyes. +</p> + +<p> +Also, he could never—or would not, as the family said—remember +names. He referred to Mrs Porter, a thin, haggard selector’s wife, as +“Mrs Stout” and he balanced matters by calling Mrs Southwick +“Mrs Porterwicket”—when he didn’t address her as +“Mrs What’s-the-woman’s-name”—and he succeeded in +deeply offending both ladies. +</p> + +<p> +Uncle Abel was Mrs Carey’s uncle. +</p> + +<p> +Down at the lower end of Carey’s selection at Rocky Rises, in the extreme +corner of the lower or outer paddock, were sliprails opening into the main +road, which ran down along the siding, round the foot of a spur from ridge, and +out west. These sliprails were called “The Lower Sliprails” by the +family, and it occurred to Uncle Abel to refer to them as +“Buckolts’ Gate,” for no other reason apparently than that +Buckolts’ farm lay in that direction. The farm was about a mile further +on, on the other side of the creek, and the gate leading to it from the main +road was round the spur, out of sight of Carey’s selection. It is quite +possible that Uncle Abel reasoned the thing out for days, for of such material +are some human brains. Sliprails, or a slip-panel, is a panel of fencing of +which the rails are made to be slipped out of the mortise holes in the posts so +as to give passage to horses, vehicles and cattle. I suppose Abel called it a +gate, because he was always going to hang a proper gate there some day. The +family were unaware of his new name for the Lower Sliprails, and after he had, +on one or two occasions, informed the boys that they would find a missing cow +or horse at the Buckolts’ Gate, and they had found it calmly camped at +the Lower Sliprails, and after he had made several appointments to meet parties +at Buckolts’ Gate, and had been found leaning obstinately on the fence by +the Lower Sliprails with no explanation to offer other than that he <i>was</i> +waiting at Buckolts’ Gate, they began to fear that he was becoming weak +in his mind. +</p> + +<h3>ACT I</h3> + +<p> +It was New Year’s Eve at Rocky Rises. There was no need for fireworks nor +bonfires, for the bush-fires were out all along the ranges to the east, and, as +night came on, lines and curves of lights—clear lights, white lights, +and, in the nearer distance, red lights and smoky lights—marked the +sidings and ridges of a western spur of the Blue Mountain Range, and seemed +suspended against a dark sky, for the stars and the loom of the hills were +hidden by smoke and drought haze. +</p> + +<p> +There was a dance at Careys’. Old Carey was a cheerful, broad-minded +bushman, haunted at times by the memories of old days, when he was the beau of +the bush balls, and so when he built his new slab-and-bark barn he had it +properly floored with hard-wood, and the floor well-faced “to give the +young people a show when they wanted a dance,” he said. The floor had a +spring in it, and bush boys and girls often rode twenty miles and more to dance +on that floor. The girls said it was a lovely floor. +</p> + +<p> +On this occasion Carey had stacked his wheat outside until after the New Year. +Spring-carts, and men and girls on horseback came in from miles round. +“Sperm” candles had been cut up and thrown on the floor during the +afternoon, and rubbed over by feet cased tightly in ’lastic-sides; and +hoops were hung horizontally from the tie-beams, with candles stuck round them. +There were fresh-faced girls, and sweet, freckled-faced girls, and jolly girls, +and shy girls—all sorts of girls except sulky, “toney” +girls—and lanky chaps, most of them sawney, and weird, whiskered +agriculturists, who watched the dancers with old, old time-worn smiles, or +stood, or sat on their heels yarning, with their pipes, outside, where two +boilers were slung over a log-fire to boil water for tea; and there were +leathery women, with complexions like dried apples, who gossiped—for the +first time in months perhaps—and watched the young people, and thought at +times, no doubt, of other days—of other days when they were girls. (And +not so far distant either, in some cases, for women dry quickly in the bush.) +</p> + +<p> +And there were one or two old soldiers and their wives, whose eyes glistened +when Jim Bullock played “The Girl I Left Behind Me.” +</p> + +<p> +Jim Bullock was there with his concertina. He sat on a stool in front of a +bench, on which was a beer-keg, piles of teacups and saucers, several big tin +teapots, and plates of sandwiches, sponge-cakes, and tarts. Jim sat in his +shirt-sleeves, with his flat-brimmed, wire-bound, “hard-hitter” hat +on, slanting over his weaker eye. He held one leg loosely and the other rigid, +with the concertina on his knee, and swanked away at the instrument by the +hour, staring straight in front of him with the expression of a cod-fish, and +never moving a muscle except the muscles of his great hairy arms and big +chapped and sun-blotched hands; while chaps in tight “larstins” +(elastic-side boots), slop suits of black, bound with braid, and with coats too +short in the neck and arms, and trousers bell-mouthed at the bottoms, and some +with paper collars, narrow red ribbon ties, or scarfs through walnut shells, +held their partners rigidly, and went round the room with their eyes—most +of them—cocked at the rafters in semi-idiotic ecstasy. +</p> + +<p> +But there was tall, graceful, pink-and-white Bertha Buckolt, blue-eyed and +blue-black-haired, and little Mary Carey with the kind, grey eyes and red-gold +hair; there was Mary’s wild brother Jim, with curly black hair and blue +eyes and dimples of innocence; and there was Harry Dale, the drover, +Jim’s shearing and droving mate, a tall, good-looking, brown-eyed and +brown-haired young fellow, a “better-class” bushman and the best +dancer in the district. Uncle Abel usurped the position of M.C., and roared +“Now then! take yer partners!” and bawled instructions and +interrupted and tangled up the dancers, until they got used to taking no notice +of his bull voice. Mary Carey was too shy—because she loved him, and +secretly and fondly hoped and doubted that he cared for her—to be seen +dancing more than once with Harry Dale, so he shared Bertha Buckolt, the best +girl dancer there, with Jim Carey, who danced with his sister when Harry was +dancing with Bertha Buckolt, and who seemed, for some reason best known to +himself, to be perfectly satisfied with the arrangement. Poor little Mary began +to fret presently, and feel a little jealous of Bertha, her old schoolmate. She +was little and couldn’t dance like Bertha, and she couldn’t help +noticing how well Bertha looked to-night, and what a well-matched pair she and +Harry made; and so, when twelve o’clock came and they all went outside to +watch the Old Year out and the New Year in—with a big bonfire on the +distant ridge where the grass fires had reached a stretch of dry +scrub—and to join hands all round and sing “Auld Lang Syne,” +little Mary was not to be found, for she was sitting on a log round behind the +cow-yard, crying softly to herself. +</p> + +<p> +And when about three o’clock they all started home, Mary gave Bertha her +cheek to kiss instead of her mouth, and that hurt Bertha, who had <i>her</i> +cry riding home, to the astonishment and irritation of her brother Jack, who +rode home with her. But when they were all gone Mary was missing again and when +her mother called her, and, after a pause, the voice of Harry Dale said, +respectfully, in the darkness, “She’s here, Mrs Carey, she’s +all right,” the two were discovered sitting on a convenient log of the +wood-heap, with an awkward and overacted interval of log between them. +</p> + +<p> +Old Carey liked Harry Dale, and seemed very well satisfied with the way things +appeared to be going. He pressed Harry to stay at the selection overnight. +“The missus will make you a shake-down on the floor,” he said. +Harry had no appointments, and stayed cheerfully, and old Carey, having had a +whisky or two, insisted on Mary making the shake-down, and the old folks winked +at each other behind the young folks’ backs to see how poor little Mary +spread a spare mattress, with redhot, averted face, and found an extra pillow +and a spare pair of ironed sheets for the shake-down. +</p> + +<p> +At sunrise she stole out to milk the cows, which was her regular duty; there +was no other way out from her room than through the dining-room, where Harry +lay on his back, with his arms folded, resting peacefully. He seemed sound +asleep and safe for a good two hours, so she ventured. As she passed out she +paused a moment looking down on him with all the lovelight in her eyes, and, +obeying a sudden impulse, she stooped softly and touched his forehead with her +lips, then she slipped out. Harry stretched, opened his eyes, winked solemnly +at the ceiling, and then, after a decent interval, he got up, dressed, and went +out to help her to milk. +</p> + +<p> +Harry Dale and Jim Carey were going out to take charge of a mob of bullocks +going north-west, away up in Queensland. And as they had lost a day and night +to be at the dance, they decided to start in the cool of the evening and travel +all night. Mary walked from the homestead to the Lower Sliprails between her +brother, who rode—because he was her brother—and led a packhorse on +the other side, and Harry, who walked and led his horse—because he was +her sweetheart, avowed only since last night. +</p> + +<p> +There were thunderstorms about, and Mary had repented sufficiently with regard +to Bertha Buckolt to wear on her shoulders a cape which Bertha had left behind +her last night. +</p> + +<p> +When they reached the Lower Sliprails Jim said he’d go on and that Harry +needn’t hurry: he stooped over his horse’s neck, kissed his sister, +promised to keep away from the drink, not to touch a card, and to leave off +fighting, and rode on. And when he rounded the Spur he saw a tall, graceful +figure slipping through the trees from the creek towards Buckolts’ Gate. +</p> + +<p> +Then came the critical time at the Lower Sliprails. The shadows from the +setting sun lengthened quickly on the siding, and then the sun slipped out of +sight over a “saddle” in the ridges, and all was soon dusk save the +sunlit peaks of the Blue Mountains away to the east over the sweeps of +blue-grey bush. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah, well! Mary,” said Harry, “I must make a start +now.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll—you’ll look after Jim, won’t you, +Harry?” said Mary. +</p> + +<p> +“I will, Mary, for your sake.” +</p> + +<p> +Her mouth began to twitch, her chin to tremble, and her eyes brimmed suddenly. +</p> + +<p> +“You must cheer up, Mary,” he said with her in his arms. +“I’ll be back before you know where you are, and then we’ll +be married right off at once and settle down for life.” +</p> + +<p> +She smiled bravely. +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Mary!” +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Harry!” +</p> + +<p> +He led his horse through the rails and lifted them, with trembling hands, and +shot them home. Another kiss across the top rail and he got on his horse. She +mounted the lower rail, and he brought his horse close alongside the fence and +stooped to kiss her again. +</p> + +<p> +“Cheer up, Mary!” he said. “I’ll tell you what +I’ll do—when I come back I’ll whistle when I reach the Spur +and you be here to let the sliprails down for me. I’ll time myself to get +here about sundown. I’ll whistle ‘Willie Riley,’ so +you’ll know it’s me. Good-bye, little girl! I must go now. +Don’t fret—the time will soon go by.” +</p> + +<p> +He turned, swung his horse, and rode slowly down the track, turning now and +again to wave his hand to her, with a farewell flourish of his hat as he +rounded the Spur. His track, five hundred miles, or perhaps a thousand, into +the great north-west; his time, six months, or perhaps a year. Hers a hundred +yards or so back to the dusty, dreary drudgery of selection life. The daylight +faded into starlight, the sidings grew very dim, and a faint white figure +blurred against the bars of the slip-panel. +</p> + +<h3>ACT II</h3> + +<p> +It was the last day of the threshing—shortly after New Year—at +Rocky Rises. The green boughs, which had been lashed to the veranda-posts on +Christmas Eve, had withered and been used for firewood. The travelling steamer +had gone with its gang of men, and the family sat down to tea, the men tired +with hard work and heat, and with prickly heat and irritating wheaten chaff and +dust under their clothes—and with smut (for the crop had been a smutty +one) “up their brains” as Uncle Abel said—the women worn out +with cooking for a big gang of shearers. +</p> + +<p> +Good-humoured Aunt Emma—who was Uncle Abel’s niece—recovered +first, and started the conversation. There were one or two neighbours’ +wives who bad lent crockery and had come over to help with the cooking in their +turns. Jim Carey’s name came up incidentally, but was quickly dropped, +for ill reports of Jim had come home. Then Aunt Emma mentioned Harry Dale, and +glanced meaningly at Mary, whose face flamed as she bent over her plate. +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind, Mary,” said Aunt Emma, “it’s nothing to be +ashamed of. We were all girls once. There’s many a girl would jump at +Harry.” +</p> + +<p> +“Who says I’m ashamed?” said Mary, straightening up +indignantly. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t tease her, Emma,” said Mrs Carey, mildly. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll tell yer what,” said young Tom Carey, frankly, +“Mary got a letter from him to-day. I seen her reading it behind the +house.” +</p> + +<p> +Mary’s face flamed again and went down over her plate. +</p> + +<p> +“Mary,” said her mother, with sudden interest, “did Harry say +anything of Jim?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, mother,” said Mary. “And that’s why I didn’t +tell you about the letter.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a pause. Then Tommy said, with that delightful tact which usually +characterizes young Tommies: +</p> + +<p> +“Well, Mary needn’t be so cocky about Harry Dale, anyhow. I seen +him New Year’s Eve when we had the dance. I seen him after the dance +liftin’ Bertha Buckolt onter her horse in the dark—as if she +couldn’t get on herself—she’s big enough. I seen him lift her +on, an’ he took her right up an’ lifted her right inter the saddle, +’stead of holdin’ his hand for her to tread on like that new-chum +jackaroo we had. An’, what’s more, I seen him hug her an’ +give her a kiss before he lifted her on. He told her he was as good as her +brother.” +</p> + +<p> +“What did he mean by that, Tommy?” asked Mrs Porter, to break an +awkward pause. +</p> + +<p> +“How’m I ter know what he means?” said Tommy, politely. +</p> + +<p> +“And, Tommy, I seen Harry Dale give young Tommy Carey a lick with a strap +the day before New Year’s Eve for throwing his sister’s cat into +the dam,” said Aunt Emma, coming to poor Mary’s rescue. +“Never mind, Mary, my dear, he said goodbye to you last.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, <i>he didn’t</i>!” roared Uncle Abel. +</p> + +<p> +They were used to Uncle Abel’s sudden bellowing, but it startled them +this time. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, Uncle Abel,” cried both Aunt Emma and Mrs Carey, +“whatever do you mean?” +</p> + +<p> +“What I means is that I ain’t a-goin’ to have the +feelin’s of a niece of mine trifled with. What I means is that I seen +Harry Dale with Bertha Buckolt on New Year’s night after he left here. +That’s what I means—” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t speak so loud, Abel, we’re not deaf,” +interrupted Carey, as Mary started up white-faced. “What do you want to +always shout for?” +</p> + +<p> +“I speak loud because I want people to hear me!” roared Uncle Abel, +turning on him. +</p> + +<p> +“Go on, Uncle Abel,” said Mary, “tell me what you +mean.” +</p> + +<p> +“I mean,” said Uncle Abel, lowering his voice a little, “that +I seen Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts’ Gate that night—I +seen it all—” +</p> + +<p> +“At <i>Buckolts</i>’ Gate!” cried Mary. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Yes</i>! at Buckolts’ Gate! Ain’t I speakin’ loud +enough?” +</p> + +<p> +“And where were you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind wheers I was. I was comin’ home along the ridges, and I +seen them. I seen them say good-bye; I seen them hug an’ +kiss—” +</p> + +<p> +“Uncle Abel!” exclaimed Aunt Emma. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s no use Uncle Abelin’ me. What I sez I sez. I +ain’t a-goin’ to have a niece of mine bungfoodled—” +</p> + +<p> +“Uncle Abel,” cried Mary, staring at him wild-eyed, “do be +careful what you say. You must have made a mistake. Are you sure it was Bertha +and Harry?” +</p> + +<p> +“Am I sure my head’s on me neck?” roared Uncle Abel. +“Would I see ’em if I didn’t see ’em? I tell +you—” +</p> + +<p> +“Now wait a moment, Uncle Abel,” interrupted Mary, with dangerous +calmness. “Listen to me. Harry Dale and I are engaged to be married, +and—” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you got the writings!” shouted Uncle Abel. +</p> + +<p> +“The what?” said Mary. +</p> + +<p> +“The writings.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, of course not.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then that’s where you are,” said Uncle Abel, triumphantly. +“If you had the writings you could sue him for breach of contract.” +</p> + +<p> +Uncle Abel, who couldn’t read, had no faith whatever in verbal agreements +(he wouldn’t sign one, he said), all others he referred to as +“writings.” +</p> + +<p> +“Now, listen to me, Uncle Abel,” said Mary, trembling now. +“Are you sure you saw Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts’ +Gate after he left here that night?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. An’ what’s more, I seen young Tommy there ridin’ +on his pony along by the Spur a little while after, an’ he muster seen +them too, if he’s got a tongue.” +</p> + +<p> +Mary turned quickly to her brother. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, all I can say,” said Tommy, quietened now, “is that I +seen <i>her</i> at Buckolts’ Gate that night. I was comin’ home +from Two-Mile Flat, and I met Jim with his packhorse about a mile the other +side of Buckolts’, and while we was talkin’ Harry Dale caught up, +so I jist said ‘So-long’ an’ left ’em. And when I got +to Buckolt’s Gate I seen Bertha Buckolt. She was standin’ under a +tree, and she looked as if she was cryin’.” +</p> + +<p> +But Mary got her bonnet and started out. +</p> + +<p> +“Where are you going to, Mary?” asked her mother, starting up +nervously. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m going across to Buckolts’ to find out the truth,” +said Mary, and she went out. +</p> + +<p> +“Better let her go, Lizzie,” said Aunt Emma, detaining her sister. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve done it now, Uncle Abel.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, why didn’t she get the writings?” retorted Uncle Abel. +</p> + +<p> +Half-way to Buckolts’ Mary met Bertha Buckolt herself, coming over to the +selection for the first time since the night of the party. Bertha started +forward to kiss Mary, but stopped short as Mary stood stock-still and faced +her, with her hands behind her back. +</p> + +<p> +“Why! whatever is the matter, Mary?” exclaimed Bertha. +</p> + +<p> +“You know very well, Bertha.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why! Whatever do you mean? What have I done?” +</p> + +<p> +“What haven’t you done? You’ve—you’ve broken my +heart.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good gracious me! Whatever are you talking about? Tell me what it is, +Mary?” +</p> + +<p> +“You met him at your gate that night?” +</p> + +<p> +“I know I did.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Bertha! How could you be so mean and deceitful?” +</p> + +<p> +“Mean and deceitful! What do you mean by that? Whatever are you talking +about? I suppose I’ve got as good a right to meet him as anyone +else.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, you haven’t,” retorted Mary, “you’re only +stringing him on. You only did it to spite me. You helped him to deceive me. +You ought to be ashamed to look me in the face.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good gracious! Whatever are you talking about? Ain’t I good enough +for him! I ought to be, God knows! I suppose he can marry who he likes, and if +I’m poor fool enough to love him and marry him, what then? Mary, you +ought to be the last to speak—speak to—to me like that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. He can marry all, the girls in the country for all I care. I never +want to see either him or you any more. You’re a cruel, deceitful, +brazen-faced hussy, and he’s a heartless, deceiving blackguard.” +</p> + +<p> +“Mary! I believe you’re mad,” said Bertha, firmly. “How +dare you speak to me like that! And as for him being a blackguard. Why, you +ought to be the last in the world to say such a thing; you ought to be the last +to say a word against him. Why, I don’t believe you ever cared a rap for +him in spite of all your pretence. He could go to the devil for all you +cared.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s enough, Bertha Buckolt!” cried Mary. +“<i>You</i>—you! Why, you’re a barefaced girl, that’s +what you are! I don’t want to see your brazen face again.” With +that she turned and stumbled blindly in the direction of home. +</p> + +<p> +“Send back my cape,” cried Bertha as she too turned away. +</p> + +<p> +Mary walked wildly home and fled to her room and locked the door. Bertha did +likewise. +</p> + +<p> +Mary let Aunt Emma in after a while, ceased sobbing and allowed herself to be +comforted a little. Next morning she was out milking at the usual time, but +there were dark hollows under her eyes, and her little face was white and set. +After breakfast she rolled the cape up very tight in a brown-paper parcel, +addressed it severely to +</p> + +<p class="center"> +MISS BERTHA BUCKOLT,<br/> +Eurunderee Creek, +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +and sent it home by one of the school-children. She wrote to Harry Dale and +told him that she knew all about it (not stating what), but she forgave him and +hoped he’d be happy. She never wanted to see his face again, and enclosed +his portrait. +</p> + +<p> +Harry, who was as true and straight as a bushman could be, puzzled it out and +decided that some one of his old love affairs must have come to Mary’s +ears, and wrote demanding an explanation. +</p> + +<p> +She never answered that letter. +</p> + +<h3>ACT III</h3> + +<p> +It was Christmas Day at Rocky Rises. The plum puddings had been made, as usual, +weeks beforehand, and hung in rags to the tie-beams and taken down and boiled +again. Poultry had been killed and plucked and cooked, and all the toil had +been gone through, and every preparation made for a red-hot dinner on a blazing +hot day—and for no other reason than that our great-grandmothers used to +do it in a cold climate at Christmas-times that came in mid-winter. Merry men +hadn’t gone forth to the wood to gather in the mistletoe (if they ever +did in England, in the olden days, instead of sending shivering, wretched +vassals in rags to do it); but Uncle Abel had gone gloomily up the ridge on +Christmas Eve, with an axe on his shoulder (and Tommy unwillingly in tow, +scowling and making faces behind his back), and had cut young pines and dragged +them home and lashed them firmly to the veranda-posts, which was the custom out +there. +</p> + +<p> +There was little goodwill or peace between the three or four farms round Rocky +Rises that Christmas Day, and Uncle Abel had been the cause of most of the +ill-feeling, though they didn’t know, and he was least aware of it of +any. +</p> + +<p> +It all came about in this way. +</p> + +<p> +Shortly after last New Year Ryan’s bull had broken loose and gone astray +for two days and nights, breaking into neighbours’ paddocks and filling +himself with hay and damaging other bulls, and making love by night and hiding +in the scrub all day. On the second night he broke through and jumped over +Reid’s fences, and destroyed about an acre of grape-vines and adulterated +Reid’s stock, besides interfering with certain heifers which were not of +a marriageable age. There was a L5 penalty on a stray bull. Reid impounded the +bull and claimed heavy damages. Ryan, a small selector of little account, was +always pulling some neighbour to court when he wasn’t being +“pulled” himself, so he went to court over this case. +</p> + +<p> +Now, it appears that the bull, on his holiday, had spent a part of the first +night in Carey’s lower paddock, and Uncle Abel (who was out mooching +about the bush at all hours, “havin’ a look at some timber” +or some “indercations” [of gold], or on some mysterious business or +fad, the mystery of which was of his own making)—Uncle Abel saw the bull +in the paddock at daylight and turned it out the sliprails, and talked about it +afterwards, referring to the sliprails as “Buckolts’ Gate,” +of course, and spoke mysteriously of the case, and put on an appearance of +great importance, and allowed people to get an idea that he knew a lot if he +only liked to speak; and finally he got himself “brought up” as a +witness for Ryan. +</p> + +<p> +He had a lot of beer in town before he went to the courthouse. All he knew +would have been of no use to either party, but he swore that he had seen +Ryan’s bull inside Buckolts’ Gate at daylight (on the day which +wasn’t in question) and had turned him out. Uncle Abel mixed up the court +a good deal, and roared like the bull, and became more obstinate the more he +was cross-examined, and narrowly escaped being committed for contempt of court. +</p> + +<p> +Ryan, who had a high opinion of the breed of his bull, got an idea that the +Buckolts had enticed or driven the bull into their paddock for stock-raising +purposes, instead of borrowing it honestly or offering to pay for the use of +it. Then Ryan wanted to know why Abel had driven his bull out of +Buckolts’ Gate, and the Buckolts wanted to know what business Abel Albury +had to drive Ryan’s bull out of their paddock, if the bull had really +ever been there. And so it went on till Rocky Rises was ripe for a tragedy. +</p> + +<p> +The breach between the Careys and the Buckolts was widened, the quarrel between +Ryan and Reid intensified. Ryan got a down on the Careys because he reckoned +that Uncle Abel had deliberately spoilt his case with his evidence; and the +Reids and Careys were no longer on speaking terms, because nothing would +convince old Reid that Abel hadn’t tried to prove that Ryan’s bull +had never been in Reid’s paddock at all. +</p> + +<p> +Well, it was Christmas Day, and the Carey family and Aunt Emma sat down to +dinner. Jim was present, having arrived overnight, with no money, as usual, and +suffering a recovery. The elder brother, Bob (who had a selection up-country), +and his wife were there. Mrs Carey moved round with watchful eyes and jealous +ears, lest there should be a word or a look which might hurt the feelings of +her wild son—for of such are mothers. +</p> + +<p> +Dinner went on very moodily, in spite of Aunt Emma, until at last Jim +spoke—almost for the first time, save for a long-whispered and, on his +part, repentant conversation with his mother. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Mary!” said Jim. “What did you throw Harry Dale +over for?” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t ask me, Jim.” +</p> + +<p> +“Rot! What did he do to you? I’m your brother” (with a glance +at Bob), “and I ought to know.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, then, ask Bertha Buckolt. She saw him last.” +</p> + +<p> +“What!” cried Jim. +</p> + +<p> +“Hold your tongue, Jim! You’ll make her cry,” said Aunt Emma. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, what’s it all about, anyway?” demanded Jim. “All +I know is that Mary wrote to Harry and threw him over, and he ain’t been +the same man since. He swears he’ll never come near the district +again.” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell Jim, Aunt Emma,” said Mary. And Aunt Emma started to tell the +story as far as she knew. +</p> + +<p> +“Saw her at Buckolt’s sliprails!” cried Jim, starting up. +“Well, he couldn’t have had time to more than say good-bye to her, +for I was with her there myself, and Harry caught up to me within a mile of the +gate—and I rode pretty fast.” +</p> + +<p> +“He had a jolly long good-bye with her,” shouted Uncle Abel. +“Look here, Jim! I ain’t goin’ to stand by and see a nephew +of mine bungfoodled by no girl; an’, I tell you I seen ’em +huggin’ and kissin’ and canoodlin’ for half an hour at +Buckolts’ Gate!” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s a—a— Look here, Uncle Abel, be careful what you +say. You’ve got the bull by the tail again, that’s what it +is!” Jim’s face grew whiter—and it had been white enough on +account of the drink. “How did you know it was them? You’re always +mistaking people. It might have been someone else.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know Harry Dale on horseback two miles off!” roared Uncle Abel. +“And I knowed her by her cape.” +</p> + +<p> +It was Mary’s turn to gasp and stare at Uncle Abel. +</p> + +<p> +“Uncle Abel,” she managed to say, “Uncle Abel! Wasn’t +it at our Lower Sliprails you saw them and not Buckolts’ Gate?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well!” bellowed Uncle Abel. “You might call ’em the +‘Lower Sliprails,’ but I calls ’em Buckolts’ Gate! They +lead to’r’ds Buckolts’, don’t they? Hey? Them other +sliprails”—jerking his arms in the direction of the upper paddock +“them theer other sliprails that leads outer Reid’s lane I calls +Reid’s Sliprails. I don’t know nothing about no upper or lower, or +easter or wester, or any other la-di-dah names you like to call +’em.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, uncle,” cried Mary, trembling like a leaf, “why +didn’t you explain this before? Why didn’t you tell us?” +</p> + +<p> +“What cause have I got to tell any of you everything I sez or does or +thinks? It ’ud take me all me time. Ain’t you got any more brains +than Ryan’s bull, any of you? Hey!—You’ve got heads, but so +has cabbages. Explain! Why, if the world wasn’t stuffed so full of +jumped-up fools there’d be never no need for explainin’.” +</p> + +<p> +Mary left the table. +</p> + +<p> +“What is it, Mary?” cried Aunt Emma. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m going across to Bertha,” said Mary, putting on her hat +with trembling hands. “It was me Uncle Abel saw. I had Bertha’s +cape on that night.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Uncle Abel,” cried Aunt Emma, “whatever have you +done?” +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Uncle Abel, “why didn’t she get the +writin’s as I told her? It’s to be hoped she won’t make such +a fool of herself next time.” +</p> + +<p> +Half an hour later, or thereabouts, Mary sat on Bertha Buckolt’s bed, +with Bertha beside her and Bertha’s arm round her, and they were crying +and laughing by turns. +</p> + +<p> +“But-but-why didn’t you <i>tell</i> me it was Jim?” said +Mary. +</p> + +<p> +“Why didn’t you tell me it was Harry, Mary?” asked Bertha. +“It would have saved all this year of misery. +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t see Harry Dale at all that night,” said Bertha. +“I was—I was crying when Jim left me, and when Harry came along I +slipped behind a tree until he was past. And now, look here, Mary, I +can’t marry Jim until he steadies down, but I’ll give him another +chance. But, Mary, I’d sooner lose him than you.” +</p> + +<p> +Bertha walked home with Mary, and during the afternoon she took Jim aside and +said: +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Jim, I’ll give you another chance—for a year. Now +I want you to ride into town and send a telegram to Harry Dale. How long would +it take him to get here?” +</p> + +<p> +“He couldn’t get here before New Year,” said Jim. +</p> + +<p> +“That will do,” said Bertha, and Jim went to catch his horse. Next +day Harry’s reply came: “Coming” +</p> + +<h3>ACT IV</h3> + +<p> +New Year’s Eve. The dance was at Buckolts’ this year, but Bertha +didn’t dance much; she was down by the gate most of the time with little +Mary Carey, waiting, and watching the long, white road, and listening for +horses’ feet, and disappointed often as other horsemen rode by or turned +up to the farm. +</p> + +<p> +And in the hot sunrise that morning, within a hundred miles of Rocky Rises, a +tired, dusty drover camped in the edge of a scrub, boiled his quart-pot, +broiled a piece of mutton on the coals, and lay down on the sand to rest an +hour or so before pushing on to a cattle station he knew to try and borrow +fresh horses. He had ridden all night. +</p> + +<p> +Old Buckolt and Carey and Reid smoked socially under the grape-vines, with +bottles of whisky and glasses, and nudged each other and coughed when they +wanted to laugh at Old Abel Albury, who was, for about the first time in his +life, condescending to explain. He was explaining to them what +thund’rin’ fools they had been. +</p> + +<p> +Later on they sent a boy on horseback with a bottle of whisky and a message to +Ryan, who turned up in time to see the New Year in with them and contradict +certain slanders concerning the breed of his bull. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile Bertha comforted Mary, and at last persuaded her to go home. +“He’s sure to be here to-morrow, Mary,” she said, “and +you need to look fresh and happy.” +</p> + +<p> +But Mary didn’t sleep that night; she was up before daylight, had the +kettle on and some chops ready to fry, and at daybreak she was down by the +sliprails again. She was turning away for the second time when she heard a +clear whistle round the Spur—then the tune of “Willie Riley,” +and the hobble-chains and camp-ware on the packhorse jingling to the tune. +</p> + +<p> +She pulled out the rails with eager, trembling hands and leaned against the +tree. An hour later a tired drover lay on his back, in his ragged, track-worn +clothes and dusty leggings, on Mary’s own little bed in the skillion off +the living-room, and rested. Mary bustled round getting breakfast ready, and +singing softly to herself; once she slipped in, bent over Harry and kissed him +gently on the lips, and ran out as he stirred. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, who’s that?” exclaimed Uncle Abel, poking round early +and catching a glimpse of Harry through the open door. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s only Harry, Uncle Abel,” said Mary. +</p> + +<p> +Uncle Abel peered in again to make sure. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, be sure you git the writin’s this time,” he said. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"></a> +THE BUSH-FIRE</h2> + +<h3>I.—SQUATTER AND SELECTOR</h3> + +<p> +Wall was a squatter and a hard man. There had been long years of drought and +loss, and then came the rabbit pest—the rabbits swarmed like flies over +his run, and cropped the ground bare where even the poor grass might have saved +thousands of sheep—and the rabbits cost the squatter hundreds of pounds +in “rabbit-proof” fences, trappers’ wages, etc., just to keep +them down. Then came arrangements with the bank. And then Wall’s wife +died. Wall started to brood over other days, and the days that had gone +between, and developed a temper which drove his children from home one by one, +till only Mary was left. She managed the lonely home with the help of a +half-caste. Then in good seasons came the selectors. +</p> + +<p> +Men remembered Wall as a grand boss and a good fellow, but that was in the days +before rabbits and banks, and syndicates and “pastoralists” or +pastoral companies instead of good squatters. Runs were mostly pastoral leases +for which the squatter paid the Government so much per square mile (almost a +nominal rent). Selections were small holdings taken up by farmers under +residential and other conditions and paid for by instalments. If you were not +ruined by the drought, and paid up long enough, the land became freehold. The +writer is heir to a dusty patch of three hundred acres or so in the scrub which +was taken up thirty years ago and isn’t freehold yet. +</p> + +<p> +Selectors were allowed to take up land on runs or pastoral leases as well as on +unoccupied Crown lands, and as they secured the best bits of land, and on water +frontages if they could, and as, of course, selections reduced the area of the +run, the squatters loved selectors like elder brothers. One man is allowed to +select only a certain amount of land, and required by law to live on it, so the +squatters bought as much freehold about the homestead as they could afford, +selected as much as they are allowed to by law, and sometimes employed +“dummy” selectors to take up choice bits about the runs and hold +them for them. They fought selectors in many various ways, and, in some cases, +annoyed and persecuted them with devilish ingenuity. +</p> + +<p> +Ross was a selector, and a very hard man physically. He was a short, nuggety +man with black hair and frill beard (a little dusty), bushy black eyebrows, +piercing black eyes, horny knotted hands, and the obstinacy or pluck of a dozen +men to fight drought and the squatter. Ross selected on Wall’s run, in a +bend of Sandy Creek, a nice bit of land with a black soil, flat and red soil +sidings from the ridges, which no one had noticed before, and with the help of +his boys he got the land cleared and fenced in a year or two—taking bush +contracts about the district between whiles to make “tucker” for +the family until he got his first crop off. +</p> + +<p> +Wall was never accused of employing dummies, or underhanded methods in dealings +with selectors, but he had been through so much and had brooded so long that he +had grown very hard and bitter and suspicious, and the reverse of +generous—as many men do who start out in life too soft and goodhearted +and with too much faith in human nature. He was a tall, dark man. He ordered +Ross’s boys off the run, impounded Ross’s stock—before Ross +had got his fencing finished, summoned Ross for trespass, and Ross retaliated +as well as he could, until at last it mightn’t have been safe for one of +those men to have met the other with a gun. The impounding of the +selector’s cattle led to the last bad quarrel between Wall and his son +Billy, who was a tall, good-natured Cornstalk, and who reckoned that Australia +was big enough for all of us. One day in the drought, and in an extra bitter +mood, Wall heard that some of his sheep had been dogged in the vicinity of +Ross’s selection, and he ordered Billy to take a station-hand and watch +Ross’s place all night, and, if Ross’s cattle put their noses over +the boundary, to drive them to the pound, fifteen miles away; also to lay +poisoned baits for the dogs all round the selection. And Billy flatly refused. +</p> + +<p> +“I know Ross and the boys,” he said, “and I don’t +believe they dogged the sheep. Why, they’ve only got a Newfoundland pup, +and an old lame, one-eyed sheep-dog that couldn’t hurt a flea. Now, +father, this sort of thing has been going on long enough. What difference does +a few paltry acres make to us? The country is big enough, God knows! Ross is a +straight man and—for God’s sake, give the man a chance to get his +ground fenced in; he’s doing it as fast as he can, and he can’t +watch his cattle day and night.” +</p> + +<p> +“Are you going to do as I tell you, or are you not?” shouted Wall. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, if it comes to that, I’m not,” said Billy. +“I’m not going to sneak round a place all night and watch for a +chance to pound a poor man’s cows.” +</p> + +<p> +It was an awful row, down behind the wool-shed, and things looked so bad that +old Peter, the station-hand, who was a witness, took off his coat and rolled up +his sleeves, ready, as he said afterwards, “to roll into” either +the father or the son if one raised a hand against the other. +</p> + +<p> +“Father!” said Billy, though rather sobered by the sight of his +father’s trembling, choking passion, “do you call yourself an +Englishman?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes!” yelled Wall, furiously. “What the hell do you call +yourself?” +</p> + +<p> +“If it comes to that I’m an Australian,” said Billy, and he +turned away and went to catch his horse. He went up-country and knocked about +in the north-west for a year or two. +</p> + +<h3>II.—ROMEO AND JULIET</h3> + +<p> +Mary Wall was twenty-five. She was an Australian bush girl, every inch of her +five-foot-nine; she had a pink-and-white complexion, dark blue eyes, blue-black +hair, and “the finest figure in the district,” on horseback or +afoot. She was the best girlrider too (saddle or bare-back), and they say that +when she was a tomboy she used to tuck her petticoats under her and gallop +man-fashion through the scrub after horses or cattle. She said she was going to +be an old maid. +</p> + +<p> +There came a jackaroo on a visit to the station. He was related to the bank +with which Wall had relations. He was a dude, with an expensive education and +no brains. He was very vain of his education and prospects. He regarded Mary +with undisguised admiration, and her father had secret hopes. One evening the +jackaroo was down by the homestead-gate when Mary came cantering home on her +tall chestnut. The gate was six feet or more, and the jackaroo raised his hat +and hastened to open it, but Mary reined her horse back a few yards and the +“dood” had barely time to jump aside when there was a scuffle of +hoofs on the road, a “Ha-ha-ha!” in mid-air, a landing thud, and +the girl was away up the home-track in a cloud of dust. +</p> + +<p> +A few days later the jackaroo happened to be at Kelly’s, a wayside +shanty, watching a fight between two bushmen, when Mary rode up. She knew the +men. She whipped her horse in between them and struck at first one and then the +other with her riding-whip. +</p> + +<p> +“You ought to be ashamed of yourselves!” she said; “and both +married men, too!” +</p> + +<p> +It evidently struck them that way, for after a bit they shook hands and went +home. +</p> + +<p> +“And I wouldn’t have married that girl for a thousand +pounds,” said the jackaroo, relating the incidents to some friends in +Sydney. +</p> + +<p> +Mary said she wanted a man, if she could get one. +</p> + +<p> +There was no life at home nowadays, so Mary went to all the bush dances in the +district. She thought nothing of riding twenty or thirty miles to a dance, +dancing all night, and riding home again next morning. At one of these dances +she met young Robert Ross, a clean-limbed, good-looking young fellow about her +own age. She danced with him and liked him, and danced with him again, and he +rode part of the way home with her. The subject of the quarrel between the two +homes came up gradually. +</p> + +<p> +“The boss,” said Robert, meaning his father, “the boss is +always ready to let bygones be bygones. It’s a pity it couldn’t be +fixed up.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Mary, looking at him (Bob looked very well on +horseback), “it is a pity.” +</p> + +<p> +They met several times, and next Prince of Wales’s birthday they rode +home from the races together. Both had good horses, and they happened to be far +ahead of the others on the wide, straight clear road that ran between the walls +of the scrub. Along, about dusk, they became very confidential +indeed—Mary had remarked what a sad and beautiful sunset it was. The +horses got confidential, too, and shouldered together, and touched noses, and, +after a long interval in the conversation, during which Robert, for one, began +to breathe quickly, he suddenly leaned over, put his arm round her waist and +made to kiss her. She jerked her body away, threw up her whiphand, and Robert +ducked instinctively; but she brought her whip down on her horse’s flank +instead, and raced ahead. Robert followed—or, rather, his horse did: he +thought it was a race, and took the bit in his teeth. Robert kept calling, +appealing: +</p> + +<p> +“Wait a while, Mary! I want to explain! I want to apologize! For +God’s sake listen to me, Mary!” +</p> + +<p> +But Mary didn’t hear him. Perhaps she misunderstood the reason of the +chase and gave him credit for a spice of the devil in his nature. But Robert +grew really desperate; he felt that the thing must be fixed up now or never, +and gave his horse a free rein. Her horse was the fastest, and Robert galloped +in the dust from his heels for about a mile and a half; then at the foot of a +rise Mary’s horse stumbled and nearly threw her over his head, and then +he stopped like the good horse he was. +</p> + +<p> +Robert got down feeling instinctively that he might best make his peace on +foot, and approached Mary with a face of misery—she had dropped her whip. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, Bob!” she said, “I’m knocked out;” and she +slipped down into his arms and stayed there a while. +</p> + +<p> +They sat on a log and rested, while their horses made inquiries of each +other’s noses, and compared notes. +</p> + +<p> +And after a good while Mary said “No, Bob, it’s no use talking of +marrying just yet. I like you, Bob, but I could never marry you while things +are as they are between your father and mine. Now, that’ll do. Let me get +on my horse, Bob. I’ll be safer there.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” asked Bob. +</p> + +<p> +“Come on, Bob, and don’t be stupid.” +</p> + +<p> +She met him often and “liked” him. +</p> + +<h3>III.—A TRAMP’S MATCH AND WHAT IT DID</h3> + +<p> +It was Christmas Eve at Wall’s, but there was no score or so of buggies +and horses and dozens of strange dogs round the place as of old. The glasses +and decanters were dusty on the heavy old-fashioned sideboard in the +dining-room; and there was only a sullen, brooding man leaning over the hurdles +and looking at his rams in the yard, and a sullen, brooding half-caste at work +in the kitchen. Mary had ridden away that morning to visit a girl chum. +</p> + +<p> +It was towards the end of a long drought, and the country was like tinder for +hundreds of miles round—the ground for miles and miles in the broiling +scrubs “as bare as your hand,” or covered with coarse, dry tufts. +There was feed grass in places, but you had to look close to see it. +</p> + +<p> +Shearing had finished the day before, but there was a black boy and a +station-hand or two about the yards and six or eight shearers and rouseabouts, +and a teamster camped in the men’s huts—they were staying over the +holidays to shear stragglers and clean up generally. Old Peter and a jackaroo +were out on the run watching a bush-fire across Sandy Creek. +</p> + +<p> +A swagman had happened to call at the station that morning; he asked for work +and then for tucker. He irritated Wall, who told him to clear out. It was the +first time that a swagman had been turned away from the station without tucker. +</p> + +<p> +Swaggy went along the track some miles, brooding over his wrongs, and crossed +Sandy Creek. He struck a match and dropped it into a convenient tuft of grass +in a likely patch of tufts, with dead grass running from it up into the scrubby +ridges—then he hurried on. +</p> + +<p> +Did you ever see a bush-fire? Not sheets of flame sweeping and roaring from +tree-top to tree-top, but the snaky, hissing grass-fire of hardwood country. +</p> + +<p> +The whole country covered with thin blue smoke so that you never know in what +direction the fire is travelling. At night you see it like the lighted streets +of cities, in the distant ranges. It roars up the hollows of dead trees and +gives them the appearance of factory chimneys in the dusk. It climbs, by shreds +of bark, the trunks of old dead white-box and blue-gums—solid and hard as +cast-iron—and cuts off the limbs. And where there’s a piece of +recently ringbarked country, with the dead leaves still on the trees, the fire +will roar from bough to bough—a fair imitation of a softwood forest fire. +The bush-fire travels through the scrubs for hundreds of miles, taking the +grass to the roots, scorching the living bush but leaving it alive—for +gumbush is hardest of any to kill. Where there is no undergrowth, and the +country seems bare as a road for miles, the fire will cross, licking up +invisible straws of grass, dusty leaves, twigs and shreds of bark on the hard +ground already baking in the drought. You hear of a fire miles away, and next +day, riding across the head of a gully, you hear a hissing and crackling and +there is the fire running over the ground in lines and curves of thin blue +smoke, snakelike, with old logs blazing on the blackened ground behind. Did you +ever <i>hear</i> a fire where a fire should not be? There is something hellish +in the sound of it. When the breeze is, say, from the east the fire runs round +western spurs, up sheltered gullies—helped by an “eddy” in +the wind perhaps—and appears along the top of the ridge, ready, with a +change in the wind, to come down on farms and fields of ripe wheat, with a +“front” miles long. +</p> + +<p> +A selector might be protected by a wide sandy creek in front and wide cleared +roads behind, and, any hour in the day or night, a shout from the farther end +of the wheat paddock, and—“Oh, my God! the wheat!” +</p> + +<p> +Wall didn’t mind this fire much; most of his sheep were on their way out +back, to a back run where there was young grass; and the dry ridges along the +creek would be better for a burning-off—only he had to watch his fences. +</p> + +<p> +But, about dusk, Mary came galloping home in her usual breakneck fashion. +</p> + +<p> +“Father,” she cried, “turn out the men and send them at once. +The fire is all down by Ross’s farm, and he has ten acres of wheat +standing, and no one at home but him and Bob.” +</p> + +<p> +“How do you know?” growled Wall. Then suddenly and suspiciously, +“Have you been there?” +</p> + +<p> +“I came home that way.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well—let Ross look after his own,” snarled the father. +</p> + +<p> +“But he can’t, father. They’re fighting the fire now, and +they’ll be burnt out before the morning if they don’t get +help—for God’s sake, father, act like a Christian and send the men. +Remember it is Christmas-time, father. You’re surely not going to see a +neighbour burnt out.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I am,” shouted Wall. “I’d like to see every +selector in the country burnt out, hut and all! Get off that horse and go +inside. If a man leaves the station to-night he needn’t come back.” +(This last for the benefit of the men’s hut.) +</p> + +<p> +“But, father—” +</p> + +<p> +“Get off that horse and go inside,” roared Wall. +</p> + +<p> +“I—I won’t.” +</p> + +<p> +“What!” He darted forward as though to drag her from the saddle, +but she swung her horse away. +</p> + +<p> +“Stop! Where are you going?” +</p> + +<p> +“To help Ross,” said Mary. “He had no one to send for +help.” +</p> + +<p> +“Then go the same way as your brother!” roared her father; +“and if you show your nose back again I’ll horse-whip you off the +run!” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll go, father,” said Mary, and she was away. +</p> + +<h3>IV.—THE FIRE AT ROSS’S FARM</h3> + +<p> +Ross’s farm was in a corner between the ridges and the creek. The fire +had come down from the creek, but the siding on that side was fairly clear, and +they had stopped the fire there. It went behind the ridge and ran up and over. +The ridge was covered thickly with scrub and dead grass; the wheat-field went +well up the siding, and along the top was a bush face with only a narrow +bridle-track between it and the long dead grass. Everything depended on the +wind. Mary saw Ross and Mrs Ross and the daughter Jenny, well up the siding +above the fence, working desperately, running to and fro, and beating out the +fire with green boughs. Mary left her horse, ran into the hut, and looked +hurriedly round for something to wear in place of her riding-skirt. She only +saw a couple of light print dresses. She stepped into a skillion room, which +happened to be Bob’s room, and there caught sight of a pair of trousers +and a coat hanging on the wall. +</p> + +<p> +Bob Ross, beating desperately along a line of fire that curved down-hill to his +right, and half-choked and blinded with the smoke, almost stumbled against a +figure which was too tall to be his father. +</p> + +<p> +“Why! who’s that?” he gasped. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s only me, Bob,” said Mary, and she lifted her bough +again. +</p> + +<p> +Bob stared. He was so astonished that he almost forgot the fire and the wheat. +Bob was not thin—but— +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t look at me, Bob!” said Mary, hurriedly. +“We’re going to be married, so it doesn’t matter. Let us save +the wheat.” +</p> + +<p> +There was no time to waste; there was a breeze now from over the ridges, light, +but enough to bear the fire down on them. Once, when they had breathing space, +Mary ran to the creek for a billy of water. They beat out the fire all along +the siding to where a rib of granite came down over the ridge to the fence, and +then they thought the wheat was safe. They came together here, and Ross had +time to look and see who the strange man was; then he stared at Mary from under +his black, bushy eyebrows. Mary, choking and getting her breath after her +exertions, suddenly became aware, said “Oh!” and fled round the +track beyond the point of granite. She felt a gust of wind and looked up the +ridge. The bush fence ended here in a corner, where it was met by a new wire +fence running up from the creek. It was a blind gully full of tall dead grass, +and, glancing up, Mary saw the flames coming down fast. She ran back. +</p> + +<p> +“Come on!” she cried, “come on! The fire’s the other +side of the rocks!” +</p> + +<p> +Back at the station, Wall walked up and down till he cooled. He went inside and +sat down, but it was no use. He lifted his head and saw his dead wife’s +portrait on the wall. Perhaps his whole life ran before him in detail—but +this is not a psychological study. +</p> + +<p> +There were only two tracks open to him now: either to give in, or go on as he +was going—to shut himself out from human nature and become known as +“Mean Wall,” “Hungry Wall,” or “Mad Wall, the +Squatter.” He was a tall, dark man of strong imagination and more than +ordinary intelligence. And it was the great crisis of his ruined life. He +walked to the top of a knoll near the homestead and saw the fire on the ridges +above Ross’s farm. As he turned back he saw a horseman ride up and +dismount by the yard. +</p> + +<p> +“Is that you, Peter?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, boss. The fences is all right.” +</p> + +<p> +“Been near Ross’s?” +</p> + +<p> +“No. He’s burnt out by this time.” +</p> + +<p> +Wall walked to and fro for a few minutes longer. Then he suddenly stopped and +called, “Peter!” +</p> + +<p> +“Ay, ay!” from the direction of the huts. +</p> + +<p> +“Turn out the men!” and Wall went into a shed and came out with his +saddle on his arm. +</p> + +<p> +The fire rushed down the blind gully. Showers of sparks fell on the bush fence, +it caught twice, and they put it out, but the third time it blazed and roared +and a fire-engine could not have stopped it. +</p> + +<p> +“The wheat must go,” said Ross. “We’ve done our +best,” and he threw down the blackened bough and leaned against a tree, +and covered his eyes with a grimy hand. +</p> + +<p> +The wheat was patchy in that corner—there were many old stumps of trees, +and there were bare strips where the plough had gone on each side of them. Mary +saw a chance, and climbed the fence. +</p> + +<p> +“Come on, Bob,” she cried, “we might save it yet. Mr Ross, +pull out the fence along there,” and she indicated a point beyond the +fire. They tramped down and tore up the wheat where it ran between the +stumps—the fire was hissing and crackling round and through it, and just +as it ran past them in one place there was a shout, a clatter of horses’ +hoofs on the stones, and Mary saw her father riding up the track with a dozen +men behind him. She gave a shriek and ran straight down, through the middle of +the wheat, towards the hut. +</p> + +<p> +Wall and his men jumped to the ground, wrenched green boughs from the saplings, +and, after twenty minutes’ hard fighting, the crop was saved—save +for a patchy acre or so. When it was all over Ross sat down on a log and rested +his head on his hands, and his shoulders shook. Presently he felt a hand on his +shoulder, looked up, and saw Wall. +</p> + +<p> +“Shake hands, Ross,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +And it was Christmas Day. +</p> + +<p> +But in after years they used to nearly chaff the life out of Mary. “You +were in a great hurry to put on the breeches, weren’t you, Mary?” +“Bob’s best Sunday-go-meetin’s, too, wasn’t they, +Mary?” “Rather tight fit, wasn’t they, Mary?” +“Couldn’t get ’em on now, could you, Mary?” +</p> + +<p> +“But,” reflected old Peter apart to some cronies, “it +ain’t every young chap as gits an idea of the shape of his wife afore he +marries her—is it? An’ that’s sayin’ +somethin’.” +</p> + +<p> +And old Peter was set down as being an innercent sort of ole cove. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"></a> +THE HOUSE THAT WAS NEVER BUILT</h2> + +<p> +There had been heavy rain and landslips all along the branch railway which left +the Great Western Line from Sydney just beyond the Blue Mountains, and ran +through thick bush and scrubby ridgy country and along great alluvial +sidings—were the hills on the opposite side of the wide valleys (misty in +depths) faded from deep blue into the pale azure of the sky—and over the +ends of western spurs to the little farming, mining and pastoral town of +Solong, situated in a circle of blue hills on the banks of the willow-fringed +Cudgegong River. +</p> + +<p> +The line was hopelessly blocked, and some publicans at Solong had put on the +old coach-road a couple of buggies, a wagonette, and an old mail +coach—relic of the days of Cobb & Co., which had been resurrected +from some backyard and tinkered up—to bring the train passengers on from +the first break in the line over the remaining distance of forty miles or so. +Capertee Station (old time, “Capertee Camp”—a +teamster’s camp) was the last station before the first washout, and there +the railway line and the old road parted company for the last time before +reaching Solong—the one to run round by the ends of the western spurs +that spread fanlike, and the other to go through and over, the rough country. +</p> + +<p> +The train reached Capertee about midnight in broad moonlight that was misty in +the valleys and round the blue of Crown Ridge. I got a “box-seat” +beside the driver on the old coach. It was a grand old road—one of the +old main coach-roads of New South Wales—broad and white, metalled nearly +all the way, and in nearly as good condition as on the day when the first +passenger train ran into Solong and the last-used section of the old road was +abandoned. It dated back to the bushranging days—right back to convict +times: it ran through tall dark bush, up over gaps or “saddles” in +high ridges, down across deep dark gullies, and here and there across grey, +marshy, curlew-haunted flats. Cobb & Co’s coach-and-six, with +“Royal Mail” gilded on the panels, had dashed over it in ten and +twelve-mile stages in the old days, the three head-lamps flashing on the wild +dark bush at night, and maybe twenty-four passengers on board. The biggest +rushes to richest goldfields in the west had gone over this old road on +coaches, on carts, on drays, on horse and bullock wagons, on horseback, and on +foot; new chums from all the world and from all stations in life. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +When many a step was on the mountains,<br/> +Marching west to the land of gold. +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +And a few came back rich—red, round-faced and jolly—on the box-seat +of Cobb & Co’s, treating the driver and all hands, “going +home” to sweethearts or families. (Home people will never feel the +meaning of those two words, “going home,” as it is felt in a new +land.) And many came back broken men, tramping in rags, and carrying their +swags through the dusty heat of the drought in December or the bitter, pelting +rain in the mountains in June. Some came back grey who went as boys; and there +were many who never came back. +</p> + +<p> +I remembered the old mile-trees, with a section of bark cut away and the +distances cut in Roman letters in the hardened sap—the distance from +Bowenfels, the railway terminus then. It was a ghostly old road, and if it +wasn’t haunted it should have been. There was an old decaying and nearly +deserted coaching town or two; there were abandoned farms and halfway inns, +built of stone, with the roofs gone and nettles growing high between the walls; +the remains of an orchard here and there—a few gnarled +quince-trees—and the bush reclaiming its own again. It was a haunted ride +for me, because I had last ridden over this old road long ago when I was +young—going to see the city for the first time—and because I was +now on my way to attend the funeral of one of my father’s blood from whom +t had parted in anger. +</p> + +<p> +We slowly climbed, and almost as slowly descended, the steep siding of a great +hill called Aaron’s Pass, and about a mile beyond the foot of the hill I +saw a spot I remembered passing on the last journey down, long ago. Rising back +from the road, and walled by heavy bush, was a square clearing, and in the +background I saw plainly, by the broad moonlight, the stone foundations for a +large house; from the front an avenue of grown pines came down to the road. +</p> + +<p> +“Why!” I exclaimed, turning to the driver, “was that house +burnt down?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” he said slowly. “That house was never built.” +</p> + +<p> +I stared at the place again and caught sight of a ghostly-looking light between +the lines of the foundations, which I presently made out to be a light in a +tent. +</p> + +<p> +“There’s someone camping there,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said the driver, “some old swaggy or +‘hatter.’ I seen him comin’ down. I don’t know nothing +about that there place.” (I hadn’t “shouted” for him +yet.) +</p> + +<p> +I thought and remembered. I remembered myself, as a boy, being sent a coach +journey along this road to visit some relatives in Sydney. We passed this +place, and the women in the coach began to talk of the fine house that was +going to be built there. The ground was being levelled for the foundations, and +young pines had been planted, with stakes round them to protect them from the +cattle. I remembered being mightily interested in the place, for the women said +that the house was to be a two-storied one. I thought it would be a wonderful +thing to see a two-storied house there in the bush. The height of my ambition +was to live in a house with stairs in it. The women said that this house was +being built for young Brassington, the son of the biggest squatter then in the +district, who was going to marry the daughter of the next biggest squatter. +That was all I remember hearing the women say. +</p> + +<p> +Three or four miles along the road was a public-house, with a post office, +general store, and blacksmith shop attached, as is usual in such +places—all that was left of the old pastoral and coaching town of Ilford. +I “shouted” for the driver at the shanty, but got nothing further +out of him concerning the fate of the house that was never built. I wanted that +house for a story. +</p> + +<p> +However, while yarning with some old residents at Solong, I mentioned the +Brassingtons, and picked up a few first links in the story. The young couple +were married and went to Sydney for their honeymoon. The story went that they +intended to take a trip to the old country and Paris, to be away a +twelve-month, and the house was to be finished and ready for them on their +return. Young Brassington himself had a big sheep-run round there. The railway +wasn’t thought of in those days, or if it was, no Brassington could have +dreamed that the line could have been brought to Solong in any other direction +than through the property of the “Big Brassingtons,” as they were +called. Well, the young couple went to Sydney, but whether they went farther +the old residents did not know. All they knew was that within a few weeks, and +before the stone foundations for the brick walls of the house were completed, +the building contract was cancelled, the workmen were dismissed, and the place +was left as I last saw it; only the ornamental pines had now grown to trees. +The Brassingtons and the bride’s people were English families and +reserved. They kept the story, if there was a story, to themselves. The +girl’s people left the district and squatted on new stations up-country. +The Big Brassingtons came down in the world and drifted to the city, as many +smaller people do, more and more every year. Neither young Brassington nor his +wife was ever again seen or heard of in the district. +</p> + +<p> +I attended my relative’s funeral, and next day started back for Sydney. +</p> + +<p> +Just as we reached Ilford, as it happened, the pin of the fore under-carriage +of the coach broke, and it took the blacksmith several hours to set it right. +The place was dull, the publican was not communicative—or else he harped +on the old local grievance of the railway not having come that way—so +about half an hour before I thought the coach would be ready, I walked on along +the road to stretch by legs. I walked on and on until I came, almost unaware, +to the site of the house that was never built. The tent was still there, in +fact, it was a permanent camp, and I was rather surprised to see the man +working with a trowel on a corner of the unfinished foundations of the house. +At first I thought he was going to build a stone hut in the corner, but when I +got close to him I saw that he was working carefully on the original plan of +the building: he was building the unfinished parts of the foundation walls up +to the required height. He had bricklayer’s tools, a bag of lime, and a +heap of sand, and had worked up a considerable quantity of mortar. It was a +rubble foundation: he was knocking off the thin end of a piece of stone to make +it fit, and the clanging of the trowel prevented his hearing my footsteps. +</p> + +<p> +“Good day, mate,” I said, close beside him. +</p> + +<p> +I half expected he’d start when I spoke, but he didn’t: he looked +round slowly, but with a haunted look in his eyes as if I might have been one +of his ghosts. He was a tall man, gaunt and haggard-eyed, as many men are in +the bush; he may have been but little past middle age, and grey before his +time. +</p> + +<p> +“Good day,” he said, and he set the stone in its place, carefully +flush with the outer edge of the wall, before he spoke again. Then he looked at +the sun, which was low, laid down his trowel, and asked me to come to the +tent-fire. “It’s turning chilly,” he said. It was a model +camp, everything clean and neat both inside the tent and out; he had made a +stone fireplace with a bark shelter over it, and a table and bench under +another little shed, with shelves for his tin cups and plates and cooking +utensils. He put a box in front of the fire and folded a flour-bag on top of it +for a seat for me, and hung the billy over the fire. He sat on his heels and +poked the burning sticks, abstractedly I thought, or to keep his hands and +thoughts steady. +</p> + +<p> +“I see you’re doing a bit of building,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he said, keeping his eyes on the fire; “I’m +getting on with it slowly.” +</p> + +<p> +I don’t suppose he looked at me half a dozen times the whole while I was +in his camp. When he spoke he talked just as if he were sitting yarning in a +row of half a dozen of us. Presently he said suddenly, and giving the fire a +vicious dig with his poker: +</p> + +<p> +“That house must be finished by Christmas.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why?” I asked, taken by surprise. “What’s the +hurry?” +</p> + +<p> +“Because,” he said, “I’m going to be married in the New +Year—to the best and dearest girl in the bush.” +</p> + +<p> +There was an awkward pause on my part, but presently I pulled myself together. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll never finish it by yourself,” I said. “Why +don’t you put on some men?” +</p> + +<p> +“Because,” he said, “I can’t trust them. Besides, how +am I to get bricklayers and carpenters in a place like this?” +</p> + +<p> +I noticed all through that his madness or the past in his mind was mixed up +with the real and the present. +</p> + +<p> +“Couldn’t you postpone the marriage?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“No!” he exclaimed, starting to his feet. “No!” and he +looked round wildly on the darkening bush. There was madness in his tone that +time, the last “No!” sounding as if from a man who was begging for +his life. +</p> + +<p> +“Couldn’t you run up a shanty then, to live in until the house is +ready?” I suggested, to soothe him. +</p> + +<p> +He gave his arm an impatient swing. “Do you think I’d ask that girl +to live in a hut?” he said. “She ought to live in a palace!” +</p> + +<p> +There seemed no way out of it, so I said nothing: he turned his back and stood +looking away over the dark, low-lying sweep of bush towards sunset. He folded +his arms tight, and seemed to me to be holding himself. After a while he let +fall his arms and turned and blinked at me and the fire like a man just woke +from a doze or rousing himself out of a deep reverie. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I almost forgot the billy!” he said. “I’ll make +some tea—you must be hungry.” +</p> + +<p> +He made the tea and fried a couple of slices of ham; he laid the biggest slice +on a thick slice of white baker’s bread on a tin plate, and put it and a +pint-pot full of tea on a box by my side. “Have it here, by the +fire,” he said; “it’s warmer and more comfortable.” +</p> + +<p> +I took the plate on my knee, and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed that meal. The +bracing mountain air and the walk had made me hungry. The hatter had his meal +standing up, cutting his ham on a slice of bread with a clasp-knife. It was +bush fashion, and set me thinking of some old times. He ate very little, and, +as far as I saw, he didn’t smoke. Non-smokers are very scarce in the +bush. +</p> + +<p> +I saw by the way his tent was pitched and his camp arranged generally, and by +the way he managed the cooking, that he must have knocked about the bush for +some years. +</p> + +<p> +He put the plates and things away and came and sat down on the other empty +gin-case by my side, and fell to poking the fire again. He never showed the +least curiosity as to who I was, or where I came from, or what I was doing on +this deserted track: he seemed to take me as a matter of course—but all +this was in keeping with bush life in general. +</p> + +<p> +Presently he got up and stood looking upwards over the place where the house +should have been. +</p> + +<p> +“I think now,” he said slowly, “I made a mistake in not +having the verandas carried all round the house.” +</p> + +<p> +“I—I beg pardon!” +</p> + +<p> +“I should have had the balcony all round instead of on two sides only, as +the man who made the plan suggested; it would have looked better and made the +house cooler in summer.” +</p> + +<p> +I thought as I listened, and presently I saw that it was a case of madness +within madness, so to speak: he was mad on the idea that he could build the +house himself, and then he had moods when he imagined that the house had been +built and he had been married and had reared a family. +</p> + +<p> +“You could easily get the balcony carried round,” I said; “it +wouldn’t cost much—you can get good carpenters at Solong.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he said. “I’ll have it done after +Christmas.” Then he turned from the house and blinked down at me. +“I am sorry,” he said, “that there’s no one at home. I +sent the wife and family to Sydney for a change. I’ve got the two boys at +the Sydney Grammar School. I think I’ll send the eldest to King’s +School at Parramatta. The girls will have to get along with a governess at home +and learn to help their mother—” +</p> + +<p> +And so he went on talking away just as a man who has made money in the bush, +and is married and settled down, might yarn to an old bachelor bush mate. +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose I’ll have to get a good piano,” he went on. +“The girls must have some amusement: there’ll be no end of balls +and parties. I suppose the boys will soon be talking of getting +‘fivers’ and ‘tenners’ out of the ‘guvner’ +or ‘old man.’ It’s the way of the world. And they’ll +marry and leave us. It’s the way of the world—” +</p> + +<p> +It was awful to hear him go on like this, the more so because he never +smiled—just talked on as if he had said the same thing over and over +again. Presently he stopped, and his eyes and hands began to wander: he sat +down on his heel to the fire again and started poking it. I began to feel +uneasy; I didn’t know what other sides there might be to his madness, and +wished the coach would come along. +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve knocked about the bush a good deal?” I asked. I +couldn’t think of anything else to say, and I thought he might break +loose if I let him brood too long. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he said, “I have.” +</p> + +<p> +“Been in Queensland and the Gulf country, I suppose?” +</p> + +<p> +“I have.” +</p> + +<p> +His tone and manner seemed a bit more natural. He had knocked about pretty well +all over Australia, and had been in many places where I had been. I had got him +on the right track, and after a bit he started telling bush yarns and +experiences, some of them awful, some of them very funny, and all of them short +and good; and now and then, looking at the side of his face, which was all he +turned to me, I thought I detected the ghost of a smile. +</p> + +<p> +One thing I noticed about him; when he spoke as a madman, he talked like a man +who had been fairly well educated (or sometimes, I fancied, like a young fellow +who was studying to be a school-teacher); his speech was deliberate and his +grammar painfully correct—far more so than I have made it; but when he +spoke as an old bushman, he dropped his g’s and often turned his grammar +back to front. But that reminds me that I have met English college men who did +the same thing after being a few years in the bush; either they dropped their +particular way of speaking because it was mimicked, because they were laughed +and chaffed out of it, or they fell gradually into the habit of talking as +rough bushmen do (they learnt Australian), as clean-mouthed men fall, in spite +of themselves, into the habit of swearing in the heat and hurry and rough life +of a shearing-shed. And, coming back into civilized life, these men, who had +been well brought up, drop into their old manner and style of speaking as +readily as the foulest-mouthed man in a shed or camp—who, amongst his +fellows, cannot say three words without an oath—can, when he finds +himself in a decent home in the woman-and-girl world, yarn by the hour without +letting slip a solitary little damn. +</p> + +<p> +The hatter warmed up the tea-billy again, got out some currant buns, which he +had baked himself in the camp-oven, and we were yarning comfortably like two +old bushmen, and I had almost forgotten that he was “ratty,” when +we heard the coach coming. I jumped up to hurry down to the road. This seemed +to shake him up. He gripped my hand hard and glanced round in his frightened, +haunted way. I never saw the eyes of a man look so hopeless and helpless as his +did just then. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m sorry you’re going,” he said, in a hurried way. +“I’m sorry you’re going. But—but they all go. Come +again, come again—we’ll all be glad to see you.” +</p> + +<p> +I had to hurry off and leave him. “We all,” I suppose, meant +himself and his ghosts. +</p> + +<p> +I ran down between the two rows of pines and reached the road just as the coach +came up. I found the publican from Ilford aboard—he was taking a trip to +Sydney. As the coach went on I looked up the clearing and saw the hatter +standing straight behind the fire, with his arms folded and his face turned in +our direction. He looked ghastly in the firelight, and at that distance his +face seemed to have an expression of listening blindness. I looked round on the +dark bush, with, away to the left, the last glow of sunset fading from the bed +of it, like a bed of reddening coals, and I looked up at the black loom of +Aaron’s Pass, and thought that never a man, sane or mad, was left in such +a depth of gloomy loneliness. +</p> + +<p> +“I see you’ve been yarning with him yonder,” said the +publican, who seemed to have relaxed wonderfully. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“You know these parts, don’t you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes. I was about here as a boy.” +</p> + +<p> +He asked me what my name might be. I told him it was Smith. He blinked a while. +</p> + +<p> +“I never heard of anyone by the name of Smith in the district,” he +said. +</p> + +<p> +Neither had I. I told him that we lived at Solong, and didn’t stay long. +It saved time. +</p> + +<p> +“Ever heard of the Big Brassingtons?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“Ever heard the yarn of the house that wasn’t built?” +</p> + +<p> +I told him how much I had heard of it. +</p> + +<p> +“And that’s about all any on ’em knows. Have you any idea who +that man back yonder is?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I have.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, who do you think it is?” +</p> + +<p> +“He is, or rather he was, young Brassington.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ve hit it!” said the publican. “I know—and a +few others.” +</p> + +<p> +“And do you know what became of his wife?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“I do,” said the shanty-keeper, who had a generous supply of whisky +with him, and seemed to have begun to fill himself up for the trip. +</p> + +<p> +He said no more for a while, and when I had remained silent long enough, he +went on, very deliberately and impressively: +</p> + +<p> +“One yarn is that the girl wasn’t any good; that when she was +married to Brassington, and as soon as they got to Sydney, she met a chap +she’d been carrying on with before she married Brassington (or that +she’d been married to in secret), an’ she cleared off with him, +leaving her fortnight-old husband. That was one yarn.” +</p> + +<p> +“Was it?” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said the publican. “That yarn was a lie.” He +opened a flask of whisky and passed it round. +</p> + +<p> +“There was madness in the family,” he said, after a nip. +</p> + +<p> +“Whose?” I asked. “Brassington’s?” +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said the publican, in a tone that implied contempt at my +ignorance, in spite of its innocence, “the girl’s. Her mother had +been in a ’sylum, and so had her grandmother. It was—it was +heridited. Some madnesses is heridited, an’ some comes through worry and +hard graft (that’s mine), an’ some comes through drink, and some +through worse, and, but as far as I’ve heard, all madnesses is pretty +much the same. My old man was a warder in a ’sylum. They have their +madnesses a bit different, the same as boozers has their d.t.’s +different; but, takin’ it by the lump, it’s pretty much all the +same. The difference is accordin’ to their natures when they’re +sane. All men are—” +</p> + +<p> +“But about young Mrs Brassington,” I interrupted. +</p> + +<p> +“Young Mrs Brassington? Rosy Webb she was, daughter of Webb the squatter. +Rosy was the brightest, best, good-heartedest, an’ most ladylike little +girl in the district, an’ the heriditry business come on her in Sydney, +about a week after she was married to young Brassington. She was only twenty. +Here—” He passed the flask round. +</p> + +<p> +“And what happened?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“What happened?” he repeated. Then he pulled himself together, as +if conscious that he had shown signs of whisky. “Everything was done, but +it was no use. She died in a year in a ’sylum.” +</p> + +<p> +“How do you know that?” +</p> + +<p> +“How do I know that?” he repeated in a tone of contempt. “How +do I know that? Well, I’ll tell you how. <i>My old wife</i> was in +service at Brassington’s station at the time—the oldest +servant—an’ young Brassington wired to her from Sydney to come and +help him in his trouble. Old Mrs Brassington was bedridden, an’ they +kep’ it from her.” +</p> + +<p> +“And about young Brassington?” +</p> + +<p> +“About young Brassington? He took a swag an’ wandered through the +bush. We’ve had him at our place several times all these years, but he +always wandered off again. My old woman tried everything with him, but it was +all no use. Years ago she used to get him to talk of things as they was, in +hopes of bringin’ his mind back, but he was always worse after. She does +all she can for him even now, but he’s mighty independent. The last five +or six years he’s been taken with the idea of buildin’ that cursed +house. He’ll stay there till he gets short of money, an’ then +he’ll go out back, shearin’, stock-ridin’, drovin’, +cookin’, fencin’—anything till he gets a few pounds. Then +he’ll settle down and build away at that bloody house. He’s knocked +about so much that he’s a regular old bushman. While he’s an old +bushman he’s all right an’ amusin’ an’ good +company;—but when he’s Brassington he’s mad—Don’t +you ever let on to my old woman that I told you. I allers let my tongue run a +bit when I get out of that hole we’re living in. We’ve kept the +secret all these years, but what does it matter now?—I ask you.” +</p> + +<p> +“It doesn’t matter much,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +“Nothing matters much, it seems to me, nothing matters a damn. The Big +Brassingtons come down years ago; the old people’s gone, and the young +scattered God knows where or how. The Webbs (the girl’s people) are away +up in new country, an’ the girls (they was mostly all girls) are married +an’ settled down by this time. We kept the secret, an’ the Webbs +kept the secret—even when the dirty yarns was goin’ +round—so’s not to spoil the chances of the other girls. What about +the chances of their husbands? Some on ’em might be in the same hell as +Brassington for all I know. The Brassingtons kept the secret because I suppose +they reckoned it didn’t matter much. Nothing matters much in this +world—” +</p> + +<p> +But I was thinking of another young couple who had married long ago, whose +married life was twenty long years of shameful quarrels, of useless brutal +recrimination—not because either was bad, but because their natures were +too much alike; of the house that was built, of the family that was reared, of +the sons and daughters who “went wrong,” of the father and mother +separated after twenty years, of the mother dead of a broken heart, of the +father (in a lunatic asylum), whose mania was not to build houses, but to +obtain and secrete matches for the purpose of burning houses down. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0018" id="link2H_4_0018"></a> +“BARNEY, TAKE ME HOME AGAIN”</h2> + +<p> +This is a sketch of one of the many ways in which a young married woman, who is +naturally thick-skinned and selfish—as most women are—and who +thinks she loves her husband, can spoil his life because he happens to be +good-natured, generous, sensitive, weak or soft, whichever you like to call it. +</p> + +<p> +Johnson went out to Australia a good many years ago with his young wife and two +children, as assisted emigrants. He should have left his wife and children with +her mother, in a street off City Road, N., and gone out by himself and got +settled down comfortably and strengthened in the glorious climate and +democratic atmosphere of Australia, and in the knowledge that he could worry +along a while without his wife, before sending for her. That bit of knowledge +would have done her good also, and it would have been better for both of them. +But no man knows the future, and few can prescribe for their own wives. If we +saw our married lives as others see them, half of us would get divorced. But +Johnson was sentimental, he could not bear to part from his wife for a little +while. Moreover, man is instinctively against leaving his wife behind; it may +be either a natural or a cowardly instinct-but we won’t argue that. I +don’t believe that Johnson was a coward in that direction; I believe that +he trusted his wife implicitly, or rather that he never dreamed of such a +thing—as is the way with most married men. Sentiment is selfishness, +perhaps, but we won’t argue that, such arguments come to nothing. +</p> + +<p> +I heard from a fellow-passenger of Johnson’s that he had “a hell of +a voyage” because of his young wife’s ignorant selfishness and his +own sensitiveness; he bribed stewards for better food and accommodation for his +wife and children, paid the stewardess to help with the children, got neither +rest, nor peace, nor thanks for himself, and landed in Sydney a nervous wreck, +with five pounds out of the ten he started with. +</p> + +<p> +Johnson was a carpenter. He got work from a firm of contractors in Sydney, who, +after giving him a fortnight’s trial, sent him up-country to work on the +railway station buildings, at the little pastoral mining and farming town of +Solong. The railway having come to Solong, things were busy in the building +line, and Johnson settled there. +</p> + +<p> +Johnson was thin when he came to Solong; he had landed a living skeleton, he +said, but he filled out later on. The democratic atmosphere soothed his mind +and he soon loved the place for its unconventional hospitality. He worked hard +and seemed to have plenty of energy—he said he got it in Australia. He +said that another year of the struggle in London would have driven him mad. He +fished in the river on Saturday afternoons and Sundays, and, perhaps for the +first month or so, he thought that he had found peace. Johnson’s wife was +a rather stout, unsympathetic-looking young woman, with the knit of obstinacy +in her forehead; she had that stamp of “hardness” on her face which +is the rule amongst English and the exception amongst Australian women. We of +Solong thought her hard, selfish and narrow-minded, and paltry; later on we +thought she was a “bit touched;” but local people often think that +of strangers. +</p> + +<p> +By her voice and her habit of whining she should have been a thin, sharp-faced, +untidy, draggled-tailed woman in a back street in London, or a worn-out +selector’s wife in the bush. She whined about the climate. “It will +kill the children! It will kill the children! We’ll never rear them +here!” She whined about the “wretched hole in the bush” that +her husband had brought her to; and to the women whom she condescended to +visit—because a woman must have a woman to talk to—she exaggerated +the miseries of the voyage until the thing became a sing-song from repetition. +Later on she settled down to endless accounts of her home in London, of her +mother and sisters, of the way they lived. “And I’ll never see it +any more. I’ll never see them any more.” +</p> + +<p> +The Solong climate was reckoned the best in Australia; the “wretched +hole” was a pretty little town on the banks of a clear, willow-bordered +river, with vineyards on the slopes, and surrounded by a circle of blue hills +and peaks. We knew nothing of London, so she had her own way there. +</p> + +<p> +“She’ll feel a bit lonely at first, but she’ll soon get used +to Australia,” said Johnson. He seemed to me to go out of his way to +excuse his wife. +</p> + +<p> +Johnson had had a few contracts in England at one time; they had been in +“better circumstances”—that was the time she looked back to +in England; the last two years of bitter, black struggle at “home” +seemed a blank in her mind—but that’s how women jump over facts +when they have a selfish fad. +</p> + +<p> +Johnson rented a cottage and garden on the bank of the sunny river. He said he +took the place because there was ivy growing on the cottage, and it might cheer +his wife; but he had lost sight of the fact that, while he had been born in an +English village, his wife had been born and bred in London, and had probably +never noticed ivy. She said it was worse than living in a slum. +</p> + +<p> +Johnson was clever at his trade, and at many other things, but his wife +didn’t seem aware of it. He was well liked, he grew to be popular, but +she didn’t seem proud of the fact; she never seemed interested in him or +his prospects. She only wanted him to take her home again. We mustn’t +forget that while he had a rush of work to occupy his mind she had not. +</p> + +<p> +But Johnson grew stouter and prospered in spite of his wife—for a year or +so. New schools were being built in the district and the town was practically +re-built. Johnson took contracts for brickwork, plumbing and house-painting, as +well as carpentering, and had at one time as many as ten men in his employ. He +was making money. +</p> + +<p> +I was working at my trade then, house-painting, and worked for Johnson. I +lodged at his cottage for a while, but soon got tired of hearing about London, +and Mrs Johnson’s mother and sisters, and the house they lived in, and +the street it was in, and the parks where they used to take their babies, and +the shopping on Saturday afternoon. That woman was terrible. She was at Johnson +all the time about taking her home. “We’ll surely be able to go +home this year, Will.” “You promised to take me home by the end of +the year.” “Mother says in her last letter, that Jack says +there’s more building going on about London than ever.” +“You’ll do just as well in London as you’ll do here.” +“What chance have the children got in a hole like this?” And the +rest of it—every night. When he took a new contract, it would be, +“What did you want to take that new contract for, Will, when we’re +going home? You know you promised me you wouldn’t take any more +contracts.” First he’d try to cheer her, then he’d argue; but +she’d only sit with the knit in her forehead deep, looking as obstinate +as a mule. Then she’d sit down to a little harmonium he’d bought +her and play and sing “Barney, take me Home again,” and “The +Old Folks at Home,” and “Swannie Ribber,” till I felt like +hanging myself—and I wasn’t an exile. Sometimes Johnson would flare +up and there’d be a row and he’d go to the pub. Gentle persuasion, +argument, or swearing, it was all the same with her. +</p> + +<p> +Bosses and men were different towards each other in Solong to what they are in +London; besides, when I wasn’t Johnson’s sub-contractor I was his +foreman—so we often had a few drinks together; and one night over a beer +(and after a breeze at home, I think) he said to me: +</p> + +<p> +“I can’t make it out, Harry; there was nothing but struggle and +worry and misery for us in England, and London was smothering me, my chest was +bad and the wife was always in ill-health; but I suppose I’ll have to +take her home in the end or else she’ll go melancholy mad!” And he +drew a breath that was more like a gasp than a sigh. +</p> + +<p> +“Why not send her home for a trip, or a year or so, boss?” I asked. +“As likely as not she’ll be just as eager to get back; and that +will be the end of it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I couldn’t do that, Harry,” said Johnson. “I +couldn’t stay here and work alone. It would be like beginning life again; +I’ve started twice and couldn’t start the third time. You’ll +understand when you’re married, Harry.” +</p> + +<p> +Well, in the end, she wore Johnson out—or wore into him rather. He drank +more, and once or twice I saw him drinking alone. Sometimes he’d +“round on us” at work for nothing at all, and at other times +he’d take no interest in the jobs—he’d let the work go on +anyhow. Some thought that Johnson was getting too big for his boots, +that’s how men are misjudged. He grew moody and melancholy and thin +again. Johnson was homesick himself. No doubt it was the misery of his domestic +life in Australia that made him so. +</p> + +<p> +Towards the end of the third or fourth year Johnson threw up a couple of +contracts he had on hand, sacrificed a piece of land which he had bought and on +which he had built a cottage in the short time he had been in Solong, and, one +lovely day in June, when the skies were their fairest, the hills their bluest, +the river its widest and clearest, and the grass was waving waist high after +rain—one blue and green and golden day the Johnsons left Solong, with the +trunks they had brought out with them, for Sydney, <i>en route</i> for smoky +London. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Johnson was a woman transformed—she was happy and looked it. The last +few weeks she had seemed in every way the opposite of the woman we had known: +cheerful, kind to neighbours in sickness and trouble, even generous; she made +many small presents in the way of mantelshelf ornaments, pictures, and +house-linen. But then it was Johnson who had to pay for that in the end. +</p> + +<p> +He looked worn and worried at the railway station—more like himself as he +was when he first came to Solong—and as the train moved off I thought he +looked—well, frightened. +</p> + +<p> +That must have been nearly twenty years ago. +</p> + +<p> +London last winter. It was one of those days when London’s lurid sun +shows up for a little while like a smoky danger signal. The snow had melted +from the house-tops and the streets were as London streets are after the first +fall of snow of the season. But I could stand the flat no longer, I had to go +out and walk. I was sun-sick—I was heart-sick for the sun, for the sunny +South—for grassy plains, blue mountains, sweeps of mountain bush and +sunny ocean beaches. I walked hard; I walked till I was mud-splashed to the +shoulders; I walked through the squalid, maddening sameness of miles of dingy, +grimy-walled blocks and rows of four-storied houses till I felt +smothered—jailed, hopelessly. “Best get home and in, and draw the +blinds on it,” I said, “or my brain will turn.” +</p> + +<p> +I was about to ask a policeman where I was when I saw, by the name on a corner +of the buildings, that I was in City Road, North. All the willow-fringed rivers +and the sunny hills of Solong flashed before me at the sight of the name of +that street. I had not been able to recall the name of the street off City Road +in which the Johnsons lived, though I had heard it often enough in the old days +from the tongue of Mrs Johnson. +</p> + +<p> +I felt it would be a relief to see anyone who had been in Australia. +“Now,” I thought, “if I walk along City Road and see the name +of that street I’ll remember it”—and I did. It was a blind +street, like the long, narrow yard of a jail, walled by dark houses, all alike. +The next door but one to that at which I knocked to inquire was where the +Johnsons lived; they lived in a four-storied house, or rather a narrow section +of a four-storied terrace. I found later on that they paid the land-lord, or +nearly paid him, by letting lodgings. They lived in one room with the use of +the parlour and the kitchen when the lodgers weren’t using them, and the +son shared a room with a lodger. The back windows looked out on the dead wall +of a poorhouse of some kind, the front on rows of similar windows +opposite—rows of the same sort of windows that run for miles and miles in +London. In one a man sat smoking in his shirtsleeves, from another a slavey +leaned out watching a fourwheeler that had stopped next door, in a third a +woman sat sewing, and in a fourth a woman was ironing, with a glimpse of a +bedstead behind her. And all outside was gloom and soot and slush. +</p> + +<p> +I would never have recognized the Johnsons. I have visited them several times +since and their faces are familiar to me now, but I don’t know whether +any traces of the old likenesses worked up in my memory. I found Johnson an old +man—old and grey before his time. He had a grizzly stubble round his chin +and cheeks towards the end of the week, because he could only afford a shave on +Saturday afternoon. He was working at some branch of his trade “in the +shop” I understood, but he said he felt the work come heavier on him +every winter. “I’ve felt very poorly this last winter or +two,” he said, “very poorly indeed.” He was very sad and +gentle. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Johnson was old and thin-looking, but seemed cheerful and energetic. Some +chest trouble kept her within doors most of the winter. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t mind so long as I can manage,” she said, “but +Johnson gets so depressed.” +</p> + +<p> +They seemed very kind towards each other; they spoke little of Australia, and +then only as an incident in their lives which was not of any +importance—had long been past and done with. It was all “before we +went to Australia” or “after we came back from Australia,” +with Mrs Johnson. +</p> + +<p> +The son, whom I remembered as a bright, robust little fellow, was now a tall, +white-faced, clean-shaven young man, a clerk on thirty shillings a week. He +wore, on Saturday afternoons and Sundays, a tall hat and a frock coat and +overcoat made cheaply in the latest fashion, so he couldn’t afford to +help the old folk much. +</p> + +<p> +“David is very extravagant,” said the old man, gently. “He +won’t wear anything when once the gloss is off it. But,” with a sad +smile, “I get the left-off overcoats.” +</p> + +<p> +He took me across to see his daughter. She had married a tradesman and they +were having a hard struggle in three rooms in a workman’s dwelling. She +was twenty-five, thin, yellow, and looking ten years older. +</p> + +<p> +There were other children who had died. “I think we might have done +better for the children in Australia,” said the old man to me, sadly, +when we got outside, “but we did our best.” +</p> + +<p> +We went into a hotel and had a drink. Johnson had treated last +time—twenty years before. We call treating “shouting” in +Australia. Presently Johnson let fall a word or two of Australian slang, and +brightened up wonderfully; we got back out into Australia at once and stayed +there an hour or so. Being an old man, Johnson’s memory for the long ago +was better than mine, and I picked up links; and, in return, I told him what +Solong was like now, and how some men he knew, who were going up, had gone +down, and others, who were going to the dogs in his time, had gone up—and +we philosophized. About one he’d say, “Ah, well! who’d have +thought it! I never thought that boy would come to any good;” about +another, “Ah, well! and he might have been an independent man.” How +familiar that expression sounded!—I think it is used more often in +Australia than in any other country: “He might have been an independent +man.” +</p> + +<p> +When I left Johnson I felt less lonely in London, and rather humbled in spirit. +He seemed so resigned—I had never seen such gentle sadness in a +man’s eyes, nor heard it in a man’s voice. I could get back to +Australia somehow and start life again, but Johnson’s day had been dead +for many years. “Besides, assisted emigration’s done away with +now,” he said, with his sad, sad smile. +</p> + +<p> +I saw the Johnsons again later on. “Things have been going very sadly +with us, very sadly indeed,” said the old man, when we’d settled +down. He had broken down at the beginning of the winter, he had dragged himself +out of bed and to work and back again until he could do so no longer; he had +been laid up most of the winter. Mrs Johnson had not been outside the door for +months. +</p> + +<p> +“It comes very hard on us,” she said, “and I’m so +poorly, and David out of work, too. I wouldn’t mind if I could get about. +But,” she went on in her energetic manner, “we’ve had the +house full all the winter; we’ve had very good luck with the lodgers, all +respectable people, and one of them answers the door and that keeps me away +from the draught—so it might be worse, mightn’t it? But Johnson +doesn’t seem to mend at all, and he gets so terribly depressed. But the +warm weather coming on, etc.” +</p> + +<p> +They and the Lord only knew how they managed to live, for they are honest +people and the lodgers scarcely pay the rent of the house. There was only David +between them and the poorhouse, as far as I could see. +</p> + +<p> +Johnson came out with me a piece and we had a drink or two together—his +was gin hot. He talked a good deal about Australia, but sadly and regretfully +on this occasion. +</p> + +<p> +“We could have done well in Australia,” he said, “very well +indeed. I might have been independent and the children well started in life. +But we did things for the best. Mrs Johnson didn’t like Australia, you +know. It was a pity we didn’t stay there, a great pity. We would have +done far better than in England. I’d go out again now if I had the money, +but I’m getting too old.” +</p> + +<p> +“Would Mrs Johnson go out?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes. But I’m afraid she wouldn’t stand the voyage.... +Things have been very sad with us ever since we came back to England, very sad +indeed.” And after a while he suddenly caught his breath. +</p> + +<p> +“It takes me that way sometimes,” he said. “I catch my breath +just as if I was going to lose it.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0019" id="link2H_4_0019"></a> +A DROVING YARN</h2> + +<p> +Andy Maculloch had heard that old Bill Barker, the well-known overland drover, +had died over on the Westralian side, and Dave Regan told a yarn about Bill. +</p> + +<p> +“Bill Barker,” said Dave, talking round his pipe stem, “was +the <i>quintessence</i> of a drover—” +</p> + +<p> +“The whatter, Dave?” came the voice of Jim Bentley, in startled +tones, from the gloom on the far end of the veranda. +</p> + +<p> +“The quintessence,” said Dave, taking his pipe out of his mouth. +“You shut up, Jim. As I said, Bill Barker was the quintessence of a +drover. He’d been at the game ever since he was a nipper. He run away +from home when he was fourteen and went up into Queensland. He’s been all +over Queensland and New South Wales and most of South Australia, and a good +deal of the Western, too: over the great stock routes from one end to the +other, Lord knows how many times. No man could keep up with him riding out, and +no one could bring a mob of cattle or a flock of sheep through like him. He +knew every trick of the game; if there was grass to be had Bill’d get it, +no matter whose run it was on. One of his games in a dry season was to let his +mob get boxed with the station stock on a run where there was grass, and before +Bill’s men and the station-hands could cut ’em out, the travelling +stock would have a good bellyful to carry them on the track. Billy was the +daddy of the drovers. Some said that he could ride in his sleep, and that he +had one old horse that could jog along in his sleep too, and +that—travelling out from home to take charge of a mob of bullocks or a +flock of sheep—Bill and his horse would often wake up at daylight and +blink round to see where they were and how far they’d got. Then Bill +would make a fire and boil his quart-pot, and roast a bit of mutton, while his +horse had a mouthful of grass and a spell. +</p> + +<p> +“You remember Bill, Andy? Big dark man, and a joker of the loud sort. +Never slept with a blanket over him—always folded under him on the sand +or grass. Seldom wore a coat on the route—though he always carried one +with him, in case he came across a bush ball or a funeral. Moleskins, flannel +waistcoat, cabbage-tree hat and ’lastic-side boots. When it was roasting +hot on the plains and the men swore at the heat, Jim would yell, ‘Call +this hot? Why, you blanks, I’m freezin’! Where’s me +overcoat?’ When it was raining and hailing and freezing on Bell’s +Line in the Blue Mountains in winter, and someone shivered and asked, ‘Is +it cold enough for yer now, Bill?’ ‘Cold!’ Bill would bellow, +‘I’m sweatin’!’ +</p> + +<p> +“I remember it well. I was little more than a youngster then—Bill +Barker came past our place with about a thousand fat sheep for the Homebush +sale-yards at Sydney, and he gave me a job to help him down with them on +Bell’s Line over the mountains, and mighty proud I was to go with him, I +can tell you. One night we camped on the Cudgegong River. The country was dry +and pretty close cropped and we’d been “sweating” the +paddocks all along there for our horses. You see, where there weren’t +sliprails handy we’d just take the tomahawk and nick the top of a +straight-grained fence-post, just above the mortise, knock out the wood there, +lift the top rail out and down, and jump the horses in over the lower +one—it was all two-rail fences around there with sheep wires under the +lower rail. And about daylight we’d have the horses out, lift back the +rail, and fit in the chock that we’d knocked out. Simple as striking +matches, wasn’t it? +</p> + +<p> +“Well, the horses were getting a good bellyful in the police horse +paddock at night, and Bill took the first watch with the sheep. It was very +cold and frosty on the flat and he thought the sheep might make back for the +ridges, it’s always warmer up in the ridges in winter out of the frost. +Bill roused me out about midnight. ‘There’s the sheep,’ he +says, pointing to a white blur. ‘They’ve settled down. I think +they’ll be quiet till daylight. Don’t go round them; there’s +no occasion to go near ’em. You can stop by the fire and keep an eye on +’em.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The night seemed very long. I watched and smoked and toasted my shins, +and warmed the billy now and then, and thought up pretty much the same sort of +old things that fellers on night watch think over all over the world. Bill lay +on his blanket, with his back to the fire and his arm under his +head—freezing on one side and roasting on the other. He never moved. I +itched once or twice to turn him over and bake the front of him—I +reckoned he was about done behind. +</p> + +<p> +“At last daylight showed. I took the billy and started down to the river +to get some water to make coffee; but half-way down, near the sheep camp, I +stopped and stared, I was never so surprised in my life. The white blur of +sheep had developed into a couple of acres of long dead silver grass! +</p> + +<p> +“I woke Bill, and he swore as I never heard a man swear before—nor +since. He swore at the sheep, and the grass, and at me; but it would have +wasted time, and besides I was too sleepy and tired to fight. But we found +those sheep scattered over a scrubby ridge about seven miles back, so they must +have slipped away back of the grass and started early in Bill’s watch, +and Bill must have watched that blessed grass for the first half of the night +and then set me to watch it. He couldn’t get away from that. +</p> + +<p> +“I wondered what the chaps would say if it got round that Bill Barker, +the boss overland drover, had lost a thousand sheep in clear country with +fences all round; and I suppose he thought that way too, for he kept me with +him right down to Homebush, and when he paid me off he threw in an extra quid, +and he said: +</p> + +<p> +“‘Now, listen here, Dave! If I ever hear a word from anyone about +watching that gory grass, I’ll find you, Dave, and murder you, if +you’re in wide Australia. I’ll screw your neck, so look out.’ +</p> + +<p> +“But he’s dead now, so it doesn’t matter.” +</p> + +<p> +There was silence for some time after Dave had finished. The chaps made no +comment on the yarn, either one way or the other, but sat smoking thoughtfully, +and in a vague atmosphere as of sadness—as if they’d just heard of +their mother’s death and had not been listening to an allegedly humorous +yarn. +</p> + +<p> +Then the voice of old Peter, the station-hand, was heard to growl from the +darkness at the end of the hut, where he sat on a three-bushel bag on the +ground with his back to the slabs. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s old Peter growlin’ about?” someone asked. +</p> + +<p> +“He wants to know where Dave got that word,” someone else replied. +</p> + +<p> +“What word?” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Quint-essents</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a chuckle. +</p> + +<p> +“He got it out back, Peter,” said Mitchell, the shearer. “He +got it from a new chum.” +</p> + +<p> +“How much did yer give for it, Dave?” growled Peter. +</p> + +<p> +“Five shillings, Peter,” said Dave, round his pipe stem. “And +stick of tobacco thrown in.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter seemed satisfied, for he was heard no more that evening. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0020" id="link2H_4_0020"></a> +GETTIN’ BACK ON DAVE REGAN</h2> + +<h3>A RATHER FISHY YARN FROM THE BUSH</h3> + +<p> +(AS TOLD BY JAMES NOWLETT, BULLOCK-DRIVER) +</p> + +<p> +You might work this yarn up. I’ve often thought of doin’ it meself, +but I ain’t got the words. I knowed a lot of funny an’ rum yarns +about the bush, an’ I often wished I had the gift o’ writin’. +I could tell a lot better yarns than the rot they put in books sometimes, but I +never had no eddication. But you might be able to work this yarn up—as +yer call it. +</p> + +<p> +There useter be a teamster’s camp six or seven miles out of Mudgee, at a +place called th’ Old Pipeclay, in the days before the railroad went round +to Dubbo, an’ most of us bullickies useter camp there for the night. +There was always good water in the crick, an’ sometimes we’d turn +the bullicks up in the ridge, an’ gullies behind for grass, an’ +camp there for a few days, and do our washin’ an’ mendin’, +and make new yokes perhaps, an tinker up the wagons. +</p> + +<p> +There was a woman livin’ on a farm there named Mrs +Hardwick—an’ she <i>was</i> a hard wick. Her husban’, Jimmy +Hardwick was throwed from his horse agenst a stump one day when he was sober, +an’ he was killed—an’ she was a widder. She had a tidy bit +o’ land, an’ a nice bit of a orchard an’ vineyard, an some +cattle, an’ they say she had a tidy bit o’ money in the bank. She +had the worst tongue in the district, no one’s character was safe with +her; but she wasn’t old, an’ she wasn’t +bad-lookin’—only hard—so there was some fellers hangin’ +round arter her. An’ Dave Regan’s horse was hangin’ up +outside her place as often as anybody else’s. Dave was a native an’ +a bushy, an’ drover an’ a digger, an’ he was a bit soft in +them days—he got hard enough arterwards. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Hardwick hated bullick-drivers—she had a awful down on +bullickies—I dunno why. We never interfered with her fowls, an’ as +for swearin’! why, she could swear herself. Jimmy Hardwick was a +bullick-driver when she married him, an’ p’r’aps that helped +to account for it. She wouldn’t let us boil our billies at her kitchen +fire, same as any other bushwoman, an’ if one of our bullicks put his +nose under her fence for a mouthful of grass, she’d set her dogs onter +him. An’ one of her dogs got something what disagreed with him one day, +an’ she accused us of layin’ poisoned baits. An’, arter that, +she ’pounded some of our bullicks that got into her lucerne paddick one +night when we was on the spree in Mudgee, an’ put heavy damages on +’em. She’d left the sliprails down on purpose, I believe. She +talked of puttin’ the police onter us, jest as if we was a sly-grog shop. +(If <i>she’d</i> kept a sly-grog shop she’d have had a different +opinion about bullick-drivers.) An’ all the bullick-drivers hated her +because she hated bullickies. +</p> + +<p> +Well, one wet season half a dozen of us chaps was camped there for a fortnight, +because the roads was too boggy to travel, an’ one night they got up a +darnce at Peter Anderson’s shanty acrost the ridges, an’ a lot of +gals an’ fellers turned up from all round about in spite of the +pourin’ rain. Someone had kidded Dave Regan that Mother Hardwick was +comin’, an’ he turned up, of course, in spite of a ragin’ +toothache he had. He was always ridin’ the high horse over us bullickies. +It was a very cold night, enough to cut the face an’ hands off yer, so we +had a roarin’ fire in the big bark-an’-slab kitchen where the +darncin’ was. It was one of them big, old-fashioned, clay-lined +fire-places that goes right acrost the end of the room, with a twenty-five foot +slab-an’-tin chimbly outside. +</p> + +<p> +Dave Regan was pretty wild about being had, an’ we copped all the gals +for darncin’; he couldn’t get one that night, an’ when he +wasn’t proddin’ out his tooth with a red-hot wire some one was +chaffin’ him about Mrs Hardwick. So at last he got disgusted an’ +left; but before he went he got a wet three-bushel flour-bag an’ climbed +up very quietly onter the roof by the battens an’ log weights an’ +riders, an’ laid the wet bag very carefully acrost the top of the chimbly +flue. +</p> + +<p> +An’ we was a mortal hour tryin’ to find out what was the matter +with that infernal chimbly, and tackin’ bits o’ tin an’ +baggin’ acrost the top of the fire-place under the mantelshelf to try +an’ stop it from smokin’, an’ all the while the gals set +there with the water runnin’ out of their eyes. We took the green back +log out an’ fetched in a dry one, but that chimbly smoked worse than +ever, an’ we had to put the fire out altogether, an’ the gals set +there shiverin’ till the rain held up a bit an’ the sky cleared, +an’ then someone goes out an’ looks up an’ sings out, +“Why, there’s somethin’ acrost the top of the blazin’ +chimbly!” an’ someone else climbs up an’ fetches down the +bag. But the darnce was spoilt, an’ the gals was so disgusted that they +went off with their fellers while the weather held up. They reckoned some of us +bullickies did it for a lark. +</p> + +<p> +An’ arter that Dave’d come ridin’ past, an’ sing out to +know if we knew of a good cure for a smokin’ chimbly, an’ them +sorter things. But he always got away before we could pull him off of his +horse. Three of us chased him on horseback one day, but we didn’t ketch +him. +</p> + +<p> +So we made up our minds to git back on Dave some way or other, an’ it +come about this way. +</p> + +<p> +About six months arter the smoked-out darnce, four or five of us same fellers +was campin’ on th’ Pipeclay agen, an’ it was a dry season. It +was dryer an’ hotter than it was cold ’n’ wet the larst time. +Dave was still hangin’ round Mrs Hardwick’s an’ doin’ +odd jobs for her. Well, one very hot day we seen Dave ridin’ past into +Mudgee, an’ we knowed he’d have a spree in town that night, +an’ call at Mrs Hardwick’s for sympathy comin’ out next day; +an’ arter he’d been gone an hour or two, Tom Tarrant comes +drivin’ past on his mail-coach, an’ drops some letters an’ +papers an’ a bag o’ groceries at our camp. +</p> + +<p> +Tom was a hard case. I remember wonst I was drivin’ along a lonely bit +o’ track, an’ it was a grand mornin’, an’ I felt great, +an’ I got singin’ an’ practisin’ a recitation that I +allers meant to give at a bush darnce some night. (I never sung or spouted +poetry unless I was sure I was miles away from anyone.) An’ I got worked +up, an’ was wavin’ me arms about an’ throwin’ it off of +me chest, when Tom’s coach comes up behind, round a bend in the road, +an’ took me by surprise. An’ Tom looked at me very hard an’ +he says, “What are yer shoutin’ an’ swearin’ an’ +darncin’ an’ goin’ on at the bullicks like that for, Jimmy? +They seem to be workin’ all right.” It took me back, I can tell +yer. The coach was full of grinnin’ passengers, an’ the worst of it +was that I didn’t know how long Tom had been drivin’ slow behind me +an’ takin’ me out of windin’. There’s nothin’ +upsets a cove as can’t sing so much as to be caught singin’ or +spoutin’ poetry when he thinks he’s privit’. +</p> + +<p> +An’ another time I remember Tom’s coach broke down on the track, +an’ he had to ride inter town with the mails on horseback; an’ he +left a couple of greenhides, for Skinner the tanner at Mudgee, for me to take +on in the wagon, an’ a bag of potatoes for Murphy the storekeeper at Home +Rule, an’ a note that said: “Render unto Murphy the things which is +murphies, and unto Skinner them things which is skins.” Tom was a hard +case. +</p> + +<p> +Well, this day, when Tom handed down the tucker an’ letters, he got down +to stretch his legs and give the horses a breathe. The coach was full of +passengers, an’ I noticed they all looked extra glum and sulky, but I +reckoned it was the heat an’ dust. Tom looked extra solemn, too, +an’ no one was talkin’. Then I suddenly began to notice something +in the atmosphere, as if there was a dead beast not far away, an’ my +mates started sniffin’ too. An’ that reminds me, it’s funny +why some people allers sniff hard instead of keepin’ their noses shut +when there’s a stink; the more it stinks the more they sniff. Tom spit in +the dust an’ thought a while; then he took a parcel out of the boot +an’ put it on the corner post of the fence. “There,” he said, +“There’s some fresh fish that come up from Sydney by train +an’ Cobb & Co’s coach larst night. They’re meant for +White the publican at Gulgong, but they won’t keep this weather till I +git out there. Pity to waste them! you chaps might as well have a feed of +’em. I’ll tell White they went bad an’ I had to throw them +out,” says Tom. Then he got on to the coach agen an’ drove off in a +cloud of dust. We undone the brown paper, an’ the fish was in a small +deal box, with a lid fastened by a catch. We nicked back the catch an’ +the lid flew open, an’ then we knowed where the smell comed from all +right. There wasn’t any doubt about that! We didn’t have to put our +noses in the box to see if the fish was bad. They was packed in salt, but that +made no difference. +</p> + +<p> +You know how a smell will start sudden in the bush on a hot, still day, +an’ then seem to take a spell, an’ then get to work agen stronger +than ever. You might be clost alongside of a horse that has been dead a +fortnight an’ smell nothin’ particular till you start to walk away, +an’ the further you go the worse it stinks. It seems to smell most round +in a circle of a hundred yards or so. But these fish smelt from the centre +right out. Tom Tarrant told us arterwards that them fish started to smell as +soon as he left Mudgee. At first they reckoned it was a dead horse by the road; +but arter a while the passengers commenced squintin’ at each other +suspicious like, an’ the conversation petered out, an’ Tom thought +he felt all their eyes on his back, an’ it was very uncomfortable; +an’ he sat tight an’ tried to make out where the smell come from; +an’ it got worse every hundred yards—like as if the track was lined +with dead horses, an’ every one dead longer than the last—till it +was like drivin’ a funeral. An’ Tom never thought of the fish till +he got down to stretch his legs and fetched his nose on a level with the boot. +</p> + +<p> +Well, we shut down the lid of that box quick an’ took it an’ +throwed it in the bushes a good way away from the camp, but next mornin’, +while we was havin’ breakfast, Billy Grimshaw got an idea, an’ +arter breakfast he wetted a canvas bag he had an’ lit up his pipe, +an’ went an’ got that there box o’ fish, an’ put it in +the wet bag, an’ wrapped it tight round it an’ tied it up tight +with string. Billy had a nipper of a nephew with him, about fourteen, named +Tommy, an’ he was a sharp kid if ever there was one. So Billy says, +“Look here, Tommy, you take this fish up to Mrs Hardwick’s +an’ tell her that Dave Regan sent ’em with his compliments, +an’ he hopes she’ll enjoy ’em. Tell her that Dave fetched +’em from Mudgee, but he’s gone back to look for a pound note that +he dropped out of a hole in his pocket somewheers along the road, an’ he +asked you to take the fish up.” So Tommy takes the fish an’ goes up +to the house with ’em. When he come back he says that Mrs Hardwick smiled +like a parson an’ give him a shillin’—an’ he +didn’t wait. We watched the house, an’ about half an hour +arterwards we seen her run out of the kitchen with the open box in her hand, +an’ run a good way away from the house an’ throw the fish inter the +bushes, an’ then go back quick, holdin’ her nose. +</p> + +<p> +An’ jest then, as luck would have it, we seen Dave Regan ridin’ up +from the creek towards the house. He got down an’ went into the kitchen, +an’ then come backin’ out agen in a hurry with her in front of him. +We could hear her voice from where we was, but we couldn’t hear what she +said. But we could see her arms wavin’ as if she was drivin’ fowls, +an’ Dave backed all the way to his horse and gets on an’ comes +ridin’ away quick, she screamin’ arter him all the time. When he +got down opposite the camp we sung out to know what was the matter. “What +have you been doin’ to Mrs Hardwick, Dave?” we says. “We +heerd her goin’ for yer proper jest now.” “Damned if I +know,” says Dave. “I ain’t done nothin’ to her that I +knows of. She’s called me everything she can lay her tongue to, an’ +she’s ravin’ about my stinkin’ fish, or somethin’. I +can’t make it out at all. I believe she’s gone ratty.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you <i>must</i> have been doin’ somethin’ to the +woman,” we says, “or else she wouldn’t have gone on at yer +like that.” +</p> + +<p> +But Dave swore he hadn’t, an’ we talked it over for a while +an’ couldn’t make head nor tail of it, an’ we come to the +conclusion that it was only a touch o’ the sun. +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind, Dave,” we says. “Go up agen in a day or two, +when she’s cooled down, an’ find out what the matter is. Or write +to her. It might only have been someone makin’ mischief. That’s +what it is.” +</p> + +<p> +But Dave only sat an’ rubbed his head, an’ presently he started +home to wherever he was hangin’ out. He wanted a quiet week to think. +</p> + +<p> +“Her chimbly might have been smokin’, Dave,” we shouted arter +him, but he was too dazed like to ketch on. +</p> + +<p> +Well, in a month or two we was campin’ there agen, an’ we found +she’d fenced in a lane to the crick she had no right to, an’ we had +to take the bullicks a couple o’ miles round to grass an’ water. +Well, the first mornin’ we seen her down in the corner of her paddick +near the camp drivin’ some heifers, an’ Billy Grimshaw went up to +the fence an’ spoke to her. Billy was the only one of us that dared face +her and he was the only one she was ever civil to—p’r’aps +because Billy had a squint an’ a wall eye and that put her out of +countenance. +</p> + +<p> +Billy took off his hat very respectful an’ sings out, “Mrs +Hardwick.” (It was Billy’s bullicks she’d +“pounded,” by the way.) +</p> + +<p> +“What is it?” she says. +</p> + +<p> +“I want to speak to you, Mrs Hardwick,” says Billy. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, speak,” she says. “I’ve got no time to waste +talkin’ to bullick-drivers.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, the fact is, Mrs Hardwick,” says Billy, “that I want +to explain somethin’, an’ apologize for that young scamp of a +nephew o’ mine, young Tommy. He ain’t here or I’d make him +beg your pardon hisself, or I’d cut him to pieces with the bullick-whip. +I heard all about Dave Regan sendin’ you that stinkin’ fish, +an’ I think it was a damned mean, dirty thing to do—to send +stinkin’ fish to a woman, an’ especially to a widder an’ an +unprotected woman like you, Mrs Hardwick. I’ve had mothers an’ +sisters of me own. An’ I want to tell you that I’m sorry a relation +o’ mine ever had anythin’ to do with it. As soon as I heerd of it I +give young Tommy a lambastin’ he won’t forgot in a hurry.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did Tommy know the fish was bad?” she says. +</p> + +<p> +“It doesn’t matter a rap,” says Billy; “he had no right +to go takin’ messages from nobody to nobody.” +</p> + +<p> +Mrs Hardwick thought a while. Then she says: “P’r’aps arter +all Dave Regan didn’t know the fish was bad. I’ve often thought I +might have been in too much of a hurry. Things goes bad so quick out here in +this weather. An’ Dave was always very friendly. I can’t understand +why he’d do a dirty thing on me like that. I never done anything to +Dave.” +</p> + +<p> +Now I forgot to tell you that Billy had a notion that Dave helped drive his +bullicks to pound that time, though I didn’t believe it. So Billy says: +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t you believe that for a minute, Mrs Hardwick. Dave knew what +he was a-doin’ of all right; an’ if I ketch him <i>I’ll</i> +give him a beltin’ for it if no one else is man enough to stand up for a +woman!” says Billy. +</p> + +<p> +“How d’yer know Dave knew?” says Mrs Hardwick. +</p> + +<p> +“Know!” says Billy. “Why, he talked about it all over the +district.” +</p> + +<p> +“What!” she screamed out, an’ I moved away from that there +fence, for she had a stick to drive them heifers with. But Billy stood his +ground. “Is that the truth, Billy Grimshaw?” she screams. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes;” he says. “I’ll-take me oath on it. He blowed +about it all over the district, as if it was very funny, an’ he +says—” An’ Billy stopped. +</p> + +<p> +“What did he say?” she shouted. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, the fact is,” says Billy, “that I hardly like to tell +it to a lady. I wouldn’t like to tell yer, Mrs Hardwick.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you’ll have to tell me, Billy Grimshaw,” she screams. +“I have a right to know. If you don’t tell me I’ll pull him +next week an’ have it dragged out of you in the witness-box!” she +says. “An’ I’ll have satisfaction out of him in the +felon’s dock of a court of law!” she says. “What did the +villain say?” she screams. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” says Billy, “if yer must have it—an’, +anyway, I’m hanged if I’m goin’ to stand by an’ see a +woman scandalized behind her back—if yer must have it I’ll tell +yer. Dave said that the fish didn’t smell no worse than your place +anyway.” +</p> + +<p> +We got away from there then. She cut up too rough altogether. I can’t +tell you what she said—I ain’t got the words. She went up to the +house, an’ we seen the farm-hand harnessin’ up the horse, an’ +we reckoned she was goin’ to drive into town straight away an’ take +out a summons agenst Dave Regan. An’ jest then Dave hisself comes +ridin’ past—jest when he was most wanted, as usual. He always rode +fast past Mrs Hardwick’s nowadays, an’ never stopped there, but +Billy shouted after him: +</p> + +<p> +“Hullo, Dave! I want to speak to yer,” shouts Billy. An’ Dave +yanks his horse round. +</p> + +<p> +“What is it, Billy?” he says. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Dave,” says Billy. “You had your little joke +about the chimbly, an’ we had our little joke about the fish an’ +Mrs Hardwick, so now we’ll call it quits. A joke’s a joke, but it +can go too far, an’ this one’s gettin’ too red-hot +altogether. So we’ve fixed it up with Mrs Hardwick.” +</p> + +<p> +“What fish an’ what joke?” says Dave, rubbin’ his head. +“An’ what have yer fixed up with Mrs Hardwick? Whatever are yer +talkin’ about, Billy?” +</p> + +<p> +So Billy told him all about us sendin’ the stinkin’ fish to Mrs +Hardwick by Tommy, an’ sayin’ Dave sent ’em—Dave +rubbin’ the back of his neck an’ starin’ at Billy all the +time. “An’ now,” says Billy, “I won’t say +anything about them bullicks; but I went up and seen Mrs Hardwick this +mornin’, an’ told her the whole truth about them fish, an’ +how you knowed nothin’ about it, an’ I apologized an’ told +her we was very sorry; an’ she says she was very sorry too on your +account, an’ wanted to see yer. I promised to tell yer as soon as I seen +yer. It ought to be fixed up. You ought to go right up to the house an’ +see her now. She’s awfully cut up about it.” +</p> + +<p> +“All right,” says Dave, brightenin’ up. “It was a +dirty, mean trick anyway to play on a cove; but I’ll go up an’ see +her.” An’ he went there ’n’ then. +</p> + +<p> +An’ about fifteen minutes arterwards he comes boltin’ back from the +house one way an’ his horse the other. The horse acted as if it had a big +scare, an’ so did Dave. Billy went an’ ketched Dave’s horse +for him, an’ I got Dave a towel to wipe the dirty dish-water off of his +face an’ out of his hair an’ collar, an’ I give him a piece +of soap to rub on the places where he’d been scalded. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, the woman must be ravin’ mad,” I says. “Whatever +did yer say to her this time, Dave? Yer allers gettin’ inter hot water +with her.” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t say nothin’,” says Dave. “I jest went +up laughin’ like, an’ says, ‘How are yer, Mrs +Hardwick?’ an’ she ups an’ lets me have a dish of dirty +wash-up water, an’ then on top of that she let fly with a dipper of +scaldin’-hot, greasy water outer the boiler. She’s gone clean +ravin’ mad, I think.” +</p> + +<p> +“She’s as mad as a hatter, right enough, Dave,” says Billy +Grimshaw. “Don’t you go there no more, Dave, it ain’t +safe.” An’ we lent Dave a hat an’ a clean shirt, an’ he +went on inter town. “You ought to have humoured her,” says Billy, +as Dave rode away. “You ought to have told her to put a wet bag over her +chimbly an’ hang the fish inside to smoke.” But Dave was too +stunned to ketch on. He went on inter the town an’ got on a howlin’ +spree. An’ while he was soberin’ up the thing began to dawn on him. +An’ the nex’ time he met Billy they had a fight. An’ Dave got +another woman to speak to Mrs Hardwick, an’ Mrs Hardwick ketched young +Tommy goin’ past her place one day an’ bailed him up an’ +scared the truth out of him. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here!” she says to him, “I want the truth, the whole +truth, an’ nothin’ but the truth about them fish, an’ if I +don’t get it outer you I’ll wring yer young neck for tryin’ +to poison me, an’ save yer from the gallust!” she says to Tommy. +</p> + +<p> +So he told her the whole truth, swelp him, an’ got away; an’ he +respected Mrs Hardwick arter that. +</p> + +<p> +An’ next time we come past with the teams we seen Dave’s horse +hangin’ up outside Mrs Hardwick’s, an’ we went some miles +further along the road an’ camped in a new place where we’d be more +comfortable. An’ ever arter that we used to always whip up an’ +drive past her place as if we didn’t know her. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0021" id="link2H_4_0021"></a> +“SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?”</h2> + +<p class="center"> +T<small>OLD BY</small> J<small>OE</small> W<small>ILSON</small> +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +God’s preacher, of churches unheeded,<br/> +God’s vineyard, though barren the sod,<br/> +Plain spokesman where spokesman is needed,<br/> +Rough link ’twixt the Bushman and God.<br/> + <i>The Christ of the Never</i>. +</p> + +<p> +I never told you about Peter M’Laughlan. He was a sort of bush missionary +up-country and out back in Australia, and before he died he was known from +Riverina down south in New South Wales to away up through the Never-Never +country in western Queensland. +</p> + +<p> +His past was a mystery, so, of course, there were all sorts of yarns about him. +He was supposed to be a Scotchman from London, and some said that he had got +into trouble in his young days and had had to clear out of the old country; or, +at least, that he had been a ne’e-er-do-well and had been sent out to +Australia on the remittance system. Some said he’d studied for the law, +some said he’d studied for a doctor, while others believed that he was, +or had been, an ordained minister. I remember one man who swore (when he was +drinking) that he had known Peter M’Laughlan as a medical student in a +big London hospital, and that he had started in practice for himself somewhere +near Gray’s Inn Road in London. Anyway, as I got to know him he struck me +as being a man who had looked into the eyes of so much misery in his life that +some of it had got into his own. +</p> + +<p> +He was a tall man, straight and well built, and about forty or forty-five, when +I first saw him. He had wavy dark hair, and a close, curly beard. I once heard +a woman say that he had a beard like you see in some Bible pictures of Christ. +Peter M’Laughlan seldom smiled; there was something in his big dark brown +eyes that was scarcely misery, nor yet sadness—a sort of haunted +sympathy. +</p> + +<p> +He must have had money, or else he got remittances from home, for he paid his +way and helped many a poor devil. They said that he gave away most of his +money. Sometimes he worked for a while himself as bookkeeper at a +shearing-shed, wool-sorter, shearer, even rouseabout; he’d work at +anything a bushman could get to do. Then he’d go out back to +God-forgotten districts and preach to bushmen in one place, and get a few +children together in another and teach them to read. He could take his drink, +and swear a little when he thought it necessary. On one occasion, at a rough +shearing-shed, he called his beloved brethren “damned fools” for +drinking their cheques. +</p> + +<p> +Towards the end of his life if he went into a “rough” shed or +shanty west of the Darling River—and some of them <i>were</i> +rough—there would be a rest in the language and drinking, even a fight +would be interrupted, and there would be more than one who would lift their +hats to Peter M’Laughlan. A bushman very rarely lifts his hat to a man, +yet the worst characters of the West have listened bareheaded to Peter when he +preached. +</p> + +<p> +It was said in our district that Peter only needed to hint to the squatter that +he wanted fifty or a hundred pounds to help someone or something, and the +squatter would give it to him without question or hesitation. +</p> + +<p> +He’d nurse sick boundary-riders, shearers, and station-hands, often +sitting in the desolate hut by the bedside of a sick man night after night. +And, if he had time, he’d look up the local blacks and see how they were +getting on. Once, on a far outback sheep station, he sat for three nights +running, by the bedside of a young Englishman, a B.A. they said he was, +who’d been employed as tutor at the homestead and who died a wreck, the +result of five years of life in London and Paris. The poor fellow was only +thirty. And the last few hours of his life he talked to Peter in French, +nothing but French. Peter understood French and one or two other languages, +besides English and Australian; but whether the young wreck was raving or +telling the story of a love, or his life, none of us ever knew, for Peter never +spoke of it. But they said that at the funeral Peter’s eyes seemed +haunted more than usual. +</p> + +<p> +There’s the yarn about Peter and the dying cattle at Piora Station one +terrible drought, when the surface was as bare as your hand for hundreds of +miles, and the heat like the breath of a furnace, and the sheep and cattle were +perishing by thousands. Peter M’Laughlan was out on the run helping the +station-hands to pull out cattle that had got bogged in the muddy waterholes +and were too weak to drag themselves out, when, about dusk, a gentlemanly +“piano-fingered” parson, who had come to the station from the next +town, drove out in his buggy to see the men. He spoke to Peter +M’Laughlan. +</p> + +<p> +“Brother,” he said, “do you not think we should offer up a +prayer?” +</p> + +<p> +“What for?” asked Peter, standing in his shirt sleeves, a rope in +his hands and mud from head to foot. +</p> + +<p> +“For? Why, for rain, brother,” replied the parson, a bit surprised. +</p> + +<p> +Peter held up his finger and said “Listen!” +</p> + +<p> +Now, with a big mob of travelling stock camped on the plain at night, there is +always a lowing, soughing or moaning sound, a sound like that of the sea on the +shore at a little distance; and, altogether, it might be called the sigh or +yawn of a big mob in camp. But the long, low moaning of cattle dying of hunger +and thirst on the hot barren plain in a drought is altogether different, and, +at night there is something awful about it—you couldn’t describe +it. This is what Peter M’Laughlan heard. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you hear that?” he asked the other preacher. +</p> + +<p> +The little parson said he did. Perhaps <i>he</i> only heard the weak lowing of +cattle. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you think that God will hear us when He does not hear +<i>that</i>?” asked Peter. +</p> + +<p> +The parson stared at him for a moment and then got into his buggy and drove +away, greatly shocked and deeply offended. But, later on, over tea at the +homestead, he said that he felt sure that that “unfortunate man,” +Peter M’Laughlan, was not in his right mind; that his wandering, +irregular life, or the heat, must have affected him. +</p> + +<p> +I well remember the day when I first heard Peter M’Laughlan preach. I was +about seventeen then. We used sometimes to attend service held on Sunday +afternoon, about once a month, in a little slab-and-bark school-house in the +scrub off the main road, three miles or so from our selection, in a barren hole +amongst the western ridges of the Great Dividing Range. School was held in this +hut for a few weeks or a few months now and again, when a teacher could be got +to stay there and teach, and cook for himself, for a pound a week, more or less +contributed by the parents. A parson from the farming town to the east, or the +pastoral town over the ridges to the west, used to come in his buggy when it +didn’t rain and wasn’t too hot to hold the service. +</p> + +<p> +I remember this Sunday. It was a blazing hot day towards the end of a long and +fearful drought which ruined many round there. The parson was expected, and a +good few had come to “chapel” in spring-carts, on horseback, and on +foot; farmers and their wives and sons and daughters. The children had been +brought here to Sunday-school, taught by some of the girls, in the morning. I +can see it all now quite plain: The one-roomed hut, for it was no more, with +the stunted blue-grey gum, scrub all round. The white, dusty road, so hot that +you could cook eggs in the dust. The horses tied up, across the road, in the +supposed shade under clumps of scraggy saplings along by the fence of a +cattle-run. The little crowd outside the hut: selectors in washed and mended +tweeds, some with paper collars, some wearing starched and ironed white coats, +and in blucher boots, greased or blackened, or the young men wearing +“larstins” (elastic-side boots). The women and girls in prints and +cottons (or cheap “alpaca,” etc.), and a bright bit of ribbon here +and there amongst the girls. The white heat blazed everywhere, and +“dazzled” across light-coloured surfaces—dead white trees, +fence-posts, and sand-heaps, like an endless swarm of bees passing in the +sun’s glare. And over above the dry boxscrub-covered ridges, the great +Granite Peak, glaring like a molten mass. +</p> + +<p> +The people didn’t like to go inside out of the heat and sit down before +the minister came. The wretched hut was a rough school, sometimes with a clay +fire-place where the teacher cooked, and a corner screened off with sacking +where he had his bunk; it was a camp for tramps at other times, or lizards and +possums, but to-day it was a house of God, and as such the people respected it. +</p> + +<p> +The town parson didn’t turn up. Perhaps he was unwell, or maybe the hot, +dusty ten-mile drive was too much for him to face. One of the farmers, who had +tried to conduct service on a previous occasion on which the ordained minister +had failed us, had broken down in the middle of it, so he was out of the +question. We waited for about an hour, and then who should happen to ride along +but Peter M’Laughlan, and one or two of the elder men asked him to hold +service. He was on his way to see a sick friend at a sheep station over the +ridges, but he said that he could spare an hour or two. (Nearly every man who +was sick, either in stomach or pocket, was a friend of Peter M’Laughlan.) +Peter tied up his horse under a bush shed at the back of the hut, and we +followed him in. +</p> + +<p> +The “school” had been furnished with a rough deal table and a +wooden chair for “the teacher,” and with a few rickety desks and +stools cadged from an old “provisional” school in town when the new +public school was built; and the desks and stools had been fastened to the +floor to strengthen them; they had been made for “infant” classes, +and youth out our way ran to length. But when grown men over six feet high +squeezed in behind the desks and sat down on the stools the effect struck me as +being ridiculous. In fact, I am afraid that on the first occasion it rather +took my attention from the sermon, and I remember being made very uncomfortable +by a school chum, Jack Barnes, who took a delight in catching my eye and +winking or grinning. He could wink without changing a solemn line in his face +and grin without exploding, and I couldn’t. The boys usually sat on +seats, slabs on blocks of wood, along the wall at the far end of the room, +which was comfortable, for they had a rest for their backs. One or two of the +boys were nearing six feet high, so they could almost rest their chins on their +knees as they sat. But I squatted with some of my tribe on a stool along the +wall by the teacher’s table, and so could see most of the congregation. +</p> + +<p> +Above us bare tie-beams and the round sapling rafters (with the bark still on), +and the inner sides of the sheets of stringybark that formed the roof. The +slabs had been lined with sacking at one time, but most of it had fallen or +dry-rotted away; there were wide cracks between the slabs and we could see the +white glare of sunlight outside, with a strip of dark shade, like a deep trench +in the white ground, by the back wall. Someone had brought a canvas water-bag +and hung it to the beam on the other side of the minister’s table, with a +pint-pot over the tap, and the drip, drip from the bag made the whole place +seem cooler. +</p> + +<p> +I studied Peter M’Laughlan first. He was dressed in washed and mended +tweed vest and trousers, and had on a long, lightcoloured coat of a material +which we called “Chinese silk.” He wore a “soft” cotton +shirt with collar attached, and blucher boots. He gave out a hymn in his quiet, +natural way, said a prayer, gave out another hymn, read a chapter from the +Bible, and then gave out another hymn. They liked to sing, out in those places. +The Southwicks used to bring a cranky little harmonium in the back of their old +dog-cart, and Clara Southwick used to accompany the hymns. She was a very +pretty girl, fair, and could play and sing well. I used to think she had the +sweetest voice I ever heard. But—ah, well— +</p> + +<p> +Peter didn’t sing himself, at first. I got an idea that he +couldn’t. While they were singing he stood loosely, with one hand in his +trouser-pocket, scratching his beard with his hymn-book, and looking as if he +were thinking things over, and only rousing himself to give another verse. He +forgot to give it once or twice, but we got through all right. I noticed the +wife of one of the men who had asked Peter to preach looking rather black at +her husband, and I reckoned that he’d get it hotter than the weather on +the way home. +</p> + +<p> +Then Peter stood up and commenced to preach. He stood with both hands in his +pockets, at first, his coat ruffled back, and there was the stem of a clay pipe +sticking out of his waistcoat pocket. The pipe fascinated me for a while, but +after that I forgot the pipe and was fascinated by the man. Peter’s face +was one that didn’t strike you at first with its full strength, it grew +on you; it grew on me, and before he had done preaching I thought it was the +noblest face I had ever seen. +</p> + +<p> +He didn’t preach much of hope in this world. How could he? The drought +had been blazing over these districts for nearly a year, with only a shower now +and again, which was a mockery—scarcely darkening the baked ground. Wheat +crops came up a few inches and were parched by the sun or mown for hay, or the +cattle turned on them; and last year there had been rust and smut in the wheat. +And, on top of it all, the dreadful cattle plague, pleuro-pneumonia, had +somehow been introduced into the district. One big farmer had lost fifty +milkers in a week. +</p> + +<p> +Peter M’Laughlan didn’t preach much of hope in this world; how +could he? There were men there who had slaved for twenty, thirty, forty years; +worked as farmers have to work in few other lands—first to clear the +stubborn bush from the barren soil, then to fence the ground, and manure it, +and force crops from it—and for what? There was Cox, the farmer, starved +off his selection after thirty years and going out back with his drays to work +at tank-sinking for a squatter. There was his eldest son going shearing or +droving—anything he could get to do—a stoop-shouldered, young-old +man of thirty. And behind them, in the end, would be a dusty patch in the +scrub, a fencepost here and there, and a pile of chimney-stones and a hardwood +slab or two where the but was—for thirty hard years of the father’s +life and twenty of the son’s. +</p> + +<p> +I forget Peter’s text, if he had a text; but the gist of his sermon was +that there was a God—there was a heaven! And there were men there +listening who needed to believe these things. There was old Ross from across +the creek, old, but not sixty, a hard man. Only last week he had broken down +and fallen on his knees on the baked sods in the middle of his ploughed ground +and prayed for rain. His frightened boys had taken him home, and later on, the +same afternoon, when they brought news of four more cows down with “the +pleuro” in an outer paddock, he had stood up outside his own door and +shaken his fist at the brassy sky and cursed high heaven to the terror of his +family, till his brave, sun-browned wife dragged him inside and soothed him. +And Peter M’Laughlan knew all about this. +</p> + +<p> +Ross’s family had the doctor out to him, and persuaded him to come to +church this Sunday. The old man sat on the front seat, stooping forward, with +his elbow resting on the desk and his chin on his hand, bunching up his beard +over his mouth with his fingers and staring gloomily at Peter with dark, +piercing eyes from under bushy eyebrows, just as I’ve since seen a +Scotchman stare at Max O’Rell all through a humorous lecture called +“A nicht wi’ Sandy.” +</p> + +<p> +Ross’s right hand resting on the desk was very eloquent: horny, scarred +and knotted at every joint, with broken, twisted nails, and nearly closed, as +though fitted to the handle of an axe or a spade. Ross was an educated man (he +had a regular library of books at home), and perhaps that’s why he +suffered so much. +</p> + +<p> +Peter preached as if he were speaking quietly to one person only, but every +word was plain and every sentence went straight to someone. I believe he looked +every soul in the eyes before he had done. Once he said something and caught my +eye, and I felt a sudden lump in my throat. There was a boy there, a pale, +thin, sensitive boy who was eating his heart out because of things he +didn’t understand. He was ambitious and longed for something different +from this life; he’d written a story or two and some rhymes for the local +paper; his companions considered him a “bit ratty” and the grown-up +people thought him a “bit wrong in his head,” idiotic, or at least +“queer.” And during his sermon Peter spoke of “unsatisfied +longings,” of the hope of something better, and said that one had to +suffer much and for long years before he could preach or write; and then he +looked at that boy. I knew the boy very well; he has risen in the world since +then. +</p> + +<p> +Peter spoke of the life we lived, of the things we knew, and used names and +terms that we used. “I don’t know whether it was a blanky sermon or +a blanky lecture,” said long swanky Jim Bullock afterwards, “but it +was straight and hit some of us hard. It hit me once or twice, I can tell +yer.” Peter spoke of our lives: “And there is beauty—even in +this life and in this place,” he said. “Nothing is +wasted—nothing is without reason. There is beauty even in this +place——” +</p> + +<p> +I noticed something like a hint of a hard smile on Ross’s face; he moved +the hand on the desk and tightened it. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Peter, as if in answer to Ross’s expression and +the movement of his hand, “there is beauty in this life here. After a +good season, and when the bush is tall and dry, when the bush-fires threaten a +man’s crop of ripened wheat, there are tired men who run and ride from +miles round to help that man, and who fight the fire all night to save his +wheat—and some of them may have been wrangling with him for years. And in +the morning, when the wheat is saved and the danger is past, when the fire is +beaten out or turned, there are blackened, grimy hands that come together and +grip-hands that have not joined for many a long day.” +</p> + +<p> +Old Palmer, Ross’s neighbour, moved uneasily. He had once helped Ross to +put a fire out, but they had quarrelled again since. Ross still sat in the same +position, looking the hard man he was. Peter glanced at Ross, looked down and +thought a while, and then went on again: +</p> + +<p> +“There is beauty even in this life and in this place. When a man loses +his farm, or his stock, or his crop, through no fault of his own, there are +poor men who put their hands into their pockets to help him.” +</p> + +<p> +Old Kurtz, over the ridge, had had his stacked crop of wheat in sheaf +burned—some scoundrel had put a match to it at night—and the +farmers round had collected nearly fifty pounds for him. +</p> + +<p> +“There is beauty even in this life and in this place. In the blazing +drought, when the cattle lie down and cannot rise from weakness, neighbours +help neighbours to lift them. When one man has hay or chaff and no stock, he +gives it or sells it cheaply to the poor man who has starving cattle and no +fodder.” +</p> + +<p> +I only knew one or two instances of this kind; but Peter was preaching of what +man should do as well as what they did. +</p> + +<p> +“When a man meets with an accident, or dies, there are young men who go +with their ploughs and horses and plough the ground for him or his widow and +put in the crop.” +</p> + +<p> +Jim Bullock and one or two other young men squirmed. They had ploughed old +Leonard’s land for him when he met with an accident in the shape of a +broken leg got by a kick from a horse. They had also ploughed the ground for +Mrs Phipps when her husband died, working, by the way, all Saturday afternoon +and Sunday, for they were very busy at home at that time. +</p> + +<p> +“There is beauty even in this life and in this place. There are women who +were friends in girlhood and who quarrelled bitterly over a careless word, an +idle tale, or some paltry thing, who live within a mile of each other and have +not spoken for years; yet let one fall ill, or lose husband or child, and the +other will hurry across to her place and take off her bonnet and tuck up her +sleeves, and set to work to help straighten things, and they will kiss, and cry +in each other’s arms, and be sisters again.” +</p> + +<p> +I saw tears in the eyes of two hard and hard-faced women I knew; but they were +smiling to each other through their tears. +</p> + +<p> +“And now,” said Peter, “I want to talk to you about some +other things. I am not preaching as a man who has been taught to preach +comfortably, but as a man who has learned in the world’s school. I know +what trouble is. Men,” he said, still speaking quietly, “and women +too! I have been through trouble as deep as any of yours—perhaps deeper. +I know how you toil and suffer, I know what battles you fight, I know. I too +fought a battle, perhaps as hard as any you fight. I carry a load and am +fighting a battle still.” His eyes were very haggard just them. +“But this is not what I wanted to talk to you about. I have nothing to +say against a young man going away from this place to better himself, but there +are young men who go out back shearing or droving, young men who are +goodhearted but careless, who make cheques, and spend their money gambling or +drinking and never think of the old folk at home until it is too late. They +never think of the old people, alone, perhaps, in a desolate but on a +worked-out farm in the scrub.” +</p> + +<p> +Jim Bullock squirmed again. He had gone out back last season and made a cheque, +and lost most of it on horse-racing and cards. +</p> + +<p> +“They never think—they cannot think how, perhaps, long years agone +in the old days, the old father, as a young man, and his brave young wife, came +out here and buried themselves in the lonely bush and toiled for many years, +trying—it does not matter whether they failed or not—trying to make +homes for their children; toiled till the young man was bowed and grey, and the +young wife brown and wrinkled and worn out. Exiles they were in the early +days—boy-husbands and girl-wives some of them, who left their native +lands, who left all that was dear, that seemed beautiful, that seemed to make +life worth living, and sacrificed their young lives in drought and utter +loneliness to make homes for their children. I want you young men to think of +this. Some of them came from England, Ireland, Bonnie Scotland.” Ross +straightened up and let his hands fall loosely on his knees. “Some from +Europe—your foreign fathers—some from across the Rhine in +Germany.” We looked at old Kurtz. He seemed affected. +</p> + +<p> +Then Peter paused for a moment and blinked thoughtfully at Ross, then he took a +drink of water. I can see now that the whole thing was a battle between Peter +M’Laughlan and Robert Ross—Scot met Scot. “It seemed to +me,” Jim Bullock said afterwards, “that Peter was only tryin’ +to make some of us blanky well blubber.” +</p> + +<p> +“And there are men,” Peter went on, “who have struggled and +suffered and failed, and who have fought and failed again till their tempers +are spoiled, until they grow bitter. They go in for self-pity, and self-pity +leads to moping and brooding and madness; self-pity is the most selfish and +useless thing on the face of God’s earth. It is cruel, it is deadly, both +to the man and to those who love him, and whom he ought to love. His load grows +heavier daily in his imagination, and he sinks down until it is in him to curse +God and die. He ceases to care for or to think of his children who are working +to help him.” (Ross’s sons were good, steady, hard-working boys.) +“Or the brave wife who has been so true to him for many hard years, who +left home and friends and country for his sake. Who bears up in the blackest of +times, and persists in looking at the bright side of things for his sake; who +has suffered more than he if he only knew it, and suffers now, through him and +because of him, but who is patient and bright and cheerful while her heart is +breaking. He thinks she does not suffer, that she cannot suffer as a man does. +My God! he doesn’t know. He has forgotten in her the bright, fresh-faced, +loving lassie he loved and won long years agone—long years +agone——” +</p> + +<p> +There was a sob, like the sob of an over-ridden horse as it sinks down +broken-hearted, and Ross’s arms went out on the desk in front of him, and +his head went down on them. He was beaten. +</p> + +<p> +He was steered out gently with his wife on one side of him and his eldest son +on the other. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t be alarmed, my friends,” said Peter, standing by the +water-bag with one hand on the tap and the pannikin in the other. “Mr +Ross has not been well lately, and the heat has been too much for him.” +And he went out after Ross. They took him round under the bush shed behind the +hut, where it was cooler. +</p> + +<p> +When Peter came back to his place he seemed to have changed his whole manner +and tone. “Our friend, Mr Ross, is much better,” he said. “We +will now sing”—he glanced at Clara Southwick at the +harmonium—“we will now sing ‘Shall We Gather at the +River?’” We all knew that hymn; it was an old favourite round +there, and Clara Southwick played it well in spite of the harmonium. +</p> + +<p> +And Peter sang—the first and last time I ever heard him sing. I never had +an ear for music; but I never before nor since heard a man’s voice that +stirred me as Peter M’Laughlan’s. We stood like emus, listening to +him all through one verse, then we pulled ourselves together. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Shall we gather at the River,<br/> +Where bright angels’ feet have trod— +</p> + +<p> +The only rivers round there were barren creeks, the best of them only strings +of muddy waterholes, and across the ridge, on the sheep-runs, the creeks were +dry gutters, with baked banks and beds, and perhaps a mudhole every mile or so, +and dead beasts rotting and stinking every few yards. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Gather with the saints at the River,<br/> +That flows by the throne of God. +</p> + +<p> +Peter’s voice trembled and broke. He caught his breath, and his eyes +filled. But he smiled then—he stood smiling at us through his tears. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +The beautiful, the beautiful River,<br/> +That flows by the throne of God. +</p> + +<p> +Outside I saw women kiss each other who had been at daggers drawn ever since I +could remember, and men shake hands silently who had hated each other for +years. Every family wanted Peter to come home to tea, but he went across to +Ross’s, and afterwards down to Kurtz’s place, and bled and +inoculated six cows or so in a new way, and after tea he rode off over the gap +to see his friend. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0022" id="link2H_4_0022"></a> +HIS BROTHER’S KEEPER</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +By his paths through the parched desolation,<br/> + Hot rides and the terrible tramps;<br/> +By the hunger, the thirst, the privation<br/> + Of his work in the furthermost camps;<br/> +<br/> +By his worth in the light that shall search men<br/> + And prove—ay! and justify each—<br/> +I place him in front of all Churchmen<br/> + Who feel not, who <i>know</i> not—but preach!<br/> + <i>The Christ of the Never</i>. +</p> + +<p> +I told you about Peter M’Laughlan, the bush missionary, and how he +preached in the little slab-and-bark school-house in the scrub on Ross’s +Creek that blazing hot Sunday afternoon long ago, when the drought was ruining +the brave farmers all round there and breaking their hearts. And how hard old +Ross, the selector, broke down at the end of the sermon, and blubbered, and had +to be taken out of church. +</p> + +<p> +I left home and drifted to Sydney, and “back into the Great North-West +where all the rovers go,” and knocked about the country for six or seven +years before I met Peter M’Laughlan again. I was young yet, but felt old +at times, and there were times, in the hot, rough, greasy shearing-shed on +blazing days, or in the bare “men’s hut” by the flicker of +the stinking slush-lamp at night, or the wretched wayside shanty with its +drink-madness and blasphemy, or tramping along the dusty, endless +track—there were times when I wished I could fall back with all the +experience I’d got, and sit once more in the little slab-and-bark +“chapel” on Ross’s Creek and hear Peter M’Laughlan and +the poor, struggling selectors sing “Shall We Gather at the River?” +and then go out and start life afresh. +</p> + +<p> +My old school chum and bush mate, Jack Barnes, had married pretty little Clara +Southwick, who used to play the portable harmonium in chapel. I nearly broke my +heart when they were married, but then I was a young fool. Clara was a year or +so older than I, and I could never get away from a boyish feeling of reverence +for her, as if she were something above and out of my world. And so, while I +was worshipping her in chapel once a month, and at picnics and parties in +between, and always at a distance, Jack used to ride up to Southwick’s +place on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, and on other days, and hang his horse +up outside, or turn it in the paddock, and argue with old Southwick, and agree +with the old woman, and court Clara on the sly. And he got her. +</p> + +<p> +It was at their wedding that I first got the worse for drink. +</p> + +<p> +Jack was a blue-eyed, curly black-haired, careless, popular young scamp; as +good-hearted as he was careless. He could ride like a circus monkey, do all +kinds of bush work, add two columns of figures at once, and write like +copper-plate. +</p> + +<p> +Jack was given to drinking, gambling and roving. He steadied up when he got +married and started on a small selection of his own; but within the year Clara +was living in a back skillion of her father’s house and Jack was +up-country shearing. He was “ringer” of the shed at Piora Station +one season and made a decent cheque; and within a fortnight after the shed +“cut out” he turned up at home in a very bad state from drink and +with about thirty shillings in his pockets. He had fallen from his horse in the +creek near Southwick’s, and altogether he was a nice sort of young +husband to go home to poor, heart-broken Clara. +</p> + +<p> +I remember that time well. She stopped me one day as I was riding past to ask +me if I’d seen Jack, and I got off my horse. Her chin and mouth began to +twitch and tremble and I saw her eyes filling with tears. She laid her hand on +my arm and asked me to promise not to drink with Jack if I met him, but to try +and persuade him to come home. And—well, have you, as a man, ever, with +the one woman that you can’t have, and no matter at what time or place, +felt a sudden mad longing to take her in your arms and kiss her—and damn +the world? I got on my horse again. She must have thought me an ignorant brute, +but I felt safer there. And when I thought how I had nearly made a fool of +myself, and been a cowardly brute, and a rotten mate to my mate, I rode ten +miles to find Jack and get him home. +</p> + +<p> +He straightened up again after a bit and went out and got another shed, and +they say that Peter M’Laughlan got hold of him there. I don’t know +what Peter did to him then—Jack never spoke of it, even to me, his old +mate; but, anyway, at the end of the shearing season Jack’s cheque came +home to Clara in a registered envelope, addressed in Peter’s +hand-writing, and about a week later Jack turned up a changed man. +</p> + +<p> +He got work as a temporary clerk in the branch government land office at +Solong, a pretty little farming town in a circle of blue hills on the banks of +a clear, willow-fringed river, where there were rich, black-soil, river-flat +farms, and vineyards on the red soil slopes, and blue peaks in the distance. It +was a great contrast to Ross’s Creek. Jack paid a deposit on an allotment +of land, a bit out of town, on the river bank, and built a little weather-board +box of a cottage in spare times, and planted roses and grape-vines to hide its +ugliness by and by. It wasn’t much of a place, but Clara was mighty proud +of it because it was “our house.” They were very happy, and she was +beginning to feel sure of Jack. She seemed to believe that the miserable old +time was all past and gone. +</p> + +<p> +When the work at the land’s office gave out, Jack did all sorts of jobs +about town, and at last, one shearing season, when there was a heavy clip of +wool, and shearers were getting L1 a hundred, he decided to go out back. I know +that Clara was against it, but he argued that it was the only chance for him, +and she persuaded herself that she could trust him. I was knocking about Solong +at the time, and Jack and I decided to go out together and share his packhorse +between us. He wrote to Beenaway Shed, about three hundred: miles north-west in +the Great Scrubs, and got pens for both of us. +</p> + +<p> +It was a fine fresh morning when we started; it was in a good season and the +country looked grand. When I rode up to Jack’s place I saw his horse and +packhorse tied up outside the gate. He had wanted me to come up the evening +before and have tea with them and camp at his place for the night. “Come +up! man alive!” he said. “We’ll make you a shake-down!” +But I wouldn’t; I said I had to meet a chap. Jack wouldn’t have +understood. I had been up before, but when I saw him and Clara so happy and +comfortable, and thought of the past and my secret, and thought of myself, a +useless, purposeless, restless, homeless sort of fellow, hanging out at a +boarding-house, it nearly broke me up, and I had to have a drink or two +afterwards. I often wonder if Clara guessed and understood. You never know how +much a woman knows; but—ah, well! +</p> + +<p> +Jack had taken my things home with him and he and Clara had packed them. I +found afterwards that she had washed, dried and ironed some collars and +handkerchiefs of mine during the night. Clara and Jack came out to the gate, +and as I wouldn’t go in to have a cup of tea there was nothing for it but +to say good-bye. She was dressed in a fresh-looking print blouse and dark +skirt, and wore a white hood that fell back from her head; she was a little +girl, with sweet, small, freckled features, and red-gold hair, and kind, +sympathetic grey eyes. I thought her the freshest, and fairest, and daintiest +little woman in the district. +</p> + +<p> +I was Jack’s mate, so she always treated me as a sort of brother-in-law, +and called me by my Christian name. Mates are closer than brothers in the bush. +</p> + +<p> +I turned my back and pretended to tighten the straps and girths on the +packhorse while she said good-bye to Jack. I heard her speaking earnestly to +him, and once I heard her mention Peter M’Laughlan’s name. I +thought Jack answered rather impatiently. “Oh, that’s all right, +Clara,” he said, “that’s all over—past and gone. I wish +you would believe it. You promised never to speak of that any more.” +</p> + +<p> +I know how it was. Jack never cared to hear about Peter; he was too ashamed of +the past, perhaps; besides, deep down, we feel a sort of resentment towards any +reference to a man who has helped or saved us in the past. It’s human +nature. +</p> + +<p> +Then they spoke in low tones for a while, and then Jack laughed, and kissed +her, and said, “Oh, I’ll be back before the time’s up.” +Then he ran into the house to say good-bye to Mary’s sister, who was +staying with her, and who was laid up with a sprained ankle. +</p> + +<p> +Then Clara stepped up to me and laid her fingers on my shoulder. I trembled +from head to foot and hoped she didn’t notice it. +</p> + +<p> +“Joe,” she said, looking at me with her big, searching grey eyes, +“I believe I can trust you. I want you to look after Jack. You know why. +Never let him have one drink if you can help it. One drink—the first +drink will do it. I want you to promise me that you will never have a drink +with Jack, no matter what happens or what he says.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never will,” I said, and I meant it. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s the first time he’s been away from me since he gave up +drinking, and if he comes back all right this time I will be sure of him and +contented. But, Joe, if he comes back wrong it will kill me; it will break my +heart. I want you to promise that if anything happens you will ride or wire for +Peter M’Laughlan. I hear he’s wool-sorting this year at Beenaway +Station. Promise me that if anything happens you will ride for Peter +M’Laughlan and tell him, no matter what Jack says.” +</p> + +<p> +“I promise,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +She half-held out her hand to me, but I kept both mine behind my back. I +suppose she thought I didn’t notice that she wanted to shake hands on the +bargain; but the truth was that my hands shook so, and I didn’t want her +to notice <i>that</i>. +</p> + +<p> +I got on my horse and felt steadier. Then, “Good-bye, +Clara”—“Good-bye, Jack.” She bore up bravely, but I saw +her eyes brimming. Jack got on his horse, and I bent over and shook hands with +her. Jack bent down and kissed her while she stood on tiptoe. “Good-bye, +little woman,” he said. “Cheer up, and I’ll be back before +you know where you are! You mustn’t fret—you know why.” +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Jack!”—she was breaking down. +</p> + +<p> +“Come on, Jack!” I said, and we rode off, turning and waving our +hats to her as she stood by the gate, looking a desolate little thing, I +thought, till we turned down a bend of the road into the river. +</p> + +<p> +As we jogged along with the packhorse trotting behind us, and the quart-pots +and hobble-chains jingling on the packsaddle, I pictured Clara running inside, +to cry a while in her sister’s arms, and then to bustle round and cheer +up, for Jack’s sake—and for the sake of something else. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll christen him after you, Joe,” said Jack, later on, when +we’d got confidential over our pipes after tea in our first camp. It +never seemed to enter his head that there was the ghost of a chance that it +might be a girl. “I’m glad he didn’t come along when I was +drinking,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +And as we lay rolled in our blankets under the stars I swore a big oath to +myself. +</p> + +<p> +We got along comfortably and reached Beenaway Station in about a week, the day +before the shearers’ roll-call. Jack never showed the slightest +inclination to go into a shanty; and several times we talked about old times +and what damned fools we’d been throwing away our money over shanty bars +shouting for loafers and cadgers. “Isn’t this ever so-much better, +Joe!” said Jack, as we lay on our blankets smoking one moonlight night. +“There’s nothing in boozing, Joe, you can take it from me. Just you +sling it for a year and then look back; you won’t want to touch it again. +You’ve been straight for a couple of months. Sling it for good, Joe, +before it gets a hold on you, like it did on me.” +</p> + +<p> +It was the morning after cut-out at Beenaway Shed, and we were glad. We were +tired of the rush and roar and rattle and heat and grease and blasphemy of the +big, hot, iron machine shed in that dusty patch in the barren scrubs. Swags +were rolled up, saddle-bags packed, horses had been rounded up and driven in, +the shearers’ cook and his mate had had their fight, and about a hundred +men—shearers, rouseabouts, and wool-washers—were waiting round the +little iron office to get their cheques. +</p> + +<p> +We were about half through when one bushman said to another: “Stop your +damned swearin’, Jim. Here’s Peter M’Laughlan!” Peter +walked up and the men made way for him and he went into the office. There was +always considerably less swearing for a few feet round about where Peter +M’Laughlan happened to be working in a shearing-shed. It seemed to be an +understood thing with the men. He took no advantages, never volunteered to +preach at a shed where he was working, and only spoke on union subjects when +the men asked him to. He was “rep.” (Shearers’ Union +representative) at this shed, but squatters and station managers respected him +as much as the men did. +</p> + +<p> +He seemed much greyer now, but still stood square and straight. And his eyes +still looked one through. +</p> + +<p> +When Peter came out and the crowd had cleared away he took Jack aside and spoke +to him in a low voice for a few minutes. I heard Jack say, “Oh, +that’s all right, Peter! You have my word for it,” and he got on +his horse. I heard Peter say the one word, “Remember!” “Oh, +that’s all right,” said Jack, and he shook hands with Peter, +shouted, “Come on, Joe!” and started off with the packhorse after +him. +</p> + +<p> +“I wish I were going down with you, Joe,” said Peter to me, +“but I can’t get away till to-morrow. I’ve got that sick +rouseabout on my hands, and I’ll have to see him fixed up somehow and +started off to the hospital” (the nearest was a hundred miles away). +“And, by the way, I’ve taken up a collection for him; I want a few +shillings from you, Joe. I nearly forgot you. The poor fellow only got in about +a fortnight’s work, and there’s a wife and youngsters in Sydney. +I’ll be down after you to-morrow. I promised to go to Comesomehow<a +href="#fn1" name="fnref1"><sup>[1]</sup></a> and get the people together and +start an agitation for a half-time school there. Anyway, I’ll be there by +the end of the week. Good-bye, Joe. I must get some more money for the rouser +from some of those chaps before they start.” +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +<a name="fn1"></a><a href="#fnref1">[1]</a> +There is a postal district in new South Wales called “Come-by-Chance.” +</p> + +<p> +Comesomehow was a wretched cockatoo settlement, a bit off the track, about one +hundred and fifty miles on our road home, where the settlers lived like savages +and the children ran wild. I reckoned that Peter would have his work cut out to +start a craving for education in that place. +</p> + +<p> +By saying he’d be there I think he intended to give me a hint, in case +anything happened. I believe now that Jack’s wife had got anxious and had +written to him. +</p> + +<p> +We jogged along comfortably and happily for three or four days, and as we +passed shanty after shanty, and town after town, without Jack showing the +slightest inclination to pull up at any of them, I began to feel safe about +him. +</p> + +<p> +Then it happened, in the simplest way, as most things of this sort happen if +you don’t watch close. +</p> + +<p> +The third night it rained, rained heavens-hard, and rainy nights can be mighty +cold out on those plains, even in midsummer. Jack and I rigged up a strip of +waterproof stuff we had to cover the swags on the packhorse, but the rain drove +in, almost horizontally, and we got wet through, blankets, clothes and all. +Jack got a bad cold and coughed fit to break himself; so about daylight, when +the rain held up a bit, we packed up and rode on to the next pub, a wretched +little weather-board place in the scrub. +</p> + +<p> +Jack reckoned he’d get some stuff for his cold there. I didn’t like +to speak, but before we reached the place I said, “You won’t touch +a drink, Jack.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you think I’m a blanky fool?” said Jack, and I shut up. +</p> + +<p> +The shanty was kept by a man who went by the name of Thomas, a notorious +lamber-down,<a href="#fn2" name="fnref2"><sup>[2]</sup></a> as I found out +afterwards. He was a big, awkward bullock of a man, a selfish, ignorant brute, +as anyone might have seen by his face; but he had a loud voice, and adopted a +careless, rollicking, hail-fellow-well-met! come-in-and-sit-down-man-alive! +clap-you-on-the-back style, which deceived a good many, or which a good many +pretended to believe in. His “missus” was an animal of his own +species, but she was duller and didn’t bellow. +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +<a name="fn2"></a><a href="#fnref2">[2]</a> +“Lamber-down,” a shanty keeper who entices cheque-men to drink. +</p> + +<p> +He had a rather good-looking girl there—I don’t know whether she +was his daughter or not. They said that when he saw the shearers coming +he’d say, “Run and titivate yourself, Mary; here comes the +shearers!” +</p> + +<p> +But what surprised me was that Jack Barnes didn’t seem able to see +through Thomas; he thought that he was all right, “a bit of a rough +diamond.” There are any amount of scoundrels and swindlers knocking about +the world disguised as rough diamonds. +</p> + +<p> +Jack had a fit of coughing when we came in. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, Jack!” bellowed Thomas, “that’s a regular +churchyarder you’ve got. Go in to the kitchen fire and I’ll mix you +a stiff toddy.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, thank you, Thomas,” said Jack, glancing at me rather +sheepishly, I thought. “I’ll have a hot cup of coffee presently, +that’ll do me more good.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, man alive, one drink won’t hurt you!” said Thomas. +“I know you’re on the straight, and you know I’m the last man +that ’ud try to get you off it. But you want something for that cold. You +don’t want to die on the track, do you? What would your missus say? That +cough of yours is enough to bust a bullock.” +</p> + +<p> +“Jack isn’t drinking, Thomas,” I said rather shortly, +“and neither am I.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll have a cup of coffee at breakfast,” said Jack; +“thank you all the same, Thomas.” +</p> + +<p> +“Right you are, Jack!” said Thomas. “Mary!” he roared +at the girl, “chuck yerself about and get breakfast, and make a strong +cup of coffee; and I say, missus” (to his wife), “git some honey +and vinegar in a cup, will yer? or see if there’s any of that cough stuff +left in the bottle. Go into the kitchen, you chaps, and dry yourselves at the +fire, you’re wringing wet.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack went through into the kitchen. I stepped out to see if the horses were all +right, and as I came in again through the bar, Thomas, who had slipped behind +the counter, crooked his finger at me and poured out a stiff whisky. “I +thought you might like to have it on the quiet,” he whispered, with a +wink. +</p> + +<p> +Now, there was this difference between Jack and me. When I was on the track, +and healthy and contented, I could take a drink, or two drinks, and then leave +it; or at other times I could drink all day, or all night, and be as happy as a +lord, and be mighty sick and repentant all next day, and then not touch drink +for a week; but if Jack once started, he was a lost man for days, for weeks, +for, months—as long as his cash or credit lasted. I felt a cold coming on +me this morning, and wanted a whisky, so I had a drink with Thomas. Then, of +course, I shouted in my turn, keeping an eye out in case Jack should come in. I +went into the kitchen and steamed with Jack for a while in front of a big log +fire, taking care to keep my breath away from him. Then we went in to +breakfast. Those two drinks were all I meant to have, and we were going right +on after breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +It was a good breakfast, ham and eggs, and we enjoyed it. The two whiskies had +got to work. I hadn’t touched drink for a long time. I shouldn’t +like to say that Thomas put anything in the drink he gave me. Before we started +breakfast he put a glass down in front of me and said: +</p> + +<p> +“There’s a good ginger-ale, it will warm you up.” +</p> + +<p> +I tasted it; it was rum, hot. I said nothing. What could I say? +</p> + +<p> +There was some joke about Jack being married and settled and steadied down, and +me, his old mate, still on the wallaby; and Mrs Thomas said that I ought to +follow Jack’s example. And just then I felt a touch of that loneliness +that some men feel when an old drinking mate turns teetotaller. +</p> + +<p> +Jack started coughing again, like an old cow with the pleuro. +</p> + +<p> +“That cough will kill you, Jack,” said Thomas. “Let’s +put a drop of brandy in your coffee, that won’t start you, anyhow; +it’s real ‘Three Star.’” And he reached a bottle from +the side-table. +</p> + +<p> +I should have stood up then, for my manhood, for my mate, and for little Clara, +but I half rose from my chair, and Jack laughed and said, “Sit down, Joe, +you old fool, you’re tanked. I know all about your seeing about the +horses and your ginger-ales. It’s all right, old man. Do you think +I’m going on the booze? Why, I’ll have to hold you on the horse all +day.” +</p> + +<p> +“Here’s luck, Joe!” said Jack, laughing, and lifting up his +cup of coffee with the brandy in it. “Here’s luck, Joe.” +</p> + +<p> +Then suddenly, and as clearly as I ever heard it, came Clara’s voice to +my ear: “Promise me, whatever you do, that you will never have a drink +with Jack.” And I felt cold and sick to the stomach. +</p> + +<p> +I got up and went out. They thought that the drink had made me sick, but if +I’d stayed there another minute I would have tackled Thomas; and I knew +that I needed a clear head to tackle a bullock like him. I walked about a bit, +and when I came in again Jack and Thomas were in the bar, and Jack had a glass +before him. +</p> + +<p> +“Come on, Joe, you old bounder,” said Jack, “come and have a +whisky-and-soda; it will straighten you up.” +</p> + +<p> +“What’s that you’re drinking, Jack?” I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, don’t be a fool!” said Jack. “One drink +won’t hurt me. Do you think I’m going on the booze? Have a soda and +straighten up; we must make a start directly.” +</p> + +<p> +I remember we had two or three whiskies, and then suddenly I tackled Thomas, +and Jack was holding me back, and laughing and swearing at me at the same time, +and I had a tussle with him; and then I was suddenly calmer and sensible, and +we were shaking hands all round, and Jack was talking about just one more spree +for the sake of old times. +</p> + +<p> +“A bit of a booze won’t hurt me, Joe, you old fool,” he said. +“We’ll have one more night of it, for the sake of Auld Lang Syne, +and start at daylight in the morning. You go and see to the horses, it will +straighten you up. Take the saddle off and hobble ’em out.” +</p> + +<p> +But I insisted on starting at once, and Jack promised he would. We were +gloriously happy for an hour or so, and then I went to sleep. +</p> + +<p> +When I woke it was late in the afternoon. I was very giddy and shaky; the girl +brought me a whisky-and-soda, and that steadied me. Some more shearers had +arrived, and Jack was playing cards with two of them on top of a cask in the +bar. Thomas was dead drunk on the floor, or pretending to be so, and his wife +was behind the bar. I went out to see to the horses; I found them in a bush +yard at the back. The packhorse was rolling in the mud with the pack-saddle and +saddlebags on. One of the chaps helped me take off the saddles and put them in +the harness-room behind the kitchen. +</p> + +<p> +I’ll pass over that night. It wouldn’t be very edifying to the +great, steady-living, sober majority, and the others, the never-do-wells, the +rovers, wrecks and failures, will understand only too well without being +told—only too well, God help them! +</p> + +<p> +When I woke in the morning I couldn’t have touched a drink to save my +life. I was fearfully shaky, and swimming about the head, but I put my head +over a tub under the pump and got the girl to pump for a while, and then I +drank a pint of tea and managed to keep it down, and felt better. +</p> + +<p> +All through the last half of the night I’d kept saying, in a sort of +drink nightmare, “I’ll go for Peter M’Laughlan in the +morning. I’ll go for Peter as soon as I can stand!” and repeating +Clara Barnes’s words, “Ride for Peter if anything happens. Ride for +Peter M’Laughlan.” +</p> + +<p> +There were drunken shearers, horsemen and swagmen sleeping all over the place, +and in all sorts of odd positions; some on the veranda with their heads on +their swags, one sitting back against the wall, and one on the broad of his +back with his head on the bare boards and his mouth open. There was another +horse rolling in its saddle, and I took the saddle off. The horse belonged to +an English University man. +</p> + +<p> +I went in to see how Jack was. He was lying in the parlour on a little, +worn-out, horse-hair sofa, that might have seen better days in some clean home +in the woman-and-girl world. He had been drinking and playing cards till early +that morning, and he looked awful—he looked as if he’d been boozing +for a month. +</p> + +<p> +“See what you’ve done!” he said, sitting up and glaring at +me; then he said, “Bring me a whisky-and-soda, Joe, for God’s +sake!” +</p> + +<p> +I got a whisky-and-soda from the girl and took it to him. +</p> + +<p> +I talked to him for a while, and at last he said, “Well, go and get the +horses and we’ll start.” +</p> + +<p> +I got the horses ready and brought them round to the front, but by that time +he’d had more drink, and he said he wanted to sleep before he started. +Next he was playing cards with one of the chaps, and asked me to wait till +he’d finished that game. I knew he’d keep promising and humbugging +me till there was a row, so at last I got him aside and said: +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Jack, I’m going for Peter +M’Laughlan——” +</p> + +<p> +“Go to hell!” said Jack. +</p> + +<p> +I put the other horses back in the yard, the saddles in the skillion, got on my +horse and rode off. Thomas and the others asked me no questions, they took no +notice. In a place like that a man could almost do anything, short of hanging +himself, without anyone interfering or being surprised. And probably, if he did +hang himself, they’d let him swing for a while to get a taste of it. +</p> + +<p> +Comesomehow was about fifteen miles back on a track off the main road. I +reckoned that I could find Peter and bring him on by the afternoon, and I rode +hard, sick as I was. I was too sick to smoke. +</p> + +<p> +As it happened, Peter had started early from his last camp and I caught him +just as he was turning off into Comesomehow track. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s up, Joe?” he asked as I rode up to him—but he +could see. +</p> + +<p> +“Jack Barnes is on the booze at Thomas’s,” I said. +</p> + +<p> +Peter just looked right through me. Then he turned his horse’s head +without a word, and rode back with me. And, after a while, he said, as if to +himself: +</p> + +<p> +“Poor Clara! Poor little lassie!” +</p> + +<p> +By the time we reached the shanty it was well on in the afternoon. A fight was +stopped in the first round and voices lowered when the chaps caught sight of +us. As Peter walked into the bar one or two drunks straightened themselves and +took off their hats with drunken sentiment. +</p> + +<p> +“Where is Jack Barnes, Thomas?” asked Peter, quietly. +</p> + +<p> +“He’s in there if you want to see him,” said Thomas, jerking +his head towards the parlour. +</p> + +<p> +We went in, and when Peter saw Jack lying there I noticed that swift, haunted +look came into his eyes, as if he’d seen a ghost of the past. He sat down +by the sofa to wait until Jack woke. I thought as he sat there that his eyes +were like a woman’s for sympathy and like a dog’s for faithfulness. +I was very shaky. +</p> + +<p> +Presently Thomas looked in. “Is there anything I can do for you, +M’Laughlan?” he asked in as civil a tone as he could get to. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Peter, “bring me a flask of your best +whisky—your own, mind—and a glass. +</p> + +<p> +“We shall need the whisky for him on the track, Joe,” said Peter, +when the flask came. “Get another glass and a bottle of soda; you want a +nip.” He poured out a drink for himself. +</p> + +<p> +“The first thing we’ve got to do is to get him away; then +I’ll soon put him on his feet. But we’ll let him sleep a while +longer. I find I’ve got business near Solong, and I’m going down +with you.” +</p> + +<p> +By and by Jack woke up and glared round, and when he caught sight of Peter he +just reached for his hands and said, “Peter! Thank God you’ve +come!” Then he said, “But I must have a drink first, Peter.” +</p> + +<p> +“All right, Jack, you shall have a drink,” said Peter; and he gave +him a stiff nobblerq. It steadied Jack a bit. +</p> + +<p> +“Now listen to me, Jack,” said Peter. “How much money have +you got left?” +</p> + +<p> +“I—I can’t think,” said Jack. “I’ve got a +cheque for twenty pounds here, sewn inside my shirt.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; but you drew thirty-six in three cheques. Where’s the +rest?” +</p> + +<p> +“Thomas has ten,” said Jack, “and the six—well, the six +is gone. I was playing cards last night.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter stepped out into the bar. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Thomas,” he said quietly, “you’ve got a +ten-pound cheque from Barnes.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know I have.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, how much of it does he owe you?” +</p> + +<p> +“The whole, and more.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean to tell me that? He has only been here since yesterday +morning.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes; but he’s been shoutin’ all round. Look at all these +chaps here.” +</p> + +<p> +“They only came yesterday afternoon,” said Peter. “Here, you +had best take this and give me the cheque;” and Peter laid a five-pound +note on the bar. Thomas bucked at first, but in the end he handed over the +cheque—he had had several warnings from the police. Then he suddenly lost +all control over himself; he came round from behind the bar and faced Peter. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, look here, you mongrel parson!” he said. “What the +—— do you mean by coming into my bar and, interfering with me. Who +the —— are you anyway? A ——!” He used the worst +oaths that were used in the bush. “Take off your —— +coat!” he roared at last, shaping up to Peter. +</p> + +<p> +Peter stepped back a pace and buttoned his coat and threw back his head. +</p> + +<p> +“No need to take off my coat, Thomas,” he said, “I am +ready.” +</p> + +<p> +He said it very quietly, but there was a danger-signal—a red light in his +eyes. He was quiet-voiced but hard-knuckled, as some had reason to know. +</p> + +<p> +Thomas balked like a bull at a spread umbrella. Jack lurched past me as I stood +in the parlour door, but I caught him and held him back; and almost at the same +moment a wretched old boozer that we called “Awful Example,” who +had been sitting huddled, a dirty bundle of rags and beard and hair, in the +corner of the bar, struggled to his feet, staggered forward and faced Thomas, +looking once again like something that might have been a man. He snatched a +thick glass bottle from the counter and held it by the neck in his right hand. +</p> + +<p> +“Stand back, Thomas!” he shouted. “Lay a hand—lay a +finger on Peter M’Laughlan, and I’ll smash your head, as sure as +there’s a God above us and I’m a ruined man!” +</p> + +<p> +Peter took “Awful” gently by the shoulders and sat him down. +“You keep quiet, old man,” he said; “nothing is going to +happen.” Thomas went round behind the bar muttering something about it +not being worth his while to, etc. +</p> + +<p> +“You go and get the horses ready, Joe,” said Peter to me; +“and you sit down, Jack, and keep quiet.” +</p> + +<p> +“He can get the horses,” growled Thomas, from behind the bar, +“but I’m damned if he gets the saddles. I’ve got them locked +up, and I’ll something well keep them till Barnes is sober enough to pay +me what he owes me.” +</p> + +<p> +Just then a tall, good-looking chap, with dark-blue eyes and a long, +light-coloured moustache, stepped into the bar from the crowd on the veranda. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s all this, Thomas?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s that got to do with you, Gentleman Once?” shouted +Thomas. +</p> + +<p> +“I think it’s got something to do with me,” said Gentleman +Once. “Now, look here, Thomas; you can do pretty well what you like with +us poor devils, and you know it, but we draw the line at Peter +M’Laughlan. If you really itch for the thrashing, you deserve you must +tempt someone else to give it to you.” +</p> + +<p> +“What the —— are you talking about?” snorted Thomas. +“You’re drunk or ratty!” +</p> + +<p> +“What’s the trouble, M’Laughlan?” asked Gentleman Once, +turning to Peter. “No trouble at all, Gentleman Once,” said Peter; +“thank you all the same. I’ve managed worse men than our friend +Thomas. Now, Thomas, don’t you think it would pay you best to hand over +the key of the harness-room and have done with this nonsense? I’m a +patient man—a very patient man—but I’ve not always been so, +and the old blood comes up sometimes, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +Thomas couldn’t stand this sort of language, because he couldn’t +understand it. He threw the key on the bar and told us to clear out. +</p> + +<p> +We were all three very quiet riding along the track that evening. Peter gave +Jack a nip now and again from the flask, and before we turned in in camp he +gave him what he called a soothing draught from a little medicine chest that he +carried in his saddle-bag. Jack seemed to have got rid of his cough; he slept +all night, and in the morning, after he’d drunk a pint of mutton-broth +that Peter had made in one of the billies, he was all right—except that +he was quiet and ashamed. I had never known him to be so quiet, and for such a +length of time, since we were boys together. He had learned his own weakness; +he’d lost all his cocksureness. I know now just exactly how he felt. He +felt as if his sober year had been lost and he would have to live it all over +again. +</p> + +<p> +Peter didn’t preach. He just jogged along and camped with us as if he +were an ordinary, every-day mate. He yarned about all sorts of things. He could +tell good yarns, and when he was fairly on you could listen to him all night. +He seemed to have been nearly all over the world. Peter never preached except +when he was asked to hold service in some bush pub, station-homestead or bush +church. But in a case like ours he had a way of telling a little life story, +with something in it that hit the young man he wanted to reform, and hit him +hard. He’d generally begin quietly, when we were comfortable with our +pipes in camp after tea, with “I once knew a young man—” or +“That reminds me of a young fellow I knew—” and so on. You +never knew when he was going to begin; or when he was going to hit you. In our +last camp, before we reached Solong, he told two of his time-fuse yarns. I +haven’t time to tell them now, but one stuffed up my pipe for a while, +and made Jack’s hand tremble when he tried to light his. I’m glad +it was too dark to see our faces. We lay a good while afterwards, rolled in our +blankets, and couldn’t get to sleep for thinking; but Peter seemed to +fall asleep as soon as he turned in. +</p> + +<p> +Next day he told Jack not to tell Clara that he’d come down with us. He +said he wouldn’t go right into Solong with us; he was going back along +another road to stay a day or two with an old friend of his. +</p> + +<p> +When we reached Solong we stopped on the river-bank just out of sight of +Jack’s house. Peter took the ten-pound cheque from his pocket and gave it +to Jack. Jack hadn’t seen Peter give the shanty-keeper the five-pound +note. +</p> + +<p> +“But I owed Thomas something,” said Jack, staring. “However +did you manage to get the cheque out of him?” +</p> + +<p> +“Never mind, Jack, I managed,” said Peter. +</p> + +<p> +Jack sat silent for a while, then he began to breathe hard. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t know what to say, Peter.” +</p> + +<p> +“Say nothing, Jack. Only promise me that you will give Clara the cheques +as soon as you go home, and let her take care of the cash for a while.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will,” said Jack. +</p> + +<p> +Jack looked down at the ground for a while, then he lifted his head and looked +Peter in the eyes. +</p> + +<p> +“Peter,” he said, “I can’t speak. I’m ashamed to +make a promise; I’ve broken so many. I’ll try to thank you in a +year’s time from now.” +</p> + +<p> +“I ask for no promises,” said Peter, and he held out his hand. Jack +gripped it. +</p> + +<p> +“Aren’t you coming home with me, Joe?” he asked. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” I said; “I’ll go into town. See you in the +morning.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack rode on. When he got along a piece Peter left his horse and moved up to +the head of the lane to watch Jack, and I followed. As Jack neared the cottage +we saw a little figure in a cloak run out to the front gate. She had heard the +horses and the jingle of the camp-ware on the pack-saddle. We saw Jack jump +down and take her in his arms. I looked at Peter, and as he watched them, +something, that might have been a strange look of the old days, came into his +eyes. +</p> + +<p> +He shook hands with me. “Good-bye, Joe.” +</p> + +<p> +He rode across the river again. He took the track that ran along the foot of +the spurs by the river, and up over a gap in the curve of blue hills, and down +and out west towards the Big Scrubs. And as he rounded the last spur, with his +packhorse trotting after him, I thought he must have felt very lonely. And I +felt lonely too. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0023" id="link2H_4_0023"></a> +THE STORY OF “GENTLEMAN ONCE”</h2> + +<p class="poem"> +They learn the world from black-sheep,<br/> +Who know it all too well.—<i>Out Back</i>. +</p> + +<p> +Peter M’Laughlan, bush missionary, Joe Wilson and his mate, Jack Barnes, +shearers for the present, and a casual swagman named Jack Mitchell, were camped +at Cox’s Crossing in a bend of Eurunderee Creek. +</p> + +<p> +It was a grassy little flat with gum-trees standing clear and clean like a +park. At the back was the steep grassy siding of a ridge, and far away across +the creek to the south a spur from the Blue Mountain range ran west, with a +tall, blue granite peak showing clear in the broad moonlight, yet dream-like +and distant over the sweeps of dark green bush. +</p> + +<p> +There was the jingle of hobble-chains and a crunching at the grass where the +horses moved in the soft shadows amongst the trees. Up the creek on the other +side was a surveyors’ camp, and from there now and again came the sound +of a good voice singing verses of old songs; and later on the sound of a violin +and a cornet being played, sometimes together and sometimes each on its own. +</p> + +<p> +Wilson and Barnes were on their way home from shearing out back in the great +scrubs at Beenaway Shed. They had been rescued by Peter M’Laughlan from a +wayside shanty where they had fallen, in spite of mutual oaths and past +promises, sacred and profane, because they had got wringing wet in a storm on +the track and caught colds, and had been tempted to take just one drink. +</p> + +<p> +They were in a bad way, and were knocking down their cheques beautifully when +Peter M’Laughlan came along. He rescued them and some of their cash from +the soulless shanty keeper, and was riding home with them, on some pretence, +because he had known them as boys, because Joe Wilson had a vein of poetry in +him—a something in sympathy with something in Peter; because Jack Barnes +had a dear little girl-wife who was much too good for him, and who was now +anxiously waiting for him in the pretty little farming town of Solong amongst +the western spurs. Because, perhaps, of something in Peter’s early past +which was a mystery. Simply and plainly because Peter M’Laughlan was the +kindest, straightest and truest man in the West—a “white +man.” +</p> + +<p> +They all knew Mitchell and welcomed him heartily when he turned up in their +camp, because he was a pathetic humorist and a kindly cynic—a +“joker” or “hard case” as the bushmen say. +</p> + +<p> +Peter was about fifty and the other three were young men. +</p> + +<p> +There was another man in camp who didn’t count and was supposed to be +dead. Old Danny Quinn, champion “beer-chewer” of the district, was +on his way out, after a spree, to one of Rouse’s stations, where, for the +sake of past services—long past—and because of old times, he was +supposed to be working. He had spent his last penny a week before and had clung +to his last-hope hotel until the landlord had taken him in one hand and his +swag in the other and lifted them clear of the veranda. Danny had blundered on, +this far, somehow; he was the last in the world who could have told how, and +had managed to light a fire; then he lay with his head on his swag and enjoyed +nips of whisky in judicious doses and at reasonable intervals, and later on a +tot of mutton-broth, which he made in one of the billies. +</p> + +<p> +It was after tea. Peter sat on a log by the fire with Joe and Jack Mitchell on +one side and Jack Barnes on the other. Jack Mitchell sat on the grass with his +back to the log, his knees drawn up, and his arms abroad on them: his most +comfortable position and one which seemed to favour the flow of his philosophy. +They talked of bush things or reflected, sometimes all three together, +sometimes by turns. +</p> + +<p> +From the surveyors’ camp: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +I remember, I remember,<br/> + The house where I was born,<br/> +The little window where the sun<br/> + Came peeping in at morn— +</p> + +<p> +The breeze from the west strengthened and the voice was blown away. +</p> + +<p> +“That chap seems a bit sentimental but he’s got a good +voice,” said Mitchell. Then presently he remarked, round his pipe: +</p> + +<p> +“I wonder if old Danny remembers?” And presently Peter said +quietly, as if the thought had just occurred to him: +</p> + +<p> +“By the way, Mitchell, I forgot to ask after your old folk. I knew your +father, you know.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, they’re all right, Peter, thank you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Heard from them lately?” asked Peter, presently, in a lazy tone. +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell straightened himself up. “N—no. To tell the truth, Peter, +I haven’t written for—I don’t know how long.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter smoked reflectively. +</p> + +<p> +“I remember your father well, Jack,” he said. “He was a +big-hearted man.” +</p> + +<p> +Old Danny was heard remonstrating loudly with spirits from a warmer clime than +Australia, and Peter stepped over to soothe him. +</p> + +<p> +“I thought I’d get it, directly after I opened my mouth,” +said Mitchell. “I suppose it will be your turn next, Joe.” +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose so,” said Joe, resignedly. +</p> + +<p> +The wind fell. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +I remember, I remember,<br/> + And it gives me little joy,<br/> +To think I’m further off from heaven,<br/> + Than when I was a boy! +</p> + +<p> +When Peter came back another thought seemed to have occurred to him. +</p> + +<p> +“How’s your mother getting on, Joe?” he asked. “She +shifted to Sydney after your father died, didn’t she?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, she’s getting on all right!” said Joe, without +elaboration. +</p> + +<p> +“Keeping a boarding-house, isn’t she?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Joe. +</p> + +<p> +“Hard to make ends meet, I suppose?” said Peter. “It’s +almost a harder life than it could have been on the old selection, and +there’s none of the old independence about it. A woman like your mother +must feel it, Joe.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, she’s all right,” said Joe. “She’s used to +it by this time. I manage to send her a few pounds now and again. I send her +all I can,” he added resentfully. +</p> + +<p> +Peter sat corrected for a few moments. Then he seemed to change the subject. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s some time since you were in Sydney last, isn’t it, +Joe?’ +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, Peter,” said Joe. “I haven’t been there for two +years. I never did any good there. I’m far better knocking about out +back.” +</p> + +<p> +There was a pause. +</p> + +<p> +“Some men seem to get on better in one place, some in another,” +reflected Mitchell, lazily. “For my part, I seem to get on better in +another.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter blinked, relit his pipe with a stick from the fire and reflected. +</p> + +<p> +The surveyor’s song had been encored: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +I remember, I remember— +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps Peter remembered. Joe did, but there were no vines round the house +where he was born, only drought and dust, and raspy voices raised in +recrimination, and hardship most times. +</p> + +<p> +“I remember,” said Peter, quietly, “I remember a young fellow +at home in the old country. He had every advantage. He had a first-class +education, a great deal more money than he needed—almost as much as he +asked for, and nearly as much freedom as he wanted. His father was an English +gentleman and his mother an English lady. They were titled people, if I +remember rightly. The old man was proud, but fond of his son; he only asked him +to pay a little duty or respect now and again. We don’t understand these +things in Australia—they seem formal and cold to us. The son paid his +respects to his father occasionally—a week or so before he’d be +wanting money, as a rule. The mother was a dear lady. She idolized her son. She +only asked for a little show of affection from him, a few days or a week of his +society at home now and then—say once in three months. But he +couldn’t spare her even that—his time was taken up so much in +fashionable London and Paris and other places. He would give the world to be +able to take his proud, soft old father’s hand now and look into his eyes +as one man who understands another. He would be glad and eager to give his +mother twelve months out of the year if he thought it would make her happier. +It has been too late for more than twenty years.” +</p> + +<p> +Old Danny called for Peter. +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell jerked his head approvingly and gave a sound like a sigh and chuckle +conjoined, the one qualifying the other. +</p> + +<p> +“I told you you’d get it, Joe,” he said. +</p> + +<p> +“I don’t see how it hits me,” said Joe. +</p> + +<p> +“But it hit all the same, Joe.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I suppose it did,” said Joe, after a short pause. +</p> + +<p> +“He wouldn’t have hit you so hard if you hadn’t tried to +parry,” reflected Mitchell. “It’s your turn now, Jack.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack Barnes said nothing. +</p> + +<p> +“Now I know that Peter would do anything for a woman or child, or an +honest, straight, hard-up chap,” said Mitchell, straightening out his +legs and folding his arms, “but I can’t quite understand his being +so partial to drunken scamps and vagabonds, black sheep and never-do-wells. +He’s got a tremendous sympathy for drunks. He’d do anything to help +a drunken man. Ain’t it marvellous? It’s my private opinion that +Peter must have been an awful boozer and scamp in his time.” +</p> + +<p> +The other two only thought. Mitchell was privileged. He was a young man of +freckled, sandy complexion, and quizzical grey eyes. “Sly Joker” +“could take a rise out of anyone on the quiet;” “You could +never tell when he was getting at you;” “Face of a born +comedian,” as bushmen said of Mitchell. But he would probably have been a +dead and dismal failure on any other stage than that of wide Australia. +</p> + +<p> +Peter came back and they sat and smoked, and maybe they reflected along four +very different back-tracks for a while. +</p> + +<p> +The surveyor started to sing again: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +I have heard the mavis singing<br/> + Her love-song to the morn.<br/> +I have seen the dew-drop clinging<br/> + To the rose just newly born. +</p> + +<p> +They smoked and listened in silence all through to the end. It was very still. +The full moon was high. The long white slender branches of a box-tree stirred +gently overhead; the she-oaks in the creek sighed as they are always sighing, +and the southern peak seemed ever so far away. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +That has made me thine for ever!<br/> +Bonny Mary of Argyle. +</p> + +<p> +“Blarst my pipe!” exclaimed Mitchell, suddenly. “I beg your +pardon, Peter. My pipe’s always getting stuffed up,” and he +proceeded to shell out and clear his pipe. +</p> + +<p> +The breeze had changed and strengthened. They heard the violin playing +“Annie Laurie.” +</p> + +<p> +“They must be having a Scotch night in that camp tonight,” said +Mitchell. The voice came again: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +Maxwelton Braes are bonny—<br/> + Where early fa’s the dew,<br/> +For ’twas there that Annie Laurie<br/> + Gie me her promise true— +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell threw out his arm impatiently. “I wish they wouldn’t play +and sing those old songs,” he said. “They make you think of damned +old things. I beg your pardon, Peter.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter sat leaning forward, his elbows resting on his knees and his hands +fingering his cold pipe nervously. His sad eyes had grown haggard and haunted. +It is in the hearts of exiles in new lands that the old songs are felt. +</p> + +<p> +“Take no thought of the morrow, Mitchell,” said Peter, +abstractedly. “I beg your pardon, Mitchell. I mean——” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all right, Peter,” said Mitchell. “You’re +right; to-morrow is the past, as far as I’m concerned.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter blinked down at him as if he were a new species. +</p> + +<p> +“You’re an odd young man, Mitchell,” he said. +“You’ll have to take care of that head of yours or you’ll be +found hanging by a saddle-strap to a leaning tree on a lonely track, or find +yourself in a lunatic asylum before you’re forty-five.” +</p> + +<p> +“Or else I’ll be a great man,” said Mitchell. +“But—ah, well!” +</p> + +<p> +Peter turned his eyes to the fire and smiled sadly. “Not enjoyment and +not sorrow, is our destined end or way,” he repeated to the fire. +</p> + +<p> +“But we get there just the same,” said Mitchell, “destined or +not.” +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +But to live, that each to-morrow,<br/> +Finds us further than to-day! +</p> + +<p> +“Why, that just fits my life, Peter,” said Mitchell. “I might +have to tramp two or three hundred miles before I get a cut<a href="#fn3" +name="fnref3"><sup>[3]</sup></a> or a job, and if to-morrow didn’t find +me nearer than to-day I’d starve or die of thirst on a dry +stretch.” +</p> + +<p class="footnote"> +<a name="fn3"></a><a href="#fnref3">[3]</a> +Cut—a pen or “stand” in a shearing shed. +</p> + +<p> +“Why don’t you get married and settle down, Mitchell?” asked +Peter, a little tired. “You’re a teetotaller.” +</p> + +<p> +“If I got married I couldn’t settle down,” said Mitchell. +“I reckon I’d be the loneliest man in Australia.” Peter gave +him a swift glance. “I reckon I’d be single no matter how much +married I might be. I couldn’t get the girl I wanted, and—ah, +well!” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell’s expression was still quaintly humorous round the lower part of +his face, but there was a sad light in his eyes. The strange light as of the +old dead days, and he was still young. +</p> + +<p> +The cornet had started in the surveyors’ camp. +</p> + +<p> +“Their blooming tunes seem to fit in just as if they knew what we were +talking about,” remarked Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +The cornet: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +You’ll break my heart, you little bird,<br/> +That sings upon the flowering thorn<br/> +Thou mind’st me of departed joys,<br/> +Departed never to return. +</p> + +<p> +“Damn it all,” said Mitchell, sitting up, “I’m getting +sentimental.” Then, as if voicing something that was troubling him, +“Don’t you think a woman pulls a man down as often as she lifts him +up, Peter?” +</p> + +<p> +“Some say so,” said Peter. +</p> + +<p> +“Some say so, and they write it, too,” said Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +“Sometimes it seems to me as if women were fated to drag a man down ever +since Adam’s time. If Adam hadn’t taken his wife’s +advice—but there, perhaps he took her advice a good many times and found +it good, and, just because she happened to be wrong this time, and to get him +into a hole, the sons of Adam have never let the daughters of Eve hear the last +of it. That’s human nature.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack Barnes, the young husband, who was suffering a recovery, had been very +silent all the evening. “I think a man’s a fool to always listen to +his wife’s advice,” he said, with the unreasonable impatience of a +man who wants to think while others are talking. “She only messes him up, +and drives him to the devil as likely as not, and gets a contempt for him in +the end.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter gave him a surprised, reproachful look, and stood up. He paced backwards +and forwards on the other side of the fire, with his hands behind his back for +a while; then he came and settled himself on the log again and filled his pipe. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” he said, “a man can always find excuses for himself +when his conscience stings him. He puts mud on the sting. Man at large is +beginning all over the world to rake up excuses for himself; he disguises them +as ‘Psychological studies,’ and thinks he is clean and clever and +cultured, or he calls ’em problems—the sex problem, for instance, +and thinks he is brave and fearless.” +</p> + +<p> +Danny was in trouble again, and Peter went to him. He complained that when he +lay down he saw the faces worse, and he wanted to be propped up somehow, so +Peter got a pack-saddle and propped the old man’s shoulders up with that. +</p> + +<p> +“I remember,” Peter began, when he came back to the fire, “I +remember a young man who got married——” +</p> + +<p> +Mitchell hugged himself. He knew Jack Barnes. He knew that Jack had a girl-wife +who was many times too good for him; that Jack had been wild, and had nearly +broken her heart, and he had guessed at once that Jack had broken out again, +and that Peter M’Laughlan was shepherding him home. Mitchell had worked +as mates with Jack, and liked him because of the good heart that was in him in +spite of all; and, because he liked him, he was glad that Jack was going to get +a kicking, so to speak, which might do him good. Mitchell saw it coming, as he +said afterwards, and filled his pipe, and settled himself comfortably to +listen. +</p> + +<p> +“I remember the case of a naturally selfish young man who got +married” said Peter. “He didn’t know he was selfish; in fact, +he thought he was too much the other way—but that doesn’t matter +now. His name was—well, we’ll call him—we’ll call him, +‘Gentleman Once.’” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you mean Gentleman Once that we saw drinking back at Thomas’s +shanty?” asked Joe. +</p> + +<p> +“No,” said Peter, “not him. There have been more than one in +the bush who went by the nickname of ‘Gentleman Once.’ I knew one +or two. It’s a big clan, the clan of Gentleman Once, and scattered all +over the world.” +</p> + +<p> +“By the way,” said Mitchell—“excuse me for +interrupting, Peter—but wasn’t old Danny, there, a gentleman once? +I’ve heard chaps say he was.” +</p> + +<p> +“I know he was,” said Peter. +</p> + +<p> +“Gentleman Once! Who’s talking about Gentleman Once?” said an +awful voice, suddenly and quickly. “About twenty or thirty years ago I +was called Gentleman Once or Gentleman Jack, I don’t know which—Get +out! <i>Get out</i>, I say! It’s all lies, and you’re the devil. +There’s four devils sitting by the fire. I see them.” +</p> + +<p> +Two of the four devils by the fire looked round, rather startled. +</p> + +<p> +Danny was sitting up, his awful bloodshot eyes glaring in the firelight, and +his ruined head looking like the bloated head of a hairy poodle that had been +drowned and dried. Peter went to the old man and soothed him by waving off the +snakes and devils with his hands, and telling them to go. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve heard Danny on the Gentleman Once racket before,” +remarked Mitchell. +</p> + +<p> +“Seems funny, doesn’t it, for a man to be proud of the fact that he +was called ‘Gentleman Once’ about twenty years ago?” +</p> + +<p> +“Seems more awful than funny to me,” said Joe. +</p> + +<p> +“You’re right, Joe,” said Mitchell. “But the saddest +things are often funny.” +</p> + +<p> +When Peter came back he went on with his story, and was only interrupted once +or twice by Danny waking up and calling him to drive off the snakes, and green +and crimson dogs with crocodile heads, and devils with flaming tails, and those +unpleasant sorts of things that force their company on boozers and madmen. +</p> + +<p> +“Gentleman Once,” said Peter, “he came from the old country +with a good education and no character. He disgraced himself and family once +too often and came, or was sent, out to Australia to reform. It’s a great +mistake. If a man is too far gone, or hasn’t the strength to live the +past down and reform at home, he won’t do it in a new country, unless a +combination of circumstances compels him to it. A man rises by chance; just as +often he falls by chance. Some men fall into the habit of keeping steady and +stick to it, for the novelty of it, until they are on their feet and in their +sane minds and can look at the past, present and future sensibly. I knew one +case—But that’s got nothing to do with the story. +</p> + +<p> +“Gentleman Once came out on the remittance system. That system is fatal +in nine cases out of ten. The remittance system is an insult to any manhood +that may be left in the black sheep, and an insult to the land he is sent to. +The cursed quarterly allowance is a stone round his neck which will drag him +down deeper in a new land than he would have fallen at home. You know that +remittance men are regarded with such contempt in the bush that a man seldom +admits he is one, save when he’s drunk and reckless and wants money or +credit. When a ne’er-do-well lands in Melbourne or Sydney without a penny +he will probably buck-up and do something for himself. When he lands with money +he will probably spend it all in the first few months and then straighten up, +because he has to. But when he lands on the remittance system he drinks, first +to drown homesickness. He decides that he’ll wait till he gets his next +quarter’s allowance and then look round. He persuades himself that +it’s no use trying to do anything: that, in fact, he can’t do +anything until he gets his money. When he gets it he drifts into one +‘last’ night with chums he has picked up in second and third-rate +hotels. He drinks from pure selfishness. No matter what precautions his friends +at home take, he finds means of getting credit or drawing on his allowance +before it is due—until he is two or three quarters behind. He drinks +because he feels happy and jolly and clever and good-natured and brave and +honest while he is drinking. Later on he drinks because he feels the reverse of +all these things when he is sober. He drinks to drown the past and repentance. +He doesn’t know that a healthy-minded man doesn’t waste time in +repenting. He doesn’t know how easy it is to reform, and is too +weak-willed to try. He gets a muddled idea that the past can’t be mended. +He finds it easy to get drink and borrow money on the strength of his next +quarter’s allowance, so he soon gets a quarter or two behind, and +sometimes gets into trouble connected with borrowed money. He drifts to the +bush and drinks, to drown the past only. The past grows blacker and blacker +until it is a hell without repentance; and often the black sheep gets to that +state when a man dreads his sober hours. And the end? Well, you see old Danny +there, and you saw old Awful Example back at Thomas’s +shanty—he’s worse than Danny, if anything. Sometimes the end comes +sooner. I saw a young new-land-new-leaf man dying in a cheap lodging-house in +Sydney. He was a schoolmate of mine, by the way. For six weeks he lay on his +back and suffered as I never saw a man suffer in this world; and I’ve +seen some bad cases. They had to chloroform him every time they wanted to move +him. He had affected to be hard and cynical, and I must say that he played it +out to the end. It was a strong character, a strong mind sodden and diseased +with drink. He never spoke of home and his people except when he was delirious. +He never spoke, even to me, of his mental agony. That was English home +training. You young Australians wouldn’t understand it; most bushmen are +poets and emotional. +</p> + +<p> +“My old schoolmate was shifted to the Sydney Hospital at last, and +consented to the amputation of one leg. But it was too late. He was gone from +the hips down. Drink—third-rate hotel and bush shanty drink—and low +debauchery.” +</p> + +<p> +Jack Barnes drew up his leg and rubbed it surreptitiously. He had “pins +and needles.” Mitchell noticed and turned a chuckle into a grunt. +</p> + +<p> +“Gentleman Once was a remittance man,” continued Peter. “But +before he got very far he met an Australian girl in a boarding-house. Her +mother was the landlady. They were bush people who had drifted to the city. The +girl was pretty, intelligent and impulsive. She pitied him and nursed him. He +wasn’t known as Gentleman Once then, he hadn’t got far enough to +merit the nickname.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter paused. Presently he jerked his head, as if he felt a spasm of pain, and +leaned forward to get a stick from the fire to light his pipe. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, there’s the girl who marries a man to reform him, and when +she has reformed him never lets him hear the last of it. Sometimes, as a woman, +she drives him back again. But this was not one of that sort of girls. I once +held a theory that sometimes a girl who has married a man and reformed him +misses in the reformed man the something which attracted her in the careless +scamp, the something which made her love him—and so she ceases to love +him, and their married life is a far more miserable one than it would have been +had he continued drinking. I hold no theory of that kind now. Such theories +ruin many married lives.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter jerked his head again as if impatient with a thought, and reached for a +fire-stick. +</p> + +<p> +“But that’s got nothing to do with the story. When Gentleman Once +reformed his natural selfishness came back. He saw that he had made a mistake. +It’s a terrible thing for a young man, a few months, perhaps a few weeks +after his marriage, to ask himself the question, ‘Have I made a +mistake?’ But Gentleman Once wasn’t to be pitied. He discovered +that he had married beneath him in intellect and education. Home training +again. He couldn’t have discovered that he had married beneath him as far +as birth was concerned, for his wife’s father had been a younger son of +an older and greater family than his own—But Gentleman Once +wouldn’t have been cad enough to bother about birth. I’ll do him +that much justice. He discovered, or thought he did, that he and his wife could +never have one thought in common; that she couldn’t possibly understand +him. I’ll tell you later on whether he was mistaken or not. He was gloomy +most times, and she was a bright, sociable, busy little body. When she tried to +draw him out of himself he grew irritable. Besides, having found that they +couldn’t have a thought in common he ceased to bother to talk to her. +There are many men who don’t bother talking to their wives; they +don’t think their wives feel it—because the wives cease to complain +after a while; they grow tired of trying to make the man realize how they +suffer. Gentleman Once tried his best—according to his lights—and +weakness. Then he went in for self-pity and all the problems. He liked to +brood, and his poor little wife’s energy and cheerfulness were wearying +to him. He wanted to be left alone. They were both high-spirited, in different +ways; she was highly strung and so was he—because of his past life +mostly. They quarrelled badly sometimes. Then he drank again and she stuck to +him. Perhaps the only time he seemed cheerful and affectionate was when he had +a few drinks in him. It was a miserable existence—a furnished room in a +cheap lodging-house, and the use of the kitchen. +</p> + +<p> +“He drank alone. +</p> + +<p> +“Now a dipsomaniac mostly thinks he is in the right—except, +perhaps, after he has been forced to be sober for a week. The noblest woman in +the world couldn’t save him—everything she does to reform him +irritates him; but a strong friend can save him sometimes—a man who has +been through it himself. The poor little wife of Gentleman Once went through it +all. And she stuck to him. She went into low pubs after him.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter shuddered again. “She went through it all. He swore promises. +He’d come home sober and fill her with hope of future happiness, and +swear that he’d never take another glass. ‘And we’ll be happy +yet, my poor boy,’ she’d say, ‘we’ll be happy yet. I +believe you, I trust you’ (she used to call him her ‘bonny +boy’ when they were first married). And next night he’d come home +worse than ever. And one day he—he struck her!” +</p> + +<p> +Peter shuddered, head and shoulders, like a man who had accidentally smashed +his finger. +</p> + +<p> +“And one day he struck her. He was sober when he did it—anyhow he +had not taken drink for a week. A man is never sober who gets drunk more than +once a week, though he might think he is. I don’t know how it happened, +but anyway he struck her, and that frightened him. He got a billet in the Civil +Service up-country. No matter in what town it was. The little wife hoped for +six months. +</p> + +<p> +“I think it’s a cruel thing that a carelessly selfish young man +cannot realize how a sensitive young wife suffers for months after he has +reformed. How she hopes and fears, how she dreads the moment he has to leave +her, and frets every hour he is away from home—and suffers mental agony +when he is late. How the horror of the wretched old past time grows upon her +until she dares not think of it. How she listens to his step and voice and +watches his face, when he comes home, for a sign of drink. A young man, a mate +of mine, who drank hard and reformed, used to take a delight in pretending for +a few minutes to be drunk when he came home. He was good-hearted, but dense. He +said he only did it to give his wife a pleasant surprise afterwards. I thought +it one of the most cruel things I had ever seen. +</p> + +<p> +“Gentleman Once found that he could not stand the routine of office work +and the dull life in that place. He commenced to drink again, and went on till +he lost his billet. They had a little boy, a bright little boy, yet the father +drank. +</p> + +<p> +“The last spree was a terrible one. He was away from home a fortnight, +and in that fortnight he got down as deep as a man could get. Then another man +got hold of him and set him on his feet, and straightened him up. The other man +was a ruined doctor, a wreck whose devil was morphia. I don’t hold that a +man’s salvation is always in his own hands; I’ve seen mates pull +mates out of hell too often to think that. +</p> + +<p> +“Then Gentleman Once saw the past as he had never seen it before—he +saw hope for the future with it. And he swore an oath that he felt he would +keep. +</p> + +<p> +“He suffered from reaction on his way home, and, as he neared the town, a +sudden fear, born of his nervous state, no doubt, sent a cold, sick emptiness +through him: ‘Was it too late?’ +</p> + +<p> +“As he turned into the street where he lived, he noticed a little group +of bush larrikins standing at the corner. And they moved uneasily when they +caught sight of him, and, as he passed, they touched and lifted their hats to +him. Now he knew that he had lost the respect even of bush larrikins; and he +knew enough of the bush to know that a bushman never lifts his hat to a +man—only to death, and a woman sometimes. He hurried home and read the +truth in his wife’s eyes. His little boy was dead. He went down under the +blow, and she held his head to her breast and kept saying. ‘My poor boy, +my poor boy!’ +</p> + +<p> +“It was he that she meant, not the boy she had lost. She knew him, she +understood him better than he did himself, and, heart-broken as she was, she +knew how he was going to suffer, and comforted him. ‘My poor boy, my +poor, foolish boy!’ +</p> + +<p> +“He mended the past, as far as he could, during the next two years, and +she seemed happy. He was very gentle, he was very kind to her. He was happy, +too, in a new, strange way. But he had learned what it was to suffer through +his own fault, and now he was to learn what it was to suffer through no fault +of his own, and without the consolation of saying ‘I was wrong! I was to +blame!’ At the end of the two years there was another child, and his wife +died.” +</p> + +<p> +The four sat silently smoking until Jack Barnes asked: +</p> + +<p> +“And what did he do then, Peter?” +</p> + +<p> +“Who?” said Peter, abstractedly. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, Gentleman Once.” +</p> + +<p> +Peter roused himself. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, I’ve told the story, and it is about time to turn in,” +he said. “I can’t say exactly what Gentleman Once did when his wife +died. He might have gone down to a deeper depth than Danny’s. He might +have risen higher than he had ever been before. From what I knew of his +character he would never have gone down an easy slope as Danny has done. He +might have dropped plump at first and then climbed up. Anyway, he had the +memory of the last two years to help him. +</p> + +<p> +“Then there’s the reformed drunkard who has trained himself to take +a drink when he needs it, to drink in moderation—he’s the strongest +character of all, I think—but it’s time to turn in.” +</p> + +<p> +The cornet up the creek was playing a march. +</p> + +<p> +Peter walked across and looked at Danny, who seemed to be sleeping as +peacefully as could be expected of him. +</p> + +<p> +Jack Barnes got up and walked slowly down the creek in the moonlight. He wanted +to think. +</p> + +<p> +Peter rolled out his blankets on the grass and arranged his saddle-bags for a +pillow. Before he turned in Mitchell shook hands with him, a most unusual and +unnecessary proceeding in camp. But there’s something in the bush grip +which means “I know,” or “I understand.” +</p> + +<p> +Joe Wilson rolled out his blankets close to Mitchell’s camp; he wanted to +enjoy some of Mitchell’s quiet humour before he went to sleep, but +Mitchell wasn’t in a philosophical mood. He wanted to reflect. +</p> + +<p> +“I wonder who Gentleman Once was?” said Joe to Mitchell. +“Could he have been Danny, or old Awful Example back there at the +shanty?” +</p> + +<p> +“Dunno,” said Mitchell. He puffed three long puffs at his pipe, and +then said, reflectively: +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve heard men tell their own stories before to-night Joe.” +</p> + +<p> +It was Joe who wanted to think now. +</p> + +<p> +About four o’clock Mitchell woke and stood up. Peter was lying rolled in +his blanket with his face turned to the west. The moon was low, the shadows had +shifted back, and the light was on Peter’s face. Mitchell stood looking +at him reverently, as a grown son might who sees his father asleep for the +first time. Then Mitchell quietly got some boughs and stuck them in the ground +at a little distance from Peter’s head, to shade his face from the bright +moonlight; and then he turned in again to sleep till the sun woke him. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="link2H_4_0024" id="link2H_4_0024"></a> +THE GHOSTS OF MANY CHRISTMASES</h2> + +<p> +Did you ever trace back your Christmas days?—right back to the days when +you were innocent and Santa Claus was real. At times you thought you were very +wicked, but you never realize how innocent you were until you’ve grown up +and knocked about the world. +</p> + +<p> +Let me think! +</p> + +<p> +Christmas in an English village, with bare hedges and trees, and leaden skies +that lie heavy on our souls as we walk, with overcoat and umbrella, sons of +English exiles and exiles in England, and think of bright skies and suns +overhead, and sweeps of country disappearing into the haze, and blue mountain +ranges melting into the azure of distant lower skies, and curves of white and +yellow sand beaches, and runs of shelving yellow sandstone sea-walls—and +the glorious Pacific! Sydney Harbour at sunrise, and the girls we took to Manly +Beach. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas in a London flat. Gloom and slush and soot. It is not the cold that +affects us Australians so much, but the horrible gloom. We get heart-sick for +the sun. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas at sea—three Christmases, in fact—one going saloon from +Sydney to Westralia early in the Golden Nineties with funds; and one, the +Christmas after next, coming back steerage with nothing but the clothes +we’d slept in. All of which was bad judgment on our part—the order +and manner of our going and coming should have been reversed. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas in a hessian tent in “th’ Westren,” with so many +old mates from the East that it was just old times over again. We had five +pounds of corned beef and a kerosene-tin to boil it in; and while we were +talking of old things the skeleton of a kangaroo-dog grabbed the beef out of +the boiling water and disappeared into the scrub—which made it seem more +like old times than ever. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas going to New Zealand, with experience, by the s.s. <i>Tasmania</i>. +We had plum duff, but it was too “soggy” for us to eat. We dropped +it overboard, lest it should swamp the boat—and it sank to the ooze. The +Tasmania was saved on that occasion, but she foundered next year outside +Gisborne. Perhaps the cook had made more duff. There was a letter from a +sweetheart of mine amongst her mails when she went down; but that’s got +nothing to do with it, though it made some difference in my life. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas on a new telegraph line with a party of lining gangmen in New +Zealand. There was no duff nor roast because there was no firewood within +twenty miles. The cook used to pile armfuls of flax-sticks under the billies, +and set light to them when the last man arrived in camp. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas in Sydney, with a dozen invitations out to dinner. The one we +accepted was to a sensible Australian Christmas dinner; a typical one, as it +should be, and will be before the Commonwealth is many years old. Everything +cold except the vegetables, the hose playing on the veranda and vines outside, +the men dressed in sensible pyjama-like suits, and the women and girls fresh +and cool and jolly, instead of being hot and cross and looking like boiled +carrots, and feeling like boiled rags, and having headaches after dinner, as +would have been the case had they broiled over the fire in a hot kitchen all +the blazing forenoon to cook a scalding, indigestible dinner, as many +Australian women do, and for no other reason than that it was the fashion in +England. One of those girls was very pretty and—ah, well!— +</p> + +<p> +Christmas dinner in a greasy Sydney sixpenny restaurant, that opened a few days +before with brass band going at full blast at the door by way of advertisement. +“Roast-beef, one! Cabbage and potatoes, one! Plum pudding, two!” +(That was the first time I dined to music.) The Christmas dinner was a good +one, but my appetite was spoilt by the expression of the restaurant keeper, a +big man with a heavy jowl, who sat by the door with a cold eye on the +sixpences, and didn’t seem to have much confidence in human nature. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas—no, that was New Year—on the Warrego River, out back (an +alleged river with a sickly stream that looked like bad milk). We spent most of +that night hunting round in the dark and feeling on the ground for camel and +horse droppings with which to build fires and make smoke round our camp to keep +off the mosquitoes. The mosquitoes started at sunset and left off at daybreak, +when the flies got to work again. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas dinner under a brush shearing-shed. Mutton and plum pudding—and +fifty miles from beer! +</p> + +<p> +An old bush friend of mine, one Jimmy Nowlett, who ranked as a bullock-driver, +told me of a Christmas time he had. He was cut off by the floods with his team, +and had nothing to eat for four days but potatoes and honey. He said potatoes +dipped in honey weren’t so bad; but he had to sleep on bullock yokes laid +on the ground to keep him out of the water, and he got a toothache that +paralysed him all down one side. +</p> + +<p> +And speaking of plum pudding, I consider it one of the most barbarous +institutions of the British. It is a childish, silly, savage superstition; it +must have been a savage inspiration, looking at it all round—but then it +isn’t so long since the British were savages. +</p> + +<p> +I got a letter last year from a mate of mine in Western +Australia—prospecting the awful desert out beyond White +Feather—telling me all about a “perish” he did on plum +pudding. He and his mates were camped at the Boulder Soak with some three or +four hundred miles—mostly sand and dust—between them and the +nearest grocer’s shop. They ordered a case of mixed canned provisions +from Perth to reach them about Christmas. They didn’t believe in plum +pudding—there are a good many British institutions that bushmen +don’t believe in but the cook was a new chum, and he said he’d go +home to his mother if he didn’t have plum pudding for Christmas, so they +ordered a can for him. Meanwhile, they hung out on kangaroo and damper and the +knowledge that it couldn’t last for ever. It was in a terrible drought, +and the kangaroos used to come into the “Soak” for water, and they +were too weak to run. Later on, when wells were dug, the kangaroos used to +commit suicide in them—there was generally a kangaroo in the well in the +morning. +</p> + +<p> +The storekeeper packed the case of tinned dog, etc., but by some blunder he or +his man put the label on the wrong box, and it went per rail, per coach, per +camel, and the last stage per boot, and reached my friends’ camp on +Christmas Eve, to their great joy. My friend broke the case open by the light +of the camp-fire. +</p> + +<p> +“Here, Jack!” he said, tossing out a can, “here’s your +plum pudding.” +</p> + +<p> +He held the next can in his hand a moment longer and read the label twice. +</p> + +<p> +“Why! he’s sent two,” he said, “and I’m sure I +only ordered one. Never mind—Jack’ll have a tuck-out.” +</p> + +<p> +He held the next can close to the fire and blinked at it hard. “I’m +damned if he hasn’t sent three tins of plum pudding. Never mind, +we’ll manage to scoff some of it between us. You’re in luck’s +way this trip, Jack, and no mistake.” +</p> + +<p> +He looked harder still at the fourth can; then he read the labels on the other +tins again to see if he’d made a mistake. +</p> + +<p> +He didn’t tell me what he said then, but a milder mate suggested that the +storekeeper had sent half a dozen tins by mistake. But when they reached the +seventh can the language was not even fit to be written down on a piece of +paper and handed up to the magistrate. The storekeeper had sent them an +unbroken case of canned plum pudding, and probably by this time he was +wondering what had become of that blanky case of duff. +</p> + +<p> +The kangaroos disappeared about this time and my friend tells me that he and +his mates had to live for a mortal fortnight on canned plum pudding. They tried +it cold and they tried it boiled, they tried it baked, they had it fried, and +they had it toasted, they had it for breakfast, dinner and tea. They had +nothing else to think, or talk, or argue and quarrel about; and they dreamed +about it every night, my friend says. It wasn’t a joke—it gave them +the nightmare and day-horrors. +</p> + +<p> +They tried it with salt. They picked as many of the raisins out as they could +and boiled it with salt kangaroo. They tried to make Yorkshire pudding out of +it; but it was too rich. +</p> + +<p> +My friend was experimenting and trying to discover a simple process for +separating the ingredients of plum pudding when a fresh supply of provisions +came along. He says he was never so sick of anything in his life, and he has +had occasion to be sick of a good many things. +</p> + +<p> +The new-chum jackaroo is still alive, but he won’t ever eat plum pudding +any more, he says. It cured him of homesickness. He wouldn’t eat it even +if his bride made it. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas on the goldfields in the last of the roaring days, in the palmy days +of Gulgong and those fields. Let’s see! it must be nearly thirty years +ago! Oh, how the time goes by! +</p> + +<p> +Santa Claus, young, fresh-faced and eager; Santa Claus, blonde and flaxen; +Santa Claus, dark; Santa Claus with a brogue and Santa Claus speaking broken +English; Santa Claus as a Chinaman (Sun Tong Lee & Co. storekeepers), with +strange, delicious sweets that melted in our mouths, and rum toys and Chinese +dolls for the children. +</p> + +<p> +Lucky diggers who were with difficulty restrained from putting pound notes and +nuggets and expensive lockets and things into the little ones’ stockings. +Santa Claus in flannel shirt and clay-covered moleskins. Diggers who bought +lollies by the pound and sent the little ones home with as much as they could +carry. +</p> + +<p> +Diggers who gave a guinea or more for a toy for a child that reminded them of +some other child at home. Diggers who took as many children as they could +gather on short notice into a store, slapped a five-pound note down on the +counter and told the little ones to call for whatever they wanted. Who set a +family of poor children side by side on the counter and called for a box of +mixed children’s boots—the best—and fitted them on with great +care and anxiety and frequent inquiries as to whether they pinched. Who stood +little girls and boys on the counter and called for the most expensive frocks, +the latest and best in sailor suits, and the brightest ribbons; and things came +long distances by bullock dray and were expensive in those days. Impressionable +diggers—and most of them were—who threw nuggets to singers, and +who, sometimes, slipped a parcel into the hands of a little boy or girl, with +instructions to give it to an elder sister (or young mother, perhaps) whom the +digger had never spoken to, only worshipped from afar off. And the elder sister +or young mother, opening the parcel, would find a piece of jewellery or a +costly article of dress, and wonder who sent it. +</p> + +<p> +Ah, the wild generosity of luck-intoxicated diggers of those days! and the +reckless generosity of the drinkers. “We thought it was going to last for +ever!” +</p> + +<p> +“If I don’t spend it on the bairns I’ll spend it on the +drink,” Sandy Burns used to say. “I ha’ nane o’ me own, +an’ the lass who was to gi’ me bairns, she couldn’t +wait.” +</p> + +<p> +Sandy had kept steady and travelled from one end of the world to the other, and +roughed it and toiled for five years, and the very day he bottomed his golden +hole on the Brown Snake Lead at Happy Valley he got a letter from his girl in +Scotland to say she had grown tired of waiting and was married. Then he drank, +and drink and luck went together. +</p> + +<p> +Gulgong on New Year’s Eve! Rows and rows of lighted tents and camp-fires, +with a clear glow over it all. Bonfires on the hills and diggers romping round +them like big boys. Tin kettling—gold dishes and spoons, and fiddles, and +hammers on pointing anvils, and sticks and empty kerosene-tins (they made a +row); concertinas and cornets, shot-guns, pistols and crackers, all sorts of +instruments, and “Auld Lang Syne” in one mighty chorus. And +now—a wretched little pastoral town; a collection of glaring +corrugated-iron hip-roofs, and maybe a rotting propped-up bark or weather-board +humpy or two—relics of the roaring days; a dried-up storekeeper and some +withered hags; a waste of caved-in holes with rain-washed mullock heaps and +quartz and gravel glaring in the sun; thistles and burrs where old bars were; +drought, dryness, desolation and goats. +</p> + +<p> +Lonely graves in the bush and grey old diggers here and there, anywhere in the +world, doing anything for a living, lonely yet because of the girls who +couldn’t wait, but prospecting and fossicking here and there, and +dreaming still. +</p> + +<p> +They thought it was going to last for ever. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas at Eurunderee Creek, amongst the old selection farms in the western +spurs of the Blue Mountains. They used to call it “Th’ +Pipeclay” thirty years ago, but the old black names have been restored. +They make plum puddings yet, weeks beforehand, and boil them for hours and hang +them in cloths to the rafters to petrify; then they take them down and boil +them again. On Christmas Eve the boys cut boughs or young pines on the hills, +and drag them home and lash them to the veranda-posts. +</p> + +<p> +Ted has turned up with his wife and children from his selection out back. The +wheat is in and shearing is over on the big stations. Tom—steady-going +old Tom—clearing or fencing or dam-sinking up-country, hides his tools in +the scrub and gets his horse and rides home. Aunt Emma (to everyone’s +joy) has arrived from Sydney with presents (astonishing bargains in frocks, +etc.) and marvellous descriptions of town life. +</p> + +<p> +Joe, “poor” Mary’s husband, who has been droving in +Queensland since the Christmas before last—while poor Mary, who is afraid +to live alone, shared a skillion and the family quarrels at home—Joe +rides day and night and reaches home at sunrise on Christmas morning, tired and +dusty, gaunt and haggard, but with his last cheque intact. He kisses his wife +and child and throws himself on the bed to sleep till dinner-time, while Mary +moves round softly, hushes the baby, dresses it and herself, lays out +Joe’s clean things, and bends over him now and then, and kisses him, +perhaps, as he sleeps. +</p> + +<p> +In the morning the boys and some of the men go down to the creek for a swim in +the big shady pool, under the she-oaks and take their Sunday clothes with them +and dress there. +</p> + +<p> +Some of them ride into town to church, and some of the women and children drive +in in spring-carts—the children to go to Sunday school, leaving mother +and the eldest daughter—usually a hard-worked, disappointed, +short-tempered girl—at home to look after the cooking. +</p> + +<p> +There is some anxiety (mostly on mother’s part) about Jim, who is +“wild,” and is supposed to be somewhere out back. There was +“a piece of blue paper” out for Jim on account of sweating +(illegally using) a horse, but his mother or father has got a hint—given +in a kindly way by the police-sergeant—that Jim is free to come home and +stay at home if he behaves himself. (There is usually a horse missing when Jim +goes out back.) +</p> + +<p> +Jim turns up all right—save that he has no money—and is welcomed +with tearful affection by his favourite sister Mary, shakes hands silently with +his father, and has a long whispered conversation with his mother, which leaves +him very subdued. His brothers forbear to sneer at him, partly because it is +Christmas, partly on mother’s account, and thirdly, because Jim can use +his hands. Aunt Emma, who is fond of him, cheers him up wonderfully. +</p> + +<p> +The family sit down to dinner. “An old mate of your +father’s”—a bearded old digger—has arrived and takes +the place of honour. (“I knowed yer father, sonny, on the diggings long +afore any of you was ever thought on.”) +</p> + +<p> +The family have only been a few hours together, yet there is an undercurrent of +growling, that, to the stranger, mysterious yet evident undercurrent of +nastiness and resentment which goes on in all families and drags many a +promising young life down. But Aunt Emma and the old mate make things brighter, +and so the dinner—of hot roast and red-hot plum pudding—passes off +fairly well. +</p> + +<p> +The men sleep the afternoon away and wake up bathed in perspiration and +helpless; some of the women have headaches. After tea they gather on the +veranda in the cool of the evening, and that’s the time when the best +sides of their natures and the best parts of the past have a chance of coming +uppermost, and perhaps they begin to feel a bit sorry that they are going to +part again. +</p> + +<p> +The local races or “sports” on Boxing Day. There is nothing to keep +the boys home over New Year. Ted and his wife go back to their lonely life on +their selection; Tom returns to his fencing or tank-sinking contract; Jim, who +has borrowed “a couple of quid” from Tom, goes out back with strong +resolutions for the New Year, and shears “stragglers,” breaks in +horses, cooks and clerks for survey parties, and gambles and drinks, and gets +into trouble again. Maybe Joe “knocks about” the farm a bit before +going into the Great North-West with another mob of cattle. +</p> + +<p> +The last time I saw the Old Year out at Eurunderee the bushfires were burning +all over the ranges, and looked like great cities lighted up. No need for +bonfires then. Christmas in Bourke, the metropolis of the great pastoral scrubs +and plains, five hundred miles west, with the thermometer +one-hundred-and-something-scarey in the shade. The rough, careless shearers +come in from stations many dusty miles out in the scrubs to have their +Christmas sprees, to drink and “shout” and fight—and have the +horrors some of them—and be run in and locked up with difficulty, within +sound of a church-going bell. +</p> + +<p> +The Bourke Christmas is a very beery and exciting one. The hotels shut up in +front on Christmas Day to satisfy the law (or out of consideration for the +feelings of the sergeant in charge of the police station), and open behind to +satisfy the public, who are supposed to have made the law. +</p> + +<p> +Sensible cold dinners are the fashion in Bourke, I think, with the hose going, +and free-and-easy costumes. +</p> + +<p> +The free males take their blankets and sleep in the “park;” the +women sleep with doors and windows open, and the married men on mattresses on +the verandas across the open doors—in case of accidents. +</p> + +<p> +Christmas in Sydney, though Christmas holidays are not so popular as Easter, or +even Anniversary Day, in the Queen city of the South. Buses, electric, cable +and the old steam trams crowded with holiday-makers with baskets. Harbour boats +loaded down to the water’s edge with harbour picnic-parties. “A +trip round the harbour and to the head of Middle Harbour one shilling +return!” Strings of tourist trains running over the Blue Mountains and +the Great Zigzag, and up the coast to Gosford and Brisbane Water, and down the +south coast to beautiful Illawarra, until after New Year. Hundreds of young +fellows going out with tents to fish in lonely bays or shoot in the mountains, +and rough it properly like bushmen—not with deck chairs, crockery, a +piano and servants. For you can camp in the grand and rugged solitude of the +bush within a stone’s throw of the city, so to speak. +</p> + +<p> +Jolly camps and holiday parties all round the beautiful bays of the harbour, +and up and down the coast, and all close to home. Camps in the moonlight on +sandy beaches under great dark bluffs and headlands, where yellow, shelving, +sandstone cliffs run, broken only by sandy-beached bays, and where the +silver-white breakers leap and roar. +</p> + +<p> +And Manly Beach on a holiday! Thousands of people in fresh summer dress, +hundreds of bare-legged, happy children running where the “blue sea over +the white sand rolls,” racing in and out with the rollers, playing with +the glorious Pacific. Manly—“Our Village”—Manly Beach, +where we used to take our girls, with the most beautiful harbour in the world +on one side, and the width of the grandest ocean on the other. Ferny gullies +and “fairy dells” to north and south, and every shady nook its +merry party or happy couple. +</p> + +<p> +Manly Beach—I remember five years ago (oh, how the time goes +by!)—and two names that were written together in the sand when the tide +was coming in. And the boat home in the moonlight, past the Heads, where we +felt the roll of the ocean, and the moonlit harbour—and the harbour +lights of Sydney—the grandest of them all. +</p> + +<hr /> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>Transcriber’s Notes:</h2> + +<p> +Henry Lawson 17th June 1867 — 2nd September 1922. +</p> + +<p> +These stories were first published as a collection in 1902. Republished as +“Send Round the Hat” and “The Romance of the Swag” in +1907. +</p> + +<p> +Notes on Australianisms. Based on my own speech over the years, with some +checking in the dictionaries, e.g. “Macquarie Book of Slang” +(2000), Oxford English Dictionary. Not all of these are peculiar to Australian +slang, but are important in Lawson’s stories, and carry overtones. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +anabranch: A bend in a river that has been cut through by the stream. The main +current now runs straight, the anabranch diverges and then rejoins. See +billabong. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +Barcoo-rot. “Persistent ulceration of the skin, chiefly on the hands, and +often originating in abrasions”. (Morris, Australian English). Barcoo is +a river in Queensland. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +billabong. Based on an aboriginal word. Sometimes used for an anabranch, but +more often used for one that, in dry season or droughts especially, is cut off +at either or both ends from the main stream. It is often just a muddy pool, and +may indeed dry up completely. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +blackfellow: condescending for Australian Aboriginal +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +blackleg: someone who is employed to cross a union picket line to break a +workers’ strike. As Molly Ivins said, she was brought up on the three +great commandments: do not lie; do not steal; never cross a picket line. Also +scab. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +blanky or ——: Fill in your own favourite word. Usually however used +for “bloody”—see crimson/gory. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +blooming: actually used in speech instead of “bloody” (see +crimson). +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bluey: swag. Explanation in Lawson’s “The romance of the +Swag” here. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bob: one shilling +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bullocky: Bullock driver. A man who drove teams of bullocks yoked to wagons +carrying e.g. wool bales or provisions. Proverbially rough and foul mouthed. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bummer: A cadger or bludger. Someone who begs for food. Interesting Americanism +already. Also, tramp. (Different meaning today) +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bush: originally referred to the low tangled scrubs of the semi-desert regions +(cf. ‘mulga’ and ‘mallee’), and hence equivalent to +“outback”. Now used generally for remote rural areas (“the +bush”) and scrubby forest. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bushfire: wild fires: whether forest fires or grass fires. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bushman/bushwoman: someone who lives an isolated existence, far from cities, +“in the bush”. (today: a “bushy”) +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bushranger: an Australian “highwayman”, who lived in the +‘bush’— scrub—and attacked especially gold carrying +coaches and banks. Romanticised as anti-authoritarian Robin Hood +figures—cf. Ned Kelly—but usually very violent. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +bunyip: Aboriginal monster, inhabiting waterholes, billabongs particularly. +Adopted into European legends. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +caser: Five shillings (12 pence to the shilling, 20 shillings to the pound +(“quid”)). As a coin, a crown piece. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +chaffing: teasing, mocking good-humouredly +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +churchyarder: Sounding as if dying—ready for the churchyard = cemetery +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +crimson = gory: literary substitutes for “bloody”—the +“colonial oath”, unacceptable in polite company. Why, is a complete +mystery. Popularly explained as contraction of “by Our Lady”. +Unproved. In reproducing (badly) a German’s pronunciation of Australian, +Lawson retains the word, but spells it “pluddy”. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +dood: Dude. A classy/cool dresser. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +drover: one who “droves” droving: driving on horseback cattle or +sheep from where they were fattened to a a city, or later, a rail-head. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +fiver: a five pound note +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +gory, see crimson +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +Homebush: Saleyard, market area in Sydney +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +humpy: rough shack +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +half-caser: Two shillings and sixpence. As a coin, a half-crown. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +jackaroo: (Jack + kangaroo; sometimes jackeroo)—someone, in early days a +new immigrant from England, learning to work on a sheep/cattle station (U.S. +“ranch”.) +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +jim-jams: the horrors, d.t.’s +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +jumbuck: a sheep (best known from Waltzing Matilda: “where’s that +jolly jumbuck, you’ve got in your tucker bag”.) +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +larrikin: anything from a disrespectful young man to a violent member of a gang +(“push”). Was considered a major social problem in Sydney of the +1880’s to 1900. The <i>Bulletin</i>, a magazine in which much of Lawson +was published, spoke of the “aggressive, soft-hatted stoush +brigade”. Anyone today who is disrespectful of authority or convention is +said to show the larrikin element in the Australian character. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +lucerne: Alfalfa in US +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +mallee: dwarfed eucalyptus trees growing in very poor soil and under harsh +rainfall conditions. Usually many stems emerging from the ground, creating a +low thicket. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +mateship: See Lawson story, “Mateship”. A heavily romanticised, but +nevertheless very practical form of (male) loyalty to a (male) companion who +travels with/works with him. A “mate” provides not only +companionship, but help in emergencies. Typical of an Australian in the +“outback”—or “Never-Never”, or under war +conditions. A man without a mate was a “hatter”—“his +hat covers his family”. Such a person might go “ratty” (see +further in The romance of the Swag). Equivalent to the “buddy +system” in SCUBA diving. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +metalled: of a road, covered in crushed rock (e.g. “blue metal”) +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +mulga: Acacia sp. (“wattle” in Australian) especially Acacia +aneura; growing in semi-desert conditions. Used as a description of such a +harsh region. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +mullock: the tailings left after gold has been removed. In Lawson generally mud +(alluvial) rather than rock +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +myall: aboriginal living in a traditional—pre-conquest—manner +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +nobbler: a drink +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +nuggety: compact but strong physique; small but well-muscled +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +pastoralist: OED sees it a equivalent to “squatter”, but in Lawson +someone often someone managing a large cattle/sheep “station” for a +“pastoral company” rather than an individual. Seen as ultimate +capitalist oppression. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +pluddy: see crimson +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +quid: monetary unit; one pound +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +ratty: insane—or, very eccentric, “cranky”. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +ringer: the champion sheep shearer in a shed that season +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +rouseabout: Labourer in a (sheep) shearing shed. Considered to be, as far as +any work is, unskilled labour. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +sawney: silly, gormless +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +scab: see blackleg +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +shout: In a group; to stand (pay for) a round of drinks. Bad form to leave +before your turn comes around. Much peer pressure to drink more than one +wished. One can also “shout” for everyone in the pub. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +skillion(-room): A “lean-to”, a room built up against the back of +some other building, with separate roof. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +spifflicated: punished, thrashed without mercy. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +spree: prolonged drinking bout—days, weeks. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +squatter: Someone who took up large areas of land, originally without official +permission (“squatted”), for sheep especially. Became the +“landed aristocracy” of Australia. (“Up rode the squatter, +mounted on his thoroughbred”) steever: Originally a Dutch coin. Used here +like “penny”—or brass razoo. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +sundowner: a swagman (see) who is NOT looking for work, but a +“handout”. Lawson explains the term as referring to someone who +turns up at a station at sundown, just in time for “tea” i.e. the +evening meal. Line (2494) of actual text (not counting P.G. matter). +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +swagman (swaggy): Generally, anyone who is walking in the “outback” +with a swag. (See “The Romance of the Swag”.) Lawson also restricts +it at times to those whom he considers to be tramps, not looking for work but +for “handouts”. In view of the Great Depression (1890—. In +1892 it was reckoned 1/3 men were out of work) perhaps unfairly. Perhaps +because he <i>was</i> there. See ‘travellers’. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +Tattersalls: The earliest public lottery in Australia. (1881) +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +tenner: a ten pound note. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +tin-kettling: making noise by striking metal pots/pans. May be celebratory +(weddings—in this collection, New Year’s Eve), or may indicate +extreme social disapproval of someone. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +travellers: “shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work” +(Lawson). +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +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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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b49d9d3 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #7065 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/7065) diff --git a/old/7065.txt b/old/7065.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5a8a414 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/7065.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9681 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Children of the Bush, by Henry Lawson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + + +Title: Children of the Bush + +Author: Henry Lawson + +Release Date: December, 2004 [EBook #7065] +Posting Date: March 26, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH *** + + + + +Produced by Geoffrey Cowling + + + + + + + +CHILDREN OF THE BUSH + + +By Henry Lawson + + +[Transcriber's notes: The year of first magazine publication is shown in +the table of contents below. Additional transcriber's notes, including a +glossary, are included at the end of the eBook.] + + + + +Contents + + + Send Round the Hat: 1901 + The Pretty Girl in the Army: 1901 + "Lord Douglas": 1901 + The Blindness of One-eyed Brogan: 1901 + The Sundowners: 1901 + A Sketch of Mateship: 1902 + On the Tucker Track: 1897 + A Bush Publican's Lament: 1901 + The Shearer's Dream: 1902 + The Lost Souls' Hotel: 1902 + The Boozers' Home: 1899 + The Sex Problem Again: 1898 + The Romance of the Swag: 1901 + "Buckholts' Gate": 1901 + The Bush-Fire: 1901 + The House that Was Never Built: 1901 + "Barney, Take me home Again": 1901 + A Droving Yarn: 1899 + Gettin' Back on Dave Regan: 1901 + "Shall We Gather at the River": 1901 + His Brother's Keeper: 1901 + The Ghosts of Many Christmases: 1901 + + + + + + +SEND ROUND THE HAT + + + Now this is the creed from the Book of the Bush-- + Should be simple and plain to a dunce: + "If a man's in a hole you must pass round the hat + Were he jail-bird or gentleman once." + + + +"Is it any harm to wake yer?" + +It was about nine o'clock in the morning, and, though it was Sunday +morning, it was no harm to wake me; but the shearer had mistaken me for +a deaf jackaroo, who was staying at the shanty and was something like +me, and had good-naturedly shouted almost at the top of his voice, and +he woke the whole shanty. Anyway he woke three or four others who were +sleeping on beds and stretchers, and one on a shake-down on the floor, +in the same room. It had been a wet night, and the shanty was full of +shearers from Big Billabong Shed which had cut out the day before. My +room mates had been drinking and gambling overnight, and they swore +luridly at the intruder for disturbing them. + +He was six-foot-three or thereabout. He was loosely built, bony, +sandy-complexioned and grey eyed. He wore a good-humoured grin at most +times, as I noticed later on; he was of a type of bushman that I always +liked--the sort that seem to get more good-natured the longer they grow, +yet are hard-knuckled and would accommodate a man who wanted to fight, +or thrash a bully in a good-natured way. The sort that like to carry +somebody's baby round, and cut wood, carry water and do little things +for overworked married bushwomen. He wore a saddle-tweed sac suit two +sizes too small for him, and his face, neck, great hands and bony wrists +were covered with sun-blotches and freckles. + +"I hope I ain't disturbin' yer," he shouted, as he bent over my bunk, +"but there's a cove--" + +"You needn't shout!" I interrupted, "I'm not deaf." + +"Oh--I beg your pardon!" he shouted. "I didn't know I was yellin'. I +thought you was the deaf feller." + +"Oh, that's all right," I said. "What's the trouble?" + +"Wait till them other chaps is done swearin' and I'll tell yer," he +said. He spoke with a quiet, good-natured drawl, with something of the +nasal twang, but tone and drawl distinctly Australian--altogether apart +from that of the Americans. + +"Oh, spit it out for Christ's sake, Long'un!" yelled One-eyed Bogan, who +had been the worst swearer in a rough shed, and he fell back on his bunk +as if his previous remarks had exhausted him. + +"It's that there sick jackaroo that was pickin'-up at Big Billabong," +said the Giraffe. "He had to knock off the first week, an' he's been +here ever since. They're sendin' him away to the hospital in Sydney by +the speeshall train. They're just goin' to take him up in the wagonette +to the railway station, an' I thought I might as well go round with the +hat an' get him a few bob. He's got a missus and kids in Sydney." + +"Yer always goin' round with yer gory hat!" growled Bogan. "Yer'd blanky +well take it round in hell!" + +"That's what he's doing, Bogan," muttered Gentleman Once, on the +shake-down, with his face to the wall. + +The hat was a genuine "cabbage-tree," one of the sort that "last a +lifetime." It was well coloured, almost black in fact with weather and +age, and it had a new strap round the base of the crown. I looked into +it and saw a dirty pound note and some silver. I dropped in half +a crown, which was more than I could spare, for I had only been a +green-hand at Big Billabong. + +"Thank yer!" he said. "Now then, you fellers!" + +"I wish you'd keep your hat on your head, and your money in your pockets +and your sympathy somewhere else," growled Jack Moonlight as he raised +himself painfully on his elbow, and felt under his pillow for two +half-crowns. "Here," he said, "here's two half-casers. Chuck 'em in and +let me sleep for God's sake!" + +Gentleman Once, the gambler, rolled round on his shake-down, bringing +his good-looking, dissipated face from the wall. He had turned in in his +clothes and, with considerable exertion he shoved his hand down into the +pocket of his trousers, which were a tight fit. He brought up a roll of +pound notes and could find no silver. + +"Here," he said to the Giraffe, "I might as well lay a quid. I'll chance +it anyhow. Chuck it in." + +"You've got rats this mornin', Gentleman Once," growled the Bogan. "It +ain't a blanky horse race." + +"P'r'aps I have," said Gentleman Once, and he turned to the wall again +with his head on his arm. + +"Now, Bogan, yer might as well chuck in somethin," said the Giraffe. + +"What's the matter with the ---- jackaroo?" asked the Bogan, tugging his +trousers from under the mattress. + +Moonlight said something in a low tone. + +"The ---- he has!" said Bogan. "Well, I pity the ----! Here, I'll chuck +in half a ---- quid!" and he dropped half a sovereign into the hat. + +The fourth man, who was known to his face as "Barcoo-Rot," and behind +his back as "The Mean Man," had been drinking all night, and not even +Bogan's stump-splitting adjectives could rouse him. So Bogan got out of +bed, and calling on us (as blanky female cattle) to witness what he was +about to do, he rolled the drunkard over, prospected his pockets till +he made up five shillings (or a "caser" in bush language), and "chucked" +them into the hat. + +And Barcoo-Rot is probably unconscious to this day that he was ever +connected with an act of charity. The Giraffe struck the deaf jackaroo +in the neat room. I heard the chaps cursing "Long-'un" for waking them, +and "Deaf-'un" for being, as they thought at first, the indirect cause +of the disturbance. I heard the Giraffe and his hat being condemned +in other rooms and cursed along the veranda where more shearers were +sleeping; and after a while I turned out. + +The Giraffe was carefully fixing a mattress and pillows on the floor of +a wagonette, and presently a man, who looked like a corpse, was carried +out and lifted into the trap. + +As the wagonette started, the shanty-keeper--a fat, soulless-looking +man--put his hand in his pocket and dropped a quid into the hat which +was still going round, in the hands of the Giraffe's mate, little Teddy +Thompson, who was as far below medium height as the Giraffe was above +it. + +The Giraffe took the horse's head and led him along on the most level +parts of the road towards the railway station, and two or three chaps +went along to help get the sick man into the train. + +The shearing-season was over in that district, but I got a job of +house-painting, which was my trade, at the Great Western Hotel (a +two-story brick place), and I stayed in Bourke for a couple of months. + + +The Giraffe was a Victorian native from Bendigo. He was well known in +Bourke and to many shearers who came through the great dry scrubs +from hundreds of miles round. He was stakeholder, drunkard's banker, +peacemaker where possible, referee or second to oblige the chaps when +a fight was on, big brother or uncle to most of the children in town, +final court of appeal when the youngsters had a dispute over a foot-race +at the school picnic, referee at their fights, and he was the stranger's +friend. + +"The feller as knows can battle around for himself," he'd say. "But +I always like to do what I can for a hard-up stranger cove. I was a +green-hand jackaroo once meself, and I know what it is." + +"You're always bothering about other people, Giraffe," said Tom Hall, +the shearers' union secretary, who was only a couple of inches shorter +than the Giraffe. "There's nothing in it, you can take it from me--I +ought to know." + +"Well, what's a feller to do?" said the Giraffe. "I'm only hangin' +round here till shearin' starts agen, an' a cove might as well be doin' +something. Besides, it ain't as if I was like a cove that had old people +or a wife an' kids to look after. I ain't got no responsibilities. A +feller can't be doin' nothin'. Besides, I like to lend a helpin' hand +when I can." + +"Well, all I've got to say," said Tom, most of whose screw went in +borrowed quids, etc. "All I've got to say is that you'll get no thanks, +and you might blanky well starve in the end." + +"There ain't no fear of me starvin' so long as I've got me hands about +me; an' I ain't a cove as wants thanks," said the Giraffe. + +He was always helping someone or something. Now it was a bit of a +"darnce" that we was gettin' up for the girls; again it was Mrs Smith, +the woman whose husban' was drowned in the flood in the Began River +lars' Crismas, or that there poor woman down by the Billabong--her +husband cleared out and left her with a lot o' kids. Or Bill Something, +the bullocky, who was run over by his own wagon, while he was drunk, and +got his leg broke. + +Toward the end of his spree One-eyed Began broke loose and smashed +nearly all the windows of the Carriers' Arms, and next morning he was +fined heavily at the police court. About dinner-time I encountered the +Giraffe and his hat, with two half-crowns in it for a start. + +"I'm sorry to trouble yer," he said, "but One-eyed Bogan carn't pay his +fine, an' I thought we might fix it up for him. He ain't half a bad sort +of feller when he ain't drinkin'. It's only when he gets too much booze +in him." + +After shearing, the hat usually started round with the Giraffe's own +dirty crumpled pound note in the bottom of it as a send-off, later on it +was half a sovereign, and so on down to half a crown and a shilling, +as he got short of stuff; till in the end he would borrow a "few +bob"--which he always repaid after next shearing-"just to start the +thing goin'." + +There were several yarns about him and his hat. 'Twas said that the hat +had belonged to his father, whom he resembled in every respect, and it +had been going round for so many years that the crown was worn as thin +as paper by the quids, half-quids, casers, half-casers, bobs and tanners +or sprats--to say nothing of the scrums--that had been chucked into it +in its time and shaken up. + +They say that when a new governor visited Bourke the Giraffe happened to +be standing on the platform close to the exit, grinning good-humouredly, +and the local toady nudged him urgently and said in an awful whisper, +"Take off your hat! Why don't you take off your hat?" + +"Why?" drawled the Giraffe, "he ain't hard up, is he?" + +And they fondly cherish an anecdote to the effect that, when the +One-Man-One-Vote Bill was passed (or Payment of Members, or when the +first Labour Party went in--I forget on which occasion they said it was) +the Giraffe was carried away by the general enthusiasm, got a few beers +in him, "chucked" a quid into his hat, and sent it round. The boys +contributed by force of habit, and contributed largely, because of the +victory and the beer. And when the hat came back to the Giraffe, he +stood holding it in front of him with both hands and stared blankly into +it for a while. Then it dawned on him. + +"Blowed if I haven't bin an' gone an' took up a bloomin' collection for +meself!" he said. + + He was almost a teetotaller, but he stood his shout in reason. He +mostly drank ginger beer. + +"I ain't a feller that boozes, but I ain't got nothin' agen chaps +enjoyin' themselves, so long as they don't go too far." + +It was common for a man on the spree to say to him: + +"Here! here's five quid. Look after it for me, Giraffe, will yer, till I +git off the booze. + +"His real name was Bob Brothers, and his bush names, 'Long-'un,' 'The +Giraffe,' 'Send-round-the-hat,' 'Chuck-in-a-bob,' and 'Ginger-ale.'" + +Some years before, camels and Afghan drivers had been imported to the +Bourke district; the camels did very well in the dry country, they +went right across country and carried everything from sardines to +flooring-boards. And the teamsters loved the Afghans nearly as much as +Sydney furniture makers love the cheap Chinese in the same line. +They love 'em even as union shearers on strike love blacklegs brought +up-country to take their places. + +Now the Giraffe was a good, straight unionist, but in cases of sickness +or trouble he was as apt to forget his unionism, as all bushmen are, at +all times (and for all time), to forget their creed. So, one evening, +the Giraffe blundered into the Carriers' Arms--of all places in the +world--when it was full of teamsters; he had his hat in his hand and +some small silver and coppers in it. + +"I say, you fellers, there's a poor, sick Afghan in the camp down there +along the--" + +A big, brawny bullock-driver took him firmly by the shoulders, or, +rather by the elbows, and ran him out before any damage was done. The +Giraffe took it as he took most things, good-humouredly; but, about +dusk, he was seen slipping down towards the Afghan camp with a billy of +soup. + +"I believe," remarked Tom Hall, "that when the Giraffe goes to +heaven--and he's the only one of us, as far as I can see, that has a +ghost of a show--I believe that when he goes to heaven, the first +thing he'll do will be to take his infernal hat round amongst the +angels--getting up a collection for this damned world that he left +behind." + +"Well, I don't think there's so much to his credit, after all," said +Jack Mitchell, shearer. "You see, the Giraffe is ambitious; he likes +public life, and that accounts for him shoving himself forward with +his collections. As for bothering about people in trouble, that's only +common curiosity; he's one of those chaps that are always shoving their +noses into other people's troubles. And, as for looking after sick +men--why! there's nothing the Giraffe likes better than pottering round +a sick man, and watching him and studying him. He's awfully interested +in sick men, and they're pretty scarce out here. I tell you there's +nothing he likes better--except, maybe, it's pottering round a corpse. I +believe he'd ride forty miles to help and sympathize and potter round +a funeral. The fact of the matter is that the Giraffe is only enjoying +himself with other people's troubles--that's all it is. It's only vulgar +curiosity and selfishness. I set it down to his ignorance; the way he +was brought up." + +A few days after the Afghan incident the Giraffe and his hat had a run +of luck. A German, one of a party who were building a new wooden bridge +over the Big Billabong, was helping unload some girders from a truck at +the railway station, when a big log slipped on the skids and his leg +was smashed badly. They carried him to the Carriers' Arms, which was +the nearest hotel, and into a bedroom behind the bar, and sent for the +doctor. The Giraffe was in evidence as usual. + +"It vas not that at all," said German Charlie, when they asked him if he +was in much pain. "It vas not that at all. I don't cares a damn for der +bain; but dis is der tird year--und I vas going home dis year--after der +gontract--und der gontract yoost commence!"` + +That was the burden of his song all through, between his groans. There +were a good few chaps sitting quietly about the bar and veranda when the +doctor arrived. The Giraffe was sitting at the end of the counter, on +which he had laid his hat while he wiped his face, neck, and forehead +with a big speckled "sweatrag." It was a very hot day. + +The doctor, a good-hearted young Australian, was heard saying something. +Then German Charlie, in a voice that rung with pain: + +"Make that leg right, doctor--quick! Dis is der tird pluddy year--und I +must go home!" + +The doctor asked him if he was in great pain. "Neffer mind der pluddy +bain, doctor! Neffer mind der pluddy bain! Dot vas nossing. Make dat leg +well quick, doctor. Dis vas der last gontract, and I vas going home dis +year." Then the words jerked out of him by physical agony: "Der girl vas +vaiting dree year, und--by Got! I must go home." + +The publican--Watty Braithwaite, known as "Watty Broadweight," or, more +familiarly, "Watty Bothways"--turned over the Giraffe's hat in a tired, +bored sort of way, dropped a quid into it, and nodded resignedly at the +Giraffe. + +The Giraffe caught up the hint and the hat with alacrity. The hat went +all round town, so to speak; and, as soon as his leg was firm enough not +to come loose on the road German Charlie went home. + +It was well known that I contributed to the Sydney _Bulletin_ and +several other papers. The Giraffe's bump of reverence was very large, +and swelled especially for sick men and poets. He treated me with much +more respect than is due from a bushman to a man, and with an odd sort +of extra gentleness I sometimes fancied. But one day he rather surprised +me. + +"I'm sorry to trouble yer," he said in a shamefaced way. "I don't know +as you go in for sportin', but One-eyed Bogan an' Barcoo-Rot is goin' to +have a bit of a scrap down the Billybong this evenin', an'----" + +"A bit of a what?" I asked. + +"A bit of fight to a finish," he said apologetically. "An' the chaps is +tryin' to fix up a fiver to put some life into the thing. There's bad +blood between One-eyed Bogan and Barcoo-Rot, an' it won't do them any +harm to have it out." + +It was a great fight, I remember. There must have been a couple of score +blood-soaked handkerchiefs (or "sweat-rags") buried in a hole on the +field of battle, and the Giraffe was busy the rest of the evening +helping to patch up the principals. Later on he took up a small +collection for the loser, who happened to be Barcoo-Rot in spite of the +advantage of an eye. + +The Salvation Army lassie, who went round with the _War Cry_, nearly +always sold the Giraffe three copies. + +A new-chum parson, who wanted a subscription to build or enlarge a +chapel, or something, sought the assistance of the Giraffe's influence +with his mates. + +"Well," said the Giraffe, "I ain't a churchgoer meself. I ain't what you +might call a religious cove, but I'll be glad to do what I can to help +yer. I don't suppose I can do much. I ain't been to church since I was a +kiddy." + +The parson was shocked, but later on he learned to appreciate the +Giraffe and his mates, and to love Australia for the bushman's sake, and +it was he who told me the above anecdote. + +The Giraffe helped fix some stalls for a Catholic Church bazaar, and +some of the chaps chaffed him about it in the union office. + +"You'll be taking up a collection for a joss-house down in the +Chinamen's camp next," said Tom Hall in conclusion. + +"Well, I ain't got nothin' agen the Roming Carflics," said the Giraffe. +"An' Father O'Donovan's a very decent sort of cove. He stuck up for the +unions all right in the strike anyway." ("He wouldn't be Irish if he +wasn't," someone commented.) "I carried swags once for six months with +a feller that was a Carflick, an' he was a very straight feller. And +a girl I knowed turned Carflick to marry a chap that had got her into +trouble, an' she was always jes' the same to me after as she was before. +Besides, I like to help everything that's goin' on." + +Tom Hall and one or two others went out hurriedly to have a drink. But +we all loved the Giraffe. + +He was very innocent and very humorous, especially when he meant to be +most serious and philosophical. + +"Some of them bush girls is regular tomboys," he said to me solemnly +one day. "Some of them is too cheeky altogether. I remember once I was +stoppin' at a place--they was sort of relations o' mine--an' they put me +to sleep in a room off the verander, where there was a glass door an' +no blinds. An' the first mornin' the girls--they was sort o' cousins +o' mine--they come gigglin' and foolin' round outside the door on the +verander, an' kep' me in bed till nearly ten o'clock. I had to put me +trowsis on under the bed-clothes in the end. But I got back on 'em the +next night," he reflected. + +"How did you do that, Bob?" I asked. + +"Why, I went to bed in me trowsis!" + + +One day I was on a plank, painting the ceiling of the bar of the Great +Western Hotel. I was anxious to get the job finished. The work had been +kept back most of the day by chaps handing up long beers to me, and +drawing my attention to the alleged fact that I was putting on the paint +wrong side out. I was slapping it on over the last few boards when: + +"I'm very sorry to trouble yer; I always seem to be troublin' yer; but +there's that there woman and them girls----" + +I looked down--about the first time I had looked down on him--and there +was the Giraffe, with his hat brim up on the plank and two half-crowns +in it. + +"Oh, that's all right, Bob," I said, and I dropped in half a crown. + +There were shearers in the bar, and presently there was some barracking. +It appeared that that there woman and them girls were strange women, in +the local as well as the Biblical sense of the word, who had come from +Sydney at the end of the shearing-season, and had taken a cottage on the +edge of the scrub on the outskirts of the town. There had been trouble +this week in connection with a row at their establishment, and they had +been fined, warned off by the police, and turned out by their landlord. + +"This is a bit too red-hot, Giraffe," said one of the shearers. "Them +----s has made enough out of us coves. They've got plenty of stuff, +don't you fret. Let 'em go to ----! I'm blanked if I give a sprat." + +"They ain't got their fares to Sydney," said the Giraffe. "An', what's +more, the little 'un is sick, an' two of them has kids in Sydney." + +"How the ---- do you know?" + +"Why, one of 'em come to me an' told me all about it." + +There was an involuntary guffaw. + +"Look here, Bob," said Billy Woods, the rouseabouts' secretary, kindly. +"Don't you make a fool of yourself. You'll have all the chaps laughing +at you. Those girls are only working you for all you're worth. I suppose +one of 'em came crying and whining to you. Don't you bother about 'em. +_You_ don't know 'em; they can pump water at a moment's notice. You +haven't had any experience with women yet, Bob." + +"She didn't come whinin' and cryin' to me," said the Giraffe, dropping +his twanging drawl a little. "She looked me straight in the face an' +told me all about it." + +"I say, Giraffe," said Box-o'-Tricks, "what have you been doin'? You've +bin down there on the nod. I'm surprised at yer, Giraffe." + +"An' he pretends to be so gory soft an' innocent, too," growled the +Bogan. "We know all about you, Giraffe." + +"Look here, Giraffe," said Mitchell the shearer. "I'd never have thought +it of you. We all thought you were the only virgin youth west the river; +I always thought you were a moral young man. You mustn't think that +because your conscience is pricking you everyone else's is." + +"I ain't had anythin' to do with them," said the Giraffe, drawling +again. "I ain't a cove that goes in for that sort of thing. But other +chaps has, and I think they might as well help 'em out of their fix." + +"They're a rotten crowd," said Billy Woods. "You don't know them, Bob. +Don't bother about them-they're not worth it. Put your money in your +pocket. You'll find a better use for it before next shearing." + +"Better shout, Giraffe," said Box-o'-Tricks. + +Now in spite of the Giraffe's softness he was the hardest man in Bourke +to move when he'd decided on what he thought was "the fair thing to do." +Another peculiarity of his was that on occasion, such for instance as +"sayin' a few words" at a strike meeting, he would straighten himself, +drop the twang, and rope in his drawl, so to speak. + +"Well, look here, you chaps," he said now. "I don't know anything about +them women. I s'pose they're bad, but I don't suppose they're worse than +men has made them. All I know is that there's four women turned out, +without any stuff, and every woman in Bourke, an' the police, an' the +law agen 'em. An' the fact that they is women is agenst 'em most of all. +You don't expect 'em to hump their swags to Sydney! Why, only I ain't +got the stuff I wouldn't trouble yer. I'd pay their fares meself. Look," +he said, lowering his voice, "there they are now, an' one of the girls +is cryin'. Don't let 'em see yer lookin'." + +I dropped softly from the plank and peeped out with the rest. + +They stood by the fence on the opposite side of the street, a bit up +towards the railway station, with their portmanteaux and bundles at +their feet. One girl leant with her arms on the fence rail and her face +buried in them, another was trying to comfort her. The third girl and +the woman stood facing our way. The woman was good-looking; she had a +hard face, but it might have been made hard. The third girl seemed half +defiant, half inclined to cry. Presently she went to the other side of +the girl who was crying on the fence and put her arm round her shoulder. +The woman suddenly turned her back on us and stood looking away over the +paddocks. + +The hat went round. Billy Woods was first, then Box-o'-Tricks, and then +Mitchell. + +Billy contributed with eloquent silence. "I was only jokin', Giraffe," +said Box-o'-Tricks, dredging his pockets for a couple of shillings. It +was some time after the shearing, and most of the chaps were hard up. +"Ah, well," sighed Mitchell. "There's no help for it. If the Giraffe +would take up a collection to import some decent girls to this +God-forgotten hole there might be some sense in it.... It's bad enough +for the Giraffe to undermine our religious prejudices, and tempt us +to take a morbid interest in sick Chows and Afghans, and blacklegs and +widows; but when he starts mixing us up with strange women it's time to +buck." And he prospected his pockets and contributed two shillings, some +odd pennies, and a pinch of tobacco dust. + +"I don't mind helping the girls, but I'm damned if I'll give a penny to +help the old ----," said Tom Hall. + +"Well, she was a girl once herself," drawled the Giraffe. + +The Giraffe went round to the other pubs and to the union offices, and +when he returned he seemed satisfied with the plate, but troubled about +something else. + +"I don't know what to do for them for to-night," he said. "None of the +pubs or boardin'-houses will hear of them, an' there ain't no empty +houses, an' the women is all agen 'em." + +"Not all," said Alice, the big, handsome barmaid from Sydney. "Come +here, Bob." She gave the Giraffe half a sovereign and a look for which +some of us would have paid him ten pounds--had we had the money, and had +the look been transferable. + +"Wait a minute, Bob," she said, and she went in to speak to the +landlord. + +"There's an empty bedroom at the end of the store in the yard," she said +when she came back. "They can camp there for to-night if they behave +themselves. You'd better tell 'em, Bob." + +"Thank yer, Alice," said the Giraffe. + +Next day, after work, the Giraffe and I drifted together and down by +the river in the cool of the evening, and sat on the edge of the steep, +drought-parched bank. + +"I heard you saw your lady friends off this morning, Bob," I said, and +was sorry I said it, even before he answered. + +"Oh, they ain't no friends of mine," he said. "Only four' poor devils of +women. I thought they mightn't like to stand waitin' with the crowd on +the platform, so I jest offered to get their tickets an' told 'em to +wait round at the back of the station till the bell rung.... An' what +do yer think they did, Harry?" he went on, with an exasperatingly +unintelligent grin. "Why, they wanted to kiss me." + +"Did they?" + +"Yes. An' they would have done it, too, if I hadn't been so long.... +Why, I'm blessed if they didn't kiss me hands." + +"You don't say so." + +"God's truth. Somehow I didn't like to go on the platform with them +after that; besides, they was cryin', and I can't stand women cryin'. +But some of the chaps put them into an empty carriage." He thought a +moment. Then: + +"There's some terrible good-hearted fellers in the world," he reflected. + +I thought so too. "Bob," I said, "you're a single man. Why don't you get +married and settle down?" + +"Well," he said, "I ain't got no wife an' kids, that's a fact. But it +ain't my fault." + +He may have been right about the wife. But I thought of the look that +Alice had given him, and-- + +"Girls seem to like me right enough," he said, "but it don't go no +further than that. The trouble is that I'm so long, and I always seem +to get shook after little girls. At least there was one little girl in +Bendigo that I was properly gone on." + +"And wouldn't she have you?" + +"Well, it seems not." + +"Did you ask her?" + +"Oh, yes, I asked her right enough." + +"Well, and what did she say?" + +"She said it would be redicilus for her to be seen trottin' alongside of +a chimbley like me." + +"Perhaps she didn't mean that. There are any amount of little women who +like tall men." + +"I thought of that too--afterwards. P'r'aps she didn't mean it that way. +I s'pose the fact of the matter was that she didn't cotton on to me, and +wanted to let me down easy. She didn't want to hurt me feelin's, if +yer understand--she was a very good-hearted little girl. There's some +terrible tall fellers where I come from, and I know two as married +little girls." + +He seemed a hopeless case. + +"Sometimes," he said, "sometimes I wish that I wasn't so blessed long." + +"There's that there deaf jackaroo," he reflected presently. "He's +something in the same fig about girls as I am. He's too deaf and I'm too +long." + +"How do you make that out?" I asked. "He's got three girls, to my +knowledge, and, as for being deaf, why, he gasses more than any man in +the town, and knows more of what's going on than old Mother Brindle the +washerwoman." + +"Well, look at that now!" said the Giraffe, slowly. "Who'd have thought +it? He never told me he had three girls, an' as for hearin' news, I +always tell him anything that's goin' on that I think he doesn't catch. +He told me his trouble was that whenever he went out with a girl people +could hear what they was sayin'--at least they could hear what she was +sayin' to him, an' draw their own conclusions, he said. He said he went +out one night with a girl, and some of the chaps foxed 'em an' heard her +sayin' `don't' to him, an' put it all round town." + +"What did she say `don't' for?" I asked. + +"He didn't tell me that, but I s'pose he was kissin' her or huggin' her +or something." + +"Bob," I said presently, "didn't you try the little girl in Bendigo a +second time?" + +"No," he said. "What was the use. She was a good little girl, and I +wasn't goin' to go botherin' her. I ain't the sort of cove that goes +hangin' round where he isn't wanted. But somehow I couldn't stay about +Bendigo after she gave me the hint, so I thought I'd come over an' have +a knock round on this side for a year or two." + +"And you never wrote to her?" + +"No. What was the use of goin' pesterin' her with letters? I know what +trouble letters give me when I have to answer one. She'd have only had +to tell me the straight truth in a letter an' it wouldn't have done me +any good. But I've pretty well got over it by this time." + +A few days later I went to Sydney. The Giraffe was the last I shook +hands with from the carriage window, and he slipped something in a piece +of newspaper into my hand. + +"I hope yer won't be offended," he drawled, "but some of the chaps +thought you mightn't be too flush of stuff--you've been shoutin' a good +deal; so they put a quid or two together. They thought it might help yer +to have a bit of a fly round in Sydney." + +I was back in Bourke before next shearing. On the evening of my arrival +I ran against the Giraffe; he seemed strangely shaken over something, +but he kept his hat on his head. + +"Would yer mind takin' a stroll as fur as the Billerbong?" he said. "I +got something I'd like to tell yer." + +His big, brown, sunburnt hands trembled and shook as he took a letter +from his pocket and opened it. + +"I've just got a letter," he said. "A letter from that little girl at +Bendigo. It seems it was all a mistake. I'd like you to read it. Somehow +I feel as if I want to talk to a feller, and I'd rather talk to you than +any of them other chaps." + +It was a good letter, from a big-hearted little girl. She had been +breaking her heart for the great ass all these months. It seemed that +he had left Bendigo without saying good-bye to her. "Somehow I couldn't +bring meself to it," he said, when I taxed him with it. She had never +been able to get his address until last week; then she got it from a +Bourke man who had gone south. She called him "an awful long fool," +which he was, without the slightest doubt, and she implored him to +write, and come back to her. + +"And will you go back, Bob?" I asked. + +"My oath! I'd take the train to-morrer only I ain't got the stuff. But +I've got a stand in Big Billerbong Shed an' I'll soon knock a few quid +together. I'll go back as soon as ever shearin's over. I'm goin' to +write away to her to-night." + + +The Giraffe was the "ringer" of Big Billabong Shed that season. His +tallies averaged a hundred and twenty a day. He only sent his hat round +once during shearing, and it was noticed that he hesitated at first and +only contributed half a crown. But then it was a case of a man being +taken from the shed by the police for wife desertion. + +"It's always that way," commented Mitchell. "Those soft, good-hearted +fellows always end by getting hard and selfish. The world makes 'em so. +It's the thought of the soft fools they've been that finds out sooner or +later and makes 'em repent. Like as not the Giraffe will be the meanest +man out back before he's done." + +When Big Billabong cut out, and we got back to Bourke with our dusty +swags and dirty cheques, I spoke to Tom Hall: + +"Look here, Tom," I said. "That long fool, the Giraffe, has been +breaking his heart for a little girl in Bendigo ever since he's been out +back, and she's been breaking her heart for him, and the ass didn't know +it till he got a letter from her just before Big Billabong started. He's +going to-morrow morning." + +That evening Tom stole the Giraffe's hat. "I s'pose it'll turn up in +the mornin'," said the Giraffe. "I don't mind a lark," he added, "but +it does seem a bit red hot for the chaps to collar a cove's hat and a +feller goin' away for good, p'r'aps, in the mornin'." + +Mitchell started the thing going with a quid. + +"It's worth it," he said, "to get rid of him. We'll have some peace now. +There won't be so many accidents or women in trouble when the Giraffe +and his blessed hat are gone. Any way, he's an eyesore in the town, and +he's getting on my nerves for one.... Come on, you sinners! Chuck 'em +in; we're only taking quids and half-quids." + +About daylight next morning Tom Hall slipped into the Giraffe's room at +the Carriers' Arms. The Giraffe was sleeping peacefully. Tom put the +hat on a chair by his side. The collection had been a record one, +and, besides the packet of money in the crown of the hat, there was a +silver-mounted pipe with case--the best that could be bought in Bourke, +a gold brooch, and several trifles--besides an ugly valentine of a long +man in his shirt walking the room with a twin on each arm. + +Tom was about to shake the Giraffe by the shoulder, when he noticed +a great foot, with about half a yard of big-boned ankle and shank, +sticking out at the bottom of the bed. The temptation was too great. Tom +took up the hair-brush, and, with the back of it, he gave a smart rap on +the point of an in-growing toe-nail, and slithered. + +We heard the Giraffe swearing good-naturedly for a while, and then there +was a pregnant silence. He was staring at the hat we supposed. + +We were all up at the station to see him off. It was rather a long wait. +The Giraffe edged me up to the other end of the platform. + +He seemed overcome. + +"There's--there's some terrible good-hearted fellers in this world," he +said. "You mustn't forgit 'em, Harry, when you make a big name writin'. +I'm--well, I'm blessed if I don't feel as if I was jist goin' to +blubber!" + +I was glad he didn't. The Giraffe blubberin' would have been a +spectacle. I steered him back to his friends. + +"Ain't you going to kiss me, Bob?" said the Great Western's big, +handsome barmaid, as the bell rang. + +"Well, I don't mind kissin' you, Alice," he said, wiping his mouth. "But +I'm goin' to be married, yer know." And he kissed her fair on the mouth. + +"There's nothin' like gettin' into practice," he said, grinning round. + +We thought he was improving wonderfully; but at the last moment +something troubled him. + +"Look here, you chaps," he said, hesitatingly, with his hand in his +pocket, "I don't know what I'm going to do with all this stuff. There's +that there poor washerwoman that scalded her legs liftin' the boiler of +clothes off the fire----" + +We shoved him into the carriage. He hung--about half of him--out the +window, wildly waving his hat, till the train disappeared in the scrub. + +And, as I sit here writing by lamplight at midday, in the midst of a +great city of shallow social sham, of hopeless, squalid poverty, of +ignorant selfishness, cultured or brutish, and of noble and heroic +endeavour frowned down or callously neglected, I am almost aware of a +burst of sunshine in the room, and a long form leaning over my chair, +and: + +"Excuse me for troublin' yer; I'm always troublin' yer; but there's that +there poor woman...." + +And I wish I could immortalize him! + + + + +THAT PRETTY GIRL IN THE ARMY + + + Now I often sit at Watty's, when the night is very near, + With a head that's full of jingles--and the fumes of bottled beer; + For I always have a fancy that, if I am over there + When the Army prays for Watty, I'm included in the prayer. + It would take a lot of praying, lots of thumping on the drum, + To prepare our sinful, straying, erring souls for Kingdom Come. + But I love my fellow-sinners! and I hope, upon the whole, + That the Army gets a hearing when it prays for Watty's soul. + -When the World was Wide. + + +The Salvation Army does good business in some of the outback towns +of the great pastoral wastes of Australia. There's the thoughtless, +careless generosity of the bushman, whose pockets don't go far +enough down his trousers (that's what's the matter with him), and who +contributes to anything that comes along, without troubling to ask +questions, like long Bob Brothers of Bourke, who, chancing to be "a +Protestant by rights," unwittingly subscribed towards the erection of a +new Catholic church, and, being chaffed for his mistake, said: + +"Ah, well, I don't suppose it'll matter a hang in the end, anyway it +goes. I ain't got nothink agenst the Roming Carflicks." + +There's the shearer, fresh with his cheque from a cut-out shed, +gloriously drunk and happy, in love with all the world, and ready to +subscribe towards any creed and shout for all hands--including Old +Nick if he happened to come along. There's the shearer, half-drunk and +inclined to be nasty, who has got the wrong end of all things with +a tight grip, and who flings a shilling in the face of out-back +conventionality (as he thinks) by chucking a bob into the Salvation Army +ring. Then he glares round to see if he can catch anybody winking behind +his back. There's the cynical joker, a queer mixture, who contributes +generously and tempts the reformed boozer afterwards. There's the +severe-faced old station-hand--in clean shirt and neckerchief and white +moleskins--in for his annual or semi-annual spree, who contributes on +principle, and then drinks religiously until his cheque is gone and the +horrors are come. There's the shearer, feeling mighty bad after a spree, +and in danger of seeing things when he tries to go to sleep. He has +dropped ten or twenty pounds over bar counters and at cards, and he now +"chucks" a repentant shilling into the ring, with a very private and +rather vague sort of feeling that something might come of it. There's +the stout, contented, good-natured publican, who tips the Army as if it +were a barrel-organ. And there are others and other reasons--black sheep +and ne'er-do-wells--and faint echoes of other times in Salvation Army +tunes. + +Bourke, the metropolis of the Great Scrubs, on the banks of the Darling +River, about five hundred miles from Sydney, was suffering from a long +drought when I was there in ninety-two; and the heat may or may not have +been another cause contributing to the success, from a business point of +view, of the Bourke garrison. There was much beer boozing--and, besides, +it was vaguely understood (as most things are vaguely understood out +there in the drought-haze) that the place the Army came to save us from +was hotter than Bourke. We didn't hanker to go to a hotter place than +Bourke. But that year there was an extraordinary reason for the Army's +great financial success there. + +She was a little girl, nineteen or twenty, I should judge, the prettiest +girl I ever saw in the Army, and one of the prettiest I've ever seen +out of it. She had the features of an angel, but her expression was +wonderfully human, sweet and sympathetic. Her big grey eyes were sad +with sympathy for sufferers and sinners, and her poke bonnet was full +of bunchy, red-gold hair. Her first appearance was somewhat +dramatic--perhaps the Army arranged it so. + +The Army used to pray, and thump the drum, and sing, and take up +collections every evening outside Watty Bothways' Hotel, the Carriers' +Arms. They performed longer and more often outside Watty's than any +other pub in town--perhaps because Watty was considered the most +hopeless publican and his customers the hardest crowd of boozers in +Bourke. The band generally began to play about dusk. Watty would lean +back comfortably in a basket easy-chair on his wide veranda, and clasp +his hands, in a calm, contented way, while the Army banged the drum and +got steam up, and whilst, perhaps, there was a barney going on in the +bar, or a bloodthirsty fight in the backyard. On such occasions there +was something like an indulgent or fatherly expression on his fat and +usually emotionless face. And by and by he'd move his head gently and +doze. The banging and the singing seemed to soothe him, and the praying, +which was often very personal, never seemed to disturb him in the least. + +Well, it was about dusk one day; it had been a terrible day, a hundred +and something startling in the shade, but there came a breeze after +sunset. There had been several dozen of buckets of water thrown on the +veranda floor and the ground outside. Watty was seated in his accustomed +place when the Army arrived. There was no barney in the bar because +there was a fight in the backyard, and that claimed the attention of all +the customers. + +The Army prayed for Watty and his clients; then a reformed drunkard +started to testify against publicans and all their works. Watty settled +himself comfortably, folded his hands, and leaned back and dozed. + +The fight was over, and the chaps began to drop round to the bar. The +man who was saved waved his arms, and danced round and howled. + +"Ye-es!" he shouted hoarsely. "The publicans, and boozers, and gamblers, +and sinners may think that Bourke is hot, but hell is a thousand times +hotter! I tell you" + +"Oh, Lord!" said Mitchell, the shearer, and he threw a penny into the +ring. + +"Ye-es! I tell you that hell is a million times hotter than Bourke! I +tell you----" + +"Oh, look here," said a voice from the background, "that won't wash. +Why, don't you know that when the Bourke people die they send back for +their blankets?" + +The saved brother glared round. + +"I hear a freethinker speaking, my friends," he said. Then, with sudden +inspiration and renewed energy, "I hear the voice of a freethinker. Show +me the face of a freethinker," he yelled, glaring round like a hunted, +hungry man. "Show me the face of a freethinker, and I'll tell you what +he is." + +Watty hitched himself into a more comfortable position and clasped his +hands on his knee and closed his eyes again. + +"Ya-a-a-s!" shrieked the brand. "I tell you, my friends, I can tell a +freethinker by his face. Show me the face of a----" + +At this point there was an interruption. One-eyed, or Wall-eyed, Bogan, +who had a broken nose, and the best side of whose face was reckoned the +ugliest and most sinister--One-eyed Bogan thrust his face forward from +the ring of darkness into the torchlight of salvation. He had got the +worst of a drawn battle; his nose and mouth were bleeding, and his good +eye was damaged. + +"Look at my face!" he snarled, with dangerous earnestness. "Look at my +face! That's the face of a freethinker, and I don't care who knows it. +Now! what have you got to say against my face, `Man-without-a-Shirt?'" + +The brother drew back. He had been known in the northwest in his sinful +days as "Man-without-a-Shirt," alias "Shirty," or "The Dirty Man," and +was flabbergasted at being recognized in speech. Also, he had been in +a shearing-shed and in a shanty orgy with One-eyed Bogan, and knew the +man. + +Now most of the chaps respected the Army, and, indeed, anything +that looked like religion, but the Bogan's face, as representing +free-thought, was a bit too sudden for them. There were sounds on the +opposite side of the ring as from men being smitten repeatedly and +rapidly below the belt, and long Tom Hall and one or two others got away +into the darkness in the background, where Tom rolled helplessly on the +grass and sobbed. + +It struck me that Bogan's face was more the result of free speech than +anything else. + +The Army was about to pray when the Pretty Girl stepped forward, her +eyes shining with indignation and enthusiasm. She had arrived by the +evening train, and had been standing shrinkingly behind an Army lass of +fifty Australian summers, who was about six feet high, flat and broad, +and had a square face, and a mouth like a joint in boiler plates. + +The Pretty Girl stamped her pretty foot on the gravel, and her eyes +flashed in the torchlight. + +"You ought to be ashamed of yourselves," she said. "Great big men like +you to be going on the way you are. If you were ignorant or poor, as +I've seen people, there might be some excuse for you. Haven't you got +any mothers, or sisters, or wives to think of? What sort of a life is +this you lead? Drinking, and gambling, and fighting, and swearing +your lives away! Do you ever think of God and the time when you were +children? Why don't you make homes? Look at that man's face!" (she +pointed suddenly at Bogan, who collapsed and sidled behind his mates out +of the light). "Look at that man's face! Is it a face for a Christian? +And you help and encourage him to fight. You're worse than he is. Oh, +it's brutal. It's--it's wicked. Great big men like you, you ought to be +ashamed of yourselves." + +Long Bob Brothers--about six-foot-four--the longest and most innocent +there, shrunk down by the wall and got his inquiring face out of the +light. The Pretty Girl fluttered on for a few moments longer, greatly +excited, and then stepped back, seemingly much upset, and was taken +under the wing of the woman with the boiler-plate mouth. + +It was a surprise, and very sudden. Bogan slipped round to the backyard, +and was seen bathing his battered features at the pump. The rest wore +the expression of men who knew that something unusual has happened, but +don't know what, and are waiting vacantly for developments.--Except Tom +Hall, who had recovered and returned. He stood looking over the head of +the ring of bushmen, and apparently taking the same critical interest in +the girl as he would in a fight--his expression was such as a journalist +might wear who is getting exciting copy. + +The Army had it all their own way for the rest of the evening, and made +a good collection. The Pretty Girl stood smiling round with shining eyes +as the bobs and tanners dropped in, and then, being shoved forward by +the flat woman, she thanked us sweetly, and said we were good fellows, +and that she was sorry for some things she'd said to us. Then she +retired, fluttering and very much flushed, and hid herself behind the +hard woman--who, by the way, had an excrescence on her upper lip which +might have stood for a rivet. + +Presently the Pretty Girl came from behind the big woman and stood +watching things with glistening eyes. Some of the chaps on the opposite +side of the ring moved a little to one side and all were careful not +to meet her eye--not to be caught looking at her--lest she should be +embarrassed. Watty had roused himself a little at the sound of a strange +voice in the Army (and such a clear, sweet voice too!) and had a look; +then he settled back peacefully again, but it was noticed that he didn't +snore that evening. + +And when the Army prayed, the Pretty Girl knelt down with the rest on +the gravel. One or two tall bushmen bowed their heads as if they had to, +and One-eyed Bogan, with the blood washed from his face, stood with his +hat off, glaring round to see if he could catch anyone sniggering. + +Mitchell, the shearer, said afterwards that the whole business made him +feel for the moment like he felt sometimes in the days when he used to +feel things. + +The town discussed the Pretty Girl in the Army that night and for many +days thereafter, but no one could find out who she was or where she +belonged to--except that she came from Sydney last. She kept her secret, +if she had one, very close--or else the other S.-A. women were not to be +pumped. She lived in skillion-rooms at the back of the big weather-board +Salvation Army barracks with two other "lassies," who did washing and +sewing and nursing, and went shabby, and half starved themselves, and +were baked in the heat, like scores of women in the bush, and even as +hundreds of women, suffering from religious mania, slave and stint in +city slums, and neglect their homes, husbands and children--for the +glory of Booth. + +The Pretty Girl was referred to as Sister Hannah by the Army people, +and came somehow to be known by sinners as "Miss Captain." I don't know +whether that was her real name or what rank she held in the Army, if +indeed she held any. + +She sold _War Crys_, and the circulation doubled in a day. One-eyed +Bogan, being bailed up unexpectedly, gave her "half a caser" for a +_Cry_, and ran away without the paper or the change. Jack Mitchell +bought a _Cry_ for the first time in his life, and read it. He said +he found some of the articles intensely realistic, and many of the +statements were very interesting. He said he read one or two things in +the _Cry_ that he didn't know before. Tom Hall, taken unawares, bought +three _Crys_ from the Pretty Girl, and blushed to find it fame. + +Little Billy Woods, the Labourers' Union secretary--who had a poetic +temperament and more than the average bushman's reverence for higher +things--Little Billy Woods told me in a burst of confidence that he +generally had two feelings, one after the other, after encountering +that girl. One was that unfathomable far-away feeling of loneliness and +longing, that comes at odd times to the best of married men, with the +best of wives and children--as Billy had. The other feeling, which +came later on, and was a reaction in fact, was the feeling of a man who +thinks he's been twisted round a woman's little finger for the benefit +of somebody else. Billy said that he couldn't help being reminded by the +shy, sweet smile and the shy, sweet "thank you" of the Pretty Girl in +the Army, of the shy, sweet smile and the shy, sweet gratitude of a +Sydney private barmaid, who had once roped him in, in the days before +he was married. Then he'd reckon that the Army lassie had been sent out +back to Bourke as a business speculation. + +Tom Hall was inclined to reckon so too--but that was after he'd been +chaffed for a month about the three _War Crys_. + +The Pretty Girl was discussed from psychological points of view; not +forgetting the sex problem. Donald Macdonald--shearer, union leader and +labour delegate to other colonies on occasion--Donald Macdonald said +that whenever he saw a circle of plain or ugly, dried-up women or +girls round a shepherd, evangelist or a Salvation Army drum, he'd say +"sexually starved!" They were hungry for love. Religious mania was +sexual passion dammed out of its course. Therefore he held that morbidly +religious girls were the most easily seduced. + +But this couldn't apply to Pretty Girl in the Army. Mitchell +reckoned that she'd either had a great sorrow--a lot of trouble, or a +disappointment in love (the "or" is Mitchell's); but they couldn't see +how a girl like her could possibly be disappointed in love--unless the +chap died or got into jail for life. Donald decided that her soul had +been starved somehow. + +Mitchell suggested that it might be only a craving for notoriety, the +same thing that makes women and girls go amongst lepers, and out to the +battlefield, and nurse ugly pieces of men back to life again; the same +thing that makes some women and girls swear ropes round men's necks. +The Pretty Girl might be the daughter of well-to-do people--even +aristocrats, said Mitchell--she was pretty enough and spoke well enough. +"Every woman's a barmaid at heart," as the _Bulletin_ puts it, said +Mitchell. + +But not even one of the haggard women of Bourke ever breathed a +suspicion of scandal against her. They said she was too good and too +pretty to be where she was. You see it was not as in an old settled town +where hags blacken God's world with their tongues. Bourke was just a +little camping town in a big land, where free, good-hearted democratic +Australians, and the best of black sheep from the old world were +constantly passing through; where husband's were often obliged to be +away from home for twelve months, and the storekeepers had to trust the +people, and mates trusted each other, and the folks were broad-minded. +The mind's eye had a wide range. + +After her maiden speech the Pretty Girl seldom spoke, except to return +thanks for collections--and she never testified. She had a sweet voice +and used to sing. + +Now, if I were writing pure fiction, and were not cursed with an +obstinate inclination to write the truth, I might say that, after the +advent of the Pretty Girl, the morals of Bourke improved suddenly and +wonderfully. That One-eyed Bogan left off gambling and drinking and +fighting and swearing, and put on a red coat and testified and fought +the devil only; that Mitchell dropped his mask of cynicism; that Donald +Macdonald ate no longer of the tree of knowledge and ceased to worry +himself with psychological problems, and was happy; and that Tom Hall +was no longer a scoffer. That no one sneaked round through the scrub +after dusk to certain necessary establishments in weather-board cottages +on the outskirts of the town; and that the broad-minded and obliging +ladies thereof became Salvation Army lassies. + +But none of these things happened. Drunks quieted down or got out of the +way if they could when the Pretty Girl appeared on the scene, fights and +games of "headin' 'em" were adjourned, and weak, ordinary language was +used for the time being, and that was about all. + +Nevertheless, most of the chaps were in love with that Pretty Girl +in the Army--all those who didn't _worship_ her privately. Long Bob +Brothers hovered round in hopes, they said, that she'd meet with an +accident--get run over by a horse or something--and he'd have to carry +her in; he scared the women at the barracks by dropping firewood over +the fence after dark. Barcoo-Rot, the meanest man in the back country, +was seen to drop a threepenny bit into the ring, and a rumour was +industriously circulated (by Tom Hall) to the effect that One-eyed Bogan +intended to shave and join the Army disguised as a lassie. + +Handsome Jake Boreham (_alias_ Bore-'em), a sentimental shearer from +New Zealand, who had read Bret Harte, made an elaborate attempt for the +Pretty Girl, by pretending to be going to the dogs headlong, with an +idea of first winning her sorrowful interest and sympathy, and then +making an apparently hard struggle to straighten up for her sake. He +related his experience with the cheerful and refreshing absence of +reserve which was characteristic of him, and is of most bushmen. + +"I'd had a few drinks," he said, "and was having a spell under a gum by +the river, when I saw the Pretty Girl and another Army woman coming down +along the bank. It was a blazing hot day. I thought of Sandy and the +Schoolmistress in Bret Harte, and I thought it would be a good idea to +stretch out in the sun and pretend to be helpless; so I threw my hat on +the ground and lay down, with my head in the blazing heat, in the most +graceful position I could get at, and I tried to put a look of pained +regret on my face, as if I was dreaming of my lost boyhood and me +mother. I thought, perhaps, the Girl would pity me, and I felt sure +she'd stoop and pick up my hat and put it gently over my poor troubled +head. Then I was going to become conscious for a moment, and look +hopelessly round, and into her eyes, and then start and look sorrowful +and ashamed, and stagger to my feet, taking off my hat like the Silver +King does to the audience when he makes his first appearance drunk on +the stage; and then I was going to reel off, trying to walk as straight +as I could. And next day I was going to clean up my teeth and nails and +put on a white shirt, and start to be a new man henceforth. + +"Well, as I lay there with my eyes shut, I heard the footsteps come up +and stop, and heard 'em whisper, and I thought I heard the Pretty Girl +say `Poor fellow!' or something that sounded like that; and just then I +got a God-almighty poke in the ribs with an umbrella--at least I suppose +it was aimed for my ribs; but women are bad shots, and the point of +the umbrella caught me in the side, just between the bottom rib and the +hip-bone, and I sat up with a click, like the blade of a pocketknife. + +"The other lassie was the big square-faced woman. The Pretty Girl looked +rather more frightened and disgusted than sentimental, but she had +plenty of pluck, and soon pulled herself together. She said I ought to +be ashamed of myself, a great big man like me, lying there in the dust +like a drunken tramp--an eyesore and a disgrace to all the world. She +told me to go to my camp, wherever that was, and sleep myself sober. The +square-jawed woman said I looked like a fool sitting there. I did feel +ashamed, and I reckon I did look like a fool--a man generally does in a +fix like that. I felt like one, anyway. I got up and walked away, and +it hurt me so much that I went over to West Bourke and went to the dogs +properly for a fortnight, and lost twenty quid on a game of draughts +against a blindfold player. Now both those women had umbrellas, but +I'm not sure to this day which of 'em it was that gave me the poke. +It wouldn't have mattered much anyway. I haven't borrowed one of Bret +Harte's books since." + +Jake reflected a while. "The worst of it was," he said ruefully, "that +I wasn't sure that the girl or the woman didn't see through me, and +that worried me a bit. You never can tell how much a woman suspects, and +that's the worst of 'em. I found that out after I got married." + +The Pretty Girl in the Army grew pale and thin and bigger-eyed. The +women said it was a shame, and that she ought to be sent home to her +friends, wherever they were. She was laid up for two or three days, and +some of the women cooked delicacies and handed 'em over the barracks +fence, and offered to come in and nurse her; but the square woman took +washing home and nursed the girl herself. + +The Pretty Girl still sold _War Crys_ and took up collections, but in a +tired, listless, half shamed-faced way. It was plain that she was tired +of the Army, and growing ashamed of the Salvationists. Perhaps she had +come to see things too plainly. + +You see, the Army does no good out back in Australia--except from a +business point of view. It is simply there to collect funds for hungry +headquarters. The bushmen are much too intelligent for the Army. There +was no poverty in Bourke--as it is understood in the city; there was +plenty of food; and camping out and roughing it come natural to the +bushmen. In cases of sickness, accident, widows or orphans, the chaps +sent round the hat, without banging a drum or testifying, and that was +all right. If a chap was hard up he borrowed a couple of quid from his +mate. If a strange family arrived without a penny, someone had to fix +'em up, and the storekeepers helped them till the man got work. For the +rest, we work out our own salvation, or damnation--as the case is--in +the bush, with no one to help us, except a mate, perhaps. The Army can't +help us, but a fellow-sinner can, sometimes, who has been through it all +himself. The Army is only a drag on the progress of Democracy, because +it attracts many who would otherwise be aggressive Democrats--and for +other reasons. + +Besides, if we all reformed the Army would get deuced little from us for +its city mission. + +The Pretty Girl went to service for a while with the stock inspector's +wife, who could get nothing out of her concerning herself or her +friends. She still slept at the barracks, stuck to the Army, and +attended its meetings. + + +It was Christmas morning, and there was peace in Bourke and goodwill +towards all men. There hadn't been a fight since yesterday evening, and +that had only been a friendly one, to settle an argument concerning +the past ownership, and, at the same time, to decide as to the future +possession of a dog. + +It had been a hot, close night, and it ended in a suffocating sunrise. +The free portion of the male population were in the habit of taking +their blankets and sleeping out in "the Park," or town square, in hot +weather; the wives and daughters of the town slept, or tried to sleep, +with bedroom windows and doors open, while husbands lay outside on the +verandas. I camped in a corner of the park that night, and the sun woke +me. + +As I sat up I caught sight of a swagman coming along the white, dusty +road from the direction of the bridge, where the cleared road ran across +west and on, a hundred and thirty miles, through the barren, broiling +mulga scrubs, to Hungerford, on the border of Sheol. I knew that +swagman's walk. It was John Merrick (Jack Moonlight), one-time +Shearers' Union secretary at Coonamble, and generally "Rep" (shearers' +representative) in any shed where he sheared. He was a "better-class +shearer," one of those quiet, thoughtful men of whom there are generally +two or three in the roughest of rough sheds, who have great influence, +and give the shed a good name from a Union point of view. Not quiet with +the resentful or snobbish reserve of the educated Englishman, but with a +sad or subdued sort of quietness that has force in it--as if they fully +realized that their intelligence is much higher than the average, that +they have suffered more real trouble and heartbreak than the majority of +their mates, and that their mates couldn't possibly understand them if +they spoke as they felt and couldn't see things as they do--yet men +who understand and are intensely sympathetic in their loneliness and +sensitive reserve. + +I had worked in a shed with Jack Moonlight, and had met him in +Sydney, and to be mates with a bushman for a few weeks is to know him +well--anyway, I found it so. He had taken a trip to Sydney the Christmas +before last, and when he came back there was something wanting. He +became more silent, he drank more, and sometimes alone, and took to +smoking heavily. He dropped his mates, took little or no interest in +Union matters, and travelled alone, and at night. + +The Australian bushman is born with a mate who sticks to him through +life--like a mole. They may be hundreds of miles apart sometimes, and +separated for years, yet they are mates for life. A bushman may have +many mates in his roving, but there is always one his mate, "my mate;" +and it is common to hear a bushman, who is, in every way, a true mate +to the man he happens to be travelling with, speak of _his mate's +mate_--"Jack's mate"--who might be in Klondyke or South Africa. A +bushman has always a mate to comfort him and argue with him, and work +and tramp and drink with him, and lend him quids when he's hard up, and +call him a b---- fool, and fight him sometimes; to abuse him to his face +and defend his name behind his back; to bear false witness and perjure +his soul for his sake; to lie to the girl for him if he's single, and to +his wife if he's married; to secure a "pen" for him at a shed where +he isn't on the spot, or, if the mate is away in New Zealand or South +Africa, to write and tell him if it's any good coming over this way. And +each would take the word of the other against all the world, and each +believes that the other is the straightest chap that ever lived-"a white +man!" And next best to your old mate is the man you're tramping, riding, +working, or drinking with. + +About the first thing the cook asks you when you come along to a +shearers' hut is, "Where's your mate?" I travelled alone for a while +one time, and it seemed to me sometimes, by the tone of the inquiry +concerning the whereabouts of my mate, that the bush had an idea that +I might have done away with him and that the thing ought to be looked +into. + +When a man drops mateship altogether and takes to "hatting" in the bush, +it's a step towards a convenient tree and a couple of saddle-straps +buckled together. + +I had an idea that I, in a measure, took the place of Jack Moonlight's +mate about this time. + +"'Ullo, Jack!" I hailed as he reached the corner of the park. + +"Good morning, Harry!" said Jack, as if he'd seen me last yesterday +evening instead of three months ago. "How are you getting on?" + +We walked together towards the Union Office, where I had a camp in the +skillion-room at the back. Jack was silent. But there's no place in +the world where a man's silence is respected so much (within reasonable +bounds) as in the Australian bush, where every man has a past more or +less sad, and every man a ghost--perhaps from other lands that we know +nothing of, and speaking in a foreign tongue. They say in the bush, "Oh, +Jack's only thinking!" And they let him think. Generally you want to +think as much as your mate; and when you've been together some time +it's quite natural to travel all day without exchanging a word. In +the morning Jim says, "Well, I think I made a bargain with that horse, +Bill," and some time late in the afternoon, say twenty miles farther on, +it occurs to Bill to "rejoin," "Well, I reckon the blank as sold it to +you had yer proper!" + +I like a good thinking mate, and I believe that thinking in company is +a lot more healthy and more comfortable, as well as less risky, than +thinking alone. + +On the way to the Union Office Jack and I passed the Royal Hotel, and +caught a glimpse, through the open door, of a bedroom off the veranda, +of the landlord's fresh, fair, young Sydney girl-wife, sleeping prettily +behind the mosquito-net, like a sleeping beauty, while the boss lay on +a mattress outside on the veranda, across the open door. (He wasn't +necessary for publication, but an evidence of good faith.) + +I glanced at Jack for a grin, but didn't get one. He wore the pained +expression of a man who is suddenly hit hard with the thought of +something that might have been. + +I boiled the billy and fried a pound of steak. + +"Been travelling all night, Tack?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Jack. "I camped at Emus yesterday." + +He didn't eat. I began to reckon that he was brooding too much for +his health. He was much thinner than when I saw him last, and pretty +haggard, and he had something of the hopeless, haggard look that I'd +seen in Tom Hall's eyes after the last big shearing strike, when Tom had +worked day and night to hold his mates up all through the hard, bitter +struggle, and the battle was lost. + +"Look here, Jack!" I said at last. "What's up?" + +"Nothing's up, Harry," said Jack. "What made you think so?" + +"Have you got yourself into any fix?" I asked. "What's the Hungerford +track been doing to you?" + +"No, Harry," he said, "I'm all right. How are you?" And he pulled some +string and papers and a roll of dusty pound notes from his pocket and +threw them on the bunk. + +I was hard up just then, so I took a note and the billy to go to the +Royal and get some beer. I thought the beer might loosen his mind a bit. + +"Better take a couple of quid," said Jack. "You look as if you want some +new shirts and things." But a pound was enough for me, and I think he +had reason to be glad of that later on, as it turned out. + +"Anything new in Bourke?" asked Jack as we drank the beer. + +"No," I said, "not a thing--except there's a pretty girl in the +Salvation Army." + +"And it's about time," growled Jack. + +"Now, look here, Jack," I said presently, "what's come over you lately +at all? I might be able to help you. It's not a bit of use telling +me that there's nothing the matter. When a man takes to brooding and +travelling alone it's a bad sign, and it will end in a leaning tree and +a bit of clothes-line as likely as not. Tell me what the trouble is. +Tell us all about it. There's a ghost, isn't there?" + +"Well, I suppose so," said Jack. "We've all got our ghosts for that +matter. But never you mind, Harry; I'm all right. I don't go interfering +with your ghosts, and I don't see what call you've got to come haunting +mine. Why, it's as bad as kicking a man's dog." And he gave the ghost of +a grin. + +"Tell me, Jack," I said, "is it a woman?" + +"Yes," said Jack, "it's a woman. Now, are you satisfied?" + +"Is it a girl?" I asked. + +"Yes," he said. + +So there was no more to be said. I'd thought it might have been a lot +worse than a girl. I'd thought he might have got married somewhere, +sometime, and made a mess of it. + +We had dinner at Billy Woods's place, and a sensible Christmas dinner it +was--everything cold, except the vegetables, with the hose going on the +veranda in spite of the by-laws, and Billy's wife and her sister, fresh +and cool-looking and jolly, instead of being hot and brown and cross +like most Australian women who roast themselves over a blazing fire in +a hot kitchen on a broiling day, all the morning, to cook scalding +plum pudding and redhot roasts, for no other reason than that their +grandmothers used to cook hot Christmas dinners in England. + +And in the afternoon we went for a row on the river, pulling easily up +the anabranch and floating down with the stream under the shade of +the river timber--instead of going to sleep and waking up helpless and +soaked in perspiration, to find the women with headaches, as many do on +Christmas Day in Australia. + +Mrs Woods tried to draw Jack out, but it was no use, and in the evening +he commenced drinking, and that made Billy uneasy. "I'm afraid Jack's on +the wrong track," he said. + +After tea most of us collected about Watty's veranda. Most things that +happened in Bourke happened at Watty's pub, or near it. + +If a horse bolted with a buggy or cart, he was generally stopped outside +Watty's, which seemed to suggest, as Mitchell said, that most of the +heroes drank at Watty's--also that the pluckiest men were found amongst +the hardest drinkers. (But sometimes the horse fetched up against +Watty's sign and lamppost--which was a stout one of "iron-bark"--and +smashed the trap.) Then Watty's was the Carriers' Arms, a union pub; and +Australian teamsters are mostly hard cases: while there was something in +Watty's beer which made men argue fluently, and the best fights came +off in his backyard. Watty's dogs were the most quarrelsome in town, and +there was a dog-fight there every other evening, followed as often as +not by a man-fight. If a bushman's horse ran away with him the chances +were that he'd be thrown on to Watty's veranda, if he wasn't pitched +into the bar; and victims of accidents, and sick, hard-up shearers, +were generally carried to Watty's pub, as being the most convenient and +comfortable for them. Mitchell denied that it was generosity or good +nature on Watty's part, he said it was all business--advertisement. +Watty knew what he was doing. He was very deep, was Watty. Mitchell +further hinted that if he was sick _he_ wouldn't be carried to Watty's, +for Watty knew what a thirsty business a funeral was. Tom Hall reckoned +that Watty bribed the Army on the quiet. + +I was sitting on a stool along the veranda wall with Donald Macdonald, +Bob Brothers (the Giraffe) and Mitchell, and one or two others, and Jack +Moonlight sat on the floor with his back to the wall and his hat well +down over his eyes. The Army came along at the usual time, but we didn't +see the Pretty Girl at first--she was a bit late. Mitchell said he liked +to be at Watty's when the Army prayed and the Pretty Girl was there; +he had no objection to being prayed for by a girl like that, though he +reckoned that nothing short of a real angel could save him now. He said +his old grandmother used to pray for him every night of her life and +three times on Sunday, with Christmas Day extra when Christmas Day +didn't fall on a Sunday; but Mitchell reckoned that the old lady +couldn't have had much influence because he became more sinful every +year, and went deeper in ways of darkness, until finally he embarked on +a career of crime. + +The Army prayed, and then a thin "ratty" little woman bobbed up in +the ring; she'd gone mad on religion as women do on woman's rights and +hundreds of other things. She was so skinny in the face, her jaws so +prominent, and her mouth so wide, that when she opened it to speak it +was like a ventriloquist's dummy and you could almost see the cracks +open down under her ears. + +"They say I'm cracked!" she screamed in a shrill, cracked voice. "But +I'm not cracked--I'm only cracked on the Lord Jesus Christ! That's all +I'm cracked on----." And just then the Amen man of the Army--the Army +groaner we called him, who was always putting both feet in it--just then +he blundered forward, rolled up his eyes, threw his hands up and down as +if he were bouncing two balls, and said, with deep feeling: + +"Thank the Lord she's got a crack in the right place!" + +Tom Hall doubled up, and most of the other sinners seemed to think there +was something very funny about it. And the Army, too, seemed struck with +an idea that there was something wrong somewhere, for they started a +hymn. + +A big American negro, who'd been a night watchman in Sydney, stepped +into the ring and waved his arms and kept time, and as he got excited he +moved his hands up and down rapidly, as if he was hauling down a rope +in a great hurry through a pulley block above, and he kept saying, "Come +down, Lord!" all through the hymn, like a bass accompaniment, "Come +down, Lord; come down, Lord; come down, Lord; come down, Lord!" and the +quicker be said it the faster he hauled. He was as good as a drum. And, +when the hymn was over, he started to testify. + +"My frens!" he said, "I was once black as der coals in der mined! I was +once black as der ink in der ocean of sin! But now--thank an' bless the +Lord!--I am whiter dan der dribben snow!" + +Tom Hall sat down on the edge of the veranda and leaned his head against +a post and cried. He had contributed a bob this evening, and he was +getting his money's worth. + +Then the Pretty Girl arrived and was pushed forward into the ring. +She looked thinner and whiter than I'd ever seen her, and there was a +feverish brightness in her eyes that I didn't like. + +"Men!" she said, "this is Christmas Day-." I didn't hear any more for, +at the sound of her voice, Jack Moonlight jumped up as if he'd sat on a +baby. He started forward, stared at her for a moment as if he couldn't +believe his eyes, and then said, "Hannah!" short and sharp. She started +as if she was shot, gave him a wild look, and stumbled forward; the next +moment he had her in his arms and was steering for the private parlour. + +I heard Mrs Bothways calling for water and smelling-salts; she was as +fat as Watty, and very much like him in the face, but she was emotional +and sympathetic. Then presently I heard, through the open window, the +Pretty Girl say to Jack, "Oh, Jack, Jack! Why did you go away and leave +me like that? It was cruel!" + +"But you told me to go, Hannah," said Jack. + +"That-that didn't make any difference. Why didn't you write?" she +sobbed. + +"Because you never wrote to me, Hannah," he said. + +"That--that was no excuse!" she said. "It was so k-k-k-cruel of you, +Jack." + +Mrs Bothways pulled down the window. A new-comer asked Watty what the +trouble was, and he said that the Army girl had only found her chap, or +husband, or long-lost brother or something, but the missus was looking +after the business; then he dozed again. + +And then we adjourned to the Royal and took the Army with us. + +"That's the way of it," said Donald Macdonald. "With a woman it's love +or religion; with a man it's love or the devil." + +"Or with a man," said Mitchell, presently, "it's love and the devil +both, sometimes, Donald." + +I looked at Mitchell hard, but for all his face expressed he might only +have said, "I think it's going to rain." + + + + +"LORD DOUGLAS" + + They hold him true, who's true to one, + However false he be. + -The Rouseabout of Rouseabouts. + + +The Imperial Hotel was rather an unfortunate name for an out-back town +pub, for out back is the stronghold of Australian democracy; it was +the out-back vote and influence that brought about "One Man One Vote," +"Payment of Members," and most of the democratic legislation of late +years, and from out back came the overwhelming vote in favour of +Australian as Imperial Federation. + +The name Royal Hotel is as familiar as that of the Railway Hotel, and +passes unnoticed and ungrowled at, even by bush republicans. The Royal +Hotel at Bourke was kept by an Irishman, one O'Donohoo, who was Union to +the backbone, loudly in favour of "Australia for the Australians," and, +of course, against even the democratic New South Wales Government of the +time. He went round town all one St Patrick's morning with a bunch +of green ribbon fastened to his coat-tail with a large fish-hook, and +wasn't aware of the fact till he sat down on the point of it. But that's +got nothing to do with it. + +The Imperial Hotel at Bourke was unpopular from the first. It was said +that the very existence of the house was the result of a swindle. It had +been built with money borrowed on certain allotments in the centre +of the town and on the understanding that it should be built on the +mortgaged land, whereas it was erected on a free allotment. Which fact +was discovered, greatly to its surprise, by the building society when it +came to foreclose on the allotments some years later. While the building +was being erected the Bourke people understood, in a vague way, that it +was to be a convent (perhaps the building society thought so, too), and +when certain ornaments in brick and cement in the shape of a bishop's +mitre were placed over the corners of the walls the question seemed +decided. But when the place was finished a bar was fitted up, and up +went the sign, to the disgust of the other publicans, who didn't know a +licence had been taken out--for licensing didn't go by local option in +those days. It was rumoured that the place belonged to, and the whole +business was engineered by, a priest. And priests are men of the world. + +The Imperial Hotel was patronized by the pastoralists, the civil +servants, the bank manager and clerks--all the scrub aristocracy; it was +the headquarters of the Pastoralists' Union in Bourke; a barracks for +blacklegs brought up from Sydney to take the place of Union shearers +on strike; and the new Governor, on his inevitable visit to Bourke, was +banqueted at the Imperial Hotel. The editor of the local "capitalistic +rag" stayed there; the pastoralists' member was elected mostly by dark +ways and means devised at the Imperial Hotel, and one of its managers +had stood as a dummy candidate to split the Labour vote; the management +of the hotel was his reward. In short, it was there that most of the +plots were hatched to circumvent Freedom, and put away or deliver into +the clutches of law and order certain sons of Light and Liberty who +believed in converting blacklegs into jellies by force of fists when +bribes, gentle persuasion and pure Australian language failed to convert +them to clean Unionism. The Imperial Hotel was called the "Squatters' +Pub," the "Scabbery," and other and more expressive names. + +The hotel became still more unpopular after Percy Douglas had managed +it for a while. He was an avowed enemy of Labour Unionists. He employed +Chinese cooks, and that in the height of the anti-Chinese agitation in +Australia, and he was known to have kindly feelings towards the Afghans +who, with their camels, were running white carriers off the roads. If an +excited Unionist called a man a "blackleg" or "scab" in the Imperial bar +he was run out--sometimes with great difficulty, and occasionally as far +as the lock-up. + +Percy Douglas was a fine-looking man, "wid a chest on him an' well +hung--a fine fee-_gure_ of a man," as O'Donohoo pronounced it. He was +tall and erect, he dressed well, wore small side-whiskers, had an eagle +nose, and looked like an aristocrat. Like many of his type, who start +sometimes as billiard-markers and suddenly become hotel managers in +Australia, nothing was known of his past. Jack Mitchell reckoned, by +the way he treated his employees and spoke to workmen, that he was the +educated son of an English farmer--gone wrong and sent out to Australia. +Someone called him "Lord Douglas," and the nickname caught on. + +He made himself well hated. He got One-eyed Bogan "three months' hard" +for taking a bottle of whisky off the Imperial bar counter because +he (Bogan) was drunk and thirsty and had knocked down his cheque, and +because there was no one minding the bar at the moment. + +Lord Douglas dismissed the barmaid, and, as she was leaving, he had +her boxes searched and gave her in charge for stealing certain articles +belonging to the hotel. The chaps subscribed to defend the case, and +subsequently put a few pounds together for the girl. She proved her +gratitude by bringing a charge of a baby against one of the chaps--but +that was only one of the little ways of the world, as Mitchell said. She +joined a Chinese camp later on. + +Lord Douglas employed a carpenter to do some work about the hotel, and +because the carpenter left before the job was finished, Lord Douglas +locked his tools in an outhouse and refused to give them up; and when +the carpenter, with the spirit of an Australian workman, broke the +padlock and removed his tool-chest, the landlord gave him in charge for +breaking and entering. The chaps defended the case and won it, and hated +Lord Douglas as much as if he were their elder brother. Mitchell was the +only one to put in a word for him. + +"I've been puzzling it out," said Mitchell, as he sat nursing his best +leg in the Union Office, "and, as far as I can see, it all amounts to +this--we're all mistaken in Lord Douglas. We don't know the man. +He's all right. We don't understand him. He's really a sensitive, +good-hearted man who's been shoved a bit off the track by the world. +It's the world's fault--he's not to blame. You see, when he was a +youngster he was the most good-natured kid in the school; he was always +soft, and, consequently, he was always being imposed upon, and bullied, +and knocked about. Whenever he got a penny to buy lollies he'd count 'em +out carefully and divide 'em round amongst his schoolmates and brothers +and sisters. He was the only one that worked at home, and consequently +they all hated him. His father respected him, but didn't love him, +because he wasn't a younger son, and wasn't bringing his father's grey +hairs down in sorrow to the grave. If it was in Australia, probably Lord +Douglas was an elder son and had to do all the hard graft, and teach +himself at night, and sleep in a bark skillion while his younger +brothers benefited--they were born in the new brick house and went to +boarding-schools. His mother had a contempt for him because he wasn't a +black sheep and a prodigal, and, when the old man died, the rest of the +family got all the stuff and Lord Douglas was kicked out because they +could do without him now. And the family hated him like poison ever +afterwards (especially his mother), and spread lies about him--because +they had treated him shamefully and because his mouth was shut--they +knew he wouldn't speak. Then probably he went in for Democracy and +worked for Freedom, till Freedom trod on him once too often with her +hob-nailed boots. Then the chances are, in the end, he was ruined by +a girl or woman, and driven, against his will, to take refuge in pure +individualism. He's all right, only we don't appreciate him. He's +only fighting against his old ideals--his old self that comes up +sometimes--and that's what makes him sweat his barmaids and servants, +and hate us, and run us in; and perhaps when he cuts up extra rough it's +because his conscience kicks him when he thinks of the damned soft fool +he used to be. He's all right--take my word for it. It's all a mask. +Why, he might be one of the kindest-hearted men in Bourke underneath." + +Tom Hall rubbed his head and blinked, as if he was worried by an idea +that there might be some facts in Mitchell's theories. + +"You're allers findin' excuses for blacklegs an' scabs, Mitchell," said +Barcoo-Rot, who took Mitchell seriously (and who would have taken +a laughing jackass seriously). "Why, you'd find a white spot on a +squatter. I wouldn't be surprised if you blacklegged yourself in the +end." + +This was an unpardonable insult, from a Union point of view, and the +chaps half-unconsciously made room on the floor for Barcoo-Rot to +fall after Jack Mitchell hit him. But Mitchell took the insult +philosophically. + +"Well, Barcoo-Rot," he said, nursing the other leg, "for the matter of +that, I did find a white spot on a squatter once. He lent me a quid when +I was hard up. There's white spots on the blackest characters if +you only drop prejudice and look close enough. I suppose even +Jack-the-Ripper's character was speckled. Why, I can even see spots on +your character, sometimes, Barcoo-Rot. I've known white spots to spread +on chaps' characters until they were little short of saints. Sometimes +I even fancy I can feel my own wings sprouting. And as for turning +blackleg--well, I suppose I've got a bit of the crawler in my +composition (most of us have), and a man never knows what might happen +to his principles." + +"Well," said Barcoo-Rot, "I beg yer pardon--ain't that enough?" + +"No," said Mitchell, "you ought to wear a three-bushel bag and ashes for +three months, and drink water; but since the police would send you to +an asylum if you did that, I think the best thing we can do is to go out +and have a drink." + + +Lord Douglas married an Australian girl somewhere, somehow, and brought +her to Bourke, and there were two little girls--regular little fairies. +She was a gentle, kind-hearted little woman, but she didn't seem to +improve him much, save that he was very good to her. + +"It's mostly that way," commented Mitchell. "When a boss gets married +and has children he thinks he's got a greater right to grind his +fellowmen and rob their wives and children. I'd never work for a boss +with a big family--it's hard enough to keep a single boss nowadays in +this country." + +After one stormy election, at the end of a long and bitter shearing +strike, One-eyed Bogan, his trusty enemy, Barcoo-Rot, and one or two +other enthusiastic reformers were charged with rioting, and got from one +to three months' hard. And they had only smashed three windows of the +Imperial Hotel and chased the Chinese cook into the river. + +"I used to have some hopes for Democracy," commented Mitchell, "but I've +got none now. How can you expect Liberty, Equality or Fraternity--how +can you expect Freedom and Universal Brotherhood and Equal Rights in a +country where Sons of Light get three months' hard for breaking windows +and bashing a Chinaman? It almost makes me long to sail away in a +gallant barque." + +There were other cases in connection with the rotten-egging of +Capitalistic candidates on the Imperial Hotel balcony, and it was partly +on the evidence of Douglas and his friends that certain respectable +Labour leaders got heavy terms of imprisonment for rioting and +"sedition" and "inciting," in connection with organized attacks on +blacklegs and their escorts. + +Retribution, if it was retribution, came suddenly and in a most +unexpected manner to Lord Douglas. + +It seems he employed a second carpenter for six months to repair and +make certain additions to the hotel, and put him off under various +pretences until he owed him a hundred pounds or thereabout. At last, +immediately after an exciting interview with Lord Douglas, the carpenter +died suddenly of heart disease. The widow, a strong-minded bushwoman, +put a bailiff in the hotel on a very short notice--and against the +advice of her lawyer, who thought the case hopeless--and the Lord +Douglas bubble promptly burst. He had somehow come to be regarded as the +proprietor of the hotel, but now the real proprietors or proprietor--he +was still said to be a priest--turned Douglas out and put in a new +manager. The old servants were paid after some trouble. The local +storekeepers and one or two firms in Sydney, who had large accounts +against the Imperial Hotel (and had trusted it, mainly because it was +patronized by Capitalism and Fat), were never paid. + +Lord Douglas cleared out to Sydney, leaving his wife and children, for +the present, with her brother, a hay-and-corn storekeeper, who also had +a large and hopeless account against the hotel; and when the brother +went broke and left the district she rented a two-roomed cottage and +took in dressmaking. + +Dressmaking didn't pay so well in the bush then as it did in the old +diggings days when sewing-machines were scarce and the possession of one +meant an independent living to any girl--when diggers paid ten shillings +for a strip of "flannen" doubled over and sewn together, with holes for +arms and head, and called a shirt. Mrs Douglas had a hard time, with her +two little girls, who were still better and more prettily dressed than +any other children in Bourke. One grocer still called on her for orders +and pretended to be satisfied to wait "till Mr Douglas came back," and +when she would no longer order what he considered sufficient provisions +for her and the children, and commenced buying sugar, etc., by the +pound, for cash, he one day sent a box of groceries round to her. He +pretended it was a mistake. + +"However," he said, "I'd be very much obliged if you could use 'em, +Mrs Douglas. I'm overstocked now; haven't got room for another tin of +sardines in the shop. Don't you worry about bills, Mrs Douglas; I can +wait till Douglas comes home. I did well enough out of the Imperial +Hotel when your husband had it, and a pound's worth of groceries won't +hurt me now. I'm only too glad to get rid of some of the stock." + +She cried a little, thought of the children, and kept the groceries. + +"I suppose I'll be sold up soon meself if things don't git brighter," +said that grocer to a friend, "so it doesn't matter much." + +The same with Foley the butcher, who had a brogue with a sort of +drawling groan in it, and was a cynic of the Mitchell school. + +"You see," he said, "she's as proud as the devil, but when I send round +a bit o' rawst, or porrk, or the undercut o' the blade-bawn, she thinks +o' the little gur-r-rls before she thinks o' sendin' it back to me. +That's where I've got the pull on her." + +The Giraffe borrowed a horse and tip-dray one day at the beginning of +winter and cut a load of firewood in the bush, and next morning, at +daylight, Mrs Douglas was nearly startled out of her life by a crash at +the end of the cottage, which made her think that the chimney had fallen +in, or a tree fallen on the house; and when she slipped on a wrapper and +looked out, she saw a load of short-cut wood by the chimney, and caught +a glimpse of the back view of the Giraffe, who stood in the dray with +his legs wide apart and was disappearing into the edge of the scrub; and +soon the rapid clock-clock-clock of the wheels died away in the west, as +if he were making for West Australia. + +The next we heard of Lord Douglas he had got two years' hard for +embezzlement in connection with some canvassing he had taken up. Mrs +Douglas fell ill--a touch of brain-fever--and one of the labourers' +wives took care of the children while two others took turns in nursing. +While she was recovering, Bob Brothers sent round the hat, and, after a +conclave in the Union Office--as mysterious as any meeting ever called +with the object of downing bloated Capitalism--it was discovered that +one of the chaps--who didn't wish his name to be mentioned--had borrowed +just twenty-five pounds from Lord Douglas in the old days and now wished +to return it to Mrs Douglas. So the thing was managed, and if she had +any suspicions she kept them to herself. She started a little fancy +goods shop and got along fairly comfortable. + +Douglas, by the way, was, publicly, supposed, for her sake and because +of the little girls, to be away in West Australia on the goldfields. + + +Time passes without much notice out back, and one hot day, when the sun +hung behind the fierce sandstorms from the northwest as dully lurid as +he ever showed in a London fog, Lord Douglas got out of the train that +had just finished its five-hundred-miles' run, and not seeing a new-chum +porter, who started forward by force of habit to take his bag, he walked +stiffly off the platform and down the main street towards his wife's +cottage. + +He was very gaunt, and his eyes, to those who passed him closely, seemed +to have a furtive, hunted expression. He had let his beard grow, and it +had grown grey. + +It was within a few days of Christmas--the same Christmas that we lost +the Pretty Girl in the Salvation Army. As a rule the big shearing-sheds +within a fortnight of Bourke cut out in time for the shearers to reach +the town and have their Christmas dinners and sprees--and for some of +them to be locked up over Christmas Day--within sound of a church-going +bell. Most of the chaps gathered in the Shearers' Union Office on New +Year's Eve and discussed Douglas amongst other things. + +"I vote we kick the cow out of the town!" snarled One-eyed Bogan, +viciously. + +"We can't do that," said Bob Brothers (the Giraffe), speaking more +promptly than usual. "There's his wife and youngsters to consider, yer +know." + +"He something well deserted his wife," snarled Began, "an' now he comes +crawlin' back to her to keep him." + +"Well," said Mitchell, mildly, "but we ain't all got as much against him +as you have, Began." + +"He made a crimson jail-bird of me!" snapped Bogan. "Well," said +Mitchell, "that didn't hurt you much, anyway; it rather improved +your character if anything. Besides, he made a jail-bird of himself +afterwards, so you ought to have a fellow-feeling--a feathered feeling, +so to speak. Now you needn't be offended, Bogan, we're all jail-birds at +heart, only we haven't all got the pluck." + +"I'm in favour of blanky well tarrin' an' featherin' him an' kickin' him +out of the town!" shouted Bogan. "It would be a good turn to his wife, +too; she'd be well rid of the----." + +"Perhaps she's fond of him," suggested Mitchell; "I've known such cases +before. I saw them sitting together on the veranda last night when they +thought no one was looking." + +"He deserted her," said One-eyed Bogan, in a climbing-down tone, "and +left her to starve." + +"Perhaps the police were to blame for that," said Mitchell. "You know +you deserted all your old mates once for three months, Bogan, and it +wasn't your fault." + +"He seems to be a crimson pet of yours, Jack Mitchell," said Bogan, +firing up. + +"Ah, well, all I know," said Mitchell, standing up and stretching +himself wearily, "all I know is that he looked like a gentleman once, +and treated us like a gentleman, and cheated us like a gentleman, and +ran some of us in like a gentleman, and, as far as I can see, he's +served his time like a gentleman and come back to face us and +live himself down like a man. I always had a sneaking regard for a +gentleman." + +"Why, Mitchell, I'm beginning to think you are a gentleman yourself," +said Jake Boreham. + +"Well," said Mitchell, "I used to have a suspicion once that I had a +drop of blue blood in me somewhere, and it worried me a lot; but I asked +my old mother about it one day, and she scalded me--God bless her!--and +father chased me with a stockwhip, so I gave up making inquiries." + +"You'll join the bloomin' Capitalists next," sneered One-eyed Bogan. + +"I wish I could, Bogan," said Mitchell. "I'd take a trip to Paris and +see for myself whether the Frenchwomen are as bad as they're made out to +be, or go to Japan. But what are we going to do about Douglas?" + +"Kick the skunk out of town, or boycott him!" said one or two. "He ought +to be tarred and feathered and hanged." + +"Couldn't do worse than hang him," commented Jake Boreham, cheerfully. + +"Oh, yes, we could," said Mitchell, sitting down, resting his elbows on +his knees, and marking his points with one forefinger on the other. "For +instance, we might boil him slow in tar. We might skin him alive. We +might put him in a cage and poke him with sticks, with his wife and +children in another cage to look on and enjoy the fun." + +The chaps, who had been sitting quietly listening to Mitchell, and +grinning, suddenly became serious and shifted their positions uneasily. + +"But I can tell you what would hurt his feelings more than anything else +we could do," said Mitchell. + +"Well, what is it, Jack?" said Tom Hall, rather impatiently. + +"Send round the hat and take up a collection for him," said Mitchell, +"enough to let him get away with his wife and children and start life +again in some less respectable town than Bourke. You needn't grin, I'm +serious about it." + +There was a thoughtful pause, and one or two scratched their heads. +"His wife seems pretty sick," Mitchell went on in a reflective tone. "I +passed the place this morning and saw him scrubbing out the floor. He's +been doing a bit of house-painting for old Heegard to-day. I suppose he +learnt it in jail. I saw him at work and touched my hat to him." + +"What!" cried Tom Hall, affecting to shrink from Mitchell in horror. + +"Yes," said Mitchell, "I'm not sure that I didn't take my hat off. Now +I know it's not bush religion for a man to touch his hat, except to a +funeral, or a strange roof or woman sometimes; but when I meet a braver +man than myself I salute him. I've only met two in my life." + +"And who were they, Jack?" asked Jake Boreham. + +"One," said Mitchell--"one is Douglas, and the other--well, the other +was the man I used to be. But that's got nothing to do with it." + +"But perhaps Douglas thought you were crowing over him when you took +off your hat to him--sneerin' at him, like, Mitchell," reflected Jake +Boreham. + +"No, Jake," said Mitchell, growing serious suddenly. "There are ways of +doing things that another man understands." + +They all thought for a while. + +"Well," said Tom Hall, "supposing we do take up a collection for him, +he'd be too damned proud to take it." + +"But that's where we've got the pull on him," said Mitchell, brightening +up. "I heard Dr Morgan say that Mrs Douglas wouldn't live if she wasn't +sent away to a cooler place, and Douglas knows it; and, besides, one of +the little girls is sick. We've got him in a corner and he'll have to +take the stuff. Besides, two years in jail takes a lot of the pride out +of a man." + +"Well, I'm damned if I'll give a sprat to help the man who tried his +best to crush the Unions!" said One-eyed Bogan. + +"Damned if I will either!" said Barcoo-Rot. + +"Now, look here, One-eyed Bogan," said Mitchell, "I don't like to harp +on old things, for I know they bore you, but when you returned to public +life that time no one talked of kicking you out of the town. In fact, I +heard that the chaps put a few pounds together to help you get away for +a while till you got over your modesty." + +No one spoke. + +"I passed Douglas's place on my way here from my camp to-night," +Mitchell went on musingly, "and I saw him walking up and down in the +yard with his sick child in his arms. You remember that little girl, +Bogan? I saw her run and pick up your hat and give it to you one day +when you were trying to put it on with your feet. You remember, Bogan? +The shock nearly sobered you." + +There was a very awkward pause. The position had become too +psychological altogether and had to be ended somehow. The awkward +silence had to be broken, and Bogan broke it. He turned up Bob +Brothers's hat, which was lying on the table, and "chucked" in a "quid," +qualifying the hat and the quid, and disguising his feelings with the +national oath of the land. + +"We've had enough of this gory, maudlin, sentimental tommy-rot," +he said. "Here, Barcoo, stump up or I'll belt it out of your hide! +I'll--I'll take yer to pieces!" + +But Douglas didn't leave the town. He sent his wife and children to +Sydney until the heat wave was past, built a new room on to the cottage, +and started a book and newspaper shop, and a poultry farm in the back +paddock, and flourished. + +They called him Mr Douglas for a while, then Douglas, then Percy +Douglas, and now he is well-known as Old Daddy Douglas, and the Sydney +_Worker_, _Truth_, and _Bulletin_, and other democratic rags are on sale +at his shop. He is big with schemes for locking the Darling River, +and he gets his drink at O'Donohoo's. He is scarcely yet regarded as a +straight-out democrat. He was a gentleman once, Mitchell said, and the +old blood was not to be trusted. But, last elections, Douglas worked +quietly for Unionism, and gave the leaders certain hints, and put them +up to various electioneering dodges which enabled them to return, in +the face of Monopoly, a Labour member who is as likely to go straight as +long as any other Labour member. + + + + +THE BLINDNESS OF ONE-EYED BOGAN + + They judge not and they are not judged--'tis their philosophy-- + (There's something wrong with every ship that sails upon the sea). + -The Ballad of the Rouseabout. + +"And what became of One-eyed Bogan?" I asked Tom Hall when I met him and +Jack Mitchell down in Sydney with their shearing cheques the Christmas +before last. + +"You'd better ask Mitchell, Harry," said Tom. "He can tell you about +Bogan better than I can. But first, what about the drink we're going to +have?" + +We turned out of Pitt Street into Hunter Street, and across George +Street, where a double line of fast electric tramway was running, into +Margaret Street and had a drink at Pfahlert's Hotel, where a counter +lunch--as good as many dinners you get for a shilling--was included with +a sixpenny drink. "Get a quiet corner," said Mitchell, "I like to bear +myself cackle." So we took our beer out in the fernery and got a cool +place at a little table in a quiet corner amongst the fern boxes. + +"Well, One-eyed Bogan was a hard case, Mitchell," I said. "Wasn't he?" + +"Yes," said Mitchell, putting down his "long-beer" glass, "he was." + +"Rather a bad egg?" + +"Yes, a regular bad egg," said Mitchell, decidedly. + +"I heard he got caught cheating at cards," I said. + +"Did you?" said Mitchell. "Well, I believe he did. Ah, well," he added +reflectively, after another long pull, "One-eyed Bogan won't cheat at +cards any more." + +"Why?" I said. "Is he dead then?" + +"No," said Mitchell, "he's blind." + +"Good God!" I said, "how did that happen?" + +"He lost the other eye," said Mitchell, and he took another drink. "Ah, +well, he won't cheat at cards any more--unless there's cards invented +for the blind." + +"How did it happen?" I asked. + +"Well," said Mitchell, "you see, Harry, it was this way. Bogan went +pretty free in Bourke after the shearing before last, and in the end he +got mixed up in a very ugly-looking business: he was accused of doing +two new-chum jackaroos out of their stuff by some sort of confidence +trick." + +"Confidence trick," I said. "I'd never have thought that One-eyed Bogan +had the brains to go in for that sort of thing." + +"Well, it seems he had, or else he used somebody else's brains; there's +plenty of broken-down English gentlemen sharpers knocking about out +back, you know, and Bogan might have been taking lessons from one. +I don't know the rights of the case, it was hushed up, as you'll see +presently; but, anyway, the jackaroos swore that Bogan had done 'em +out of ten quid. They were both Cockneys and I suppose they reckoned +themselves smart, but bushmen have more time to think. Besides, Bogan's +one eye was in his favour. You see he always kept his one eye fixed +strictly on whatever business he had in hand; if he'd had another eye to +rove round and distract his attention and look at things on the outside, +the chances are he would never have got into trouble." + +"Never mind that, Jack," said Tom Hall. "Harry wants to hear the yarn." + +"Well, to make it short, one of the jackaroos went to the police and +Bogan cleared out. His character was pretty bad just then, so there was +a piece of blue paper out for him. Bogan didn't seem to think the thing +was so serious as it was, for he only went a few miles down the river +and camped with his horses on a sort of island inside an anabranch, till +the thing should blow over or the new chums leave Bourke. + +"Bogan's old enemy, Constable Campbell, got wind of Bogan's camp, and +started out after him. He rode round the outside track and came in on to +the river just below where the anabranch joins it, at the lower end +of the island and right opposite Bogan's camp. You know what those +billabongs are: dry gullies till the river rises from the Queensland +rains and backs them up till the water runs round into the river again +and makes anabranches of 'em--places that you thought were hollows +you'll find above water, and you can row over places you thought were +hills. There's no water so treacherous and deceitful as you'll find in +some of those billabongs. A man starts to ride across a place where +he thinks the water is just over the grass, and blunders into a deep +channel--that wasn't there before--with a steady undercurrent with the +whole weight of the Darling River funnelled into it; and if he can't +swim and his horse isn't used to it--or sometimes if he can swim--it's a +case with him, and the Darling River cod hold an inquest on him, if they +have time, before he's buried deep in Darling River mud for ever. And +somebody advertises in the missing column for Jack Somebody who was last +heard of in Australia." + +"Never mind that, Mitchell, go on," I said. + +"Well, Campbell knew the river and saw that there was a stiff current +there, so he hailed Bogan. + +"'Good day, Campbell,' shouted Bogan. + +"`I want you, Bogan,' said Campbell. `Come across and bring your +horses.' + +"`I'm damned if I will,' says Bogan. `I'm not going to catch me death o' +cold to save your skin. If you want me you'll have to bloody well come +and git me.' Bogan was a good strong swimmer, and he had good horses, +but he didn't try to get away--I suppose he reckoned he'd have to face +the music one time or another--and one time is as good as another out +back. + +"Campbell was no swimmer; he had no temptation to risk his life--you see +it wasn't as in war with a lot of comrades watching ready to advertise a +man as a coward for staying alive--so he argued with Bogan and tried to +get him to listen to reason, and swore at him. `I'll make it damned hot +for you, Bogan,' he said, `if I have to come over for you.' + +"`Two can play at that game,' says Bogan. + +"`Look here, Bogan," said Campbell, `I'll tell you what I'll do. If you +give me your word that you'll come up to the police station to-morrow +I'll go back and say nothing about it. You can say you didn't know a +warrant was out after you. It will be all the better for you in the end. +Better give me your word, man.' + +"Perhaps Campbell knew Bogan better than any of us. + +"`Now then, Bogan,' he said, `don't be a fool. Give your word like a +sensible man, and I'll go back. I'll give you five minutes to make up +your mind.' And he took out his watch. + +"But Bogan was nasty and wouldn't give his word, so there was nothing +for it but for Campbell to make a try for him. + +"Campbell had plenty of pluck, or obstinacy, which amounts to the same +thing. He put his carbine and revolver under a log, out of the rain that +was coming on, saw to his handcuffs, and then spurred his horse into the +water. Bogan lit his pipe with a stick from his camp-fire--so Campbell +said afterwards--and sat down on his heels and puffed away, and waited +for him. + +"Just as Campbell's horse floundered into the current Bogan shouted to +go back, but Campbell thought it was a threat and kept on. But Bogan +had caught sight of a log coming down the stream, end on, with a sharp, +splintered end, and before Campbell knew where he was, the sharp end of +the log caught the horse in the flank. The horse started to plunge and +struggle sideways, with all his legs, and Campbell got free of him as +quick as he could. Now, you know, in some of those Darling River reaches +the current will seem to run steadily far a while, and then come with a +rush. (I was caught in one of those rushes once, when I was in swimming, +and would have been drowned if I hadn't been born to be hanged.) Well, +a rush came along just as Campbell got free from his horse, and he +went down-stream one side of a snag and his horse the other. Campbell's +pretty stout, you know, and his uniform was tight, and it handicapped +him. + +"Just as he was being washed past the lower end of the snag he caught +hold of a branch that stuck out of the water and held on. He swung round +and saw Bogan running down to the point opposite him. Now, you know +there was always a lot of low cunning about Bogan, and I suppose he +reckoned that if he pulled Campbell out he'd stand a good show of +getting clear of his trouble; anyway, if he didn't save Campbell it +might be said that he killed him--besides, Bogan was a good swimmer, so +there wasn't any heroism about it anyhow. Campbell was only a few feet +from the bank, but Bogan started to strip--to make the job look as big +as possible, I suppose. He shouted to Campbell to say he was coming, +and to hold on. Campbell said afterwards that Bogan seemed an hour +undressing. The weight of the current was forcing down the bough that +Campbell was hanging on to, and suddenly, he said, he felt a great +feeling of helplessness take him by the shoulders. He yelled to Bogan +and let go. + +"Now, it happened that Jake Boreham and I were passing away the time +between shearings, and we were having a sort of fishing and shooting +loaf down the river in a boat arrangement that Jake had made out of +boards and tarred canvas. We called her the _Jolly Coffin_. We were just +poking up the bank in the slack water, a few hundred yards below the +billabong, when Jake said, `Why, there's a horse or something in the +river.' Then he shouted, `No, by God, it's a man,' and we poked the +_Coffin_ out into the stream for all she was worth. `Looks like two men +fighting in the water,' Jake shouts presently. `Hurry up, or they'll +drown each other.' + +"We hailed 'em, and Bogan shouted for help. He was treading water and +holding Campbell up in front of him now in real professional style. As +soon as he heard us he threw up his arms and splashed a bit--I reckoned +he was trying to put as much style as he could into that rescue. But I +caught a crab, and, before we could get to them, they were washed past +into the top of a tree that stood well below flood-mark. I pulled the +boat's head round and let her stern down between the branches. Bogan had +one arm over a limb and was holding Campbell with the other, and +trying to lift him higher out of the water. I noticed Bogan's face +was bleeding--there was a dead limb stuck in the tree with nasty sharp +points on it, and I reckoned he'd run his face against one of them. +Campbell was gasping like a codfish out of water, and he was the +whitest man I ever saw (except one, and _he'd_ been drowned for a week). +Campbell had the sense to keep still. We asked Bogan if he could hold +on, and he said he could, but he couldn't hold Campbell any longer. +So Jake took the oars and I leaned over the stern and caught hold of +Campbell, and Jake ran the boat into the bank, and we got him ashore; +then we went back for Bogan and landed him. + +"We had some whisky and soon brought Campbell round; but Bogan was +bleeding like a pig from a nasty cut over his good eye, so we bound wet +handkerchiefs round his eyes and led him to a log and he sat down for +a while, holding his hand to his eye and groaning. He kept saying, `I'm +blind, mates, I'm blind! I've lost me other eye!' but we didn't dream +it was so bad as that: we kept giving him whisky. We got some dry boughs +and made a big fire. Then Bogan stood up and held his arms stiff down +to his sides, opening and shutting his hands as if he was in great pain. +And I've often thought since what a different man Bogan seemed without +his clothes and with the broken bridge of his nose and his eyes covered +by the handkerchiefs. He was clean shaven, and his mouth and chin are +his best features, and he's clean limbed and well hung. I often thought +afterwards that there was something of a blind god about him as he stood +there naked by the fire on the day he saved Campbell's life--something +that reminded me of a statue I saw once in the Art Gallery. (Pity the +world isn't blinder to a man's worst points.) + +"Presently Jake listened and said, `By God, that's lucky!' and we heard +a steamer coming up-river and presently we saw her coming round the +point with a couple of wool-barges in tow. We got Bogan aboard and got +some clothes on him, and took him ashore at Bourke to the new hospital. +The doctors did all they knew, but Bogan was blind for life. He never +saw anything again--except `a sort of dull white blur,' as he called +it--or his past life sometimes, I suppose. Perhaps he saw that for the +first time. Ah, well! + +"Bogan's old enemy, Barcoo-Rot, went to see him in the hospital, and +Bogan said, `Well, Barcoo, I reckon we've had our last fight. I owe you +a hiding, but I don't see how I'm going to pay you.' `Never mind that, +Bogan, old man,' says Barcoo. `I'll take it from anyone yer likes to +appoint, if that worries yer; and, look here, Bogan, if I can't fight +you I can fight for you--and don't you forget it!' And Barcoo used to +lead Bogan round about town in his spare time and tell him all that was +going on; and I believe he always had an ear cocked in case someone said +a word against Bogan--as if any of the chaps would say a word against a +blind man. + +"Bogan's case was hushed up. The police told us to fix it up the best +way we could. One of the jackaroos, who reckoned that Bogan had swindled +him, was a gentleman, and he was the first to throw a quid in the +Giraffe's hat when it went round for Bogan, but the other jackaroo was +a cur: he said he wanted the money that Bogan had robbed him of. There +were two witnesses, but we sent 'em away, and Tom Hall, there, scared +the jackaroo. You know Tom was always the best hand we had at persuading +witnesses in Union cases to go home to see their mothers." + +"How did you scare that jackaroo, Tom?" I asked. + +"Tell you about it some other time," said Tom. + +"Well," said Mitchell, "Bogan was always a good woolsorter, so, next +shearing, old Baldy Thompson--(you know Baldy Thompson, Harry, of +West-o'-Sunday Station)--Baldy had a talk with some of the chaps, and +took Bogan out in his buggy with him to West-o'-Sunday. Bogan would sit +at the end of the rolling tables, in the shearing-shed, with a boy to +hand him the fleeces, and he'd feel a fleece and tell the boy what bin +to throw it into; and by and by he began to learn to throw the fleeces +into the bins himself. And sometimes Baldy would have a sheep brought to +him and get him to feel the fleece and tell him the quality of it. And +then again Baldy would talk, just loud enough for Bogan to overhear, and +swear that he'd sooner have Bogan, blind as he was, than half a dozen +scientific jackaroo experts with all their eyes about them. + +"Of course Bogan wasn't worth anything much to Baldy, but Baldy gave him +two pounds a week out of his own pocket, and another quid that we made +up between us; so he made enough to pull him through the rest of the +year. + +"It was curious to see how soon he learned to find his way about the hut +and manage his tea and tucker. It was a rough shed, but everybody was +eager to steer Bogan about--and, in fact, two of them had a fight about +it one day. Baldy and all of us----and especially visitors when they +came--were mighty interested in Bogan; and I reckon we were rather proud +of having a blind wool-sorter. I reckon Bogan had thirty or forty pairs +of eyes watching out for him in case he'd run against something or fall. +It irritated him to be messed round too much--he said a baby would never +learn to walk if it was held all the time. He reckoned he'd learn more +in a year than a man who'd served a lifetime to blindness; but we didn't +let him wander much--for fear he'd fall into the big rocky waterhole +there, by accident. + +"And after the shearing-season Bogan's wife turned up in Bourke----" + +"Bogan's wife!" I exclaimed. "Why, I never knew Bogan was married." + +"Neither did anyone else," said Mitchell. "But he was. Perhaps that was +what accounted for Bogan. Sometimes, in his sober moods, I used to have +an idea that there must have been something behind the Bogan to account +for him. Perhaps he got trapped--or got married and found out that he'd +made a mistake--which is about the worst thing a man can find out----" + +"Except that his wife made the mistake, Mitchell," said Tom Hall. + +"Or that both did," reflected Mitchell. "Ah, well!--never mind--Bogan +had been married two or three years. Maybe he got married when he was on +the spree--I knew that he used to send money to someone in Sydney and I +suppose it was her. Anyway, she turned up after he was blind. She was a +hard-looking woman--just the sort that might have kept a third-rate pub +or a sly-grog shop. But you can't judge between husband and wife, unless +you've lived in the same house with them--and under the same roofs with +their parents right back to Adam for that matter. Anyway, she stuck +to Bogan all right; she took a little two-roomed cottage and made +him comfortable--she's got a sewing-machine and a mangle and takes in +washing and sewing. She brought a carrotty-headed youngster with +her, and the first time I saw Bogan sitting on the veranda with that +youngster on his knee I thought it was a good thing that he was blind." + +"Why?" I asked. + +"Because the youngster isn't his," said Mitchell. + +"How do you know that?" + +"By the look of it--and by the look on her face, once, when she caught +me squinting from the kid's face to Bogan's." + +"And whose was it?" I asked, without thinking. + +"How am I to know?" said Mitchell. "It might be yours for all I +know--it's ugly enough, and you never had any taste in women. But you +mustn't speak of that in Bourke. But there's another youngster coming, +and I'll swear that'll be Bogan's all right. + +"A curious thing about Bogan is that he's begun to be fidgety about his +personal appearance--and you know he wasn't a dood. He wears a collar +now, and polishes his boots; he wears elastic-sides, and polishes 'em +himself--the only thing is that he blackens over the elastic. He can do +many things for himself, and he's proud of it. He says he can see many +things that he couldn't see when he had his eyes. You seldom hear him +swear, save in a friendly way; he seems much gentler, but he reckons he +would stand a show with Barcoo-Rot even now, if Barcoo would stand up in +front of him and keep yelling----" + +"By the way," I asked, "how did Bogan lose the sight of his other eye?" + +"Sleeping out in the rain when he was drunk," said Mitchell. "He got a +cold in his eye." Then he asked, suddenly: + +"Did you ever see a blind man cry?" + +"No," I said. + +"Well, I have," said Mitchell. + +"You know Bogan wears goggles to hide his eyes--his wife made him do +that. The chaps often used to drop round and have a yarn with Bogan +and cheer him up, and one evening I was sitting smoking with him, and +yarning about old times, when he got very quiet all of a sudden, and I +saw a tear drop from under one of his shutters and roll down his cheek. +It wasn't the eye he lost saving Campbell--it was the old wall-eye he +used to use in the days before he was called 'One-eyed Bogan.' I suppose +he thought it was dark and that I couldn't see his face. (There's a good +many people in this world who think you can't see because they can't.) +It made me feel like I used to feel sometimes in the days when I felt +things----" + +"Come on, Mitchell," said Tom Hall, "you've had enough beer." + +"I think I have," said Mitchell. "Besides, I promised to send a wire +to Jake Boreham to tell him that his mother's dead. Jake's shearing at +West-o'-Sunday; shearing won't be over for three or four weeks, and Jake +wants an excuse to get away without offending old Baldy and come down +and have a fly round with us before the holidays are over." + +Down at the telegraph-office Mitchell took a form and filled it in very +carefully: "Jacob Boreham. West-o'-Sunday Station. Bourke. Come home at +once. Mother is dead. In terrible trouble. Father dying.--MARY BOREHAM." + +"I think that will do," said Mitchell. "It ought to satisfy Baldy, and +it won't give Jake too much of a shock, because he hasn't got a sister +or sister-in-law, and his father and mother's been dead over ten years." + +"Now, if I was running a theatre," said Mitchell, as we left the office, +"I'd give five pounds a night for the face Jake'll have on him when he +takes that telegram to Baldy Thompson." + + + + +TWO SUNDOWNERS + + +Sheep stations in Australia are any distance from twenty to a hundred +miles apart, to keep well within the boundaries of truth and the great +pastoral country. Shearing at any one shed only lasts a few weeks in +the year; the number of men employed is according to the size of the +shed--from three to five men in the little bough-covered shed of the +small "cockatoo," up to a hundred and fifty or two hundred hands all +told in the big corrugated iron machine shed of a pastoral company. + +Shearing starts early up in northern Queensland, where you can get a +"January shed;" and further south, in February, March or April sheds, +and so on down into New South Wales, where shearing often lasts over +Christmas. Shearers travel from shed to shed; some go a travel season +without getting a pen, and an unlucky shearer might ride or tramp for +several seasons and never get hands in wool; and all this explains the +existence of the "footman" with his swag and the horse man with his +packhorse. They have a rough life, and the Australian shearers are +certainly the most democratic and perhaps the most independent, +intelligent and generous body of workmen in the world. + +Shearers at a shed elect their own cook, pay him so much a head, +and they buy their rations in the lump from the station store; and +"travellers," i.e. shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work, are +invited, as a matter of course, to sit down to the shearers' table. +Also a certain allowance of tea, sugar, flour or meat is still made +to travellers at most Western station stores; so it would be rather +surprising if there weren't some who, travelled on the game. The swagman +loafer, or "bummer," times himself, especially in bad weather, to arrive +at the shed just about sundown; he is then sure of "tea," shelter for +the night, breakfast, and some tucker from the cook to take him on along +the track. Brummy and Swampy were sundowners. + +Swampy was a bummer born--and proud of it. Brummy had drifted down to +loaferdom, and his nature was soured and his spirit revengeful against +the world because of the memory of early years wasted at hard work and +in being honest. Both were short and stout, and both had scrubby beards, +but Brummy's beard was a dusty black and Swampy's fiery red--he indulged +in a monkey-shave sometimes, but his lower face was mostly like a +patch of coarse stubble with a dying hedge round it. They had travelled +together for a long time. They seemed at times to hate each other with +a murderous hatred, but they were too lazy to fight. Sometimes they'd +tramp side, by side and growl at each other by the hour, other times +they'd sulk for days; one would push on ahead and the other drop behind +until there was a mile or two between them; but one always carried the +billy, or the sugar, or something that was necessary to the comfort +of the other, so they'd come together at sundown. They had travelled +together a long time, and perhaps that was why they hated each other. +They often agreed to part and take different tracks, and sometimes they +parted--for a while. They agreed in cadging, and cadged in turn. They +carried a spare set of tucker-bags, and if, for instance, they were out +of sugar and had plenty flour and tea, Brummy or Swampy would go to the +store, boundary-rider's hut, or selector's, with the sugar-bag in his +hand and the other bags in his shirt front on spec. He'd get the sugar +first, and then, if it looked good enough, the flour-bag would come out, +then the tea-bag. And before he left he'd remark casually that he and +his mate hadn't had a smoke for two days. They never missed a chance. +And when they'd cadged more tucker than they could comfortably carry, +they'd camp for a day or two and eat it down. Sometimes they'd have as +much as a pound of tobacco, all in little "borrowed" bits, cut from the +sticks or cakes of honest travellers. They never missed a chance. If a +stranger gave Swampy his cake of tobacco with instructions to "cut off a +pipeful," Swampy would cut off as much as he thought judicious, talking +to the stranger and watching his eye all the time, and hiding his palm +as much as possible--and sometimes, when he knew he'd cut off more than +he could cram into his pipe, he'd put his hand in his pocket for the +pipe and drop some of the tobacco there. Then he'd hand the plug to his +mate, engage the stranger in conversation and try to hold his eye or +detract his attention from Brummy so as to give Brummy a chance of +cutting off a couple of pipefuls, and, maybe, nicking off a corner of +the cake and slipping it into his pocket. I once heard a bushman say +that no one but a skunk would be guilty of this tobacco trick--that it +is about the meanest trick a man could be capable of--_because it spoils +the chances of the next hard-up swaggy who asks the victim for tobacco._ + +When Brummy and Swampy came to a shed where shearing was in full swing, +they'd inquire, first thing, and with some show of anxiety, if there was +any chance of gettin' on; if the shed was full-handed they'd growl +about hard times, wonder what the country was coming to; talk of their +missuses and kids that they'd left in Sydney, curse the squatters and +the Government, and, next morning, get a supply of rations from the cook +and depart with looks of gloom. If, on the other hand, there was room in +the shed for one or both of them, and the boss told them to go to work +in the morning, they'd keep it quiet from the cook if possible, and +depart, after breakfast, unostentatiously. + +Sometimes, at the beginning of a drought, when the tall dead grass was +like tinder for hundreds of miles and a carelessly-dropped match +would set the whole country on fire, Swampy would strike a hard-faced +squatter, manager or overseer with a cold eye, and the conversation +would be somewhat as follows: + +Swampy: "Good day, boss!" + +Boss (shortly): "'Day." + +Swampy: "Any chance of a job?" + +Boss: "Naw. Got all I want and we don't start for a fortnight." + +Swampy: "Can I git a bit o' meat?" + +Boss: "Naw! Don't kill till Saturday." + +Swampy: "Pint o' flour?" + +Boss: "Naw. Short ourselves." + +Swampy: "Bit o' tea or sugar, boss?" + +Boss: "Naw--what next?" + +Swampy: "Bit o' baccer, boss. Ain't had a smoke for a week." + +Boss: "Naw. Ain't got enough for meself till the wagon comes out." + +Swampy: "Ah, well! It's hot, ain't it, boss?" + +Boss: "Yes-it's hot." + +Swampy: "Country very dry?" + +Boss: "Yes. Looks like it." + +Swampy: "A fire 'ud be very bad just now?" + +Boss: "Eh?" + +Swampy: "Yes. Now I'm allers very careful with matches an' fire when I'm +on the track." + +Boss "Are yer?" + +Swampy: "Yes. I never lights a fire near the grass--allers in the middle +of the track--it's the safest place yer can get. An' I allers puts the +fire out afore I leaves the camp. If there ain't no water ter spare +I covers the ashes with dirt. An' some fellers are so careless with +matches lightin' their pipes." (Reflective pause.) + +Boss: "Are they?" + +Swampy: "Yes. Now, when I lights me pipe on the track in dry weather I +allers rubs the match head up an' drops it in the dust. I never drops +a burnin' match. But some travellers is so careless. A chap might light +his pipe an' fling the match away without thinkin' an' the match might +fall in a dry tuft, an'-there yer are!" (with a wave of his arms). +"Hundreds of miles o' grass gone an' thousands o' sheep starvin'. Some +fellers is so careless--they never thinks.... An' what's more, they +don't care if they burn the whole country." + +Boss (scratching his head reflectively): "Ah-umph! You can go up to the +store and get a bit of tucker. The storekeeper might let yer have a bit +o' tobacco." + + +On one occasion, when they were out of flour and meat; Brummy and Swampy +came across two other pilgrims camped on a creek, who were also out of +flour and meat. One of them had tried a surveyors' camp a little further +down, but without success. The surveyors' cook had said that he was +short of flour and meat himself. Brummy tried him--no luck. Then Swampy +said he'd go and have a try. As luck would have it, the surveyors' cook +was just going to bake; he had got the flour out in the dish, put in +the salt and baking powder, mixed it up, and had gone to the creek for +a billy of water when Swampy arrived. While the cook was gone Swampy +slipped the flour out of the dish into his bag, _wiped_ the dish, set it +down again, and planted the bag behind a tree at a little distance. Then +he stood waiting, holding a spare empty bag in his hand. When the cook +came back he glanced at the dish, lowered the billy of water slowly +to the ground, scratched his head, and looked at the dish again in a +puzzled way. + +"Blanked if I didn't think I got that flour out!" he said. + +"What's that, mate?" asked Swampy. + +"Why! I could have sworn I got the flour out in the dish and mixed it +before I went for the water," said the cook, staring at the dish again. +"It's rum what tricks your memory plays on you sometimes." + +"Yes," said Swampy, showing interest, while the cook got some more flour +out into the dish from a bag in the back of the tent. "It is strange. +I've done the same, thing meself. I suppose it's the heat that makes us +all a bit off at times." + +"Do you cook, then?" asked the surveyors' cook. + +"Well, yes. I've done a good bit of it in me time; but it's about played +out. I'm after stragglers now." (Stragglers are stray sheep missed in +the general muster and found about the out paddocks and shorn after the +general shearing.) + +They had a yarn and Swampy "bit the cook's ear" for a "bit o' meat an' +tea an' sugar," not forgetting "a handful of flour if yer can spare it." + +"Sorry," said the cook, "but I can only let you have about a pint. We're +very short ourselves." + +"Oh, that's all right!" said Swampy, as he put the stuff into his spare +bags. "Thank you! Good day!" + +"Good day," said the cook. The cook went on with his work and Swampy +departed, catching up the bag of flour from behind the tree as he passed +it, and keeping the clump of timber well between him and the surveyors' +camp, lest the cook should glance round, and, noticing the increased +bulk of his load, get some new ideas concerning mental aberration. + + +Nearly every bushman has at least one superstition, or notion, that +lasts his time--as nearly every bushman has at least one dictionary word +which lasts him all his life. Brummy had a gloomy notion--Lord knows how +he got it!--that he should 'a' gone on the boards if his people hadn't +been so ignorant. He reckoned that he had the face and cut of an +actor, could mimic any man's voice, and had wonderful control over his +features. They came to a notoriously "hungry" station, where there was +a Scottish manager and storekeeper. Brummy went up to "government house" +in his own proper person, had a talk with the storekeeper, spoke of a +sick mate, and got some flour and meat. They camped down the creek, and +next morning Brummy started to shave himself. + +"Whatever are you a-doin' of, Brummy?" gasped Swampy in great +astonishment. + +"Wait and see," growled Brummy, with awful impressiveness, as if he were +going to cut Swampy's throat after he'd finished shaving. He shaved +off his beard and whiskers, put on a hat and coat belonging to Swampy, +changed his voice, dropped his shoulders, and went limping up to the +station on a game leg. He saw the cook and got some "brownie," a bit of +cooked meat and a packet of baking powder. Then he saw the storekeeper +and approached the tobacco question. Sandy looked at him and listened +with some slight show of interest, then he said: + +"Oh that's all right now! But ye needn't ha' troublt shavin' yer +beard--the cold weather's comin' on! An' yer mate's duds don't suit +ye--they 're too sma'; an' yer game leg doesn't fit ye either--it takes +a lot o' practice. Ha' ye got ony tea an' sugar?" + +Brummy must have touched something responsive in that old Scot +somewhere, but his lack of emotion upset Brummy somewhat, or else an old +deep-rooted superstition had been severely shaken. Anyway he let Swampy +do the cadging for several days thereafter. + + +But one bad season they were very hard up indeed--even for Brummy +and Swampy. They'd tramped a long hungry track and had only met a few +wretched jackaroos, driven out of the cities by hard times, and tramping +hopelessly west. They were out of tobacco, and their trousers were so +hopelessly "gone" behind that when they went to cadge at a place where +there was a woman they were moved to back and sidle and edge away +again--and neither Brummy nor Swampy was over fastidious in matters +of dress or personal appearance. It was absolutely necessary to earn a +pound or two, so they decided to go to work for a couple of weeks. It +wouldn't hurt them, and then there was the novelty of it. + +They struck West-o'-Sunday Station, and the boss happened to want a +rouseabout to pick up wool and sweep the floor for the shearers. + +"I can put _one_ of you on," he said. "Fix it up between yourselves and +go to work in the morning." + +Brummy and Swampy went apart to talk it over. + +"Look here! Brum, old man," said Swampy, with great heartiness, "we've +been mates for a long while now, an' shared an' shared alike. You've +allers acted straight to me an' I want to do the fair thing by you. +_I_ don't want to stand in _your_ light. You take the job an' I'll be +satisfied with a pair of pants out of it and a bit o' tobacco now an' +agen. There yer are! I can't say no fairer than that." + +"Yes," said Brummy, resentfully, "an' you'll always be thrown' it up to +me afterwards that I done you out of a job!" + +"I'll swear I won't," said Swampy, hurriedly. "But since you're so +blasted touchy and suspicious about it, _you_ take this job an' I'll +take the next that turns up. How'll that suit you?" + +Brummy thought resentfully. + +"Look here!" he said presently, "let's settle it and have done with this +damned sentimental tommy-rot. I'll tell you what I'll do--I'll give you +the job and take my chance. The boss might want another man to-morrow. +Now, are you satisfied?" + +But Swampy didn't look grateful or happy. + +"Well," growled Brummy, "of all the ---- I ever travelled with you're +the ----. What do you want anyway? What'll satisfy you? That's all I +want to know. Hey?--can't yer speak?" + +"Let's toss up for it," said Swampy, sulkily. + +"All right," said Brummy, with a big oath, and he felt in his pocket for +two old pennies he had. But Swampy had got a suspicion somehow that one +of those pennies had two heads on it, and he wasn't sure that the other +hadn't two tails--also, he suspected Brummy of some skill in "palming," +so he picked up a chip from the wood-heap, spat on it, and spun it into +the air. "Sing out!" he cried, "wet or dry?" + +"Dry," said Brummy, promptly. He had a theory that the wet side of the +chip, being presumably heaviest, was more likely to fall downwards; +but this time it was "wet" up three times in succession. Brummy ignored +Swampy's hand thrown out in hearty congratulation; and next morning +he went to work in the shed. Swampy camped down the river, and Brummy +supplied him with a cheap pair of moleskin trousers, tucker and tobacco. +The shed cut out within three weeks and the two sundowners took the +track again, Brummy with two pounds odd in his pocket--he having +negotiated his cheque at the shed. + +But now there was suspicion, envy, and distrust in the hearts of those +two wayfarers. Brummy was now a bloated capitalist, and proud, and +anxious to get rid of Swampy--at least Swampy thought so. He thought +that the least that Brummy might have done was to have shared the +"stuff" with him. + +"Look here, Brummy," he said reproachfully, "we've shared and shared +alike, and----" + +"We never shared money," said Brummy, decidedly. + +"Do you think I want yer blasted money?" retorted Swampy, indignantly. +"When did I ever ask yer for a sprat? Tell me that!" + +"You wouldn't have got it if you had asked," said Brummy, +uncompromisingly. "Look here!" with vehemence. "Didn't I keep yer in +tobacco and buy yer gory pants? What are you naggin' about anyway?" + +"Well," said Swampy, "all I was goin' to say was that yer might let me +carry one of them quids in case you lost one--yer know you're careless +and lose things; or in case anything happened to you." + +"I ain't going to lose it--if that's all that's fretting you," said +Brummy, "and there ain't nothing going to happen to me--and don't you +forget it." + +"That's all the thanks I get for givin' yer my gory job," said Swampy, +savagely. "I won't be sick a soft fool agen, I can tell yer." + +Brummy was silent, and Swampy dropped behind. He brooded darkly, +and it's a bad thing for a man to brood in the bush. He was reg'lar +disgusted with Brummy. He'd allers acted straight to him, and Brummy +had acted like a "cow." He'd stand it no longer; but he'd have some +satisfaction. He wouldn't be a fool. If Brummy was mean skunk enough to +act to a mate like that, Swampy would be even with him; he would wait +till Brummy was asleep, collar the stuff, and clear. It was his job, +anyway, and the money was his by rights. He'd have his rights. + +Brummy, who carried the billy, gave Swampy a long tramp before he camped +and made a fire. They had tea in silence, and smoked moodily apart until +Brummy turned in. They usually slept on the ground, with a few leaves +under them, or on the sand where there was any, each wrapped in his own +blankets, and with their spare clothes, or rags rather, for pillows. +Presently Swampy turned in and pretended to sleep, but he lay awake +watching, and listening to Brummy's breathing. When he thought it was +safe he moved cautiously and slipped his hand under Brummy's head, but +Brummy's old pocket-book--in which he carried some dirty old letters in +a woman's handwriting--was not there. All next day Swampy watched Brummy +sharply every time he put his hands into his pockets, to try and find +out in which pocket he kept his money. Brummy seemed very cheerful and +sociable, even considerate, to his mate all day, and Swampy pretended to +be happy. They yarned more than they had done for many a day. Brummy was +a heavy sleeper, and that night Swampy went over him carefully and felt +all his pockets, but without success. Next day Brummy seemed in high +spirits--they were nearing Bourke, where they intended to loaf round +the pubs for a week or two. On the third night Swampy waited till about +midnight, and then searched Brummy, every inch of him he could get at, +and tickled him, with a straw of grass till he turned over, and ran his +hands over the other side of him, and over his feet (Brummy slept with +his socks on), and looked in his boots, and in the billy and in the +tucker-bags, and felt in every tuft of grass round the camp, and under +every bush, and down a hollow stump, and up a hollow log: but there +was no pocket-book. Brummy couldn't have lost the money and kept it +dark--he'd have gone back to look for it at once. Perhaps he'd thrown +away the book and sewn the money in his clothes somewhere. Swampy crept +back to him and felt the lining of his hat, and was running his hand +over Brummy's chest when Brummy suddenly started to snore, and Swampy +desisted without loss of time. He crept back to bed, breathing short, +and thought hard. It struck him that there was something aggressive +about that snore. He began to suspect that Brummy was up to his little +game, and it pained him. + +Next morning Brummy was decidedly frivolous. At any other time Swampy +would have put it down to a "touch o' the sun," but now he felt a +growing conviction that Brummy knew what he'd been up to the last three +nights, and the more he thought of it the more it pained him--till at +last he could stand it no longer. + +"Look here, Brummy," he said frankly, "where the hell do you keep that +flamin' stuff o' yourn? I been tryin' to git at it ever since we left +West-o'-Sunday." + +"I know you have, Swampy," said Brummy, affectionately--as if he +considered that Swampy had done his best in the interests of mateship. + +"I _knowed_ yer knowed!" exclaimed Swampy, triumphantly. "But where the +blazes did yer put it?" + +"Under _your_ head, Swampy, old man," said Brummy, cheerfully. + +Swampy was hurt now. He commented in the language that used to be used +by the bullock-punchers of the good days as they pranced up and down by +their teams and lammed into the bullocks with saplings and crow-bars, +and called on them to lift a heavy load out of a bog in the bed of a +muddy creek. + +"Never mind, Swampy!" said Brummy, soothingly, as his mate paused and +tried to remember worse oaths. "It wasn't your fault." + +But they parted at Bourke. Swampy had allers acted straight ter +Brummy--share 'n' share alike. He'd do as much for a mate as any other +man, an' put up with as much from a mate. He had put up with a lot from +Brummy: he'd picked him up on the track and learned him all he knowed; +Brummy would have starved many a time if it hadn't been for Swampy; +Swampy had learned him how to "battle." He'd stick to Brummy yet, but he +couldn't stand ingratitude. He hated low cunnin' an' suspicion, and when +a gory mate got suspicious of his own old mate and wouldn't trust him, +an' took to plantin' his crimson money--it was time to leave him. + + + + +A SKETCH OF MATESHIP + + +Bill and Jim, professional shearers, were coming into Bourke from the +Queensland side. They were horsemen and had two packhorses. At the last +camp before Bourke Jim's packhorse got disgusted and home-sick during +the night and started back for the place where he was foaled. Jim was +little more than a new-chum jackaroo; he was no bushman and generally +got lost when he went down the next gully. Bill was a bushman, so it was +decided that he should go back to look for the horse. + +Now Bill was going to sell his packhorse, a well-bred mare, in Bourke, +and he was anxious to get her into the yards before the horse sales +were over; this was to be the last day of the sales. Jim was the +best "barracker" of the two; he had great imagination; he was a very +entertaining story-teller and conversationalist in social life, and a +glib and a most impressive liar in business, so it was decided that he +should hurry on into Bourke with the mare and sell her for Bill. Seven +pounds, reserve. + +Next day Bill turned up with the missing horse and saw Jim standing +against a veranda-post of the Carriers' Arms, with his hat down over his +eyes, and thoughtfully spitting in the dust. Bill rode over to him. + +"'Ullo, Jim." + +"'Ullo, Bill. I see you got him." + +"Yes, I got him." + +Pause. + +"Where'd yer find him?" + +"'Bout ten mile back. Near Ford's Bridge. He was just feedin' along." + +Pause. Jim shifted his feet and spat in the dust. + +"Well," said Bill at last. "How did you get on, Jim?" + +"Oh, all right," said Jim. "I sold the mare." + +"That's right," said Bill. "How much did she fetch?" + +"Eight quid;" then, rousing himself a little and showing some emotion, +"An' I could 'a' got ten quid for her if I hadn't been a dam' fool." + +"Oh, that's good enough," said Bill. + +"I could 'a' got ten quid if I'd 'a' waited." + +"Well, it's no use cryin'. Eight quid is good enough. Did you get the +stuff?" + +"Oh, yes. They parted all right. If I hadn't been such a dam' fool an' +rushed it, there was a feller that would 'a' given ten quid for that +mare." + +"Well, don't break yer back about it," said Bill. "Eight is good +enough." + +"Yes. But I could 'a' got ten," said Jim, languidly, putting his hand in +his pocket. + +Pause. Bill sat waiting for him to hand over the money; but Jim withdrew +his hand empty, stretched, and said: + +"Ah, well, Bill, I done it in. Lend us a couple o' notes." + +Jim had been drinking and gambling all night and he'd lost the eight +pounds as well as his own money. + +Bill didn't explode. What was the use? He should have known that Jim +wasn't to be trusted with money in town. It was he who had been the +fool. He sighed and lent Jim a pound, and they went in to have a drink. + +Now it strikes me that if this had happened in a civilized country (like +England) Bill would have had Jim arrested and jailed for larceny as a +bailee, or embezzlement, or whatever it was. And would Bill or Jim or +the world have been any better for it? + + + + +ON THE TUCKER TRACK: A STEELMAN STORY + + +Steelman and Smith, professional wanderers from New Zealand, took a run +over to Australia one year to have a look at the country, and drifted +out back, and played cards and "headin' 'em" at the shearing-sheds +(while pretending to be strangers to each other), and sold eye-water and +unpatented medicine, and worked the tucker tracks. They struck a streak +of bad luck at West-o'-Sunday Station, where they were advised (by the +boss and about fifty excited shearers) to go east, and not to stop +till they reached the coast. They were tramping along the track towards +Bourke; they were very hard up and had to "battle" for tucker and +tobacco along the track. They came to a lonely shanty, about two camps +west of Bourke. + +"We'll turn off into the scrub and strike the track the other side of +the shanty and come back to it," said Steelman. "You see, if they see us +coming into Bourke they'll say to themselves, `Oh, we're never likely +to see these chaps again,' and they won't give us anything, or, perhaps, +only a pinch of tea or sugar in a big lump of paper. There's some women +that can never see a tucker-bag, even if you hold it right under their +noses. But if they see us going out back they'll reckon that we'll get +a shed likely as not, and we'll be sure to call there with our cheques +coming back. I hope the old man's got the lumbago, or sciatica, or +something." + +"Why?" asked Smith. + +"Because whenever I see an old man poking round the place on a stick +I always make for him straight and inquire about his trouble; and no +matter what complaint he's got, my old man suffered from it for years. +It's pretty hard graft listening to an old man with a pet leg, but I +find it pays; and I always finish up by advising him to try St Jacob's +oil. Perhaps he's been trying it for years, but that doesn't matter; the +consultation works out all right all the same, and there's never been a +remedy tried yet but I've got another. + +"I've got a lot of Maori and blackfellow remedies in my mind, and when +they fail I can fall back on the Chinese; and if that isn't enough I've +got a list of my grandmother's remedies that she wrote down for me when +I was leaving home, and I kept it for a curiosity. It took her three +days to write them, and I reckon they'll fill the bill. + +"You don't want a shave. You look better with that stubble on. You +needn't say anything; just stand by and wear your usual expression, and +if they ask me what's the matter with my mate I'll fix up a disease for +you to have, and get something extra on your account, poor beggar! + +"I wish we had a chap with us that could sing a bit and run the gamut on +a fiddle or something. With a sickly-looking fish like you to stand by +and look interesting and die slowly of consumption all the time, and me +to do the talking, we'd be able to travel from one end of the bush to +the other and live on the fat of the land. I wouldn't cure you for a +hundred pounds:" + +They reached the shanty, and there, sure enough, was an old man +pottering round with a list to starboard. He was working with a hoe +inside a low paling fence round a sort of garden. Steelman and Smith +stopped outside the fence. + +"Good day, boss!" + +"'Day." + +"It's hot." + +"It's hot." + +So far it was satisfactory. + +He was a little man, with a wiry, red beard. He might have been a +Scandinavian. + +"You seem to be a bit lame," said Steelman. "Hurt your foot?" + +"Naw," said the old man. "It's an old thing." + +"Ah!" said Steelman, "lumbago, I suppose? My father suffered cruel from +it for years." + +"Naw," said the old man, moving closer to the fence. "It ain't in me +back; the trouble's with me leg." + +"Oh!" said Steelman. "One a bit shorter than the other?" + +"Well, yes. It seems to be wearin' a bit shorter. I must see to it." + +"Hip disease, perhaps?" said Steelman. "A brother o' mine had----" + +"Naw, it's not in the hip," said the old man. "My leg's gone at the +knee." + +"Oh! stiff joint; I know what that is. Had a touch of it once myself. +An uncle of mine was nearly crippled with it. He used to use St Jacob's +oil. Ever try St Jacob's oil?" + +"Naw," said the old man, "not that I know of. I've used linseed oil +though." + +"Linseed oil!" said Steelman; "I've never heard of that for stiff knee. +How do you use it?" + +"Use it raw," said the old man. "Raw linseed oil; I've rubbed it in, and +I've soaked me leg in it." + +"Soaked your leg in it!" said Steelman. "And did it do it any good?" + +"Well, it seems to preserve it--keeps it from warping, and it wears +better--and it makes it heavier. It seemed a bit too light before." + +Steelman nudged Smith under cover of the palings. The old man was +evidently a bit ratty. + +"Well, I hope your leg will soon be all right, boss," said Steelman. + +"Thank you," said the old man, "but I don't think there's much hope. I +suppose you want some tucker?" + +"Well, yes," said Steelman, rather taken aback by the old man's sudden +way of putting it. "We're hard up." + +"Well, come along to the house and I'll see if I can get yer something," +said the old man; and they walked along outside the fence, and he +hobbled along inside, till he came to a little gate at the corner. +He opened the gate and stumped out. He had a wooden leg. He wore his +trouser-leg down over it, and the palings had hidden the bottom from +Steelman and Smith. + +He wanted them to stay to dinner, but Steelman didn't feel comfortable, +and thanked him, and said they'd rather be getting on (Steelman always +spoke for Smith); so the old man gave them some cooked meat, bread, and +a supply of tea and sugar. Steelman watched his face very close, but he +never moved a muscle. But when they looked back he was leaning on his +hoe, and seemed to be shaking. + +"Took you back a bit, Steely, didn't it?" suggested Smith. + +"How do you make that out?" snorted Steelman, turning on him suddenly. +"I knew a carpenter who used to soak his planes in raw linseed oil to +preserve them and give them weight. There's nothing funny about that." + +Smith rubbed his head. + + + + +A BUSH PUBLICAN'S LAMENT + + ... For thirst is long and throats is short + Among the sons o' men. + M. J. C. + +I Wish I was spifflicated before I ever seen a pub! + +You see, it's this way. Suppose a cove comes along on a blazin' hot +day in the drought--an' _you_ ought to know how hell-hot it can be out +here--an' he dumps his swag in the corner of the bar; an' he turns round +an' he ses ter me, "Look here boss, I ain't got a lonely steever on me, +an' God knows when I'll git one. I've tramped ten mile this mornin', an' +I'll have ter tramp another ten afore to-night. I'm expectin' ter git +on shearin' with of Baldy Thompson at West-o'-Sunday nex' week. I got a +thirst on me like a sun-struck bone, an', for God sake, put up a couple +o' beers for me an' my mate, an' I'll fix it up with yer when I come +back after shearin'." + +An' what's a feller ter do? I bin there meself, an--I put it to you! +I've known what it is to have a thirst on me. + +An' suppose a poor devil comes along in the jim-jams, with every inch +on him jumpin' an' a look in his eyes like a man bein' murdered an' sent +ter hell, an' a whine in his voice like a whipped cur, an' the snakes +a-chasing of him; an' he hooks me with his finger ter the far end o' +the bar--as if he was goin' ter tell me that the world was ended--an' he +hangs over the bar an' chews me lug, an' tries to speak, an' breaks off +inter a sort o' low shriek, like a terrified woman, an' he says, "For +Mother o' Christ's sake, giv' me a drink!" An' what am I to do? I bin +there meself. I knows what the horrors is. He mighter blued his cheque +at the last shanty. But what am I ter do? I put it ter you. If I let him +go he might hang hisself ter the nex' leanin' tree. + +What's a drink? yer might arst--I don't mind a drink or two; but when it +comes to half a dozen in a day it mounts up, I can tell yer. Drinks is +sixpence here--I have to pay for it, an' pay carriage on it. It's all up +ter me in the end. I used sometimes ter think it was lucky I wasn't west +o' the sixpenny line, where I'd lose a shillin' on every drink I give +away. + +An' supposen a sundowner comes along smokin' tea-leaves, an' ses ter +me, "Look her, boss! me an' my mate ain't had a smoke for three days!" +What's a man ter do? I put it ter you! I'm a heavy smoker meself, an' +I've known what it is to be without a smoke on the track. But "nail-rod" +is ninepence a stick out here, an' I have ter pay carriage. It all +mounts up, I can tell yer. + +An' supposen Ole King Billy an' his ole black gin comes round at holiday +time and squats on the verander, an' blarneys an' wheedles and whines +and argues like a hundred Jews an' ole Irishwomen put tergether, an' +accuses me o' takin' his blarsted country from him, an' makes me an' the +missus laugh; an' we gives him a bottl'er rum an' a bag of grub ter get +rid of him an' his rotten ole scarecrow tribe--It all tells up. I was +allers soft on the blacks, an', beside, a ole gin nursed me an' me +mother when I was born, an' saved me blessed life--not that that mounts +to much. But it all tells up, an' I got me licence ter pay. An' some +bloody skunk goes an' informs on me for supplyin' the haboriginalls with +intossicatin' liquor, an' I have ter pay a fine an' risk me licence. But +what's a man ter do? + +An' three or four herrin'-gutted jackaroos comes along about +dinner-time, when the table's set and the cookin' smellin' from the +kichen, with their belts done up three holes, an' not the price of a +feed on 'em. What's a man ter do? I've known what it is ter do a perish +on the track meself. It's not the tucker I think on. I don't care a +damn for that. When the shearers come every one is free to go inter the +kitchin an' forage for hisself when he feels hungry--so long as he pays +for his drink. But the jackaroos can't pay for drinks, an' I have ter +pay carriage on the flour an' tea an' sugar an' groceries--an' it all +tells up by the end o' the year. + +An' a straight chap that knows me gets a job to take a flock o' sheep +or a mob o' cattle ter the bloomin' Gulf, or South Australia, or +somewheers--an' loses one of his horses goin' out ter take charge, an' +borrers eight quid from me ter buy another. He'll turn up agen in a +year or two an' most likely want ter make me take twenty quid for that +eight--an' make everybody about the place blind drunk--but I've got ter +wait, an' the wine an' sperit merchants an' the brewery won't. They know +I can't do without liquor in the place. + +An' lars' rains Jimmy Nowlett, the bullick-driver, gets bogged over +his axle-trees back there on the Blacksoil Plains between two flooded +billerbongs, an' prays till the country steams an' his soul's busted, +an' his throat like a lime-kiln. He taps a keg o' rum or beer ter keep +his throat in workin' order. I don't mind that at all, but him an' his +mates git flood-bound for near a week, an' broach more kegs, an' go on +a howlin' spree in ther mud, an' spill mor'n they swipe, an' leave a +tarpaulin off a load, an' the flour gets wet, an' the sugar runs out of +the bags like syrup, an'-- What's a feller ter do? Do yer expect me to +set the law onter Jimmy? I've knowed him all my life, an' he knowed my +father afore I was born. He's been on the roads this forty year, till +he's as thin as a rat, and as poor as a myall black; an' he's got a +family ter keep back there in Bourke. No, I have ter pay for it in the +end, an' it all mounts up, I can tell yer. + +An' suppose some poor devil of a new-chum black sheep comes along, +staggerin' from one side of the track to the other, and spoutin' poetry; +dyin' o' heat or fever, or heartbreak an' home-sickness, or a life o' +disserpation he'd led in England, an' without a sprat on him, an' no +claim on the bush; an' I ketches: him in me arms as he stumbles inter +the bar, an' he wants me ter hold him up while he turns English inter +Greek for me. An' I put him ter bed, an' he gits worse, an' I have ter +send the buggy twenty mile for a doctor--an' pay him. An' the jackaroo +gits worse, an' has ter be watched an' nursed an' held down sometimes; +an' he raves about his home an' mother in England, an' the blarsted +University that he was eddicated at--an' a woman--an' somethin' that +sounds like poetry in French; an' he upsets my missus a lot, an' makes +her blubber. An' he dies, an' I have ter pay a man ter bury him (an' +knock up a sort o' fence round the grave arterwards ter keep the stock +out), an' send the buggy agen for a parson, an'--Well, what's a man ter +do? I couldn't let him wander away an' die like a dog in the scrub, an' +be shoved underground like a dog, too, if his body was ever found. The +Government might pay ter bury him, but there ain't never been a +pauper funeral from my house yet, an' there won't be one if I can help +it--except it be meself. + +An' then there's the bother goin' through his papers to try an' find out +who he was an' where his friends is. An' I have ter get the missus to +write a letter to his people, an' we have ter make up lies about how +he died ter make it easier for 'em. An' goin' through his letters, the +missus comes across a portrait an' a locket of hair, an' letters from +his mother an' sisters an' girl; an' they upset her, an' she blubbers +agin, an' gits sentimental--like she useter long ago when we was first +married. + +There was one bit of poetry--I forgit it now--that that there jackaroo +kep' sayin' over an' over agen till it buzzed in me head; an', weeks +after, I'd ketch the missus mutterin' it to herself in the kitchen till +I thought she was goin' ratty. + +An' we gets a letter from the jackaroo's friends that puts us to a lot +more bother. I hate havin' anythin' to do with letters. An' someone's +sure to say he was lambed down an' cleaned out an' poisoned with bad +bush liquor at my place. It's almost enough ter make a man wish there +_was_ a recorin' angel. + +An' what's the end of it? I got the blazin' bailiff in the place now! +I can't shot him out because he's a decent, hard-up, poor devil from +Bourke, with consumption or somethin', an' he's been talkin' to the +missus about his missus an' kids; an' I see no chance of gittin' rid +of him, unless the shearers come along with their cheques from +West-o'-Sunday nex' week and act straight by me. Like as not I'll have +ter roll up me swag an' take the track meself in the end. They say +publicans are damned, an' I think so, too; an' I wish I'd bin operated +on before ever I seen a pub. + + + + +THE SHEARER'S DREAM + + +Mitchell and I rolled up our swags after New Year and started to tramp +west. It had been a very bad season after a long drought. Old Baldy +Thompson had only shorn a few bales of grass-seed and burrs, so he said, +and thought of taking the track himself; but we hoped to get on shearing +stragglers at West-o'-Sunday or one of the stations of the Hungerford +track. + +It was very hot weather, so we started after sunset, intending to travel +all night. We crossed the big billabong, and were ploughing through the +dust and sand towards West Bourke, when a buggy full of city girls and +swells passed by. They were part of a theatrical company on tour in the +Back-Blocks, and some local Johnnies. They'd been driven out to see +an artesian bore, or wool-shed, or something. The horses swerved, and +jerked a little squawk out of one of the girls. Then another said: + +"Ow-w! Two old swaggies. He! he! he!" + +I glanced at Mitchell to see if he was hit, and caught his head down; +but he pulled himself up and pretended to hitch his swag into an easier +position. + +About a hundred yards further on he gave me a side look and said: + +"Did that touch you, Harry" + +"No," I said, and I laughed. + +"You see," reflected Mitchell, "they're more to be pitied than blamed. +It's their ignorance. In the first place, we're not two old tramps, as +they think. We are professional shearers; and the Australian shearers +are about the most independent and intelligent class of men in the +world. We've got more genius in one of our little fingers than there is +in the whole of that wagonette-load of diddle-daddle and fiddle-faddle +and giggles. Their intellects are on a level with the rotten dramas +they travel with, and their lives about as false. They are slaves to +the public, and their home is the pub-parlour, with sickly, senseless +Johnnies to shout suppers and drink for them and lend their men money. +If one of those girls is above the average, how she must despise those +Johnnies--and the life! She must feel a greater contempt for them than +the private-barmaid does for the boozer she cleans out. He gets his +drink and some enjoyment, anyhow. And how she must loathe the life she +leads! And what's the end of it as often as not? I remember once, when +I was a boy, I was walking out with two aunts of mine--they're both +dead now. God rest their fussy, innocent old souls!--and one of 'em +said suddenly, 'Look! Quick, Jack! There's Maggie So-and-So, the great +actress.' And I looked and saw a woman training vines in a porch. It +seemed like seeing an angel to me, and I never forgot her as she was +then. The diggers used to go miles out of town to meet the coach that +brought her, and take the horses out and drag it in, and throw gold in +her lap, and worship her. + +"The last time I was in Sydney I saw her sitting in the back parlour +of a third-rate pub. She was dying of dropsy and couldn't move from +her chair. She showed me a portrait of herself as I remembered her, and +talked quite seriously about going on the stage again. + +"Now, our home is about two thousand miles wide, and the world's our +stage. If the worst comes to the worst we can always get tucker and wood +and water for nothing. If we're camping at a job in a tent there's no +house-cleaning to bother us. All we've got to do when the camp gets too +dirty is to shift the tent to a fresh place. We've got time to think +and--we're free. + +"But then, agen," he reflected, "there's the world's point of view to +be considered. Some day I might be flashing past in a buggy or +saloon-carriage--or, the chances are it will be you--and you might look +out the window and see an old swaggy tramping along in the dust, or +camped under a strip of calico in the rain in the scrub. (And it might +be me--old Mitchell--that really wrote your books, only the world won't +know it.) And then you'll realize what a wretched, miserable life +it was. We never realize the miseries of life till we look back--the +mistakes and miseries that had to be and couldn't be helped. It's all +luck--luck and chance." + +But those girls seemed to have gravelled Mitchell, and he didn't seem +able to talk himself round. He tramped on, brooding for a while, and +then suddenly he said: + +"Look here, Harry! Those girls are giving a dance to-night, and if I +liked to go back to Bourke and tog up and go to the dance I could pick +out the prettiest, dance with her all the evening, and take her for +a stroll afterwards, old tramp as they thought me. I've lived--but it +wouldn't be worth my while now." + +I'd seen Jack in a mood like this before, and thought it best to say +nothing. Perhaps the terrible heat had affected him a little. We walked +on in silence until we came to the next billabong. "Best boil the +billy here, Harry," said Mitchell, "and have some tea before we go any +further." + +I got some sticks together and made a fire and put the billy on. The +country looked wretched--like the ghost of a burnt-out land--in the +moonlight. The banks of the creek were like ashes, the thin, gnarled +gum-bush seemed dry-rotting fast, and in many places the surface of the +ground was cracked in squares where it had shrunk in the drought. In the +bed of the creek was a narrow gutter of water that looked like bad milk. + +Mitchell sat on his swag, with his pint of tea on the ground by his +foot, and chewed his pipe. + +"What's up, Jack?" I asked. "Have you got the blues?" + +"Well, yes, Harry," he said. "I'm generally dull the first day on +the track. The first day is generally the worst, anywhere or +anytime--except, perhaps, when you're married.... I got--well, I got +thinking of the time when a woman's word could have hurt me." + +Just then one of the "travellers" who were camped a bit up the creek +suddenly commenced to sing. It was a song called "The Shearer's Dream," +and I suppose the buggy of girls, or the conversation they started, +reminded him of it. He started his verses and most of his lines with +a howl; and there were unexpected howls all through the song, and it +wailed off, just as unexpectedly, in places where there was no pathos +that I could see: + + Oh, I dreamt I shore in a shearer's shed, and it was a dream of joy, + For every one of the rouseabouts was a girl dressed up as a boy-- + Dressed up like a page in a pantomime, and the prettiest ever seen-- + They had flaxen hair, they had coal-black hair--and every shade between. + +"Every" with sudden and great energy, a long drop on to "shade," and a +wail of intense sadness and regret running on into "between," the dirge +reaching its wailsomest in the "tween" in every case. + + The shed was cooled by electric fans that was over every "shoot"; + The pens was of polished ma-ho-gany, and ev'rything else to suit; + The huts was fixed with spring-mattresses, and the tucker was + simply grand, + And every night by the biller-bong we darnced to a German band. + + "_Chorus, boys!"_ + + There was short, plump girls, there was tall, slim girls, + and the handsomest ever seen + They was four-foot-five, they was six-foot high, and hevery size + between. + Our pay was the wool on the jumbucks' backs, so we shore till all + was blue + The sheep was washed afore they was shore (and the rams was scented + too); + And we all of us cried when the shed cut out, in spite of the + long, hot days, + For hevery hour them girls waltzed in with whisky and beer on + tr-a-a-a-ys! + + "_Chorus_! _you_ ----!" + + They had kind grey eyes, they had coal-black eyes, and the + grandest ever seen + They had plump pink hands, they had slim white hands, and hevery + shape be-tw-e-e-n. + There was three of them girls to every chap, and as jealous as they + could be-- + +"Ow! you ----" + +The singer's voice or memory seemed suddenly to have failed him at this +point, but whether his mates hit him on the back of the head with a +tomahawk, or only choked him, I do not know. Mitchell was inclined to +think, from the sound of it, that they choked him. + + + + +THE LOST SOULS' HOTEL + + +Hunqerford Road, February. One hundred and thirty miles of heavy +reddish sand, bordered by dry, hot scrubs. Dense cloud of hot dust. +Four wool-teams passing through a gate in a "rabbit proof" fence which +crosses the road. Clock, clock, clock of wheels and rattle and clink of +chains, crack of whips and explosions of Australian language. Bales +and everything else coated with dust. Stink of old axle-grease and +tarpaulins. Tyres hot enough to fry chops on: bows and chains so hot +that it's a wonder they do not burn through the bullock's hides. Water +lukewarm in blistered kegs slung behind the wagons. Bullocks dragging +along as only bullocks do. Wheels ploughing through the deep sand, and +the load lurching from side to side. Half-way on a "dry-stretch" of +seventeen miles. Big "tank" full of good water through the scrub to the +right, but it is a private tank and a boundary-rider is shepherding it. +Mulga scrub and sparse, spiky undergrowth. + +The carriers camp for dinner and boil their billies while the bullocks +droop under their yokes in the blazing heat; one or two lie down and +the leaders drag and twist themselves round under a dead tree, under +the impression that there is shade there. The carriers look like Red +Indians, with the masks of red dust "bound" with sweat on their faces, +but there is an unhealthy-looking, whitish space round their eyes, +caused by wiping away the blinding dust, sweat, and flies. The dry +sticks burn with a pale flame and an almost invisible thin pale +blue smoke. The sun's heat dancing and dazzling across every white +fence-post, sandhill, or light-coloured object in the distance. + +One man takes off his boot and sock, empties half a pint of sand out of +them, and pulls up his trouser-leg. His leg is sheathed to the knee in +dust and sweat; he absently scrapes it with his knife, and presently he +amuses himself by moistening a strip with his forefinger and shaving it, +as if he were vaguely curious to see if he is still a white man. + +The Hungerford coach ploughs past in a dense cloud of dust. + +The teams drag on again like a "wounded snake that dies at sundown," +if a wounded snake that dies at sundown could revive sufficiently next +morning to drag on again until another sun goes down. + +Hopeless-looking swagmen are met with during the afternoon, and one +carrier--he of the sanded leg--lends them tobacco; his mates contribute +"bits o'" tea, flour, and sugar. + +Sundown and the bullocks done up. The teamsters unyoke them and drive +them on to the next water--five miles--having previously sent a mate to +reconnoitre and see that boundary-rider is not round, otherwise, to make +terms with him, for it is a squatter's bore. They hurry the bullocks +down to the water and back in the twilight, and then, under cover of +darkness, turn them into a clearing in the scrub off the road, where a +sign in the grass might be seen--if you look close. But the "bullockies" +are better off than the horse-teamsters, for bad chaff is sold by the +pound and corn is worth its weight in gold. + + +Mitchell and I turned off the track at the rabbit-proof fence and made +for the tank in the mulga. We boiled the billy and had some salt mutton +and damper. We were making back for Bourke, having failed to get a cut +in any of the sheds on the Hungerford track. We sat under a clump of +mulga saplings, with our backs to the trunks, and got out our pipes. +Usually, when the flies were very bad on the track, we had to keep twigs +or wild-turkey=tail feathers going in front of our faces the whole time +to keep the mad flies out of our eyes; and, when we camped, one would +keep the feather going while the other lit his pipe--then the smoke +would keep them away. But the flies weren't so bad in a good shade or in +a darkened hut. Mitchell's pipe would have smoked out Old Nick; it +was an ancient string-bound meerschaum, and strong enough to kill a +blackfellow. I had one smoke out of it, once when I felt bad in my +inside and wanted to be sick, and the result was very satisfactory. + +Mitchell looked through his old pocket-book--more by force of habit +than anything else--and turned up a circular from Tattersall's. And that +reminded him. + +"Do you know what I'd do, Harry," he said, "if I won Tattersall's big +sweep, or was to come into fifty or a hundred thousand pounds, or, +better still, a million?" + +"Nothing I suppose," I said, "except to get away to Sydney or some +cooler place than this." + +"I'll tell you what I'd do," said Mitchell, talking round his pipe. "I'd +build a Swagman's Rest right here." + +"A Swagman's Rest?" + +"Yes. Right here on this very God-forsaken spot. I'd build a Swagman's +Rest and call it the Lost Souls' Hotel, or the Sundowners' Arms, or the +Half-way House to ----, or some such name that would take the bushmen's +fancy. I'd have it built on the best plans for coolness in a hot +country; bricks, and plenty of wide verandas with brick floors, and +balconies, and shingles, in the old Australian style. I wouldn't have +a sheet of corrugated iron about the place. And I'd have old-fashioned +hinged sashes with small panes and vines round 'em; they look cooler and +more homely and romantic than the glaring sort that shove up. + +"And I'd dig a tank or reservoir for surface water as big as a lake, and +bore for artesian water--and get it, too, if I had to bore right through +to England; and I'd irrigate the ground and make it grow horse-feed +and fruit, and vegetables too, if I had to cart manure from Bourke. And +every teamster's bullock or horse, and every shearer's hack, could burst +itself free, but I'd make travelling stock pay--for it belongs to the +squatters and capitalists. All carriers could camp for one night +only. And I'd--no, I wouldn't have any flowers; they might remind some +heart-broken, new-chum black sheep of the house where he was born, and +the mother whose heart he broke--and the father whose grey hairs he +brought down in sorrow to the grave--and break him up altogether." + +"But what about the old-fashioned windows and the vines?" I asked. + +"Oh!" said Mitchell, "I forgot them. On second thought, I think I would +have some flowers; and maybe a bit of ivy-green. The new chum might be +trying to work out his own salvation, and the sight of the roses and ivy +would show him that he hadn't struck such a God-forgotten country after +all, and help strengthen the hope for something better that's in the +heart of every vagabond till he dies." + +Puff, puff, puff, slowly and reflectively. + +"Until he dies," repeated Mitchell. "And, maybe," he said, rousing +himself, "I'd have a little room fixed up like a corner of a swell +restaurant, with silver and napkins on the table, and I'd fix up a +waiter, so that when a broken-down University wreck came along he might +feel, for an hour or so, something like the man he used to be. But I +suppose," Mitchell reflected, "he wouldn't feel completely his old self +without a lady friend sitting opposite to him. I might fix up a black +gin for him, but I suppose he'd draw the colour line. But that's +nonsense. + +"All teamsters and travellers could camp there for one night only. I'd +have shower-baths; but I wouldn't force any man to have a bath +against his will. They could sit down to a table and have a feed off a +table-cloth, and sleep in sheets, and feel like they did before their +old mothers died, or before they ran away from home." + +"Who? The mothers?" I asked. + +"Yes, in some cases," said Mitchell. "And I'd have a nice, cool little +summer-house down near the artificial lake, out of earshot of the house, +where the bullock-drivers could sit with their pipes after tea, and tell +yarns, and talk in their own language. And I'd have boats on the lake, +too, in case an old Oxford or Cambridge man, or an old sailor came +along--it might put years on to his life to have a pull at the oars. You +remember that old sailor we saw in charge of the engine back there at +the government tank? You saw how he had the engine?--clean and bright as +a new pin--everything spick-and-span and shipshape, and his hut fixed up +like a ship's cabin. I believe he thinks he's at sea half his time, and +shoving her through it, instead of pumping muddy water out of a hole in +the baking scrubs for starving stock. Or maybe he reckons he's keeping +her afloat." + +"And would you have fish in this lake of yours?" I asked. + +"Oh, yes," said Mitchell, "and any ratty old shepherd or sundowner, +that's gone mad of heat and loneliness--like the old codger we met back +yonder--he could sit by the lagoon in the cool of the evening and fish +to his heart's content with a string and a bent pin, and dream he's +playing truant from school and fishing in the brook near his native +village in England about fifty years ago. It would seem more real than +fishing in the dust as some mad old bushmen do." + +"But you'd draw the line somewhere?" I asked. + +"No," said Mitchell, "not even at poets. I'd try to cure them, too, with +good wholesome food and plenty of physical exercise. The Lost Souls' +Hotel would be a refuge for men who'd been jail-birds once as well +as men who were gentlemen once, and for physical wrecks and ruined +drunkards as well as healthy honest shearers. I'd sit down and talk to +the boozer or felon just as if I thought he was as good a man as me--and +he might be, for that matter--God knows. + +"The sick man would be kept till he recovered, or died; and the boozer, +suffering from a recovery, I'd keep him till he was on his legs again." + +"Then you'd have to have a doctor," I said. + +"Yes," said Mitchell, "I'd fix that up all right. I wouldn't bother +much about a respectable medical practitioner from the city. I'd get a +medical wreck who had a brilliant career before him once in England and +got into disgrace, and cleared out to the colonies--a man who knows what +the d.t.'s is--a man who's been through it all and knows it all." + +"Then you'd want a manager, or a clerk or secretary," I suggested. + +"I suppose I would," said Mitchell. "I've got no head for figures. I +suppose I'd have to advertise for him. If an applicant came with the +highest testimonials of character, and especially if one was signed by +a parson, I'd tell him to call again next week; and if a young man +could prove that he came of a good Christian family, and went to church +regularly, and sang in the choir, and taught Sunday-school, I'd tell him +that he needn't come again, that the vacancy was filled, for I +couldn't trust, him. The man who's been extra religious and honest and +hard-working in his young days is most likely to go wrong afterwards. +I'd sooner trust some poor old devil of a clerk who'd got into the hands +of a woman or racing men when he was young, and went wrong, and served +his time for embezzlement; anyway, I'd take him out and give him another +chance." + +"And what about woman's influence?" I asked. + +"Oh, I suppose there'd have to be a woman, if only to keep the doctor on +the line. I'd get a woman with a past, one that hadn't been any better +than she should have been, they're generally the most kind-hearted +in the end. Say an actress who'd come down in the world, or an old +opera-singer who'd lost her voice but could still sing a little. A woman +who knows what trouble is. And I'd get a girl to keep her company, a +sort of housemaid, with a couple of black gins or half-castes to help +her. I'd get hold of some poor girl who'd been deceived and deserted: +and a baby or two wouldn't be an objection--the kids would amuse the +chaps and help humanize the place." + +"And what if the manageress fell in love with the doctor?" I asked. + +"Well, I couldn't provide against love," said Mitchell. "I fell in love +myself more than once--and I don't suppose I'd have been any worse off +if I'd have stayed in love. Ah, well! But suppose she did fall in love +with the doctor and marry him, or suppose she fell in love with him and +didn't marry him, for that matter--and suppose the girl fell in love +with the secretary? There wouldn't be any harm done; it would only make +them more contented with the home and bind them to it. They'd be a happy +family, and the Lost Souls' Hotel would be more cheerful and homelike +than ever." + +"But supposing they all fell in love with each other and cleared out," I +said. + +"I don't see what they'd have to clear out for," said Mitchell. "But +suppose they did. There's more than one medical wreck in Australia, and +more than one woman with a past, and more than one broken old clerk who +went wrong and was found out, and who steadied down in jail, and there's +more than one poor girl that's been deceived. I could easily replace +'em. And the Lost Souls' Hotel might be the means of patching up many +wrecked lives in that way--giving people with pasts the chance of +another future, so to speak." + +"I suppose you'd have music and books and pictures?" I said. + +"Oh, yes," said Mitchell. "But I wouldn't have any bitter or sex-problem +books. They do no good. Problems have been the curse of the world ever +since it started. I think one noble, kindly, cheerful character in a +book does more good than all the clever villains or romantic adventurers +ever invented. And I think a man ought to get rid of his maudlin +sentiment in private, or when he's drunk. It's a pity that every writer +couldn't put all his bitterness into one book and then burn it. + +"No; I'd have good cheerful books of the best and brightest sides of +human nature--Charles Dickens, and Mark Twain, and Bret Harte, and those +men. And I'd have all Australian pictures--showing the brightest and +best side of Australian life. And I'd have all Australian songs. +I wouldn't have `Swannie Ribber,' or `Home, Sweet Home,' or +`Annie Laurie,' or any of those old songs sung at the Lost Souls' +Hotel--they're the cause of more heartbreaks and drink and suicide in +the bush than anything else. And if a jackaroo got up to sing, `Just +before the battle, mother,' or, `Mother bit me in me sleep,' he'd find +it was just before the battle all right. He'd have to go out and sleep +in the scrub, where the mosquitoes and bulldog ants would bite him +out of his sleep. I hate the man who's always whining about his mother +through his nose, because, as a rule, he never cared a rap for his old +mother, nor for anyone else, except his own paltry, selfish little self. + +"I'd have intellectual and elevating conversation for those that----" + +"Who'd take charge of that department?" I inquired hurriedly. + +"Well," reflected Mitchell, "I did have an idea of taking it on myself +for a while anyway; but, come to think of it, the doctor or the woman +with the past would have more experience; and I could look after that +part of the business at a pinch. Of course you're not in a position to +judge as to my ability in the intellectual line; you see, I've had no +one to practise on since I've been with you. But no matter---- There'd +be intellectual conversation for the benefit of black-sheep new chums. +And any broken-down actors that came along could get up a play if they +liked--it would brighten up things and help elevate the bullock-drivers +and sundowners. I'd have a stage fixed up and a bit of scenery. I'd do +all I could to attract shearers to the place after shearing, and keep +them from rushing to the next shanty with their cheques, or down to +Sydney, to be cleaned out by barmaids. + +"And I'd have the hero squashed in the last act for a selfish sneak, and +marry the girl to the villain--he'd be more likely to make her happy in +the end." + + +"And what about the farm?" I asked. "I suppose you'd get some expert +from the agricultural college to manage that?" + +"No," said Mitchell. "I'd get some poor drought-ruined selector and +put him in charge of the vegetation. Only, the worst of it is," he +reflected, "if you take a selector who has bullocked all his life to +raise crops on dusty, stony patches in the scrubs, and put him on land +where there's plenty of water and manure, and where he's only got to +throw the seed on the ground and then light his pipe and watch it grow, +he's apt to get disheartened. But that's human nature. + +"And, of course, I'd have to have a `character' about the place--a sort +of identity and joker to brighten up things. I wouldn't get a man who'd +been happy and comfortable all his life; I'd get hold of some old codger +whose wife had nagged him till she died, and who'd been sold off many +times, and run in for drowning his sorrows, and who started as +an undertaker and failed at that, and finally got a job pottering +round--gardener, or gatekeeper, or something--in a lunatic asylum. I'd +get him. He'd most likely be a humorist and a philosopher, and he'd help +cheer up the Lost Souls' Hotel. I reckon the lost souls would get very +fond of him." + +"And would you have drink at Lost Souls'?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Mitchell. "I'd have the best beer and spirits and wine to +be had. After tea I'd let every man have just enough to make him feel +comfortable and happy, and as good and clever, and innocent and honest +as any other man, but no more. But if a poor devil came along in the +horrors, with every inch of him jumping, and snakes, and green-eyed +yahoos, and flaming-nosed bunyips chasing him, we'd take him in and give +him soothing draughts, and nurse him, and watch him, and clear him out +with purgatives, and keep giving him nips of good whisky, and, above +all, we'd sympathize with him, and tell him that we were worse than he +was many a time. We wouldn't tell him what a weak, selfish man he was, +or harp on his ruined life. We'd try to make him out a good deal better +morally than he really was. It's remorse that hurries most men to +hell--especially in the Bush. When a man firmly believes he is a +hopeless case, then there's no hope for him: but let him have doubts and +there's a chance. Make him believe that there are far worse cases than +his. We wouldn't preach the sin of dissipation to him, no--but we'd try +to show him the _folly_ of a wasted life. I ought to be able to preach +that, God knows. + +"And, above all, we'd try to drive out of his head the cursed old +popular idea that it's hard to reform--that a man's got to fight a hard +battle with himself to get away from drink--pity drunkards can't believe +how easy it is. And we'd put it to him straight whether his few hours' +enjoyment were worth the days he had to suffer hell for it." + +"And, likely as not," I said, "when you'd put him on his feet he'd take +the nearest track to the next shanty, and go on a howling spree, and +come back to Lost Souls' in a week, raving aid worse than ever. What +would you do then?" + +"We'd take him in again, and build him up some more; and a third or +fourth time if necessary. I believe in going right on with a thing once +I take it in hand. And if he didn't turn up after the last spree we'd +look for him up the scrub and bring him in and let him die on a bed, and +make his death as comfortable as possible. I've seen one man die on the +ground, and found one dead in the bush. We'd bury him under a gum and +put `Sacred to the Memory of a Man who Died. (Let him R.I.P.)' over him. +I'd have a nice little graveyard, with gums for tombstones--and I'd have +some original epitaphs--I promise you." + +"And how much gratitude would you expect to get out of the Lost Souls' +Hotel?" I asked. + +"None," said Mitchell, promptly. "It wouldn't be a Gratitude Discovery +Syndicate. People might say that the Lost Souls' Hotel was a den for +kidnapping women and girls to be used as decoys for the purpose of +hocussing and robbing bushmen, and the law and retribution might come +after me--but I'd fight the thing out. Or they might want to make a +K.C.M.G., or a god of me, and worship me before they hung me. I reckon +a philanthropist or reformer is lucky if he escapes with a whole skin +in the end, let alone his character-- But there!-- Talking of gratitude: +it's the fear of ingratitude that keeps thousands from doing good. It's +just as paltry and selfish and cowardly as any other fear that curses +the world--it's rather more selfish than most fears, in fact--take +the fear of being thought a coward, or being considered eccentric, or +conceited, or affected, or too good, or too bad, for instance. The man +that's always canting about the world's ingratitude has no gratitude +owing to him as a rule--generally the reverse--he ought to be grateful +to the world for being let live. He broods over the world's ingratitude +until he gets to be a cynic. He sees the world like the outside of a +window, as it were, with the blind drawn and the dead, cold moonlight +shining on it, and he passes on with a sour face; whereas, if he took +the trouble to step inside he'd most likely find a room full of ruddy +firelight, and sympathy and cheerfulness, and kindness, and love, and +gratitude. Sometimes, when he's right down on his uppers, and forced to +go amongst people and hustle for bread, he gets a lot of surprises at +the amount of kindness he keeps running against in the world--and in +places where he'd never have expected to find it. But--ah, well! I'm +getting maudlin." + +"And you've forgot all about the Lost Souls' Hotel," I said. + +"No, I haven't," said Mitchell; "I'd fix that up all right. As soon +as I'd got things going smoothly under a man I could trust, I'd tie up +every penny I had for the benefit of the concern; get some `white men' +for trustees, and take the track again. I'm getting too old to stay long +in one place--(I'm a lost soul that always got along better in another +place). I'm so used to the track that if I was shut up in a house I'd +get walking up and down in my room of nights and disturb the folk; and, +besides, I'd feel lost and light-shouldered without the swag." + +"So you'd put all your money in the concern?" + +"Yes--except a pound or two to go on the track with--for, who knows, I +might come along there, dusty and tired, and ragged and hard up and old, +some day, and be very glad of a night's rest at the Lost Souls' Hotel. +But I wouldn't let on that I was old Mitchell, the millionaire, who +founded Lost Souls'. They might be too officious, and I hate fuss.... +But it's time to take the track, Harry." + +There came a cool breeze with sunset; we stood up stiffly, shouldered +our swags and tucker-bags, and pushed on, for we had to make the next +water before we camped. We were out of tobacco, so we borrowed some from +one of the bullock-drivers. + + + + +THE BOOZERS' HOME + + +"A dipsomaniac," said Mitchell, "needs sympathy and commonsense +treatment. (Sympathy's a grand and glorious thing, taking it all round +and looking at it any way you will: a little of it makes a man think +that the world's a good world after all, and there's room and hope for +sinners, and that life's worth living; enough of it makes him sure of +it: and an overdose of sympathy makes a man _feel_ weak and ashamed of +himself, and so moves him to stop whining--and wining--and buck up.) + +"Now, I'm not taking the case of a workman who goes on the spree on +pay night and sweats the drink out of himself at work next day, nor a +slum-bred brute who guzzles for the love of it; but a man with brains, +who drinks to drown his intellect or his memory. He's generally a man +under it all, and a sensitive, generous, gentle man with finer feelings +as often as not. The best and cleverest and whitest men in the world +seem to take to drink mostly. It's an awful pity. Perhaps it's because +they're straight and the world's crooked and they can see things too +plain. And I suppose in the bush the loneliness and the thoughts of the +girl-world they left behind help to sink 'em. + +"Now a drunkard seldom reforms at home, because he's always surrounded +by the signs of the ruin and misery he has brought on the home; and +the sight and thought of it sets him off again before he's had time to +recover from the last spree. Then, again, the noblest wife in the +world mostly goes the wrong way to work with a drunken husband--nearly +everything she does is calculated to irritate him. If, for instance, +he brings a bottle home from the pub, it shows that he wants to stay at +home and not go back to the pub any more; but the first thing the wife +does is to get hold of the bottle and plant it, or smash it before his +eyes, and that maddens him in the state he is in then. + +"No. A dipsomaniac needs to be taken away from home for a while. I knew +a man that got so bad that the way he acted at home one night frightened +him, and next morning he went into an inebriate home of his own +accord--to a place where his friends had been trying to get him for a +year past. For the first day or two he was nearly dead with remorse and +shame--mostly shame; and he didn't know what they were going to do to +him next--and he only wanted them to kill him quick and be done with it. +He reckons he felt as bad as if he was in jail. But there were ten +other patients there, and one or two were worse than he was, and that +comforted him a lot. They compared notes and sympathized and helped each +other. They discovered that all their wives were noble women. He +struck one or two surprises too--one of the patients was a doctor who'd +attended him one time, and another was an old boss of his, and they +got very chummy. And there was a man there who was standing for +Parliament--he was supposed to be having a rest down the coast.... Yes, +my old mate felt very bad for the first day or two; it was all Yes, +Nurse, and Thank you, Nurse, and Yes, Doctor, and No, Doctor, and +Thank you, Doctor. But, inside a week, he was calling the doctor 'Ol' +Pill-Box' behind his back, and making love to one of the nurses. + +"But he said it was pitiful when women relatives came to visit patients +the first morning. It shook the patients up a lot, but I reckon it +did 'em good. There were well-bred old lady mothers in black, and +hard-working, haggard wives and loving daughters--and the expressions of +sympathy and faith and hope in those women's faces! My old mate said +it was enough in itself to make a man swear off drink for ever.... Ah, +God--what a world it is! + +"Reminds me how I once went with the wife of another old mate of mine to +see him. He was in a lunatic asylum. It was about the worst hour I ever +had in my life, and I've had some bad ones. The way she tried to coax +him back to his old self. She thought she could do it when all the +doctors had failed. But I'll tell you about him some other time. + +"The old mate said that the principal part of the treatment was supposed +to be injection of bi-chloride of gold or something, and it was supposed +to be a secret. It might have been water and sugar for all he knew, and +he thought it was. You see, when patients got better they were allowed +out, two by two, on their honour--one to watch the other--and it worked. +But it was necessary to have an extra hold on them; so they were +told that if they were a minute late for `treatment,' or missed one +injection, all the good would be undone. This was dinged into their ears +all the time. Same as many things are done in the Catholic religion--to +hold the people. My old mate said that, as far as the medical treatment +was concerned, he could do all that was necessary himself. But it was +the sympathy that counted, especially the sympathy between the patients +themselves. They always got hold of a new patient and talked to him +and cheered him up; he nearly always came in thinking he was the most +miserable wretch in this world. And it comforts a man and strengthens +him and makes him happier to meet another man who's worse off or sicker, +or has been worse swindled than he has been. That's human nature.... And +a man will take draughts from a nurse and eat for her when he wouldn't +do it for his own wife--not even though she had been a trained nurse +herself. And if a patient took a bad turn in the night at the Boozers' +Home and got up to hunt the snakes out of his room, he wouldn't be sworn +at, or laughed at, or held down; no, they'd help him shoo the snakes out +and comfort him. My old mate said that, when he got better, one of the +new patients reckoned that he licked St Pathrick at managing snakes. +And when he came out he didn't feel a bit ashamed of his experience. +The institution didn't profess to cure anyone of drink, only to mend up +shattered nerves and build up wrecked constitutions; give them back some +will-power if they weren't too far gone. And they set my old mate on his +feet all right. When he went in his life seemed lost, he had the horror +of being sober, he couldn't start the day without a drink or do any +business without it. He couldn't live for more than two hours without +a drink; but when he came out he didn't feel as if he wanted it. He +reckoned that those six weeks in the institution were the happiest he'd +ever spent in his life, and he wished the time had been longer; he says +he'd never met with so much sympathy and genius, and humour and human +nature under one roof before. And he said it was nice and novel to be +looked after and watched and physicked and bossed by a pretty nurse in +uniform--but I don't suppose he told his wife that. And when he came out +he never took the trouble to hide the fact that he'd been in. If any of +his friends had a drunkard in the family, he'd recommend the institution +and do his best to get him into it. But when he came out he firmly +believed that if he took one drink he'd be a lost man. He made a mania +of that. One curious effect was that, for some time after he left the +institution, he'd sometimes feel suddenly in high spirits--with nothing +to account for it--something like he used to feel when he had half a +dozen whiskies in him; then suddenly he'd feel depressed and sort of +hopeless--with nothing to account for that either--just as if he was +suffering a recovery. But those moods never lasted long and he soon grew +out of them altogether. He didn't flee temptation. He'd knock round the +pubs on Saturday nights with his old mates, but never drank anything +but soft stuff--he was always careful to smell his glass for fear of an +accident or trick. He drank gallons of ginger beer, milk-and-soda, and +lemonade; and he got very fond of sweets, too--he'd never liked them +before. He said he enjoyed the novelty of the whole thing and his mates +amused him at first; but he found he had to leave them early in the +evening, and, after a while, he dropped them altogether. They seemed +such fools when they were drunk (they'd never seemed fools to him +before). And, besides, as they got full, they'd get suspicious of him, +and then mad at him, because he couldn't see things as they could. That +reminds me that it nearly breaks a man's heart when his old drinking +chum turns teetotaller--it's worse than if he got married or died. When +two mates meet and one is drunk and the other sober there is only one +of two things for them to do if they want to hit it together--either the +drunken mate must get sober or the sober mate drunk. And that reminds +me: Take the case of two old mates who've been together all their lives, +say they always had their regular sprees together and went through the +same stages of drunkenness together, and suffered their recoveries and +sobered up together, and each could stand about the same quantity of +drink and one never got drunker than the other. Each, when he's +boozing, reckons his mate the cleverest man and the hardest case in +the world--second to himself. But one day it happens, by a most +extraordinary combination of circumstances, that Bill, being sober, +meets Jim very drunk, and pretty soon Bill is the most disgusted man +in this world. He never would have dreamed that his old mate could make +such a fool and such a public spectacle of himself. And Bill's disgust +intensifies all the time he is helping Jim home, and Jim arguing with +him and wanting to fight him, and slobbering over him and wanting to +love him by turns, until Bill swears he'll give Jim a hammering as soon +as ever he's able to stand steady on his feet." + +"I suppose your old boozing mate's wife was very happy when he +reformed," I said to Mitchell. + +"Well, no," said Mitchell, rubbing his head rather ruefully. "I suppose +it was an exceptional case. But I knew her well, and the fact is that +she got more discontented and thinner, and complained and nagged him +worse than she'd ever done in his drinking days. And she'd never +been afraid of him. Perhaps it was this way: She loved and married a +careless, good-natured, drinking scamp, and when he reformed and +became a careful, hard-working man, and an honest and respected +fellow-townsman, she was disappointed in him. He wasn't the man that won +her heart when she was a girl. Or maybe he was only company for her when +he was half drunk. Or maybe lots of things. Perhaps he'd killed the love +in her before he reformed--and reformed too late. I wonder how a man +feels when he finds out for the first time that his wife doesn't love +him any longer? But my old mate wasn't the nature to find out that sort +of thing. Ah, well! If a woman caused all our trouble, my God! women +have suffered for it since--and they suffer like martyrs mostly and with +the patience of working bullocks. Anyway it goes, if I'm the last man +in the world, and the last woman is the worst, and there's only room +for one more in Heaven, I'll step down at once and take my chances in +Blazes." + + + + +THE SEX PROBLEM AGAIN + + +It was Mitchell's habit to take an evening off now and then from yarning +or reflecting, and proceed, in a most methodical manner, to wash his +spare shirts and patch his pants. I was in the habit of contributing to +some Sydney papers, and every man is an editor at heart, so, at other +times, Mitchell would take another evening off, and root out my swag, +and go through my papers in the same methodical manner, and make +alterations and additions without comment or reference to me; and +sometimes he'd read a little thing of my own which didn't meet his +views, and accidentally drop it into the fire; and at other times he'd +get hold of some rhyme or sketch that was troubling me, and wrap it +up and give it to a passing mailman unbeknown to me. The unexpected +appearance of such articles in the paper, as well as the effects of +the involuntary collaboration in other pieces, gave me several big +surprises. + +It was in camp on a fencing contract west of Bourke. We had a book which +we'd borrowed from a library at Bourke for a year or two--never mind the +name of it--it was in ninety-one or ninety-two, and the sex problem was +booming then. I had been surreptitiously tearing some carefully-written +slips of manuscript--leaves taken from an old pocket-book--into small +pieces; I dropped them, with apparent carelessness, into the fire and +stood with my back to it. + +"I'll bet five pounds," said Mitchell, suddenly, "that you've been +trying your hand on a sex-problem story." + +I shifted uneasily and brought my hands from behind me into my pockets. +"Well, to tell you the truth," I admitted, "I have." + +"I thought so," exclaimed Mitchell. "We'll be put to the expense of +sending you to Sydney for medical treatment yet. You've been having too +easy times lately, plenty of hard graft and no anxiety about tucker or +the future. What are the symptoms?" + +"Well," I said, taking a hand out to scratch the back of my head, "the +plot looked all right--at first sight." + +"So there's a plot, is there? Well, in the first place, a plot is a +problem. Well, what's the plot?... Come on, you needn't be frightened to +tell an old mate like me." + +"Well," I said, "the yarn looked all right at first sight; that article +of `T's' in the _Bulletin_ turned me off it; listen and see what you +think of it: There was a young fellow, a bit of a genius----" + +"Just so, it's the geniuses that build the sex problems. It's an +autobiography. Go on." + +"Well, he married a girl." + +Mitchell (sotto voce): "God help her." + +"He loved her, and she loved him: but after they'd been married a while +he found out that, although he understood her, she didn't and couldn't +possibly ever understand him." + +"Yes," commented Mitchell, "and if he hadn't caught the sex problem, nor +been reading about it, he would never have found that out." + +"It was a terrible disappointment," I continued--I had got into the +habit of taking Mitchell's interruptions and comments as matters of +course--"He saw that his life would be a hell with her----" + +Mitchell: "Didn't strike him that her life would be a hell with him?" + +"They had no thought in common." + +Mitchell: "She was in her right mind then." + +"But he couldn't leave her because he loved her, and because he knew +that she loved him and would break her heart if he left her." + +"Must have been a pretty cocksure sort of a fellow," remarked Mitchell, +"but all geniuses are." + +"When he was with her he saw all her obstinacy, unreason, and +selfishness; but when he was away he only saw her good points." + +Mitchell: "Pity such men don't stop away." + +"He thought and thought, and brooded over it till his life was a +hell----" + +Mitchell: "Jes-so: thanks to the problemaniacs." + +"He thought of killing her and himself, and so taking her with him" + +"Where?" asked Mitchell. "He must have loved her a lot.... Good Lord! +That shows the awful effects of the sex problem on the mind of a healthy +young man like you;" and Mitchell stood up. + +"He lay awake by her side at nights thinking and fighting the thing +out." + +"And you've been lying awake, thinking, with me and `the Oracle' by +your side. We'll have to plant the tommy-hawk, and watch you by turns at +night till you get over this." + +"One night he rested on his elbow, and watched her sleeping, and tried +to reconstruct his ideal out of her, and, just when he was getting +into a happier frame of mind, her mouth fell open, and she snored.... I +didn't get any further than the snore," I said. + +"No, of course you didn't," said Mitchell, "and none of the sex +problemers ever will--unless they get as far as `blanky.' You might have +made the snore cure him; did it?" + +"No, it was making things worse in my idea of the yarn. He fell back and +lay staring at the ceiling in a hopeless kind of a way." + +"Then he was a fit case for the lunatic asylum.... Now, look here, +Harry, you're a good-natured, soft old fool when you're in your right +mind; just you go on being a good-natured, soft old fool, and don't try +to make a problem out of yourself or anybody else, or you'll come to a +bad end. A pocket-book's to keep your accounts in, not to take notes +in (you take them in your head and use 'em in your arms), not to write +sex-problem rot in--that's spoilt many a good pocket-book, and many a +good man. You've got a girl you're talking about going back to as soon +as we've finished this contract. Don't you make a problem of her; make +a happy wife and mother of her.... I was very clever when I was +young"--and here Mitchell's voice took a tinge of bitterness, or +sadness. "I used to make problems out of things.... I ain't much to +boast of now.... Seems to me that a good many men want to make angels of +their wives without first taking trouble of making saints of themselves. +We want to make women's ways our ways--it would be just as fair to make +our ways theirs. Some men want to be considered gods in their own homes; +you'll generally find that sort of men very small potatoes outside; if +they weren't they wouldn't bother so much about being cocks on their own +little dunghills.... And again, old mates seldom quarrel, because they +understand each other's moods. Now, if you went brooding round for any +length of time I'd say to you. `Now then, Harry, what have I been doing +to you? Spit it out, old man.' And you'd do the same by me; but how many +men would take even that much trouble with their wives?" + +A breeze stirred the mulga and brought the sound of a good voice singing +in the surveyors' camp: + + Should old acquaintance be forgot + And never brought to min'? + Should old acquaintance be forgot + And the days of Auld Lang Syne? + +"That damned old tune will upset the Oracle for the rest of the night," +I said. + +"Now, there's the Oracle," said Mitchell. "He was wronged by a woman as +few men are wronged; his life was ruined--but he isn't the man to take +any stock in sex problems on account of her. He thinks he's great on +problems, but he isn't. It all amounts to this--that he's sorry for most +men and all women and tries to act up to it to the best of his ability; +and if he ain't a Christian, God knows what is--I don't. No matter +what a woman does to you, or what you think she does to you, there come +times, sooner or later, when you feel sorry for her--deep down in your +heart--that is if you're a man. And, no matter what action or course you +might take against her, and no matter how right or justified you might +seem in doing it, there comes a time when, deep down in your heart, +you feel mean and doubtful about your own part. You can take that as +a general thing as regards men against women, and man against man, I +think. And I believe that deep-down feeling of being doubtful, or mean, +or sorry, that comes afterwards, when you are cooler and know more about +the world, is a right and natural thing, and we ought to act more in +accordance with it." + +Came the refrain from the surveyors' camp: + + We twa hae run about the braes, + An' pu'd the gowans fine; + But we've wandered mony a weary foot + Sin' Auld Lang Syne. + +"We feel sorry for our quarrels with our worst enemy when we see him +lying still and quiet--dead. Why can't we try and feel a bit sorry +beforehand?" + + For Auld Lang Syne. + We twa ha' padl't i' the burn, + Fra mornin' sun till dine; + But seas between us braid ha' roar'd + Sin' Auld Lang Syne. + +"I used to feel blazing bitter against things one time but it never +hurt anybody but myself in the end. I argued and quarrelled with a girl +once--and made a problem of the thing and went away. She's married to +a brute now, and I'm what I am. I made a problem of a good home or the +world once, and went against the last man in God's world that I should +have gone against, and turned my back on his hand, and left him. His +hand was very cold the next time I took it in mine. We don't want +problems to make us more bitter against the world than we get +sometimes." + + And here's a han' my trusty frien', + An' gie's a han' o' thine, + We'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet + For Auld Lang Syne. + +"And that song's the answer of all problems," said Mitchell. But it was +I who lay awake and thought that night. + + [Children of the Bush by Henry Lawson II] + + + + +THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAG + +The Australian swag fashion is the easiest way in the world of carrying +a load. I ought to know something about carrying loads: I've carried +babies, which are the heaviest and most awkward and heartbreaking loads +in this world for a boy or man to carry, I fancy. God remember mothers +who slave about the housework (and do sometimes a man's work in addition +in the bush) with a heavy, squalling kid on one arm! I've humped logs on +the selection, "burning-off," with loads of fencing-posts and rails and +palings out of steep, rugged gullies (and was happier then, perhaps); +I've carried a shovel, crowbar, heavy "rammer," a dozen insulators on +an average (strung round my shoulders with raw flax)-to say nothing +of soldiering kit, tucker-bag, billy and climbing spurs--all day on a +telegraph line in rough country in New Zealand, and in places where a +man had to manage his load with one hand and help himself climb with +the other; and I've helped hump and drag telegraph-poles up cliffs and +sidings where the horses couldn't go. I've carried a portmanteau on the +hot dusty roads in green old jackaroo days. Ask any actor who's been +stranded and had to count railway sleepers from one town to another! +he'll tell you what sort of an awkward load a portmanteau is, especially +if there's a broken-hearted man underneath it. I've tried knapsack +fashion--one of the least healthy and most likely to give a man +sores; I've carried my belongings in a three-bushel sack slung over my +shoulder--blankets, tucker, spare boots and poetry all lumped together. +I tried carrying a load on my head, and got a crick in my neck and spine +for days. I've carried a load on my mind that should have been shared +by editors and publishers. I've helped hump luggage and furniture up to, +and down from, a top flat in London. And I've carried swag for months +out back in Australia--and it was life, in spite of its "squalidness" +and meanness and wretchedness and hardship, and in spite of the fact +that the world would have regarded us as "tramps"--and a free life +amongst _men_ from all the world! + +The Australian swag was born of Australia and no other land--of the +Great Lone Land of magnificent distances and bright heat; the land of +self-reliance, and never-give-in, and help-your-mate. The grave of many +of the world's tragedies and comedies--royal and otherwise. The land +where a man out of employment might shoulder his swag in Adelaide and +take the track, and years later walk into a hut on the Gulf, or never +be heard of any more, or a body be found in the bush and buried by the +mounted police, or never found and never buried--what does it matter? + +The land I love above all others--not because it was kind to me, but +because I was born on Australian soil, and because of the foreign father +who died at his work in the ranks of Australian pioneers, and because +of many things. Australia! My country! Her very name is music to me. God +bless Australia! for the sake of the great hearts of the heart of her! +God keep her clear of the old-world shams and social lies and mockery, +and callous commercialism, and sordid shame! And heaven send that, if +ever in my time her sons are called upon to fight for her young life and +honour, I die with the first rank of them and be buried in Australian +ground. + +But this will probably be called false, forced or "maudlin sentiment" +here in England, where the mawkish sentiment of the music-halls, and the +popular applause it receives, is enough to make a healthy man sick, and +is only equalled by music-hall vulgarity. So I'll get on. + +In the old digging days the knapsack, or straps-across-the chest +fashion, was tried, but the load pressed on a man's chest and impeded +his breathing, and a man needs to have his bellows free on long tracks +in hot, stirless weather. Then the "horse-collar," or rolled military +overcoat style--swag over one shoulder and under the other arm--was +tried, but it was found to be too hot for the Australian climate, and +was discarded along with Wellington boots and leggings. Until recently, +Australian city artists and editors--who knew as much about the bush as +Downing Street knows about the British colonies in general--seemed to +think the horse-collar swag was still in existence; and some artists +gave the swagman a stick, as if he were a tramp of civilization with an +eye on the backyard and a fear of the dog. English artists, by the way, +seem firmly convinced that the Australian bushman is born in Wellington +boots with a polish on 'em you could shave yourself by. + +The swag is usually composed of a tent "fly" or strip of calico (a cover +for the swag and a shelter in bad weather--in New Zealand it is +oilcloth or waterproof twill), a couple of blankets, blue by custom and +preference, as that colour shows the dirt less than any other (hence the +name "bluey" for swag), and the core is composed of spare clothing and +small personal effects. To make or "roll up" your swag: lay the fly or +strip of calico on the ground, blueys on top of it; across one end, +with eighteen inches or so to spare, lay your spare trousers and shirt, +folded, light boots tied together by the laces toe to heel, books, +bundle of old letters, portraits, or whatever little knick-knacks +you have or care to carry, bag of needles, thread, pen and ink, spare +patches for your pants, and bootlaces. Lay or arrange the pile so +that it will roll evenly with the swag (some pack the lot in an old +pillowslip or canvas bag), take a fold over of blanket and calico the +whole length on each side, so as to reduce the width of the swag to, +say, three feet, throw the spare end, with an inward fold, over the +little pile of belongings, and then roll the whole to the other end, +using your knees and judgment to make the swag tight, compact and +artistic; when within eighteen inches of the loose end take an inward +fold in that, and bring it up against the body of the swag. There is a +strong suggestion of a roley-poley in a rag about the business, only the +ends of the swag are folded in, in rings, and not 'tied. Fasten the +swag with three or four straps, according to judgment and the supply +of straps. To the top strap, for the swag is carried (and eased down in +shanty bars and against walls or veranda-posts when not on the track) +in a more or less vertical position--to the top strap, and lowest, or +lowest but one, fasten the ends of the shoulder strap (usually a towel +is preferred as being softer to the shoulder), your coat being carried +outside the swag at the back, under the straps. To the top strap fasten +the string of the nose-bag, a calico bag about the size of a pillowslip, +containing the tea, sugar and flour bags, bread, meat, baking-powder and +salt, and brought, when the swag is carried from the left shoulder, +over the right on to the chest, and so balancing the swag behind. But a +swagman can throw a heavy swag in a nearly vertical position against his +spine, slung from one shoulder only and without any balance, and carry +it as easily as you might wear your overcoat. Some bushmen arrange their +belongings so neatly and conveniently, with swag straps in a sort of +harness, that they can roll up the swag in about a minute, and unbuckle +it and throw it out as easily as a roll of wall-paper, and there's the +bed ready on the ground with the wardrobe for a pillow. The swag is +always used for a seat on the track; it is a soft seat, so trousers +last a long time. And, the dust being mostly soft and silky on the long +tracks out back, boots last marvellously. Fifteen miles a day is the +average with the swag, but you must travel according to the water: if +the next bore or tank is five miles on, and the next twenty beyond, you +camp at the five-mile water to-night and do the twenty next day. But +if it's thirty miles you have to do it. Travelling with the swag in +Australia is variously and picturesquely described as "humping bluey," +"walking Matilda," "humping Matilda," "humping your drum," "being on the +wallaby," "jabbing trotters," and "tea and sugar burglaring," but most +travelling shearers now call themselves trav'lers, and say simply "on +the track," or "carrying swag." + +And there you have the Australian swag. Men from all the world have +carried it--lords and low-class Chinamen, saints and world martyrs, +and felons, thieves, and murderers, educated gentlemen and boors who +couldn't sign their mark, gentlemen who fought for Poland and convicts +who fought the world, women, and more than one woman disguised as a +man. The Australian swag has held in its core letters and papers in +all languages, the honour of great houses, and more than one national +secret, papers that would send well-known and highly-respected men to +jail, and proofs of the innocence of men going mad in prisons, life +tragedies and comedies, fortunes and papers that secured titles and +fortunes, and the last pence of lost fortunes, life secrets, portraits +of mothers and dead loves, pictures of fair women, heart-breaking old +letters written long ago by vanished hands, and the pencilled manuscript +of more than one book which will be famous yet. + +The weight of the swag varies from the light rouseabout's swag, +containing one blanket and a clean shirt, to the "royal Alfred," with +tent and all complete, and weighing part of a ton. Some old sundowners +have a mania for gathering, from selectors' and shearers' huts, and +dust-heaps, heart-breaking loads of rubbish which can never be of +any possible use to them or anyone else. Here is an inventory of the +contents of the swag of an old tramp who was found dead on the track, +lying on his face on the sand, with his swag on top of him, and his arms +stretched straight out as if he were embracing the mother earth, or +had made, with his last movement, the sign of the cross to the blazing +heavens: + + +Rotten old tent in rags. Filthy blue blanket, patched with squares of +red and calico. Half of "white blanket" nearly black now, patched with +pieces of various material and sewn to half of red blanket. Three-bushel +sack slit open. Pieces of sacking. Part of a woman's skirt. Two rotten +old pairs of moleskin trousers. One leg of a pair of trousers. Back of +a shirt. Half a waistcoat. Two tweed coats, green, old and rotting, and +patched with calico. Blanket, etc. Large bundle of assorted rags for +patches, all rotten. Leaky billy-can, containing fishing-line, papers, +suet, needles and cotton, etc. Jam-tin, medicine bottles, corks on +strings, to hang to his hat to keep the flies off (a sign of madness in +the bush, for the corks would madden a sane man sooner than the flies +could). Three boots of different sizes, all belonging to the right foot, +and a left slipper. Coffee-pot, without handle or spout, and quart-pot +full of rubbish--broken knives and forks, with the handles burnt off, +spoons, etc., picked up on rubbish-heaps; and many rusty nails, to be +used as buttons, I suppose. + +Broken saw blade, hammer, broken crockery, old pannikins, small rusty +frying-pan without a handle, children's old shoes, many bits of old +bootleather and greenhide, part of yellowback novel, mutilated English +dictionary, grammar and arithmetic book, a ready reckoner, a cookery +book, a bulgy anglo-foreign dictionary, part of a Shakespeare, book +in French and book in German, and a book on etiquette and courtship. A +heavy pair of blucher boots, with uppers parched and cracked, and soles +so patched (patch over patch) with leather, boot protectors, hoop +iron and hobnails that they were about two inches thick, and the boots +weighed over five pounds. (If you don't believe me go into the Melbourne +Museum, where, in a glass case in a place of honour, you will see a +similar, perhaps the same, pair of bluchers labelled "An example of +colonial industry.") And in the core of the swag was a sugar-bag tied +tightly with a whip-lash, and containing another old skirt, rolled very +tight and fastened with many turns of a length of clothes-line, which +last, I suppose, he carried to hang himself with if he felt that way. +The skirt was rolled round a small packet of old portraits and almost +indecipherable letters--one from a woman who had evidently been a +sensible woman and a widow, and who stated in the letter that she did +not intend to get married again as she had enough to do already, slavin' +her finger-nails off to keep a family, without having a second husband +to keep. And her answer was "final for good and all," and it wasn't no +use comin' "bungfoodlin'" round her again. If he did she'd set Satan on +to him. "Satan" was a dog, I suppose. + +The letter was addressed to "Dear Bill," as were others. There were no +envelopes. The letters were addressed from no place in particular, so +there weren't any means of identifying the dead man. The police buried +him under a gum, and a young trooper cut on the tree the words: + +SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF BILL +WHO DIED. + + + + +"BUCKOLTS' GATE" + +PROLOGUE + +Old Abel Albury had a genius for getting the bull by the tail with a +tight grip, and holding on with both hands and an obstinacy born of +ignorance--and not necessarily for the sake of self-preservation or +selfishness--while all the time the bull might be, so to speak, rooting +up life-long friendships and neighbourly relations, and upsetting +domestic customs and traditions with his horns. + +Yes, Uncle Abel was always grasping the wrong end of things, and +sticking to it with that human mulishness which is often stronger, and +more often wearies and breaks down the opposition than an intelligent +man's arguments. He was----or professed to be, the family said--unable +for a long time to distinguish between his two grand-nephews, one of +whom was short and fat, while the other was tall and thin, the only +points of resemblance between them being that each possessed the old +family nose and eyes. When they were boys he used to lay the strap about +one in mistake for the other. They had a saying that Uncle Abel saw with +ten squinting eyes. + +Also, he could never--or would not, as the family said--remember names. +He referred to Mrs Porter, a thin, haggard selector's wife, as +"Mrs Stout" and he balanced matters by calling Mrs Southwick +"Mrs Porterwicket"--when he didn't address her as "Mrs +What's-the-woman's-name"--and he succeeded in deeply offending both +ladies. + +Uncle Abel was Mrs Carey's uncle. + +Down at the lower end of Carey's selection at Rocky Rises, in the +extreme corner of the lower or outer paddock, were sliprails opening +into the main road, which ran down along the siding, round the foot of +a spur from ridge, and out west. These sliprails were called "The Lower +Sliprails" by the family, and it occurred to Uncle Abel to refer to them +as "Buckolts' Gate," for no other reason apparently than that Buckolts' +farm lay in that direction. The farm was about a mile further on, on the +other side of the creek, and the gate leading to it from the main road +was round the spur, out of sight of Carey's selection. It is quite +possible that Uncle Abel reasoned the thing out for days, for of such +material are some human brains. Sliprails, or a slip-panel, is a panel +of fencing of which the rails are made to be slipped out of the mortise +holes in the posts so as to give passage to horses, vehicles and cattle. +I suppose Abel called it a gate, because he was always going to hang a +proper gate there some day. The family were unaware of his new name for +the Lower Sliprails, and after he had, on one or two occasions, informed +the boys that they would find a missing cow or horse at the Buckolts' +Gate, and they had found it calmly camped at the Lower Sliprails, and +after he had made several appointments to meet parties at Buckolts' +Gate, and had been found leaning obstinately on the fence by the Lower +Sliprails with no explanation to offer other than that he _was_ waiting +at Buckolts' Gate, they began to fear that he was becoming weak in his +mind. + +ACT I + +It was New Year's Eve at Rocky Rises. There was no need for fireworks +nor bonfires, for the bush-fires were out all along the ranges to the +east, and, as night came on, lines and curves of lights--clear lights, +white lights, and, in the nearer distance, red lights and smoky +lights--marked the sidings and ridges of a western spur of the Blue +Mountain Range, and seemed suspended against a dark sky, for the stars +and the loom of the hills were hidden by smoke and drought haze. + + +There was a dance at Careys'. Old Carey was a cheerful, broad-minded +bushman, haunted at times by the memories of old days, when he was the +beau of the bush balls, and so when he built his new slab-and-bark barn +he had it properly floored with hard-wood, and the floor well-faced "to +give the young people a show when they wanted a dance," he said. The +floor had a spring in it, and bush boys and girls often rode twenty +miles and more to dance on that floor. The girls said it was a lovely +floor. + +On this occasion Carey had stacked his wheat outside until after the New +Year. Spring-carts, and men and girls on horseback came in from miles +round. "Sperm" candles had been cut up and thrown on the floor during +the afternoon, and rubbed over by feet cased tightly in 'lastic-sides; +and hoops were hung horizontally from the tie-beams, with candles stuck +round them. There were fresh-faced girls, and sweet, freckled-faced +girls, and jolly girls, and shy girls--all sorts of girls except +sulky, "toney" girls--and lanky chaps, most of them sawney, and +weird, whiskered agriculturists, who watched the dancers with old, old +time-worn smiles, or stood, or sat on their heels yarning, with their +pipes, outside, where two boilers were slung over a log-fire to boil +water for tea; and there were leathery women, with complexions like +dried apples, who gossiped--for the first time in months perhaps--and +watched the young people, and thought at times, no doubt, of other +days--of other days when they were girls. (And not so far distant +either, in some cases, for women dry quickly in the bush.) + + +And there were one or two old soldiers and their wives, whose eyes +glistened when Jim Bullock played "The Girl I Left Behind Me." + +Jim Bullock was there with his concertina. He sat on a stool in front of +a bench, on which was a beer-keg, piles of teacups and saucers, several +big tin teapots, and plates of sandwiches, sponge-cakes, and tarts. +Jim sat in his shirt-sleeves, with his flat-brimmed, wire-bound, +"hard-hitter" hat on, slanting over his weaker eye. He held one leg +loosely and the other rigid, with the concertina on his knee, and +swanked away at the instrument by the hour, staring straight in front of +him with the expression of a cod-fish, and never moving a muscle except +the muscles of his great hairy arms and big chapped and sun-blotched +hands; while chaps in tight "larstins" (elastic-side boots), slop suits +of black, bound with braid, and with coats too short in the neck and +arms, and trousers bell-mouthed at the bottoms, and some with paper +collars, narrow red ribbon ties, or scarfs through walnut shells, held +their partners rigidly, and went round the room with their eyes--most of +them--cocked at the rafters in semi-idiotic ecstasy. + +But there was tall, graceful, pink-and-white Bertha Buckolt, blue-eyed +and blue-black-haired, and little Mary Carey with the kind, grey eyes +and red-gold hair; there was Mary's wild brother Jim, with curly black +hair and blue eyes and dimples of innocence; and there was Harry Dale, +the drover, Jim's shearing and droving mate, a tall, good-looking, +brown-eyed and brown-haired young fellow, a "better-class" bushman and +the best dancer in the district. Uncle Abel usurped the position of +M.C., and roared "Now then! take yer partners!" and bawled instructions +and interrupted and tangled up the dancers, until they got used to +taking no notice of his bull voice. Mary Carey was too shy--because she +loved him, and secretly and fondly hoped and doubted that he cared for +her--to be seen dancing more than once with Harry Dale, so he shared +Bertha Buckolt, the best girl dancer there, with Jim Carey, who danced +with his sister when Harry was dancing with Bertha Buckolt, and who +seemed, for some reason best known to himself, to be perfectly satisfied +with the arrangement. Poor little Mary began to fret presently, and +feel a little jealous of Bertha, her old schoolmate. She was little +and couldn't dance like Bertha, and she couldn't help noticing how well +Bertha looked to-night, and what a well-matched pair she and Harry made; +and so, when twelve o'clock came and they all went outside to watch +the Old Year out and the New Year in--with a big bonfire on the distant +ridge where the grass fires had reached a stretch of dry scrub--and to +join hands all round and sing "Auld Lang Syne," little Mary was not to +be found, for she was sitting on a log round behind the cow-yard, crying +softly to herself. + +And when about three o'clock they all started home, Mary gave Bertha her +cheek to kiss instead of her mouth, and that hurt Bertha, who had _her_ +cry riding home, to the astonishment and irritation of her brother Jack, +who rode home with her. But when they were all gone Mary was missing +again and when her mother called her, and, after a pause, the voice of +Harry Dale said, respectfully, in the darkness, "She's here, Mrs Carey, +she's all right," the two were discovered sitting on a convenient log +of the wood-heap, with an awkward and overacted interval of log between +them. + +Old Carey liked Harry Dale, and seemed very well satisfied with the way +things appeared to be going. He pressed Harry to stay at the selection +overnight. "The missus will make you a shake-down on the floor," he +said. Harry had no appointments, and stayed cheerfully, and old Carey, +having had a whisky or two, insisted on Mary making the shake-down, and +the old folks winked at each other behind the young folks' backs to see +how poor little Mary spread a spare mattress, with redhot, averted face, +and found an extra pillow and a spare pair of ironed sheets for the +shake-down. + +At sunrise she stole out to milk the cows, which was her regular duty; +there was no other way out from her room than through the dining-room, +where Harry lay on his back, with his arms folded, resting peacefully. +He seemed sound asleep and safe for a good two hours, so she ventured. +As she passed out she paused a moment looking down on him with all the +lovelight in her eyes, and, obeying a sudden impulse, she stooped softly +and touched his forehead with her lips, then she slipped out. Harry +stretched, opened his eyes, winked solemnly at the ceiling, and then, +after a decent interval, he got up, dressed, and went out to help her to +milk. + + +Harry Dale and Jim Carey were going out to take charge of a mob of +bullocks going north-west, away up in Queensland. And as they had lost +a day and night to be at the dance, they decided to start in the cool of +the evening and travel all night. Mary walked from the homestead to +the Lower Sliprails between her brother, who rode--because he was her +brother--and led a packhorse on the other side, and Harry, who walked +and led his horse--because he was her sweetheart, avowed only since last +night. + +There were thunderstorms about, and Mary had repented sufficiently with +regard to Bertha Buckolt to wear on her shoulders a cape which Bertha +had left behind her last night. + +When they reached the Lower Sliprails Jim said he'd go on and that Harry +needn't hurry: he stooped over his horse's neck, kissed his sister, +promised to keep away from the drink, not to touch a card, and to leave +off fighting, and rode on. And when he rounded the Spur he saw a tall, +graceful figure slipping through the trees from the creek towards +Buckolts' Gate. + +Then came the critical time at the Lower Sliprails. The shadows from the +setting sun lengthened quickly on the siding, and then the sun slipped +out of sight over a "saddle" in the ridges, and all was soon dusk save +the sunlit peaks of the Blue Mountains away to the east over the sweeps +of blue-grey bush. + +"Ah, well! Mary," said Harry, "I must make a start now." + +"You'll--you'll look after Jim, won't you, Harry?" said Mary. + +"I will, Mary, for your sake." + +Her mouth began to twitch, her chin to tremble, and her eyes brimmed +suddenly. + +"You must cheer up, Mary," he said with her in his arms. "I'll be back +before you know where you are, and then we'll be married right off at +once and settle down for life." + +She smiled bravely. + +"Good-bye, Mary!" + +"Good-bye, Harry!" + +He led his horse through the rails and lifted them, with trembling +hands, and shot them home. Another kiss across the top rail and he got +on his horse. She mounted the lower rail, and he brought his horse close +alongside the fence and stooped to kiss her again. + +"Cheer up, Mary!" he said. "I'll tell you what I'll do--when I come back +I'll whistle when I reach the Spur and you be here to let the sliprails +down for me. I'll time myself to get here about sundown. I'll whistle +`Willie Riley,' so you'll know it's me. Good-bye, little girl! I must go +now. Don't fret--the time will soon go by." + +He turned, swung his horse, and rode slowly down the track, turning now +and again to wave his hand to her, with a farewell flourish of his hat +as he rounded the Spur. His track, five hundred miles, or perhaps a +thousand, into the great north-west; his time, six months, or perhaps a +year. Hers a hundred yards or so back to the dusty, dreary drudgery of +selection life. The daylight faded into starlight, the sidings grew +very dim, and a faint white figure blurred against the bars of the +slip-panel. + + +ACT II + + +It was the last day of the threshing--shortly after New Year--at Rocky +Rises. The green boughs, which had been lashed to the veranda-posts on +Christmas Eve, had withered and been used for firewood. The travelling +steamer had gone with its gang of men, and the family sat down to +tea, the men tired with hard work and heat, and with prickly heat and +irritating wheaten chaff and dust under their clothes--and with smut +(for the crop had been a smutty one) "up their brains" as Uncle Abel +said--the women worn out with cooking for a big gang of shearers. + +Good-humoured Aunt Emma--who was Uncle Abel's niece--recovered first, +and started the conversation. There were one or two neighbours' wives +who bad lent crockery and had come over to help with the cooking in +their turns. Jim Carey's name came up incidentally, but was quickly +dropped, for ill reports of Jim had come home. Then Aunt Emma mentioned +Harry Dale, and glanced meaningly at Mary, whose face flamed as she bent +over her plate. + +"Never mind, Mary," said Aunt Emma, "it's nothing to be ashamed of. We +were all girls once. There's many a girl would jump at Harry." + +"Who says I'm ashamed?" said Mary, straightening up indignantly. + +"Don't tease her, Emma," said Mrs Carey, mildly. + +"I'll tell yer what," said young Tom Carey, frankly, "Mary got a letter +from him to-day. I seen her reading it behind the house." + +Mary's face flamed again and went down over her plate. + + +"Mary," said her mother, with sudden interest, "did Harry say anything +of Jim?" + +"No, mother," said Mary. "And that's why I didn't tell you about the +letter." + +There was a pause. Then Tommy said, with that delightful tact which +usually characterizes young Tommies: + +"Well, Mary needn't be so cocky about Harry Dale, anyhow. I seen him +New Year's Eve when we had the dance. I seen him after the dance liftin' +Bertha Buckolt onter her horse in the dark--as if she couldn't get on +herself--she's big enough. I seen him lift her on, an' he took her right +up an' lifted her right inter the saddle, 'stead of holdin' his hand for +her to tread on like that new-chum jackaroo we had. An', what's more, +I seen him hug her an' give her a kiss before he lifted her on. He told +her he was as good as her brother." + +"What did he mean by that, Tommy?" asked Mrs Porter, to break an awkward +pause. + +"How'm I ter know what he means?" said Tommy, politely. + +"And, Tommy, I seen Harry Dale give young Tommy Carey a lick with a +strap the day before New Year's Eve for throwing his sister's cat into +the dam," said Aunt Emma, coming to poor Mary's rescue. "Never mind, +Mary, my dear, he said goodbye to you last." + +"No, _he didn't_!" roared Uncle Abel. + +They were used to Uncle Abel's sudden bellowing, but it startled them +this time. + +"Why, Uncle Abel," cried both Aunt Emma and Mrs Carey, "whatever do you +mean?" + +"What I means is that I ain't a-goin' to have the feelin's of a niece +of mine trifled with. What I means is that I seen Harry Dale with Bertha +Buckolt on New Year's night after he left here. That's what I means--" + +"Don't speak so loud, Abel, we're not deaf," interrupted Carey, as Mary +started up white-faced. "What do you want to always shout for?" + +"I speak loud because I want people to hear me!" roared Uncle Abel, +turning on him. + +"Go on, Uncle Abel," said Mary, "tell me what you mean." + +"I mean," said Uncle Abel, lowering his voice a little, "that I seen +Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts' Gate that night--I seen it +all--" + +"At _Buckolts_' Gate!" cried Mary. + +"_Yes_! at Buckolts' Gate! Ain't I speakin' loud enough?" + +"And where were you?" + +"Never mind wheers I was. I was comin' home along the ridges, and I seen +them. I seen them say good-bye; I seen them hug an' kiss--" + +"Uncle Abel!" exclaimed Aunt Emma. + +"It's no use Uncle Abelin' me. What I sez I sez. I ain't a-goin' to have +a niece of mine bungfoodled--" + +"Uncle Abel," cried Mary, staring at him wild-eyed, "do be careful what +you say. You must have made a mistake. Are you sure it was Bertha and +Harry?" + +"Am I sure my head's on me neck?" roared Uncle Abel. "Would I see 'em if +I didn't see 'em? I tell you--" + +"Now wait a moment, Uncle Abel," interrupted Mary, with dangerous +calmness. "Listen to me. Harry Dale and I are engaged to be married, +and--" + +"Have you got the writings!" shouted Uncle Abel. + +"The what?" said Mary. + +"The writings." + +"No, of course not." + +"Then that's where you are," said Uncle Abel, triumphantly. "If you had +the writings you could sue him for breach of contract." + +Uncle Abel, who couldn't read, had no faith whatever in verbal +agreements (he wouldn't sign one, he said), all others he referred to as +"writings." + +"Now, listen to me, Uncle Abel," said Mary, trembling now. "Are you sure +you saw Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts' Gate after he left +here that night?" + +"Yes. An' what's more, I seen young Tommy there ridin' on his pony along +by the Spur a little while after, an' he muster seen them too, if he's +got a tongue." + +Mary turned quickly to her brother. + +"Well, all I can say," said Tommy, quietened now, "is that I seen _her_ +at Buckolts' Gate that night. I was comin' home from Two-Mile Flat, and +I met Jim with his packhorse about a mile the other side of Buckolts', +and while we was talkin' Harry Dale caught up, so I jist said 'So-long' +an' left 'em. And when I got to Buckolt's Gate I seen Bertha Buckolt. +She was standin' under a tree, and she looked as if she was cryin'." + +But Mary got her bonnet and started out. + +"Where are you going to, Mary?" asked her mother, starting up nervously. + +"I'm going across to Buckolts' to find out the truth," said Mary, and +she went out. + +"Better let her go, Lizzie," said Aunt Emma, detaining her sister. + +"You've done it now, Uncle Abel." + +"Well, why didn't she get the writings?" retorted Uncle Abel. + +Half-way to Buckolts' Mary met Bertha Buckolt herself, coming over to +the selection for the first time since the night of the party. +Bertha started forward to kiss Mary, but stopped short as Mary stood +stock-still and faced her, with her hands behind her back. + +"Why! whatever is the matter, Mary?" exclaimed Bertha. + +"You know very well, Bertha." + +"Why! Whatever do you mean? What have I done?" + +"What haven't you done? You've--you've broken my heart." + +"Good gracious me! Whatever are you talking about? Tell me what it is, +Mary?" + +"You met him at your gate that night?" + +"I know I did." + +"Oh, Bertha! How could you be so mean and deceitful?" + +"Mean and deceitful! What do you mean by that? Whatever are you talking +about? I suppose I've got as good a right to meet him as anyone else." + +"No, you haven't," retorted Mary, "you're only stringing him on. You +only did it to spite me. You helped him to deceive me. You ought to be +ashamed to look me in the face." + +"Good gracious! Whatever are you talking about? Ain't I good enough for +him! I ought to be, God knows! I suppose he can marry who he likes, and +if I'm poor fool enough to love him and marry him, what then? Mary, you +ought to be the last to speak--speak to--to me like that." + +"Yes. He can marry all, the girls in the country for all I care. I +never want to see either him or you any more. You're a cruel, deceitful, +brazen-faced hussy, and he's a heartless, deceiving blackguard." + +"Mary! I believe you're mad," said Bertha, firmly. "How dare you speak +to me like that! And as for him being a blackguard. Why, you ought to be +the last in the world to say such a thing; you ought to be the last to +say a word against him. Why, I don't believe you ever cared a rap for +him in spite of all your pretence. He could go to the devil for all you +cared." + +"That's enough, Bertha Buckolt!" cried Mary. "_You_--you! Why, you're +a barefaced girl, that's what you are! I don't want to see your brazen +face again." With that she turned and stumbled blindly in the direction +of home. + +"Send back my cape," cried Bertha as she too turned away. + +Mary walked wildly home and fled to her room and locked the door. Bertha +did likewise. + +Mary let Aunt Emma in after a while, ceased sobbing and allowed herself +to be comforted a little. Next morning she was out milking at the usual +time, but there were dark hollows under her eyes, and her little face +was white and set. After breakfast she rolled the cape up very tight in +a brown-paper parcel, addressed it severely to + +MISS BERTHA BUCKOLT, + +Eurunderee Creek, + +and sent it home by one of the school-children. She wrote to Harry Dale +and told him that she knew all about it (not stating what), but she +forgave him and hoped he'd be happy. She never wanted to see his face +again, and enclosed his portrait. + +Harry, who was as true and straight as a bushman could be, puzzled it +out and decided that some one of his old love affairs must have come to +Mary's ears, and wrote demanding an explanation. + +She never answered that letter. + + +ACT III + +It was Christmas Day at Rocky Rises. The plum puddings had been made, +as usual, weeks beforehand, and hung in rags to the tie-beams and taken +down and boiled again. Poultry had been killed and plucked and cooked, +and all the toil had been gone through, and every preparation made for +a red-hot dinner on a blazing hot day--and for no other reason than +that our great-grandmothers used to do it in a cold climate at +Christmas-times that came in mid-winter. Merry men hadn't gone forth to +the wood to gather in the mistletoe (if they ever did in England, in the +olden days, instead of sending shivering, wretched vassals in rags to +do it); but Uncle Abel had gone gloomily up the ridge on Christmas Eve, +with an axe on his shoulder (and Tommy unwillingly in tow, scowling and +making faces behind his back), and had cut young pines and dragged them +home and lashed them firmly to the veranda-posts, which was the custom +out there. + +There was little goodwill or peace between the three or four farms round +Rocky Rises that Christmas Day, and Uncle Abel had been the cause of +most of the ill-feeling, though they didn't know, and he was least aware +of it of any. + +It all came about in this way. + +Shortly after last New Year Ryan's bull had broken loose and gone astray +for two days and nights, breaking into neighbours' paddocks and filling +himself with hay and damaging other bulls, and making love by night and +hiding in the scrub all day. On the second night he broke through and +jumped over Reid's fences, and destroyed about an acre of grape-vines +and adulterated Reid's stock, besides interfering with certain heifers +which were not of a marriageable age. There was a L5 penalty on a stray +bull. Reid impounded the bull and claimed heavy damages. Ryan, a small +selector of little account, was always pulling some neighbour to court +when he wasn't being "pulled" himself, so he went to court over this +case. + +Now, it appears that the bull, on his holiday, had spent a part of +the first night in Carey's lower paddock, and Uncle Abel (who was out +mooching about the bush at all hours, "havin' a look at some timber" or +some "indercations" [of gold], or on some mysterious business or fad, +the mystery of which was of his own making)--Uncle Abel saw the bull +in the paddock at daylight and turned it out the sliprails, and talked +about it afterwards, referring to the sliprails as "Buckolts' Gate," of +course, and spoke mysteriously of the case, and put on an appearance of +great importance, and allowed people to get an idea that he knew a lot +if he only liked to speak; and finally he got himself "brought up" as a +witness for Ryan. + +He had a lot of beer in town before he went to the courthouse. All he +knew would have been of no use to either party, but he swore that he +had seen Ryan's bull inside Buckolts' Gate at daylight (on the day which +wasn't in question) and had turned him out. Uncle Abel mixed up the +court a good deal, and roared like the bull, and became more obstinate +the more he was cross-examined, and narrowly escaped being committed for +contempt of court. + +Ryan, who had a high opinion of the breed of his bull, got an idea +that the Buckolts had enticed or driven the bull into their paddock for +stock-raising purposes, instead of borrowing it honestly or offering to +pay for the use of it. Then Ryan wanted to know why Abel had driven +his bull out of Buckolts' Gate, and the Buckolts wanted to know what +business Abel Albury had to drive Ryan's bull out of their paddock, if +the bull had really ever been there. And so it went on till Rocky Rises +was ripe for a tragedy. + +The breach between the Careys and the Buckolts was widened, the quarrel +between Ryan and Reid intensified. Ryan got a down on the Careys because +he reckoned that Uncle Abel had deliberately spoilt his case with his +evidence; and the Reids and Careys were no longer on speaking terms, +because nothing would convince old Reid that Abel hadn't tried to prove +that Ryan's bull had never been in Reid's paddock at all. + + +Well, it was Christmas Day, and the Carey family and Aunt Emma sat down +to dinner. Jim was present, having arrived overnight, with no money, +as usual, and suffering a recovery. The elder brother, Bob (who had a +selection up-country), and his wife were there. Mrs Carey moved round +with watchful eyes and jealous ears, lest there should be a word or +a look which might hurt the feelings of her wild son--for of such are +mothers. + + +Dinner went on very moodily, in spite of Aunt Emma, until at last Jim +spoke--almost for the first time, save for a long-whispered and, on his +part, repentant conversation with his mother. + +"Look here, Mary!" said Jim. "What did you throw Harry Dale over for?" + +"Don't ask me, Jim." + +"Rot! What did he do to you? I'm your brother" (with a glance at Bob), +"and I ought to know." + +"Well, then, ask Bertha Buckolt. She saw him last." + +"What!" cried Jim. + +"Hold your tongue, Jim! You'll make her cry," said Aunt Emma. + +"Well, what's it all about, anyway?" demanded Jim. "All I know is that +Mary wrote to Harry and threw him over, and he ain't been the same man +since. He swears he'll never come near the district again." + +"Tell Jim, Aunt Emma," said Mary. And Aunt Emma started to tell the +story as far as she knew. + +"Saw her at Buckolt's sliprails!" cried Jim, starting up. "Well, he +couldn't have had time to more than say good-bye to her, for I was +with her there myself, and Harry caught up to me within a mile of the +gate--and I rode pretty fast." + +"He had a jolly long good-bye with her," shouted Uncle Abel. "Look here, +Jim! I ain't goin' to stand by and see a nephew of mine bungfoodled by +no girl; an', I tell you I seen 'em huggin' and kissin' and canoodlin' +for half an hour at Buckolts' Gate!" + +"It's a--a-- Look here, Uncle Abel, be careful what you say. You've +got the bull by the tail again, that's what it is!" Jim's face grew +whiter--and it had been white enough on account of the drink. "How did +you know it was them? You're always mistaking people. It might have been +someone else." + +"I know Harry Dale on horseback two miles off!" roared Uncle Abel. "And +I knowed her by her cape." + +It was Mary's turn to gasp and stare at Uncle Abel. + +"Uncle Abel," she managed to say, "Uncle Abel! Wasn't it at our Lower +Sliprails you saw them and not Buckolts' Gate?" + +"Well!" bellowed Uncle Abel. "You might call 'em the `Lower Sliprails,' +but I calls 'em Buckolts' Gate! They lead to'r'ds Buckolts', don't they? +Hey? Them other sliprails"--jerking his arms in the direction of the +upper paddock "them theer other sliprails that leads outer Reid's lane I +calls Reid's Sliprails. I don't know nothing about no upper or lower, or +easter or wester, or any other la-di-dah names you like to call 'em." + +"Oh, uncle," cried Mary, trembling like a leaf, "why didn't you explain +this before? Why didn't you tell us?" + +"What cause have I got to tell any of you everything I sez or does or +thinks? It 'ud take me all me time. Ain't you got any more brains than +Ryan's bull, any of you? Hey!--You've got heads, but so has cabbages. +Explain! Why, if the world wasn't stuffed so full of jumped-up fools +there'd be never no need for explainin'." + +Mary left the table. + +"What is it, Mary?" cried Aunt Emma. + +"I'm going across to Bertha," said Mary, putting on her hat with +trembling hands. "It was me Uncle Abel saw. I had Bertha's cape on that +night." + +"Oh, Uncle Abel," cried Aunt Emma, "whatever have you done?" + +"Well," said Uncle Abel, "why didn't she get the writin's as I told her? +It's to be hoped she won't make such a fool of herself next time." + + +Half an hour later, or thereabouts, Mary sat on Bertha Buckolt's bed, +with Bertha beside her and Bertha's arm round her, and they were crying +and laughing by turns. + +"But-but-why didn't you _tell_ me it was Jim?" said Mary. + +"Why didn't you tell me it was Harry, Mary?" asked Bertha. "It would +have saved all this year of misery. + +"I didn't see Harry Dale at all that night," said Bertha. "I was--I was +crying when Jim left me, and when Harry came along I slipped behind +a tree until he was past. And now, look here, Mary, I can't marry Jim +until he steadies down, but I'll give him another chance. But, Mary, I'd +sooner lose him than you." + +Bertha walked home with Mary, and during the afternoon she took Jim +aside and said: + +"Look here, Jim, I'll give you another chance--for a year. Now I want +you to ride into town and send a telegram to Harry Dale. How long would +it take him to get here?" + +"He couldn't get here before New Year," said Jim. + +"That will do," said Bertha, and Jim went to catch his horse. Next day +Harry's reply came: "Coming" + + +ACT IV + +New Year's Eve. The dance was at Buckolts' this year, but Bertha didn't +dance much; she was down by the gate most of the time with little Mary +Carey, waiting, and watching the long, white road, and listening for +horses' feet, and disappointed often as other horsemen rode by or turned +up to the farm. + +And in the hot sunrise that morning, within a hundred 'miles of Rocky +Rises, a tired, dusty drover camped in the edge of a scrub, boiled his +quart-pot, broiled a piece of mutton on the coals, and lay down on the +sand to rest an hour or so before pushing on to a cattle station he knew +to try and borrow fresh horses. He had ridden all night. + +Old Buckolt and Carey and Reid smoked socially under the grape-vines, +with bottles of whisky and glasses, and nudged each other and coughed +when they wanted to laugh at Old Abel Albury, who was, for about the +first time in his life, condescending to explain. He was explaining to +them what thund'rin' fools they had been. + +Later on they sent a boy on horseback with a bottle of whisky and a +message to Ryan, who turned up in time to see the New Year in with them +and contradict certain slanders concerning the breed of his bull. + + +Meanwhile Bertha comforted Mary, and at last persuaded her to go home. +"He's sure to be here to-morrow, Mary," she said, "and you need to look +fresh and happy." + +But Mary didn't sleep that night; she was up before daylight, had the +kettle on and some chops ready to fry, and at daybreak she was down by +the sliprails again. She was turning away for the second time when she +heard a clear whistle round the Spur--then the tune of "Willie Riley," +and the hobble-chains and camp-ware on the packhorse jingling to the +tune. + +She pulled out the rails with eager, trembling hands and leaned against +the tree. An hour later a tired drover lay on his back, in his ragged, +track-worn clothes and dusty leggings, on Mary's own little bed in the +skillion off the living-room, and rested. Mary bustled round getting +breakfast ready, and singing softly to herself; once she slipped in, +bent over Harry and kissed him gently on the lips, and ran out as he +stirred. + +"Why, who's that?" exclaimed Uncle Abel, poking round early and catching +a glimpse of Harry through the open door. + + +"It's only Harry, Uncle Abel," said Mary. + +Uncle Abel peered in again to make sure. + +"Well, be sure you git the writin's this time," he said. + + + + +THE BUSH-FIRE + +I + +SQUATTER AND SELECTOR + +Wall was a squatter and a hard man. There had been long years of drought +and loss, and then came the rabbit pest--the rabbits swarmed like flies +over his run, and cropped the ground bare where even the poor grass +might have saved thousands of sheep--and the rabbits cost the squatter +hundreds of pounds in "rabbit-proof" fences, trappers' wages, etc., just +to keep them down. Then came arrangements with the bank. And then Wall's +wife died. Wall started to brood over other days, and the days that had +gone between, and developed a temper which drove his children from home +one by one, till only Mary was left. She managed the lonely home with +the help of a half-caste. Then in good seasons came the selectors. + +Men remembered Wall as a grand boss and a good fellow, but that was in +the days before rabbits and banks, and syndicates and "pastoralists" or +pastoral companies instead of good squatters. Runs were mostly pastoral +leases for which the squatter paid the Government so much per square +mile (almost a nominal rent). Selections were small holdings taken up +by farmers under residential and other conditions and paid for by +instalments. If you were not ruined by the drought, and paid up long +enough, the land became freehold. The writer is heir to a dusty patch of +three hundred acres or so in the scrub which was taken up thirty years +ago and isn't freehold yet. + + +Selectors were allowed to take up land on runs or pastoral leases as +well as on unoccupied Crown lands, and as they secured the best bits +of land, and on water frontages if they could, and as, of course, +selections reduced the area of the run, the squatters loved selectors +like elder brothers. One man is allowed to select only a certain amount +of land, and required by law to live on it, so the squatters bought as +much freehold about the homestead as they could afford, selected as much +as they are allowed to by law, and sometimes employed "dummy" selectors +to take up choice bits about the runs and hold them for them. They +fought selectors in many various ways, and, in some cases, annoyed and +persecuted them with devilish ingenuity. + +Ross was a selector, and a very hard man physically. He was a short, +nuggety man with black hair and frill beard (a little dusty), bushy +black eyebrows, piercing black eyes, horny knotted hands, and the +obstinacy or pluck of a dozen men to fight drought and the squatter. +Ross selected on Wall's run, in a bend of Sandy Creek, a nice bit of +land with a black soil, flat and red soil sidings from the ridges, which +no one had noticed before, and with the help of his boys he got the land +cleared and fenced in a year or two--taking bush contracts about the +district between whiles to make "tucker" for the family until he got his +first crop off. + +Wall was never accused of employing dummies, or underhanded methods in +dealings with selectors, but he had been through so much and had brooded +so long that he had grown very hard and bitter and suspicious, and the +reverse of generous--as many men do who start out in life too soft and +goodhearted and with too much faith in human nature. He was a tall, dark +man. He ordered Ross's boys off the run, impounded Ross's stock--before +Ross had got his fencing finished, summoned Ross for trespass, and Ross +retaliated as well as he could, until at last it mightn't have been safe +for one of those men to have met the other with a gun. The impounding of +the selector's cattle led to the last bad quarrel between Wall and his +son Billy, who was a tall, good-natured Cornstalk, and who reckoned that +Australia was big enough for all of us. One day in the drought, and in +an extra bitter mood, Wall heard that some of his sheep had been dogged +in the vicinity of Ross's selection, and he ordered Billy to take a +station-hand and watch Ross's place all night, and, if Ross's cattle put +their noses over the boundary, to drive them to the pound, fifteen miles +away; also to lay poisoned baits for the dogs all round the selection. +And Billy flatly refused. + +"I know Ross and the boys," he said, "and I don't believe they dogged +the sheep. Why, they've only got a Newfoundland pup, and an old lame, +one-eyed sheep-dog that couldn't hurt a flea. Now, father, this sort of +thing has been going on long enough. What difference does a few paltry +acres make to us? The country is big enough, God knows! Ross is a +straight man and--for God's sake, give the man a chance to get his +ground fenced in; he's doing it as fast as he can, and he can't watch +his cattle day and night." + +"Are you going to do as I tell you, or are you not?" shouted Wall. + +"Well, if it comes to that, I'm not," said Billy. "I'm not going to +sneak round a place all night and watch for a chance to pound a poor +man's cows." + +It was an awful row, down behind the wool-shed, and things looked so bad +that old Peter, the station-hand, who was a witness, took off his coat +and rolled up his sleeves, ready, as he said afterwards, "to roll into" +either the father or the son if one raised a hand against the other. + +"Father!" said Billy, though rather sobered by the sight of his father's +trembling, choking passion, "do you call yourself an Englishman?" + +"Yes!" yelled Wall, furiously. "What the hell do you call yourself?" + +"If it comes to that I'm an Australian," said Billy, and he turned away +and went to catch his horse. He went up-country and knocked about in the +north-west for a year or two. + + +II + +ROMEO AND JULIET + +Mary Wall was twenty-five. She was an Australian bush girl, every inch +of her five-foot-nine; she had a pink-and-white complexion, dark blue +eyes, blue-black hair, and "the finest figure in the district," +on horseback or afoot. She was the best girlrider too (saddle or +bare-back), and they say that when she was a tomboy she used to tuck +her petticoats under her and gallop man-fashion through the scrub after +horses or cattle. She said she was going to be an old maid. + +There came a jackaroo on a visit to the station. He was related to the +bank with which Wall had relations. He was a dude, with an expensive +education and no brains. He was very vain of his education and +prospects. He regarded Mary with undisguised admiration, and her +father had secret hopes. One evening the jackaroo was down by the +homestead-gate when Mary came cantering home on her tall chestnut. The +gate was six feet or more, and the jackaroo raised his hat and hastened +to open it, but Mary reined her horse back a few yards and the "dood" +had barely time to jump aside when there was a scuffle of hoofs on the +road, a "Ha-ha-ha!" in mid-air, a landing thud, and the girl was away up +the home-track in a cloud of dust. + +A few days later the jackaroo happened to be at Kelly's, a wayside +shanty, watching a fight between two bushmen, when Mary rode up. She +knew the men. She whipped her horse in between them and struck at first +one and then the other with her riding-whip. + +"You ought to be ashamed of yourselves!" she said; "and both married +men, too!" + +It evidently struck them that way, for after a bit they shook hands and +went home. + +"And I wouldn't have married that girl for a thousand pounds," said the +jackaroo, relating the incidents to some friends in Sydney. + +Mary said she wanted a man, if she could get one. + + +There was no life at home nowadays, so Mary went to all the bush dances +in the district. She thought nothing of riding twenty or thirty miles to +a dance, dancing all night, and riding home again next morning. At one +of these dances she met young Robert Ross, a clean-limbed, good-looking +young fellow about her own age. She danced with him and liked him, and +danced with him again, and he rode part of the way home with her. The +subject of the quarrel between the two homes came up gradually. + +"The boss," said Robert, meaning his father, "the boss is always ready +to let bygones be bygones. It's a pity it couldn't be fixed up." + +"Yes," said Mary, looking at him (Bob looked very well on horseback), +"it is a pity." + +They met several times, and next Prince of Wales's birthday they rode +home from the races together. Both had good horses, and they happened +to be far ahead of the others on the wide, straight clear road that +ran between the walls of the scrub. Along, about dusk, they became very +confidential indeed--Mary had remarked what a sad and beautiful sunset +it was. The horses got confidential, too, and shouldered together, and +touched noses, and, after a long interval in the conversation, during +which Robert, for one, began to breathe quickly, he suddenly leaned +over, put his arm round her waist and made to kiss her. She jerked her +body away, threw up her whiphand, and Robert ducked instinctively; but +she brought her whip down on her horse's flank instead, and raced ahead. +Robert followed--or, rather, his horse did: he thought it was a race, +and took the bit in his teeth. Robert kept calling, appealing: + +"Wait a while, Mary! I want to explain! I want to apologize! For God's +sake listen to me, Mary!" + +But Mary didn't hear him. Perhaps she misunderstood the reason of the +chase and gave him credit for a spice of the devil in his nature. But +Robert grew really desperate; he felt that the thing must be fixed up +now or never, and gave his horse a free rein. Her horse was the fastest, +and Robert galloped in the dust from his heels for about a mile and a +half; then at the foot of a rise Mary's horse stumbled and nearly threw +her over his head, and then he stopped like the good horse he was. + +Robert got down feeling instinctively that he might best make his peace +on foot, and approached Mary with a face of misery--she had dropped her +whip. + +"Oh, Bob!" she said, "I'm knocked out;" and she slipped down into his +arms and stayed there a while. + +They sat on a log and rested, while their horses made inquiries of each +other's noses, and compared notes. + +And after a good while Mary said "No, Bob, it's no use talking of +marrying just yet. I like you, Bob, but I could never marry you while +things are as they are between your father and mine. Now, that'll do. +Let me get on my horse, Bob. I'll be safer there." + +"Why?" asked Bob. + + +"Come on, Bob, and don't be stupid." + +She met him often and "liked" him. + + +III + +A TRAMP'S MATCH AND WHAT IT DID + +It was Christmas Eve at Wall's, but there was no score or so of buggies +and horses and dozens of strange dogs round the place as of old. The +glasses and decanters were dusty on the heavy old-fashioned sideboard in +the dining-room; and there was only a sullen, brooding man leaning over +the hurdles and looking at his rams in the yard, and a sullen, brooding +half-caste at work in the kitchen. Mary had ridden away that morning to +visit a girl chum. + +It was towards the end of a long drought, and the country was like +tinder for hundreds of miles round--the ground for miles and miles in +the broiling scrubs "as bare as your hand," or covered with coarse, dry +tufts. There was feed grass in places, but you had to look close to see +it. + +Shearing had finished the day before, but there was a black boy and +a station-hand or two about the yards and six or eight shearers and +rouseabouts, and a teamster camped in the men's huts--they were staying +over the holidays to shear stragglers and clean up generally. Old Peter +and a jackaroo were out on the run watching a bush-fire across Sandy +Creek. + +A swagman had happened to call at the station that morning; he asked for +work and then for tucker. He irritated Wall, who told him to clear +out. It was the first time that a swagman had been turned away from the +station without tucker. + +Swaggy went along the track some miles, brooding over his wrongs, and +crossed Sandy Creek. He struck a match and dropped it into a convenient +tuft of grass in a likely patch of tufts, with dead grass running from +it up into the scrubby ridges--then he hurried on. + + +Did you ever see a bush-fire? Not sheets of flame sweeping and roaring +from tree-top to tree-top, but the snaky, hissing grass-fire of hardwood +country. + +The whole country covered with thin blue smoke so that you never know +in what direction the fire is travelling. At night you see it like +the lighted streets of cities, in the distant ranges. It roars up the +hollows of dead trees and gives them the appearance of factory chimneys +in the dusk. It climbs, by shreds of bark, the trunks of old dead +white-box and blue-gums--solid and hard as cast-iron--and cuts off the +limbs. And where there's a piece of recently ringbarked country, with +the dead leaves still on the trees, the fire will roar from bough to +bough--a fair imitation of a softwood forest fire. The bush-fire travels +through the scrubs for hundreds of miles, taking the grass to the roots, +scorching the living bush but leaving it alive--for gumbush is hardest +of any to kill. Where there is no undergrowth, and the country seems +bare as a road for miles, the fire will cross, licking up invisible +straws of grass, dusty leaves, twigs and shreds of bark on the hard +ground already baking in the drought. You hear of a fire miles away, +and next day, riding across the head of a gully, you hear a hissing and +crackling and there is the fire running over the ground in lines and +curves of thin blue smoke, snakelike, with old logs blazing on the +blackened ground behind. Did you ever _hear_ a fire where a fire should +not be? There is something hellish in the sound of it. When the breeze +is, say, from the east the fire runs round western spurs, up sheltered +gullies--helped by an "eddy" in the wind perhaps--and appears along +the top of the ridge, ready, with a change in the wind, to come down on +farms and fields of ripe wheat, with a "front" miles long. + +A selector might be protected by a wide sandy creek in front and wide +cleared roads behind, and, any hour in the day or night, a shout from +the farther end of the wheat paddock, and--"Oh, my God! the wheat!" + +Wall didn't mind this fire much; most of his sheep were on their way +out back, to a back run where there was young grass; and the dry ridges +along the creek would be better for a burning-off--only he had to watch +his fences. + +But, about dusk, Mary came galloping home in her usual breakneck +fashion. + +"Father," she cried, "turn out the men and send them at once. The fire +is all down by Ross's farm, and he has ten acres of wheat standing, and +no one at home but him and Bob." + +"How do you know?" growled Wall. Then suddenly and suspiciously, "Have +you been there?" + +"I came home that way." + +"Well--let Ross look after his own," snarled the father. + +"But he can't, father. They're fighting the fire now, and they'll be +burnt out before the morning if they don't get help--for God's +sake, father, act like a Christian and send the men. Remember it is +Christmas-time, father. You're surely not going to see a neighbour burnt +out." + +"Yes, I am," shouted Wall. "I'd like to see every selector in the +country burnt out, hut and all! Get off that horse and go inside. If a +man leaves the station to-night he needn't come back." (This last for +the benefit of the men's hut.) + +"But, father--" + +"Get off that horse and go inside," roared Wall. + +"I--I won't." + +"What!" He darted forward as though to drag her from the saddle, but she +swung her horse away. + +"Stop! Where are you going?" + +"To help Ross," said Mary. "He had no one to send for help." + +"Then go the same way as your brother!" roared her father; "and if you +show your nose back again I'll horse-whip you off the run!" + +"I'll go, father," said Mary, and she was away. + + +IV + +THE FIRE AT ROSS'S FARM + +Ross's farm was in a corner between the ridges and the creek. The fire +had come down from the creek, but the siding on that side was fairly +clear, and they had stopped the fire there. It went behind the ridge +and ran up and over. The ridge was covered thickly with scrub and dead +grass; the wheat-field went well up the siding, and along the top was a +bush face with only a narrow bridle-track between it and the long dead +grass. Everything depended on the wind. Mary saw Ross and Mrs Ross +and the daughter Jenny, well up the siding above the fence, working +desperately, running to and fro, and beating out the fire with green +boughs. Mary left her horse, ran into the hut, and looked hurriedly +round for something to wear in place of her riding-skirt. She only saw +a couple of light print dresses. She stepped into a skillion room, which +happened to be Bob's room, and there caught sight of a pair of trousers +and a coat hanging on the wall. + +Bob Ross, beating desperately along a line of fire that curved down-hill +to his right, and half-choked and blinded with the smoke, almost +stumbled against a figure which was too tall to be his father. + +"Why! who's that?" he gasped. + +"It's only me, Bob," said Mary, and she lifted her bough again. + +Bob stared. He was so astonished that he almost forgot the fire and the +wheat. Bob was not thin--but-- + +"Don't look at me, Bob!" said Mary, hurriedly. "We're going to be +married, so it doesn't matter. Let us save the wheat." + +There was no time to waste; there was a breeze now from over the ridges, +light, but enough to bear the fire down on them. Once, when they had +breathing space, Mary ran to the creek for a billy of water. They beat +out the fire all along the siding to where a rib of granite came down +over the ridge to the fence, and then they thought the wheat was safe. +They came together here, and Ross had time to look and see who the +strange man was; then he stared at Mary from under his black, bushy +eyebrows. Mary, choking and getting her breath after her exertions, +suddenly became aware, said "Oh!" and fled round the track beyond the +point of granite. She felt a gust of wind and looked up the ridge. The +bush fence ended here in a corner, where it was met by a new wire fence +running up from the creek. It was a blind gully full of tall dead grass, +and, glancing up, Mary saw the flames coming down fast. She ran back. + +"Come on!" she cried, "come on! The fire's the other side of the rocks!" + + +Back at the station, Wall walked up and down till he cooled. He went +inside and sat down, but it was no use. He lifted his head and saw his +dead wife's portrait on the wall. Perhaps his whole life ran before him +in detail--but this is not a psychological study. + +There were only two tracks open to him now: either to give in, or go on +as he was going--to shut himself out from human nature and become known +as "Mean Wall," "Hungry Wall," or "Mad Wall, the Squatter." He was +a tall, dark man of strong imagination and more than ordinary +intelligence. And it was the great crisis of his ruined life. He walked +to the top of a knoll near the homestead and saw the fire on the ridges +above Ross's farm. As he turned back he saw a horseman ride up and +dismount by the yard. + +"Is that you, Peter?" + +"Yes, boss. The fences is all right." + +"Been near Ross's?" + +"No. He's burnt out by this time." + +Wall walked to and fro for a few minutes longer. Then he suddenly +stopped and called, "Peter!" + +"Ay, ay!" from the direction of the huts. + +"Turn out the men!" and Wall went into a shed and came out with his +saddle on his arm. + + +The fire rushed down the blind gully. Showers of sparks fell on the +bush fence, it caught twice, and they put it out, but the third time it +blazed and roared and a fire-engine could not have stopped it. + + +"The wheat must go," said Ross. "We've done our best," and he threw down +the blackened bough and leaned against a tree, and covered his eyes with +a grimy hand. + +The wheat was patchy in that corner--there were many old stumps of +trees, and there were bare strips where the plough had gone on each side +of them. Mary saw a chance, and climbed the fence. + +"Come on, Bob," she cried, "we might save it ye. Mr Ross, pull out the +fence along there," and she indicated a point beyond the fire. They +tramped down and tore up the wheat where it ran between the stumps--the +fire was hissing and crackling round and through it, and just as it ran +past them in one place there was a shout, a clatter of horses' hoofs on +the stones, and Mary saw her father riding up the track with a dozen men +behind him. She gave a shriek and ran straight down, through the middle +of the wheat, towards the hut. + +Wall and his men jumped to the ground, wrenched green boughs from +the saplings, and, after twenty minutes' hard fighting, the crop was +saved--save for a patchy acre or so. When it was all over Ross sat down +on a log and rested his head on his hands, and his shoulders shook. +Presently he felt a hand on his shoulder, looked up, and saw Wall. + +"Shake hands, Ross," he said. + +And it was Christmas Day. + + +But in after years they used to nearly chaff the life out of Mary. "You +were in a great hurry to put on the breeches, weren't you, Mary?" "Bob's +best Sunday-go-meetin's, too, wasn't they, Mary?" "Rather tight fit, +wasn't they, Mary?" "Couldn't get 'em on now, could you, Mary?" + +"But," reflected old Peter apart to some cronies, "it ain't every young +chap as gits an idea of the shape of his wife afore he marries her--is +it? An' that's sayin' somethin'." + +And old Peter was set down as being an innercent sort of ole cove. + + + + +THE HOUSE THAT WAS NEVER BUILT + + +There had been heavy rain and landslips all along the branch railway +which left the Great Western Line from Sydney just beyond the Blue +Mountains, and ran through thick bush and scrubby ridgy country and +along great alluvial sidings--were the hills on the opposite side of the +wide valleys (misty in depths) faded from deep blue into the pale azure +of the sky--and over the ends of western spurs to the little farming, +mining and pastoral town of Solong, situated in a circle of blue hills +on the banks of the willow-fringed Cudgegong River. + +The line was hopelessly blocked, and some publicans at Solong had put +on the old coach-road a couple of buggies, a wagonette, and an old mail +coach--relic of the days of Cobb & Co., which had been resurrected from +some backyard and tinkered up--to bring the train passengers on from the +first break in the line over the remaining distance of forty miles or +so. Capertee Station (old time, "Capertee Camp"--a teamster's camp) was +the last station before the first washout, and there the railway line +and the old road parted company for the last time before reaching +Solong--the one to run round by the ends of the western spurs that +spread fanlike, and the other to go through and over, the rough country. + +The train reached Capertee about midnight in broad moonlight that +was misty in the valleys and round the blue of Crown Ridge. I got +a "box-seat" beside the driver on the old coach. It was a grand old +road--one of the old main coach-roads of New South Wales--broad and +white, metalled nearly all the way, and in nearly as good condition +as on the day when the first passenger train ran into Solong and the +last-used section of the old road was abandoned. It dated back to the +bushranging days--right back to convict times: it ran through tall dark +bush, up over gaps or "saddles" in high ridges, down across deep dark +gullies, and here and there across grey, marshy, curlew-haunted flats. +Cobb & Co's coach-and-six, with "Royal Mail" gilded on the panels, had +dashed over it in ten and twelve-mile stages in the old days, the +three head-lamps flashing on the wild dark bush at night, and maybe +twenty-four passengers on board. The biggest rushes to richest +goldfields in the west had gone over this old road on coaches, on carts, +on drays, on horse and bullock wagons, on horseback, and on foot; new +chums from all the world and from all stations in life. + + When many a step was on the mountains, + Marching west to the land of gold. + +And a few came back rich--red, round-faced and jolly--on the box-seat +of Cobb & Co's, treating the driver and all hands, "going home" to +sweethearts or families. (Home people will never feel the meaning of +those two words, "going home," as it is felt in a new land.) And many +came back broken men, tramping in rags, and carrying their swags through +the dusty heat of the drought in December or the bitter, pelting rain in +the mountains in June. Some came back grey who went as boys; and there +were many who never came back. + +I remembered the old mile-trees, with a section of bark cut away and the +distances cut in Roman letters in the hardened sap--the distance from +Bowenfels, the railway terminus then. It was a ghostly old road, and +if it wasn't haunted it should have been. There was an old decaying and +nearly deserted coaching town or two; there were abandoned farms and +halfway inns, built of stone, with the roofs gone and nettles growing +high between the walls; the remains of an orchard here and there--a few +gnarled quince-trees--and the bush reclaiming its own again. It was a +haunted ride for me, because I had last ridden over this old road long +ago when I was young--going to see the city for the first time--and +because I was now on my way to attend the funeral of one of my father's +blood from whom t had parted in anger. + +We slowly climbed, and almost as slowly descended, the steep siding of a +great hill called Aaron's Pass, and about a mile beyond the foot of the +hill I saw a spot I remembered passing on the last journey down, long +ago. Rising back from the road, and walled by heavy bush, was a square +clearing, and in the background I saw plainly, by the broad moonlight, +the stone foundations for a large house; from the front an avenue of +grown pines came down to the road. + +"Why!" I exclaimed, turning to the driver, "was that house burnt down?" + +"No," he said slowly. "That house was never built." + +I stared at the place again and caught sight of a ghostly-looking light +between the lines of the foundations, which I presently made out to be a +light in a tent. + +"There's someone camping there," I said. + +"Yes," said the driver, "some old swaggy or `hatter.' I seen him comin' +down. I don't know nothing about that there place." (I hadn't "shouted" +for him yet.) + +I thought and remembered. I remembered myself, as a boy, being sent +a coach journey along this road to visit some relatives in Sydney. We +passed this place, and the women in the coach began to talk of the fine +house that was going to be built there. The ground was being levelled +for the foundations, and young pines had been planted, with stakes +round them to protect them from the cattle. I remembered being mightily +interested in the place, for the women said that the house was to be +a two-storied one. I thought it would be a wonderful thing to see a +two-storied house there in the bush. The height of my ambition was to +live in a house with stairs in it. The women said that this house was +being built for young Brassington, the son of the biggest squatter then +in the district, who was going to marry the daughter of the next biggest +squatter. That was all I remember hearing the women say. + +Three or four miles along the road was a public-house, with a post +office, general store, and blacksmith shop attached, as is usual in +such places--all that was left of the old pastoral and coaching town +of Ilford. I "shouted" for the driver at the shanty, but got nothing +further out of him concerning the fate of the house that was never +built. I wanted that house for a story. + +However, while yarning with some old residents at Solong, I mentioned +the Brassingtons, and picked up a few first links in the story. The +young couple were married and went to Sydney for their honeymoon. The +story went that they intended to take a trip to the old country and +Paris, to be away a twelve-month, and the house was to be finished and +ready for them on their return. Young Brassington himself had a big +sheep-run round there. The railway wasn't thought of in those days, or +if it was, no Brassington could have dreamed that the line could have +been brought to Solong in any other direction than through the property +of the "Big Brassingtons," as they were called. Well, the young couple +went to Sydney, but whether they went farther the old residents did not +know. All they knew was that within a few weeks, and before the stone +foundations for the brick walls of the house were completed, the +building contract was cancelled, the workmen were dismissed, and the +place was left as I last saw it; only the ornamental pines had now grown +to trees. The Brassingtons and the bride's people were English families +and reserved. They kept the story, if there was a story, to themselves. +The girl's people left the district and squatted on new stations +up-country. The Big Brassingtons came down in the world and drifted to +the city, as many smaller people do, more and more every year. Neither +young Brassington nor his wife was ever again seen or heard of in the +district. + +I attended my relative's funeral, and next day started back for Sydney. + +Just as we reached Ilford, as it happened, the pin of the fore +under-carriage of the coach broke, and it took the blacksmith several +hours to set it right. The place was dull, the publican was not +communicative--or else he harped on the old local grievance of the +railway not having come that way--so about half an hour before I thought +the coach would be ready, I walked on along the road to stretch by legs. +I walked on and on until I came, almost unaware, to the site of the +house that was never built. The tent was still there, in fact, it was a +permanent camp, and I was rather surprised to see the man working with a +trowel on a corner of the unfinished foundations of the house. At first +I thought he was going to build a stone hut in the corner, but when I +got close to him I saw that he was working carefully on the original +plan of the building: he was building the unfinished parts of the +foundation walls up to the required height. He had bricklayer's tools, +a bag of lime, and a heap of sand, and had worked up a considerable +quantity of mortar. It was a rubble foundation: he was knocking off the +thin end of a piece of stone to make it fit, and the clanging of the +trowel prevented his hearing my footsteps. + +"Good day, mate," I said, close beside him. + +I half expected he'd start when I spoke, but he didn't: he looked round +slowly, but with a haunted look in his eyes as if I might have been one +of his ghosts. He was a tall man, gaunt and haggard-eyed, as many men +are in the bush; he may have been but little past middle age, and grey +before his time. + +"Good day," he said, and he set the stone in its place, carefully flush +with the outer edge of the wall, before he spoke again. Then he looked +at the sun, which was low, laid down his trowel, and asked me to come +to the tent-fire. "It's turning chilly," he said. It was a model camp, +everything clean and neat both inside the tent and out; he had made a +stone fireplace with a bark shelter over it, and a table and bench +under another little shed, with shelves for his tin cups and plates +and cooking utensils. He put a box in front of the fire and folded a +flour-bag on top of it for a seat for me, and hung the billy over the +fire. He sat on his heels and poked the burning sticks, abstractedly I +thought, or to keep his hands and thoughts steady. + +"I see you're doing a bit of building," I said. + +"Yes," he said, keeping his eyes on the fire; "I'm getting on with it +slowly." + +I don't suppose he looked at me half a dozen times the whole while I was +in his camp. When he spoke he talked just as if he were sitting yarning +in a row of half a dozen of us. Presently he said suddenly, and giving +the fire a vicious dig with his poker: + +"That house must be finished by Christmas." + +"Why?" I asked, taken by surprise. "What's the hurry?" + +"Because," he said, "I'm going to be married in the New Year--to the +best and dearest girl in the bush." + +There was an awkward pause on my part, but presently I pulled myself +together. + +"You'll never finish it by yourself," I said. "Why don't you put on some +men?" + +"Because," he said, "I can't trust them. Besides, how am I to get +bricklayers and carpenters in a place like this?" + +I noticed all through that his madness or the past in his mind was mixed +up with the real and the present. + +"Couldn't you postpone the marriage?" I asked. + +"No!" he exclaimed, starting to his feet. "No!" and he looked round +wildly on the darkening bush. There was madness in his tone that time, +the last "No!" sounding as if from a man who was begging for his life. + +"Couldn't you run up a shanty then, to live in until the house is +ready?" I suggested, to soothe him. + +He gave his arm an impatient swing. "Do you think I'd ask that girl to +live in a hut?" he said. "She ought to live in a palace!" + +There seemed no way out of it, so I said nothing: he turned his back +and stood looking away over the dark, low-lying sweep of bush towards +sunset. He folded his arms tight, and seemed to me to be holding +himself. After a while he let fall his arms and turned and blinked at me +and the fire like a man just woke from a doze or rousing himself out of +a deep reverie. + +"Oh, I almost forgot the billy!" he said. "I'll make some tea--you must +be hungry." + +He made the tea and fried a couple of slices of ham; he laid the biggest +slice on a thick slice of white baker's bread on a tin plate, and put +it and a pint-pot full of tea on a box by my side. "Have it here, by the +fire," he said; "it's warmer and more comfortable." + +I took the plate on my knee, and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed that +meal. The bracing mountain air and the walk had made me hungry. The +hatter had his meal standing up, cutting his ham on a slice of bread +with a clasp-knife. It was bush fashion, and set me thinking of some +old times. He ate very little, and, as far as I saw, he didn't smoke. +Non-smokers are very scarce in the bush. + +I saw by the way his tent was pitched and his camp arranged generally, +and by the way he managed the cooking, that he must have knocked about +the bush for some years. + +He put the plates and things away and came and sat down on the other +empty gin-case by my side, and fell to poking the fire again. He never +showed the least curiosity as to who I was, or where I came from, or +what I was doing on this deserted track: he seemed to take me as a +matter of course--but all this was in keeping with bush life in general. + +Presently he got up and stood looking upwards over the place where the +house should have been. + +"I think now," he said slowly, "I made a mistake in not having the +verandas carried all round the house." + +"I--I beg pardon!" + +"I should have had the balcony all round instead of on two sides only, +as the man who made the plan suggested; it would have looked better and +made the house cooler in summer." + +I thought as I listened, and presently I saw that it was a case of +madness within madness, so to speak: he was mad on the idea that he +could build the house himself, and then he had moods when he imagined +that the house had been built and he had been married and had reared a +family. + +"You could easily get the balcony carried round," I said; "it wouldn't +cost much--you can get good carpenters at Solong." + +"Yes," he said. "I'll have it done after Christmas." Then he turned from +the house and blinked down at me. "I am sorry," he said, "that there's +no one at home. I sent the wife and family to Sydney for a change. I've +got the two boys at the Sydney Grammar School. I think I'll send the +eldest to King's School at Parramatta. The girls will have to get along +with a governess at home and learn to help their mother--" + +And so he went on talking away just as a man who has made money in the +bush, and is married and settled down, might yarn to an old bachelor +bush mate. + +"I suppose I'll have to get a good piano," he went on. "The girls must +have some amusement: there'll be no end of balls and parties. I suppose +the boys will soon be talking of getting `fivers' and `tenners' out of +the `guvner' or `old man.' It's the way of the world. And they'll marry +and leave us. It's the way of the world--" + +It was awful to hear him go on like this, the more so because he never +smiled--just talked on as if he had said the same thing over and over +again. Presently he stopped, and his eyes and hands began to wander: he +sat down on his heel to the fire again and started poking it. I began +to feel uneasy; I didn't know what other sides there might be to his +madness, and wished the coach would come along. + +"You've knocked about the bush a good deal?" I asked. I couldn't think +of anything else to say, and I thought he might break loose if I let him +brood too long. + +"Yes," he said, "I have." + +"Been in Queensland and the Gulf country, I suppose?" + +"I have." + +His tone and manner seemed a bit more natural. He had knocked about +pretty well all over Australia, and had been in many places where I +had been. I had got him on the right track, and after a bit he started +telling bush yarns and experiences, some of them awful, some of them +very funny, and all of them short and good; and now and then, looking +at the side of his face, which was all he turned to me, I thought I +detected the ghost of a smile. + +One thing I noticed about him; when he spoke as a madman, he talked like +a man who had been fairly well educated (or sometimes, I fancied, like +a young fellow who was studying to be a school-teacher); his speech was +deliberate and his grammar painfully correct--far more so than I have +made it; but when he spoke as an old bushman, he dropped his g's and +often turned his grammar back to front. But that reminds me that I have +met English college men who did the same thing after being a few years +in the bush; either they dropped their particular way of speaking +because it was mimicked, because they were laughed and chaffed out of +it, or they fell gradually into the habit of talking as rough bushmen +do (they learnt Australian), as clean-mouthed men fall, in spite of +themselves, into the habit of swearing in the heat and hurry and rough +life of a shearing-shed. And, coming back into civilized life, these +men, who had been well brought up, drop into their old manner and +style of speaking as readily as the foulest-mouthed man in a shed +or camp--who, amongst his fellows, cannot say three words without an +oath--can, when he finds himself in a decent home in the woman-and-girl +world, yarn by the hour without letting slip a solitary little damn. + +The hatter warmed up the tea-billy again, got out some currant buns, +which he had baked himself in the camp-oven, and we were yarning +comfortably like two old bushmen, and I had almost forgotten that he was +"ratty," when we heard the coach coming. I jumped up to hurry down +to the road. This seemed to shake him up. He gripped my hand hard and +glanced round in his frightened, haunted way. I never saw the eyes of a +man look so hopeless and helpless as his did just then. + +"I'm sorry you're going," he said, in a hurried way. "I'm sorry you're +going. But--but they all go. Come again, come again--we'll all be glad +to see you." + +I had to hurry off and leave him. "We all," I suppose, meant himself and +his ghosts. + +I ran down between the two rows of pines and reached the road just +as the coach came up. I found the publican from Ilford aboard--he was +taking a trip to Sydney. As the coach went on I looked up the clearing +and saw the hatter standing straight behind the fire, with his arms +folded and his face turned in our direction. He looked ghastly in the +firelight, and at that distance his face seemed to have an expression of +listening blindness. I looked round on the dark bush, with, away to the +left, the last glow of sunset fading from the bed of it, like a bed of +reddening coals, and I looked up at the black loom of Aaron's Pass, +and thought that never a man, sane or mad, was left in such a depth of +gloomy loneliness. + +"I see you've been yarning with him yonder," said the publican, who +seemed to have relaxed wonderfully. + +"Yes." + +"You know these parts, don't you?" + +"Yes. I was about here as a boy." + +He asked me what my name might be. I told him it was Smith. He blinked a +while. + +"I never heard of anyone by the name of Smith in the district," he said. + +Neither had I. I told him that we lived at Solong, and didn't stay long. +It saved time. + +"Ever heard of the Big Brassingtons?" + +"Yes." + +"Ever heard the yarn of the house that wasn't built?" + +I told him how much I had heard of it. + +"And that's about all any on 'em knows. Have you any idea who that man +back yonder is?" + +"Yes, I have." + +"Well, who do you think it is?" + +"He is, or rather he was, young Brassington." + +"You've hit it!" said the publican. "I know--and a few others." + +"And do you know what became of his wife?" I asked. + +"I do," said the shanty-keeper, who had a generous supply of whisky with +him, and seemed to have begun to fill himself up for the trip. + +He said no more for a while, and when I had remained silent long enough, +he went on, very deliberately and impressively: + +"One yarn is that the girl wasn't any good; that when she was married +to Brassington, and as soon as they got to Sydney, she met a chap she'd +been carrying on with before she married Brassington (or that she'd +been married to in secret), an' she cleared off with him, leaving her +fortnight-old husband. That was one yarn." + +"Was it?" I said. + +"Yes," said the publican. "That yarn was a lie." He opened a flask of +whisky and passed it round. + +"There was madness in the family," he said, after a nip. + +"Whose?" I asked. "Brassington's?" + +"No," said the publican, in a tone that implied contempt at my +ignorance, in spite of its innocence, "the girl's. Her mother had been +in a 'sylum, and so had her grandmother. It was--it was heridited. Some +madnesses is heridited, an' some comes through worry and hard graft +(that's mine), an' some comes through drink, and some through worse, +and, but as far as I've heard, all madnesses is pretty much the same. +My old man was a warder in a 'sylum. They have their madnesses a bit +different, the same as boozers has their d.t.'s different; but, takin' +it by the lump, it's pretty much all the same. The difference is +accordin' to their natures when they're sane. All men are--" + +"But about young Mrs Brassington," I interrupted. + +"Young Mrs Brassington? Rosy Webb she was, daughter of Webb the +squatter. Rosy was the brightest, best, good-heartedest, an' most +ladylike little girl in the district, an' the heriditry business come on +her in Sydney, about a week after she was married to young Brassington. +She was only twenty. Here--" He passed the flask round. + + +"And what happened?" I asked. + +"What happened?" he repeated. Then he pulled himself together, as if +conscious that he had shown signs of whisky. "Everything was done, but +it was no use. She died in a year in a 'sylum." + +"How do you know that?" + +"How do I know that?" he repeated in a tone of contempt. "How do I +know that? Well, I'll tell you how. _My old wife_ was in service +at Brassington's station at the time--the oldest servant--an' young +Brassington wired to her from Sydney to come and help him in his +trouble. Old Mrs Brassington was bedridden, an' they kep' it from her." + +"And about young Brassington?" + +"About young Brassington? He took a swag an' wandered through the bush. +We've had him at our place several times all these years, but he always +wandered off again. My old woman tried everything with him, but it was +all no use. Years ago she used to get him to talk of things as they was, +in hopes of bringin' his mind back, but he was always worse after. She +does all she can for him even now, but he's mighty independent. The last +five or six years he's been taken with the idea of buildin' that cursed +house. He'll stay there till he gets short of money, an' then he'll go +out back, shearin', stock-ridin', drovin', cookin', fencin'--anything +till he gets a few pounds. Then he'll settle down and build away at +that bloody house. He's knocked about so much that he's a regular old +bushman. While he's an old bushman he's all right an' amusin' an' good +company;--but when he's Brassington he's mad--Don't you ever let on to +my old woman that I told you. I allers let my tongue run a bit when I +get out of that hole we're living in. We've kept the secret all these +years, but what does it matter now?--I ask you." + +"It doesn't matter much," I said. + +"Nothing matters much, it seems to me, nothing matters a damn. The Big +Brassingtons come down years ago; the old people's gone, and the young +scattered God knows where or how. The Webbs (the girl's people) are away +up in new country, an' the girls (they was mostly all girls) are married +an' settled down by this time. We kept the secret, an' the Webbs kept +the secret--even when the dirty yarns was goin' round--so's not to +spoil the chances of the other girls. What about the chances of their +husbands? Some on 'em might be in the same hell as Brassington for all +I know. The Brassingtons kept the secret because I suppose they reckoned +it didn't matter much. Nothing matters much in this world--" + +But I was thinking of another young couple who had married long ago, +whose married life was twenty long years of shameful quarrels, of +useless brutal recrimination--not because either was bad, but because +their natures were too much alike; of the house that was built, of the +family that was reared, of the sons and daughters who "went wrong," of +the father and mother separated after twenty years, of the mother dead +of a broken heart, of the father (in a lunatic asylum), whose mania was +not to build houses, but to obtain and secrete matches for the purpose +of burning houses down. + + + + +"BARNEY, TAKE ME HOME AGAIN" + +This is a sketch of one of the many ways in which a young married woman, +who is naturally thick-skinned and selfish--as most women are--and who +thinks she loves her husband, can spoil his life because he happens to +be good-natured, generous, sensitive, weak or soft, whichever you like +to call it. + +Johnson went out to Australia a good many years ago with his young wife +and two children, as assisted emigrants. He should have left his wife +and children with her mother, in a street off City Road, N., and gone +out by himself and got settled down comfortably and strengthened in +the glorious climate and democratic atmosphere of Australia, and in the +knowledge that he could worry along a while without his wife, before +sending for her. That bit of knowledge would have done her good also, +and it would have been better for both of them. But no man knows the +future, and few can prescribe for their own wives. If we saw our married +lives as others see them, half of us would get divorced. But Johnson was +sentimental, he could not bear to part from his wife for a little while. +Moreover, man is instinctively against leaving his wife behind; it may +be either a natural or a cowardly instinct-but we won't argue that. I +don't believe that Johnson was a coward in that direction; I believe +that he trusted his wife implicitly, or rather that he never dreamed +of such a thing--as is the way with most married men. Sentiment is +selfishness, perhaps, but we won't argue that, such arguments come to +nothing. + +I heard from a fellow-passenger of Johnson's that he had "a hell of a +voyage" because of his young wife's ignorant selfishness and his own +sensitiveness; he bribed stewards for better food and accommodation for +his wife and children, paid the stewardess to help with the children, +got neither rest, nor peace, nor thanks for himself, and landed in +Sydney a nervous wreck, with five pounds out of the ten he started with. + +Johnson was a carpenter. He got work from a firm of contractors in +Sydney, who, after giving him a fortnight's trial, sent him up-country +to work on the railway station buildings, at the little pastoral mining +and farming town of Solong. The railway having come to Solong, things +were busy in the building line, and Johnson settled there. + +Johnson was thin when he came to Solong; he had landed a living +skeleton, he said, but he filled out later on. The democratic atmosphere +soothed his mind and he soon loved the place for its unconventional +hospitality. He worked hard and seemed to have plenty of energy--he said +he got it in Australia. He said that another year of the struggle in +London would have driven him mad. He fished in the river on Saturday +afternoons and Sundays, and, perhaps for the first month or so, he +thought that he had found peace. Johnson's wife was a rather stout, +unsympathetic-looking young woman, with the knit of obstinacy in her +forehead; she had that stamp of "hardness" on her face which is the rule +amongst English and the exception amongst Australian women. We of Solong +thought her hard, selfish and narrow-minded, and paltry; later on we +thought she was a "bit touched;" but local people often think that of +strangers. + +By her voice and her habit of whining she should have been a thin, +sharp-faced, untidy, draggled-tailed woman in a back street in London, +or a worn-out selector's wife in the bush. She whined about the climate. +"It will kill the children! It will kill the children! We'll never rear +them here!" She whined about the "wretched hole in the bush" that her +husband had brought her to; and to the women whom she condescended to +visit--because a woman must have a woman to talk to--she exaggerated +the miseries of the voyage until the thing became a sing-song from +repetition. Later on she settled down to endless accounts of her home +in London, of her mother and sisters, of the way they lived. "And I'll +never see it any more. I'll never see them any more." + +The Solong climate was reckoned the best in Australia; the "wretched +hole" was a pretty little town on the banks of a clear, willow-bordered +river, with vineyards on the slopes, and surrounded by a circle of +blue hills and peaks. We knew nothing of London, so she had her own way +there. + + +"She'll feel a bit lonely at first, but she'll soon get used to +Australia," said Johnson. He seemed to me to go out of his way to excuse +his wife. + +Johnson had had a few contracts in England at one time; they had been in +"better circumstances"--that was the time she looked back to in England; +the last two years of bitter, black struggle at "home" seemed a blank in +her mind--but that's how women jump over facts when they have a selfish +fad. + +Johnson rented a cottage and garden on the bank of the sunny river. He +said he took the place because there was ivy growing on the cottage, and +it might cheer his wife; but he had lost sight of the fact that, while +he had been born in an English village, his wife had been born and bred +in London, and had probably never noticed ivy. She said it was worse +than living in a slum. + +Johnson was clever at his trade, and at many other things, but his wife +didn't seem aware of it. He was well liked, he grew to be popular, but +she didn't seem proud of the fact; she never seemed interested in him +or his prospects. She only wanted him to take her home again. We mustn't +forget that while he had a rush of work to occupy his mind she had not. + +But Johnson grew stouter and prospered in spite of his wife--for a year +or so. New schools were being built in the district and the town was +practically re-built. Johnson took contracts for brickwork, plumbing and +house-painting, as well as carpentering, and had at one time as many as +ten men in his employ. He was making money. + +I was working at my trade then, house-painting, and worked for Johnson. +I lodged at his cottage for a while, but soon got tired of hearing about +London, and Mrs Johnson's mother and sisters, and the house they lived +in, and the street it was in, and the parks where they used to take +their babies, and the shopping on Saturday afternoon. That woman was +terrible. She was at Johnson all the time about taking her home. "We'll +surely be able to go home this year, Will." "You promised to take me +home by the end of the year." "Mother says in her last letter, that Jack +says there's more building going on about London than ever." "You'll +do just as well in London as you'll do here." "What chance have the +children got in a hole like this?" And the rest of it--every night. When +he took a new contract, it would be, "What did you want to take that new +contract for, Will, when we're going home? You know you promised me you +wouldn't take any more contracts." First he'd try to cheer her, then +he'd argue; but she'd only sit with the knit in her forehead deep, +looking as obstinate as a mule. Then she'd sit down to a little +harmonium he'd bought her and play and sing "Barney, take me Home +again," and "The Old Folks at Home," and "Swannie Ribber," till I felt +like hanging myself--and I wasn't an exile. Sometimes Johnson would +flare up and there'd be a row and he'd go to the pub. Gentle persuasion, +argument, or swearing, it was all the same with her. + +Bosses and men were different towards each other in Solong to what they +are in London; besides, when I wasn't Johnson's sub-contractor I was +his foreman--so we often had a few drinks together; and one night over a +beer (and after a breeze at home, I think) he said to me: + +"I can't make it out, Harry; there was nothing but struggle and worry +and misery for us in England, and London was smothering me, my chest was +bad and the wife was always in ill-health; but I suppose I'll have to +take her home in the end or else she'll go melancholy mad!" And he drew +a breath that was more like a gasp than a sigh. + +"Why not send her home for a trip, or a year or so, boss?" I asked. "As +likely as not she'll be just as eager to get back; and that will be the +end of it." + +"I couldn't do that, Harry," said Johnson. "I couldn't stay here and +work alone. It would be like beginning life again; I've started twice +and couldn't start the third time. You'll understand when you're +married, Harry." + +Well, in the end, she wore Johnson out--or wore into him rather. He +drank more, and once or twice I saw him drinking alone. Sometimes he'd +"round on us" at work for nothing at all, and at other times he'd take +no interest in the jobs--he'd let the work go on anyhow. Some thought +that Johnson was getting too big for his boots, that's how men are +misjudged. He grew moody and melancholy and thin again. Johnson was +homesick himself. No doubt it was the misery of his domestic life in +Australia that made him so. + +Towards the end of the third or fourth year Johnson threw up a couple of +contracts he had on hand, sacrificed a piece of land which he had bought +and on which he had built a cottage in the short time he had been in +Solong, and, one lovely day in June, when the skies were their fairest, +the hills their bluest, the river its widest and clearest, and the grass +was waving waist high after rain--one blue and green and golden day the +Johnsons left Solong, with the trunks they had brought out with them, +for Sydney, _en route_ for smoky London. + +Mrs Johnson was a woman transformed--she was happy and looked it. The +last few weeks she had seemed in every way the opposite of the woman we +had known: cheerful, kind to neighbours in sickness and trouble, +even generous; she made many small presents in the way of mantelshelf +ornaments, pictures, and house-linen. But then it was Johnson who had to +pay for that in the end. + +He looked worn and worried at the railway station--more like himself +as he was when he first came to Solong--and as the train moved off I +thought he looked--well, frightened. + +That must have been nearly twenty years ago. + + +London last winter. It was one of those days when London's lurid sun +shows up for a little while like a smoky danger signal. The snow had +melted from the house-tops and the streets were as London streets are +after the first fall of snow of the season. But I could stand the flat +no longer, I had to go out and walk. I was sun-sick--I was heart-sick +for the sun, for the sunny South--for grassy plains, blue mountains, +sweeps of mountain bush and sunny ocean beaches. I walked hard; I walked +till I was mud-splashed to the shoulders; I walked through the squalid, +maddening sameness of miles of dingy, grimy-walled blocks and rows of +four-storied houses till I felt smothered--jailed, hopelessly. "Best +get home and in, and draw the blinds on it," I said, "or my brain will +turn." + +I was about to ask a policeman where I was when I saw, by the name on +a corner of the buildings, that I was in City Road, North. All the +willow-fringed rivers and the sunny hills of Solong flashed before me at +the sight of the name of that street. I had not been able to recall the +name of the street off City Road in which the Johnsons lived, though +I had heard it often enough in the old days from the tongue of Mrs +Johnson. + +I felt it would be a relief to see anyone who had been in Australia. +"Now," I thought, "if I walk along City Road and see the name of that +street I'll remember it"--and I did. It was a blind street, like the +long, narrow yard of a jail, walled by dark houses, all alike. The +next door but one to that at which I knocked to inquire was where the +Johnsons lived; they lived in a four-storied house, or rather a narrow +section of a four-storied terrace. I found later on that they paid the +land-lord, or nearly paid him, by letting lodgings. They lived in +one room with the use of the parlour and the kitchen when the lodgers +weren't using them, and the son shared a room with a lodger. The back +windows looked out on the dead wall of a poorhouse of some kind, the +front on rows of similar windows opposite--rows of the same sort of +windows that run for miles and miles in London. In one a man sat +smoking in his shirtsleeves, from another a slavey leaned out watching +a fourwheeler that had stopped next door, in a third a woman sat sewing, +and in a fourth a woman was ironing, with a glimpse of a bedstead behind +her. And all outside was gloom and soot and slush. + +I would never have recognized the Johnsons. I have visited them several +times since and their faces are familiar to me now, but I don't know +whether any traces of the old likenesses worked up in my memory. I +found Johnson an old man--old and grey before his time. He had a grizzly +stubble round his chin and cheeks towards the end of the week, because +he could only afford a shave on Saturday afternoon. He was working at +some branch of his trade "in the shop" I understood, but he said he felt +the work come heavier on him every winter. "I've felt very poorly this +last winter or two," he said, "very poorly indeed." He was very sad and +gentle. + +Mrs Johnson was old and thin-looking, but seemed cheerful and energetic. +Some chest trouble kept her within doors most of the winter. + +"I don't mind so long as I can manage," she said, "but Johnson gets so +depressed." + +They seemed very kind towards each other; they spoke little of +Australia, and then only as an incident in their lives which was not of +any importance--had long been past and done with. It was all "before +we went to Australia" or "after we came back from Australia," with Mrs +Johnson. + +The son, whom I remembered as a bright, robust little fellow, was now a +tall, white-faced, clean-shaven young man, a clerk on thirty shillings +a week. He wore, on Saturday afternoons and Sundays, a tall hat and +a frock coat and overcoat made cheaply in the latest fashion, so he +couldn't afford to help the old folk much. + +"David is very extravagant," said the old man, gently. "He won't wear +anything when once the gloss is off it. But," with a sad smile, "I get +the left-off overcoats." + +He took me across to see his daughter. She had married a tradesman and +they were having a hard struggle in three rooms in a workman's dwelling. +She was twenty-five, thin, yellow, and looking ten years older. + +There were other children who had died. "I think we might have done +better for the children in Australia," said the old man to me, sadly, +when we got outside, "but we did our best." + +We went into a hotel and had a drink. Johnson had treated last +time--twenty years before. We call treating "shouting" in Australia. +Presently Johnson let fall a word or two of Australian slang, and +brightened up wonderfully; we got back out into Australia at once and +stayed there an hour or so. Being an old man, Johnson's memory for the +long ago was better than mine, and I picked up links; and, in return, +I told him what Solong was like now, and how some men he knew, who were +going up, had gone down, and others, who were going to the dogs in his +time, had gone up--and we philosophized. About one he'd say, "Ah, well! +who'd have thought it! I never thought that boy would come to any good;" +about another, "Ah, well! and he might have been an independent man." +How familiar that expression sounded!--I think it is used more often in +Australia than in any other country: "He might have been an independent +man." + +When I left Johnson I felt less lonely in London, and rather humbled in +spirit. He seemed so resigned--I had never seen such gentle sadness in a +man's eyes, nor heard it in a man's voice. I could get back to Australia +somehow and start life again, but Johnson's day had been dead for many +years. "Besides, assisted emigration's done away with now," he said, +with his sad, sad smile. + +I saw the Johnsons again later on. "Things have been going very sadly +with us, very sadly indeed," said the old man, when we'd settled down. +He had broken down at the beginning of the winter, he had dragged +himself out of bed and to work and back again until he could do so no +longer; he had been laid up most of the winter. Mrs Johnson had not been +outside the door for months. + +"It comes very hard on us," she said, "and I'm so poorly, and David out +of work, too. I wouldn't mind if I could get about. But," she went on +in her energetic manner, "we've had the house full all the winter; we've +had very good luck with the lodgers, all respectable people, and one +of them answers the door and that keeps me away from the draught--so it +might be worse, mightn't it? But Johnson doesn't seem to mend at all, +and he gets so terribly depressed. But the warm weather coming on, etc." + +They and the Lord only knew how they managed to live, for they are +honest people and the lodgers scarcely pay the rent of the house. There +was only David between them and the poorhouse, as far as I could see. + +Johnson came out with me a piece and we had a drink or two together--his +was gin hot. He talked a good deal about Australia, but sadly and +regretfully on this occasion. + +"We could have done well in Australia," he said, "very well indeed. I +might have been independent and the children well started in life. But +we did things for the best. Mrs Johnson didn't like Australia, you know. +It was a pity we didn't stay there, a great pity. We would have done far +better than in England. I'd go out again now if I had the money, but I'm +getting too old." + +"Would Mrs Johnson go out?" I asked. + +"Oh, yes. But I'm afraid she wouldn't stand the voyage.... Things have +been very sad with us ever since we came back to England, very sad +indeed." And after a while he suddenly caught his breath. + +"It takes me that way sometimes," he said. "I catch my breath just as if +I was going to lose it." + + + + +A DROVING YARN + + +Andy Maculloch had heard that old Bill Barker, the well-known overland +drover, had died over on the Westralian side, and Dave Regan told a yarn +about Bill. + +"Bill Barker," said Dave, talking round his pipe stem, "was the +_quintessence_ of a drover--" + +"The whatter, Dave?" came the voice of Jim Bentley, in startled tones, +from the gloom on the far end of the veranda. + +"The quintessence," said Dave, taking his pipe out of his mouth. "You +shut up, Jim. As I said, Bill Barker was the quintessence of a drover. +He'd been at the game ever since he was a nipper. He run away from home +when he was fourteen and went up into Queensland. He's been all over +Queensland and New South Wales and most of South Australia, and a good +deal of the Western, too: over the great stock routes from one end to +the other, Lord knows how many times. No man could keep up with him +riding out, and no one could bring a mob of cattle or a flock of sheep +through like him. He knew every trick of the game; if there was grass to +be had Bill'd get it, no matter whose run it was on. One of his games +in a dry season was to let his mob get boxed with the station stock on +a run where there was grass, and before Bill's men and the station-hands +could cut 'em out, the travelling stock would have a good bellyful to +carry them on the track. Billy was the daddy of the drovers. Some said +that he could ride in his sleep, and that he had one old horse that +could jog along in his sleep too, and that--travelling out from home to +take charge of a mob of bullocks or a flock of sheep--Bill and his horse +would often wake up at daylight and blink round to see where they +were and how far they'd got. Then Bill would make a fire and boil his +quart-pot, and roast a bit of mutton, while his horse had a mouthful of +grass and a spell. + +"You remember Bill, Andy? Big dark man, and a joker of the loud sort. +Never slept with a blanket over him--always folded under him on the sand +or grass. Seldom wore a coat on the route--though he always carried one +with him, in case he came across a bush ball or a funeral. Moleskins, +flannel waistcoat, cabbage-tree hat and 'lastic-side boots. When it +was roasting hot on the plains and the men swore at the heat, Jim +would yell, `Call this hot? Why, you blanks, I'm freezin'! Where's me +overcoat?' When it was raining and hailing and freezing on Bell's Line +in the Blue Mountains in winter, and someone shivered and asked, `Is +it cold enough for yer now, Bill?' `Cold!' Bill would bellow, `I'm +sweatin'!' + +"I remember it well. I was little more than a youngster then--Bill +Barker came past our place with about a thousand fat sheep for the +Homebush sale-yards at Sydney, and he gave me a job to help him down +with them on Bell's Line over the mountains, and mighty proud I was to +go with him, I can tell you. One night we camped on the Cudgegong River. +The country was dry and pretty close cropped and we'd been "sweating" +the paddocks all along there for our horses. You see, where there +weren't sliprails handy we'd just take the tomahawk and nick the top +of a straight-grained fence-post, just above the mortise, knock out the +wood there, lift the top rail out and down, and jump the horses in over +the lower one--it was all two-rail fences around there with sheep wires +under the lower rail. And about daylight we'd have the horses out, lift +back the rail, and fit in the chock that we'd knocked out. Simple as +striking matches, wasn't it? + +"Well, the horses were getting a good bellyful in the police horse +paddock at night, and Bill took the first watch with the sheep. It was +very cold and frosty on the flat and he thought the sheep might make +back for the ridges, it's always warmer up in the ridges in winter out +of the frost. Bill roused me out about midnight. `There's the sheep,' he +says, pointing to a white blur. `They've settled down. I think they'll +be quiet till daylight. Don't go round them; there's no occasion to go +near 'em. You can stop by the fire and keep an eye on 'em.' + +"The night seemed very long. I watched and smoked and toasted my shins, +and warmed the billy now and then, and thought up pretty much the same +sort of old things that fellers on night watch think over all over the +world. Bill lay on his blanket, with his back to the fire and his arm +under his head--freezing on one side and roasting on the other. He never +moved. I itched once or twice to turn him over and bake the front of +him--I reckoned he was about done behind. + +"At last daylight showed. I took the billy and started down to the river +to get some water to make coffee; but half-way down, near the sheep +camp, I stopped and stared, I was never so surprised in my life. The +white blur of sheep had developed into a couple of acres of long dead +silver grass! + +"I woke Bill, and he swore as I never heard a man swear before--nor +since. He swore at the sheep, and the grass, and at me; but it would +have wasted time, and besides I was too sleepy and tired to fight. But +we found those sheep scattered over a scrubby ridge about seven miles +back, so they must have slipped away back of the grass and started early +in Bill's watch, and Bill must have watched that blessed grass for the +first half of the night and then set me to watch it. He couldn't get +away from that. + +"I wondered what the chaps would say if it got round that Bill Barker, +the boss overland drover, had lost a thousand sheep in clear country +with fences all round; and I suppose he thought that way too, for he +kept me with him right down to Homebush, and when he paid me off he +threw in an extra quid, and he said: + +"`Now, listen here, Dave! If I ever hear a word from anyone about +watching that gory grass, I'll find you, Dave, and murder you, if you're +in wide Australia. I'll screw your neck, so look out.' + +"But he's dead now, so it doesn't matter." + + +There was silence for some time after Dave had finished. The chaps made +no comment on the yarn, either one way or the other, but sat smoking +thoughtfully, and in a vague atmosphere as of sadness--as if they'd just +heard of their mother's death and had not been listening to an allegedly +humorous yarn. + +Then the voice of old Peter, the station-hand, was heard to growl from +the darkness at the end of the hut, where he sat on a three-bushel bag +on the ground with his back to the slabs. + +"What's old Peter growlin' about?" someone asked. + +"He wants to know where Dave got that word," someone else replied. + +"What word?" + +"_Quint-essents_." + +There was a chuckle. + +"He got it out back, Peter," said Mitchell, the shearer. "He got it from +a new chum." + +"How much did yer give for it, Dave?" growled Peter. + +"Five shillings, Peter," said Dave, round his pipe stem. "And stick of +tobacco thrown in." + +Peter seemed satisfied, for he was heard no more that evening. + + + + +GETTIN' BACK ON DAVE REGAN + +A RATHER FISHY YARN FROM THE BUSH + +(AS TOLD BY JAMES NOWLETT, BULLOCK-DRIVER) + + +You might work this yarn up. I've often thought of doin' it meself, but +I ain't got the words. I knowed a lot of funny an' rum yarns about the +bush, an' I often wished I had the gift o' writin'. I could tell a lot +better yarns than the rot they put in books sometimes, but I never had +no eddication. But you might be able to work this yarn up--as yer call +it. + +There useter be a teamster's camp six or seven miles out of Mudgee, at +a place called th' Old Pipeclay, in the days before the railroad went +round to Dubbo, an' most of us bullickies useter camp there for the +night. There was always good water in the crick, an' sometimes we'd turn +the bullicks up in the ridge, an' gullies behind for grass, an' camp +there for a few days, and do our washin' an' mendin', and make new yokes +perhaps, an tinker up the wagons. + +There was a woman livin' on a farm there named Mrs Hardwick--an' she +_was_ a hard wick. Her husban', Jimmy Hardwick was throwed from his +horse agenst a stump one day when he was sober, an' he was killed--an' +she was a widder. She had a tidy bit o' land, an' a nice bit of a +orchard an' vineyard, an some cattle, an' they say she had a tidy bit +o' money in the bank. She had the worst tongue in the district, no +one's character was safe with her; but she wasn't old, an' she wasn't +bad-lookin'--only hard--so there was some fellers hangin' round arter +her. An' Dave Regan's horse was hangin' up outside her place as often as +anybody else's. Dave was a native an' a bushy, an' drover an' a digger, +an' he was a bit soft in them days--he got hard enough arterwards. + +Mrs Hardwick hated bullick-drivers--she had a awful down on +bullickies--I dunno why. We never interfered with her fowls, an' as +for swearin'! why, she could swear herself. Jimmy Hardwick was a +bullick-driver when she married him, an' p'r'aps that helped to account +for it. She wouldn't let us boil our billies at her kitchen fire, same +as any other bushwoman, an' if one of our bullicks put his nose under +her fence for a mouthful of grass, she'd set her dogs onter him. An' +one of her dogs got something what disagreed with him one day, an' she +accused us of layin' poisoned baits. An', arter that, she 'pounded some +of our bullicks that got into her lucerne paddick one night when we was +on the spree in Mudgee, an' put heavy damages on 'em. She'd left the +sliprails down on purpose, I believe. She talked of puttin' the police +onter us, jest as if we was a sly-grog shop. (If _she'd_ kept a sly-grog +shop she'd have had a different opinion about bullick-drivers.) An' all +the bullick-drivers hated her because she hated bullickies. + +Well, one wet season half a dozen of us chaps was camped there for a +fortnight, because the roads was too boggy to travel, an' one night they +got up a darnce at Peter Anderson's shanty acrost the ridges, an' a +lot of gals an' fellers turned up from all round about in spite of the +pourin' rain. Someone had kidded Dave Regan that Mother Hardwick was +comin', an' he turned up, of course, in spite of a ragin' toothache he +had. He was always ridin' the high horse over us bullickies. It was a +very cold night, enough to cut the face an' hands off yer, so we had a +roarin' fire in the big bark-an'-slab kitchen where the darncin' was. +It was one of them big, old-fashioned, clay-lined fire-places that goes +right acrost the end of the room, with a twenty-five foot slab-an'-tin +chimbly outside. + +Dave Regan was pretty wild about being had, an' we copped all the +gals for darncin'; he couldn't get one that night, an' when he wasn't +proddin' out his tooth with a red-hot wire some one was chaffin' him +about Mrs Hardwick. So at last he got disgusted an' left; but before +he went he got a wet three-bushel flour-bag an' climbed up very quietly +onter the roof by the battens an' log weights an' riders, an' laid the +wet bag very carefully acrost the top of the chimbly flue. + +An' we was a mortal hour tryin' to find out what was the matter with +that infernal chimbly, and tackin' bits o' tin an' baggin' acrost the +top of the fire-place under the mantelshelf to try an' stop it from +smokin', an' all the while the gals set there with the water runnin' out +of their eyes. We took the green back log out an' fetched in a dry one, +but that chimbly smoked worse than ever, an' we had to put the fire out +altogether, an' the gals set there shiverin' till the rain held up a bit +an' the sky cleared, an' then someone goes out an' looks up an' sings +out, "Why, there's somethin' acrost the top of the blazin' chimbly!" +an' someone else climbs up an' fetches down the bag. But the darnce +was spoilt, an' the gals was so disgusted that they went off with their +fellers while the weather held up. They reckoned some of us bullickies +did it for a lark. + +An' arter that Dave'd come ridin' past, an' sing out to know if we knew +of a good cure for a smokin' chimbly, an' them sorter things. But he +always got away before we could pull him off of his horse. Three of us +chased him on horseback one day, but we didn't ketch him. + +So we made up our minds to git back on Dave some way or other, an' it +come about this way. + +About six months arter the smoked-out darnce, four or five of us same +fellers was campin' on th' Pipeclay agen, an' it was a dry season. It +was dryer an' hotter than it was cold 'n' wet the larst time. Dave was +still hangin' round Mrs Hardwick's an' doin' odd jobs for her. Well, one +very hot day we seen Dave ridin' past into Mudgee, an' we knowed he'd +have a spree in town that night, an' call at Mrs Hardwick's for sympathy +comin' out next day; an' arter he'd been gone an hour or two, Tom +Tarrant comes drivin' past on his mail-coach, an' drops some letters an' +papers an' a bag o' groceries at our camp. + +Tom was a hard case. I remember wonst I was drivin' along a lonely +bit o' track, an' it was a grand mornin', an' I felt great, an' I got +singin' an' practisin' a recitation that I allers meant to give at a +bush darnce some night. (I never sung or spouted poetry unless I was +sure I was miles away from anyone.) An' I got worked up, an' was wavin' +me arms about an' throwin' it off of me chest, when Tom's coach comes +up behind, round a bend in the road, an' took me by surprise. An' Tom +looked at me very hard an' he says, "What are yer shoutin' an' swearin' +an' darncin' an' goin' on at the bullicks like that for, Jimmy? They +seem to be workin' all right." It took me back, I can tell yer. The +coach was full of grinnin' passengers, an' the worst of it was that I +didn't know how long Tom had been drivin' slow behind me an' takin' me +out of windin'. There's nothin' upsets a cove as can't sing so much as +to be caught singin' or spoutin' poetry when he thinks he's privit'. + +An' another time I remember Tom's coach broke down on the track, an' he +had to ride inter town with the mails on horseback; an' he left a couple +of greenhides, for Skinner the tanner at Mudgee, for me to take on in +the wagon, an' a bag of potatoes for Murphy the storekeeper at Home +Rule, an' a note that said: "Render unto Murphy the things which is +murphies, and unto Skinner them things which is skins." Tom was a hard +case. + +Well, this day, when Tom handed down the tucker an' letters, he got down +to stretch his legs and give the horses a breathe. The coach was full +of passengers, an' I noticed they all looked extra glum and sulky, but I +reckoned it was the heat an' dust. Tom looked extra solemn, too, an' +no one was talkin'. Then I suddenly began to notice something in the +atmosphere, as if there was a dead beast not far away, an' my mates +started sniffin' too. An' that reminds me, it's funny why some people +allers sniff hard instead of keepin' their noses shut when there's a +stink; the more it stinks the more they sniff. Tom spit in the dust an' +thought a while; then he took a parcel out of the boot an' put it on +the corner post of the fence. "There," he said, "There's some fresh fish +that come up from Sydney by train an' Cobb & Co's coach larst night. +They're meant for White the publican at Gulgong, but they won't keep +this weather till I git out there. Pity to waste them! you chaps might +as well have a feed of 'em. I'll tell White they went bad an' I had to +throw them out," says Tom. Then he got on to the coach agen an' drove +off in a cloud of dust. We undone the brown paper, an' the fish was in a +small deal box, with a lid fastened by a catch. We nicked back the catch +an' the lid flew open, an' then we knowed where the smell comed from +all right. There wasn't any doubt about that! We didn't have to put our +noses in the box to see if the fish was bad. They was packed in salt, +but that made no difference. + +You know how a smell will start sudden in the bush on a hot, still day, +an' then seem to take a spell, an' then get to work agen stronger than +ever. You might be clost alongside of a horse that has been dead a +fortnight an' smell nothin' particular till you start to walk away, an' +the further you go the worse it stinks. It seems to smell most round in +a circle of a hundred yards or so. But these fish smelt from the centre +right out. Tom Tarrant told us arterwards that them fish started to +smell as soon as he left Mudgee. At first they reckoned it was a dead +horse by the road; but arter a while the passengers commenced squintin' +at each other suspicious like, an' the conversation petered out, an' +Tom thought he felt all their eyes on his back, an' it was very +uncomfortable; an' he sat tight an' tried to make out where the smell +come from; an' it got worse every hundred yards--like as if the +track was lined with dead horses, an' every one dead longer than the +last--till it was like drivin' a funeral. An' Tom never thought of the +fish till he got down to stretch his legs and fetched his nose on a +level with the boot. + +Well, we shut down the lid of that box quick an' took it an' throwed it +in the bushes a good way away from the camp, but next mornin', while we +was havin' breakfast, Billy Grimshaw got an idea, an' arter breakfast +he wetted a canvas bag he had an' lit up his pipe, an' went an' got that +there box o' fish, an' put it in the wet bag, an' wrapped it tight round +it an' tied it up tight with string. Billy had a nipper of a nephew with +him, about fourteen, named Tommy, an' he was a sharp kid if ever there +was one. So Billy says, "Look here, Tommy, you take this fish up to Mrs +Hardwick's an' tell her that Dave Regan sent 'em with his compliments, +an' he hopes she'll enjoy 'em. Tell her that Dave fetched 'em from +Mudgee, but he's gone back to look for a pound note that he dropped out +of a hole in his pocket somewheers along the road, an' he asked you to +take the fish up." So Tommy takes the fish an' goes up to the house with +'em. When he come back he says that Mrs Hardwick smiled like a parson +an' give him a shillin'--an' he didn't wait. We watched the house, an' +about half an hour arterwards we seen her run out of the kitchen with +the open box in her hand, an' run a good way away from the house an' +throw the fish inter the bushes, an' then go back quick, holdin' her +nose. + +An' jest then, as luck would have it, we seen Dave Regan ridin' up from +the creek towards the house. He got down an' went into the kitchen, an' +then come backin' out agen in a hurry with her in front of him. We could +hear her voice from where we was, but we couldn't hear what she said. +But we could see her arms wavin' as if she was drivin' fowls, an' Dave +backed all the way to his horse and gets on an' comes ridin' away quick, +she screamin' arter him all the time. When he got down opposite the camp +we sung out to know what was the matter. "What have you been doin' to +Mrs Hardwick, Dave?" we says. "We heerd her goin' for yer proper jest +now." "Damned if I know," says Dave. "I ain't done nothin' to her that +I knows of. She's called me everything she can lay her tongue to, an' +she's ravin' about my stinkin' fish, or somethin'. I can't make it out +at all. I believe she's gone ratty." + +"But you _must_ have been doin' somethin' to the woman," we says, "or +else she wouldn't have gone on at yer like that." + +But Dave swore he hadn't, an' we talked it over for a while an' couldn't +make head nor tail of it, an' we come to the conclusion that it was only +a touch o' the sun. + + +"Never mind, Dave," we says. "Go up agen in a day or two, when she's +cooled down, an' find out what the matter is. Or write to her. It might +only have been someone makin' mischief. That's what it is." + +But Dave only sat an' rubbed his head, an' presently he started home to +wherever he was hangin' out. He wanted a quiet week to think. + +"Her chimbly might have been smokin', Dave," we shouted arter him, but +he was too dazed like to ketch on. + +Well, in a month or two we was campin' there agen, an' we found she'd +fenced in a lane to the crick she had no right to, an' we had to take +the bullicks a couple o' miles round to grass an' water. Well, the first +mornin' we seen her down in the corner of her paddick near the camp +drivin' some heifers, an' Billy Grimshaw went up to the fence an' spoke +to her. Billy was the only one of us that dared face her and he was the +only one she was ever civil to--p'r'aps because Billy had a squint an' a +wall eye and that put her out of countenance. + +Billy took off his hat very respectful an' sings out, "Mrs Hardwick." +(It was Billy's bullicks she'd "pounded," by the way.) + +"What is it?" she says. + +"I want to speak to you, Mrs Hardwick," says Billy. + +"Well, speak," she says. "I've got no time to waste talkin' to +bullick-drivers." + +"Well, the fact is, Mrs Hardwick," says Billy, "that I want to explain +somethin', an' apologize for that young scamp of a nephew o' mine, young +Tommy. He ain't here or I'd make him beg your pardon hisself, or I'd +cut him to pieces with the bullick-whip. I heard all about Dave Regan +sendin' you that stinkin' fish, an' I think it was a damned mean, dirty +thing to do--to send stinkin' fish to a woman, an' especially to a +widder an' an unprotected woman like you, Mrs Hardwick. I've had mothers +an' sisters of me own. An' I want to tell you that I'm sorry a relation +o' mine ever had anythin' to do with it. As soon as I heerd of it I give +young Tommy a lambastin' he won't forgot in a hurry." + +"Did Tommy know the fish was bad?" she says. + +"It doesn't matter a rap," says Billy; "he had no right to go takin' +messages from nobody to nobody." + + +Mrs Hardwick thought a while. Then she says: "P'r'aps arter all Dave +Regan didn't know the fish was bad. I've often thought I might have +been in too much of a hurry. Things goes bad so quick out here in this +weather. An' Dave was always very friendly. I can't understand why he'd +do a dirty thing on me like that. I never done anything to Dave." + +Now I forgot to tell you that Billy had a notion that Dave helped drive +his bullicks to pound that time, though I didn't believe it. So Billy +says: + +"Don't you believe that for a minute, Mrs Hardwick. Dave knew what he +was a-doin' of all right; an' if I ketch him _I'll_ give him a beltin' +for it if no one else is man enough to stand up for a woman!" says +Billy. + +"How d'yer know Dave knew?" says Mrs Hardwick. + +"Know!" says Billy. "Why, he talked about it all over the district." + +"What!" she screamed out, an' I moved away from that there fence, for +she had a stick to drive them heifers with. But Billy stood his ground. +"Is that the truth, Billy Grimshaw?" she screams. + +"Yes;" he says. "I'll-take me oath on it. He blowed about it all over +the district, as if it was very funny, an' he says--" An' Billy stopped. + +"What did he say?" she shouted. + +"Well, the fact is," says Billy, "that I hardly like to tell it to a +lady. I wouldn't like to tell yer, Mrs Hardwick." + +"But you'll have to tell me, Billy Grimshaw," she screams. "I have a +right to know. If you don't tell me I'll pull him next week an' have +it dragged out of you in the witness-box!" she says. "An' I'll have +satisfaction out of him in the felon's dock of a court of law!" she +says. "What did the villain say?" she screams. + + +"Well," says Billy, "if yer must have it--an', anyway, I'm hanged if I'm +goin' to stand by an' see a woman scandalized behind her back--if yer +must have it I'll tell yer. Dave said that the fish didn't smell no +worse than your place anyway." + +We got away from there then. She cut up too rough altogether. I can't +tell you what she said--I ain't got the words. She went up to the house, +an' we seen the farm-hand harnessin' up the horse, an' we reckoned she +was goin' to drive into town straight away an' take out a summons agenst +Dave Regan. An' jest then Dave hisself comes ridin' past--jest when +he was most wanted, as usual. He always rode fast past Mrs Hardwick's +nowadays, an' never stopped there, but Billy shouted after him: + +"Hullo, Dave! I want to speak to yer," shouts Billy. An' Dave yanks his +horse round. + +"What is it, Billy?" he says. + +"Look here, Dave," says Billy. "You had your little joke about the +chimbly, an' we had our little joke about the fish an' Mrs Hardwick, +so now we'll call it quits. A joke's a joke, but it can go too far, an' +this one's gettin' too red-hot altogether. So we've fixed it up with Mrs +Hardwick." + +"What fish an' what joke?" says Dave, rubbin' his head. "An' what have +yer fixed up with Mrs Hardwick? Whatever are yer talkin' about, Billy?" + +So Billy told him all about us sendin' the stinkin' fish to Mrs Hardwick +by Tommy, an' sayin' Dave sent 'em--Dave rubbin' the back of his neck +an' starin' at Billy all the time. "An' now," says Billy, "I won't say +anything about them bullicks; but I went up and seen Mrs Hardwick this +mornin', an' told her the whole truth about them fish, an' how you +knowed nothin' about it, an' I apologized an' told her we was very +sorry; an' she says she was very sorry too on your account, an' wanted +to see yer. I promised to tell yer as soon as I seen yer. It ought to be +fixed up. You ought to go right up to the house an' see her now. She's +awfully cut up about it." + +"All right," says Dave, brightenin' up. "It was a dirty, mean trick +anyway to play on a cove; but I'll go up an' see her." An' he went there +'n' then. + +An' about fifteen minutes arterwards he comes boltin' back from the +house one way an' his horse the other. The horse acted as if it had a +big scare, an' so did Dave. Billy went an' ketched Dave's horse for him, +an' I got Dave a towel to wipe the dirty dish-water off of his face an' +out of his hair an' collar, an' I give him a piece of soap to rub on the +places where he'd been scalded. + +"Why, the woman must be ravin' mad," I says. "Whatever did yer say to +her this time, Dave? Yer allers gettin' inter hot water with her." + +"I didn't say nothin'," says Dave. "I jest went up laughin' like, an' +says, `How are yer, Mrs Hardwick?' an' she ups an' lets me have a dish +of dirty wash-up water, an' then on top of that she let fly with a +dipper of scaldin'-hot, greasy water outer the boiler. She's gone clean +ravin' mad, I think." + +"She's as mad as a hatter, right enough, Dave," says Billy Grimshaw. +"Don't you go there no more, Dave, it ain't safe." An' we lent Dave a +hat an' a clean shirt, an' he went on inter town. "You ought to have +humoured her," says Billy, as Dave rode away. "You ought to have told +her to put a wet bag over her chimbly an' hang the fish inside to +smoke." But Dave was too stunned to ketch on. He went on inter the town +an' got on a howlin' spree. An' while he was soberin' up the thing began +to dawn on him. An' the nex' time he met Billy they had a fight. An' +Dave got another woman to speak to Mrs Hardwick, an' Mrs Hardwick +ketched young Tommy goin' past her place one day an' bailed him up an' +scared the truth out of him. + +"Look here!" she says to him, "I want the truth, the whole truth, an' +nothin' but the truth about them fish, an' if I don't get it outer you +I'll wring yer young neck for tryin' to poison me, an' save yer from the +gallust!" she says to Tommy. + +So he told her the whole truth, swelp him, an' got away; an' he +respected Mrs Hardwick arter that. + +An' next time we come past with the teams we seen Dave's horse hangin' +up outside Mrs Hardwick's, an' we went some miles further along the road +an' camped in a new place where we'd be more comfortable. An' ever arter +that we used to always whip up an' drive past her place as if we didn't +know her. + + + + +"SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?" + + God's preacher, of churches unheeded, + God's vineyard, though barren the sod, + Plain spokesman where spokesman is needed, + Rough link 'twixt the Bushman and God. + The Christ of the Never. + + TOLD BY JOE WILSON + + +I never told you about Peter M'Laughlan. He was a sort of bush +missionary up-country and out back in Australia, and before he died he +was known from Riverina down south in New South Wales to away up through +the Never-Never country in western Queensland. + +His past was a mystery, so, of course, there were all sorts of yarns +about him. He was supposed to be a Scotchman from London, and some said +that he had got into trouble in his young days and had had to clear out +of the old country; or, at least, that he had been a ne'e-er-do-well and +had been sent out to Australia on the remittance system. Some said he'd +studied for the law, some said he'd studied for a doctor, while others +believed that he was, or had been, an ordained minister. I remember one +man who swore (when he was drinking) that he had known Peter M'Laughlan +as a medical student in a big London hospital, and that he had started +in practice for himself somewhere near Gray's Inn Road in London. +Anyway, as I got to know him he struck me as being a man who had looked +into the eyes of so much misery in his life that some of it had got into +his own. + +He was a tall man, straight and well built, and about forty or +forty-five, when I first saw him. He had wavy dark hair, and a close, +curly beard. I once heard a woman say that he had a beard like you see +in some Bible pictures of Christ. Peter M'Laughlan seldom smiled; there +was something in his big dark brown eyes that was scarcely misery, nor +yet sadness--a sort of haunted sympathy. + +He must have had money, or else he got remittances from home, for he +paid his way and helped many a poor devil. They said that he gave away +most of his money. Sometimes he worked for a while himself as bookkeeper +at a shearing-shed, wool-sorter, shearer, even rouseabout; he'd work +at anything a bushman could get to do. Then he'd go out back to +God-forgotten districts and preach to bushmen in one place, and get a +few children together in another and teach them to read. He could take +his drink, and swear a little when he thought it necessary. On one +occasion, at a rough shearing-shed, he called his beloved brethren +"damned fools" for drinking their cheques. + +Towards the end of his life if he went into a "rough" shed or shanty +west of the Darling River--and some of them _were_ rough--there would be +a rest in the language and drinking, even a fight would be interrupted, +and there would be more than one who would lift their hats to Peter +M'Laughlan. A bushman very rarely lifts his hat to a man, yet the +worst characters of the West have listened bareheaded to Peter when he +preached. + +It was said in our district that Peter only needed to hint to the +squatter that he wanted fifty or a hundred pounds to help someone or +something, and the squatter would give it to him without question or +hesitation. + +He'd nurse sick boundary-riders, shearers, and station-hands, often +sitting in the desolate hut by the bedside of a sick man night after +night. And, if he had time, he'd look up the local blacks and see how +they were getting on. Once, on a far outback sheep station, he sat for +three nights running, by the bedside of a young Englishman, a B.A. they +said he was, who'd been employed as tutor at the homestead and who died +a wreck, the result of five years of life in London and Paris. The poor +fellow was only thirty. And the last few hours of his life he talked to +Peter in French, nothing but French. Peter understood French and one +or two other languages, besides English and Australian; but whether the +young wreck was raving or telling the story of a love, or his life, none +of us ever knew, for Peter never spoke of it. But they said that at the +funeral Peter's eyes seemed haunted more than usual. + +There's the yarn about Peter and the dying cattle at Piora Station one +terrible drought, when the surface was as bare as your hand for hundreds +of miles, and the heat like the breath of a furnace, and the sheep and +cattle were perishing by thousands. Peter M'Laughlan was out on the run +helping the station-hands to pull out cattle that had got bogged in the +muddy waterholes and were too weak to drag themselves out, when, about +dusk, a gentlemanly "piano-fingered" parson, who had come to the station +from the next town, drove out in his buggy to see the men. He spoke to +Peter M'Laughlan. + +"Brother," he said, "do you not think we should offer up a prayer?" + +"What for?" asked Peter, standing in his shirt sleeves, a rope in his +hands and mud from head to foot. + +"For? Why, for rain, brother," replied the parson, a bit surprised. + +Peter held up his finger and said "Listen!" + +Now, with a big mob of travelling stock camped on the plain at night, +there is always a lowing, soughing or moaning sound, a sound like that +of the sea on the shore at a little distance; and, altogether, it might +be called the sigh or yawn of a big mob in camp. But the long, low +moaning of cattle dying of hunger and thirst on the hot barren plain +in a drought is altogether different, and, at night there is something +awful about it--you couldn't describe it. This is what Peter M'Laughlan +heard. + +"Do you hear that?" he asked the other preacher. + +The little parson said he did. Perhaps _he_ only heard the weak lowing +of cattle. + +"Do you think that God will hear us when He does not hear _that_?" asked +Peter. + +The parson stared at him for a moment and then got into his buggy and +drove away, greatly shocked and deeply offended. But, later on, over tea +at the homestead, he said that he felt sure that that "unfortunate +man," Peter M'Laughlan, was not in his right mind; that his wandering, +irregular life, or the heat, must have affected him. + +I well remember the day when I first heard Peter M'Laughlan preach. I +was about seventeen then. We used sometimes to attend service held +on Sunday afternoon, about once a month, in a little slab-and-bark +school-house in the scrub off the main road, three miles or so from +our selection, in a barren hole amongst the western ridges of the Great +Dividing Range. School was held in this hut for a few weeks or a few +months now and again, when a teacher could be got to stay there +and teach, and cook for himself, for a pound a week, more or less +contributed by the parents. A parson from the farming town to the east, +or the pastoral town over the ridges to the west, used to come in his +buggy when it didn't rain and wasn't too hot to hold the service. + +I remember this Sunday. It was a blazing hot day towards the end of a +long and fearful drought which ruined many round there. The parson +was expected, and a good few had come to "chapel" in spring-carts, on +horseback, and on foot; farmers and their wives and sons and daughters. +The children had been brought here to Sunday-school, taught by some +of the girls, in the morning. I can see it all now quite plain: The +one-roomed hut, for it was no more, with the stunted blue-grey gum, +scrub all round. The white, dusty road, so hot that you could cook eggs +in the dust. The horses tied up, across the road, in the supposed shade +under clumps of scraggy saplings along by the fence of a cattle-run. +The little crowd outside the hut: selectors in washed and mended tweeds, +some with paper collars, some wearing starched and ironed white coats, +and in blucher boots, greased or blackened, or the young men wearing +"larstins" (elastic-side boots). The women and girls in prints and +cottons (or cheap "alpaca," etc.), and a bright bit of ribbon here and +there amongst the girls. The white heat blazed everywhere, and "dazzled" +across light-coloured surfaces--dead white trees, fence-posts, and +sand-heaps, like an endless swarm of bees passing in the sun's glare. +And over above the dry boxscrub-covered ridges, the great Granite Peak, +glaring like a molten mass. + +The people didn't like to go inside out of the heat and sit down before +the minister came. The wretched hut was a rough school, sometimes with a +clay fire-place where the teacher cooked, and a corner screened off with +sacking where he had his bunk; it was a camp for tramps at other times, +or lizards and possums, but to-day it was a house of God, and as such +the people respected it. + +The town parson didn't turn up. Perhaps he was unwell, or maybe the hot, +dusty ten-mile drive was too much for him to face. One of the farmers, +who had tried to conduct service on a previous occasion on which the +ordained minister had failed us, had broken down in the middle of it, +so he was out of the question. We waited for about an hour, and then who +should happen to ride along but Peter M'Laughlan, and one or two of the +elder men asked him to hold service. He was on his way to see a sick +friend at a sheep station over the ridges, but he said that he could +spare an hour or two. (Nearly every man who was sick, either in stomach +or pocket, was a friend of Peter M'Laughlan.) Peter tied up his horse +under a bush shed at the back of the hut, and we followed him in. + +The "school" had been furnished with a rough deal table and a wooden +chair for "the teacher," and with a few rickety desks and stools cadged +from an old "provisional" school in town when the new public school +was built; and the desks and stools had been fastened to the floor to +strengthen them; they had been made for "infant" classes, and youth out +our way ran to length. But when grown men over six feet high squeezed +in behind the desks and sat down on the stools the effect struck me as +being ridiculous. In fact, I am afraid that on the first occasion it +rather took my attention from the sermon, and I remember being made +very uncomfortable by a school chum, Jack Barnes, who took a delight in +catching my eye and winking or grinning. He could wink without changing +a solemn line in his face and grin without exploding, and I couldn't. +The boys usually sat on seats, slabs on blocks of wood, along the wall +at the far end of the room, which was comfortable, for they had a rest +for their backs. One or two of the boys were nearing six feet high, so +they could almost rest their chins on their knees as they sat. But +I squatted with some of my tribe on a stool along the wall by the +teacher's table, and so could see most of the congregation. + +Above us bare tie-beams and the round sapling rafters (with the bark +still on), and the inner sides of the sheets of stringybark that formed +the roof. The slabs had been lined with sacking at one time, but most +of it had fallen or dry-rotted away; there were wide cracks between the +slabs and we could see the white glare of sunlight outside, with a strip +of dark shade, like a deep trench in the white ground, by the back wall. +Someone had brought a canvas water-bag and hung it to the beam on the +other side of the minister's table, with a pint-pot over the tap, and +the drip, drip from the bag made the whole place seem cooler. + +I studied Peter M`Laughlan first. He was dressed in washed and mended +tweed vest and trousers, and had on a long, lightcoloured coat of a +material which we called "Chinese silk." He wore a "soft" cotton shirt +with collar attached, and blucher boots. He gave out a hymn in his +quiet, natural way, said a prayer, gave out another hymn, read a chapter +from the Bible, and then gave out another hymn. They liked to sing, out +in those places. The Southwicks used to bring a cranky little harmonium +in the back of their old dog-cart, and Clara Southwick used to accompany +the hymns. She was a very pretty girl, fair, and could play and sing +well. I used to think she had the sweetest voice I ever heard. But--ah, +well-- + +Peter didn't sing himself, at first. I got an idea that he couldn't. +While they were singing he stood loosely, with one hand in his +trouser-pocket, scratching his beard with his hymn-book, and looking +as if he were thinking things over, and only rousing himself to give +another verse. He forgot to give it once or twice, but we got through +all right. I noticed the wife of one of the men who had asked Peter to +preach looking rather black at her husband, and I reckoned that he'd get +it hotter than the weather on the way home. + +Then Peter stood up and commenced to preach. He stood with both hands in +his pockets, at first, his coat ruffled back, and there was the stem of +a clay pipe sticking out of his waistcoat pocket. The pipe fascinated me +for a while, but after that I forgot the pipe and was fascinated by the +man. Peter's face was one that didn't strike you at first with its +full strength, it grew on you; it grew on me, and before he had done +preaching I thought it was the noblest face I had ever seen. + +He didn't preach much of hope in this world. How could he? The drought +had been blazing over these districts for nearly a year, with only a +shower now and again, which was a mockery--scarcely darkening the baked +ground. Wheat crops came up a few inches and were parched by the sun or +mown for hay, or the cattle turned on them; and last year there had been +rust and smut in the wheat. And, on top of it all, the dreadful cattle +plague, pleuro-pneumonia, had somehow been introduced into the district. +One big farmer had lost fifty milkers in a week. + +Peter M'Laughlan didn't preach much of hope in this world; how could +he? There were men there who had slaved for twenty, thirty, forty years; +worked as farmers have to work in few other lands--first to clear the +stubborn bush from the barren soil, then to fence the ground, and manure +it, and force crops from it--and for what? There was Cox, the farmer, +starved off his selection after thirty years and going out back with his +drays to work at tank-sinking for a squatter. There was his eldest +son going shearing or droving--anything he could get to do--a +stoop-shouldered, young-old man of thirty. And behind them, in the end, +would be a dusty patch in the scrub, a fencepost here and there, and a +pile of chimney-stones and a hardwood slab or two where the but was--for +thirty hard years of the father's life and twenty of the son's. + +I forget Peter's text, if he had a text; but the gist of his sermon +was that there was a God--there was a heaven! And there were men there +listening who needed to believe these things. There was old Ross from +across the creek, old, but not sixty, a hard man. Only last week he had +broken down and fallen on his knees on the baked sods in the middle of +his ploughed ground and prayed for rain. His frightened boys had taken +him home, and later on, the same afternoon, when they brought news of +four more cows down with "the pleuro" in an outer paddock, he had stood +up outside his own door and shaken his fist at the brassy sky and cursed +high heaven to the terror of his family, till his brave, sun-browned +wife dragged him inside and soothed him. And Peter M'Laughlan knew all +about this. + +Ross's family had the doctor out to him, and persuaded him to come to +church this Sunday. The old man sat on the front seat, stooping forward, +with his elbow resting on the desk and his chin on his hand, bunching up +his beard over his mouth with his fingers and staring gloomily at Peter +with dark, piercing eyes from under bushy eyebrows, just as I've since +seen a Scotchman stare at Max O'Rell all through a humorous lecture +called "A nicht wi' Sandy." + +Ross's right hand resting on the desk was very eloquent: horny, scarred +and knotted at every joint, with broken, twisted nails, and nearly +closed, as though fitted to the handle of an axe or a spade. Ross was +an educated man (he had a regular library of books at home), and perhaps +that's why he suffered so much. + +Peter preached as if he were speaking quietly to one person only, but +every word was plain and every sentence went straight to someone. I +believe he looked every soul in the eyes before he had done. Once he +said something and caught my eye, and I felt a sudden lump in my throat. +There was a boy there, a pale, thin, sensitive boy who was eating his +heart out because of things he didn't understand. He was ambitious and +longed for something different from this life; he'd written a story or +two and some rhymes for the local paper; his companions considered him +a "bit ratty" and the grown-up people thought him a "bit wrong in his +head," idiotic, or at least "queer." And during his sermon Peter spoke +of "unsatisfied longings," of the hope of something better, and said +that one had to suffer much and for long years before he could preach or +write; and then he looked at that boy. I knew the boy very well; he has +risen in the world since then. + +Peter spoke of the life we lived, of the things we knew, and used names +and terms that we used. "I don't know whether it was a blanky sermon or +a blanky lecture," said long swanky Jim Bullock afterwards, "but it was +straight and hit some of us hard. It hit me once or twice, I can tell +yer." Peter spoke of our lives: "And there is beauty--even in this life +and in this place," he said. "Nothing is wasted--nothing is without +reason. There is beauty even in this place----" + +I noticed something like a hint of a hard smile on Ross's face; he moved +the hand on the desk and tightened it. + +"Yes," said Peter, as if in answer to Ross's expression and the movement +of his hand, "there is beauty in this life here. After a good season, +and when the bush is tall and dry, when the bush-fires threaten a man's +crop of ripened wheat, there are tired men who run and ride from miles +round to help that man, and who fight the fire all night to save his +wheat--and some of them may have been wrangling with him for years. And +in the morning, when the wheat is saved and the danger is past, when the +fire is beaten out or turned, there are blackened, grimy hands that come +together and grip-hands that have not joined for many a long day." + +Old Palmer, Ross's neighbour, moved uneasily. He had once helped Ross to +put a fire out, but they had quarrelled again since. Ross still sat in +the same position, looking the hard man he was. Peter glanced at Ross, +looked down and thought a while, and then went on again: + +"There is beauty even in this life and in this place. When a man loses +his farm, or his stock, or his crop, through no fault of his own, there +are poor men who put their hands into their pockets to help him." + +Old Kurtz, over the ridge, had had his stacked crop of wheat in sheaf +burned--some scoundrel had put a match to it at night--and the farmers +round had collected nearly fifty pounds for him. + +"There is beauty even in this life and in this place. In the blazing +drought, when the cattle lie down and cannot rise from weakness, +neighbours help neighbours to lift them. When one man has hay or chaff +and no stock, he gives it or sells it cheaply to the poor man who has +starving cattle and no fodder." + +I only knew one or two instances of this kind; but Peter was preaching +of what man should do as well as what they did. + +"When a man meets with an accident, or dies, there are young men who go +with their ploughs and horses and plough the ground for him or his widow +and put in the crop." + +Jim Bullock and one or two other young men squirmed. They had ploughed +old Leonard's land for him when he met with an accident in the shape +of a broken leg got by a kick from a horse. They had also ploughed the +ground for Mrs Phipps when her husband died, working, by the way, all +Saturday afternoon and Sunday, for they were very busy at home at that +time. + +"There is beauty even in this life and in this place. There are women +who were friends in girlhood and who quarrelled bitterly over a careless +word, an idle tale, or some paltry thing, who live within a mile of +each other and have not spoken for years; yet let one fall ill, or lose +husband or child, and the other will hurry across to her place and +take off her bonnet and tuck up her sleeves, and set to work to help +straighten things, and they will kiss, and cry in each other's arms, and +be sisters again." + +I saw tears in the eyes of two hard and hard-faced women I knew; but +they were smiling to each other through their tears. + +"And now," said Peter, "I want to talk to you about some other things. I +am not preaching as a man who has been taught to preach comfortably, but +as a man who has learned in the world's school. I know what trouble +is. Men," he said, still speaking quietly, "and women too! I have been +through trouble as deep as any of yours--perhaps deeper. I know how you +toil and suffer, I know what battles you fight, I know. I too fought a +battle, perhaps as hard as any you fight. I carry a load and am fighting +a battle still." His eyes were very haggard just them. "But this is +not what I wanted to talk to you about. I have nothing to say against +a young man going away from this place to better himself, but there +are young men who go out back shearing or droving, young men who are +goodhearted but careless, who make cheques, and spend their money +gambling or drinking and never think of the old folk at home until it +is too late. They never think of the old people, alone, perhaps, in a +desolate but on a worked-out farm in the scrub." + +Jim Bullock squirmed again. He had gone out back last season and made a +cheque, and lost most of it on horse-racing and cards. + +"They never think--they cannot think how, perhaps, long years agone in +the old days, the old father, as a young man, and his brave young wife, +came out here and buried themselves in the lonely bush and toiled +for many years, trying--it does not matter whether they failed or +not--trying to make homes for their children; toiled till the young man +was bowed and grey, and the young wife brown and wrinkled and worn out. +Exiles they were in the early days--boy-husbands and girl-wives some +of them, who left their native lands, who left all that was dear, that +seemed beautiful, that seemed to make life worth living, and sacrificed +their young lives in drought and utter loneliness to make homes for +their children. I want you young men to think of this. Some of them came +from England, Ireland, Bonnie Scotland." Ross straightened up and let +his hands fall loosely on his knees. "Some from Europe--your foreign +fathers--some from across the Rhine in Germany." We looked at old Kurtz. +He seemed affected. + +Then Peter paused for a moment and blinked thoughtfully at Ross, then he +took a drink of water. I can see now that the whole thing was a battle +between Peter M'Laughlan and Robert Ross--Scot met Scot. "It seemed to +me," Jim Bullock said afterwards, "that Peter was only tryin' to make +some of us blanky well blubber." + +"And there are men," Peter went on, "who have struggled and suffered +and failed, and who have fought and failed again till their tempers are +spoiled, until they grow bitter. They go in for self-pity, and self-pity +leads to moping and brooding and madness; self-pity is the most selfish +and useless thing on the face of God's earth. It is cruel, it is deadly, +both to the man and to those who love him, and whom he ought to love. +His load grows heavier daily in his imagination, and he sinks down until +it is in him to curse God and die. He ceases to care for or to think +of his children who are working to help him." (Ross's sons were good, +steady, hard-working boys.) "Or the brave wife who has been so true to +him for many hard years, who left home and friends and country for his +sake. Who bears up in the blackest of times, and persists in looking at +the bright side of things for his sake; who has suffered more than he +if he only knew it, and suffers now, through him and because of him, but +who is patient and bright and cheerful while her heart is breaking. He +thinks she does not suffer, that she cannot suffer as a man does. My +God! he doesn't know. He has forgotten in her the bright, fresh-faced, +loving lassie he loved and won long years agone--long years agone----" + +There was a sob, like the sob of an over-ridden horse as it sinks down +broken-hearted, and Ross's arms went out on the desk in front of him, +and his head went down on them. He was beaten. + +He was steered out gently with his wife on one side of him and his +eldest son on the other. + +"Don't be alarmed, my friends," said Peter, standing by the water-bag +with one hand on the tap and the pannikin in the other. "Mr Ross has not +been well lately, and the heat has been too much for him." And he went +out after Ross. They took him round under the bush shed behind the hut, +where it was cooler. + +When Peter came back to his place he seemed to have changed his whole +manner and tone. "Our friend, Mr Ross, is much better," he said. "We +will now sing"--he glanced at Clara Southwick at the harmonium--"we will +now sing `Shall We Gather at the River?'" We all knew that hymn; it +was an old favourite round there, and Clara Southwick played it well in +spite of the harmonium. + +And Peter sang--the first and last time I ever heard him sing. I never +had an ear for music; but I never before nor since heard a man's voice +that stirred me as Peter M'Laughlan's. We stood like emus, listening to +him all through one verse, then we pulled ourselves together. + + Shall we gather at the River, + Where bright angels' feet have trod-- + +The only rivers round there were barren creeks, the best of them only +strings of muddy waterholes, and across the ridge, on the sheep-runs, +the creeks were dry gutters, with baked banks and beds, and perhaps a +mudhole every mile or so, and dead beasts rotting and stinking every few +yards. + + Gather with the saints at the River, + That flows by the throne of God. + +Peter's voice trembled and broke. He caught his breath, and his eyes +filled. But he smiled then--he stood smiling at us through his tears. + + The beautiful, the beautiful River, + That flows by the throne of God. + +Outside I saw women kiss each other who had been at daggers drawn ever +since I could remember, and men shake hands silently who had hated each +other for years. Every family wanted Peter to come home to tea, but he +went across to Ross's, and afterwards down to Kurtz's place, and bled +and inoculated six cows or so in a new way, and after tea he rode off +over the gap to see his friend. + + + + +HIS BROTHER'S KEEPER + + By his paths through the parched desolation, + Hot rides and the terrible tramps; + By the hunger, the thirst, the privation + Of his work in the furthermost camps; + + By his worth in the light that shall search men + And prove--ay! and justify each-- + I place him in front of all Churchmen + Who feel not, who _know_ not--but preach! + --The Christ of the Never. + +I told you about Peter M'Laughlan, the bush missionary, and how he +preached in the little slab-and-bark school-house in the scrub on Ross's +Creek that blazing hot Sunday afternoon long ago, when the drought was +ruining the brave farmers all round there and breaking their hearts. And +how hard old Ross, the selector, broke down at the end of the sermon, +and blubbered, and had to be taken out of church. + +I left home and drifted to Sydney, and "back into the Great North-West +where all the rovers go," and knocked about the country for six or seven +years before I met Peter M'Laughlan again. I was young yet, but felt old +at times, and there were times, in the hot, rough, greasy shearing-shed +on blazing days, or in the bare "men's hut" by the flicker of the +stinking slush-lamp at night, or the wretched wayside shanty with +its drink-madness and blasphemy, or tramping along the dusty, endless +track--there were times when I wished I could fall back with all the +experience I'd got, and sit once more in the little slab-and-bark +"chapel" on Ross's Creek and hear Peter M'Laughlan and the poor, +struggling selectors sing "Shall We Gather at the River?" and then go +out and start life afresh. + +My old school chum and bush mate, Jack Barnes, had married pretty little +Clara Southwick, who used to play the portable harmonium in chapel. I +nearly broke my heart when they were married, but then I was a young +fool. Clara was a year or so older than I, and I could never get away +from a boyish feeling of reverence for her, as if she were something +above and out of my world. And so, while I was worshipping her in chapel +once a month, and at picnics and parties in between, and always at a +distance, Jack used to ride up to Southwick's place on Saturday and +Sunday afternoons, and on other days, and hang his horse up outside, or +turn it in the paddock, and argue with old Southwick, and agree with the +old woman, and court Clara on the sly. And he got her. + +It was at their wedding that I first got the worse for drink. + +Jack was a blue-eyed, curly black-haired, careless, popular young scamp; +as good-hearted as he was careless. He could ride like a circus monkey, +do all kinds of bush work, add two columns of figures at once, and write +like copper-plate. + +Jack was given to drinking, gambling and roving. He steadied up when he +got married and started on a small selection of his own; but within the +year Clara was living in a back skillion of her father's house and Jack +was up-country shearing. He was "ringer" of the shed at Piora Station +one season and made a decent cheque; and within a fortnight after the +shed "cut out" he turned up at home in a very bad state from drink and +with about thirty shillings in his pockets. He had fallen from his horse +in the creek near Southwick's, and altogether he was a nice sort of +young husband to go home to poor, heart-broken Clara. + +I remember that time well. She stopped me one day as I was riding past +to ask me if I'd seen Jack, and I got off my horse. Her chin and mouth +began to twitch and tremble and I saw her eyes filling with tears. She +laid her hand on my arm and asked me to promise not to drink with Jack +if I met him, but to try and persuade him to come home. And--well, have +you, as a man, ever, with the one woman that you can't have, and no +matter at what time or place, felt a sudden mad longing to take her in +your arms and kiss her--and damn the world? I got on my horse again. She +must have thought me an ignorant brute, but I felt safer there. And when +I thought how I had nearly made a fool of myself, and been a cowardly +brute, and a rotten mate to my mate, I rode ten miles to find Jack and +get him home. + +He straightened up again after a bit and went out and got another shed, +and they say that Peter M'Laughlan got hold of him there. I don't know +what Peter did to him then--Jack never spoke of it, even to me, his old +mate; but, anyway, at the end of the shearing season Jack's cheque +came home to Clara in a registered envelope, addressed in Peter's +hand-writing, and about a week later Jack turned up a changed man. + +He got work as a temporary clerk in the branch government land office +at Solong, a pretty little farming town in a circle of blue hills on +the banks of a clear, willow-fringed river, where there were rich, +black-soil, river-flat farms, and vineyards on the red soil slopes, and +blue peaks in the distance. It was a great contrast to Ross's Creek. +Jack paid a deposit on an allotment of land, a bit out of town, on the +river bank, and built a little weather-board box of a cottage in spare +times, and planted roses and grape-vines to hide its ugliness by and by. +It wasn't much of a place, but Clara was mighty proud of it because it +was "our house." They were very happy, and she was beginning to feel +sure of Jack. She seemed to believe that the miserable old time was all +past and gone. + +When the work at the land's office gave out, Jack did all sorts of jobs +about town, and at last, one shearing season, when there was a heavy +clip of wool, and shearers were getting L1 a hundred, he decided to go +out back. I know that Clara was against it, but he argued that it was +the only chance for him, and she persuaded herself that she could trust +him. I was knocking about Solong at the time, and Jack and I decided to +go out together and share his packhorse between us. He wrote to Beenaway +Shed, about three hundred: miles north-west in the Great Scrubs, and got +pens for both of us. + +It was a fine fresh morning when we started; it was in a good season and +the country looked grand. When I rode up to Jack's place I saw his horse +and packhorse tied up outside the gate. He had wanted me to come up +the evening before and have tea with them and camp at his place for the +night. "Come up! man alive!" he said. "We'll make you a shake-down!" But +I wouldn't; I said I had to meet a chap. Jack wouldn't have understood. +I had been up before, but when I saw him and Clara so happy and +comfortable, and thought of the past and my secret, and thought of +myself, a useless, purposeless, restless, homeless sort of fellow, +hanging out at a boarding-house, it nearly broke me up, and I had to +have a drink or two afterwards. I often wonder if Clara guessed and +understood. You never know how much a woman knows; but--ah, well! + +Jack had taken my things home with him and he and Clara had packed them. +I found afterwards that she had washed, dried and ironed some collars +and handkerchiefs of mine during the night. Clara and Jack came out to +the gate, and as I wouldn't go in to have a cup of tea there was nothing +for it but to say good-bye. She was dressed in a fresh-looking print +blouse and dark skirt, and wore a white hood that fell back from her +head; she was a little girl, with sweet, small, freckled features, +and red-gold hair, and kind, sympathetic grey eyes. I thought her the +freshest, and fairest, and daintiest little woman in the district. + +I was Jack's mate, so she always treated me as a sort of brother-in-law, +and called me by my Christian name. Mates are closer than brothers in +the bush. + +I turned my back and pretended to tighten the straps and girths on +the packhorse while she said good-bye to Jack. I heard her speaking +earnestly to him, and once I heard her mention Peter M`Laughlan's name. +I thought Jack answered rather impatiently. "Oh, that's all right, +Clara," he said, "that's all over--past and gone. I wish you would +believe it. You promised never to speak of that any more." + +I know how it was. Jack never cared to hear about Peter; he was too +ashamed of the past, perhaps; besides, deep down, we feel a sort of +resentment towards any reference to a man who has helped or saved us in +the past. It's human nature. + +Then they spoke in low tones for a while, and then Jack laughed, and +kissed her, and said, "Oh, I'll be back before the time's up." Then he +ran into the house to say good-bye to Mary's sister, who was staying +with her, and who was laid up with a sprained ankle. + +Then Clara stepped up to me and laid her fingers on my shoulder. I +trembled from head to foot and hoped she didn't notice it. + +"Joe," she said, looking at me with her big, searching grey eyes, "I +believe I can trust you. I want you to look after Jack. You know why. +Never let him have one drink if you can help it. One drink--the first +drink will do it. I want you to promise me that you will never have a +drink with Jack, no matter what happens or what he says." + +"I never will," I said, and I meant it. + +"It's the first time he's been away from me since he gave up drinking, +and if he comes back all right this time I will be sure of him and +contented. But, Joe, if he comes back wrong it will kill me; it will +break my heart. I want you to promise that if anything happens you will +ride or wire for Peter M'Laughlan. I hear he's wool-sorting this year at +Beenaway Station. Promise me that if anything happens you will ride for +Peter M'Laughlan and tell him, no matter what Jack says." + +"I promise," I said. + +She half-held out her hand to me, but I kept both mine behind my back. +I suppose she thought I didn't notice that she wanted to shake hands on +the bargain; but the truth was that my hands shook so, and I didn't want +her to notice _that_. + +I got on my horse and felt steadier. Then, "Good-bye, Clara"--"Good-bye, +Jack." She bore up bravely, but I saw her eyes brimming. Jack got on +his horse, and I bent over and shook hands with her. Jack bent down and +kissed her while she stood on tiptoe. "Good-bye, little woman," he said. +"Cheer up, and I'll be back before you know where you are! You mustn't +fret--you know why." + +"Good-bye, Jack!"--she was breaking down. + +"Come on, Jack!" I said, and we rode off, turning and waving our hats +to her as she stood by the gate, looking a desolate little thing, I +thought, till we turned down a bend of the road into the river. + +As we jogged along with the packhorse trotting behind us, and the +quart-pots and hobble-chains jingling on the packsaddle, I pictured +Clara running inside, to cry a while in her sister's arms, and then +to bustle round and cheer up, for Jack's sake--and for the sake of +something else. + + +"I'll christen him after you, Joe," said Jack, later on, when we'd got +confidential over our pipes after tea in our first camp. It never seemed +to enter his head that there was the ghost of a chance that it might be +a girl. "I'm glad he didn't come along when I was drinking," he said. + +And as we lay rolled in our blankets under the stars I swore a big oath +to myself. + +We got along comfortably and reached Beenaway Station in about a week, +the day before the shearers' roll-call. Jack never showed the slightest +inclination to go into a shanty; and several times we talked about +old times and what damned fools we'd been throwing away our money over +shanty bars shouting for loafers and cadgers. "Isn't this ever so-much +better, Joe!" said Jack, as we lay on our blankets smoking one moonlight +night. "There's nothing in boozing, Joe, you can take it from me. Just +you sling it for a year and then look back; you won't want to touch it +again. You've been straight for a couple of months. Sling it for good, +Joe, before it gets a hold on you, like it did on me." + + +It was the morning after cut-out at Beenaway Shed, and we were glad. +We were tired of the rush and roar and rattle and heat and grease and +blasphemy of the big, hot, iron machine shed in that dusty patch in the +barren scrubs. Swags were rolled up, saddle-bags packed, horses had been +rounded up and driven in, the shearers' cook and his mate had had +their fight, and about a hundred men--shearers, rouseabouts, and +wool-washers--were waiting round the little iron office to get their +cheques. + +We were about half through when one bushman said to another: "Stop your +damned swearin', Jim. Here's Peter M'Laughlan!" Peter walked up and +the men made way for him and he went into the office. There was always +considerably less swearing for a few feet round about where Peter +M'Laughlan happened to be working in a shearing-shed. It seemed to be an +understood thing with the men. He took no advantages, never volunteered +to preach at a shed where he was working, and only spoke on union +subjects when the men asked him to. He was "rep." (Shearers' Union +representative) at this shed, but squatters and station managers +respected him as much as the men did. + +He seemed much greyer now, but still stood square and straight. And his +eyes still looked one through. + +When Peter came out and the crowd had cleared away he took Jack aside +and spoke to him in a low voice for a few minutes. I heard Jack say, +"Oh, that's all right, Peter! You have my word for it," and he got on +his horse. I heard Peter say the one word, "Remember!" "Oh, that's all +right," said Jack, and he shook hands with Peter, shouted, "Come on, +Joe!" and started off with the packhorse after him. + +"I wish I were going down with you, Joe," said Peter to me, "but I can't +get away till to-morrow. I've got that sick rouseabout on my hands, and +I'll have to see him fixed up somehow and started off to the hospital" +(the nearest was a hundred miles away). "And, by the way, I've taken +up a collection for him; I want a few shillings from you, Joe. I nearly +forgot you. The poor fellow only got in about a fortnight's work, +and there's a wife and youngsters in Sydney. I'll be down after you +to-morrow. I promised to go to Comesomehow* and get the people together +and start an agitation for a half-time school there. Anyway, I'll be +there by the end of the week. Good-bye, Joe. I must get some more money +for the rouser from some of those chaps before they start." + + [* There is a postal district in new South Wales called + "Come-by-Chance"] + +Comesomehow was a wretched cockatoo settlement, a bit off the track, +about one hundred and fifty miles on our road home, where the settlers +lived like savages and the children ran wild. I reckoned that Peter +would have his work cut out to start a craving for education in that +place. + +By saying he'd be there I think he intended to give me a hint, in case +anything happened. I believe now that Jack's wife had got anxious and +had written to him. + +We jogged along comfortably and happily for three or four days, and as +we passed shanty after shanty, and town after town, without Jack showing +the slightest inclination to pull up at any of them, I began to feel +safe about him. + +Then it happened, in the simplest way, as most things of this sort +happen if you don't watch close. + +The third night it rained, rained heavens-hard, and rainy nights can be +mighty cold out on those plains, even in midsummer. Jack and I rigged up +a strip of waterproof stuff we had to cover the swags on the packhorse, +but the rain drove in, almost horizontally, and we got wet through, +blankets, clothes and all. Jack got a bad cold and coughed fit to break +himself; so about daylight, when the rain held up a bit, we packed up +and rode on to the next pub, a wretched little weather-board place in +the scrub. + +Jack reckoned he'd get some stuff for his cold there. I didn't like to +speak, but before we reached the place I said, "You won't touch a drink, +Jack." + +"Do you think I'm a blanky fool?" said Jack, and I shut up. + +The shanty was kept by a man who went by the name of Thomas, a notorious +lamber-down,* as I found out afterwards. He was a big, awkward bullock +of a man, a selfish, ignorant brute, as anyone might have seen by his +face; but he had a loud voice, and adopted a careless, +rollicking, hail-fellow-well-met! come-in-and-sit-down-man-alive! +clap-you-on-the-back style, which deceived a good many, or which a good +many pretended to believe in. His "missus" was an animal of his own +species, but she was duller and didn't bellow. + + [ * "Lamber-down," a shanty keeper who entices cheque-men + to drink. ] + +He had a rather good-looking girl there--I don't know whether she was +his daughter or not. They said that when he saw the shearers coming he'd +say, "Run and titivate yourself, Mary; here comes the shearers!" + +But what surprised me was that Jack Barnes didn't seem able to see +through Thomas; he thought that he was all right, "a bit of a rough +diamond." There are any amount of scoundrels and swindlers knocking +about the world disguised as rough diamonds. + +Jack had a fit of coughing when we came in. + +"Why, Jack!" bellowed Thomas, "that's a regular churchyarder you've got. +Go in to the kitchen fire and I'll mix you a stiff toddy." + +"No, thank you, Thomas," said Jack, glancing at me rather sheepishly, +I thought. "I'll have a hot cup of coffee presently, that'll do me more +good." + +"Why, man alive, one drink won't hurt you!" said Thomas. "I know you're +on the straight, and you know I'm the last man that 'ud try to get you +off it. But you want something for that cold. You don't want to die on +the track, do you? What would your missus say? That cough of yours is +enough to bust a bullock." + +"Jack isn't drinking, Thomas," I said rather shortly, "and neither am +I." + +"I'll have a cup of coffee at breakfast," said Jack; "thank you all the +same, Thomas." + +"Right you are, Jack!" said Thomas. "Mary!" he roared at the girl, +"chuck yerself about and get breakfast, and make a strong cup of coffee; +and I say, missus" (to his wife), "git some honey and vinegar in a cup, +will yer? or see if there's any of that cough stuff left in the bottle. +Go into the kitchen, you chaps, and dry yourselves at the fire, you're +wringing wet." + +Jack went through into the kitchen. I stepped out to see if the horses +were all right, and as I came in again through the bar, Thomas, who had +slipped behind the counter, crooked his finger at me and poured out a +stiff whisky. "I thought you might like to have it on the quiet," he +whispered, with a wink. + +Now, there was this difference between Jack and me. When I was on the +track, and healthy and contented, I could take a drink, or two drinks, +and then leave it; or at other times I could drink all day, or all +night, and be as happy as a lord, and be mighty sick and repentant all +next day, and then not touch drink for a week; but if Jack once started, +he was a lost man for days, for weeks, for, months--as long as his cash +or credit lasted. I felt a cold coming on me this morning, and wanted a +whisky, so I had a drink with Thomas. Then, of course, I shouted in my +turn, keeping an eye out in case Jack should come in. I went into the +kitchen and steamed with Jack for a while in front of a big log +fire, taking care to keep my breath away from him. Then we went in to +breakfast. Those two drinks were all I meant to have, and we were going +right on after breakfast. + +It was a good breakfast, ham and eggs, and we enjoyed it. The two +whiskies had got to work. I hadn't touched drink for a long time. I +shouldn't like to say that Thomas put anything in the drink he gave me. +Before we started breakfast he put a glass down in front of me and said: + +"There's a good ginger-ale, it will warm you up." + +I tasted it; it was rum, hot. I said nothing. What could I say? + +There was some joke about Jack being married and settled and steadied +down, and me, his old mate, still on the wallaby; and Mrs Thomas said +that I ought to follow Jack's example. And just then I felt a touch +of that loneliness that some men feel when an old drinking mate turns +teetotaller. + +Jack started coughing again, like an old cow with the pleuro. + +"That cough will kill you, Jack," said Thomas. "Let's put a drop of +brandy in your coffee, that won't start you, anyhow; it's real `Three +Star.'" And he reached a bottle from the side-table. + +I should have stood up then, for my manhood, for my mate, and for little +Clara, but I half rose from my chair, and Jack laughed and said, "Sit +down, Joe, you old fool, you're tanked. I know all about your seeing +about the horses and your ginger-ales. It's all right, old man. Do you +think I'm going on the booze? Why, I'll have to hold you on the horse +all day." + +"Here's luck, Joe!" said Jack, laughing, and lifting up his cup of +coffee with the brandy in it. "Here's luck, Joe." + +Then suddenly, and as clearly as I ever heard it, came Clara's voice to +my ear: "Promise me, whatever you do, that you will never have a drink +with Jack." And I felt cold and sick to the stomach. + +I got up and went out. They thought that the drink had made me sick, but +if I'd stayed there another minute I would have tackled Thomas; and I +knew that I needed a clear head to tackle a bullock like him. I walked +about a bit, and when I came in again Jack and Thomas were in the bar, +and Jack had a glass before him. + +"Come on, Joe, you old bounder," said Jack, "come and have a +whisky-and-soda; it will straighten you up." + +"What's that you're drinking, Jack?" I asked. + +"Oh, don't be a fool!" said Jack. "One drink won't hurt me. Do you think +I'm going on the booze? Have a soda and straighten up; we must make a +start directly." + +I remember we had two or three whiskies, and then suddenly I tackled +Thomas, and Jack was holding me back, and laughing and swearing at me +at the same time, and I had a tussle with him; and then I was suddenly +calmer and sensible, and we were shaking hands all round, and Jack was +talking about just one more spree for the sake of old times. + +"A bit of a booze won't hurt me, Joe, you old fool," he said. "We'll +have one more night of it, for the sake of Auld Lang Syne, and start +at daylight in the morning. You go and see to the horses, it will +straighten you up. Take the saddle off and hobble 'em out." + +But I insisted on starting at once, and Jack promised he would. We were +gloriously happy for an hour or so, and then I went to sleep. + +When I woke it was late in the afternoon. I was very giddy and shaky; +the girl brought me a whisky-and-soda, and that steadied me. Some more +shearers had arrived, and Jack was playing cards with two of them on top +of a cask in the bar. Thomas was dead drunk on the floor, or pretending +to be so, and his wife was behind the bar. I went out to see to the +horses; I found them in a bush yard at the back. The packhorse was +rolling in the mud with the pack-saddle and saddlebags on. One of the +chaps helped me take off the saddles and put them in the harness-room +behind the kitchen. + +I'll pass over that night. It wouldn't be very edifying to the great, +steady-living, sober majority, and the others, the never-do-wells, the +rovers, wrecks and failures, will understand only too well without being +told--only too well, God help them! + +When I woke in the morning I couldn't have touched a drink to save my +life. I was fearfully shaky, and swimming about the head, but I put my +head over a tub under the pump and got the girl to pump for a while, and +then I drank a pint of tea and managed to keep it down, and felt better. + +All through the last half of the night I'd kept saying, in a sort of +drink nightmare, "I'll go for Peter M'Laughlan in the morning. I'll go +for Peter as soon as I can stand!" and repeating Clara Barnes's words, +"Ride for Peter if anything happens. Ride for Peter M'Laughlan." + +There were drunken shearers, horsemen and swagmen sleeping all over the +place, and in all sorts of odd positions; some on the veranda with their +heads on their swags, one sitting back against the wall, and one on the +broad of his back with his head on the bare boards and his mouth open. +There was another horse rolling in its saddle, and I took the saddle +off. The horse belonged to an English University man. + +I went in to see how Jack was. He was lying in the parlour on a little, +worn-out, horse-hair sofa, that might have seen better days in some +clean home in the woman-and-girl world. He had been drinking and playing +cards till early that morning, and he looked awful--he looked as if he'd +been boozing for a month. + +"See what you've done!" he said, sitting up and glaring at me; then he +said, "Bring me a whisky-and-soda, Joe, for God's sake!" + +I got a whisky-and-soda from the girl and took it to him. + +I talked to him for a while, and at last he said, "Well, go and get the +horses and we'll start." + +I got the horses ready and brought them round to the front, but by +that time he'd had more drink, and he said he wanted to sleep before he +started. Next he was playing cards with one of the chaps, and asked me +to wait till he'd finished that game. I knew he'd keep promising and +humbugging me till there was a row, so at last I got him aside and said: + +"Look here, Jack, I'm going for Peter M'Laughlan----" + +"Go to hell!" said Jack. + +I put the other horses back in the yard, the saddles in the skillion, +got on my horse and rode off. Thomas and the others asked me no +questions, they took no notice. In a place like that a man could almost +do anything, short of hanging himself, without anyone interfering or +being surprised. And probably, if he did hang himself, they'd let him +swing for a while to get a taste of it. + +Comesomehow was about fifteen miles back on a track off the main road. I +reckoned that I could find Peter and bring him on by the afternoon, and +I rode hard, sick as I was. I was too sick to smoke. + +As it happened, Peter had started early from his last camp and I caught +him just as he was turning off into Comesomehow track. + +"What's up, Joe?" he asked as I rode up to him--but he could see. + +"Jack Barnes is on the booze at Thomas's," I said. + +Peter just looked right through me. Then he turned his horse's head +without a word, and rode back with me. And, after a while, he said, as +if to himself: + +"Poor Clara! Poor little lassie!" + +By the time we reached the shanty it was well on in the afternoon. A +fight was stopped in the first round and voices lowered when the chaps +caught sight of us. As Peter walked into the bar one or two drunks +straightened themselves and took off their hats with drunken sentiment. + +"Where is Jack Barnes, Thomas?" asked Peter, quietly. + +"He's in there if you want to see him," said Thomas, jerking his head +towards the parlour. + +We went in, and when Peter saw Jack lying there I noticed that swift, +haunted look came into his eyes, as if he'd seen a ghost of the past. He +sat down by the sofa to wait until Jack woke. I thought as he sat there +that his eyes were like a woman's for sympathy and like a dog's for +faithfulness. I was very shaky. + +Presently Thomas looked in. "Is there anything I can do for you, +M'Laughlan?" he asked in as civil a tone as he could get to. + +"Yes," said Peter, "bring me a flask of your best whisky--your own, +mind--and a glass. + +"We shall need the whisky for him on the track, Joe," said Peter, when +the flask came. "Get another glass and a bottle of soda; you want a +nip." He poured out a drink for himself. + +"The first thing we've got to do is to get him away; then I'll soon put +him on his feet. But we'll let him sleep a while longer. I find I've got +business near Solong, and I'm going down with you." + +By and by Jack woke up and glared round, and when he caught sight of +Peter he just reached for his hands and said, "Peter! Thank God you've +come!" Then he said, "But I must have a drink first, Peter." + +"All right, Jack, you shall have a drink," said Peter; and he gave him a +stiff nobblerq. It steadied Jack a bit. + +"Now listen to me, Jack," said Peter. "How much money have you got +left?" + +"I--I can't think," said Jack. "I've got a cheque for twenty pounds +here, sewn inside my shirt." + +"Yes; but you drew thirty-six in three cheques. Where's the rest?" + +"Thomas has ten," said Jack, "and the six--well, the six is gone. I was +playing cards last night." + +Peter stepped out into the bar. + +"Look here, Thomas," he said quietly, "you've got a ten-pound cheque +from Barnes." + +"I know I have." + +"Well, how much of it does he owe you?" + +"The whole, and more." + +"Do you mean to tell me that? He has only been here since yesterday +morning." + +"Yes; but he's been shoutin' all round. Look at all these chaps here." + +"They only came yesterday afternoon," said Peter. "Here, you had best +take this and give me the cheque;" and Peter laid a five-pound note +on the bar. Thomas bucked at first, but in the end he handed over the +cheque--he had had several warnings from the police. Then he suddenly +lost all control over himself; he came round from behind the bar and +faced Peter. + +"Now, look here, you mongrel parson!" he said. "What the ---- do you +mean by coming into my bar and, interfering with me. Who the ---- are +you anyway? A ----!" He used the worst oaths that were used in the bush. +"Take off your ---- coat!" he roared at last, shaping up to Peter. + +Peter stepped back a pace and buttoned his coat and threw back his head. + +"No need to take off my coat, Thomas," he said, "I am ready." + +He said it very quietly, but there was a danger-signal--a red light in +his eyes. He was quiet-voiced but hard-knuckled, as some had reason to +know. + +Thomas balked like a bull at a spread umbrella. Jack lurched past me +as I stood in the parlour door, but I caught him and held him back; and +almost at the same moment a wretched old boozer that we called "Awful +Example," who had been sitting huddled, a dirty bundle of rags and beard +and hair, in the corner of the bar, struggled to his feet, staggered +forward and faced Thomas, looking once again like something that might +have been a man. He snatched a thick glass bottle from the counter and +held it by the neck in his right hand. + + +"Stand back, Thomas!" he shouted. "Lay a hand--lay a finger on Peter +M'Laughlan, and I'll smash your head, as sure as there's a God above us +and I'm a ruined man!" + +Peter took "Awful" gently by the shoulders and sat him down. "You keep +quiet, old man," he said; "nothing is going to happen." Thomas went +round behind the bar muttering something about it not being worth his +while to, etc. + +"You go and get the horses ready, Joe," said Peter to me; "and you sit +down, Jack, and keep quiet." + +"He can get the horses," growled Thomas, from behind the bar, "but +I'm damned if he gets the saddles. I've got them locked up, and I'll +something well keep them till Barnes is sober enough to pay me what he +owes me." + +Just then a tall, good-looking chap, with dark-blue eyes and a long, +light-coloured moustache, stepped into the bar from the crowd on the +veranda. + +"What's all this, Thomas?" he asked. + +"What's that got to do with you, Gentleman Once?" shouted Thomas. + +"I think it's got something to do with me," said Gentleman Once. "Now, +look here, Thomas; you can do pretty well what you like with us poor +devils, and you know it, but we draw the line at Peter M'Laughlan. If +you really itch for the thrashing, you deserve you must tempt someone +else to give it to you." + +"What the ---- are you talking about?" snorted Thomas. "You're drunk or +ratty!" + +"What's the trouble, M'Laughlan?" asked Gentleman Once, turning to +Peter. "No trouble at all, Gentleman Once," said Peter; "thank you all +the same. I've managed worse men than our friend Thomas. Now, Thomas, +don't you think it would pay you best to hand over the key of the +harness-room and have done with this nonsense? I'm a patient man--a very +patient man--but I've not always been so, and the old blood comes up +sometimes, you know." + +Thomas couldn't stand this sort of language, because he couldn't +understand it. He threw the key on the bar and told us to clear out. + +We were all three very quiet riding along the track that evening. Peter +gave Jack a nip now and again from the flask, and before we turned in +in camp he gave him what he called a soothing draught from a little +medicine chest that he carried in his saddle-bag. Jack seemed to have +got rid of his cough; he slept all night, and in the morning, after he'd +drunk a pint of mutton-broth that Peter had made in one of the billies, +he was all right--except that he was quiet and ashamed. I had never +known him to be so quiet, and for such a length of time, since we +were boys together. He had learned his own weakness; he'd lost all his +cocksureness. I know now just exactly how he felt. He felt as if his +sober year had been lost and he would have to live it all over again. + +Peter didn't preach. He just jogged along and camped with us as if he +were an ordinary, every-day mate. He yarned about all sorts of things. +He could tell good yarns, and when he was fairly on you could listen to +him all night. He seemed to have been nearly all over the world. Peter +never preached except when he was asked to hold service in some bush +pub, station-homestead or bush church. But in a case like ours he had +a way of telling a little life story, with something in it that hit the +young man he wanted to reform, and hit him hard. He'd generally begin +quietly, when we were comfortable with our pipes in camp after tea, +with "I once knew a young man--" or "That reminds me of a young fellow I +knew--" and so on. You never knew when he was going to begin; or when +he was going to hit you. In our last camp, before we reached Solong, he +told two of his time-fuse yarns. I haven't time to tell them now, but +one stuffed up my pipe for a while, and made Jack's hand tremble when he +tried to light his. I'm glad it was too dark to see our faces. We lay a +good while afterwards, rolled in our blankets, and couldn't get to sleep +for thinking; but Peter seemed to fall asleep as soon as he turned in. + +Next day he told Jack not to tell Clara that he'd come down with us. He +said he wouldn't go right into Solong with us; he was going back along +another road to stay a day or two with an old friend of his. + +When we reached Solong we stopped on the river-bank just out of sight of +Jack's house. Peter took the ten-pound cheque from his pocket and gave +it to Jack. Jack hadn't seen Peter give the shanty-keeper the five-pound +note. + +"But I owed Thomas something," said Jack, staring. "However did you +manage to get the cheque out of him?" + +"Never mind, Jack, I managed," said Peter. + +Jack sat silent for a while, then he began to breathe hard. + +"I don't know what to say, Peter." + +"Say nothing, Jack. Only promise me that you will give Clara the cheques +as soon as you go home, and let her take care of the cash for a while." + +"I will," said Jack. + +Jack looked down at the ground for a while, then he lifted his head and +looked Peter in the eyes. + +"Peter," he said, "I can't speak. I'm ashamed to make a promise; I've +broken so many. I'll try to thank you in a year's time from now." + +"I ask for no promises," said Peter, and he held out his hand. Jack +gripped it. + +"Aren't you coming home with me, Joe?" he asked. + +"No," I said; "I'll go into town. See you in the morning." + +Jack rode on. When he got along a piece Peter left his horse and moved +up to the head of the lane to watch Jack, and I followed. As Jack neared +the cottage we saw a little figure in a cloak run out to the front +gate. She had heard the horses and the jingle of the camp-ware on the +pack-saddle. We saw Jack jump down and take her in his arms. I looked at +Peter, and as he watched them, something, that might have been a strange +look of the old days, came into his eyes. + +He shook hands with me. "Good-bye, Joe." + +He rode across the river again. He took the track that ran along the +foot of the spurs by the river, and up over a gap in the curve of blue +hills, and down and out west towards the Big Scrubs. And as he rounded +the last spur, with his packhorse trotting after him, I thought he must +have felt very lonely. And I felt lonely too. + + + + +THE STORY OF "GENTLEMAN ONCE" + + They learn the world from black-sheep, + Who know it all too well. + -Out Back. + +Peter M'Laughlan, bush missionary, Joe Wilson and his mate, Jack Barnes, +shearers for the present, and a casual swagman named Jack Mitchell, were +camped at Cox's Crossing in a bend of Eurunderee Creek. + +It was a grassy little flat with gum-trees standing clear and clean like +a park. At the back was the steep grassy siding of a ridge, and far away +across the creek to the south a spur from the Blue Mountain range +ran west, with a tall, blue granite peak showing clear in the broad +moonlight, yet dream-like and distant over the sweeps of dark green +bush. + +There was the jingle of hobble-chains and a crunching at the grass where +the horses moved in the soft shadows amongst the trees. Up the creek on +the other side was a surveyors' camp, and from there now and again came +the sound of a good voice singing verses of old songs; and later on +the sound of a violin and a cornet being played, sometimes together and +sometimes each on its own. + +Wilson and Barnes were on their way home from shearing out back in the +great scrubs at Beenaway Shed. They had been rescued by Peter M`Laughlan +from a wayside shanty where they had fallen, in spite of mutual oaths +and past promises, sacred and profane, because they had got wringing wet +in a storm on the track and caught colds, and had been tempted to take +just one drink. + +They were in a bad way, and were knocking down their cheques beautifully +when Peter M'Laughlan came along. He rescued them and some of their cash +from the soulless shanty keeper, and was riding home with them, on some +pretence, because he had known them as boys, because Joe Wilson had a +vein of poetry in him--a something in sympathy with something in Peter; +because Jack Barnes had a dear little girl-wife who was much too good +for him, and who was now anxiously waiting for him in the pretty little +farming town of Solong amongst the western spurs. Because, perhaps, of +something in Peter's early past which was a mystery. Simply and plainly +because Peter M'Laughlan was the kindest, straightest and truest man in +the West--a "white man." + +They all knew Mitchell and welcomed him heartily when he turned up in +their camp, because he was a pathetic humorist and a kindly cynic--a +"joker" or "hard case" as the bushmen say. + +Peter was about fifty and the other three were young men. + +There was another man in camp who didn't count and was supposed to be +dead. Old Danny Quinn, champion "beer-chewer" of the district, was on +his way out, after a spree, to one of Rouse's stations, where, for +the sake of past services--long past--and because of old times, he was +supposed to be working. He had spent his last penny a week before and +had clung to his last-hope hotel until the landlord had taken him in +one hand and his swag in the other and lifted them clear of the veranda. +Danny had blundered on, this far, somehow; he was the last in the world +who could have told how, and had managed to light a fire; then he lay +with his head on his swag and enjoyed nips of whisky in judicious doses +and at reasonable intervals, and later on a tot of mutton-broth, which +he made in one of the billies. + +It was after tea. Peter sat on a log by the fire with Joe and Jack +Mitchell on one side and Jack Barnes on the other. Jack Mitchell sat +on the grass with his back to the log, his knees drawn up, and his arms +abroad on them: his most comfortable position and one which seemed +to favour the flow of his philosophy. They talked of bush things or +reflected, sometimes all three together, sometimes by turns. + +From the surveyors' camp: + + I remember, I remember, + The house where I was born, + The little window where the sun + Came peeping in at morn-- + +The breeze from the west strengthened and the voice was blown away. + +"That chap seems a bit sentimental but he's got a good voice," said +Mitchell. Then presently he remarked, round his pipe: + +"I wonder if old Danny remembers?" And presently Peter said quietly, as +if the thought had just occurred to him: + +"By the way, Mitchell, I forgot to ask after your old folk. I knew your +father, you know." + +"Oh, they're all right, Peter, thank you." + +"Heard from them lately?" asked Peter, presently, in a lazy tone. + +Mitchell straightened himself up. "N--no. To tell the truth, Peter, I +haven't written for--I don't know how long." + +Peter smoked reflectively. + +"I remember your father well, Jack," he said. "He was a big-hearted +man." + +Old Danny was heard remonstrating loudly with spirits from a warmer +clime than Australia, and Peter stepped over to soothe him. + +"I thought I'd get it, directly after I opened my mouth," said Mitchell. +"I suppose it will be your turn next, Joe." + +"I suppose so," said Joe, resignedly. + +The wind fell. + + I remember, I remember, + And it gives me little joy, + To think I'm further off from heaven, + Than when I was a boy! + +When Peter came back another thought seemed to have occurred to him. + +"How's your mother getting on, Joe?" he asked. "She shifted to Sydney +after your father died, didn't she?" + +"Oh, she's getting on all right!" said Joe, without elaboration. + +"Keeping a boarding-house, isn't she?" + +"Yes," said Joe. + +"Hard to make ends meet, I suppose?" said Peter. "It's almost a harder +life than it could have been on the old selection, and there's none of +the old independence about it. A woman like your mother must feel it, +Joe." + +"Oh, she's all right," said Joe. "She's used to it by this time. I +manage to send her a few pounds now and again. I send her all I can," he +added resentfully. + +Peter sat corrected for a few moments. Then he seemed to change the +subject. + +"It's some time since you were in Sydney last, isn't it, Joe?' + +"Yes, Peter," said Joe. "I haven't been there for two years. I never did +any good there. I'm far better knocking about out back." + +There was a pause. + +"Some men seem to get on better in one place, some in another," +reflected Mitchell, lazily. "For my part, I seem to get on better in +another." + +Peter blinked, relit his pipe with a stick from the fire and reflected. + +The surveyor's song had been encored: + + I remember, I remember-- + +Perhaps Peter remembered. Joe did, but there were no vines round the +house where he was born, only drought and dust, and raspy voices raised +in recrimination, and hardship most times. + +"I remember," said Peter, quietly, "I remember a young fellow at home in +the old country. He had every advantage. He had a first-class education, +a great deal more money than he needed--almost as much as he asked +for, and nearly as much freedom as he wanted. His father was an English +gentleman and his mother an English lady. They were titled people, if +I remember rightly. The old man was proud, but fond of his son; he +only asked him to pay a little duty or respect now and again. We don't +understand these things in Australia--they seem formal and cold to +us. The son paid his respects to his father occasionally--a week or so +before he'd be wanting money, as a rule. The mother was a dear lady. +She idolized her son. She only asked for a little show of affection from +him, a few days or a week of his society at home now and then--say once +in three months. But he couldn't spare her even that--his time was taken +up so much in fashionable London and Paris and other places. He would +give the world to be able to take his proud, soft old father's hand now +and look into his eyes as one man who understands another. He would be +glad and eager to give his mother twelve months out of the year if he +thought it would make her happier. It has been too late for more than +twenty years." + +Old Danny called for Peter. + +Mitchell jerked his head approvingly and gave a sound like a sigh and +chuckle conjoined, the one qualifying the other. + +"I told you you'd get it, Joe," he said. + +"I don't see how it hits me," said Joe. + +"But it hit all the same, Joe." + +"Well, I suppose it did," said Joe, after a short pause. + +"He wouldn't have hit you so hard if you hadn't tried to parry," +reflected Mitchell. "It's your turn now, Jack." + +Jack Barnes said nothing. + +"Now I know that Peter would do anything for a woman or child, or an +honest, straight, hard-up chap," said Mitchell, straightening out his +legs and folding his arms, "but I can't quite understand his being so +partial to drunken scamps and vagabonds, black sheep and never-do-wells. +He's got a tremendous sympathy for drunks. He'd do anything to help a +drunken man. Ain't it marvellous? It's my private opinion that Peter +must have been an awful boozer and scamp in his time." + +The other two only thought. Mitchell was privileged. He was a young +man of freckled, sandy complexion, and quizzical grey eyes. "Sly Joker" +"could take a rise out of anyone on the quiet;" "You could never tell +when he was getting at you;" "Face of a born comedian," as bushmen said +of Mitchell. But he would probably have been a dead and dismal failure +on any other stage than that of wide Australia. + +Peter came back and they sat and smoked, and maybe they reflected along +four very different back-tracks for a while. + +The surveyor started to sing again: + + I have heard the mavis singing + Her love-song to the morn. + I have seen the dew-drop clinging + To the rose just newly born. + +They smoked and listened in silence all through to the end. It was very +still. The full moon was high. The long white slender branches of a +box-tree stirred gently overhead; the she-oaks in the creek sighed as +they are always sighing, and the southern peak seemed ever so far away. + + That has made me thine for ever! + Bonny Mary of Argyle. + +"Blarst my pipe!" exclaimed Mitchell, suddenly. "I beg your pardon, +Peter. My pipe's always getting stuffed up," and he proceeded to shell +out and clear his pipe. + +The breeze had changed and strengthened. They heard the violin playing +"Annie Laurie." + +"They must be having a Scotch night in that camp tonight," said +Mitchell. The voice came again: + + Maxwelton Braes are bonny-- + Where early fa's the dew, + For 'twas there that Annie Laurie + Gie me her promise true-- + +Mitchell threw out his arm impatiently. "I wish they wouldn't play +and sing those old songs," he said. "They make you think of damned old +things. I beg your pardon, Peter." + +Peter sat leaning forward, his elbows resting on his knees and his hands +fingering his cold pipe nervously. His sad eyes had grown haggard and +haunted. It is in the hearts of exiles in new lands that the old songs +are felt. + +"Take no thought of the morrow, Mitchell," said Peter, abstractedly. "I +beg your pardon, Mitchell. I mean----" + +"That's all right, Peter," said Mitchell. "You're right; to-morrow is +the past, as far as I'm concerned." + + Peter blinked down at him as if he were a new species. + +"You're an odd young man, Mitchell," he said. "You'll have to take care +of that head of yours or you'll be found hanging by a saddle-strap to +a leaning tree on a lonely track, or find yourself in a lunatic asylum +before you're forty-five." + +"Or else I'll be a great man," said Mitchell. "But--ah, well!" + +Peter turned his eyes to the fire and smiled sadly. "Not enjoyment and +not sorrow, is our destined end or way," he repeated to the fire. + +"But we get there just the same," said Mitchell, "destined or not." + + But to live, that each to-morrow, + Finds us further than to-day! + +"Why, that just fits my life, Peter," said Mitchell. "I might have to +tramp two or three hundred miles before I get a cut* or a job, and if +to-morrow didn't find me nearer than to-day I'd starve or die of thirst +on a dry stretch." + + [ * Cut--a pen or "stand" in a shearing shed ] + +"Why don't you get married and settle down, Mitchell?" asked Peter, a +little tired. "You're a teetotaller." + +"If I got married I couldn't settle down," said Mitchell. "I reckon I'd +be the loneliest man in Australia." Peter gave him a swift glance. "I +reckon I'd be single no matter how much married I might be. I couldn't +get the girl I wanted, and--ah, well!" + +Mitchell's expression was still quaintly humorous round the lower part +of his face, but there was a sad light in his eyes. The strange light as +of the old dead days, and he was still young. + +The cornet had started in the surveyors' camp. + +"Their blooming tunes seem to fit in just as if they knew what we were +talking about," remarked Mitchell. + +The cornet: + + You'll break my heart, you little bird, + That sings upon the flowering thorn + Thou mind'st me of departed joys, + Departed never to return. + +"Damn it all," said Mitchell, sitting up, "I'm getting sentimental." +Then, as if voicing something that was troubling him, "Don't you think a +woman pulls a man down as often as she lifts him up, Peter?" + +"Some say so," said Peter. + +"Some say so, and they write it, too," said Mitchell. + +"Sometimes it seems to me as if women were fated to drag a man down ever +since Adam's time. If Adam hadn't taken his wife's advice--but there, +perhaps he took her advice a good many times and found it good, and, +just because she happened to be wrong this time, and to get him into a +hole, the sons of Adam have never let the daughters of Eve hear the last +of it. That's human nature." + +Jack Barnes, the young husband, who was suffering a recovery, had been +very silent all the evening. "I think a man's a fool to always listen to +his wife's advice," he said, with the unreasonable impatience of a man +who wants to think while others are talking. "She only messes him up, +and drives him to the devil as likely as not, and gets a contempt for +him in the end." + +Peter gave him a surprised, reproachful look, and stood up. He paced +backwards and forwards on the other side of the fire, with his hands +behind his back for a while; then he came and settled himself on the log +again and filled his pipe. + +"Yes," he said, "a man can always find excuses for himself when his +conscience stings him. He puts mud on the sting. Man at large is +beginning all over the world to rake up excuses for himself; he +disguises them as `Psychological studies,' and thinks he is clean and +clever and cultured, or he calls 'em problems--the sex problem, for +instance, and thinks he is brave and fearless." + +Danny was in trouble again, and Peter went to him. He complained that +when he lay down he saw the faces worse, and he wanted to be propped up +somehow, so Peter got a pack-saddle and propped the old man's shoulders +up with that. + +"I remember," Peter began, when he came back to the fire, "I remember a +young man who got married----" + +Mitchell hugged himself. He knew Jack Barnes. He knew that Jack had a +girl-wife who was many times too good for him; that Jack had been wild, +and had nearly broken her heart, and he had guessed at once that Jack +had broken out again, and that Peter M'Laughlan was shepherding him +home. Mitchell had worked as mates with Jack, and liked him because of +the good heart that was in him in spite of all; and, because he liked +him, he was glad that Jack was going to get a kicking, so to speak, +which might do him good. Mitchell saw it coming, as he said afterwards, +and filled his pipe, and settled himself comfortably to listen. + +"I remember the case of a naturally selfish young man who got married" +said Peter. "He didn't know he was selfish; in fact, he thought he was +too much the other way--but that doesn't matter now. His name was--well, +we'll call him--we'll call him, `Gentleman Once.'" + +"Do you mean Gentleman Once that we saw drinking back at Thomas's +shanty?" asked Joe. + +"No," said Peter, "not him. There have been more than one in the bush +who went by the nickname of `Gentleman Once.' I knew one or two. It's a +big clan, the clan of Gentleman Once, and scattered all over the world." + +"By the way," said Mitchell--"excuse me for interrupting, Peter--but +wasn't old Danny, there, a gentleman once? I've heard chaps say he was." + +"I know he was," said Peter. + +"Gentleman Once! Who's talking about Gentleman Once?" said an awful +voice, suddenly and quickly. "About twenty or thirty years ago I was +called Gentleman Once or Gentleman Jack, I don't know which--Get out! +_Get out_, I say! It's all lies, and you're the devil. There's four +devils sitting by the fire. I see them." + +Two of the four devils by the fire looked round, rather startled. + +Danny was sitting up, his awful bloodshot eyes glaring in the firelight, +and his ruined head looking like the bloated head of a hairy poodle that +had been drowned and dried. Peter went to the old man and soothed him by +waving off the snakes and devils with his hands, and telling them to go. + +"I've heard Danny on the Gentleman Once racket before," remarked +Mitchell. + +"Seems funny, doesn't it, for a man to be proud of the fact that he was +called `Gentleman Once' about twenty years ago?" + +"Seems more awful than funny to me," said Joe. + +"You're right, Joe," said Mitchell. "But the saddest things are often +funny." + +When Peter came back he went on with his story, and was only interrupted +once or twice by Danny waking up and calling him to drive off the +snakes, and green and crimson dogs with crocodile heads, and devils with +flaming tails, and those unpleasant sorts of things that force their +company on boozers and madmen. + +"Gentleman Once," said Peter, "he came from the old country with a good +education and no character. He disgraced himself and family once too +often and came, or was sent, out to Australia to reform. It's a great +mistake. If a man is too far gone, or hasn't the strength to live the +past down and reform at home, he won't do it in a new country, unless a +combination of circumstances compels him to it. A man rises by chance; +just as often he falls by chance. Some men fall into the habit of +keeping steady and stick to it, for the novelty of it, until they are on +their feet and in their sane minds and can look at the past, present and +future sensibly. I knew one case--But that's got nothing to do with the +story. + +"Gentleman Once came out on the remittance system. That system is fatal +in nine cases out of ten. The remittance system is an insult to any +manhood that may be left in the black sheep, and an insult to the land +he is sent to. The cursed quarterly allowance is a stone round his neck +which will drag him down deeper in a new land than he would have fallen +at home. You know that remittance men are regarded with such contempt +in the bush that a man seldom admits he is one, save when he's drunk +and reckless and wants money or credit. When a ne'er-do-well lands in +Melbourne or Sydney without a penny he will probably buck-up and do +something for himself. When he lands with money he will probably spend +it all in the first few months and then straighten up, because he has +to. But when he lands on the remittance system he drinks, first to drown +homesickness. He decides that he'll wait till he gets his next quarter's +allowance and then look round. He persuades himself that it's no use +trying to do anything: that, in fact, he can't do anything until he gets +his money. When he gets it he drifts into one `last' night with chums +he has picked up in second and third-rate hotels. He drinks from pure +selfishness. No matter what precautions his friends at home take, he +finds means of getting credit or drawing on his allowance before it +is due--until he is two or three quarters behind. He drinks because he +feels happy and jolly and clever and good-natured and brave and honest +while he is drinking. Later on he drinks because he feels the reverse +of all these things when he is sober. He drinks to drown the past and +repentance. He doesn't know that a healthy-minded man doesn't waste +time in repenting. He doesn't know how easy it is to reform, and is +too weak-willed to try. He gets a muddled idea that the past can't be +mended. He finds it easy to get drink and borrow money on the strength +of his next quarter's allowance, so he soon gets a quarter or two +behind, and sometimes gets into trouble connected with borrowed money. +He drifts to the bush and drinks, to drown the past only. The past grows +blacker and blacker until it is a hell without repentance; and often the +black sheep gets to that state when a man dreads his sober hours. And +the end? Well, you see old Danny there, and you saw old Awful Example +back at Thomas's shanty--he's worse than Danny, if anything. Sometimes +the end comes sooner. I saw a young new-land-new-leaf man dying in a +cheap lodging-house in Sydney. He was a schoolmate of mine, by the +way. For six weeks he lay on his back and suffered as I never saw a +man suffer in this world; and I've seen some bad cases. They had to +chloroform him every time they wanted to move him. He had affected to +be hard and cynical, and I must say that he played it out to the end. It +was a strong character, a strong mind sodden and diseased with drink. +He never spoke of home and his people except when he was delirious. +He never spoke, even to me, of his mental agony. That was English home +training. You young Australians wouldn't understand it; most bushmen are +poets and emotional. + +"My old schoolmate was shifted to the Sydney Hospital at last, and +consented to the amputation of one leg. But it was too late. He was gone +from the hips down. Drink--third-rate hotel and bush shanty drink--and +low debauchery." + +Jack Barnes drew up his leg and rubbed it surreptitiously. He had "pins +and needles." Mitchell noticed and turned a chuckle into a grunt. + +"Gentleman Once was a remittance man," continued Peter. "But before he +got very far he met an Australian girl in a boarding-house. Her mother +was the landlady. They were bush people who had drifted to the city. The +girl was pretty, intelligent and impulsive. She pitied him and nursed +him. He wasn't known as Gentleman Once then, he hadn't got far enough to +merit the nickname." + +Peter paused. Presently he jerked his head, as if he felt a spasm of +pain, and leaned forward to get a stick from the fire to light his pipe. + +"Now, there's the girl who marries a man to reform him, and when she has +reformed him never lets him hear the last of it. Sometimes, as a woman, +she drives him back again. But this was not one of that sort of girls. +I once held a theory that sometimes a girl who has married a man and +reformed him misses in the reformed man the something which attracted +her in the careless scamp, the something which made her love him--and so +she ceases to love him, and their married life is a far more miserable +one than it would have been had he continued drinking. I hold no theory +of that kind now. Such theories ruin many married lives." + +Peter jerked his head again as if impatient with a thought, and reached +for a fire-stick. + +"But that's got nothing to do with the story. When Gentleman Once +reformed his natural selfishness came back. He saw that he had made a +mistake. It's a terrible thing for a young man, a few months, perhaps a +few weeks after his marriage, to ask himself the question, `Have I made +a mistake?' But Gentleman Once wasn't to be pitied. He discovered that +he had married beneath him in intellect and education. Home training +again. He couldn't have discovered that he had married beneath him as +far as birth was concerned, for his wife's father had been a younger son +of an older and greater family than his own--But Gentleman Once wouldn't +have been cad enough to bother about birth. I'll do him that much +justice. He discovered, or thought he did, that he and his wife could +never have one thought in common; that she couldn't possibly understand +him. I'll tell you later on whether he was mistaken or not. He was +gloomy most times, and she was a bright, sociable, busy little body. +When she tried to draw him out of himself he grew irritable. Besides, +having found that they couldn't have a thought in common he ceased to +bother to talk to her. There are many men who don't bother talking to +their wives; they don't think their wives feel it--because the wives +cease to complain after a while; they grow tired of trying to make the +man realize how they suffer. Gentleman Once tried his best--according +to his lights--and weakness. Then he went in for self-pity and all +the problems. He liked to brood, and his poor little wife's energy and +cheerfulness were wearying to him. He wanted to be left alone. They were +both high-spirited, in different ways; she was highly strung and so was +he--because of his past life mostly. They quarrelled badly sometimes. +Then he drank again and she stuck to him. Perhaps the only time he +seemed cheerful and affectionate was when he had a few drinks in him. +It was a miserable existence--a furnished room in a cheap lodging-house, +and the use of the kitchen. + +"He drank alone. + +"Now a dipsomaniac mostly thinks he is in the right--except, perhaps, +after he has been forced to be sober for a week. The noblest woman in +the world couldn't save him--everything she does to reform him irritates +him; but a strong friend can save him sometimes--a man who has been +through it himself. The poor little wife of Gentleman Once went through +it all. And she stuck to him. She went into low pubs after him." + +Peter shuddered again. "She went through it all. He swore promises. He'd +come home sober and fill her with hope of future happiness, and swear +that he'd never take another glass. `And we'll be happy yet, my poor +boy,' she'd say, `we'll be happy yet. I believe you, I trust you' (she +used to call him her `bonny boy' when they were first married). And next +night he'd come home worse than ever. And one day he--he struck her!" + +Peter shuddered, head and shoulders, like a man who had accidentally +smashed his finger. + +"And one day he struck her. He was sober when he did it--anyhow he had +not taken drink for a week. A man is never sober who gets drunk more +than once a week, though he might think he is. I don't know how it +happened, but anyway he struck her, and that frightened him. He got a +billet in the Civil Service up-country. No matter in what town it was. +The little wife hoped for six months. + +"I think it's a cruel thing that a carelessly selfish young man cannot +realize how a sensitive young wife suffers for months after he has +reformed. How she hopes and fears, how she dreads the moment he has to +leave her, and frets every hour he is away from home--and suffers mental +agony when he is late. How the horror of the wretched old past time +grows upon her until she dares not think of it. How she listens to his +step and voice and watches his face, when he comes home, for a sign of +drink. A young man, a mate of mine, who drank hard and reformed, used to +take a delight in pretending for a few minutes to be drunk when he came +home. He was good-hearted, but dense. He said he only did it to give his +wife a pleasant surprise afterwards. I thought it one of the most cruel +things I had ever seen. + +"Gentleman Once found that he could not stand the routine of office work +and the dull life in that place. He commenced to drink again, and went +on till he lost his billet. They had a little boy, a bright little boy, +yet the father drank. + +"The last spree was a terrible one. He was away from home a fortnight, +and in that fortnight he got down as deep as a man could get. Then +another man got hold of him and set him on his feet, and straightened +him up. The other man was a ruined doctor, a wreck whose devil was +morphia. I don't hold that a man's salvation is always in his own hands; +I've seen mates pull mates out of hell too often to think that. + +"Then Gentleman Once saw the past as he had never seen it before--he saw +hope for the future with it. And he swore an oath that he felt he would +keep. + +"He suffered from reaction on his way home, and, as he neared the town, +a sudden fear, born of his nervous state, no doubt, sent a cold, sick +emptiness through him: `Was it too late?' + +"As he turned into the street where he lived, he noticed a little group +of bush larrikins standing at the corner. And they moved uneasily when +they caught sight of him, and, as he passed, they touched and lifted +their hats to him. Now he knew that he had lost the respect even of bush +larrikins; and he knew enough of the bush to know that a bushman never +lifts his hat to a man--only to death, and a woman sometimes. He hurried +home and read the truth in his wife's eyes. His little boy was dead. He +went down under the blow, and she held his head to her breast and kept +saying. `My poor boy, my poor boy!' + +"It was he that she meant, not the boy she had lost. She knew him, she +understood him better than he did himself, and, heart-broken as she was, +she knew how he was going to suffer, and comforted him. `My poor boy, my +poor, foolish boy!' + +"He mended the past, as far as he could, during the next two years, and +she seemed happy. He was very gentle, he was very kind to her. He was +happy, too, in a new, strange way. But he had learned what it was to +suffer through his own fault, and now he was to learn what it was to +suffer through no fault of his own, and without the consolation of +saying `I was wrong! I was to blame!' At the end of the two years there +was another child, and his wife died." + +The four sat silently smoking until Jack Barnes asked: + +"And what did he do then, Peter?" + +"Who?" said Peter, abstractedly. + +"Why, Gentleman Once." + +Peter roused himself. + +"Well, I've told the story, and it is about time to turn in," he said. +"I can't say exactly what Gentleman Once did when his wife died. He +might have gone down to a deeper depth than Danny's. He might have risen +higher than he had ever been before. From what I knew of his character +he would never have gone down an easy slope as Danny has done. He might +have dropped plump at first and then climbed up. Anyway, he had the +memory of the last two years to help him. + +"Then there's the reformed drunkard who has trained himself to take +a drink when he needs it, to drink in moderation--he's the strongest +character of all, I think--but it's time to turn in." + +The cornet up the creek was playing a march. + +Peter walked across and looked at Danny, who seemed to be sleeping as +peacefully as could be expected of him. + +Jack Barnes got up and walked slowly down the creek in the moonlight. He +wanted to think. + +Peter rolled out his blankets on the grass and arranged his saddle-bags +for a pillow. Before he turned in Mitchell shook hands with him, a most +unusual and unnecessary proceeding in camp. But there's something in the +bush grip which means "I know," or "I understand." + +Joe Wilson rolled out his blankets close to Mitchell's camp; he wanted +to enjoy some of Mitchell's quiet humour before he went to sleep, but +Mitchell wasn't in a philosophical mood. He wanted to reflect. + +"I wonder who Gentleman Once was?" said Joe to Mitchell. "Could he have +been Danny, or old Awful Example back there at the shanty?" + +"Dunno," said Mitchell. He puffed three long puffs at his pipe, and then +said, reflectively: + +"I've heard men tell their own stories before to-night Joe." + +It was Joe who wanted to think now. + + +About four o'clock Mitchell woke and stood up. Peter was lying rolled +in his blanket with his face turned to the west. The moon was low, the +shadows had shifted back, and the light was on Peter's face. Mitchell +stood looking at him reverently, as a grown son might who sees his +father asleep for the first time. Then Mitchell quietly got some boughs +and stuck them in the ground at a little distance from Peter's head, to +shade his face from the bright moonlight; and then he turned in again to +sleep till the sun woke him. + + + + +THE GHOSTS OF MANY CHRISTMASES + + +Did you ever trace back your Christmas days?--right back to the days +when you were innocent and Santa Claus was real. At times you thought +you were very wicked, but you never realize how innocent you were until +you've grown up and knocked about the world. + +Let me think! + +Christmas in an English village, with bare hedges and trees, and +leaden skies that lie heavy on our souls as we walk, with overcoat and +umbrella, sons of English exiles and exiles in England, and think of +bright skies and suns overhead, and sweeps of country disappearing into +the haze, and blue mountain ranges melting into the azure of distant +lower skies, and curves of white and yellow sand beaches, and runs of +shelving yellow sandstone sea-walls--and the glorious Pacific! Sydney +Harbour at sunrise, and the girls we took to Manly Beach. + +Christmas in a London flat. Gloom and slush and soot. It is not the +cold that affects us Australians so much, but the horrible gloom. We get +heart-sick for the sun. + +Christmas at sea--three Christmases, in fact--one going saloon from +Sydney to Westralia early in the Golden Nineties with funds; and one, +the Christmas after next, coming back steerage with nothing but the +clothes we'd slept in. All of which was bad judgment on our part--the +order and manner of our going and coming should have been reversed. + +Christmas in a hessian tent in "th' Westren," with so many old mates +from the East that it was just old times over again. We had five pounds +of corned beef and a kerosene-tin to boil it in; and while we were +talking of old things the skeleton of a kangaroo-dog grabbed the beef +out of the boiling water and disappeared into the scrub--which made it +seem more like old times than ever. + +Christmas going to New Zealand, with experience, by the s.s. _Tasmania_. +We had plum duff, but it was too "soggy" for us to eat. We dropped it +overboard, lest it should swamp the boat--and it sank to the ooze. The +Tasmania was saved on that occasion, but she foundered next year outside +Gisborne. Perhaps the cook had made more duff. There was a letter from a +sweetheart of mine amongst her mails when she went down; but that's got +nothing to do with it, though it made some difference in my life. + +Christmas on a new telegraph line with a party of lining gangmen in +New Zealand. There was no duff nor roast because there was no firewood +within twenty miles. The cook used to pile armfuls of flax-sticks under +the billies, and set light to them when the last man arrived in camp. + +Christmas in Sydney, with a dozen invitations out to dinner. The one we +accepted was to a sensible Australian Christmas dinner; a typical one, +as it should be, and will be before the Commonwealth is many years old. +Everything cold except the vegetables, the hose playing on the veranda +and vines outside, the men dressed in sensible pyjama-like suits, and +the women and girls fresh and cool and jolly, instead of being hot and +cross and looking like boiled carrots, and feeling like boiled rags, +and having headaches after dinner, as would have been the case had they +broiled over the fire in a hot kitchen all the blazing forenoon to cook +a scalding, indigestible dinner, as many Australian women do, and for no +other reason than that it was the fashion in England. One of those girls +was very pretty and--ah, well!-- + +Christmas dinner in a greasy Sydney sixpenny restaurant, that opened a +few days before with brass band going at full blast at the door by way +of advertisement. "Roast-beef, one! Cabbage and potatoes, one! Plum +pudding, two!" (That was the first time I dined to music.) The Christmas +dinner was a good one, but my appetite was spoilt by the expression of +the restaurant keeper, a big man with a heavy jowl, who sat by the +door with a cold eye on the sixpences, and didn't seem to have much +confidence in human nature. + + +Christmas--no, that was New Year--on the Warrego River, out back (an +alleged river with a sickly stream that looked like bad milk). We spent +most of that night hunting round in the dark and feeling on the ground +for camel and horse droppings with which to build fires and make smoke +round our camp to keep off the mosquitoes. The mosquitoes started at +sunset and left off at daybreak, when the flies got to work again. + +Christmas dinner under a brush shearing-shed. Mutton and plum +pudding--and fifty miles from beer! + +An old bush friend of mine, one Jimmy Nowlett, who ranked as a +bullock-driver, told me of a Christmas time he had. He was cut off +by the floods with his team, and had nothing to eat for four days but +potatoes and honey. He said potatoes dipped in honey weren't so bad; but +he had to sleep on bullock yokes laid on the ground to keep him out of +the water, and he got a toothache that paralysed him all down one side. + +And speaking of plum pudding, I consider it one of the most barbarous +institutions of the British. It is a childish, silly, savage +superstition; it must have been a savage inspiration, looking at it all +round--but then it isn't so long since the British were savages. + +I got a letter last year from a mate of mine in Western +Australia--prospecting the awful desert out beyond White +Feather--telling me all about a "perish" he did on plum pudding. He +and his mates were camped at the Boulder Soak with some three or four +hundred miles--mostly sand and dust--between them and the nearest +grocer's shop. They ordered a case of mixed canned provisions from +Perth to reach them about Christmas. They didn't believe in plum +pudding--there are a good many British institutions that bushmen don't +believe in but the cook was a new chum, and he said he'd go home to his +mother if he didn't have plum pudding for Christmas, so they ordered +a can for him. Meanwhile, they hung out on kangaroo and damper and the +knowledge that it couldn't last for ever. It was in a terrible drought, +and the kangaroos used to come into the "Soak" for water, and they were +too weak to run. Later on, when wells were dug, the kangaroos used to +commit suicide in them--there was generally a kangaroo in the well in +the morning. + +The storekeeper packed the case of tinned dog, etc., but by some blunder +he or his man put the label on the wrong box, and it went per rail, per +coach, per camel, and the last stage per boot, and reached my friends' +camp on Christmas Eve, to their great joy. My friend broke the case open +by the light of the camp-fire. + +"Here, Jack!" he said, tossing out a can, "here's your plum pudding." + +He held the next can in his hand a moment longer and read the label +twice. + +"Why! he's sent two," he said, "and I'm sure I only ordered one. Never +mind--Jack'll have a tuck-out." + +He held the next can close to the fire and blinked at it hard. "I'm +damned if he hasn't sent three tins of plum pudding. Never mind, we'll +manage to scoff some of it between us. You're in luck's way this trip, +Jack, and no mistake." + +He looked harder still at the fourth can; then he read the labels on the +other tins again to see if he'd made a mistake. + +He didn't tell me what he said then, but a milder mate suggested that +the storekeeper had sent half a dozen tins by mistake. But when they +reached the seventh can the language was not even fit to be written down +on a piece of paper and handed up to the magistrate. The storekeeper had +sent them an unbroken case of canned plum pudding, and probably by this +time he was wondering what had become of that blanky case of duff. + +The kangaroos disappeared about this time and my friend tells me that he +and his mates had to live for a mortal fortnight on canned plum pudding. +They tried it cold and they tried it boiled, they tried it baked, they +had it fried, and they had it toasted, they had it for breakfast, dinner +and tea. They had nothing else to think, or talk, or argue and quarrel +about; and they dreamed about it every night, my friend says. It wasn't +a joke--it gave them the nightmare and day-horrors. + +They tried it with salt. They picked as many of the raisins out as they +could and boiled it with salt kangaroo. They tried to make Yorkshire +pudding out of it; but it was too rich. + +My friend was experimenting and trying to discover a simple process +for separating the ingredients of plum pudding when a fresh supply of +provisions came along. He says he was never so sick of anything in his +life, and he has had occasion to be sick of a good many things. + +The new-chum jackaroo is still alive, but he won't ever eat plum pudding +any more, he says. It cured him of homesickness. He wouldn't eat it even +if his bride made it. + + +Christmas on the goldfields in the last of the roaring days, in the +palmy days of Gulgong and those fields. Let's see! it must be nearly +thirty years ago! Oh, how the time goes by! + +Santa Claus, young, fresh-faced and eager; Santa Claus, blonde and +flaxen; Santa Claus, dark; Santa Claus with a brogue and Santa Claus +speaking broken English; Santa Claus as a Chinaman (Sun Tong Lee & Co. +storekeepers), with strange, delicious sweets that melted in our mouths, +and rum toys and Chinese dolls for the children. + + +Lucky diggers who were with difficulty restrained from putting pound +notes and nuggets and expensive lockets and things into the little ones' +stockings. Santa Claus in flannel shirt and clay-covered moleskins. +Diggers who bought lollies by the pound and sent the little ones home +with as much as they could carry. + +Diggers who gave a guinea or more for a toy for a child that reminded +them of some other child at home. Diggers who took as many children as +they could gather on short notice into a store, slapped a five-pound +note down on the counter and told the little ones to call for whatever +they wanted. Who set a family of poor children side by side on the +counter and called for a box of mixed children's boots--the best--and +fitted them on with great care and anxiety and frequent inquiries as to +whether they pinched. Who stood little girls and boys on the counter +and called for the most expensive frocks, the latest and best in sailor +suits, and the brightest ribbons; and things came long distances +by bullock dray and were expensive in those days. Impressionable +diggers--and most of them were--who threw nuggets to singers, and who, +sometimes, slipped a parcel into the hands of a little boy or girl, with +instructions to give it to an elder sister (or young mother, perhaps) +whom the digger had never spoken to, only worshipped from afar off. And +the elder sister or young mother, opening the parcel, would find a piece +of jewellery or a costly article of dress, and wonder who sent it. + +Ah, the wild generosity of luck-intoxicated diggers of those days! and +the reckless generosity of the drinkers. "We thought it was going to +last for ever!" + +"If I don't spend it on the bairns I'll spend it on the drink," Sandy +Burns used to say. "I ha' nane o' me own, an' the lass who was to gi' me +bairns, she couldn't wait." + +Sandy had kept steady and travelled from one end of the world to the +other, and roughed it and toiled for five years, and the very day he +bottomed his golden hole on the Brown Snake Lead at Happy Valley he got +a letter from his girl in Scotland to say she had grown tired of waiting +and was married. Then he drank, and drink and luck went together. + +Gulgong on New Year's Eve! Rows and rows of lighted tents and +camp-fires, with a clear glow over it all. Bonfires on the hills and +diggers romping round them like big boys. Tin kettling--gold dishes +and spoons, and fiddles, and hammers on pointing anvils, and sticks +and empty kerosene-tins (they made a row); concertinas and cornets, +shot-guns, pistols and crackers, all sorts of instruments, and "Auld +Lang Syne" in one mighty chorus. And now--a wretched little pastoral +town; a collection of glaring corrugated-iron hip-roofs, and maybe a +rotting propped-up bark or weather-board humpy or two--relics of the +roaring days; a dried-up storekeeper and some withered hags; a waste +of caved-in holes with rain-washed mullock heaps and quartz and gravel +glaring in the sun; thistles and burrs where old bars were; drought, +dryness, desolation and goats. + +Lonely graves in the bush and grey old diggers here and there, anywhere +in the world, doing anything for a living, lonely yet because of the +girls who couldn't wait, but prospecting and fossicking here and there, +and dreaming still. + +They thought it was going to last for ever. + + +Christmas at Eurunderee Creek, amongst the old selection farms in the +western spurs of the Blue Mountains. They used to call it "Th' Pipeclay" +thirty years ago, but the old black names have been restored. They make +plum puddings yet, weeks beforehand, and boil them for hours and hang +them in cloths to the rafters to petrify; then they take them down and +boil them again. On Christmas Eve the boys cut boughs or young pines on +the hills, and drag them home and lash them to the veranda-posts. + +Ted has turned up with his wife and children from his selection +out back. The wheat is in and shearing is over on the big stations. +Tom--steady-going old Tom--clearing or fencing or dam-sinking +up-country, hides his tools in the scrub and gets his horse and rides +home. Aunt Emma (to everyone's joy) has arrived from Sydney with +presents (astonishing bargains in frocks, etc.) and marvellous +descriptions of town life. + +Joe, "poor" Mary's husband, who has been droving in Queensland since +the Christmas before last--while poor Mary, who is afraid to live alone, +shared a skillion and the family quarrels at home--Joe rides day and +night and reaches home at sunrise on Christmas morning, tired and dusty, +gaunt and haggard, but with his last cheque intact. He kisses his wife +and child and throws himself on the bed to sleep till dinner-time, while +Mary moves round softly, hushes the baby, dresses it and herself, lays +out Joe's clean things, and bends over him now and then, and kisses him, +perhaps, as he sleeps. + +In the morning the boys and some of the men go down to the creek for +a swim in the big shady pool, under the she-oaks and take their Sunday +clothes with them and dress there. + +Some of them ride into town to church, and some of the women and +children drive in in spring-carts--the children to go to Sunday +school, leaving mother and the eldest daughter--usually a hard-worked, +disappointed, short-tempered girl--at home to look after the cooking. + +There is some anxiety (mostly on mother's part) about Jim, who is +"wild," and is supposed to be somewhere out back. There was "a piece +of blue paper" out for Jim on account of sweating (illegally using) a +horse, but his mother or father has got a hint--given in a kindly way by +the police-sergeant--that Jim is free to come home and stay at home if +he behaves himself. (There is usually a horse missing when Jim goes out +back.) + +Jim turns up all right--save that he has no money--and is welcomed with +tearful affection by his favourite sister Mary, shakes hands silently +with his father, and has a long whispered conversation with his mother, +which leaves him very subdued. His brothers forbear to sneer at him, +partly because it is Christmas, partly on mother's account, and thirdly, +because Jim can use his hands. Aunt Emma, who is fond of him, cheers him +up wonderfully. + +The family sit down to dinner. "An old mate of your father's"--a bearded +old digger--has arrived and takes the place of honour. ("I knowed yer +father, sonny, on the diggings long afore any of you was ever thought +on.") + +The family have only been a few hours together, yet there is an +undercurrent of growling, that, to the stranger, mysterious yet evident +undercurrent of nastiness and resentment which goes on in all families +and drags many a promising young life down. But Aunt Emma and the old +mate make things brighter, and so the dinner--of hot roast and red-hot +plum pudding--passes off fairly well. + +The men sleep the afternoon away and wake up bathed in perspiration and +helpless; some of the women have headaches. After tea they gather on the +veranda in the cool of the evening, and that's the time when the best +sides of their natures and the best parts of the past have a chance of +coming uppermost, and perhaps they begin to feel a bit sorry that they +are going to part again. + +The local races or "sports" on Boxing Day. There is nothing to keep the +boys home over New Year. Ted and his wife go back to their lonely life +on their selection; Tom returns to his fencing or tank-sinking contract; +Jim, who has borrowed "a couple of quid" from Tom, goes out back with +strong resolutions for the New Year, and shears "stragglers," breaks in +horses, cooks and clerks for survey parties, and gambles and drinks, and +gets into trouble again. Maybe Joe "knocks about" the farm a bit before +going into the Great North-West with another mob of cattle. + +The last time I saw the Old Year out at Eurunderee the bushfires were +burning all over the ranges, and looked like great cities lighted up. No +need for bonfires then. Christmas in Bourke, the metropolis of the +great pastoral scrubs and plains, five hundred miles west, with the +thermometer one-hundred-and-something-scarey in the shade. The rough, +careless shearers come in from stations many dusty miles out in +the scrubs to have their Christmas sprees, to drink and "shout" and +fight--and have the horrors some of them--and be run in and locked up +with difficulty, within sound of a church-going bell. + +The Bourke Christmas is a very beery and exciting one. The hotels shut +up in front on Christmas Day to satisfy the law (or out of consideration +for the feelings of the sergeant in charge of the police station), and +open behind to satisfy the public, who are supposed to have made the +law. + +Sensible cold dinners are the fashion in Bourke, I think, with the hose +going, and free-and-easy costumes. + +The free males take their blankets and sleep in the "park;" the women +sleep with doors and windows open, and the married men on mattresses on +the verandas across the open doors--in case of accidents. + +Christmas in Sydney, though Christmas holidays are not so popular as +Easter, or even Anniversary Day, in the Queen city of the South. Buses, +electric, cable and the old steam trams crowded with holiday-makers +with baskets. Harbour boats loaded down to the water's edge with harbour +picnic-parties. "A trip round the harbour and to the head of Middle +Harbour one shilling return!" Strings of tourist trains running over +the Blue Mountains and the Great Zigzag, and up the coast to Gosford and +Brisbane Water, and down the south coast to beautiful Illawarra, until +after New Year. Hundreds of young fellows going out with tents to fish +in lonely bays or shoot in the mountains, and rough it properly like +bushmen--not with deck chairs, crockery, a piano and servants. For you +can camp in the grand and rugged solitude of the bush within a stone's +throw of the city, so to speak. + +Jolly camps and holiday parties all round the beautiful bays of the +harbour, and up and down the coast, and all close to home. Camps in the +moonlight on sandy beaches under great dark bluffs and headlands, where +yellow, shelving, sandstone cliffs run, broken only by sandy-beached +bays, and where the silver-white breakers leap and roar. + +And Manly Beach on a holiday! Thousands of people in fresh summer dress, +hundreds of bare-legged, happy children running where the "blue sea over +the white sand rolls," racing in and out with the rollers, playing with +the glorious Pacific. Manly--"Our Village"--Manly Beach, where we used +to take our girls, with the most beautiful harbour in the world on one +side, and the width of the grandest ocean on the other. Ferny gullies +and "fairy dells" to north and south, and every shady nook its merry +party or happy couple. + +Manly Beach--I remember five years ago (oh, how the time goes by!)--and +two names that were written together in the sand when the tide was +coming in. And the boat home in the moonlight, past the Heads, where +we felt the roll of the ocean, and the moonlit harbour--and the harbour +lights of Sydney--the grandest of them all. + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + + Henry Lawson 17th June 1867 - 2nd September 1922. + + These stories were first published as a collection in 1902. + Republished as "Send Round the Hat" and "The Romance of + the Swag" in 1907. + + + + Notes on Australianisms. Based on my own speech over the years, with + some checking in the dictionaries, e.g. "Macquarie Book of Slang" + (2000), Oxford English Dictionary. Not all of these are peculiar to + Australian slang, but are important in Lawson's stories, and carry + overtones. + + + anabranch: A bend in a river that has been cut through by the stream. + The main current now runs straight, the anabranch diverges and then + rejoins. See billabong. + Barcoo-rot. "Persistent ulceration of the skin, chiefly on the hands, + and often originating in abrasions". (Morris, Australian + English). Barcoo is a river in Queensland. + billabong. Based on an aboriginal word. Sometimes used for an + anabranch, but more often used for one that, in dry season or droughts + especially, is cut off at either or both ends from the main stream. + It is often just a muddy pool, and may indeed dry up completely. + blackfellow: condescending for Australian Aboriginal + blackleg: someone who is employed to cross a union picket line to + break a workers' strike. As Molly Ivins said, she was brought up + on the three great commandments: do not lie; do not steal; never + cross a picket line. Also scab. + blanky or ----: Fill in your own favourite word. Usually however used + for "bloody"--see crimson/gory. + blooming: actually used in speech instead of "bloody" (see crimson). + bluey: swag. Explanation in Lawson's "The romance of the Swag" here. + bob: one shilling + bullocky: Bullock driver. A man who drove teams of bullocks yoked to + wagons carrying e.g. wool bales or provisions. Proverbially rough and + foul mouthed. + bummer: A cadger or bludger. Someone who begs for food. Interesting + Americanism already. Also, tramp. (Different meaning today) + bush: originally referred to the low tangled scrubs of the semi-desert + regions (cf. `mulga' and `mallee'), and hence equivalent to + "outback". Now used generally for remote rural areas ("the + bush") and scrubby forest. + bushfire: wild fires: whether forest fires or grass fires. + bushman/bushwoman: someone who lives an isolated existence, far from + cities, "in the bush". (today: a "bushy") + bushranger: an Australian "highwayman", who lived in the `bush'-- + scrub--and attacked especially gold carrying coaches and banks. + Romanticised as anti-authoritarian Robin Hood figures--cf. Ned + Kelly--but usually very violent. + bunyip: Aboriginal monster, inhabiting waterholes, billabongs + particularly. Adopted into European legends. + caser: Five shillings (12 pence to the shilling, 20 shillings to the + pound ("quid")). As a coin, a crown piece. + chaffing: teasing, mocking good-humouredly + churchyarder: Sounding as if dying--ready for the churchyard = cemetery + crimson = gory: literary substitutes for "bloody"--the "colonial oath", + unacceptable in polite company. Why, is a complete mystery. + Popularly explained as contraction of "by Our Lady". Unproved. + In reproducing (badly) a German's pronunciation of Australian, + Lawson retains the word, but spells it "pluddy". + dood: Dude. A classy/cool dresser. + drover: one who "droves" + droving: driving on horseback cattle or sheep from where they were + fattened to a a city, or later, a rail-head. + fiver: a five pound note + gory, see crimson + Homebush: Saleyard, market area in Sydney + humpy: rough shack + half-caser: Two shillings and sixpence. As a coin, a half-crown. + jackaroo: (Jack + kangaroo; sometimes jackeroo)--someone, in early + days a new immigrant from England, learning to work on a + sheep/cattle station (U.S. "ranch".) + jim-jams: the horrors, d.t.'s + jumbuck: a sheep (best known from Waltzing Matilda: "where's that + jolly jumbuck, you've got in your tucker bag".) + larrikin: anything from a disrespectful young man to a violent member + of a gang ("push"). Was considered a major social problem in + Sydney of the 1880's to 1900. The _Bulletin_, a magazine in + which much of Lawson was published, spoke of the "aggressive, + soft-hatted stoush brigade". Anyone today who is disrespectful of + authority or convention is said to show the larrikin element in the + Australian character. + lucerne: Alfalfa in US + mallee: dwarfed eucalyptus trees growing in very poor soil and under + harsh rainfall conditions. Usually many stems emerging from the + ground, creating a low thicket. + mateship: See Lawson story, "Mateship". A heavily romanticised, + but nevertheless very practical form of (male) loyalty to a (male) + companion who travels with/works with him. A "mate" provides not + only companionship, but help in emergencies. Typical of an + Australian in the "outback"--or "Never-Never", or under war + conditions. A man without a mate was a "hatter"--"his hat + covers his family". Such a person might go "ratty" (see further + in The romance of the Swag). + Equivalent to the "buddy system" in SCUBA diving. + metalled: of a road, covered in crushed rock (e.g. "blue metal") + mulga: Acacia sp. ("wattle" in Australian) especially Acacia aneura; + growing in semi-desert conditions. Used as a description of such + a harsh region. + mullock: the tailings left after gold has been removed. In Lawson + generally mud (alluvial) rather than rock + myall: aboriginal living in a traditional--pre-conquest--manner + nobbler: a drink + nuggety: compact but strong physique; small but well-muscled + pastoralist: OED sees it a equivalent to "squatter", but in + Lawson someone often someone managing a large cattle/sheep + "station" for a "pastoral company" rather than an individual. + Seen as ultimate capitalist oppression. + pluddy: see crimson + quid: monetary unit; one pound + ratty: insane--or, very eccentric, "cranky". + ringer: the champion sheep shearer in a shed that season + rouseabout: Labourer in a (sheep) shearing shed. Considered to be, + as far as any work is, unskilled labour. + sawney: silly, gormless + scab: see blackleg + shout: In a group; to stand (pay for) a round of drinks. Bad form + to leave before your turn comes around. Much peer pressure to + drink more than one wished. One can also "shout" for everyone + in the pub. + skillion(-room): A "lean-to", a room built up against the back of + some other building, with separate roof. + spifflicated: punished, thrashed without mercy. + spree: prolonged drinking bout--days, weeks. + squatter: Someone who took up large areas of land, originally without + official permission ("squatted"), for sheep especially. Became + the "landed aristocracy" of Australia. + ("Up rode the squatter, mounted on his thoroughbred") + steever: Originally a Dutch coin. Used here like "penny"--or brass razoo. + sundowner: a swagman (see) who is NOT looking for work, but a + "handout". Lawson explains the term as referring to someone who + turns up at a station at sundown, just in time for "tea" i.e. the + evening meal. Line (2494) of actual text (not counting + P.G. matter). + swagman (swaggy): Generally, anyone who is walking in the "outback" + with a swag. (See "The Romance of the Swag".) Lawson also + restricts it at times to those whom he considers to be tramps, + not looking for work but for "handouts". In view of the Great + Depression (1890--. In 1892 it was reckoned 1/3 men were out of + work) perhaps unfairly. Perhaps because he _was_ there. + See `travellers'. + Tattersalls: The earliest public lottery in Australia. (1881) + tenner: a ten pound note. + tin-kettling: making noise by striking metal pots/pans. May be + celebratory (weddings--in this collection, New Year's Eve), or may + indicate extreme social disapproval of someone. + travellers: "shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work" (Lawson). + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Children of the Bush, by Henry Lawson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH *** + +***** This file should be named 7065.txt or 7065.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/7/0/6/7065/ + +Produced by Geoffrey Cowling + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions 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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You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!**** + + +Title: Children of the Bush + +Author: Henry Lawson + +Release Date: December, 2004 [EBook #7065] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on March 5, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH *** + + + + +Produced by Geoffrey Cowling; gcowling@laurel.ocs.mq.edu.au +[ Transcriber's notes: The year of first magazine publication is +shown in the table of contents below. Additional transcriber's +notes, including a glossary, are included at the end of the EBook. ] + + + + +Children of the Bush by Henry Lawson + + + +Contents + + +Send Round the Hat: 1901 +The Pretty Girl in the Army: 1901 +"Lord Douglas": 1901 +The Blindness of One-eyed Brogan: 1901 +The Sundowners: 1901 +A Sketch of Mateship: 1902 +On the Tucker Track: 1897 +A Bush Publican's Lament: 1901 +The Shearer's Dream: 1902 +The Lost Souls' Hotel: 1902 +The Boozers' Home: 1899 +The Sex Problem Again: 1898 +The Romance of the Swag: 1901 +"Buckholts' Gate": 1901 +The Bush-Fire: 1901 +The House that Was Never Built: 1901 +"Barney, Take me home Again": 1901 +A Droving Yarn: 1899 +Gettin' Back on Dave Regan: 1901 +"Shall We Gather at the River": 1901 +His Brother's Keeper: 1901 +The Ghosts of Many Christmases: 1901 + + + + + + +SEND ROUND THE HAT + + + Now this is the creed from the Book of the Bush-- + Should be simple and plain to a dunce: + "If a man's in a hole you must pass round the hat + Were he jail-bird or gentleman once." + + + +"Is it any harm to wake yer?" + +It was about nine o'clock in the morning, and, though it was Sunday +morning, it was no harm to wake me; but the shearer had mistaken me +for a deaf jackaroo, who was staying at the shanty and was something +like me, and had good-naturedly shouted almost at the top of his +voice, and he woke the whole shanty. Anyway he woke three or four +others who were sleeping on beds and stretchers, and one on a +shake-down on the floor, in the same room. It had been a wet night, +and the shanty was full of shearers from Big Billabong Shed which had +cut out the day before. My room mates had been drinking and gambling +overnight, and they swore luridly at the intruder for disturbing them. + +He was six-foot-three or thereabout. He was loosely built, bony, +sandy-complexioned and grey eyed. He wore a good-humoured grin at +most times, as I noticed later on; he was of a type of bushman that I +always liked--the sort that seem to get more good-natured the longer +they grow, yet are hard-knuckled and would accommodate a man who +wanted to fight, or thrash a bully in a good-natured way. The sort +that like to carry somebody's baby round, and cut wood, carry water +and do little things for overworked married bushwomen. He wore a +saddle-tweed sac suit two sizes too small for him, and his face, neck, +great hands and bony wrists were covered with sun-blotches and +freckles. + +"I hope I ain't disturbin' yer," he shouted, as he bent over my +bunk, "but there's a cove--" + +"You needn't shout!" I interrupted, "I'm not deaf." + +"Oh--I beg your pardon!" he shouted. "I didn't know I was yellin'. +I thought you was the deaf feller." + +"Oh, that's all right," I said. "What's the trouble?" + +"Wait till them other chaps is done swearin' and I'll tell yer," he +said. He spoke with a quiet, good-natured drawl, with something of +the nasal twang, but tone and drawl distinctly Australian--altogether +apart from that of the Americans. + +"Oh, spit it out for Christ's sake, Long'un!" yelled One-eyed Bogan, +who had been the worst swearer in a rough shed, and he fell back on +his bunk as if his previous remarks had exhausted him. + +"It's that there sick jackaroo that was pickin'-up at Big +Billabong," said the Giraffe. "He had to knock off the first week, +an' he's been here ever since. They're sendin' him away to the +hospital in Sydney by the speeshall train. They're just goin' to take +him up in the wagonette to the railway station, an' I thought I might +as well go round with the hat an' get him a few bob. He's got a +missus and kids in Sydney." + +"Yer always goin' round with yer gory hat!" growled Bogan. "Yer'd +blanky well take it round in hell!" + +"That's what he's doing, Bogan," muttered Gentleman Once, on the +shake-down, with his face to the wall. + +The hat was a genuine "cabbage-tree," one of the sort that "last a +lifetime." It was well coloured, almost black in fact with weather +and age, and it had a new strap round the base of the crown. I looked +into it and saw a dirty pound note and some silver. I dropped in half +a crown, which was more than I could spare, for I had only been a +green-hand at Big Billabong. + +"Thank yer!" he said. "Now then, you fellers!" + +"I wish you'd keep your hat on your head, and your money in your +pockets and your sympathy somewhere else," growled Jack Moonlight as +he raised himself painfully on his elbow, and felt under his pillow +for two half-crowns. "Here," he said, "here's two half-casers. +Chuck 'em in and let me sleep for God's sake!" + +Gentleman Once, the gambler, rolled round on his shake-down, bringing +his good-looking, dissipated face from the wall. He had turned in in +his clothes and, with considerable exertion he shoved his hand down +into the pocket of his trousers, which were a tight fit. He brought +up a roll of pound notes and could find no silver. + +"Here," he said to the Giraffe, "I might as well lay a quid. I'll +chance it anyhow. Chuck it in." + +"You've got rats this mornin', Gentleman Once," growled the +Bogan. "It ain't a blanky horse race." + +"P'r'aps I have," said Gentleman Once, and he turned to the +wall again with his head on his arm. + +"Now, Bogan, yer might as well chuck in somethin ," said the +Giraffe. + +"What's the matter with the --- jackaroo?" asked the Bogan, tugging his +trousers from under the mattress. + +Moonlight said something in a low tone. + +"The --- he has!" said Bogan. "Well, I pity the ---! Here, I'll chuck in +half a --- quid!" and he dropped half a sovereign into the hat. + +The fourth man, who was known to his face as "Barcoo-Rot," and +behind his back as "The Mean Man," had been drinking all night, and +not even Bogan's stump-splitting adjectives could rouse him. So Bogan +got out of bed, and calling on us (as blanky female cattle) to witness +what he was about to do, he rolled the drunkard over, prospected his +pockets till he made up five shillings (or a "caser" in bush +language), and "chucked" them into the hat. + +And Barcoo-Rot is probably unconscious to this day that he was ever +connected with an act of charity. The Giraffe struck the deaf +jackaroo in the neat room. I heard the chaps cursing "Long-'un" for +waking them, and "Deaf-'un" for being, as they thought at first, the +indirect cause of the disturbance. I heard the Giraffe and his hat +being condemned in other rooms and cursed along the veranda where more +shearers were sleeping; and after a while I turned out. + +The Giraffe was carefully fixing a mattress and pillows on the floor +of a wagonette, and presently a man, who looked like a corpse, was +carried out and lifted into the trap. + +As the wagonette started, the shanty-keeper--a fat, soulless-looking +man--put his hand in his pocket and dropped a quid into the hat which +was still going round, in the hands of the Giraffe's mate, little +Teddy Thompson, who was as far below medium height as the Giraffe was +above it. + +The Giraffe took the horse's head and led him along on the most level +parts of the road towards the railway station, and two or three chaps +went along to help get the sick man into the train. + +The shearing-season was over in that district, but I got a job of +house-painting, which was my trade, at the Great Western Hotel (a +two-story brick place), and I stayed in Bourke for a couple of months. + + +The Giraffe was a Victorian native from Bendigo. He was well known in +Bourke and to many shearers who came through the great dry scrubs from +hundreds of miles round. He was stakeholder, drunkard's banker, +peacemaker where possible, referee or second to oblige the chaps when +a fight was on, big brother or uncle to most of the children in town, +final court of appeal when the youngsters had a dispute over a +foot-race at the school picnic, referee at their fights, and he was +the stranger's friend. + +"The feller as knows can battle around for himself," he'd say. +"But I always like to do what I can for a hard-up stranger cove. I +was a green-hand jackaroo once meself, and I know what it is." + +"You're always bothering about other people, Giraffe," said Tom +Hall, the shearers' union secretary, who was only a couple of inches +shorter than the Giraffe. "There's nothing in it, you can take it +from me--I ought to know." + +"Well, what's a feller to do?" said the Giraffe. "I'm only hangin' +round here till shearin' starts agen, an' a cove might as well be +doin' something. Besides, it ain't as if I was like a cove that had +old people or a wife an' kids to look after. I ain't got no +responsibilities. A feller can't be doin' nothin'. Besides, I like +to lend a helpin' hand when I can." + +"Well, all I've got to say," said Tom, most of whose screw went in +borrowed quids, etc. "All I've got to say is that you'll get no +thanks, and you might blanky well starve in the end." + +"There ain't no fear of me starvin' so long as I've got me hands +about me; an' I ain't a cove as wants thanks," said the Giraffe. + +He was always helping someone or something. Now it was a bit of a +"darnce" that we was gettin' up for the girls; again it was Mrs +Smith, the woman whose husban' was drowned in the flood in the Began +River lars' Crismas, or that there poor woman down by the +Billabong--her husband cleared out and left her with a lot o' kids. +Or Bill Something, the bullocky, who was run over by his own wagon, +while he was drunk, and got his leg broke. + +Toward the end of his spree One-eyed Began broke loose and smashed +nearly all the windows of the Carriers' Arms, and next morning he was +fined heavily at the police court. About dinner-time I encountered +the Giraffe and his hat, with two half-crowns in it for a start. + +"I'm sorry to trouble yer," he said, "but One-eyed Bogan carn't pay +his fine, an' I thought we might fix it up for him. He ain't half a +bad sort of feller when he ain't drinkin'. It's only when he gets too +much booze in him." + +After shearing, the hat usually started round with the +Giraffe's own dirty crumpled pound note in the bottom of it as a +send-off, later on it was half a sovereign, and so on down to half a +crown and a shilling, as he got short of stuff; till in the end he +would borrow a "few bob"--which he always repaid after next +shearing-"just to start the thing goin'." + +There were several yarns about him and his hat. 'Twas said that the +hat had belonged to his father, whom he resembled in every respect, +and it had been going round for so many years that the crown was worn +as thin as paper by the quids, half-quids, casers, half-casers, bobs +and tanners or sprats--to say nothing of the scrums--that had been +chucked into it in its time and shaken up. + +They say that when a new governor visited Bourke the Giraffe happened +to be standing on the platform close to the exit, grinning +good-humouredly, and the local toady nudged him urgently and said in +an awful whisper, "Take off your hat! Why don't you take off your +hat?" + +"Why?" drawled the Giraffe, "he ain't hard up, is he?" + +And they fondly cherish an anecdote to the effect that, when the +One-Man-One-Vote Bill was passed (or Payment of Members, or when the +first Labour Party went in--I forget on which occasion they said it +was) the Giraffe was carried away by the general enthusiasm, got a few +beers in him, "chucked" a quid into his hat, and sent it round. The +boys contributed by force of habit, and contributed largely, because +of the victory and the beer. And when the hat came back to the +Giraffe, he stood holding it in front of him with both hands and +stared blankly into it for a while. Then it dawned on him. + +"Blowed if I haven't bin an' gone an' took up a bloomin' collection +for meself!" he said. + + He was almost a teetotaller, but he stood his shout in reason. He +mostly drank ginger beer. + +"I ain't a feller that boozes, but I ain't got nothin' agen chaps +enjoyin' themselves, so long as they don't go too far." + +It was common for a man on the spree to say to him: + +"Here! here's five quid. Look after it for me, Giraffe, will yer, +till I git off the booze. + +"His real name was Bob Brothers, and his bush names, 'Long-'un,' +'The Giraffe,' 'Send-round-the-hat,' 'Chuck-in-a-bob,' and +'Ginger-ale.'" + +Some years before, camels and Afghan drivers had been imported to the +Bourke district; the camels did very well in the dry country, they +went right across country and carried everything from sardines to +flooring-boards. And the teamsters loved the Afghans nearly as much +as Sydney furniture makers love the cheap Chinese in the same line. +They love 'em even as union shearers on strike love blacklegs brought +up-country to take their places. + +Now the Giraffe was a good, straight unionist, but in cases of +sickness or trouble he was as apt to forget his unionism, as all +bushmen are, at all times (and for all time), to forget their creed. +So, one evening, the Giraffe blundered into the Carriers' Arms--of all +places in the world--when it was full of teamsters; he had his hat in +his hand and some small silver and coppers in it. + +"I say, you fellers, there's a poor, sick Afghan in the camp down +there along the---" + +A big, brawny bullock-driver took him firmly by the shoulders, or, +rather by the elbows, and ran him out before any damage was done. The +Giraffe took it as he took most things, good-humouredly; but, about +dusk, he was seen slipping down towards the Afghan camp with a billy +of soup. + +"I believe," remarked Tom Hall, "that when the Giraffe goes to +heaven--and he's the only one of us, as far as I can see, that has a +ghost of a show--I believe that when he goes to heaven, the first +thing he'll do will be to take his infernal hat round amongst the +angels--getting up a collection for this damned world that he left +behind." + +"Well, I don't think there's so much to his credit, after all," said +Jack Mitchell, shearer. "You see, the Giraffe is ambitious; he likes +public life, and that accounts for him shoving himself forward with +his collections. As for bothering about people in trouble, that's +only common curiosity; he's one of those chaps that are always shoving +their noses into other people's troubles. And, as for looking after +sick men--why! there's nothing the Giraffe likes better than pottering +round a sick man, and watching him and studying him. He's awfully +interested in sick men, and they're pretty scarce out here. I tell +you there's nothing he likes better--except, maybe, it's pottering +round a corpse. I believe he'd ride forty miles to help and +sympathize and potter round a funeral. The fact of the matter is that +the Giraffe is only enjoying himself with other people's +troubles--that's all it is. It's only vulgar curiosity and +selfishness. I set it down to his ignorance; the way he was brought +up." + +A few days after the Afghan incident the Giraffe and his hat had a run +of luck. A German, one of a party who were building a new wooden +bridge over the Big Billabong, was helping unload some girders from a +truck at the railway station, when a big log slipped on the skids and +his leg was smashed badly. They carried him to the Carriers' Arms, +which was the nearest hotel, and into a bedroom behind the bar, and +sent for the doctor. The Giraffe was in evidence as usual. + +"It vas not that at all," said German Charlie, when they asked him +if he was in much pain. "It vas not that at all. I don't cares a +damn for der bain; but dis is der tird year--und I vas going home dis +year--after der gontract--und der gontract yoost commence!"` + +That was the burden of his song all through, between his groans. +There were a good few chaps sitting quietly about the bar and veranda +when the doctor arrived. The Giraffe was sitting at the end of the +counter, on which he had laid his hat while he wiped his face, neck, +and forehead with a big speckled "sweatrag." It was a very hot day. + +The doctor, a good-hearted young Australian, was heard saying +something. Then German Charlie, in a voice that rung with pain: + +"Make that leg right, doctor--quick! Dis is der tird pluddy +year--und I must go home!" + +The doctor asked him if he was in great pain. "Neffer mind der +pluddy bain, doctor! Neffer mind der pluddy bain! Dot vas nossing. +Make dat leg well quick, doctor. Dis vas der last gontract, and I vas +going home dis year." Then the words jerked out of him by physical +agony: "Der girl vas vaiting dree year, und--by Got! I must go +home." + +The publican--Watty Braithwaite, known as "Watty Broadweight," or, +more familiarly, "Watty Bothways"--turned over the Giraffe's hat in +a tired, bored sort of way, dropped a quid into it, and nodded +resignedly at the Giraffe. + +The Giraffe caught up the hint and the hat with alacrity. The hat +went all round town, so to speak; and, as soon as his leg was firm +enough not to come loose on the road German Charlie went home. + +It was well known that I contributed to the Sydney _Bulletin_ and +several other papers. The Giraffe's bump of reverence was very large, +and swelled especially for sick men and poets. He treated me with +much more respect than is due from a bushman to a man, and with an odd +sort of extra gentleness I sometimes fancied. But one day he rather +surprised me. + +"I'm sorry to trouble yer," he said in a shamefaced way. "I don't +know as you go in for sportin', but One-eyed Bogan an' Barcoo-Rot is +goin' to have a bit of a scrap down the Billybong this evenin', +an'---" + +"A bit of a what?" I asked. + +"A bit of fight to a finish," he said apologetically. "An' the +chaps is tryin' to fix up a fiver to put some life into the thing. +There's bad blood between One-eyed Bogan and Barcoo-Rot, an' it won't +do them any harm to have it out." + +It was a great fight, I remember. There must have been a couple of +score blood-soaked handkerchiefs (or "sweat-rags") buried in a hole +on the field of battle, and the Giraffe was busy the rest of the +evening helping to patch up the principals. Later on he took up a +small collection for the loser, who happened to be Barcoo-Rot in spite +of the advantage of an eye. + +The Salvation Army lassie, who went round with the _War Cry_, +nearly always sold the Giraffe three copies. + +A new-chum parson, who wanted a subscription to build or enlarge a +chapel, or something, sought the assistance of the Giraffe's influence +with his mates. + +"Well," said the Giraffe, "I ain't a churchgoer meself. I ain't +what you might call a religious cove, but I'll be glad to do what I +can to help yer. I don't suppose I can do much. I ain't been to +church since I was a kiddy." + +The parson was shocked, but later on he learned to appreciate the +Giraffe and his mates, and to love Australia for the bushman's sake, +and it was he who told me the above anecdote. + +The Giraffe helped fix some stalls for a Catholic Church bazaar, and +some of the chaps chaffed him about it in the union office. + +"You'll be taking up a collection for a joss-house down in the +Chinamen's camp next," said Tom Hall in conclusion. + +"Well, I ain't got nothin' agen the Roming Carflics," said the +Giraffe. "An' Father O'Donovan's a very decent sort of cove. He +stuck up for the unions all right in the strike anyway." ("He +wouldn't be Irish if he wasn't," someone commented.) "I carried +swags once for six months with a feller that was a Carflick, an' he +was a very straight feller. And a girl I knowed turned Carflick to +marry a chap that had got her into trouble, an' she was always jes' +the same to me after as she was before. Besides, I like to help +everything that's goin' on." + +Tom Hall and one or two others went out hurriedly to have a drink. +But we all loved the Giraffe. + +He was very innocent and very humorous, especially when he meant to be +most serious and philosophical. + +"Some of them bush girls is regular tomboys," he said to me solemnly +one day. "Some of them is too cheeky altogether. I remember once I +was stoppin' at a place--they was sort of relations o' mine--an' they +put me to sleep in a room off the verander, where there was a glass +door an' no blinds. An' the first mornin' the girls--they was sort o' +cousins o' mine--they come gigglin' and foolin' round outside the door +on the verander, an' kep' me in bed till nearly ten o'clock. I had to +put me trowsis on under the bed-clothes in the end. But I got back on +'em the next night," he reflected. + +"How did you do that, Bob?" I asked. + +"Why, I went to bed in me trowsis!" + + +One day I was on a plank, painting the ceiling of the bar of the Great +Western Hotel. I was anxious to get the job finished. The work had +been kept back most of the day by chaps handing up long beers to me, +and drawing my attention to the alleged fact that I was putting on the +paint wrong side out. I was slapping it on over the last few boards +when: + +"I'm very sorry to trouble yer; I always seem to be troublin' yer; +but there's that there woman and them girls---" + +I looked down--about the first time I had looked down on him--and +there was the Giraffe, with his hat brim up on the plank and two +half-crowns in it. + +"Oh, that's all right, Bob," I said, and I dropped in half a crown. + +There were shearers in the bar, and presently there was some +barracking. It appeared that that there woman and them girls were +strange women, in the local as well as the Biblical sense of the word, +who had come from Sydney at the end of the shearing-season, and had +taken a cottage on the edge of the scrub on the outskirts of the town. +There had been trouble this week in connection with a row at their +establishment, and they had been fined, warned off by the police, and +turned out by their landlord. + +"This is a bit too red-hot, Giraffe," said one of the shearers. +"Them ---s has made enough out of us coves. They've got plenty of +stuff, don't you fret. Let 'em go to ---! I'm blanked if I give a +sprat." + +"They ain't got their fares to Sydney," said the Giraffe. "An', +what's more, the little 'un is sick, an' two of them has kids in +Sydney." + +"How the --- do you know?" + +"Why, one of 'em come to me an' told me all about it." + +There was an involuntary guffaw. + +"Look here, Bob," said Billy Woods, the rouseabouts' secretary, +kindly. "Don't you make a fool of yourself. You'll have all the +chaps laughing at you. Those girls are only working you for all +you're worth. I suppose one of 'em came crying and whining to you. +Don't you bother about 'em. _You_ don't know 'em; they can pump +water at a moment's notice. You haven't had any experience with women +yet, Bob." + +"She didn't come whinin' and cryin' to me," said the Giraffe, dropping +his twanging drawl a little. "She looked me straight in the face an' +told me all about it." + +"I say, Giraffe," said Box-o'-Tricks, "what have you been doin'? +You've bin down there on the nod. I'm surprised at yer, Giraffe." + +"An' he pretends to be so gory soft an' innocent, too," growled the +Bogan. "We know all about you, Giraffe." + +"Look here, Giraffe," said Mitchell the shearer. "I'd never have +thought it of you. We all thought you were the only virgin youth west +the river; I always thought you were a moral young man. You mustn't +think that because your conscience is pricking you everyone else's +is." + +"I ain't had anythin' to do with them," said the Giraffe, drawling +again. "I ain't a cove that goes in for that sort of thing. But +other chaps has, and I think they might as well help 'em out of their +fix." + +"They're a rotten crowd," said Billy Woods. "You don't know them, +Bob. Don't bother about them-they're not worth it. Put your money in +your pocket. You'll find a better use for it before next shearing." + +"Better shout, Giraffe," said Box-o'-Tricks. + +Now in spite of the Giraffe's softness he was the hardest man in +Bourke to move when he'd decided on what he thought was "the fair +thing to do." Another peculiarity of his was that on occasion, such +for instance as "sayin' a few words" at a strike meeting, he would +straighten himself, drop the twang, and rope in his drawl, so to +speak. + +"Well, look here, you chaps," he said now. "I don't know anything +about them women. I s'pose they're bad, but I don't suppose they're +worse than men has made them. All I know is that there's four women +turned out, without any stuff, and every woman in Bourke, an' the +police, an' the law agen 'em. An' the fact that they is women is +agenst 'em most of all. You don't expect 'em to hump their swags to +Sydney! Why, only I ain't got the stuff I wouldn't trouble yer. I'd +pay their fares meself. Look," he said, lowering his voice, "there +they are now, an' one of the girls is cryin'. Don't let 'em see yer +lookin'." + +I dropped softly from the plank and peeped out with the rest. + +They stood by the fence on the opposite side of the street, a bit up +towards the railway station, with their portmanteaux and bundles at +their feet. One girl leant with her arms on the fence rail and her +face buried in them, another was trying to comfort her. The third +girl and the woman stood facing our way. The woman was good-looking; +she had a hard face, but it might have been made hard. The third girl +seemed half defiant, half inclined to cry. Presently she went to the +other side of the girl who was crying on the fence and put her arm +round her shoulder. The woman suddenly turned her back on us and +stood looking away over the paddocks. + +The hat went round. Billy Woods was first, then Box-o'-Tricks, and +then Mitchell. + +Billy contributed with eloquent silence. "I was only jokin', +Giraffe," said Box-o'-Tricks, dredging his pockets for a couple of +shillings. It was some time after the shearing, and most of the chaps +were hard up. "Ah, well," sighed Mitchell. "There's no help for +it. If the Giraffe would take up a collection to import some decent +girls to this God-forgotten hole there might be some sense in +it. . . . It's bad enough for the Giraffe to undermine our religious +prejudices, and tempt us to take a morbid interest in sick Chows and +Afghans, and blacklegs and widows; but when he starts mixing us up +with strange women it's time to buck." And he prospected his pockets +and contributed two shillings, some odd pennies, and a pinch of +tobacco dust. + +"I don't mind helping the girls, but I'm damned if I'll give a penny +to help the old---," said Tom Hall. + +"Well, she was a girl once herself," drawled the Giraffe. + +The Giraffe went round to the other pubs and to the union offices, and +when he returned he seemed satisfied with the plate, but troubled +about something else. + +"I don't know what to do for them for to-night," he said. "None of +the pubs or boardin'-houses will hear of them, an' there ain't no +empty houses, an' the women is all agen 'em." + +"Not all," said Alice, the big, handsome barmaid from Sydney. +"Come here, Bob." She gave the Giraffe half a sovereign and a look +for which some of us would have paid him ten pounds--had we had the +money, and had the look been transferable. + +"Wait a minute, Bob," she said, and she went in to speak to the +landlord. + +"There's an empty bedroom at the end of the store in the yard," she +said when she came back. "They can camp there for to-night if they +behave themselves. You'd better tell 'em, Bob." + +"Thank yer, Alice," said the Giraffe. + +Next day, after work, the Giraffe and I drifted together and down by +the river in the cool of the evening, and sat on the edge of the +steep, drought-parched bank. + +"I heard you saw your lady friends off this morning, Bob," I said, +and was sorry I said it, even before he answered. + +"Oh, they ain't no friends of mine," he said. "Only four' poor +devils of women. I thought they mightn't like to stand waitin' with +the crowd on the platform, so I jest offered to get their tickets an' +told 'em to wait round at the back of the station till the bell +rung. . . . An' what do yer think they did, Harry?" he went on, with +an exasperatingly unintelligent grin. "Why, they wanted to kiss me." + +"Did they?" + +"Yes. An' they would have done it, too, if I hadn't been so +long. . . . Why, I'm blessed if they didn't kiss me hands." + +"You don't say so." + +"God's truth. Somehow I didn't like to go on the platform with them +after that; besides, they was cryin', and I can't stand women cryin'. +But some of the chaps put them into an empty carriage." He thought a +moment. Then: + +"There's some terrible good-hearted fellers in the world," he +reflected. + +I thought so too. "Bob," I said, "you're a single man. Why don't +you get married and settle down?" + +"Well," he said, "I ain't got no wife an' kids, that's a fact. But +it ain't my fault." + +He may have been right about the wife. But I thought of the look that +Alice had given him, and--- + +"Girls seem to like me right enough," he said, "but it don't go no +further than that. The trouble is that I'm so long, and I always seem +to get shook after little girls. At least there was one little girl +in Bendigo that I was properly gone on." + +"And wouldn't she have you?" + +"Well, it seems not." + +"Did you ask her?" + +"Oh, yes, I asked her right enough." + +"Well, and what did she say?" + +"She said it would be redicilus for her to be seen trottin' alongside +of a chimbley like me." + +"Perhaps she didn't mean that. There are any amount of little women +who like tall men." + +"I thought of that too--afterwards. P'r'aps she didn't mean it that +way. I s'pose the fact of the matter was that she didn't cotton on to +me, and wanted to let me down easy. She didn't want to hurt me +feelin's, if yer understand--she was a very good-hearted little girl. +There's some terrible tall fellers where I come from, and I know two +as married little girls." + +He seemed a hopeless case. + +"Sometimes," he said, "sometimes I wish that I wasn't so blessed +long." + +"There's that there deaf jackaroo," he reflected presently. "He's +something in the same fig about girls as I am. He's too deaf and I'm +too long." + +"How do you make that out?" I asked. "He's got three girls, to my +knowledge, and, as for being deaf, why, he gasses more than any man in +the town, and knows more of what's going on than old Mother Brindle +the washerwoman." + +"Well, look at that now!" said the Giraffe, slowly. "Who'd have +thought it? He never told me he had three girls, an' as for hearin' +news, I always tell him anything that's goin' on that I think he +doesn't catch. He told me his trouble was that whenever he went out +with a girl people could hear what they was sayin'--at least they +could hear what she was sayin' to him, an' draw their own conclusions, +he said. He said he went out one night with a girl, and some of the +chaps foxed 'em an' heard her sayin' `don't' to him, an' put it all +round town." + +"What did she say `don't' for?" I asked. + +"He didn't tell me that, but I s'pose he was kissin' her or huggin' +her or something." + +"Bob," I said presently, "didn't you try the little girl in Bendigo +a second time?" + +"No," he said. "What was the use. She was a good little girl, and I +wasn't goin' to go botherin' her. I ain't the sort of cove that goes +hangin' round where he isn't wanted. But somehow I couldn't stay +about Bendigo after she gave me the hint, so I thought I'd come over +an' have a knock round on this side for a year or two." + +"And you never wrote to her?" + +"No. What was the use of goin' pesterin' her with letters? I know +what trouble letters give me when I have to answer one. She'd have +only had to tell me the straight truth in a letter an' it wouldn't +have done me any good. But I've pretty well got over it by this +time." + +A few days later I went to Sydney. The Giraffe was the last I shook +hands with from the carriage window, and he slipped something in a +piece of newspaper into my hand. + +"I hope yer won't be offended," he drawled, "but some of the chaps +thought you mightn't be too flush of stuff--you've been shoutin' a +good deal; so they put a quid or two together. They thought it might +help yer to have a bit of a fly round in Sydney." + +I was back in Bourke before next shearing. On the evening of my +arrival I ran against the Giraffe; he seemed strangely shaken over +something, but he kept his hat on his head. + +"Would yer mind takin' a stroll as fur as the Billerbong?" he said. +"I got something I'd like to tell yer." + +His big, brown, sunburnt hands trembled and shook as he took a letter +from his pocket and opened it. + +"I've just got a letter," he said. "A letter from that little girl +at Bendigo. It seems it was all a mistake. I'd like you to read it. +Somehow I feel as if I want to talk to a feller, and I'd rather talk +to you than any of them other chaps." + +It was a good letter, from a big-hearted little girl. She had been +breaking her heart for the great ass all these months. It seemed that +he had left Bendigo without saying good-bye to her. "Somehow I +couldn't bring meself to it," he said, when I taxed him with it. She +had never been able to get his address until last week; then she got +it from a Bourke man who had gone south. She called him "an awful +long fool," which he was, without the slightest doubt, and she +implored him to write, and come back to her. + +"And will you go back, Bob?" I asked. + +"My oath! I'd take the train to-morrer only I ain't got the stuff. +But I've got a stand in Big Billerbong Shed an' I'll soon knock a few +quid together. I'll go back as soon as ever shearin's over. I'm +goin' to write away to her to-night." + + +The Giraffe was the "ringer" of Big Billabong Shed that season. His +tallies averaged a hundred and twenty a day. He only sent his hat +round once during shearing, and it was noticed that he hesitated at +first and only contributed half a crown. But then it was a case of a +man being taken from the shed by the police for wife desertion. + +"It's always that way," commented Mitchell. "Those soft, +good-hearted fellows always end by getting hard and selfish. The +world makes 'em so. It's the thought of the soft fools they've been +that finds out sooner or later and makes 'em repent. Like as not the +Giraffe will be the meanest man out back before he's done." + +When Big Billabong cut out, and we got back to Bourke with our dusty +swags and dirty cheques, I spoke to Tom Hall: + +"Look here, Tom," I said. "That long fool, the Giraffe, has been +breaking his heart for a little girl in Bendigo ever since he's been +out back, and she's been breaking her heart for him, and the ass +didn't know it till he got a letter from her just before Big Billabong +started. He's going to-morrow morning." + +That evening Tom stole the Giraffe's hat. "I s'pose it'll turn up in +the mornin'," said the Giraffe. "I don't mind a lark," he added, +"but it does seem a bit red hot for the chaps to collar a cove's hat +and a feller goin' away for good, p'r'aps, in the mornin'." + +Mitchell started the thing going with a quid. + +"It's worth it," he said, "to get rid of him. We'll have some +peace now. There won't be so many accidents or women in trouble when +the Giraffe and his blessed hat are gone. Any way, he's an eyesore in +the town, and he's getting on my nerves for one. . . . Come on, you +sinners! Chuck 'em in; we're only taking quids and half-quids." + +About daylight next morning Tom Hall slipped into the Giraffe's room +at the Carriers' Arms. The Giraffe was sleeping peacefully. Tom put +the hat on a chair by his side. The collection had been a record one, +and, besides the packet of money in the crown of the hat, there was a +silver-mounted pipe with case--the best that could be bought in +Bourke, a gold brooch, and several trifles--besides an ugly valentine +of a long man in his shirt walking the room with a twin on each arm. + +Tom was about to shake the Giraffe by the shoulder, when he noticed a +great foot, with about half a yard of big-boned ankle and shank, +sticking out at the bottom of the bed. The temptation was too great. +Tom took up the hair-brush, and, with the back of it, he gave a smart +rap on the point of an in-growing toe-nail, and slithered. + +We heard the Giraffe swearing good-naturedly for a while, and then +there was a pregnant silence. He was staring at the hat we supposed. + +We were all up at the station to see him off. It was rather a long +wait. The Giraffe edged me up to the other end of the platform. + +He seemed overcome. + +"There's--there's some terrible good-hearted fellers in this world," +he said. "You mustn't forgit 'em, Harry, when you make a big name +writin'. I'm--well, I'm blessed if I don't feel as if I was jist +goin' to blubber!" + +I was glad he didn't. The Giraffe blubberin' would have been a +spectacle. I steered him back to his friends. + +"Ain't you going to kiss me, Bob?" said the Great Western's big, +handsome barmaid, as the bell rang. + +"Well, I don't mind kissin' you, Alice," he said, wiping his mouth. +"But I'm goin' to be married, yer know." And he kissed her fair on +the mouth. + +"There's nothin' like gettin' into practice," he said, grinning +round. + +We thought he was improving wonderfully; but at the last moment +something troubled him. + +"Look here, you chaps," he said, hesitatingly, with his hand in his +pocket, "I don't know what I'm going to do with all this stuff. +There's that there poor washerwoman that scalded her legs liftin' the +boiler of clothes off the fire---" + +We shoved him into the carriage. He hung--about half of him--out the +window, wildly waving his hat, till the train disappeared in the +scrub. + +And, as I sit here writing by lamplight at midday, in the midst of a +great city of shallow social sham, of hopeless, squalid poverty, of +ignorant selfishness, cultured or brutish, and of noble and heroic +endeavour frowned down or callously neglected, I am almost aware of a +burst of sunshine in the room, and a long form leaning over my chair, +and: + +"Excuse me for troublin' yer; I'm always troublin' yer; but there's +that there poor woman. . . ." + +And I wish I could immortalize him! + + + + +THAT PRETTY GIRL IN THE ARMY + + + Now I often sit at Watty's, when the night is very near, + With a head that's full of jingles--and the fumes of bottled beer; + For I always have a fancy that, if I am over there + When the Army prays for Watty, I'm included in the prayer. + It would take a lot of praying, lots of thumping on the drum, + To prepare our sinful, straying, erring souls for Kingdom Come. + But I love my fellow-sinners! and I hope, upon the whole, + That the Army gets a hearing when it prays for Watty's soul. + -When the World was Wide. + + +The Salvation Army does good business in some of the outback towns of +the great pastoral wastes of Australia. There's the thoughtless, +careless generosity of the bushman, whose pockets don't go far enough +down his trousers (that's what's the matter with him), and who +contributes to anything that comes along, without troubling to ask +questions, like long Bob Brothers of Bourke, who, chancing to be "a +Protestant by rights," unwittingly subscribed towards the erection of +a new Catholic church, and, being chaffed for his mistake, said: + +"Ah, well, I don't suppose it'll matter a hang in the end, anyway it +goes. I ain't got nothink agenst the Roming Carflicks." + +There's the shearer, fresh with his cheque from a cut-out shed, +gloriously drunk and happy, in love with all the world, and ready to +subscribe towards any creed and shout for all hands--including Old +Nick if he happened to come along. There's the shearer, half-drunk +and inclined to be nasty, who has got the wrong end of all things with +a tight grip, and who flings a shilling in the face of out-back +conventionality (as he thinks) by chucking a bob into the Salvation +Army ring. Then he glares round to see if he can catch anybody +winking behind his back. There's the cynical joker, a queer mixture, +who contributes generously and tempts the reformed boozer afterwards. +There's the severe-faced old station-hand--in clean shirt and +neckerchief and white moleskins--in for his annual or semi-annual +spree, who contributes on principle, and then drinks religiously until +his cheque is gone and the horrors are come. There's the shearer, +feeling mighty bad after a spree, and in danger of seeing things when +he tries to go to sleep. He has dropped ten or twenty pounds over bar +counters and at cards, and he now "chucks" a repentant shilling into +the ring, with a very private and rather vague sort of feeling that +something might come of it. There's the stout, contented, +good-natured publican, who tips the Army as if it were a barrel-organ. +And there are others and other reasons--black sheep and +ne'er-do-wells--and faint echoes of other times in Salvation Army +tunes. + +Bourke, the metropolis of the Great Scrubs, on the banks of the +Darling River, about five hundred miles from Sydney, was suffering +from a long drought when I was there in ninety-two; and the heat may +or may not have been another cause contributing to the success, from a +business point of view, of the Bourke garrison. There was much beer +boozing--and, besides, it was vaguely understood (as most things are +vaguely understood out there in the drought-haze) that the place the +Army came to save us from was hotter than Bourke. We didn't hanker to +go to a hotter place than Bourke. But that year there was an +extraordinary reason for the Army's great financial success there. + +She was a little girl, nineteen or twenty, I should judge, the +prettiest girl I ever saw in the Army, and one of the prettiest I've +ever seen out of it. She had the features of an angel, but her +expression was wonderfully human, sweet and sympathetic. Her big grey +eyes were sad with sympathy for sufferers and sinners, and her poke +bonnet was full of bunchy, red-gold hair. Her first appearance was +somewhat dramatic--perhaps the Army arranged it so. + +The Army used to pray, and thump the drum, and sing, and take up +collections every evening outside Watty Bothways' Hotel, the Carriers' +Arms. They performed longer and more often outside Watty's than any +other pub in town--perhaps because Watty was considered the most +hopeless publican and his customers the hardest crowd of boozers in +Bourke. The band generally began to play about dusk. Watty would +lean back comfortably in a basket easy-chair on his wide veranda, and +clasp his hands, in a calm, contented way, while the Army banged the +drum and got steam up, and whilst, perhaps, there was a barney going +on in the bar, or a bloodthirsty fight in the backyard. On such +occasions there was something like an indulgent or fatherly expression +on his fat and usually emotionless face. And by and by he'd move his +head gently and doze. The banging and the singing seemed to soothe +him, and the praying, which was often very personal, never seemed to +disturb him in the least. + +Well, it was about dusk one day; it had been a terrible day, a hundred +and something startling in the shade, but there came a breeze after +sunset. There had been several dozen of buckets of water thrown on +the veranda floor and the ground outside. Watty was seated in his +accustomed place when the Army arrived. There was no barney in the +bar because there was a fight in the backyard, and that claimed the +attention of all the customers. + +The Army prayed for Watty and his clients; then a reformed drunkard +started to testify against publicans and all their works. Watty +settled himself comfortably, folded his hands, and leaned back and +dozed. + +The fight was over, and the chaps began to drop round to the bar. The +man who was saved waved his arms, and danced round and howled. + +"Ye-es!" he shouted hoarsely. "The publicans, and boozers, and +gamblers, and sinners may think that Bourke is hot, but hell is a +thousand times hotter! I tell you" + +"Oh, Lord!" said Mitchell, the shearer, and he threw a penny into +the ring. + +"Ye-es! I tell you that hell is a million times hotter than Bourke! +I tell you---" + +"Oh, look here," said a voice from the background, "that won't +wash. Why, don't you know that when the Bourke people die they send +back for their blankets?" + +The saved brother glared round. + +"I hear a freethinker speaking, my friends," he said. Then, with +sudden inspiration and renewed energy, "I hear the voice of a +freethinker. Show me the face of a freethinker," he yelled, glaring +round like a hunted, hungry man. "Show me the face of a freethinker, +and I'll tell you what he is." + +Watty hitched himself into a more comfortable position and clasped his +hands on his knee and closed his eyes again. + +"Ya-a-a-s!" shrieked the brand. "I tell you, my friends, I can +tell a freethinker by his face. Show me the face of a---" + +At this point there was an interruption. One-eyed, or Wall-eyed, +Bogan, who had a broken nose, and the best side of whose face was +reckoned the ugliest and most sinister--One-eyed Bogan thrust his face +forward from the ring of darkness into the torchlight of salvation. +He had got the worst of a drawn battle; his nose and mouth were +bleeding, and his good eye was damaged. + +"Look at my face!" he snarled, with dangerous earnestness. "Look +at my face! That's the face of a freethinker, and I don't care who +knows it. Now! what have you got to say against my face, +`Man-without-a-Shirt?'" + +The brother drew back. He had been known in the northwest in his +sinful days as "Man-without-a-Shirt," alias "Shirty," or "The +Dirty Man," and was flabbergasted at being recognized in speech. +Also, he had been in a shearing-shed and in a shanty orgy with +One-eyed Bogan, and knew the man. + +Now most of the chaps respected the Army, and, indeed, anything that +looked like religion, but the Bogan's face, as representing +free-thought, was a bit too sudden for them. There were sounds on the +opposite side of the ring as from men being smitten repeatedly and +rapidly below the belt, and long Tom Hall and one or two others got +away into the darkness in the background, where Tom rolled helplessly +on the grass and sobbed. + +It struck me that Bogan's face was more the result of free speech than +anything else. + +The Army was about to pray when the Pretty Girl stepped forward, her +eyes shining with indignation and enthusiasm. She had arrived by the +evening train, and had been standing shrinkingly behind an Army lass +of fifty Australian summers, who was about six feet high, flat and +broad, and had a square face, and a mouth like a joint in boiler +plates. + +The Pretty Girl stamped her pretty foot on the gravel, and her eyes +flashed in the torchlight. + +"You ought to be ashamed of yourselves," she said. "Great big men +like you to be going on the way you are. If you were ignorant or +poor, as I've seen people, there might be some excuse for you. +Haven't you got any mothers, or sisters, or wives to think of? What +sort of a life is this you lead? Drinking, and gambling, and +fighting, and swearing your lives away! Do you ever think of God and +the time when you were children? Why don't you make homes? Look at +that man's face!" (she pointed suddenly at Bogan, who collapsed and +sidled behind his mates out of the light). "Look at that man's face! +Is it a face for a Christian? And you help and encourage him to +fight. You're worse than he is. Oh, it's brutal. It's--it's wicked. +Great big men like you, you ought to be ashamed of yourselves." + +Long Bob Brothers--about six-foot-four--the longest and most innocent +there, shrunk down by the wall and got his inquiring face out of the +light. The Pretty Girl fluttered on for a few moments longer, greatly +excited, and then stepped back, seemingly much upset, and was taken +under the wing of the woman with the boiler-plate mouth. + +It was a surprise, and very sudden. Bogan slipped round to the +backyard, and was seen bathing his battered features at the pump. The +rest wore the expression of men who knew that something unusual has +happened, but don't know what, and are waiting vacantly for +developments.--Except Tom Hall, who had recovered and returned. He +stood looking over the head of the ring of bushmen, and apparently +taking the same critical interest in the girl as he would in a +fight--his expression was such as a journalist might wear who is +getting exciting copy. + +The Army had it all their own way for the rest of the evening, and +made a good collection. The Pretty Girl stood smiling round with +shining eyes as the bobs and tanners dropped in, and then, being +shoved forward by the flat woman, she thanked us sweetly, and said we +were good fellows, and that she was sorry for some things she'd said +to us. Then she retired, fluttering and very much flushed, and hid +herself behind the hard woman--who, by the way, had an excrescence on +her upper lip which might have stood for a rivet. + +Presently the Pretty Girl came from behind the big woman and stood +watching things with glistening eyes. Some of the chaps on the +opposite side of the ring moved a little to one side and all were +careful not to meet her eye--not to be caught looking at her--lest she +should be embarrassed. Watty had roused himself a little at the sound +of a strange voice in the Army (and such a clear, sweet voice too!) +and had a look; then he settled back peacefully again, but it was +noticed that he didn't snore that evening. + +And when the Army prayed, the Pretty Girl knelt down with the rest on +the gravel. One or two tall bushmen bowed their heads as if they had +to, and One-eyed Bogan, with the blood washed from his face, stood +with his hat off, glaring round to see if he could catch anyone +sniggering. + +Mitchell, the shearer, said afterwards that the whole business made +him feel for the moment like he felt sometimes in the days when he +used to feel things. + +The town discussed the Pretty Girl in the Army that night and for many +days thereafter, but no one could find out who she was or where she +belonged to--except that she came from Sydney last. She kept her +secret, if she had one, very close--or else the other S.-A. women +were not to be pumped. She lived in skillion-rooms at the back of the +big weather-board Salvation Army barracks with two other "lassies," +who did washing and sewing and nursing, and went shabby, and half +starved themselves, and were baked in the heat, like scores of women +in the bush, and even as hundreds of women, suffering from religious +mania, slave and stint in city slums, and neglect their homes, +husbands and children--for the glory of Booth. + +The Pretty Girl was referred to as Sister Hannah by the Army people, +and came somehow to be known by sinners as "Miss Captain." I don't +know whether that was her real name or what rank she held in the Army, +if indeed she held any. + +She sold _War Crys_, and the circulation doubled in a day. +One-eyed Bogan, being bailed up unexpectedly, gave her "half a +caser" for a _Cry_, and ran away without the paper or the +change. Jack Mitchell bought a _Cry_ for the first time in his +life, and read it. He said he found some of the articles intensely +realistic, and many of the statements were very interesting. He said +he read one or two things in the _Cry_ that he didn't know +before. Tom Hall, taken unawares, bought three _Crys_ from the +Pretty Girl, and blushed to find it fame. + +Little Billy Woods, the Labourers' Union secretary--who had a poetic +temperament and more than the average bushman's reverence for higher +things--Little Billy Woods told me in a burst of confidence that he +generally had two feelings, one after the other, after encountering +that girl. One was that unfathomable far-away feeling of loneliness +and longing, that comes at odd times to the best of married men, with +the best of wives and children--as Billy had. The other feeling, +which came later on, and was a reaction in fact, was the feeling of a +man who thinks he's been twisted round a woman's little finger for the +benefit of somebody else. Billy said that he couldn't help being +reminded by the shy, sweet smile and the shy, sweet "thank you" of +the Pretty Girl in the Army, of the shy, sweet smile and the shy, +sweet gratitude of a Sydney private barmaid, who had once roped him +in, in the days before he was married. Then he'd reckon that the Army +lassie had been sent out back to Bourke as a business speculation. + +Tom Hall was inclined to reckon so too--but that was after he'd been +chaffed for a month about the three _War Crys_. + +The Pretty Girl was discussed from psychological points of view; not +forgetting the sex problem. Donald Macdonald--shearer, union leader +and labour delegate to other colonies on occasion--Donald Macdonald +said that whenever he saw a circle of plain or ugly, dried-up women or +girls round a shepherd, evangelist or a Salvation Army drum, he'd say +"sexually starved!" They were hungry for love. Religious mania was +sexual passion dammed out of its course. Therefore he held that +morbidly religious girls were the most easily seduced. + +But this couldn't apply to Pretty Girl in the Army. Mitchell reckoned +that she'd either had a great sorrow--a lot of trouble, or a +disappointment in love (the "or" is Mitchell's); but they couldn't +see how a girl like her could possibly be disappointed in love--unless +the chap died or got into jail for life. Donald decided that her soul +had been starved somehow. + +Mitchell suggested that it might be only a craving for notoriety, the +same thing that makes women and girls go amongst lepers, and out to +the battlefield, and nurse ugly pieces of men back to life again; the +same thing that makes some women and girls swear ropes round men's +necks. The Pretty Girl might be the daughter of well-to-do +people--even aristocrats, said Mitchell--she was pretty enough and +spoke well enough. "Every woman's a barmaid at heart," as the +_Bulletin_ puts it, said Mitchell. + +But not even one of the haggard women of Bourke ever breathed a +suspicion of scandal against her. They said she was too good and too +pretty to be where she was. You see it was not as in an old settled +town where hags blacken God's world with their tongues. Bourke was +just a little camping town in a big land, where free, good-hearted +democratic Australians, and the best of black sheep from the old world +were constantly passing through; where husband's were often obliged to +be away from home for twelve months, and the storekeepers had to trust +the people, and mates trusted each other, and the folks were +broad-minded. The mind's eye had a wide range. + +After her maiden speech the Pretty Girl seldom spoke, except to return +thanks for collections--and she never testified. She had a sweet +voice and used to sing. + +Now, if I were writing pure fiction, and were not cursed with an +obstinate inclination to write the truth, I might say that, after the +advent of the Pretty Girl, the morals of Bourke improved suddenly and +wonderfully. That One-eyed Bogan left off gambling and drinking and +fighting and swearing, and put on a red coat and testified and fought +the devil only; that Mitchell dropped his mask of cynicism; that +Donald Macdonald ate no longer of the tree of knowledge and ceased to +worry himself with psychological problems, and was happy; and that Tom +Hall was no longer a scoffer. That no one sneaked round through the +scrub after dusk to certain necessary establishments in weather-board +cottages on the outskirts of the town; and that the broad-minded and +obliging ladies thereof became Salvation Army lassies. + +But none of these things happened. Drunks quieted down or got out of +the way if they could when the Pretty Girl appeared on the scene, +fights and games of "headin' 'em" were adjourned, and weak, ordinary +language was used for the time being, and that was about all. + +Nevertheless, most of the chaps were in love with that Pretty Girl in +the Army--all those who didn't _worship_ her privately. Long Bob +Brothers hovered round in hopes, they said, that she'd meet with an +accident--get run over by a horse or something--and he'd have to carry +her in; he scared the women at the barracks by dropping firewood over +the fence after dark. Barcoo-Rot, the meanest man in the back +country, was seen to drop a threepenny bit into the ring, and a rumour +was industriously circulated (by Tom Hall) to the effect that One-eyed +Bogan intended to shave and join the Army disguised as a lassie. + +Handsome Jake Boreham (_alias_ Bore-'em), a sentimental shearer +from New Zealand, who had read Bret Harte, made an elaborate attempt +for the Pretty Girl, by pretending to be going to the dogs headlong, +with an idea of first winning her sorrowful interest and sympathy, and +then making an apparently hard struggle to straighten up for her sake. +He related his experience with the cheerful and refreshing absence of +reserve which was characteristic of him, and is of most bushmen. + +"I'd had a few drinks," he said, "and was having a spell under a +gum by the river, when I saw the Pretty Girl and another Army woman +coming down along the bank. It was a blazing hot day. I thought of +Sandy and the Schoolmistress in Bret Harte, and I thought it would be +a good idea to stretch out in the sun and pretend to be helpless; so I +threw my hat on the ground and lay down, with my head in the blazing +heat, in the most graceful position I could get at, and I tried to put +a look of pained regret on my face, as if I was dreaming of my lost +boyhood and me mother. I thought, perhaps, the Girl would pity me, +and I felt sure she'd stoop and pick up my hat and put it gently over +my poor troubled head. Then I was going to become conscious for a +moment, and look hopelessly round, and into her eyes, and then start +and look sorrowful and ashamed, and stagger to my feet, taking off my +hat like the Silver King does to the audience when he makes his first +appearance drunk on the stage; and then I was going to reel off, +trying to walk as straight as I could. And next day I was going to +clean up my teeth and nails and put on a white shirt, and start to be +a new man henceforth. + +"Well, as I lay there with my eyes shut, I heard the footsteps come +up and stop, and heard 'em whisper, and I thought I heard the Pretty +Girl say `Poor fellow!' or something that sounded like that; and just +then I got a God-almighty poke in the ribs with an umbrella--at least +I suppose it was aimed for my ribs; but women are bad shots, and the +point of the umbrella caught me in the side, just between the bottom +rib and the hip-bone, and I sat up with a click, like the blade of a +pocketknife. + +"The other lassie was the big square-faced woman. The Pretty Girl +looked rather more frightened and disgusted than sentimental, but she +had plenty of pluck, and soon pulled herself together. She said I +ought to be ashamed of myself, a great big man like me, lying there +in the dust like a drunken tramp--an eyesore and a disgrace to all the +world. She told me to go to my camp, wherever that was, and sleep +myself sober. The square-jawed woman said I looked like a fool +sitting there. I did feel ashamed, and I reckon I did look like +a fool--a man generally does in a fix like that. I felt like one, +anyway. I got up and walked away, and it hurt me so much that I went +over to West Bourke and went to the dogs properly for a fortnight, and +lost twenty quid on a game of draughts against a blindfold player. +Now both those women had umbrellas, but I'm not sure to this day which +of 'em it was that gave me the poke. It wouldn't have mattered much +anyway. I haven't borrowed one of Bret Harte's books since." + +Jake reflected a while. "The worst of it was," he said ruefully, +"that I wasn't sure that the girl or the woman didn't see through me, +and that worried me a bit. You never can tell how much a woman +suspects, and that's the worst of 'em. I found that out after I got +married." + +The Pretty Girl in the Army grew pale and thin and bigger-eyed. The +women said it was a shame, and that she ought to be sent home to her +friends, wherever they were. She was laid up for two or three days, +and some of the women cooked delicacies and handed 'em over the +barracks fence, and offered to come in and nurse her; but the square +woman took washing home and nursed the girl herself. + +The Pretty Girl still sold _War Crys_ and took up collections, +but in a tired, listless, half shamed-faced way. It was plain that +she was tired of the Army, and growing ashamed of the Salvationists. +Perhaps she had come to see things too plainly. + +You see, the Army does no good out back in Australia--except from a +business point of view. It is simply there to collect funds for +hungry headquarters. The bushmen are much too intelligent for the +Army. There was no poverty in Bourke--as it is understood in the +city; there was plenty of food; and camping out and roughing it come +natural to the bushmen. In cases of sickness, accident, widows or +orphans, the chaps sent round the hat, without banging a drum or +testifying, and that was all right. If a chap was hard up he borrowed +a couple of quid from his mate. If a strange family arrived without a +penny, someone had to fix 'em up, and the storekeepers helped them +till the man got work. For the rest, we work out our own salvation, +or damnation--as the case is--in the bush, with no one to help us, +except a mate, perhaps. The Army can't help us, but a fellow-sinner +can, sometimes, who has been through it all himself. The Army is only +a drag on the progress of Democracy, because it attracts many who +would otherwise be aggressive Democrats--and for other reasons. + +Besides, if we all reformed the Army would get deuced little from us +for its city mission. + +The Pretty Girl went to service for a while with the stock inspector's +wife, who could get nothing out of her concerning herself or her +friends. She still slept at the barracks, stuck to the Army, and +attended its meetings. + + +It was Christmas morning, and there was peace in Bourke and goodwill +towards all men. There hadn't been a fight since yesterday evening, +and that had only been a friendly one, to settle an argument +concerning the past ownership, and, at the same time, to decide as to +the future possession of a dog. + +It had been a hot, close night, and it ended in a suffocating sunrise. +The free portion of the male population were in the habit of taking +their blankets and sleeping out in "the Park," or town square, in +hot weather; the wives and daughters of the town slept, or tried to +sleep, with bedroom windows and doors open, while husbands lay outside +on the verandas. I camped in a corner of the park that night, and the +sun woke me. + +As I sat up I caught sight of a swagman coming along the white, dusty +road from the direction of the bridge, where the cleared road ran +across west and on, a hundred and thirty miles, through the barren, +broiling mulga scrubs, to Hungerford, on the border of Sheol. I knew +that swagman's walk. It was John Merrick (Jack Moonlight), one-time +Shearers' Union secretary at Coonamble, and generally "Rep" +(shearers' representative) in any shed where he sheared. He was a +"better-class shearer," one of those quiet, thoughtful men of whom +there are generally two or three in the roughest of rough sheds, who +have great influence, and give the shed a good name from a Union point +of view. Not quiet with the resentful or snobbish reserve of the +educated Englishman, but with a sad or subdued sort of quietness that +has force in it--as if they fully realized that their intelligence is +much higher than the average, that they have suffered more real +trouble and heartbreak than the majority of their mates, and that +their mates couldn't possibly understand them if they spoke as they +felt and couldn't see things as they do--yet men who understand and +are intensely sympathetic in their loneliness and sensitive reserve. + +I had worked in a shed with Jack Moonlight, and had met him in Sydney, +and to be mates with a bushman for a few weeks is to know him +well--anyway, I found it so. He had taken a trip to Sydney the +Christmas before last, and when he came back there was something +wanting. He became more silent, he drank more, and sometimes alone, +and took to smoking heavily. He dropped his mates, took little or no +interest in Union matters, and travelled alone, and at night. + +The Australian bushman is born with a mate who sticks to him through +life--like a mole. They may be hundreds of miles apart sometimes, and +separated for years, yet they are mates for life. A bushman may have +many mates in his roving, but there is always one his mate, "my +mate;" and it is common to hear a bushman, who is, in every way, a +true mate to the man he happens to be travelling with, speak of _his +mate's mate_--"Jack's mate"--who might be in Klondyke or South +Africa. A bushman has always a mate to comfort him and argue with +him, and work and tramp and drink with him, and lend him quids when +he's hard up, and call him a b--- fool, and fight him sometimes; to +abuse him to his face and defend his name behind his back; to bear +false witness and perjure his soul for his sake; to lie to the girl +for him if he's single, and to his wife if he's married; to secure a +"pen" for him at a shed where he isn't on the spot, or, if the mate +is away in New Zealand or South Africa, to write and tell him if it's +any good coming over this way. And each would take the word of the +other against all the world, and each believes that the other is the +straightest chap that ever lived-"a white man!" And next best to +your old mate is the man you're tramping, riding, working, or drinking +with. + +About the first thing the cook asks you when you come along to a +shearers' hut is, "Where's your mate?" I travelled alone for a +while one time, and it seemed to me sometimes, by the tone of the +inquiry concerning the whereabouts of my mate, that the bush had an +idea that I might have done away with him and that the thing ought to +be looked into. + +When a man drops mateship altogether and takes to "hatting" in the +bush, it's a step towards a convenient tree and a couple of +saddle-straps buckled together. + +I had an idea that I, in a measure, took the place of Jack Moonlight's +mate about this time. + +"'Ullo, Jack!" I hailed as he reached the corner of the park. + +"Good morning, Harry!" said Jack, as if he'd seen me last yesterday +evening instead of three months ago. "How are you getting on?" + +We walked together towards the Union Office, where I had a camp in the +skillion-room at the back. Jack was silent. But there's no place in +the world where a man's silence is respected so much (within +reasonable bounds) as in the Australian bush, where every man has a +past more or less sad, and every man a ghost--perhaps from other lands +that we know nothing of, and speaking in a foreign tongue. They say +in the bush, "Oh, Jack's only thinking!" And they let him think. +Generally you want to think as much as your mate; and when you've been +together some time it's quite natural to travel all day without +exchanging a word. In the morning Jim says, "Well, I think I made a +bargain with that horse, Bill," and some time late in the afternoon, +say twenty miles farther on, it occurs to Bill to "rejoin," "Well, +I reckon the blank as sold it to you had yer proper!" + +I like a good thinking mate, and I believe that thinking in company is +a lot more healthy and more comfortable, as well as less risky, than +thinking alone. + +On the way to the Union Office Jack and I passed the Royal Hotel, and +caught a glimpse, through the open door, of a bedroom off the veranda, +of the landlord's fresh, fair, young Sydney girl-wife, sleeping +prettily behind the mosquito-net, like a sleeping beauty, while the +boss lay on a mattress outside on the veranda, across the open door. +(He wasn't necessary for publication, but an evidence of good faith.) + +I glanced at Jack for a grin, but didn't get one. He wore +the pained expression of a man who is suddenly hit hard with the +thought of something that might have been. + +I boiled the billy and fried a pound of steak. + +"Been travelling all night, .Tack?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Jack. "I camped at Emus yesterday." + +He didn't eat. I began to reckon that he was brooding too much for +his health. He was much thinner than when I saw him last, and pretty +haggard, and he had something of the hopeless, haggard look that I'd +seen in Tom Hall's eyes after the last big shearing strike, when Tom +had worked day and night to hold his mates up all through the hard, +bitter struggle, and the battle was lost. + +"Look here, Jack!" I said at last. "What's up?" + +"Nothing's up, Harry," said Jack. "What made you think so?" + +"Have you got yourself into any fix?" I asked. "What's the +Hungerford track been doing to you?" + +"No, Harry," he said, "I'm all right. How are you?" And he +pulled some string and papers and a roll of dusty pound notes from his +pocket and threw them on the bunk. + +I was hard up just then, so I took a note and the billy to go to the +Royal and get some beer. I thought the beer might loosen his mind a +bit. + +"Better take a couple of quid," said Jack. "You look as if you +want some new shirts and things." But a pound was enough for me, and +I think he had reason to be glad of that later on, as it turned out. + +"Anything new in Bourke?" asked Jack as we drank the beer. + +"No," I said, "not a thing--except there's a pretty girl in the +Salvation Army." + +"And it's about time," growled Jack. + +"Now, look here, Jack," I said presently, "what's come over you +lately at all? I might be able to help you. It's not a bit of use +telling me that there's nothing the matter. When a man takes to +brooding and travelling alone it's a bad sign, and it will end in a +leaning tree and a bit of clothes-line as likely as not. Tell me what +the trouble is. Tell us all about it. There's a ghost, isn't +there?" + +"Well, I suppose so," said Jack. "We've all got our ghosts for +that matter. But never you mind, Harry; I'm all right. I don't go +interfering with your ghosts, and I don't see what call you've got to +come haunting mine. Why, it's as bad as kicking a man's dog." And +he gave the ghost of a grin. + +"Tell me, Jack," I said, "is it a woman?" + +"Yes," said Jack, "it's a woman. Now, are you satisfied?" + +"Is it a girl?" I asked. + +"Yes," he said. + +So there was no more to be said. I'd thought it might have been a lot +worse than a girl. I'd thought he might have got married somewhere, +sometime, and made a mess of it. + +We had dinner at Billy Woods's place, and a sensible Christmas dinner +it was--everything cold, except the vegetables, with the hose going on +the veranda in spite of the by-laws, and Billy's wife and her sister, +fresh and cool-looking and jolly, instead of being hot and brown and +cross like most Australian women who roast themselves over a blazing +fire in a hot kitchen on a broiling day, all the morning, to cook +scalding plum pudding and redhot roasts, for no other reason than that +their grandmothers used to cook hot Christmas dinners in England. + +And in the afternoon we went for a row on the river, pulling easily up +the anabranch and floating down with the stream under the shade of the +river timber--instead of going to sleep and waking up helpless and +soaked in perspiration, to find the women with headaches, as many do +on Christmas Day in Australia. + +Mrs Woods tried to draw Jack out, but it was no use, and in the +evening he commenced drinking, and that made Billy uneasy. "I'm +afraid Jack's on the wrong track," he said. + +After tea most of us collected about Watty's veranda. Most things +that happened in Bourke happened at Watty's pub, or near it. + +If a horse bolted with a buggy or cart, he was generally stopped +outside Watty's, which seemed to suggest, as Mitchell said, that most +of the heroes drank at Watty's--also that the pluckiest men were found +amongst the hardest drinkers. (But sometimes the horse fetched up +against Watty's sign and lamppost--which was a stout one of +"iron-bark"--and smashed the trap.) Then Watty's was the Carriers' +Arms, a union pub; and Australian teamsters are mostly hard cases: +while there was something in Watty's beer which made men argue +fluently, and the best fights came off in his backyard. Watty's dogs +were the most quarrelsome in town, and there was a dog-fight there +every other evening, followed as often as not by a man-fight. If a +bushman's horse ran away with him the chances were that he'd be thrown +on to Watty's veranda, if he wasn't pitched into the bar; and victims +of accidents, and sick, hard-up shearers, were generally carried to +Watty's pub, as being the most convenient and comfortable for them. +Mitchell denied that it was generosity or good nature on Watty's part, +he said it was all business--advertisement. Watty knew what he was +doing. He was very deep, was Watty. Mitchell further hinted that if +he was sick _he_ wouldn't be carried to Watty's, for Watty knew +what a thirsty business a funeral was. Tom Hall reckoned that Watty +bribed the Army on the quiet. + +I was sitting on a stool along the veranda wall with Donald Macdonald, +Bob Brothers (the Giraffe) and Mitchell, and one or two others, and +Jack Moonlight sat on the floor with his back to the wall and his hat +well down over his eyes. The Army came along at the usual time, but +we didn't see the Pretty Girl at first--she was a bit late. Mitchell +said he liked to be at Watty's when the Army prayed and the Pretty +Girl was there; he had no objection to being prayed for by a girl like +that, though he reckoned that nothing short of a real angel could save +him now. He said his old grandmother used to pray for him every night +of her life and three times on Sunday, with Christmas Day extra when +Christmas Day didn't fall on a Sunday; but Mitchell reckoned that the +old lady couldn't have had much influence because he became more +sinful every year, and went deeper in ways of darkness, until finally +he embarked on a career of crime. + +The Army prayed, and then a thin "ratty" little woman bobbed up in +the ring; she'd gone mad on religion as women do on woman's rights and +hundreds of other things. She was so skinny in the face, her jaws so +prominent, and her mouth so wide, that when she opened it to speak it +was like a ventriloquist's dummy and you could almost see the cracks +open down under her ears. + +"They say I'm cracked!" she screamed in a shrill, cracked voice. +"But I'm not cracked--I'm only cracked on the Lord Jesus Christ! +That's all I'm cracked on---." And just then the Amen man of the +Army--the Army groaner we called him, who was always putting both feet +in it--just then he blundered forward, rolled up his eyes, threw his +hands up and down as if he were bouncing two balls, and said, with +deep feeling: + +"Thank the Lord she's got a crack in the right place!" + +Tom Hall doubled up, and most of the other sinners seemed to think +there was something very funny about it. And the Army, too, seemed +struck with an idea that there was something wrong somewhere, for they +started a hymn. + +A big American negro, who'd been a night watchman in Sydney, stepped +into the ring and waved his arms and kept time, and as he got excited +he moved his hands up and down rapidly, as if he was hauling down a +rope in a great hurry through a pulley block above, and he kept +saying, "Come down, Lord!" all through the hymn, like a bass +accompaniment, "Come down, Lord; come down, Lord; come down, Lord; +come down, Lord!" and the quicker be said it the faster he hauled. +He was as good as a drum. And, when the hymn was over, he started to +testify. + +"My frens!" he said, "I was once black as der coals in der mined! +I was once black as der ink in der ocean of sin! But now--thank an' +bless the Lord!--I am whiter dan der dribben snow!" + +Tom Hall sat down on the edge of the veranda and leaned his head +against a post and cried. He had contributed a bob this evening, and +he was getting his money's worth. + +Then the Pretty Girl arrived and was pushed forward into the ring. +She looked thinner and whiter than I'd ever seen her, and there was a +feverish brightness in her eyes that I didn't like. + +"Men!" she said, "this is Christmas Day-." I didn't hear any more +for, at the sound of her voice, Jack Moonlight jumped up as if he'd +sat on a baby. He started forward, stared at her for a moment as if +he couldn't believe his eyes, and then said, "Hannah!" short and +sharp. She started as if she was shot, gave him a wild look, and +stumbled forward; the next moment he had her in his arms and was +steering for the private parlour. + +I heard Mrs Bothways calling for water and smelling-salts; she was as +fat as Watty, and very much like him in the face, but she was +emotional and sympathetic. Then presently I heard, through the open +window, the Pretty Girl say to Jack, "Oh, Jack, Jack! Why did you go +away and leave me like that? It was cruel!" + +"But you told me to go, Hannah," said Jack. + +"That-that didn't make any difference. Why didn't you write?" +she sobbed. + +"Because you never wrote to me, Hannah," he said. + +"That--that was no excuse!" she said. "It was so k-k-k-cruel of you, +Jack." + +Mrs Bothways pulled down the window. A new-comer asked Watty what the +trouble was, and he said that the Army girl had only found her chap, +or husband, or long-lost brother or something, but the missus was +looking after the business; then he dozed again. + +And then we adjourned to the Royal and took the Army with us. + +"That's the way of it," said Donald Macdonald. "With a woman it's +love or religion; with a man it's love or the devil." + +"Or with a man," said Mitchell, presently, "it's love and the devil +both, sometimes, Donald." + +I looked at Mitchell hard, but for all his face expressed he might +only have said, "I think it's going to rain." + + + +"LORD DOUGLAS" + + They hold him true, who's true to one, + However false he be. + -The Rouseabout of Rouseabouts. + + +The Imperial Hotel was rather an unfortunate name for an out-back town +pub, for out back is the stronghold of Australian democracy; it was +the out-back vote and influence that brought about "One Man One +Vote," "Payment of Members," and most of the democratic legislation +of late years, and from out back came the overwhelming vote in favour +of Australian as Imperial Federation. + +The name Royal Hotel is as familiar as that of the Railway Hotel, and +passes unnoticed and ungrowled at, even by bush republicans. The +Royal Hotel at Bourke was kept by an Irishman, one O'Donohoo, who was +Union to the backbone, loudly in favour of "Australia for the +Australians," and, of course, against even the democratic New South +Wales Government of the time. He went round town all one St Patrick's +morning with a bunch of green ribbon fastened to his coat-tail with a +large fish-hook, and wasn't aware of the fact till he sat down on the +point of it. But that's got nothing to do with it. + +The Imperial Hotel at Bourke was unpopular from the first. It was +said that the very existence of the house was the result of a swindle. +It had been built with money borrowed on certain allotments in the +centre of the town and on the understanding that it should be built on +the mortgaged land, whereas it was erected on a free allotment. Which +fact was discovered, greatly to its surprise, by the building society +when it came to foreclose on the allotments some years later. While +the building was being erected the Bourke people understood, in a +vague way, that it was to be a convent (perhaps the building society +thought so, too), and when certain ornaments in brick and cement in +the shape of a bishop's mitre were placed over the corners of the +walls the question seemed decided. But when the place was finished a +bar was fitted up, and up went the sign, to the disgust of the other +publicans, who didn't know a licence had been taken out--for licensing +didn't go by local option in those days. It was rumoured that the +place belonged to, and the whole business was engineered by, a priest. +And priests are men of the world. + +The Imperial Hotel was patronized by the pastoralists, the civil +servants, the bank manager and clerks--all the scrub aristocracy; it +was the headquarters of the Pastoralists' Union in Bourke; a barracks +for blacklegs brought up from Sydney to take the place of Union +shearers on strike; and the new Governor, on his inevitable visit to +Bourke, was banqueted at the Imperial Hotel. The editor of the local +"capitalistic rag" stayed there; the pastoralists' member was +elected mostly by dark ways and means devised at the Imperial Hotel, +and one of its managers had stood as a dummy candidate to split the +Labour vote; the management of the hotel was his reward. In short, it +was there that most of the plots were hatched to circumvent Freedom, +and put away or deliver into the clutches of law and order certain +sons of Light and Liberty who believed in converting blacklegs into +jellies by force of fists when bribes, gentle persuasion and pure +Australian language failed to convert them to clean Unionism. The +Imperial Hotel was called the "Squatters' Pub," the "Scabbery," +and other and more expressive names. + +The hotel became still more unpopular after Percy Douglas. had +managed it for a while. He was an avowed enemy of Labour Unionists. +He employed Chinese cooks, and that in the height of the anti-Chinese +agitation in Australia, and he was known to have kindly feelings +towards the Afghans who, with their camels, were running white +carriers off the roads. If an excited Unionist called a man a +"blackleg" or "scab" in the Imperial bar he was run out--sometimes +with great difficulty, and occasionally as far as the lock-up. + +Percy Douglas was a fine-looking man, "wid a chest on him an' well +hung--a fine fee-_gure_ of a man," as O'Donohoo pronounced it. +He was tall and erect, he dressed well, wore small side-whiskers, had +an eagle nose, and looked like an aristocrat. Like many of his type, +who start sometimes as billiard-markers and suddenly become hotel +managers in Australia, nothing was known of his past. Jack Mitchell +reckoned, by the way he treated his employees and spoke to workmen, +that he was the educated son of an English farmer--gone wrong and sent +out to Australia. Someone called him "Lord Douglas," and the +nickname caught on. + +He made himself well hated. He got One-eyed Bogan "three months' +hard" for taking a bottle of whisky off the Imperial bar counter +because he (Bogan) was drunk and thirsty and had knocked down his +cheque, and because there was no one minding the bar at the moment. + +Lord Douglas dismissed the barmaid, and, as she was leaving, he had +her boxes searched and gave her in charge for stealing certain +articles belonging to the hotel. The chaps subscribed to defend the +case, and subsequently put a few pounds together for the girl. She +proved her gratitude by bringing a charge of a baby against one of the +chaps--but that was only one of the little ways of the world, as +Mitchell said. She joined a Chinese camp later on. + +Lord Douglas employed a carpenter to do some work about the hotel, and +because the carpenter left before the job was finished, Lord Douglas +locked his tools in an outhouse and refused to give them up; and when +the carpenter, with the spirit of an Australian workman, broke the +padlock and removed his tool-chest, the landlord gave him in charge +for breaking and entering. The chaps defended the case and won it, +and hated Lord Douglas as much as if he were their elder brother. +Mitchell was the only one to put in a word for him. + +"I've been puzzling it out," said Mitchell, as he sat nursing his +best leg in the Union Office, "and, as far as I can see, it all +amounts to this--we're all mistaken in Lord Douglas. We don't know +the man. He's all right. We don't understand him. He's really a +sensitive, good-hearted man who's been shoved a bit off the track by +the world. It's the world's fault--he's not to blame. You see, when +he was a youngster he was the most good-natured kid in the school; he +was always soft, and, consequently, he was always being imposed upon, +and bullied, and knocked about. Whenever he got a penny to buy +lollies he'd count 'em out carefully and divide 'em round amongst his +schoolmates and brothers and sisters. He was the only one that worked +at home, and consequently they all hated him. His father respected +him, but didn't love him, because he wasn't a younger son, and wasn't +bringing his father's grey hairs down in sorrow to the grave. If it +was in Australia, probably Lord Douglas was an elder son and had to do +all the hard graft, and teach himself at night, and sleep in a bark +skillion while his younger brothers benefited--they were born in the +new brick house and went to boarding-schools. His mother had a +contempt for him because he wasn't a black sheep and a prodigal, and, +when the old man died, the rest of the family got all the stuff and +Lord Douglas was kicked out because they could do without him now. +And the family hated him like poison ever afterwards (especially his +mother), and spread lies about him--because they had treated him +shamefully and because his mouth was shut--they knew he wouldn't +speak. Then probably he went in for Democracy and worked for Freedom, +till Freedom trod on him once too often with her hob-nailed boots. +Then the chances are, in the end, he was ruined by a girl or woman, +and driven, against his will, to take refuge in pure individualism. +He's all right, only we don't appreciate him. He's only fighting +against his old ideals--his old self that comes up sometimes--and +that's what makes him sweat his barmaids and servants, and hate us, +and run us in; and perhaps when he cuts up extra rough it's because +his conscience kicks him when he thinks of the damned soft fool he +used to be. He's all right--take my word for it. It's all a mask. +Why, he might be one of the kindest-hearted men in Bourke +underneath." + +Tom Hall rubbed his head and blinked, as if he was worried by an idea +that there might be some facts in Mitchell's theories. + +"You're allers findin' excuses for blacklegs an' scabs, Mitchell," +said Barcoo-Rot, who took Mitchell seriously (and who would have taken +a laughing jackass seriously). "Why, you'd find a white spot on a +squatter. I wouldn't be surprised if you blacklegged yourself in the +end." + +This was an unpardonable insult, from a Union point of view, and the +chaps half-unconsciously made room on the floor for Barcoo-Rot to fall +after Jack Mitchell hit him. But Mitchell took the insult +philosophically. + +"Well, Barcoo-Rot," he said, nursing the other leg, "for the matter +of that, I did find a white spot on a squatter once. He lent me a +quid when I was hard up. There's white spots on the blackest +characters if you only drop prejudice and look close enough. I +suppose even Jack-the-Ripper's character was speckled. Why, I can +even see spots on your character, sometimes, Barcoo-Rot. I've known +white spots to spread on chaps' characters until they were little +short of saints. Sometimes I even fancy I can feel my own wings +sprouting. And as for turning blackleg--well, I suppose I've got a +bit of the crawler in my composition (most of us have), and a man +never knows what might happen to his principles." + +"Well," said Barcoo-Rot, "I beg yer pardon--ain't that enough?" + +"No," said Mitchell, "you ought to wear a three-bushel bag and +ashes for three months, and drink water; but since the police would +send you to an asylum if you did that, I think the best thing we can +do is to go out and have a drink." + + +Lord Douglas married an Australian girl somewhere, somehow, and +brought her to Bourke, and there were two little girls--regular little +fairies. She was a gentle, kind-hearted little woman, but she didn't +seem to improve him much, save that he was very good to her. + +"It's mostly that way," commented Mitchell. "When a boss gets +married and has children he thinks he's got a greater right to grind +his fellowmen and rob their wives and children. I'd never work for a +boss with a big family--it's hard enough to keep a single boss +nowadays in this country." + +After one stormy election, at the end of a long and bitter shearing +strike, One-eyed Bogan, his trusty enemy, Barcoo-Rot, and one or two +other enthusiastic reformers were charged with rioting, and got from +one to three months' hard. And they had only smashed three windows of +the Imperial Hotel and chased the Chinese cook into the river. + +"I used to have some hopes for Democracy," commented Mitchell, "but +I've got none now. How can you expect Liberty, Equality or +Fraternity--how can you expect Freedom and Universal Brotherhood and +Equal Rights in a country where Sons of Light get three months' hard +for breaking windows and bashing a Chinaman? It almost makes me long +to sail away in a gallant barque." + +There were other cases in connection with the rotten-egging of +Capitalistic candidates on the Imperial Hotel balcony, and it was +partly on the evidence of Douglas and his friends that certain +respectable Labour leaders got heavy terms of imprisonment for rioting +and "sedition" and "inciting," in connection with organized +attacks on blacklegs and their escorts. + +Retribution, if it was retribution, came suddenly and in a most +unexpected manner to Lord Douglas. + +It seems he employed a second carpenter for six months to repair and +make certain additions to the hotel, and put him off under various +pretences until he owed him a hundred pounds or thereabout. At last, +immediately after an exciting interview with Lord Douglas, the +carpenter died suddenly of heart disease. The widow, a strong-minded +bushwoman, put a bailiff in the hotel on a very short notice--and +against the advice of her lawyer, who thought the case hopeless--and +the Lord Douglas bubble promptly burst. He had somehow come to be +regarded as the proprietor of the hotel, but now the real proprietors +or proprietor--he was still said to be a priest--turned Douglas out +and put in a new manager. The old servants were paid after some +trouble. The local storekeepers and one or two firms in Sydney, who +had large accounts against the Imperial Hotel (and had trusted it, +mainly because it was patronized by Capitalism and Fat), were never +paid. + +Lord Douglas cleared out to Sydney, leaving his wife and children, for +the present, with her brother, a hay-and-corn storekeeper, who also +had a large and hopeless account against the hotel; and when the +brother went broke and left the district she rented a two-roomed +cottage and took in dressmaking. + +Dressmaking didn't pay so well in the bush then as it did in the old +diggings days when sewing-machines were scarce and the possession of +one meant an independent living to any girl--when diggers paid ten +shillings for a strip of "flannen" doubled over and sewn together, +with holes for arms and head, and called a shirt. Mrs Douglas had a +hard time, with her two little girls, who were still better and more +prettily dressed than any other children in Bourke. One grocer +still called on her for orders and pretended to be satisfied to wait +"till Mr Douglas came back," and when she would no longer order what +he considered sufficient provisions for her and the children, and +commenced buying sugar, etc., by the pound, for cash, he one day +sent a box of groceries round to her. He pretended it was a mistake. + +"However," he said, "I'd be very much obliged if you could use 'em, +Mrs Douglas. I'm overstocked now; haven't got room for another tin of +sardines in the shop. Don't you worry about bills, Mrs Douglas; I can +wait till Douglas comes home. I did well enough out of the Imperial +Hotel when your husband had it, and a pound's worth of groceries won't +hurt me now. I'm only too glad to get rid of some of the stock." + +She cried a little, thought of the children, and kept the groceries. + +"I suppose I'll be sold up soon meself if things don't git +brighter," said that grocer to a friend, "so it doesn't matter +much." + +The same with Foley the butcher, who had a brogue with a sort of +drawling groan in it, and was a cynic of the Mitchell school. + +"You see," he said, "she's as proud as the devil, but when I send +round a bit o' rawst, or porrk, or the undercut o' the blade-bawn, she +thinks o' the little gur-r-rls before she thinks o' sendin' it back to +me. That's where I've got the pull on her." + +The Giraffe borrowed a horse and tip-dray one day at the beginning of +winter and cut a load of firewood in the bush, and next morning, at +daylight, Mrs Douglas was nearly startled out of her life by a crash +at the end of the cottage, which made her think that the chimney had +fallen in, or a tree fallen on the house; and when she slipped on a +wrapper and looked out, she saw a load of short-cut wood by the +chimney, and caught a glimpse of the back view of the Giraffe, who +stood in the dray with his legs wide apart and was disappearing into +the edge of the scrub; and soon the rapid clock-clock-clock of the +wheels died away in the west, as if he were making for West Australia. + +The next we heard of Lord Douglas he had got two years' hard for +embezzlement in connection with some canvassing he had taken up. Mrs +Douglas fell ill--a touch of brain-fever--and one of the labourers' +wives took care of the children while two others took turns in +nursing. While she was recovering, Bob Brothers sent round the hat, +and, after a conclave in the Union Office--as mysterious as any +meeting ever called with the object of downing bloated Capitalism--it +was discovered that one of the chaps--who didn't wish his name to be +mentioned--had borrowed just twenty-five pounds from Lord Douglas in +the old days and now wished to return it to Mrs Douglas. So the thing +was managed, and if she had any suspicions she kept them to herself. +She started a little fancy goods shop and got along fairly +comfortable. + +Douglas, by the way, was, publicly, supposed, for her sake and because +of the little girls, to be away in West Australia on the goldfields. + + +Time passes without much notice out back, and one hot day, when the +sun hung behind the fierce sandstorms from the northwest as dully +lurid as he ever showed in a London fog, Lord Douglas got out of the +train that had just finished its five-hundred-miles' run, and not +seeing a new-chum porter, who started forward by force of habit to +take his bag, he walked stiffly off the platform and down the main +street towards his wife's cottage. + +He was very gaunt, and his eyes, to those who passed him closely, +seemed to have a furtive, hunted expression. He had let his beard +grow, and it had grown grey. + +It was within a few days of Christmas--the same Christmas that we lost +the Pretty Girl in the Salvation Army. As a rule the big +shearing-sheds within a fortnight of Bourke cut out in time for the +shearers to reach the town and have their Christmas dinners and +sprees--and for some of them to be locked up over Christmas +Day--within sound of a church-going bell. Most of the chaps gathered +in the Shearers' Union Office on New Year's Eve and discussed Douglas +amongst other things. + +"I vote we kick the cow out of the town!" snarled One-eyed Bogan, +viciously. + +"We can't do that," said Bob Brothers (the Giraffe), speaking more +promptly than usual. "There's his wife and youngsters to consider, +yer know." + +"He something well deserted his wife," snarled Began, "an' now he +comes crawlin' back to her to keep him." + +"Well," said Mitchell, mildly, "but we ain't all got as much +against him as you have, Began." + +"He made a crimson jail-bird of me!" snapped Bogan. "Well," said +Mitchell, "that didn't hurt you much, anyway; it rather improved your +character if anything. Besides, he made a jail-bird of himself +afterwards, so you ought to have a fellow-feeling--a feathered +feeling, so to speak. Now you needn't be offended, Bogan, we're all +jail-birds at heart, only we haven't all got the pluck." + +"I'm in favour of blanky well tarrin' an' featherin' him an' kickin' +him out of the town!" shouted Bogan. "It would be a good turn to +his wife, too; she'd be well rid of the---." + +"Perhaps she's fond of him," suggested Mitchell; "I've known such +cases before. I saw them sitting together on the veranda last night +when they thought no one was looking." + +"He deserted her," said One-eyed Bogan, in a climbing-down tone, +"and left her to starve." + +"Perhaps the police were to blame for that," said Mitchell. "You +know you deserted all your old mates once for three months, Bogan, and +it wasn't your fault." + +"He seems to be a crimson pet of yours, Jack Mitchell," said Bogan, +firing up. + +"Ah, well, all I know," said Mitchell, standing up and stretching +himself wearily, "all I know is that he looked like a gentleman once, +and treated us like a gentleman, and cheated us like a gentleman, and +ran some of us in like a gentleman, and, as far as I can see, he's +served his time like a gentleman and come back to face us and live +himself down like a man. I always had a sneaking regard for a +gentleman." + +"Why, Mitchell, I'm beginning to think you are a gentleman +yourself," said Jake Boreham. + +"Well," said Mitchell, "I used to have a suspicion once that I had +a drop of blue blood in me somewhere, and it worried me a lot; but I +asked my old mother about it one day, and she scalded me--God bless +her!--and father chased me with a stockwhip, so I gave up making +inquiries." + +"You'll join the bloomin' Capitalists next," sneered One-eyed Bogan. + +"I wish I could, Bogan," said Mitchell. "I'd take a trip to Paris +and see for myself whether the Frenchwomen are as bad as they're made +out to be, or go to Japan. But what are we going to do about +Douglas?" + +"Kick the skunk out of town, or boycott him!" said one or two. "He +ought to be tarred and feathered and hanged." + +"Couldn't do worse than hang him," commented Jake Boreham, cheerfully. + +"Oh, yes, we could," said Mitchell, sitting down, resting his elbows +on his knees, and marking his points with one forefinger on the other. +"For instance, we might boil him slow in tar. We might skin him +alive. We might put him in a cage and poke him with sticks, with his +wife and children in another cage to look on and enjoy the fun." + +The chaps, who had been sitting quietly listening to Mitchell, and +grinning, suddenly became serious and shifted their positions +uneasily. + +"But I can tell you what would hurt his feelings more than anything +else we could do," said Mitchell. + +"Well, what is it, Jack?" said Tom Hall, rather impatiently. + +"Send round the hat and take up a collection for him," said +Mitchell, "enough to let him get away with his wife and children and +start life again in some less respectable town than Bourke. You +needn't grin, I'm serious about it." + +There was a thoughtful pause, and one or two scratched their heads. +"His wife seems pretty sick," Mitchell went on in a reflective tone. +"I passed the place this morning and saw him scrubbing out the floor. +He's been doing a bit of house-painting for old Heegard to-day. I +suppose he learnt it in jail. I saw him at work and touched my hat to +him." + +"What!" cried Tom Hall, affecting to shrink from Mitchell in horror. + +"Yes," said Mitchell, "I'm not sure that I didn't take my hat off. +Now I know it's not bush religion for a man to touch his hat, except +to a funeral, or a strange roof or woman sometimes; but when I meet a +braver man than myself I salute him. I've only met two in my life." + +"And who were they, Jack?" asked Jake Boreham. + +"One," said Mitchell--"one is Douglas, and the other--well, the +other was the man I used to be. But that's got nothing to do with +it." + +"But perhaps Douglas thought you were crowing over him when you took +off your hat to him--sneerin' at him, like, Mitchell," reflected Jake +Boreham. + +"No, Jake," said Mitchell, growing serious suddenly. "There are ways +of doing things that another man understands." + +They all thought for a while. + +"Well," said Tom Hall, "supposing we do take up a collection for +him, he'd be too damned proud to take it." + +"But that's where we've got the pull on him," said Mitchell, +brightening up. "I heard Dr Morgan say that Mrs Douglas wouldn't +live if she wasn't sent away to a cooler place, and Douglas knows it; +and, besides, one of the little girls is sick. We've got him in a +corner and he'll have to take the stuff. Besides, two years in jail +takes a lot of the pride out of a man." + +"Well, I'm damned if I'll give a sprat to help the man who tried +his best to crush the Unions!" said One-eyed Bogan. + +"Damned if I will either!" said Barcoo-Rot. + +"Now, look here, One-eyed Bogan," said Mitchell, "I don't like to +harp on old things, for I know they bore you, but when you returned to +public life that time no one talked of kicking you out of the town. +In fact, I heard that the chaps put a few pounds together to help you +get away for a while till you got over your modesty." + +No one spoke. + +"I passed Douglas's place on my way here from my camp to-night," +Mitchell went on musingly, "and I saw him walking up and down in the +yard with his sick child in his arms. You remember that little girl, +Bogan? I saw her run and pick up your hat and give it to you one day +when you were trying to put it on with your feet. You remember, +Bogan? The shock nearly sobered you." + +There was a very awkward pause. The position had become too +psychological altogether and had to be ended somehow. The awkward +silence had to be broken, and Bogan broke it. He turned up Bob +Brothers's hat, which was lying on the table, and "chucked" in a +"quid," qualifying the hat and the quid, and disguising his feelings +with the national oath of the land. + +"We've had enough of this gory, maudlin, sentimental tommy-rot," he +said. "Here, Barcoo, stump up or I'll belt it out of your hide! +I'll--I'll take yer to pieces!" + +But Douglas didn't leave the town. He sent his wife and children to +Sydney until the heat wave was past, built a new room on to the +cottage, and started a book and newspaper shop, and a poultry farm in +the back paddock, and flourished. + +They called him Mr Douglas for a while, then Douglas, then Percy +Douglas, and now he is well-known as Old Daddy Douglas, and the Sydney +_Worker_, _Truth_, and _Bulletin_, and other democratic +rags are on sale at his shop. He is big with schemes for locking the +Darling River, and he gets his drink at O'Donohoo's. He is scarcely +yet regarded as a straight-out democrat. He was a gentleman once, +Mitchell said, and the old blood was not to be trusted. But, last +elections, Douglas worked quietly for Unionism, and gave the leaders +certain hints, and put them up to various electioneering dodges which +enabled them to return, in the face of Monopoly, a Labour member who +is as likely to go straight as long as any other Labour member. + + + +THE BLINDNESS OF ONE-EYED BOGAN + + They judge not and they are not judged--'tis their philosophy-- + (There's something wrong with every ship that sails upon the sea). + -The Ballad of the Rouseabout. + +"And what became of One-eyed Bogan?" I asked Tom Hall when I met him +and Jack Mitchell down in Sydney with their shearing cheques the +Christmas before last. + +"You'd better ask Mitchell, Harry," said Tom. "He can tell you +about Bogan better than I can. But first, what about the drink we're +going to have?" + +We turned out of Pitt Street into Hunter Street, and across George +Street, where a double line of fast electric tramway was running, into +Margaret Street and had a drink at Pfahlert's Hotel, where a counter +lunch--as good as many dinners you get for a shilling--was included +with a sixpenny drink. "Get a quiet corner," said Mitchell, "I +like to bear myself cackle." So we took our beer out in the fernery +and got a cool place at a little table in a quiet corner amongst the +fern boxes. + +"Well, One-eyed Bogan was a hard case, Mitchell," I said. "Wasn't +he?" + +"Yes," said Mitchell, putting down his "long-beer" glass, "he +was." + +"Rather a bad egg?" + +"Yes, a regular bad egg," said Mitchell, decidedly. + +"I heard he got caught cheating at cards," I said. + +"Did you?" said Mitchell. "Well, I believe he did. Ah, well," he +added reflectively, after another long pull, "One-eyed Bogan won't +cheat at cards any more." + +"Why?" I said. "Is he dead then?" + +"No," said Mitchell, "he's blind." + +"Good God!" I said, "how did that happen?" + +"He lost the other eye," said Mitchell, and he took another drink. +"Ah, well, he won't cheat at cards any more--unless there's cards +invented for the blind." + +"How did it happen?" I asked. + +"Well," said Mitchell, "you see, Harry, it was this way. Bogan +went pretty free in Bourke after the shearing before last, and in the +end he got mixed up in a very ugly-looking business: he was accused of +doing two new-chum jackaroos out of their stuff by some sort of +confidence trick." + +"Confidence trick," I said. "I'd never have thought that One-eyed +Bogan had the brains to go in for that sort of thing." + +"Well, it seems he had, or else he used somebody else's brains; +there's plenty of broken-down English gentlemen sharpers knocking +about out back, you know, and Bogan might have been taking lessons +from one. I don't know the rights of the case, it was hushed up, as +you'll see presently; but, anyway, the jackaroos swore that Bogan had +done 'em out of ten quid. They were both Cockneys and I suppose they +reckoned themselves smart, but bushmen have more time to think. +Besides, Bogan's one eye was in his favour. You see he always kept +his one eye fixed strictly on whatever business he had in hand; if +he'd had another eye to rove round and distract his attention and look +at things on the outside, the chances are he would never have got into +trouble." + +"Never mind that, Jack," said Tom Hall. "Harry wants to hear the +yarn." + +"Well, to make it short, one of the jackaroos went to the police and +Bogan cleared out. His character was pretty bad just then, so there +was a piece of blue paper out for him. Bogan didn't seem to think the +thing was so serious as it was, for he only went a few miles down the +river and camped with his horses on a sort of island inside an +anabranch, till the thing should blow over or the new chums leave +Bourke. + +"Bogan's old enemy, Constable Campbell, got wind of Bogan's camp, and +started out after him. He rode round the outside track and came in on +to the river just below where the anabranch joins it, at the lower end +of the island and right opposite Bogan's camp. You know what those +billabongs are: dry gullies till the river rises from the Queensland +rains and backs them up till the water runs round into the river again +and makes anabranches of 'em--places that you thought were hollows +you'll find above water, and you can row over places you thought were +hills. There's no water so treacherous and deceitful as you'll find +in some of those billabongs. A man starts to ride across a place +where he thinks the water is just over the grass, and blunders into a +deep channel--that wasn't there before--with a steady undercurrent +with the whole weight of the Darling River funnelled into it; and if +he can't swim and his horse isn't used to it--or sometimes if he can +swim--it's a case with him, and the Darling River cod hold an inquest +on him, if they have time, before he's buried deep in Darling River +mud for ever. And somebody advertises in the missing column for Jack +Somebody who was last heard of in Australia." + +"Never mind that, Mitchell, go on," I said. + +"Well, Campbell knew the river and saw that there was a stiff current +there, so he hailed Bogan. + +"'Good day, Campbell,' shouted Bogan. + +"`I want you, Bogan,' said Campbell. `Come across and bring your +horses.' + +"`I'm damned if I will,' says Bogan. `I'm not going to catch me +death o' cold to save your skin. If you want me you'll have to bloody +well come and git me.' Bogan was a good strong swimmer, and he had +good horses, but he didn't try to get away--I suppose he reckoned he'd +have to face the music one time or another--and one time is as good as +another out back. + +"Campbell was no swimmer; he had no temptation to risk his life--you +see it wasn't as in war with a lot of comrades watching ready to +advertise a man as a coward for staying alive--so he argued with Bogan +and tried to get him to listen to reason, and swore at him. `I'll +make it damned hot for you, Bogan,' he said, `if I have to come over +for you.' + +"`Two can play at that game,' says Bogan. + +"`Look here, Bogan," said Campbell, `I'll tell you what I'll do. +If you give me your word that you'll come up to the police station +to-morrow I'll go back and say nothing about it. You can say you +didn't know a warrant was out after you. It will be all the better +for you in the end. Better give me your word, man.' + +"Perhaps Campbell knew Bogan better than any of us. + +"`Now then, Bogan,' he said, `don't be a fool. Give your word like +a sensible man, and I'll go back. I'll give you five minutes to make +up your mind.' And he took out his watch. + +"But Bogan was nasty and wouldn't give his word, so there was +nothing for it but for Campbell to make a try for him. + +"Campbell had plenty of pluck, or obstinacy, which amounts to the +same thing. He put his carbine and revolver under a log, out of the +rain that was coming on, saw to his handcuffs, and then spurred his +horse into the water. Bogan lit his pipe with a stick from his +camp-fire--so Campbell said afterwards--and sat down on his heels and +puffed away, and waited for him. + +"Just as Campbell's horse floundered into the current Bogan shouted +to go back, but Campbell thought it was a threat and kept on. But +Bogan had caught sight of a log coming down the stream, end on, with a +sharp, splintered end, and before Campbell knew where he was, the +sharp end of the log caught the horse in the flank. The horse started +to plunge and struggle sideways, with all his legs, and Campbell got +free of him as quick as he could. Now, you know, in some of those +Darling River reaches the current will seem to run steadily far a +while, and then come with a rush. (I was caught in one of those +rushes once, when I was in swimming, and would have been drowned if I +hadn't been born to be hanged.) Well, a rush came along just as +Campbell got free from his horse, and he went down-stream one side of +a snag and his horse the other. Campbell's pretty stout, you know, +and his uniform was tight, and it handicapped him. + +"Just as he was being washed past the lower end of the snag he caught +hold of a branch that stuck out of the water and held on. He swung +round and saw Bogan running down to the point opposite him. Now, you +know there was always a lot of low cunning about Bogan, and I suppose +he reckoned that if he pulled Campbell out he'd stand a good show of +getting clear of his trouble; anyway, if he didn't save Campbell it +might be said that he killed him--besides, Bogan was a good swimmer, +so there wasn't any heroism about it anyhow. Campbell was only a few +feet from the bank, but Bogan started to strip--to make the job look +as big as possible, I suppose. He shouted to Campbell to say he was +coming, and to hold on. Campbell said afterwards that Bogan seemed an +hour undressing. The weight of the current was forcing down the bough +that Campbell was hanging on to, and suddenly, he said, he felt a +great feeling of helplessness take him by the shoulders. He yelled to +Bogan and let go. + +"Now, it happened that Jake Boreham and I were passing away the time +between shearings, and we were having a sort of fishing and shooting +loaf down the river in a boat arrangement that Jake had made out of +boards and tarred canvas. We called her the _Jolly Coffin_. We +were just poking up the bank in the slack water, a few hundred yards +below the billabong, when Jake said, `Why, there's a horse or +something in the river.' Then he shouted, `No, by God, it's a man,' +and we poked the _Coffin_ out into the stream for all she was +worth. `Looks like two men fighting in the water,' Jake shouts +presently. `Hurry up, or they'll drown each other.' + +"We hailed 'em, and Bogan shouted for help. He was treading water +and holding Campbell up in front of him now in real professional +style. As soon as he heard us he threw up his arms and splashed a +bit--I reckoned he was trying to put as much style as he could into +that rescue. But I caught a crab, and, before we could get to them, +they were washed past into the top of a tree that stood well below +flood-mark. I pulled the boat's head round and let her stern down +between the branches. Bogan had one arm over a limb and was holding +Campbell with the other, and trying to lift him higher out of the +water. I noticed Bogan's face was bleeding--there was a dead limb +stuck in the tree with nasty sharp points on it, and I reckoned he'd +run his face against one of them. Campbell was gasping like a codfish +out of water, and he was the whitest man I ever saw (except one, and +_he'd_ been drowned for a week). Campbell had the sense to keep +still. We asked Bogan if he could hold on, and he said he could, but +he couldn't hold Campbell any longer. So Jake took the oars and I +leaned over the stern and caught hold of Campbell, and Jake ran the +boat into the bank, and we got him ashore; then we went back for Bogan +and landed him. + +"We had some whisky and soon brought Campbell round; but Bogan was +bleeding like a pig from a nasty cut over his good eye, so we bound +wet handkerchiefs round his eyes and led him to a log and he sat down +for a while, holding his hand to his eye and groaning. He kept +saying, `I'm blind, mates, I'm blind! I've lost me other eye!' but we +didn't dream it was so bad as that: we kept giving him whisky. We got +some dry boughs and made a big fire. Then Bogan stood up and held his +arms stiff down to his sides, opening and shutting his hands as if he +was in great pain. And I've often thought since what a different man +Bogan seemed without his clothes and with the broken bridge of his +nose and his eyes covered by the handkerchiefs. He was clean shaven, +and his mouth and chin are his best features, and he's clean limbed +and well hung. I often thought afterwards that there was something of +a blind god about him as he stood there naked by the fire on the day +he saved Campbell's life--something that reminded me of a statue I saw +once in the Art Gallery. (Pity the world isn't blinder to a man's +worst points.) + +"Presently Jake listened and said, `By God, that's lucky!' and we +heard a steamer coming up-river and presently we saw her coming round +the point with a couple of wool-barges in tow. We got Bogan aboard +and got some clothes on him, and took him ashore at Bourke to the new +hospital. The doctors did all they knew, but Bogan was blind for +life. He never saw anything again--except `a sort of dull white +blur,' as he called it--or his past life sometimes, I suppose. +Perhaps he saw that for the first time. Ah, well! + +"Bogan's old enemy, Barcoo-Rot, went to see him in the hospital, and +Bogan said, `Well, Barcoo, I reckon we've had our last fight. I owe +you a hiding, but I don't see how I'm going to pay you.' `Never mind +that, Bogan, old man,' says Barcoo. `I'll take it from anyone yer +likes to appoint, if that worries yer; and, look here, Bogan, if I +can't fight you I can fight for you--and don't you forget it!' And +Barcoo used to lead Bogan round about town in his spare time and tell +him all that was going on; and I believe he always had an ear cocked +in case someone said a word against Bogan--as if any of the chaps +would say a word against a blind man. + +"Bogan's case was hushed up. The police told us to fix it up the +best way we could. One of the jackaroos, who reckoned that Bogan had +swindled him, was a gentleman, and he was the first to throw a quid in +the Giraffe's hat when it went round for Bogan, but the other jackaroo +was a cur: he said he wanted the money that Bogan had robbed him of. +There were two witnesses, but we sent 'em away, and Tom Hall, there, +scared the jackaroo. You know Tom was always the best hand we had at +persuading witnesses in Union cases to go home to see their mothers." + +"How did you scare that jackaroo, Tom?" I asked. + +"Tell you about it some other time," said Tom. + +"Well," said Mitchell, "Bogan was always a good woolsorter, so, +next shearing, old Baldy Thompson--(you know Baldy Thompson, Harry, of +West-o'-Sunday Station)--Baldy had a talk with some of the chaps, and +took Bogan out in his buggy with him to West-o'-Sunday. Bogan would +sit at the end of the rolling tables, in the shearing-shed, with a boy +to hand him the fleeces, and he'd feel a fleece and tell the boy what +bin to throw it into; and by and by he began to learn to throw the +fleeces into the bins himself. And sometimes Baldy would have a sheep +brought to him and get him to feel the fleece and tell him the quality +of it. And then again Baldy would talk, just loud enough for Bogan to +overhear, and swear that he'd sooner have Bogan, blind as he was, than +half a dozen scientific jackaroo experts with all their eyes about +them. + +"Of course Bogan wasn't worth anything much to Baldy, but Baldy gave +him two pounds a week out of his own pocket, and another quid that we +made up between us; so he made enough to pull him through the rest of +the year. + +"It was curious to see how soon he learned to find his way about the +hut and manage his tea and tucker. It was a rough shed, but everybody +was eager to steer Bogan about--and, in fact, two of them had a fight +about it one day. Baldy and all of us---and especially visitors when +they came--were mighty interested in Bogan; and I reckon we were +rather proud of having a blind wool-sorter. I reckon Bogan had thirty +or forty pairs of eyes watching out for him in case he'd run against +something or fall. It irritated him to be messed round too much--he +said a baby would never learn to walk if it was held all the time. He +reckoned he'd learn more in a year than a man who'd served a lifetime +to blindness; but we didn't let him wander much--for fear he'd fall +into the big rocky waterhole there, by accident. + +"And after the shearing-season Bogan's wife turned up in Bourke---" + +"Bogan's wife!" I exclaimed. "Why, I never knew Bogan was +married." + +"Neither did anyone else," said Mitchell. "But he was. Perhaps +that was what accounted for Bogan. Sometimes, in his sober moods, I +used to have an idea that there must have been something behind the +Bogan to account for him. Perhaps he got trapped--or got married and +found out that he'd made a mistake--which is about the worst thing a +man can find out---" + +"Except that his wife made the mistake, Mitchell," said Tom Hall. + +"Or that both did," reflected Mitchell. "Ah, well!--never +mind--Bogan had been married two or three years. Maybe he got married +when he was on the spree--I knew that he used to send money to someone +in Sydney and I suppose it was her. Anyway, she turned up after he +was blind. She was a hard-looking woman--just the sort that might +have kept a third-rate pub or a sly-grog shop. But you can't judge +between husband and wife, unless you've lived in the same house with +them--and under the same roofs with their parents right back to Adam +for that matter. Anyway, she stuck to Bogan all right; she took a +little two-roomed cottage and made him comfortable--she's got a +sewing-machine and a mangle and takes in washing and sewing. She +brought a carrotty-headed youngster with her, and the first time I saw +Bogan sitting on the veranda with that youngster on his knee I thought +it was a good thing that he was blind." + +"Why?" I asked. + +"Because the youngster isn't his," said Mitchell. + +"How do you know that?" + +"By the look of it--and by the look on her face, once, when she +caught me squinting from the kid's face to Bogan's." + +"And whose was it?" I asked, without thinking. + +"How am I to know?" said Mitchell. "It might be yours for all I +know--it's ugly enough, and you never had any taste in women. But you +mustn't speak of that in Bourke. But there's another youngster +coming, and I'll swear that'll be Bogan's all right. + +"A curious thing about Bogan is that he's begun to be fidgety about +his personal appearance--and you know he wasn't a dood. He wears a +collar now, and polishes his boots; he wears elastic-sides, and +polishes 'em himself--the only thing is that he blackens over the +elastic. He can do many things for himself, and he's proud of it. He +says he can see many things that he couldn't see when he had his eyes. +You seldom hear him swear, save in a friendly way; he seems much +gentler, but he reckons he would stand a show with Barcoo-Rot even +now, if Barcoo would stand up in front of him and keep yelling---" + +"By the way," I asked, "how did Bogan lose the sight of his other +eye?" + +"Sleeping out in the rain when he was drunk," said Mitchell. "He +got a cold in his eye." Then he asked, suddenly: + +"Did you ever see a blind man cry?" + +"No," I said. + +"Well, I have," said Mitchell. + +"You know Bogan wears goggles to hide his eyes--his wife made him do +that. The chaps often used to drop round and have a yarn with Bogan +and cheer him up, and one evening I was sitting smoking with him, and +yarning about old times, when he got very quiet all of a sudden, and I +saw a tear drop from under one of his shutters and roll down his +cheek. It wasn't the eye he lost saving Campbell--it was the old +wall-eye he used to use in the days before he was called 'One-eyed +Bogan.' I suppose he thought it was dark and that I couldn't see his +face. (There's a good many people in this world who think you can't +see because they can't.) It made me feel like I used to feel +sometimes in the days when I felt things---" + +"Come on, Mitchell," said Tom Hall, "you've had enough beer." + +"I think I have," said Mitchell. "Besides, I promised to send a +wire to Jake Boreham to tell him that his mother's dead. Jake's +shearing at West-o'-Sunday; shearing won't be over for three or four +weeks, and Jake wants an excuse to get away without offending old +Baldy and come down and have a fly round with us before the holidays +are over." + +Down at the telegraph-office Mitchell took a form and filled it in +very carefully: "Jacob Boreham. West-o'-Sunday Station. Bourke. +Come home at once. Mother is dead. In terrible trouble. Father +dying.--MARY BOREHAM." + +"I think that will do," said Mitchell. "It ought to satisfy Baldy, +and it won't give Jake too much of a shock, because he hasn't got a +sister or sister-in-law, and his father and mother's been dead over +ten years." + +"Now, if I was running a theatre," said Mitchell, as we left the +office, "I'd give five pounds a night for the face Jake'll have on +him when he takes that telegram to Baldy Thompson." + + + + +TWO SUNDOWNERS + + +Sheep stations in Australia are any distance from twenty to a hundred +miles apart, to keep well within the boundaries of truth and the great +pastoral country. Shearing at any one shed only lasts a few weeks in +the year; the number of men employed is according to the size of the +shed--from three to five men in the little bough-covered shed of the +small "cockatoo," up to a hundred and fifty or two hundred hands all +told in the big corrugated iron machine shed of a pastoral company. + +Shearing starts early up in northern Queensland, where you can get a +"January shed;" and further south, in February, March or April +sheds, and so on down into New South Wales, where shearing often lasts +over Christmas. Shearers travel from shed to shed; some go a travel +season without getting a pen, and an unlucky shearer might ride or +tramp for several seasons and never get hands in wool; and all this +explains the existence of the "footman" with his swag and the horse +man with his packhorse. They have a rough life, and the Australian +shearers are certainly the most democratic and perhaps the most +independent, intelligent and generous body of workmen in the world. + +Shearers at a shed elect their own cook, pay him so much a head, and +they buy their rations in the lump from the station store; and +"travellers," i.e. shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work, are +invited, as a matter of course, to sit down to the shearers' table. +Also a certain allowance of tea, sugar, flour or meat is still made to +travellers at most Western station stores; so it would be rather +surprising if there weren't some who, travelled on the game. The +swagman loafer, or "bummer," times himself, especially in bad +weather, to arrive at the shed just about sundown; he is then sure of +"tea," shelter for the night, breakfast, and some tucker from the +cook to take him on along the track. Brummy and Swampy were +sundowners. + +Swampy was a bummer born--and proud of it. Brummy had drifted down to +loaferdom, and his nature was soured and his spirit revengeful against +the world because of the memory of early years wasted at hard work and +in being honest. Both were short and stout, and both had scrubby +beards, but Brummy's beard was a dusty black and Swampy's fiery +red--he indulged in a monkey-shave sometimes, but his lower face was +mostly like a patch of coarse stubble with a dying hedge round it. +They had travelled together for a long time. They seemed at times to +hate each other with a murderous hatred, but they were too lazy to +fight. Sometimes they'd tramp side, by side and growl at each other +by the hour, other times they'd sulk for days; one would push on ahead +and the other drop behind until there was a mile or two between them; +but one always carried the billy, or the sugar, or something that was +necessary to the comfort of the other, so they'd come together at +sundown. They had travelled together a long time, and perhaps that +was why they hated each other. They often agreed to part and take +different tracks, and sometimes they parted--for a while. They agreed +in cadging, and cadged in turn. They carried a spare set of +tucker-bags, and if, for instance, they were out of sugar and had +plenty flour and tea, Brummy or Swampy would go to the store, +boundary-rider's hut, or selector's, with the sugar-bag in his hand +and the other bags in his shirt front on spec. He'd get the sugar +first, and then, if it looked good enough, the flour-bag would come +out, then the tea-bag. And before he left he'd remark casually that +he and his mate hadn't had a smoke for two days. They never missed a +chance. And when they'd cadged more tucker than they could +comfortably carry, they'd camp for a day or two and eat it down. +Sometimes they'd have as much as a pound of tobacco, all in little +"borrowed" bits, cut from the sticks or cakes of honest travellers. +They never missed a chance. If a stranger gave Swampy his cake of +tobacco with instructions to "cut off a pipeful," Swampy would cut +off as much as he thought judicious, talking to the stranger and +watching his eye all the time, and hiding his palm as much as +possible--and sometimes, when he knew he'd cut off more than he could +cram into his pipe, he'd put his hand in his pocket for the pipe and +drop some of the tobacco there. Then he'd hand the plug to his mate, +engage the stranger in conversation and try to hold his eye or detract +his attention from Brummy so as to give Brummy a chance of cutting off +a couple of pipefuls, and, maybe, nicking off a corner of the cake and +slipping it into his pocket. I once heard a bushman say that no one +but a skunk would be guilty of this tobacco trick--that it is about +the meanest trick a man could be capable of--_because it spoils the +chances of the next hard-up swaggy who asks the victim for +tobacco._ + +When Brummy and Swampy came to a shed where shearing was in full +swing, they'd inquire, first thing, and with some show of anxiety, if +there was any chance of gettin' on; if the shed was full-handed they'd +growl about hard times, wonder what the country was coming to; talk of +their missuses and kids that they'd left in Sydney, curse the +squatters and the Government, and, next morning, get a supply of +rations from the cook and depart with looks of gloom. If, on the +other hand, there was room in the shed for one or both of them, and +the boss told them to go to work in the morning, they'd keep it quiet +from the cook if possible, and depart, after breakfast, +unostentatiously. + +Sometimes, at the beginning of a drought, when the tall dead grass was +like tinder for hundreds of miles and a carelessly-dropped match would +set the whole country on fire, Swampy would strike a hard-faced +squatter, manager or overseer with a cold eye, and the conversation +would be somewhat as follows: + +Swampy: "Good day, boss!" + +Boss (shortly): "'Day." + +Swampy: "Any chance of a job?" + +Boss: "Naw. Got all I want and we don't start for a fortnight." + +Swampy: "Can I git a bit o' meat?" + +Boss: "Naw! Don't kill till Saturday." + +Swampy: "Pint o' flour?" + +Boss: "Naw. Short ourselves." + +Swampy: "Bit o' tea or sugar, boss?" + +Boss: "Naw--what next?" + +Swampy: "Bit o' baccer, boss. Ain't had a smoke for a week." + +Boss: "Naw. Ain't got enough for meself till the wagon comes out." + +Swampy: "Ah, well! It's hot, ain't it, boss?" + +Boss: "Yes-it's hot." + +Swampy: "Country very dry?" + +Boss: "Yes. Looks like it." + +Swampy: "A fire 'ud be very bad just now?" + +Boss: "Eh?" + +Swampy: "Yes. Now I'm allers very careful with matches an' fire when +I'm on the track." + +Boss "Are yer?" + +Swampy: "Yes. I never lights a fire near the grass--allers in the +middle of the track--it's the safest place yer can get. An' I allers +puts the fire out afore I leaves the camp. If there ain't no water +ter spare I covers the ashes with dirt. An' some fellers are so +careless with matches lightin' their pipes." (Reflective pause.) + +Boss: "Are they?" + +Swampy: "Yes. Now, when I lights me pipe on the track in dry weather +I allers rubs the match head up an' drops it in the dust. I never +drops a burnin' match. But some travellers is so careless. A chap +might light his pipe an' fling the match away without thinkin' an' the +match might fall in a dry tuft, an'-there yer are!" (with a wave of +his arms). "Hundreds of miles o' grass gone an' thousands o' sheep +starvin'. Some fellers is so careless--they never thinks. . . . An' +what's more, they don't care if they burn the whole country." + +Boss (scratching his head reflectively): "Ah-umph! You can go up to +the store and get a bit of tucker. The storekeeper might let yer have +a bit o' tobacco." + + +On one occasion, when they were out of flour and meat; Brummy and +Swampy came across two other pilgrims camped on a creek, who were also +out of flour and meat. One of them had tried a surveyors' camp a +little further down, but without success. The surveyors' cook had +said that he was short of flour and meat himself. Brummy tried +him--no luck. Then Swampy said he'd go and have a try. As luck would +have it, the surveyors' cook was just going to bake; he had got the +flour out in the dish, put in the salt and baking powder, mixed it up, +and had gone to the creek for a billy of water when Swampy arrived. +While the cook was gone Swampy slipped the flour out of the dish into +his bag, _wiped_ the dish, set it down again, and planted the bag +behind a tree at a little distance. Then he stood waiting, holding a +spare empty bag in his hand. When the cook came back he glanced at +the dish, lowered the billy of water slowly to the ground, scratched +his head, and looked at the dish again in a puzzled way. + +"Blanked if I didn't think I got that flour out!" he said. + +"What's that, mate?" asked Swampy. + +"Why! I could have sworn I got the flour out in the dish and mixed +it before I went for the water," said the cook, staring at the dish +again. "It's rum what tricks your memory plays on you sometimes." + +"Yes," said Swampy, showing interest, while the cook got some more +flour out into the dish from a bag in the back of the tent. "It is +strange. I've done the same, thing meself. I suppose it's the heat +that makes us all a bit off at times." + +"Do you cook, then?" asked the surveyors' cook. + +"Well, yes. I've done a good bit of it in me time; but it's about +played out. I'm after stragglers now." (Stragglers are stray sheep +missed in the general muster and found about the out paddocks and +shorn after the general shearing.) + +They had a yarn and Swampy "bit the cook's ear" for a "bit o' meat +an' tea an' sugar," not forgetting "a handful of flour if yer can +spare it." + +"Sorry," said the cook, "but I can only let you have about a pint. +We're very short ourselves." + +"Oh, that's all right!" said Swampy, as he put the stuff into his +spare bags. "Thank you! Good day!" + +"Good day," said the cook. The cook went on with his work and +Swampy departed, catching up the bag of flour from behind the tree as +he passed it, and keeping the clump of timber well between him and the +surveyors' camp, lest the cook should glance round, and, noticing the +increased bulk of his load, get some new ideas concerning mental +aberration. + + +Nearly every bushman has at least one superstition, or +notion, that lasts his time--as nearly every bushman has at least one +dictionary word which lasts him all his life. Brummy had a gloomy +notion--Lord knows how he got it!--that he should 'a' gone on the +boards if his people hadn't been so ignorant. He reckoned that he had +the face and cut of an actor, could mimic any man's voice, and had +wonderful control over his features. They came to a notoriously +"hungry" station, where there was a Scottish manager and +storekeeper. Brummy went up to "government house" in his own proper +person, had a talk with the storekeeper, spoke of a sick mate, and got +some flour and meat. They camped down the creek, and next morning +Brummy started to shave himself. + +"Whatever are you a-doin' of, Brummy?" gasped Swampy in great +astonishment. + +"Wait and see," growled Brummy, with awful impressiveness, as if he +were going to cut Swampy's throat after he'd finished shaving. He +shaved off his beard and whiskers, put on a hat and coat belonging to +Swampy, changed his voice, dropped his shoulders, and went limping up +to the station on a game leg. He saw the cook and got some +"brownie," a bit of cooked meat and a packet of baking powder. Then +he saw the storekeeper and approached the tobacco question. Sandy +looked at him and listened with some slight show of interest, then he +said: + +"Oh that's all right now! But ye needn't ha' troublt shavin' yer +beard--the cold weather's comin' on! An' yer mate's duds don't suit +ye--they 're too sma'; an' yer game leg doesn't fit ye either--it +takes a lot o' practice. Ha' ye got ony tea an' sugar?" + +Brummy must have touched something responsive in that old Scot +somewhere, but his lack of emotion upset Brummy somewhat, or else an +old deep-rooted superstition had been severely shaken. Anyway he let +Swampy do the cadging for several days thereafter. + + +But one bad season they were very hard up indeed--even for Brummy and +Swampy. They'd tramped a long hungry track and had only met a few +wretched jackaroos, driven out of the cities by hard times, and +tramping hopelessly west. They were out of tobacco, and their +trousers were so hopelessly "gone" behind that when they went to +cadge at a place where there was a woman they were moved to back and +sidle and edge away again--and neither Brummy nor Swampy was over +fastidious in matters of dress or personal appearance. It was +absolutely necessary to earn a pound or two, so they decided to go to +work for a couple of weeks. It wouldn't hurt them, and then there was +the novelty of it. + +They struck West-o'-Sunday Station, and the boss happened to want a +rouseabout to pick up wool and sweep the floor for the shearers. + +"I can put _one_ of you on," he said. "Fix it up between +yourselves and go to work in the morning." + +Brummy and Swampy went apart to talk it over. + +"Look here! Brum, old man," said Swampy, with great heartiness, +"we've been mates for a long while now, an' shared an' shared alike. +You've allers acted straight to me an' I want to do the fair thing by +you. _I_ don't want to stand in _your_ light. You take the +job an' I'll be satisfied with a pair of pants out of it and a bit o' +tobacco now an' agen. There yer are! I can't say no fairer than +that." + +"Yes," said Brummy, resentfully, "an' you'll always be thrown' it +up to me afterwards that I done you out of a job!" + +"I'll swear I won't," said Swampy, hurriedly. "But since you're +so blasted touchy and suspicious about it, _you_ take this job an' +I'll take the next that turns up. How'll that suit you?" + +Brummy thought resentfully. + +"Look here!" he said presently, "let's settle it and have done with +this damned sentimental tommy-rot. I'll tell you what I'll do--I'll +give you the job and take my chance. The boss might want another man +to-morrow. Now, are you satisfied?" + +But Swampy didn't look grateful or happy. + +"Well," growled Brummy, "of all the --- I ever travelled with +you're the ---. What do you want anyway? What'll satisfy you? +That's all I want to know. Hey?--can't yer speak?" + +"Let's toss up for it," said Swampy, sulkily. + +"All right," said Brummy, with a big oath, and he felt in his pocket +for two old pennies he had. But Swampy had got a suspicion somehow +that one of those pennies had two heads on it, and he wasn't sure that +the other hadn't two tails--also, he suspected Brummy of some skill in +"palming," so he picked up a chip from the wood-heap, spat on it, +and spun it into the air. "Sing out!" he cried, "wet or dry?" + +"Dry," said Brummy, promptly. He had a theory that the wet side of +the chip, being presumably heaviest, was more likely to fall +downwards; but this time it was "wet" up three times in succession. +Brummy ignored Swampy's hand thrown out in hearty congratulation; and +next morning he went to work in the shed. Swampy camped down the +river, and Brummy supplied him with a cheap pair of moleskin trousers, +tucker and tobacco. The shed cut out within three weeks and the two +sundowners took the track again, Brummy with two pounds odd in his +pocket--he having negotiated his cheque at the shed. + +But now there was suspicion, envy, and distrust in the hearts of those +two wayfarers. Brummy was now a bloated capitalist, and proud, and +anxious to get rid of Swampy--at least Swampy thought so. He thought +that the least that Brummy might have done was to have shared the +"stuff" with him. + +"Look here, Brummy," he said reproachfully, "we've shared and shared +alike, and---" + +"We never shared money," said Brummy, decidedly. + +"Do you think I want yer blasted money?" retorted Swampy, +indignantly. "When did I ever ask yer for a sprat? Tell me that!" + +"You wouldn't have got it if you had asked," said Brummy, +uncompromisingly. "Look here!" with vehemence. "Didn't I keep +yer in tobacco and buy yer gory pants? What are you naggin' about +anyway?" + +"Well," said Swampy, "all I was goin' to say was that yer might let +me carry one of them quids in case you lost one--yer know you're +careless and lose things; or in case anything happened to you." + +"I ain't going to lose it--if that's all that's fretting you," said +Brummy, "and there ain't nothing going to happen to me--and don't you +forget it." + +"That's all the thanks I get for givin' yer my gory job," said +Swampy, savagely. "I won't be sick a soft fool agen, I can tell +yer." + +Brummy was silent, and Swampy dropped behind. He brooded darkly, and +it's a bad thing for a man to brood in the bush. He was reg'lar +disgusted with Brummy. He'd allers acted straight to him, and Brummy +had acted like a "cow." He'd stand it no longer; but he'd have some +satisfaction. He wouldn't be a fool. If Brummy was mean skunk enough +to act to a mate like that, Swampy would be even with him; he would +wait till Brummy was asleep, collar the stuff, and clear. It was his +job, anyway, and the money was his by rights. He'd have his rights. + +Brummy, who carried the billy, gave Swampy a long tramp before he +camped and made a fire. They had tea in silence, and smoked moodily +apart until Brummy turned in. They usually slept on the ground, with +a few leaves under them, or on the sand where there was any, each +wrapped in his own blankets, and with their spare clothes, or rags +rather, for pillows. Presently Swampy turned in and pretended to +sleep, but he lay awake watching, and listening to Brummy's breathing. +When he thought it was safe he moved cautiously and slipped his hand +under Brummy's head, but Brummy's old pocket-book--in which he carried +some dirty old letters in a woman's handwriting--was not there. All +next day Swampy watched Brummy sharply every time he put his hands +into his pockets, to try and find out in which pocket he kept his +money. Brummy seemed very cheerful and sociable, even considerate, to +his mate all day, and Swampy pretended to be happy. They yarned more +than they had done for many a day. Brummy was a heavy sleeper, and +that night Swampy went over him carefully and felt all his pockets, +but without success. Next day Brummy seemed in high spirits--they +were nearing Bourke, where they intended to loaf round the pubs for a +week or two. On the third night Swampy waited till about midnight, +and then searched Brummy, every inch of him he could get at, and +tickled him, with a straw of grass till he turned over, and ran his +hands over the other side of him, and over his feet (Brummy slept with +his socks on), and looked in his boots, and in the billy and in the +tucker-bags, and felt in every tuft of grass round the camp, and under +every bush, and down a hollow stump, and up a hollow log: but there +was no pocket-book. Brummy couldn't have lost the money and kept it +dark--he'd have gone back to look for it at once. Perhaps he'd thrown +away the book and sewn the money in his clothes somewhere. Swampy +crept back to him and felt the lining of his hat, and was running his +hand over Brummy's chest when Brummy suddenly started to snore, and +Swampy desisted without loss of time. He crept back to bed, breathing +short, and thought hard. It struck him that there was something +aggressive about that snore. He began to suspect that Brummy was up +to his little game, and it pained him. + +Next morning Brummy was decidedly frivolous. At any other time Swampy +would have put it down to a "touch o' the sun," but now he felt a +growing conviction that Brummy knew what he'd been up to the last +three nights, and the more he thought of it the more it pained +him--till at last he could stand it no longer. + +"Look here, Brummy," he said frankly, "where the hell do you keep +that flamin' stuff o' yourn? I been tryin' to git at it ever since we +left West-o'-Sunday." + +"I know you have, Swampy," said Brummy, affectionately--as if he +considered that Swampy had done his best in the interests of mateship. + +"I _knowed_ yer knowed!" exclaimed Swampy, triumphantly. "But +where the blazes did yer put it?" + +"Under _your_ head, Swampy, old man," said Brummy, cheerfully. + +Swampy was hurt now. He commented in the language that used to be +used by the bullock-punchers of the good days as they pranced up and +down by their teams and lammed into the bullocks with saplings and +crow-bars, and called on them to lift a heavy load out of a bog in the +bed of a muddy creek. + +"Never mind, Swampy!" said Brummy, soothingly, as his mate paused +and tried to remember worse oaths. "It wasn't your fault." + +But they parted at Bourke. Swampy had allers acted straight +ter Brummy--share 'n' share alike. He'd do as much for a mate as any +other man, an' put up with as much from a mate. He had put up with a +lot from Brummy: he'd picked him up on the track and learned him all +he knowed; Brummy would have starved many a time if it hadn't been +for Swampy; Swampy had learned him how to "battle." He'd stick to +Brummy yet, but he couldn't stand ingratitude. He hated low cunnin' +an' suspicion, and when a gory mate got suspicious of his own old +mate and wouldn't trust him, an' took to plantin' his crimson +money--it was time to leave him. + + + +A SKETCH OF MATESHIP + + +Bill and Jim, professional shearers, were coming into Bourke from the +Queensland side. They were horsemen and had two packhorses. At the +last camp before Bourke Jim's packhorse got disgusted and home-sick +during the night and started back for the place where he was foaled. +Jim was little more than a new-chum jackaroo; he was no bushman and +generally got lost when he went down the next gully. Bill was a +bushman, so it was decided that he should go back to look for the +horse. + +Now Bill was going to sell his packhorse, a well-bred mare, in Bourke, +and he was anxious to get her into the yards before the horse sales +were over; this was to be the last day of the sales. Jim was the best +"barracker" of the two; he had great imagination; he was a very +entertaining story-teller and conversationalist in social life, and a +glib and a most impressive liar in business, so it was decided that he +should hurry on into Bourke with the mare and sell her for Bill. +Seven pounds, reserve. + +Next day Bill turned up with the missing horse and saw Jim standing +against a veranda-post of the Carriers' Arms, with his hat down over +his eyes, and thoughtfully spitting in the dust. Bill rode over to +him. + +"'Ullo, Jim." + +"'Ullo, Bill. I see you got him." + +"Yes, I got him." + +Pause. + +"Where'd yer find him?" + +"'Bout ten mile back. Near Ford's Bridge. He was just feedin' +along." + +Pause. Jim shifted his feet and spat in the dust. + +"Well," said Bill at last. "How did you get on, Jim?" + +"Oh, all right," said Jim. "I sold the mare." + +"That's right," said Bill. "How much did she fetch?" + +"Eight quid;" then, rousing himself a little and showing some +emotion, "An' I could 'a' got ten quid for her if I hadn't been a +dam' fool." + +"Oh, that's good enough," said Bill. + +"I could 'a' got ten quid if I'd 'a' waited." + +"Well, it's no use cryin'. Eight quid is good enough. Did you get +the stuff?" + +"Oh, yes. They parted all right. If I hadn't been such a dam' fool +an' rushed it, there was a feller that would 'a' given ten quid for +that mare." + +"Well, don't break yer back about it," said Bill. "Eight is good +enough." + +"Yes. But I could 'a' got ten," said Jim, languidly, putting his +hand in his pocket. + +Pause. Bill sat waiting for him to hand over the money; but Jim +withdrew his hand empty, stretched, and said: + +"Ah, well, Bill, I done it in. Lend us a couple o' notes." + +Jim had been drinking and gambling all night and he'd lost the eight +pounds as well as his own money. + +Bill didn't explode. What was the use? He should have known that Jim +wasn't to be trusted with money in town. It was he who had been the +fool. He sighed and lent Jim a pound, and they went in to have a +drink. + +Now it strikes me that if this had happened in a civilized country +(like England) Bill would have had Jim arrested and jailed for larceny +as a bailee, or embezzlement, or whatever it was. And would Bill or +Jim or the world have been any better for it? + + + + +ON THE TUCKER TRACK: A STEELMAN STORY + + +Steelman and Smith, professional wanderers from New Zealand, took a +run over to Australia one year to have a look at the country, and +drifted out back, and played cards and "headin' 'em" at the +shearing-sheds (while pretending to be strangers to each other), and +sold eye-water and unpatented medicine, and worked the tucker tracks. +They struck a streak of bad luck at West-o'-Sunday Station, where they +were advised (by the boss and about fifty excited shearers) to go +east, and not to stop till they reached the coast. They were tramping +along the track towards Bourke; they were very hard up and had to +"battle" for tucker and tobacco along the track. They came to a +lonely shanty, about two camps west of Bourke. + +"We'll turn off into the scrub and strike the track the other side of +the shanty and come back to it," said Steelman. "You see, if they +see us coming into Bourke they'll say to themselves, `Oh, we're never +likely to see these chaps again,' and they won't give us anything, or, +perhaps, only a pinch of tea or sugar in a big lump of paper. There's +some women that can never see a tucker-bag, even if you hold it right +under their noses. But if they see us going out back they'll reckon +that we'll get a shed likely as not, and we'll be sure to call there +with our cheques coming back. I hope the old man's got the lumbago, +or sciatica, or something." + +"Why?" asked Smith. + +"Because whenever I see an old man poking round the place on a stick +I always make for him straight and inquire about his trouble; and no +matter what complaint he's got, my old man suffered from it for years. +It's pretty hard graft listening to an old man with a pet leg, but I +find it pays; and I always finish up by advising him to try St Jacob's +oil. Perhaps he's been trying it for years, but that doesn't matter; +the consultation works out all right all the same, and there's never +been a remedy tried yet but I've got another. + +"I've got a lot of Maori and blackfellow remedies in my mind, and +when they fail I can fall back on the Chinese; and if that isn't +enough I've got a list of my grandmother's remedies that she wrote +down for me when I was leaving home, and I kept it for a curiosity. +It took her three days to write them, and I reckon they'll fill the +bill. + +"You don't want a shave. You look better with that stubble on. You +needn't say anything; just stand by and wear your usual expression, +and if they ask me what's the matter with my mate I'll fix up a +disease for you to have, and get something extra on your account, poor +beggar! + +"I wish we had a chap with us that could sing a bit and run the gamut +on a fiddle or something. With a sickly-looking fish like you to +stand by and look interesting and die slowly of consumption all the +time, and me to do the talking, we'd be able to travel from one end +of the bush to the other and live on the fat of the land. I wouldn't +cure you for a hundred pounds:" + +They reached the shanty, and there, sure enough, was an old man +pottering round with a list to starboard. He was working with a hoe +inside a low paling fence round a sort of garden. Steelman and Smith +stopped outside the fence. + +"Good day, boss!" + +"'Day." + +"It's hot." + +"It's hot." + +So far it was satisfactory. + +He was a little man, with a wiry, red beard. He might have been a +Scandinavian. + +"You seem to be a bit lame," said Steelman. "Hurt your foot?" + +"Naw," said the old man. "It's an old thing." + +"Ah!" said Steelman, "lumbago, I suppose? My father suffered cruel +from it for years." + +"Naw," said the old man, moving closer to the fence. "It ain't in +me back; the trouble's with me leg." + +"Oh!" said Steelman. "One a bit shorter than the other?" + +"Well, yes. It seems to be wearin' a bit shorter. I must see to +it." + +"Hip disease, perhaps?" said Steelman. "A brother o' mine had---" + +"Naw, it's not in the hip," said the old man. "My leg's gone at +the knee." + +"Oh! stiff joint; I know what that is. Had a touch of it once +myself. An uncle of mine was nearly crippled with it. He used to use +St Jacob's oil. Ever try St Jacob's oil?" + +"Naw," said the old man, "not that I know of. I've used linseed +oil though." + +"Linseed oil!" said Steelman; "I've never heard of that for stiff +knee. How do you use it?" + +"Use it raw," said the old man. "Raw linseed oil; I've rubbed it +in, and I've soaked me leg in it." + +"Soaked your leg in it!" said Steelman. "And did it do it any +good?" + +"Well, it seems to preserve it--keeps it from warping, and it wears +better--and it makes it heavier. It seemed a bit too light before." + +Steelman nudged Smith under cover of the palings. The old man was +evidently a bit ratty. + +"Well, I hope your leg will soon be all right, boss," said Steelman. + +"Thank you," said the old man, "but I don't think there's much +hope. I suppose you want some tucker?" + +"Well, yes," said Steelman, rather taken aback by the old man's +sudden way of putting it. "We're hard up." + +"Well, come along to the house and I'll see if I can get yer +something," said the old man; and they walked along outside the +fence, and he hobbled along inside, till he came to a little gate at +the corner. He opened the gate and stumped out. He had a wooden leg. +He wore his trouser-leg down over it, and the palings had hidden the +bottom from Steelman and Smith. + +He wanted them to stay to dinner, but Steelman didn't feel +comfortable, and thanked him, and said they'd rather be getting on +(Steelman always spoke for Smith); so the old man gave them some +cooked meat, bread, and a supply of tea and sugar. Steelman watched +his face very close, but he never moved a muscle. But when they +looked back he was leaning on his hoe, and seemed to be shaking. + +"Took you back a bit, Steely, didn't it?" suggested Smith. + +"How do you make that out?" snorted Steelman, turning on him +suddenly. "I knew a carpenter who used to soak his planes in raw +linseed oil to preserve them and give them weight. There's nothing +funny about that." + +Smith rubbed his head. + + + + +A BUSH PUBLICAN'S LAMENT + + . . . For thirst is long and throats is short + Among the sons o' men. + M. J. C. + +I Wish I was spifflicated before I ever seen a pub! + +You see, it's this way. Suppose a cove comes along on a blazin' hot +day in the drought--an' _you_ ought to know how hell-hot it can +be out here--an' he dumps his swag in the corner of the bar; an' he +turns round an' he ses ter me, "Look here boss, I ain't got a lonely +steever on me, an' God knows when I'll git one. I've tramped ten mile +this mornin', an' I'll have ter tramp another ten afore to-night. I'm +expectin' ter git on shearin' with of Baldy Thompson at West-o'-Sunday +nex' week. I got a thirst on me like a sun-struck bone, an', for God +sake, put up a couple o' beers for me an' my mate, an' I'll fix it up +with yer when I come back after shearin'." + +An' what's a feller ter do? I bin there meself, an--I put it to you! +I've known what it is to have a thirst on me. + +An' suppose a poor devil comes along in the jim-jams, with every inch +on him jumpin' an' a look in his eyes like a man bein' murdered an' +sent ter hell, an' a whine in his voice like a whipped cur, an' the +snakes a-chasing of him; an' he hooks me with his finger ter the far +end o' the bar--as if he was goin' ter tell me that the world was +ended--an' he hangs over the bar an' chews me lug, an' tries to speak, +an' breaks off inter a sort o' low shriek, like a terrified woman, an' +he says, "For Mother o' Christ's sake, giv' me a drink!" An' what +am I to do? I bin there meself. I knows what the horrors is. He +mighter blued his cheque at the last shanty. But what am I ter do? I +put it ter you. If I let him go he might hang hisself ter the nex' +leanin' tree. + +What's a drink? yer might arst--I don't mind a drink or two; but when +it comes to half a dozen in a day it mounts up, I can tell yer. +Drinks is sixpence here--I have to pay for it, an' pay carriage on it. +It's all up ter me in the end. I used sometimes ter think it was +lucky I wasn't west o' the sixpenny line, where I'd lose a shillin' on +every drink I give away. + +An' supposen a sundowner comes along smokin' tea-leaves, an' ses ter +me, "Look her, boss! me an' my mate ain't had a smoke for three +days!" What's a man ter do? I put it ter you! I'm a heavy smoker +meself, an' I've known what it is to be without a smoke on the track. +But "nail-rod" is ninepence a stick out here, an' I have ter pay +carriage. It all mounts up, I can tell yer. + +An' supposen Ole King Billy an' his ole black gin comes round at +holiday time and squats on the verander, an' blarneys an' wheedles and +whines and argues like a hundred Jews an' ole Irishwomen put +tergether, an' accuses me o' takin' his blarsted country from him, an' +makes me an' the missus laugh; an' we gives him a bottl'er rum an' a +bag of grub ter get rid of him an' his rotten ole scarecrow tribe--It +all tells up. I was allers soft on the blacks, an', beside, a ole gin +nursed me an' me mother when I was born, an' saved me blessed +life--not that that mounts to much. But it all tells up, an' I got me +licence ter pay. An' some bloody skunk goes an' informs on me for +supplyin' the haboriginalls with intossicatin' liquor, an' I have ter +pay a fine an' risk me licence. But what's a man ter do? + +An' three or four herrin'-gutted jackaroos comes along about +dinner-time, when the table's set and the cookin' smellin' from the +kichen, with their belts done up three holes, an' not the price of a +feed on 'em. What's a man ter do? I've known what it is ter do a +perish on the track meself. It's not the tucker I think on. I don't +care a damn for that. When the shearers come every one is free to +go inter the kitchin an' forage for hisself when he feels hungry--so +long as he pays for his drink. But the jackaroos can't pay for +drinks, an' I have ter pay carriage on the flour an' tea an' sugar an' +groceries--an' it all tells up by the end o' the year. + +An' a straight chap that knows me gets a job to take a flock o' sheep +or a mob o' cattle ter the bloomin' Gulf, or South Australia, or +somewheers--an' loses one of his horses goin' out ter take charge, an' +borrers eight quid from me ter buy another. He'll turn up agen in a +year or two an' most likely want ter make me take twenty quid for that +eight--an' make everybody about the place blind drunk--but I've got +ter wait, an' the wine an' sperit merchants an' the brewery won't. +They know I can't do without liquor in the place. + +An' lars' rains Jimmy Nowlett, the bullick-driver, gets bogged over +his axle-trees back there on the Blacksoil Plains between two flooded +billerbongs, an' prays till the country steams an' his soul's busted, +an' his throat like a lime-kiln. He taps a keg o' rum or beer ter +keep his throat in workin' order. I don't mind that at all, but him +an' his mates git flood-bound for near a week, an' broach more kegs, +an' go on a howlin' spree in ther mud, an' spill mor'n they swipe, an' +leave a tarpaulin off a load, an' the flour gets wet, an' the sugar +runs out of the bags like syrup, an'-- What's a feller ter do? Do yer +expect me to set the law onter Jimmy? I've knowed him all my life, +an' he knowed my father afore I was born. He's been on the roads this +forty year, till he's as thin as a rat, and as poor as a myall black; +an' he's got a family ter keep back there in Bourke. No, I have ter +pay for it in the end, an' it all mounts up, I can tell yer. + +An' suppose some poor devil of a new-chum black sheep comes along, +staggerin' from one side of the track to the other, and spoutin' +poetry; dyin' o' heat or fever, or heartbreak an' home-sickness, or a +life o' disserpation he'd led in England, an' without a sprat on him, +an' no claim on the bush; an' I ketches: him in me arms as he stumbles +inter the bar, an' he wants me ter hold him up while he turns English +inter Greek for me. An' I put him ter bed, an' he gits worse, an' I +have ter send the buggy twenty mile for a doctor--an' pay him. An' +the jackaroo gits worse, an' has ter be watched an' nursed an' held +down sometimes; an' he raves about his home an' mother in England, an' +the blarsted University that he was eddicated at--an' a woman--an' +somethin' that sounds like poetry in French; an' he upsets my missus a +lot, an' makes her blubber. An' he dies, an' I have ter pay a man ter +bury him (an' knock up a sort o' fence round the grave arterwards ter +keep the stock out), an' send the buggy agen for a parson, an'--Well, +what's a man ter do? I couldn't let him wander away an' die like a +dog in the scrub, an' be shoved underground like a dog, too, if his +body was ever found. The Government might pay ter bury him, but there +ain't never been a pauper funeral from my house yet, an' there won't +be one if I can help it--except it be meself. + +An' then there's the bother goin' through his papers to try an' find +out who he was an' where his friends is. An' I have ter get the +missus to write a letter to his people, an' we have ter make up lies +about how he died ter make it easier for 'em. An' goin' through his +letters, the missus comes across a portrait an' a locket of hair, an' +letters from his mother an' sisters an' girl; an' they upset her, an' +she blubbers agin, an' gits sentimental--like she useter long ago when +we was first married. + +There was one bit of poetry--I forgit it now--that that there jackaroo +kep' sayin' over an' over agen till it buzzed in me head; an', weeks +after, I'd ketch the missus mutterin' it to herself in the kitchen +till I thought she was goin' ratty. + +An' we gets a letter from the jackaroo's friends that puts us to a lot +more bother. I hate havin' anythin' to do with letters. An' +someone's sure to say he was lambed down an' cleaned out an' poisoned +with bad bush liquor at my place. It's almost enough ter make a man +wish there _was_ a recorin' angel. + +An' what's the end of it? I got the blazin' bailiff in the place now! +I can't shot him out because he's a decent, hard-up, poor devil from +Bourke, with consumption or somethin', an' he's been talkin' to the +missus about his missus an' kids; an' I see no chance of gittin' rid +of him, unless the shearers come along with their cheques from +West-o'-Sunday nex' week and act straight by me. Like as not I'll +have ter roll up me swag an' take the track meself in the end. They +say publicans are damned, an' I think so, too; an' I wish I'd bin +operated on before ever I seen a pub. + + + + +THE SHEARER'S DREAM + + +Mitchell and I rolled up our swags after New Year and started to tramp +west. It had been a very bad season after a long drought. Old Baldy +Thompson had only shorn a few bales of grass-seed and burrs, so he +said, and thought of taking the track himself; but we hoped to get on +shearing stragglers at West-o'-Sunday or one of the stations of the +Hungerford track. + +It was very hot weather, so we started after sunset, intending to +travel all night. We crossed the big billabong, and were ploughing +through the dust and sand towards West Bourke, when a buggy full of +city girls and swells passed by. They were part of a theatrical +company on tour in the Back-Blocks, and some local Johnnies. They'd +been driven out to see an artesian bore, or wool-shed, or something. +The horses swerved, and jerked a little squawk out of one of the +girls. Then another said: + +"Ow-w! Two old swaggies. He! he! he!" + +I glanced at Mitchell to see if he was hit, and caught his head down; +but he pulled himself up and pretended to hitch his swag into an +easier position. + +About a hundred yards further on he gave me a side look and said: + +"Did that touch you, Harry" + +"No," I said, and I laughed. + +"You see," reflected Mitchell, "they're more to be pitied than +blamed. It's their ignorance. In the first place, we're not two old +tramps, as they think. We are professional shearers; and the +Australian shearers are about the most independent and intelligent +class of men in the world. We've got more genius in one of our little +fingers than there is in the whole of that wagonette-load of +diddle-daddle and fiddle-faddle and giggles. Their intellects are on +a level with the rotten dramas they travel with, and their lives about +as false. They are slaves to the public, and their home is the +pub-parlour, with sickly, senseless Johnnies to shout suppers and +drink for them and lend their men money. If one of those girls is +above the average, how she must despise those Johnnies--and the life! +She must feel a greater contempt for them than the private-barmaid +does for the boozer she cleans out. He gets his drink and some +enjoyment, anyhow. And how she must loathe the life she leads! And +what's the end of it as often as not? I remember once, when I was a +boy, I was walking out with two aunts of mine--they're both dead now. +God rest their fussy, innocent old souls!--and one of 'em said +suddenly, 'Look! Quick, Jack! There's Maggie So-and-So, the great +actress.' And I looked and saw a woman training vines in a porch. It +seemed like seeing an angel to me, and I never forgot her as she was +then. The diggers used to go miles out of town to meet the coach that +brought her, and take the horses out and drag it in, and throw gold in +her lap, and worship her. + +"The last time I was in Sydney I saw her sitting in the back parlour +of a third-rate pub. She was dying of dropsy and couldn't move from +her chair. She showed me a portrait of herself as I remembered her, +and talked quite seriously about going on the stage again. + +"Now, our home is about two thousand miles wide, and the world's our +stage. If the worst comes to the worst we can always get tucker and +wood and water for nothing. If we're camping at a job in a tent +there's no house-cleaning to bother us. All we've got to do when the +camp gets too dirty is to shift the tent to a fresh place. We've got +time to think and--we're free. + +"But then, agen," he reflected, "there's the world's point of view +to be considered. Some day I might be flashing past in a buggy or +saloon-carriage--or, the chances are it will be you--and you might +look out the window and see an old swaggy tramping along in the dust, +or camped under a strip of calico in the rain in the scrub. +(And it might be me--old Mitchell--that really wrote your books, +only the world won't know it.) And then you'll realize what a +wretched, miserable life it was. We never realize the miseries of +life till we look back--the mistakes and miseries that had to be and +couldn't be helped. It's all luck--luck and chance." + +But those girls seemed to have gravelled Mitchell, and he didn't seem +able to talk himself round. He tramped on, brooding for a while, and +then suddenly he said: + +"Look here, Harry! Those girls are giving a dance to-night, +and if I liked to go back to Bourke and tog up and go to the dance I +could pick out the prettiest, dance with her all the evening, and +take her for a stroll afterwards, old tramp as they thought me. I've +lived--but it wouldn't be worth my while now." + +I'd seen Jack in a mood like this before, and thought it best to say +nothing. Perhaps the terrible heat had affected him a little. We +walked on in silence until we came to the next billabong. "Best boil +the billy here, Harry," said Mitchell, "and have some tea before we +go any further." + +I got some sticks together and made a fire and put the billy on. The +country looked wretched--like the ghost of a burnt-out land--in the +moonlight. The banks of the creek were like ashes, the thin, gnarled +gum-bush seemed dry-rotting fast, and in many places the surface of +the ground was cracked in squares where it had shrunk in the drought. +In the bed of the creek was a narrow gutter of water that looked like +bad milk. + +Mitchell sat on his swag, with his pint of tea on the ground by his +foot, and chewed his pipe. + +"What's up, Jack?" I asked. "Have you got the blues?" + +"Well, yes, Harry," he said. "I'm generally dull the first day on +the track. The first day is generally the worst, anywhere or +anytime--except, perhaps, when you're married. . . . I got--well, I got +thinking of the time when a woman's word could have hurt me." + +Just then one of the "travellers" who were camped a bit up the creek +suddenly commenced to sing. It was a song called "The Shearer's +Dream," and I suppose the buggy of girls, or the conversation they +started, reminded him of it. He started his verses and most of his +lines with a howl; and there were unexpected howls all through the +song, and it wailed off, just as unexpectedly, in places where there +was no pathos that I could see: + + Oh, I dreamt I shore in a shearer's shed, and it was a dream of joy, + For every one of the rouseabouts was a girl dressed up as a boy-- + Dressed up like a page in a pantomime, and the prettiest ever seen-- + They had flaxen hair, they had coal-black hair--and every shade between. + +"Every" with sudden and great energy, a long drop on to "shade," and a +wail of intense sadness and regret running on into "between," the +dirge reaching its wailsomest in the "tween" in every case. + + The shed was cooled by electric fans that was over every "shoot"; + The pens was of polished ma-ho-gany, and ev'rything else to suit; + The huts was fixed with spring-mattresses, and the tucker was + simply grand, + And every night by the biller-bong we darnced to a German band. + + "_Chorus, boys!"_ + + There was short, plump girls, there was tall, slim girls, + and the handsomest ever seen + They was four-foot-five, they was six-foot high, and hevery size + between. + Our pay was the wool on the jumbucks' backs, so we shore till all + was blue + The sheep was washed afore they was shore (and the rams was scented + too); + And we all of us cried when the shed cut out, in spite of the + long, hot days, + For hevery hour them girls waltzed in with whisky and beer on + tr-a-a-a-ys! + + "_Chorus_! _you_ ---!" + + They had kind grey eyes, they had coal-black eyes, and the + grandest ever seen + They had plump pink hands, they had slim white hands, and hevery + shape be-tw-e-e-n. + There was three of them girls to every chap, and as jealous as they + could be-- + +"Ow! you ---" + +The singer's voice or memory seemed suddenly to have failed him at +this point, but whether his mates hit him on the back of the head +with a tomahawk, or only choked him, I do not know. Mitchell was +inclined to think, from the sound of it, that they choked him. + + + + +THE LOST SOULS' HOTEL + + + +Hunqerford Road, February. One hundred and thirty miles of heavy +reddish sand, bordered by dry, hot scrubs. Dense cloud of hot dust. +Four wool-teams passing through a gate in a "rabbit proof" fence +which crosses the road. Clock, clock, clock of wheels and rattle and +clink of chains, crack of whips and explosions of Australian language. +Bales and everything else coated with dust. Stink of old axle-grease +and tarpaulins. Tyres hot enough to fry chops on: bows and chains so +hot that it's a wonder they do not burn through the bullock's hides. +Water lukewarm in blistered kegs slung behind the wagons. Bullocks +dragging along as only bullocks do. Wheels ploughing through the deep +sand, and the load lurching from side to side. Half-way on a +"dry-stretch" of seventeen miles. Big "tank" full of good water +through the scrub to the right, but it is a private tank and a +boundary-rider is shepherding it. Mulga scrub and sparse, spiky +undergrowth. + +The carriers camp for dinner and boil their billies while the bullocks +droop under their yokes in the blazing heat; one or two lie down and +the leaders drag and twist themselves round under a dead tree, under +the impression that there is shade there. The carriers look like Red +Indians, with the masks of red dust "bound" with sweat on their +faces, but there is an unhealthy-looking, whitish space round their +eyes, caused by wiping away the blinding dust, sweat, and flies. The +dry sticks burn with a pale flame and an almost invisible thin pale +blue smoke. The sun's heat dancing and dazzling across every white +fence-post, sandhill, or light-coloured object in the distance. + +One man takes off his boot and sock, empties half a pint of sand out +of them, and pulls up his trouser-leg. His leg is sheathed to the +knee in dust and sweat; he absently scrapes it with his knife, and +presently he amuses himself by moistening a strip with his forefinger +and shaving it, as if he were vaguely curious to see if he is still a +white man. + +The Hungerford coach ploughs past in a dense cloud of dust. + +The teams drag on again like a "wounded snake that dies at sundown," +if a wounded snake that dies at sundown could revive sufficiently next +morning to drag on again until another sun goes down. + +Hopeless-looking swagmen are met with during the afternoon, and one +carrier--he of the sanded leg--lends them tobacco; his mates contribute +"bits o'" tea, flour, and sugar. + +Sundown and the bullocks done up. The teamsters unyoke them and drive +them on to the next water--five miles--having previously sent a mate +to reconnoitre and see that boundary-rider is not round, otherwise, to +make terms with him, for it is a squatter's bore. They hurry the +bullocks down to the water and back in the twilight, and then, under +cover of darkness, turn them into a clearing in the scrub off the +road, where a sign in the grass might be seen--if you look close. But +the "bullockies" are better off than the horse-teamsters, for bad +chaff is sold by the pound and corn is worth its weight in gold. + + +Mitchell and I turned off the track at the rabbit-proof fence and made +for the tank in the mulga. We boiled the billy and had some salt +mutton and damper. We were making back for Bourke, having failed to +get a cut in any of the sheds on the Hungerford track. We sat under a +clump of mulga saplings, with our backs to the trunks, and got out our +pipes. Usually, when the flies were very bad on the track, we had to +keep twigs or wild-turkey=tail feathers going in front of our faces +the whole time to keep the mad flies out of our eyes; and, when we +camped, one would keep the feather going while the other lit his +pipe--then the smoke would keep them away. But the flies weren't so +bad in a good shade or in a darkened hut. Mitchell's pipe would have +smoked out Old Nick; it was an ancient string-bound meerschaum, and +strong enough to kill a blackfellow. I had one smoke out of it, once +when I felt bad in my inside and wanted to be sick, and the result was +very satisfactory. + +Mitchell looked through his old pocket-book--more by force of habit +than anything else--and turned up a circular from Tattersall's. And +that reminded him. + +"Do you know what I'd do, Harry," he said, if I won Tattersall's +big sweep, or was to come into fifty or a hundred thousand pounds, or, +better still, a million?" + +"Nothing I suppose," I said, "except to get away to Sydney or some +cooler place than this." + +"I'll tell you what I'd do," said Mitchell, talking round his pipe. +"I'd build a Swagman's Rest right here." + +"A Swagman's Rest?" + +"Yes. Right here on this very God-forsaken spot. I'd build a +Swagman's Rest and call it the Lost Souls' Hotel, or the Sundowners' +Arms, or the Half-way House to ---, or some such name that would take +the bushmen's fancy. I'd have it built on the best plans for coolness +in a hot country; bricks, and plenty of wide verandas with brick +floors, and balconies, and shingles, in the old Australian style. I +wouldn't have a sheet of corrugated iron about the place. And I'd +have old-fashioned hinged sashes with small panes and vines round 'em; +they look cooler and more homely and romantic than the glaring sort +that shove up. + +"And I'd dig a tank or reservoir for surface water as big as a lake, +and bore for artesian water--and get it, too, if I had to bore right +through to England; and I'd irrigate the ground and make it grow +horse-feed and fruit, and vegetables too, if I had to cart manure from +Bourke. And every teamster's bullock or horse, and every shearer's +hack, could burst itself free, but I'd make travelling stock pay--for +it belongs to the squatters and capitalists. All carriers could camp +for one night only. And I'd--no, I wouldn't have any flowers; they +might remind some heart-broken, new-chum black sheep of the house +where he was born, and the mother whose heart he broke--and the father +whose grey hairs he brought down in sorrow to the grave--and break him +up altogether." + +"But what about the old-fashioned windows and the vines?" I asked. + +"Oh!" said Mitchell, "I forgot them. On second thought, I think I +would have some flowers; and maybe a bit of ivy-green. The new chum +might be trying to work out his own salvation, and the sight of the +roses and ivy would show him that he hadn't struck such a +God-forgotten country after all, and help strengthen the hope for +something better that's in the heart of every vagabond till he dies." + +Puff, puff, puff, slowly and reflectively. + +"Until he dies," repeated Mitchell. "And, maybe," he said, +rousing himself, "I'd have a little room fixed up like a corner of a +swell restaurant, with silver and napkins on the table, and I'd fix up +a waiter, so that when a broken-down University wreck came along he +might feel, for an hour or so, something like the man he used to be. +But I suppose," Mitchell reflected, "he wouldn't feel completely his +old self without a lady friend sitting opposite to him. I might fix +up a black gin for him, but I suppose he'd draw the colour line. But +that's nonsense. + +"All teamsters and travellers could camp there for one night only. +I'd have shower-baths; but I wouldn't force any man to have a bath +against his will. They could sit down to a table and have a feed off +a table-cloth, and sleep in sheets, and feel like they did before +their old mothers died, or before they ran away from home." + +"Who? The mothers?" I asked. + +"Yes, in some cases," said Mitchell. "And I'd have a nice, cool +little summer-house down near the artificial lake, out of earshot of +the house, where the bullock-drivers could sit with their pipes after +tea, and tell yarns, and talk in their own language. And I'd have +boats on the lake, too, in case an old Oxford or Cambridge man, or an +old sailor came along--it might put years on to his life to have a +pull at the oars. You remember that old sailor we saw in charge of +the engine back there at the government tank? You saw how he had the +engine?--clean and bright as a new pin--everything spick-and-span and +shipshape, and his hut fixed up like a ship's cabin. I believe he +thinks he's at sea half his time, and shoving her through it, instead +of pumping muddy water out of a hole in the baking scrubs for starving +stock. Or maybe he reckons he's keeping her afloat." + +"And would you have fish in this lake of yours?" I asked. + +"Oh, yes," said Mitchell, "and any ratty old shepherd or sundowner, +that's gone mad of heat and loneliness--like the old codger we met +back yonder--he could sit by the lagoon in the cool of the evening and +fish to his heart's content with a string and a bent pin, and dream +he's playing truant from school and fishing in the brook near his +native village in England about fifty years ago. It would seem more +real than fishing in the dust as some mad old bushmen do." + +"But you'd draw the line somewhere?" I asked. + +"No," said Mitchell, "not even at poets. I'd try to cure them, +too, with good wholesome food and plenty of physical exercise. The +Lost Souls' Hotel would be a refuge for men who'd been jail-birds once +as well as men who were gentlemen once, and for physical wrecks and +ruined drunkards as well as healthy honest shearers. I'd sit down and +talk to the boozer or felon just as if I thought he was as good a man +as me--and he might be, for that matter--God knows. + +"The sick man would be kept till he recovered, or died; and the +boozer, suffering from a recovery, I'd keep him till he was on his +legs again." + +"Then you'd have to have a doctor," I said. + +"Yes," said Mitchell, "I'd fix that up all right. I wouldn't +bother much about a respectable medical practitioner from the city. +I'd get a medical wreck who had a brilliant career before him once in +England and got into disgrace, and cleared out to the colonies--a man +who knows what the d.t.'s is--a man who's been through it all and +knows it all." + +"Then you'd want a manager, or a clerk or secretary," I suggested. + +"I suppose I would," said Mitchell. "I've got no head for figures. +I suppose I'd have to advertise for him. If an applicant came with +the highest testimonials of character, and especially if one was +signed by a parson, I'd tell him to call again next week; and if a +young man could prove that he came of a good Christian family, and +went to church regularly, and sang in the choir, and taught +Sunday-school, I'd tell him that he needn't come again, that the +vacancy was filled, for I couldn't trust, him. The man who's been +extra religious and honest and hard-working in his young days is most +likely to go wrong afterwards. I'd sooner trust some poor old devil +of a clerk who'd got into the hands of a woman or racing men when he +was young, and went wrong, and served his time for embezzlement; +anyway, I'd take him out and give him another chance." + +"And what about woman's influence?" I asked. + +"Oh, I suppose there'd have to be a woman, if only to keep the doctor +on the line. I'd get a woman with a past, one that hadn't been any +better than she should have been, they're generally the most +kind-hearted in the end. Say an actress who'd come down in the world, +or an old opera-singer who'd lost her voice but could still sing a +little. A woman who knows what trouble is. And I'd get a girl to +keep her company, a sort of housemaid, with a couple of black gins or +half-castes to help her. I'd get hold of some poor girl who'd been +deceived and deserted: and a baby or two wouldn't be an objection--the +kids would amuse the chaps and help humanize the place." + +"And what if the manageress fell in love with the doctor?" I asked. + +"Well, I couldn't provide against love," said Mitchell. "I fell in +love myself more than once--and I don't suppose I'd have been any +worse off if I'd have stayed in love. Ah, well! But suppose she did +fall in love with the doctor and marry him, or suppose she fell in +love with him and didn't marry him, for that matter--and suppose the +girl fell in love with the secretary? There wouldn't be any harm +done; it would only make them more contented with the home and bind +them to it. They'd be a happy family, and the Lost Souls' Hotel would +be more cheerful and homelike than ever." + +"But supposing they all fell in love with each other and cleared +out," I said. + +"I don't see what they'd have to clear out for," said Mitchell. +"But suppose they did. There's more than one medical wreck in +Australia, and more than one woman with a past, and more than one +broken old clerk who went wrong and was found out, and who steadied +down in jail, and there's more than one poor girl that's been +deceived. I could easily replace 'em. And the Lost Souls' Hotel +might be the means of patching up many wrecked lives in that +way--giving people with pasts the chance of another future, so to +speak." + +"I suppose you'd have music and books and pictures?" I said. + +"Oh, yes," said Mitchell. "But I wouldn't have any bitter or +sex-problem books. They do no good. Problems have been the curse of +the world ever since it started. I think one noble, kindly, cheerful +character in a book does more good than all the clever villains or +romantic adventurers ever invented. And I think a man ought to get +rid of his maudlin sentiment in private, or when he's drunk. It's a +pity that every writer couldn't put all his bitterness into one book +and then burn it. + +"No; I'd have good cheerful books of the best and brightest sides of +human nature--Charles Dickens, and Mark Twain, and Bret Harte, and +those men. And I'd have all Australian pictures--showing the +brightest and best side of Australian life. And I'd have all +Australian songs. I wouldn't have `Swannie Ribber,' or `Home, Sweet +Home,' or `Annie Laurie,' or any of those old songs sung at the Lost +Souls' Hotel--they're the cause of more heartbreaks and drink and +suicide in the bush than anything else. And if a jackaroo got up to +sing, `Just before the battle, mother,' or, `Mother bit me in me +sleep,' he'd find it was just before the battle all right. He'd have +to go out and sleep in the scrub, where the mosquitoes and bulldog +ants would bite him out of his sleep. I hate the man who's always +whining about his mother through his nose, because, as a rule, he +never cared a rap for his old mother, nor for anyone else, except his +own paltry, selfish little self. + +"I'd have intellectual and elevating conversation for those that---" + +"Who'd take charge of that department?" I inquired hurriedly. + +"Well," reflected Mitchell, "I did have an idea of taking it on +myself for a while anyway; but, come to think of it, the doctor or the +woman with the past would have more experience; and I could look after +that part of the business at a pinch. Of course you're not in a +position to judge as to my ability in the intellectual line; you see, +I've had no one to practise on since I've been with you. But no +matter--- There'd be intellectual conversation for the benefit of +black-sheep new chums. And any broken-down actors that came along +could get up a play if they liked--it would brighten up things and +help elevate the bullock-drivers and sundowners. I'd have a stage +fixed up and a bit of scenery. I'd do all I could to attract shearers +to the place after shearing, and keep them from rushing to the next +shanty with their cheques, or down to Sydney, to be cleaned out by +barmaids. + +"And I'd have the hero squashed in the last act for a selfish sneak, +and marry the girl to the villain--he'd be more likely to make her +happy in the end." + + +"And what about the farm?" I asked. "I suppose you'd get some +expert from the agricultural college to manage that?" + +"No," said Mitchell. "I'd get some poor drought-ruined selector +and put him in charge of the vegetation. Only, the worst of it is," +he reflected, "if you take a selector who has bullocked all his life +to raise crops on dusty, stony patches in the scrubs, and put him on +land where there's plenty of water and manure, and where he's only got +to throw the seed on the ground and then light his pipe and watch it +grow, he's apt to get disheartened. But that's human nature. + +"And, of course, I'd have to have a `character' about the place--a +sort of identity and joker to brighten up things. I wouldn't get a +man who'd been happy and comfortable all his life; I'd get hold of +some old codger whose wife had nagged him till she died, and who'd +been sold off many times, and run in for drowning his sorrows, and who +started as an undertaker and failed at that, and finally got a job +pottering round--gardener, or gatekeeper, or something--in a lunatic +asylum. I'd get him. He'd most likely be a humorist and a +philosopher, and he'd help cheer up the Lost Souls' Hotel. I reckon +the lost souls would get very fond of him." + +"And would you have drink at Lost Souls'?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Mitchell. "I'd have the best beer and spirits and wine +to be had. After tea I'd let every man have just enough to make him +feel comfortable and happy, and as good and clever, and innocent and +honest as any other man, but no more. But if a poor devil came along +in the horrors, with every inch of him jumping, and snakes, and +green-eyed yahoos, and flaming-nosed bunyips chasing him, we'd take +him in and give him soothing draughts, and nurse him, and watch him, +and clear him out with purgatives, and keep giving him nips of good +whisky, and, above all, we'd sympathize with him, and tell him that we +were worse than he was many a time. We wouldn't tell him what a weak, +selfish man he was, or harp on his ruined life. We'd try to make him +out a good deal better morally than he really was. It's remorse that +hurries most men to hell--especially in the Bush. When a man firmly +believes he is a hopeless case, then there's no hope for him: but let +him have doubts and there's a chance. Make him believe that there are +far worse cases than his. We wouldn't preach the sin of dissipation +to him, no--but we'd try to show him the _folly_ of a wasted +life. I ought to be able to preach that, God knows. + +"And, above all, we'd try to drive out of his head the cursed old +popular idea that it's hard to reform--that a man's got to fight a +hard battle with himself to get away from drink--pity drunkards can't +believe how easy it is. And we'd put it to him straight whether his +few hours' enjoyment were worth the days he had to suffer hell for +it." + +"And, likely as not," I said, "when you'd put him on his feet he'd +take the nearest track to the next shanty, and go on a howling spree, +and come back to Lost Souls' in a week, raving aid worse than ever. +What would you do then?" + +"We'd take him in again, and build him up some more; and a third or +fourth time if necessary. I believe in going right on with a thing +once I take it in hand. And if he didn't turn up after the last spree +we'd look for him up the scrub and bring him in and let him die on a +bed, and make his death as comfortable as possible. I've seen one man +die on the ground, and found one dead in the bush. We'd bury him +under a gum and put `Sacred to the Memory of a Man who Died. (Let him +R.I.P.)' over him. I'd have a nice little graveyard, with gums for +tombstones--and I'd have some original epitaphs--I promise you." + +"And how much gratitude would you expect to get out of the Lost +Souls' Hotel?" I asked. + +"None," said Mitchell, promptly. "It wouldn't be a Gratitude +Discovery Syndicate. People might say that the Lost Souls' Hotel was +a den for kidnapping women and girls to be used as decoys for the +purpose of hocussing and robbing bushmen, and the law and retribution +might come after me--but I'd fight the thing out. Or they might want +to make a K.C.M.G., or a god of me, and worship me before they hung +me. I reckon a philanthropist or reformer is lucky if he escapes with +a whole skin in the end, let alone his character--- But there!--- +Talking of gratitude: it's the fear of ingratitude that keeps +thousands from doing good. It's just as paltry and selfish and +cowardly as any other fear that curses the world--it's rather more +selfish than most fears, in fact--take the fear of being thought a +coward, or being considered eccentric, or conceited, or affected, or +too good, or too bad, for instance. The man that's always canting +about the world's ingratitude has no gratitude owing to him as a +rule--generally the reverse--he ought to be grateful to the world for +being let live. He broods over the world's ingratitude until he gets +to be a cynic. He sees the world like the outside of a window, as it +were, with the blind drawn and the dead, cold moonlight shining on it, +and he passes on with a sour face; whereas, if he took the trouble to +step inside he'd most likely find a room full of ruddy firelight, and +sympathy and cheerfulness, and kindness, and love, and gratitude. +Sometimes, when he's right down on his uppers, and forced to go +amongst people and hustle for bread, he gets a lot of surprises at the +amount of kindness he keeps running against in the world--and in +places where he'd never have expected to find it. But--ah, well! I'm +getting maudlin." + +"And you've forgot all about the Lost Souls' Hotel," I said. + +"No, I haven't," said Mitchell; "I'd fix that up all right. As +soon as I'd got things going smoothly under a man I could trust, I'd +tie up every penny I had for the benefit of the concern; get some +`white men' for trustees, and take the track again. I'm getting too +old to stay long in one place--(I'm a lost soul that always got along +better in another place). I'm so used to the track that if I was shut +up in a house I'd get walking up and down in my room of nights and +disturb the folk; and, besides, I'd feel lost and light-shouldered +without the swag." + +"So you'd put all your money in the concern?" + +"Yes--except a pound or two to go on the track with--for, who knows, +I might come along there, dusty and tired, and ragged and hard up and +old, some day, and be very glad of a night's rest at the Lost Souls' +Hotel. But I wouldn't let on that I was old Mitchell, the +millionaire, who founded Lost Souls'. They might be too officious, +and I hate fuss. . . . But it's time to take the track, Harry." + +There came a cool breeze with sunset; we stood up stiffly, shouldered +our swags and tucker-bags, and pushed on, for we had to make the next +water before we camped. We were out of tobacco, so we borrowed some +from one of the bullock-drivers. + + + + +THE BOOZERS' HOME + + +"A dipsomaniac," said Mitchell, "needs sympathy and commonsense +treatment. (Sympathy's a grand and glorious thing, taking it all +round and looking at it any way you will: a little of it makes a man +think that the world's a good world after all, and there's room and +hope for sinners, and that life's worth living; enough of it makes him +sure of it: and an overdose of sympathy makes a man _feel_ weak +and ashamed of himself, and so moves him to stop whining--and +wining--and buck up.) + +"Now, I'm not taking the case of a workman who goes on the spree on +pay night and sweats the drink out of himself at work next day, nor a +slum-bred brute who guzzles for the love of it; but a man with brains, +who drinks to drown his intellect or his memory. He's generally a man +under it all, and a sensitive, generous, gentle man with finer +feelings as often as not. The best and cleverest and whitest men in +the world seem to take to drink mostly. It's an awful pity. Perhaps +it's because they're straight and the world's crooked and they can see +things too plain. And I suppose in the bush the loneliness and the +thoughts of the girl-world they left behind help to sink 'em. + +"Now a drunkard seldom reforms at home, because he's always +surrounded by the signs of the ruin and misery he has brought on the +home; and the sight and thought of it sets him off again before he's +had time to recover from the last spree. Then, again, the noblest +wife in the world mostly goes the wrong way to work with a drunken +husband--nearly everything she does is calculated to irritate him. +If, for instance, he brings a bottle home from the pub, it shows that +he wants to stay at home and not go back to the pub any more; but the +first thing the wife does is to get hold of the bottle and plant it, +or smash it before his eyes, and that maddens him in the state he is +in then. + +"No. A dipsomaniac needs to be taken away from home for a while. I +knew a man that got so bad that the way he acted at home one night +frightened him, and next morning he went into an inebriate home of his +own accord--to a place where his friends had been trying to get him +for a year past. For the first day or two he was nearly dead with +remorse and shame--mostly shame; and he didn't know what they were +going to do to him next--and he only wanted them to kill him quick and +be done with it. He reckons he felt as bad as if he was in jail. But +there were ten other patients there, and one or two were worse than he +was, and that comforted him a lot. They compared notes and +sympathized and helped each other. They discovered that all their +wives were noble women. He struck one or two surprises too--one of +the patients was a doctor who'd attended him one time, and another was +an old boss of his, and they got very chummy. And there was a man +there who was standing for Parliament--he was supposed to be having a +rest down the coast. . . . Yes, my old mate felt very bad for the first +day or two; it was all Yes, Nurse, and Thank you, Nurse, and Yes, +Doctor, and No, Doctor, and Thank you, Doctor. But, inside a week, he +was calling the doctor 'Ol' Pill-Box' behind his back, and making love +to one of the nurses. + +"But he said it was pitiful when women relatives came to visit +patients the first morning. It shook the patients up a lot, but I +reckon it did 'em good. There were well-bred old lady mothers in +black, and hard-working, haggard wives and loving daughters--and the +expressions of sympathy and faith and hope in those women's faces! My +old mate said it was enough in itself to make a man swear off drink +for ever. . . . Ah, God--what a world it is! + +"Reminds me how I once went with the wife of another old mate of mine +to see him. He was in a lunatic asylum. It was about the worst hour +I ever had in my life, and I've had some bad ones. The way she tried +to coax him back to his old self. She thought she could do it when +all the doctors had failed. But I'll tell you about him some other +time. + +"The old mate said that the principal part of the treatment was +supposed to be injection of bi-chloride of gold or something, and it +was supposed to be a secret. It might have been water and sugar for +all he knew, and he thought it was. You see, when patients got better +they were allowed out, two by two, on their honour--one to watch the +other--and it worked. But it was necessary to have an extra hold on +them; so they were told that if they were a minute late for +`treatment,' or missed one injection, all the good would be undone. +This was dinged into their ears all the time. Same as many things are +done in the Catholic religion--to hold the people. My old mate said +that, as far as the medical treatment was concerned, he could do all +that was necessary himself. But it was the sympathy that counted, +especially the sympathy between the patients themselves. They always +got hold of a new patient and talked to him and cheered him up; he +nearly always came in thinking he was the most miserable wretch in +this world. And it comforts a man and strengthens him and makes him +happier to meet another man who's worse off or sicker, or has been +worse swindled than he has been. That's human nature. . . . And a man +will take draughts from a nurse and eat for her when he wouldn't do it +for his own wife--not even though she had been a trained nurse +herself. And if a patient took a bad turn in the night at the +Boozers' Home and got up to hunt the snakes out of his room, he +wouldn't be sworn at, or laughed at, or held down; no, they'd help him +shoo the snakes out and comfort him. My old mate said that, when he +got better, one of the new patients reckoned that he licked St +Pathrick at managing snakes. And when he came out he didn't feel a +bit ashamed of his experience. The institution didn't profess to cure +anyone of drink, only to mend up shattered nerves and build up wrecked +constitutions; give them back some will-power if they weren't too far +gone. And they set my old mate on his feet all right. When he went +in his life seemed lost, he had the horror of being sober, he couldn't +start the day without a drink or do any business without it. He +couldn't live for more than two hours without a drink; but when he +came out he didn't feel as if he wanted it. He reckoned that those +six weeks in the institution were the happiest he'd ever spent in his +life, and he wished the time had been longer; he says he'd never met +with so much sympathy and genius, and humour and human nature under +one roof before. And he said it was nice and novel to be looked after +and watched and physicked and bossed by a pretty nurse in uniform--but +I don't suppose he told his wife that. And when he came out he never +took the trouble to hide the fact that he'd been in. If any of his +friends had a drunkard in the family, he'd recommend the institution +and do his best to get him into it. But when he came out he firmly +believed that if he took one drink he'd be a lost man. He made a +mania of that. One curious effect was that, for some time after he +left the institution, he'd sometimes feel suddenly in high +spirits--with nothing to account for it--something like he used to +feel when he had half a dozen whiskies in him; then suddenly he'd feel +depressed and sort of hopeless--with nothing to account for that +either--just as if he was suffering a recovery. But those moods never +lasted long and he soon grew out of them altogether. He didn't flee +temptation. He'd knock round the pubs on Saturday nights with his old +mates, but never drank anything but soft stuff--he was always careful +to smell his glass for fear of an accident or trick. He drank gallons +of ginger beer, milk-and-soda, and lemonade; and he got very fond of +sweets, too--he'd never liked them before. He said he enjoyed the +novelty of the whole thing and his mates amused him at first; but he +found he had to leave them early in the evening, and, after a while, +he dropped them altogether. They seemed such fools when they were +drunk (they'd never seemed fools to him before). And, besides, as +they got full, they'd get suspicious of him, and then mad at him, +because he couldn't see things as they could. That reminds me that it +nearly breaks a man's heart when his old drinking chum turns +teetotaller--it's worse than if he got married or died. When two +mates meet and one is drunk and the other sober there is only one of +two things for them to do if they want to hit it together--either the +drunken mate must get sober or the sober mate drunk. And that reminds +me: Take the case of two old mates who've been together all their +lives, say they always had their regular sprees together and went +through the same stages of drunkenness together, and suffered their +recoveries and sobered up together, and each could stand about the +same quantity of drink and one never got drunker than the other. +Each, when he's boozing, reckons his mate the cleverest man and the +hardest case in the world--second to himself. But one day it happens, +by a most extraordinary combination of circumstances, that Bill, being +sober, meets Jim very drunk, and pretty soon Bill is the most +disgusted man in this world. He never would have dreamed that his old +mate could make such a fool and such a public spectacle of himself. +And Bill's disgust intensifies all the time he is helping Jim home, +and Jim arguing with him and wanting to fight him, and slobbering over +him and wanting to love him by turns, until Bill swears he'll give Jim +a hammering as soon as ever he's able to stand steady on his feet." + +"I suppose your old boozing mate's wife was very happy when he +reformed," I said to Mitchell. + +"Well, no," said Mitchell, rubbing his head rather ruefully. "I +suppose it was an exceptional case. But I knew her well, and the fact +is that she got more discontented and thinner, and complained and +nagged him worse than she'd ever done in his drinking days. And she'd +never been afraid of him. Perhaps it was this way: She loved and +married a careless, good-natured, drinking scamp, and when he reformed +and became a careful, hard-working man, and an honest and respected +fellow-townsman, she was disappointed in him. He wasn't the man that +won her heart when she was a girl. Or maybe he was only company for +her when he was half drunk. Or maybe lots of things. Perhaps he'd +killed the love in her before he reformed--and reformed too late. I +wonder how a man feels when he finds out for the first time that his +wife doesn't love him any longer? But my old mate wasn't the nature +to find out that sort of thing. Ah, well! If a woman caused all our +trouble, my God! women have suffered for it since--and they suffer +like martyrs mostly and with the patience of working bullocks. Anyway +it goes, if I'm the last man in the world, and the last woman is the +worst, and there's only room for one more in Heaven, I'll step down at +once and take my chances in Blazes." + + + + +THE SEX PROBLEM AGAIN + + +It was Mitchell's habit to take an evening off now and then from +yarning or reflecting, and proceed, in a most methodical manner, to +wash his spare shirts and patch his pants. I was in the habit of +contributing to some Sydney papers, and every man is an editor at +heart, so, at other times, Mitchell would take another evening off, +and root out my swag, and go through my papers in the same methodical +manner, and make alterations and additions without comment or +reference to me; and sometimes he'd read a little thing of my own +which didn't meet his views, and accidentally drop it into the fire; +and at other times he'd get hold of some rhyme or sketch that was +troubling me, and wrap it up and give it to a passing mailman +unbeknown to me. The unexpected appearance of such articles in the +paper, as well as the effects of the involuntary collaboration in +other pieces, gave me several big surprises. + +It was in camp on a fencing contract west of Bourke. We had a book +which we'd borrowed from a library at Bourke for a year or two--never +mind the name of it--it was in ninety-one or ninety-two, and the sex +problem was booming then. I had been surreptitiously tearing some +carefully-written slips of manuscript--leaves taken from an old +pocket-book--into small pieces; I dropped them, with apparent +carelessness, into the fire and stood with my back to it. + +"I'll bet five pounds," said Mitchell, suddenly, "that you've been +trying your hand on a sex-problem story." + +I shifted uneasily and brought my hands from behind me into my +pockets. "Well, to tell you the truth," I admitted, "I have." + +"I thought so," exclaimed Mitchell. "We'll be put to the expense +of sending you to Sydney for medical treatment yet. You've been +having too easy times lately, plenty of hard graft and no anxiety +about tucker or the future. What are the symptoms?" + +"Well," I said, taking a hand out to scratch the back of my head, +"the plot looked all right--at first sight." + +"So there's a plot, is there? Well, in the first place, a plot is a +problem. Well, what's the plot? . . . Come on, you needn't be +frightened to tell an old mate like me." + +"Well," I said, "the yarn looked all right at first sight; that +article of `T's' in the _Bulletin_ turned me off it; listen and +see what you think of it: There was a young fellow, a bit of a +genius---" + +"Just so, it's the geniuses that build the sex problems. It's an +autobiography. Go on." + +"Well, he married a girl." + +Mitchell (sotto voce): "God help her." + +"He loved her, and she loved him: but after they'd been married a +while he found out that, although he understood her, she didn't and +couldn't possibly ever understand him." + +"Yes," commented Mitchell, "and if he hadn't caught the sex +problem, nor been reading about it, he would never have found that +out." + +"It was a terrible disappointment," I continued--I had got into the +habit of taking Mitchell's interruptions and comments as matters of +course--"He saw that his life would be a hell with her---" + +Mitchell: "Didn't strike him that her life would be a hell with +him?" + +"They had no thought in common." + +Mitchell: "She was in her right mind then." + +"But he couldn't leave her because he loved her, and because he knew +that she loved him and would break her heart if he left her." + +"Must have been a pretty cocksure sort of a fellow," remarked +Mitchell, "but all geniuses are." + +"When he was with her he saw all her obstinacy, unreason, and +selfishness; but when he was away he only saw her good points." + +Mitchell: "Pity such men don't stop away." + +"He thought and thought, and brooded over it till his life was a +hell---" + +Mitchell: "Jes-so: thanks to the problemaniacs." + +"He thought of killing her and himself, and so taking her with him" + +"Where?" asked Mitchell. "He must have loved her a lot. . . . Good +Lord! That shows the awful effects of the sex problem on the mind of +a healthy young man like you;" and Mitchell stood up. + +"He lay awake by her side at nights thinking and fighting the thing +out." + +"And you've been lying awake, thinking, with me and `the Oracle' by +your side. We'll have to plant the tommy-hawk, and watch you by turns +at night till you get over this." + +"One night he rested on his elbow, and watched her sleeping, and +tried to reconstruct his ideal out of her, and, just when he was +getting into a happier frame of mind, her mouth fell open, and she +snored. . . . I didn't get any further than the snore," I said. + +"No, of course you didn't," said Mitchell, "and none of the sex +problemers ever will--unless they get as far as `blanky.' You might +have made the snore cure him; did it?" + +"No, it was making things worse in my idea of the yarn. He fell back +and lay staring at the ceiling in a hopeless kind of a way." + +"Then he was a fit case for the lunatic asylum. . . . Now, look here, +Harry, you're a good-natured, soft old fool when you're in your right +mind; just you go on being a good-natured, soft old fool, and don't +try to make a problem out of yourself or anybody else, or you'll come +to a bad end. A pocket-book's to keep your accounts in, not to take +notes in (you take them in your head and use 'em in your arms), not to +write sex-problem rot in--that's spoilt many a good pocket-book, and +many a good man. You've got a girl you're talking about going back to +as soon as we've finished this contract. Don't you make a problem of +her; make a happy wife and mother of her. . . . I was very clever when +I was young"--and here Mitchell's voice took a tinge of bitterness, or +sadness. "I used to make problems out of things. . . . I ain't much to +boast of now. . . . Seems to me that a good many men want to make angels +of their wives without first taking trouble of making saints of +themselves. We want to make women's ways our ways--it would be just +as fair to make our ways theirs. Some men want to be considered gods +in their own homes; you'll generally find that sort of men very small +potatoes outside; if they weren't they wouldn't bother so much about +being cocks on their own little dunghills. . . . And again, old mates +seldom quarrel, because they understand each other's moods. Now, if +you went brooding round for any length of time I'd say to you. `Now +then, Harry, what have I been doing to you? Spit it out, old man.' +And you'd do the same by me; but how many men would take even that +much trouble with their wives?" + +A breeze stirred the mulga and brought the sound of a good voice +singing in the surveyors' camp: + + Should old acquaintance be forgot + And never brought to min'? + Should old acquaintance be forgot + And the days of Auld Lang Syne? + +"That damned old tune will upset the Oracle for the rest of the +night," I said. + +"Now, there's the Oracle," said Mitchell. "He was wronged by a woman +as few men are wronged; his life was ruined--but he isn't the man to +take any stock in sex problems on account of her. He thinks he's +great on problems, but he isn't. It all amounts to this--that he's +sorry for most men and all women and tries to act up to it to the best +of his ability; and if he ain't a Christian, God knows what is--I don't. +No matter what a woman does to you, or what you think she does to you, +there come times, sooner or later, when you feel sorry for her--deep +down in your heart--that is if you're a man. And, no matter what action +or course you might take against her, and no matter how right or +justified you might seem in doing it, there comes a time when, deep +down in your heart, you feel mean and doubtful about your own part. +You can take that as a general thing as regards men against women, +and man against man, I think. And I believe that deep-down feeling +of being doubtful, or mean, or sorry, that comes afterwards, when you +are cooler and know more about the world, is a right and natural thing, +and we ought to act more in accordance with it." + +Came the refrain from the surveyors' camp: + + We twa hae run about the braes, + An' pu'd the gowans fine; + But we've wandered mony a weary foot + Sin' Auld Lang Syne. + +"We feel sorry for our quarrels with our worst enemy when we see him +lying still and quiet--dead. Why can't we try and feel a bit sorry +beforehand?" + + For Auld Lang Syne. + We twa ha' padl't i' the burn, + Fra mornin' sun till dine; + But seas between us braid ha' roar'd + Sin' Auld Lang Syne. + +"I used to feel blazing bitter against things one time but it never +hurt anybody but myself in the end. I argued and quarrelled with a +girl once--and made a problem of the thing and went away. She's +married to a brute now, and I'm what I am. I made a problem of a good +home or the world once, and went against the last man in God's world +that I should have gone against, and turned my back on his hand, and +left him. His hand was very cold the next time I took it in mine. We +don't want problems to make us more bitter against the world than we +get sometimes." + + And here's a han' my trusty frien', + An' gie's a han' o' thine, + We'll tak' a cup o' kindness yet + For Auld Lang Syne. + +"And that song's the answer of all problems," said Mitchell. But it +was I who lay awake and thought that night. + +[Children of the Bush by Henry Lawson II] + + + +THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAG + +The Australian swag fashion is the easiest way in the world of +carrying a load. I ought to know something about carrying loads: I've +carried babies, which are the heaviest and most awkward and +heartbreaking loads in this world for a boy or man to carry, I fancy. +God remember mothers who slave about the housework (and do sometimes a +man's work in addition in the bush) with a heavy, squalling kid on one +arm! I've humped logs on the selection, "burning-off," with loads of +fencing-posts and rails and palings out of steep, rugged gullies (and +was happier then, perhaps); I've carried a shovel, crowbar, heavy +"rammer," a dozen insulators on an average (strung round my shoulders +with raw flax)-to say nothing of soldiering kit, tucker-bag, billy and +climbing spurs--all day on a telegraph line in rough country in New +Zealand, and in places where a man had to manage his load with one +hand and help himself climb with the other; and I've helped hump and +drag telegraph-poles up cliffs and sidings where the horses couldn't +go. I've carried a portmanteau on the hot dusty roads in green old +jackaroo days. Ask any actor who's been stranded and had to count +railway sleepers from one town to another! he'll tell you what sort of +an awkward load a portmanteau is, especially if there's a +broken-hearted man underneath it. I've tried knapsack fashion--one of +the least healthy and most likely to give a man sores; I've carried my +belongings in a three-bushel sack slung over my shoulder--blankets, +tucker, spare boots and poetry all lumped together. I tried carrying +a load on my head, and got a crick in my neck and spine for days. +I've carried a load on my mind that should have been shared by editors +and publishers. I've helped hump luggage and furniture up to, and +down from, a top flat in London. And I've carried swag for months out +back in Australia--and it was life, in spite of its "squalidness" and +meanness and wretchedness and hardship, and in spite of the fact that +the world would have regarded us as "tramps"--and a free life amongst +_men_ from all the world! + +The Australian swag was born of Australia and no other land--of the +Great Lone Land of magnificent distances and bright heat; the land of +self-reliance, and never-give-in, and help-your-mate. The grave of +many of the world's tragedies and comedies--royal and otherwise. The +land where a man out of employment might shoulder his swag in Adelaide +and take the track, and years later walk into a hut on the Gulf, or +never be heard of any more, or a body be found in the bush and buried +by the mounted police, or never found and never buried--what does it +matter? + +The land I love above all others--not because it was kind to me, but +because I was born on Australian soil, and because of the foreign +father who died at his work in the ranks of Australian pioneers, and +because of many things. Australia! My country! Her very name is +music to me. God bless Australia! for the sake of the great hearts of +the heart of her! God keep her clear of the old-world shams and +social lies and mockery, and callous commercialism, and sordid shame! +And heaven send that, if ever in my time her sons are called upon to +fight for her young life and honour, I die with the first rank of them +and be buried in Australian ground. + +But this will probably be called false, forced or "maudlin +sentiment" here in England, where the mawkish sentiment of the +music-halls, and the popular applause it receives, is enough to make +a healthy man sick, and is only equalled by music-hall vulgarity. +So I'll get on. + +In the old digging days the knapsack, or straps-across-the chest +fashion, was tried, but the load pressed on a man's chest and impeded +his breathing, and a man needs to have his bellows free on long tracks +in hot, stirless weather. Then the "horse-collar," or rolled +military overcoat style--swag over one shoulder and under the other +arm--was tried, but it was found to be too hot for the Australian +climate, and was discarded along with Wellington boots and leggings. +Until recently, Australian city artists and editors--who knew as much +about the bush as Downing Street knows about the British colonies in +general--seemed to think the horse-collar swag was still in existence; +and some artists gave the swagman a stick, as if he were a tramp of +civilization with an eye on the backyard and a fear of the dog. +English artists, by the way, seem firmly convinced that the Australian +bushman is born in Wellington boots with a polish on 'em you could +shave yourself by. + +The swag is usually composed of a tent "fly" or strip of calico (a +cover for the swag and a shelter in bad weather--in New Zealand it is +oilcloth or waterproof twill), a couple of blankets, blue by custom +and preference, as that colour shows the dirt less than any other +(hence the name "bluey" for swag), and the core is composed of spare +clothing and small personal effects. To make or "roll up" your +swag: lay the fly or strip of calico on the ground, blueys on top of +it; across one end, with eighteen inches or so to spare, lay your +spare trousers and shirt, folded, light boots tied together by the +laces toe to heel, books, bundle of old letters, portraits, or +whatever little knick-knacks you have or care to carry, bag of +needles, thread, pen and ink, spare patches for your pants, and +bootlaces. Lay or arrange the pile so that it will roll evenly with +the swag (some pack the lot in an old pillowslip or canvas bag), take +a fold over of blanket and calico the whole length on each side, so as +to reduce the width of the swag to, say, three feet, throw the spare +end, with an inward fold, over the little pile of belongings, and then +roll the whole to the other end, using your knees and judgment to make +the swag tight, compact and artistic; when within eighteen inches of +the loose end take an inward fold in that, and bring it up against the +body of the swag. There is a strong suggestion of a roley-poley in a +rag about the business, only the ends of the swag are folded in, in +rings, and not 'tied. Fasten the swag with three or four straps, +according to judgment and the supply of straps. To the top strap, for +the swag is carried (and eased down in shanty bars and against walls +or veranda-posts when not on the track) in a more or less vertical +position--to the top strap, and lowest, or lowest but one, fasten the +ends of the shoulder strap (usually a towel is preferred as being +softer to the shoulder), your coat being carried outside the swag at +the back, under the straps. To the top strap fasten the string of the +nose-bag, a calico bag about the size of a pillowslip, containing the +tea, sugar and flour bags, bread, meat, baking-powder and salt, and +brought, when the swag is carried from the left shoulder, over the +right on to the chest, and so balancing the swag behind. But a +swagman can throw a heavy swag in a nearly vertical position against +his spine, slung from one shoulder only and without any balance, and +carry it as easily as you might wear your overcoat. Some bushmen +arrange their belongings so neatly and conveniently, with swag straps +in a sort of harness, that they can roll up the swag in about a +minute, and unbuckle it and throw it out as easily as a roll of +wall-paper, and there's the bed ready on the ground with the wardrobe +for a pillow. The swag is always used for a seat on the track; it is +a soft seat, so trousers last a long time. And, the dust being mostly +soft and silky on the long tracks out back, boots last marvellously. +Fifteen miles a day is the average with the swag, but you must travel +according to the water: if the next bore or tank is five miles on, and +the next twenty beyond, you camp at the five-mile water to-night and +do the twenty next day. But if it's thirty miles you have to do it. +Travelling with the swag in Australia is variously and picturesquely +described as "humping bluey," "walking Matilda," "humping +Matilda," "humping your drum," "being on the wallaby," "jabbing +trotters," and "tea and sugar burglaring," but most travelling +shearers now call themselves trav'lers, and say simply "on the +track," or "carrying swag." + +And there you have the Australian swag. Men from all the world have +carried it--lords and low-class Chinamen, saints and world martyrs, +and felons, thieves, and murderers, educated gentlemen and boors who +couldn't sign their mark, gentlemen who fought for Poland and convicts +who fought the world, women, and more than one woman disguised as a +man. The Australian swag has held in its core letters and papers in +all languages, the honour of great houses, and more than one national +secret, papers that would send well-known and highly-respected men to +jail, and proofs of the innocence of men going mad in prisons, life +tragedies and comedies, fortunes and papers that secured titles and +fortunes, and the last pence of lost fortunes, life secrets, portraits +of mothers and dead loves, pictures of fair women, heart-breaking old +letters written long ago by vanished hands, and the pencilled +manuscript of more than one book which will be famous yet. + +The weight of the swag varies from the light rouseabout's swag, +containing one blanket and a clean shirt, to the "royal Alfred," +with tent and all complete, and weighing part of a ton. Some old +sundowners have a mania for gathering, from selectors' and shearers' +huts, and dust-heaps, heart-breaking loads of rubbish which can never +be of any possible use to them or anyone else. Here is an inventory +of the contents of the swag of an old tramp who was found dead on the +track, lying on his face on the sand, with his swag on top of him, and +his arms stretched straight out as if he were embracing the mother +earth, or had made, with his last movement, the sign of the cross to +the blazing heavens: + + +Rotten old tent in rags. Filthy blue blanket, patched with squares of +red and calico. Half of "white blanket" nearly black now, patched +with pieces of various material and sewn to half of red blanket. +Three-bushel sack slit open. Pieces of sacking. Part of a woman's +skirt. Two rotten old pairs of moleskin trousers. One leg of a pair +of trousers. Back of a shirt. Half a waistcoat. Two tweed coats, +green, old and rotting, and patched with calico. Blanket, etc. Large +bundle of assorted rags for patches, all rotten. Leaky billy-can, +containing fishing-line, papers, suet, needles and cotton, etc. +Jam-tin, medicine bottles, corks on strings, to hang to his hat to +keep the flies off (a sign of madness in the bush, for the corks would +madden a sane man sooner than the flies could). Three boots of +different sizes, all belonging to the right foot, and a left slipper. +Coffee-pot, without handle or spout, and quart-pot full of +rubbish--broken knives and forks, with the handles burnt off, spoons, +etc., picked up on rubbish-heaps; and many rusty nails, to be used as +buttons, I suppose. + +Broken saw blade, hammer, broken crockery, old pannikins, small rusty +frying-pan without a handle, children's old shoes, many bits of old +bootleather and greenhide, part of yellowback novel, mutilated English +dictionary, grammar and arithmetic book, a ready reckoner, a cookery +book, a bulgy anglo-foreign dictionary, part of a Shakespeare, book in +French and book in German, and a book on etiquette and courtship. A +heavy pair of blucher boots, with uppers parched and cracked, and +soles so patched (patch over patch) with leather, boot protectors, +hoop iron and hobnails that they were about two inches thick, and the +boots weighed over five pounds. (If you don't believe me go into the +Melbourne Museum, where, in a glass case in a place of honour, you +will see a similar, perhaps the same, pair of bluchers labelled "An +example of colonial industry.") And in the core of the swag was a +sugar-bag tied tightly with a whip-lash, and containing another old +skirt, rolled very tight and fastened with many turns of a length of +clothes-line, which last, I suppose, he carried to hang himself with +if he felt that way. The skirt was rolled round a small packet of old +portraits and almost indecipherable letters--one from a woman who had +evidently been a sensible woman and a widow, and who stated in the +letter that she did not intend to get married again as she had enough +to do already, slavin' her finger-nails off to keep a family, without +having a second husband to keep. And her answer was "final for good +and all," and it wasn't no use comin' "bungfoodlin'" round her +again. If he did she'd set Satan on to him. "Satan" was a dog, I +suppose. + +The letter was addressed to "Dear Bill," as were others. There were +no envelopes. The letters were addressed from no place in particular, +so there weren't any means of identifying the dead man. The police +buried him under a gum, and a young trooper cut on the tree the words: + +SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF + BILL +WHO DIED. + + + + +"BUCKOLTS' GATE" + +PROLOGUE + +Old Abel Albury had a genius for getting the bull by the tail with a +tight grip, and holding on with both hands and an obstinacy born of +ignorance--and not necessarily for the sake of self-preservation or +selfishness--while all the time the bull might be, so to speak, +rooting up life-long friendships and neighbourly relations, and +upsetting domestic customs and traditions with his horns. + +Yes, Uncle Abel was always grasping the wrong end of things, and +sticking to it with that human mulishness which is often stronger, and +more often wearies and breaks down the opposition than an intelligent +man's arguments. He was---or professed to be, the family said--unable +for a long time to distinguish between his two grand-nephews, one of +whom was short and fat, while the other was tall and thin, the only +points of resemblance between them being that each possessed the old +family nose and eyes. When they were boys he used to lay the strap +about one in mistake for the other. They had a saying that Uncle Abel +saw with ten squinting eyes. + +Also, he could never-or would not, as the family said--remember names. +He referred to Mrs Porter, a thin, haggard selector's wife, as "Mrs +Stout" and he balanced matters by calling Mrs Southwick "Mrs +Porterwicket"--when he didn't address her as "Mrs What's-the- +woman's-name"--and he succeeded in deeply offending both ladies. + +Uncle Abel was Mrs Carey's uncle. + +Down at the lower end of Carey's selection at Rocky Rises, in the +extreme corner of the lower or outer paddock, were sliprails opening +into the main road, which ran down along the siding, round the foot of +a spur from ridge, and out west. These sliprails were called "The +Lower Sliprails" by the family, and it occurred to Uncle Abel to refer +to them as "Buckolts' Gate," for no other reason apparently than that +Buckolts' farm lay in that direction. The farm was about a mile +further on, on the other side of the creek, and the gate leading to it +from the main road was round the spur, out of sight of Carey's +selection. It is quite possible that Uncle Abel reasoned the thing +out for days, for of such material are some human brains. Sliprails, +or a slip-panel, is a panel of fencing of which the rails are made to +be slipped out of the mortise holes in the posts so as to give passage +to horses, vehicles and cattle. I suppose Abel called it a gate, +because he was always going to hang a proper gate there some day. The +family were unaware of his new name for the Lower Sliprails, and after +he had, on one or two occasions, informed the boys that they would +find a missing cow or horse at the Buckolts' Gate, and they had found +it calmly camped at the Lower Sliprails, and after he had made several +appointments to meet parties at Buckolts' Gate, and had been found +leaning obstinately on the fence by the Lower Sliprails with no +explanation to offer other than that he _was_ waiting at Buckolts' +Gate, they began to fear that he was becoming weak in his mind. + +ACT I + +It was New Year's Eve at Rocky Rises. There was no need for fireworks +nor bonfires, for the bush-fires were out all along the ranges to the +east, and, as night came on, lines and curves of lights--clear lights, +white lights, and, in the nearer distance, red lights and smoky +lights--marked the sidings and ridges of a western spur of the Blue +Mountain Range, and seemed suspended against a dark sky, for the stars +and the loom of the hills were hidden by smoke and drought haze. + + +There was a dance at Careys'. Old Carey was a cheerful, broad-minded +bushman, haunted at times by the memories of old days, when he was the +beau of the bush balls, and so when he built his new slab-and-bark +barn he had it properly floored with hard-wood, and the floor +well-faced "to give the young people a show when they wanted a +dance," he said. The floor had a spring in it, and bush boys and +girls often rode twenty miles and more to dance on that floor. The +girls said it was a lovely floor. + +On this occasion Carey had stacked his wheat outside until after the +New Year. Spring-carts, and men and girls on horseback came in from +miles round. "Sperm" candles had been cut up and thrown on the +floor during the afternoon, and rubbed over by feet cased tightly in +'lastic-sides; and hoops were hung horizontally from the tie-beams, +with candles stuck round them. There were fresh-faced girls, and +sweet, freckled-faced girls, and jolly girls, and shy girls--all sorts +of girls except sulky, "toney" girls--and lanky chaps, most of them +sawney, and weird, whiskered agriculturists, who watched the dancers +with old, old time-worn smiles, or stood, or sat on their heels +yarning, with their pipes, outside, where two boilers were slung over +a log-fire to boil water for tea; and there were leathery women, with +complexions like dried apples, who gossiped--for the first time in +months perhaps--and watched the young people, and thought at times, no +doubt, of other days--of other days when they were girls. (And not so +far distant either, in some cases, for women dry quickly in the bush.) + + +And there were one or two old soldiers and their wives, whose eyes +glistened when Jim Bullock played "The Girl I Left Behind Me." + +Jim Bullock was there with his concertina. He sat on a stool in front +of a bench, on which was a beer-keg, piles of teacups and saucers, +several big tin teapots, and plates of sandwiches, sponge-cakes, and +tarts. Jim sat in his shirt-sleeves, with his flat-brimmed, +wire-bound, "hard-hitter" hat on, slanting over his weaker eye. He +held one leg loosely and the other rigid, with the concertina on his +knee, and swanked away at the instrument by the hour, staring straight +in front of him with the expression of a cod-fish, and never moving a +muscle except the muscles of his great hairy arms and big chapped and +sun-blotched hands; while chaps in tight "larstins" (elastic-side +boots), slop suits of black, bound with braid, and with coats too +short in the neck and arms, and trousers bell-mouthed at the bottoms, +and some with paper collars, narrow red ribbon ties, or scarfs through +walnut shells, held their partners rigidly, and went round the room +with their eyes--most of them--cocked at the rafters in semi-idiotic +ecstasy. + +But there was tall, graceful, pink-and-white Bertha Buckolt, blue-eyed +and blue-black-haired, and little Mary Carey with the kind, grey eyes +and red-gold hair; there was Mary's wild brother Jim, with curly black +hair and blue eyes and dimples of innocence; and there was Harry Dale, +the drover, Jim's shearing and droving mate, a tall, good-looking, +brown-eyed and brown-haired young fellow, a "better-class" bushman +and the best dancer in the district. Uncle Abel usurped the position +of M.C., and roared "Now then! take yer partners!" and bawled +instructions and interrupted and tangled up the dancers, until they +got used to taking no notice of his bull voice. Mary Carey was too +shy--because she loved him, and secretly and fondly hoped and doubted +that he cared for her--to be seen dancing more than once with Harry +Dale, so he shared Bertha Buckolt, the best girl dancer there, with +Jim Carey, who danced with his sister when Harry was dancing with +Bertha Buckolt, and who seemed, for some reason best known to himself, +to be perfectly satisfied with the arrangement. Poor little Mary +began to fret presently, and feel a little jealous of Bertha, her old +schoolmate. She was little and couldn't dance like Bertha, and she +couldn't help noticing how well Bertha looked to-night, and what a +well-matched pair she and Harry made; and so, when twelve o'clock came +and they all went outside to watch the Old Year out and the New Year +in--with a big bonfire on the distant ridge where the grass fires had +reached a stretch of dry scrub--and to join hands all round and sing +"Auld Lang Syne," little Mary was not to be found, for she was +sitting on a log round behind the cow-yard, crying softly to herself. + +And when about three o'clock they all started home, Mary gave Bertha +her cheek to kiss instead of her mouth, and that hurt Bertha, who had +_her_ cry riding home, to the astonishment and irritation of her +brother Jack, who rode home with her. But when they were all gone +Mary was missing again and when her mother called her, and, after a +pause, the voice of Harry Dale said, respectfully, in the darkness, +"She's here, Mrs Carey, she's all right," the two were discovered +sitting on a convenient log of the wood-heap, with an awkward and +overacted interval of log between them. + +Old Carey liked Harry Dale, and seemed very well satisfied with the +way things appeared to be going. He pressed Harry to stay at the +selection overnight. "The missus will make you a shake-down on the +floor," he said. Harry had no appointments, and stayed cheerfully, +and old Carey, having had a whisky or two, insisted on Mary making the +shake-down, and the old folks winked at each other behind the young +folks' backs to see how poor little Mary spread a spare mattress, with +redhot, averted face, and found an extra pillow and a spare pair of +ironed sheets for the shake-down. + +At sunrise she stole out to milk the cows, which was her regular duty; +there was no other way out from her room than through the dining-room, +where Harry lay on his back, with his arms folded, resting peacefully. +He seemed sound asleep and safe for a good two hours, so she ventured. +As she passed out she paused a moment looking down on him with all the +lovelight in her eyes, and, obeying a sudden impulse, she stooped +softly and touched his forehead with her lips, then she slipped out. +Harry stretched, opened his eyes, winked solemnly at the ceiling, and +then, after a decent interval, he got up, dressed, and went out to +help her to milk. + + + +Harry Dale and Jim Carey were going out to take charge of a mob of +bullocks going north-west, away up in Queensland. And as they had +lost a day and night to be at the dance, they decided to start in the +cool of the evening and travel all night. Mary walked from the +homestead to the Lower Sliprails between her brother, who +rode--because he was her brother--and led a packhorse on the other +side, and Harry, who walked and led his horse--because he was her +sweetheart, avowed only since last night. + +There were thunderstorms about, and Mary had repented sufficiently +with regard to Bertha Buckolt to wear on her shoulders a cape which +Bertha had left behind her last night. + +When they reached the Lower Sliprails Jim said he'd go on and that +Harry needn't hurry: he stooped over his horse's neck, kissed his +sister, promised to keep away from the drink, not to touch a card, +and to leave off fighting, and rode on. And when he rounded the Spur +he saw a tall, graceful figure slipping through the trees from the +creek towards Buckolts' Gate. + +Then came the critical time at the Lower Sliprails. The shadows from +the setting sun lengthened quickly on the siding, and then the sun +slipped out of sight over a "saddle" in the ridges, and all was soon +dusk save the sunlit peaks of the Blue Mountains away to the east over +the sweeps of blue-grey bush. + +"Ah, well! Mary," said Harry, "I must make a start now." + +"You'll--you'll look after Jim, won't you, Harry?" said Mary. + +"I will, Mary, for your sake." + +Her mouth began to twitch, her chin to tremble, and her eyes brimmed +suddenly. + +"You must cheer up, Mary," he said with her in his arms. "I'll be +back before you know where you are, and then we'll be married right +off at once and settle down for life." + +She smiled bravely. + +"Good-bye, Mary!" + +"Good-bye, Harry!" + +He led his horse through the rails and lifted them, with trembling +hands, and shot them home. Another kiss across the top rail and he +got on his horse. She mounted the lower rail, and he brought his +horse close alongside the fence and stooped to kiss her again. + +"Cheer up, Mary!" he said. "I'll tell you what I'll do--when I come +back I'll whistle when I reach the Spur and you be here to let the +sliprails down for me. I'll time myself to get here about sundown. +I'll whistle `Willie Riley,' so you'll know it's me. Good-bye, little +girl! I must go now. Don't fret--the time will soon go by." + +He turned, swung his horse, and rode slowly down the track, turning +now and again to wave his hand to her, with a farewell flourish of his +hat as he rounded the Spur. His track, five hundred miles, or perhaps +a thousand, into the great north-west; his time, six months, or +perhaps a year. Hers a hundred yards or so back to the dusty, dreary +drudgery of selection life. The daylight faded into starlight, the +sidings grew very dim, and a faint white figure blurred against the +bars of the slip-panel. + + +ACT II + + +It was the last day of the threshing--shortly after New Year--at Rocky +Rises. The green boughs, which had been lashed to the veranda-posts +on Christmas Eve, had withered and been used for firewood. The +travelling steamer had gone with its gang of men, and the family sat +down to tea, the men tired with hard work and heat, and with prickly +heat and irritating wheaten chaff and dust under their clothes--and +with smut (for the crop had been a smutty one) "up their brains" as +Uncle Abel said--the women worn out with cooking for a big gang of +shearers. + +Good-humoured Aunt Emma--who was Uncle Abel's niece +--recovered first, and started the conversation. There were one or two +neighbours' wives who bad lent crockery and had come over to help with +the cooking in their turns. Jim Carey's name came up incidentally, but +was quickly dropped, for ill reports of Jim had come home. Then Aunt +Emma mentioned Harry Dale, and glanced meaningly at Mary, whose face +flamed as she bent over her plate. + +"Never mind, Mary," said Aunt Emma, "it's nothing to be ashamed of. +We were all girls once. There's many a girl would jump at Harry." + +"Who says I'm ashamed?" said Mary, straightening up indignantly. + +"Don't tease her, Emma," said Mrs Carey, mildly. + +"I'll tell yer what," said young Tom Carey, frankly, "Mary got a +letter from him to-day. I seen her reading it behind the house." + +Mary's face flamed again and went down over her plate. + + +"Mary," said her mother, with sudden interest, "did Harry say anything +of Jim?" + +"No, mother," said Mary. "And that's why I didn't tell you +about the letter." + +There was a pause. Then Tommy said, with that delightful tact which +usually characterizes young Tommies: + +"Well, Mary needn't be so cocky about Harry Dale, anyhow. I seen him +New Year's Eve when we had the dance. I seen him after the dance +liftin' Bertha Buckolt onter her horse in the dark--as if she couldn't +get on herself--she's big enough. I seen him lift her on, an' he took +her right up an' lifted her right inter the saddle, 'stead of holdin' +his hand for her to tread on like that new-chum jackaroo we had. An', +what's more, I seen him hug her an' give her a kiss before he lifted +her on. He told her he was as good as her brother." + +"What did he mean by that, Tommy?" asked Mrs Porter, to break an +awkward pause. + +"How'm I ter know what he means?" said Tommy, politely. + +"And, Tommy, I seen Harry Dale give young Tommy Carey a lick with a +strap the day before New Year's Eve for throwing his sister's cat into +the dam," said Aunt Emma, coming to poor Mary's rescue. "Never +mind, Mary, my dear, he said goodbye to you last." + +"No, _he didn't_!" roared Uncle Abel. + +They were used to Uncle Abel's sudden bellowing, but it startled them +this time. + +"Why, Uncle Abel," cried both Aunt Emma and Mrs Carey, "whatever do +you mean?" + +"What I means is that I ain't a-goin' to have the feelin's of a niece +of mine trifled with. What I means is that I seen Harry Dale with +Bertha Buckolt on New Year's night after he left here. That's what I +means--" + +"Don't speak so loud, Abel, we're not deaf," interrupted Carey, as +Mary started up white-faced. "What do you want to always shout +for?" + +"I speak loud because I want people to hear me!" roared Uncle Abel, +turning on him. + +"Go on, Uncle Abel," said Mary, "tell me what you mean." + +"I mean," said Uncle Abel, lowering his voice a little, "that I +seen Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts' Gate that night--I +seen it all--" + +"At _Buckolts_' Gate!" cried Mary. + +"_Yes_! at Buckolts' Gate! Ain't I speakin' loud enough?" + +"And where were you?" + +"Never mind wheers I was. I was comin' home along the ridges, and +I seen them. I seen them say good-bye; I seen them hug an' kiss--" + +"Uncle Abel!" exclaimed Aunt Emma. + +"It's no use Uncle Abelin' me. What I sez I sez. I ain't a-goin' to +have a niece of mine bungfoodled--" + +"Uncle Abel," cried Mary, staring at him wild-eyed, "do be careful +what you say. You must have made a mistake. Are you sure it was +Bertha and Harry?" + +"Am I sure my head's on me neck?" roared Uncle Abel. "Would I see +'em if I didn't see 'em? I tell you--" + +"Now wait a moment, Uncle Abel," interrupted Mary, with dangerous +calmness. "Listen to me. Harry Dale and I are engaged to be +married, and--" + +"Have you got the writings!" shouted Uncle Abel. + +"The what?" said Mary. + +"The writings." + +"No, of course not." + +"Then that's where you are," said Uncle Abel, triumphantly. "If +you had the writings you could sue him for breach of contract." + +Uncle Abel, who couldn't read, had no faith whatever in verbal +agreements (he wouldn't sign one, he said), all others he referred +to as "writings." + +"Now, listen to me, Uncle Abel," said Mary, trembling now. "Are you +sure you saw Harry Dale and Bertha Buckolt at Buckolts' Gate after he +left here that night?" + +"Yes. An' what's more, I seen young Tommy there ridin' on his pony +along by the Spur a little while after, an' he muster seen them too, +if he's got a tongue." + +Mary turned quickly to her brother. + +"Well, all I can say," said Tommy, quietened now, "is that I seen +_her_ at Buckolts' Gate that night. I was comin' home from +Two-Mile Flat, and I met Jim with his packhorse about a mile the other +side of Buckolts', and while we was talkin' Harry Dale caught up, so I +jist said 'So-long' an' left 'em. And when I got to Buckolt's Gate I +seen Bertha Buckolt. She was standin' under a tree, and she looked as +if she was cryin"' + +But Mary got her bonnet and started out. + +"Where are you going to, Mary?" asked her mother, starting up +nervously. + +"I'm going across to Buckolts' to find out the truth," said Mary, +and she went out. + +"Better let her go, Lizzie," said Aunt Emma, detaining her sister. + +"You've done it now, Uncle Abel." + +"Well, why didn't she get the writings?" retorted Uncle Abel. + +Half-way to Buckolts' Mary met Bertha Buckolt herself, coming over to +the selection for the first time since the night of the party. Bertha +started forward to kiss Mary, but stopped short as Mary stood +stock-still and faced her, with her hands behind her back. + +"Why! whatever is the matter, Mary?" exclaimed Bertha. + +"You know very well, Bertha." + +"Why! Whatever do you mean? What have I done?" + +"What haven't you done? You've--you've broken my heart." + +"Good gracious me! Whatever are you talking about? Tell me what it +is, Mary?" + +"You met him at your gate that night?" + +"I know I did." + +"Oh, Bertha! How could you be so mean and deceitful?" + +"Mean and deceitful! What do you mean by that? Whatever are you +talking about? I suppose I've got as good a right to meet him as +anyone else." + +"No, you haven't," retorted Mary, "you're only stringing him on. +You only did it to spite me. You helped him to deceive me. +You ought to be ashamed to look me in the face." + +"Good gracious! Whatever are you talking about? Ain't I good enough +for him! I ought to be, God knows! I suppose he can marry who he +likes, and if I'm poor fool enough to love him and marry him, what +then? Mary, you ought to be the last to speak--speak to--to me like +that." + +"Yes. He can marry all, the girls in the country for all I care. +I never want to see either him or you any more. You're a cruel, +deceitful, brazen-faced hussy, and he's a heartless, deceiving +blackguard." + +"Mary! I believe you're mad," said Bertha, firmly. "How dare you +speak to me like that! And as for him being a blackguard. Why, you +ought to be the last in the world to say such a thing; you ought to be +the last to say a word against him. Why, I don't believe you ever +cared a rap for him in spite of all your pretence. He could go to the +devil for all you cared." + +"That's enough, Bertha Buckolt!" cried Mary. "_You_--you! +Why, you're a barefaced girl, that's what you are! I don't want to +see your brazen face again." With that she turned and stumbled +blindly in the direction of home. + +"Send back my cape," cried Bertha as she too turned away. + +Mary walked wildly home and fled to her room and locked the door. +Bertha did likewise. + +Mary let Aunt Emma in after a while, ceased sobbing and allowed +herself to be comforted a little. Next morning she was out milking at +the usual time, but there were dark hollows under her eyes, and her +little face was white and set. After breakfast she rolled the cape up +very tight in a brown-paper parcel, addressed it severely to + +MISS BERTHA BUCKOLT, + +Eurunderee Creek, + +and sent it home by one of the school-children. She wrote to Harry +Dale and told him that she knew all about it (not stating what), but +she forgave him and hoped he'd be happy. She never wanted to see his +face again, and enclosed his portrait. + +Harry, who was as true and straight as a bushman could be, puzzled it +out and decided that some one of his old love affairs must have come +to Mary's ears, and wrote demanding an explanation. + +She never answered that letter. + + +ACT III + +It was Christmas Day at Rocky Rises. The plum puddings had been made, +as usual, weeks beforehand, and hung in rags to the tie-beams and +taken down and boiled again. Poultry had been killed and plucked and +cooked, and all the toil had been gone through, and every preparation +made for a red-hot dinner on a blazing hot day--and for no other +reason than that our great-grandmothers used to do it in a cold +climate at Christmas-times that came in mid-winter. Merry men hadn't +gone forth to the wood to gather in the mistletoe (if they ever did in +England, in the olden days, instead of sending shivering, wretched +vassals in rags to do it); but Uncle Abel had gone gloomily up the +ridge on Christmas Eve, with an axe on his shoulder (and Tommy +unwillingly in tow, scowling and making faces behind his back), and +had cut young pines and dragged them home and lashed them firmly to +the veranda-posts, which was the custom out there. + +There was little goodwill or peace between the three or four farms +round Rocky Rises that Christmas Day, and Uncle Abel had been the +cause of most of the ill-feeling, though they didn't know, and he was +least aware of it of any. + +It all came about in this way. + +Shortly after last New Year Ryan's bull had broken loose and gone +astray for two days and nights, breaking into neighbours' paddocks and +filling himself with hay and damaging other bulls, and making love by +night and hiding in the scrub all day. On the second night he broke +through and jumped over Reid's fences, and destroyed about an acre of +grape-vines and adulterated Reid's stock, besides interfering with +certain heifers which were not of a marriageable age. There was a L5 +penalty on a stray bull. Reid impounded the bull and claimed heavy +damages. Ryan, a small selector of little account, was always pulling +some neighbour to court when he wasn't being "pulled" himself, so he +went to court over this case. + +Now, it appears that the bull, on his holiday, had spent a part of the +first night in Carey's lower paddock, and Uncle Abel (who was out +mooching about the bush at all hours, "havin' a look at some timber" +or some "indercations" [of gold], or on some mysterious business or +fad, the mystery of which was of his own making)--Uncle Abel saw the +bull in the paddock at daylight and turned it out the sliprails, and +talked about it afterwards, referring to the sliprails as "Buckolts' +Gate," of course, and spoke mysteriously of the case, and put on an +appearance of great importance, and allowed people to get an idea that +he knew a lot if he only liked to speak; and finally he got himself +"brought up" as a witness for Ryan. + +He had a lot of beer in town before he went to the courthouse. All he +knew would have been of no use to either party, but he swore that he +had seen Ryan's bull inside Buckolts' Gate at daylight (on the day +which wasn't in question) and had turned him out. Uncle Abel mixed up +the court a good deal, and roared like the bull, and became more +obstinate the more he was cross-examined, and narrowly escaped being +committed for contempt of court. + +Ryan, who had a high opinion of the breed of his bull, got an idea +that the Buckolts had enticed or driven the bull into their paddock +for stock-raising purposes, instead of borrowing it honestly or +offering to pay for the use of it. Then Ryan wanted to know why Abel +had driven his bull out of Buckolts' Gate, and the Buckolts wanted to +know what business Abel Albury had to drive Ryan's bull out of their +paddock, if the bull had really ever been there. And so it went on +till Rocky Rises was ripe for a tragedy. + +The breach between the Careys and the Buckolts was widened, the +quarrel between Ryan and Reid intensified. Ryan got a down on the +Careys because he reckoned that Uncle Abel had deliberately spoilt his +case with his evidence; and the Reids and Careys were no longer on +speaking terms, because nothing would convince old Reid that Abel +hadn't tried to prove that Ryan's bull had never been in Reid's +paddock at all. + + +Well, it was Christmas Day, and the Carey family and Aunt Emma sat +down to dinner. Jim was present, having arrived overnight, with no +money, as usual, and suffering a recovery. The elder brother, Bob +(who had a selection up-country), and his wife were there. Mrs Carey +moved round with watchful eyes and jealous ears, lest there should be +a word or a look which might hurt the feelings of her wild son--for of +such are mothers. + + +Dinner went on very moodily, in spite of Aunt Emma, until at last Jim +spoke--almost for the first time, save for a long-whispered and, on his +part, repentant conversation with his mother. + +"Look here, Mary!" said Jim. "What did you throw Harry Dale over +for?" + +"Don't ask me, Jim." + +"Rot! What did he do to you? I'm your brother" (with a glance +at Bob), "and I ought to know." + +"Well, then, ask Bertha Buckolt. She saw him last." + +"What!" cried Jim. + +"Hold your tongue, Jim! You'll make her cry," said Aunt Emma. + +"Well, what's it all about, anyway?" demanded Jim. "All I know is +that Mary wrote to Harry and threw him over, and he ain't been the +same man since. He swears he'll never come near the district again." + +"Tell Jim, Aunt Emma," said Mary. And Aunt Emma started to tell the +story as far as she knew. + +"Saw her at Buckolt's sliprails!" cried Jim, starting up. "Well, +he couldn't have had time to more than say good-bye to her, for I was +with her there myself, and Harry caught up to me within a mile of the +gate--and I rode pretty fast." + +"He had a jolly long good-bye with her," shouted Uncle Abel. +"Look here, Jim! I ain't goin' to stand by and see a nephew of mine +bungfoodled by no girl; an', I tell you I seen 'em huggin' and kissin' +and canoodlin' for half an hour at Buckolts' Gate!" + +"It's a--a-- Look here, Uncle Abel, be careful what you say. You've +got the bull by the tail again, that's what it is!" Jim's face grew +whiter--and it had been white enough on account of the drink. "How +did you know it was them? You're always mistaking people. It might +have been someone else." + +"I know Harry Dale on horseback two miles off!" roared Uncle Abel. +"And I knowed her by her cape." + +It was Mary's turn to gasp and stare at Uncle Abel. + +"Uncle Abel," she managed to say, "Uncle Abel! Wasn't it at our +Lower Sliprails you saw them and not Buckolts' Gate?" + +"Well!" bellowed Uncle Abel. "You might call 'em the `Lower +Sliprails,' but I calls 'em Buckolts' Gate! They lead to'r'ds +Buckolts', don't they? Hey? Them other sliprails"--jerking his arms +in the direction of the upper paddock "them theer other sliprails +that leads outer Reid's lane I calls Reid's Sliprails. I don't know +nothing about no upper or lower, or easter or wester, or any other +la-di-dah names you like to call 'em." + +"Oh, uncle," cried Mary, trembling like a leaf, "why didn't you +explain this before? Why didn't you tell us?" + +"What cause have I got to tell any of you everything I sez or does or +thinks? It 'ud take me all me time. Ain't you got any more brains +than Ryan's bull, any of you? Hey!--You've got heads, but so has +cabbages. Explain! Why, if the world wasn't stuffed so full of +jumped-up fools there'd be never no need for explainin'." + +Mary left the table. + +"What is it, Mary?" cried Aunt Emma. + +"I'm going across to Bertha," said Mary, putting on her hat with +trembling hands. "It was me Uncle Abel saw. I had Bertha's cape on +that night." + +"Oh, Uncle Abel," cried Aunt Emma, "whatever have you done?" + +"Well," said Uncle Abel, "why didn't she get the writin's as I told +her? It's to be hoped she won't make such a fool of herself next +time." + + +Half an hour later, or thereabouts, Mary sat on Bertha Buckolt's bed, +with Bertha beside her and Bertha's arm round her, and they were +crying and laughing by turns. + +"But-but-why didn't you _tell_ me it was Jim?" said +Mary. + +"Why didn't you tell me it was Harry, Mary?" asked Bertha. "It +would have saved all this year of misery. + +"I didn't see Harry Dale at all that night," said Bertha. "I was--I +was crying when Jim left me, and when Harry came along I slipped +behind a tree until he was past. And now, look here, Mary, I can't +marry Jim until he steadies down, but I'll give him another chance. +But, Mary, I'd sooner lose him than you." + +Bertha walked home with Mary, and during the afternoon she took +Jim aside and said: + +"Look here, Jim, I'll give you another chance--for a year. Now I +want you to ride into town and send a telegram to Harry Dale. How +long would it take him to get here?" + +"He couldn't get here before New Year," said Jim. + +"That will do," said Bertha, and Jim went to catch his horse. +Next day Harry's reply came: "Coming" + + +ACT IV + +New Year's Eve. The dance was at Buckolts' this year, but Bertha +didn't dance much; she was down by the gate most of the time with +little Mary Carey, waiting, and watching the long, white road, and +listening for horses' feet, and disappointed often as other horsemen +rode by or turned up to the farm. + +And in the hot sunrise that morning, within a hundred 'miles of Rocky +Rises, a tired, dusty drover camped in the edge of a scrub, boiled his +quart-pot, broiled a piece of mutton on the coals, and lay down on the +sand to rest an hour or so before pushing on to a cattle station he +knew to try and borrow fresh horses. He had ridden all night. + +Old Buckolt and Carey and Reid smoked socially under the grape-vines, +with bottles of whisky and glasses, and nudged each other and coughed +when they wanted to laugh at Old Abel Albury, who was, for about the +first time in his life, condescending to explain. He was explaining +to them what thund'rin' fools they had been. + +Later on they sent a boy on horseback with a bottle of whisky and a +message to Ryan, who turned up in time to see the New Year in with +them and contradict certain slanders concerning the breed of his bull. + + +Meanwhile Bertha comforted Mary, and at last persuaded her to go home. +"He's sure to be here to-morrow, Mary," she said, "and you need to +look fresh and happy." + +But Mary didn't sleep that night; she was up before daylight, had the +kettle on and some chops ready to fry, and at daybreak she was down by +the sliprails again. She was turning away for the second time when +she heard a clear whistle round the Spur--then the tune of "Willie +Riley," and the hobble-chains and camp-ware on the packhorse jingling +to the tune. + +She pulled out the rails with eager, trembling hands and leaned +against the tree. An hour later a tired drover lay on his back, in +his ragged, track-worn clothes and dusty leggings, on Mary's own +little bed in the skillion off the living-room, and rested. Mary +bustled round getting breakfast ready, and singing softly to herself; +once she slipped in, bent over Harry and kissed him gently on the +lips, and ran out as he stirred. + +"Why, who's that?" exclaimed Uncle Abel, poking round early and +catching a glimpse of Harry through the open door. + + +"It's only Harry, Uncle Abel," said Mary. + +Uncle Abel peered in again to make sure. + +"Well, be sure you git the writin's this time," he said. + + + +THE BUSH-FIRE + +I + +SQUATTER AND SELECTOR + +Wall was a squatter and a hard man. There had been long years of +drought and loss, and then came the rabbit pest--the rabbits swarmed +like flies over his run, and cropped the ground bare where even the +poor grass might have saved thousands of sheep--and the rabbits cost +the squatter hundreds of pounds in "rabbit-proof" fences, trappers' +wages, etc., just to keep them down. Then came arrangements with the +bank. And then Wall's wife died. Wall started to brood over other +days, and the days that had gone between, and developed a temper which +drove his children from home one by one, till only Mary was left. She +managed the lonely home with the help of a half-caste. Then in good +seasons came the selectors. + +Men remembered Wall as a grand boss and a good fellow, but that was in +the days before rabbits and banks, and syndicates and "pastoralists" +or pastoral companies instead of good squatters. Runs were mostly +pastoral leases for which the squatter paid the Government so much per +square mile (almost a nominal rent). Selections were small holdings +taken up by farmers under residential and other conditions and paid +for by instalments. If you were not ruined by the drought, and paid +up long enough, the land became freehold. The writer is heir to a +dusty patch of three hundred acres or so in the scrub which was taken +up thirty years ago and isn't freehold yet. + + +Selectors were allowed to take up land on runs or pastoral leases as +well as on unoccupied Crown lands, and as they secured the best bits +of land, and on water frontages if they could, and as, of course, +selections reduced the area of the run, the squatters loved selectors +like elder brothers. One man is allowed to select only a certain +amount of land, and required by law to live on it, so the squatters +bought as much freehold about the homestead as they could afford, +selected as much as they are allowed to by law, and sometimes employed +"dummy" selectors to take up choice bits about the runs and hold +them for them. They fought selectors in many various ways, and, in +some cases, annoyed and persecuted them with devilish ingenuity. + +Ross was a selector, and a very hard man physically. He was a short, +nuggety man with black hair and frill beard (a little dusty), bushy +black eyebrows, piercing black eyes, horny knotted hands, and the +obstinacy or pluck of a dozen men to fight drought and the squatter. +Ross selected on Wall's run, in a bend of Sandy Creek, a nice bit of +land with a black soil, flat and red soil sidings from the ridges, +which no one had noticed before, and with the help of his boys he got +the land cleared and fenced in a year or two--taking bush contracts +about the district between whiles to make "tucker" for the family +until he got his first crop off. + +Wall was never accused of employing dummies, or underhanded methods in +dealings with selectors, but he had been through so much and had +brooded so long that he had grown very hard and bitter and suspicious, +and the reverse of generous--as many men do who start out in life too +soft and goodhearted and with too much faith in human nature. He was +a tall, dark man. He ordered Ross's boys off the run, impounded +Ross's stock--before Ross had got his fencing finished, summoned Ross +for trespass, and Ross retaliated as well as he could, until at last +it mightn't have been safe for one of those men to have met the other +with a gun. The impounding of the selector's cattle led to the last +bad quarrel between Wall and his son Billy, who was a tall, +good-natured Cornstalk, and who reckoned that Australia was big enough +for all of us. One day in the drought, and in an extra bitter mood, +Wall heard that some of his sheep had been dogged in the vicinity of +Ross's selection, and he ordered Billy to take a station-hand and +watch Ross's place all night, and, if Ross's cattle put their noses +over the boundary, to drive them to the pound, fifteen miles away; +also to lay poisoned baits for the dogs all round the selection. And +Billy flatly refused. + +"I know Ross and the boys," he said, "and I don't believe they +dogged the sheep. Why, they've only got a Newfoundland pup, and an +old lame, one-eyed sheep-dog that couldn't hurt a flea. Now, father, +this sort of thing has been going on long enough. What difference +does a few paltry acres make to us? The country is big enough, God +knows! Ross is a straight man and--for God's sake, give the man a +chance to get his ground fenced in; he's doing it as fast as he can, +and he can't watch his cattle day and night." + +"Are you going to do as I tell you, or are you not?" shouted Wall. + +"Well, if it comes to that, I'm not," said Billy. "I'm not +going to sneak round a place all night and watch for a chance to pound +a poor man's cows." + +It was an awful row, down behind the wool-shed, and things looked so +bad that old Peter, the station-hand, who was a witness, took off his +coat and rolled up his sleeves, ready, as he said afterwards, "to +roll into" either the father or the son if one raised a hand against +the other. + +"Father!" said Billy, though rather sobered by the sight of his +father's trembling, choking passion, "do you call yourself an +Englishman?" + +"Yes!" yelled Wall, furiously. "What the hell do you call +yourself?" + +"If it comes to that I'm an Australian," said Billy, and he turned +away and went to catch his horse. He went up-country and knocked +about in the north-west for a year or two. + + +II + +ROMEO AND JULIET + +Mary Wall was twenty-five. She was an Australian bush girl, every +inch of her five-foot-nine; she had a pink-and-white complexion, dark +blue eyes, blue-black hair, and "the finest figure in the district," +on horseback or afoot. She was the best girlrider too (saddle or +bare-back), and they say that when she was a tomboy she used to tuck +her petticoats under her and gallop man-fashion through the scrub +after horses or cattle. She said she was going to be an old maid. + +There came a jackaroo on a visit to the station. He was related to +the bank with which Wall had relations. He was a dude, with an +expensive education and no brains. He was very vain of his education +and prospects. He regarded Mary with undisguised admiration, and her +father had secret hopes. One evening the jackaroo was down by the +homestead-gate when Mary came cantering home on her tall chestnut. +The gate was six feet or more, and the jackaroo raised his hat and +hastened to open it, but Mary reined her horse back a few yards and +the "dood" had barely time to jump aside when there was a scuffle of +hoofs on the road, a "Ha-ha-ha!" in mid-air, a landing thud, and the +girl was away up the home-track in a cloud of dust. + +A few days later the jackaroo happened to be at Kelly's, a wayside +shanty, watching a fight between two bushmen, when Mary rode up. She +knew the men. She whipped her horse in between them and struck at +first one and then the other with her riding-whip. + +"You ought to be ashamed of yourselves!" she said; "and both married +men, too!" + +It evidently struck them that way, for after a bit they shook hands +and went home. + +"And I wouldn't have married that girl for a thousand pounds," said +the jackaroo, relating the incidents to some friends in Sydney. + +Mary said she wanted a man, if she could get one. + + +There was no life at home nowadays, so Mary went to all the bush +dances in the district. She thought nothing of riding twenty or +thirty miles to a dance, dancing all night, and riding home again next +morning. At one of these dances she met young Robert Ross, a +clean-limbed, good-looking young fellow about her own age. She danced +with him and liked him, and danced with him again, and he rode part of +the way home with her. The subject of the quarrel between the two +homes came up gradually. + +"The boss," said Robert, meaning his father, "the boss is always +ready to let bygones be bygones. It's a pity it couldn't be fixed +up." + +"Yes," said Mary, looking at him (Bob looked very well on +horseback), "it is a pity." + +They met several times, and next Prince of Wales's birthday they rode +home from the races together. Both had good horses, and they happened +to be far ahead of the others on the wide, straight clear road that +ran between the walls of the scrub. Along, about dusk, they became +very confidential indeed--Mary had remarked what a sad and beautiful +sunset it was. The horses got confidential, too, and shouldered +together, and touched noses, and, after a long interval in the +conversation, during which Robert, for one, began to breathe quickly, +he suddenly leaned over, put his arm round her waist and made to kiss +her. She jerked her body away, threw up her whiphand, and Robert +ducked instinctively; but she brought her whip down on her horse's +flank instead, and raced ahead. Robert followed--or, rather, his +horse did: he thought it was a race, and took the bit in his teeth. +Robert kept calling, appealing: + +"Wait a while, Mary! I want to explain! I want to apologize! For +God's sake listen to me, Mary!" + +But Mary didn't hear him. Perhaps she misunderstood the reason of the +chase and gave him credit for a spice of the devil in his nature. But +Robert grew really desperate; he felt that the thing must be fixed up +now or never, and gave his horse a free rein. Her horse was the +fastest, and Robert galloped in the dust from his heels for about a +mile and a half; then at the foot of a rise Mary's horse stumbled and +nearly threw her over his head, and then he stopped like the good +horse he was. + +Robert got down feeling instinctively that he might best make his +peace on foot, and approached Mary with a face of misery--she had +dropped her whip. + +"Oh, Bob!" she said, "I'm knocked out;" and she slipped down into +his arms and stayed there a while. + +They sat on a log and rested, while their horses made inquiries of +each other's noses, and compared notes. + +And after a good while Mary said "No, Bob, it's no use talking of +marrying just yet. I like you, Bob, but I could never marry you while +things are as they are between your father and mine. Now, that'll do. +Let me get on my horse, Bob. I'll be safer there." + +"Why?" asked Bob. + + +"Come on, Bob, and don't be stupid." + +She met him often and "liked" him. + + +III + +A TRAMP'S MATCH AND WHAT IT DID + +It was Christmas Eve at Wall's, but there was no score or so of +buggies and horses and dozens of strange dogs round the place as of +old. The glasses and decanters were dusty on the heavy old-fashioned +sideboard in the dining-room; and there was only a sullen, brooding +man leaning over the hurdles and looking at his rams in the yard, and +a sullen, brooding half-caste at work in the kitchen. Mary had ridden +away that morning to visit a girl chum. + +It was towards the end of a long drought, and the country was like +tinder for hundreds of miles round--the ground for miles and miles in +the broiling scrubs "as bare as your hand," or covered with coarse, +dry tufts. There was feed grass in places, but you had to look close +to see it. + +Shearing had finished the day before, but there was a black boy and a +station-hand or two about the yards and six or eight shearers and +rouseabouts, and a teamster camped in the men's huts--they were +staying over the holidays to shear stragglers and clean up generally. +Old Peter and a jackaroo were out on the run watching a bush-fire +across Sandy Creek. + +A swagman had happened to call at the station that morning; he asked +for work and then for tucker. He irritated Wall, who told him to +clear out. It was the first time that a swagman had been turned away +from the station without tucker. + +Swaggy went along the track some miles, brooding over his wrongs, and +crossed Sandy Creek. He struck a match and dropped it into a +convenient tuft of grass in a likely patch of tufts, with dead grass +running from it up into the scrubby ridges--then he hurried on. + + +Did you ever see a bush-fire? Not sheets of flame sweeping and +roaring from tree-top to tree-top, but the snaky, hissing grass-fire +of hardwood country. + +The whole country covered with thin blue smoke so that you never know +in what direction the fire is travelling. At night you see it like +the lighted streets of cities, in the distant ranges. It roars up the +hollows of dead trees and gives them the appearance of factory +chimneys in the dusk. It climbs, by shreds of bark, the trunks of old +dead white-box and blue-gums--solid and hard as cast-iron--and cuts +off the limbs. And where there's a piece of recently ringbarked +country, with the dead leaves still on the trees, the fire will roar +from bough to bough--a fair imitation of a softwood forest fire. The +bush-fire travels through the scrubs for hundreds of miles, taking the +grass to the roots, scorching the living bush but leaving it +alive--for gumbush is hardest of any to kill. Where there is no +undergrowth, and the country seems bare as a road for miles, the fire +will cross, licking up invisible straws of grass, dusty leaves, twigs +and shreds of bark on the hard ground already baking in the drought. +You hear of a fire miles away, and next day, riding across the head of +a gully, you hear a hissing and crackling and there is the fire +running over the ground in lines and curves of thin blue smoke, +snakelike, with old logs blazing on the blackened ground behind. Did +you ever _hear_ a fire where a fire should not be? There is +something hellish in the sound of it. When the breeze is, say, from +the east the fire runs round western spurs, up sheltered +gullies--helped by an "eddy" in the wind perhaps--and appears along +the top of the ridge, ready, with a change in the wind, to come down +on farms and fields of ripe wheat, with a "front" miles long. + +A selector might be protected by a wide sandy creek in front and wide +cleared roads behind, and, any hour in the day or night, a shout from +the farther end of the wheat paddock, and--"Oh, my God! the wheat!" + +Wall didn't mind this fire much; most of his sheep were on their way +out back, to a back run where there was young grass; and the dry +ridges along the creek would be better for a burning-off--only he had +to watch his fences. + +But, about dusk, Mary came galloping home in her usual breakneck +fashion. + +"Father," she cried, "turn out the men and send them at once. The +fire is all down by Ross's farm, and he has ten acres of wheat +standing, and no one at home but him and Bob." + +"How do you know?" growled Wall. Then suddenly and suspiciously, +"Have you been there?" + +"I came home that way." + +"Well--let Ross look after his own," snarled the father. + +"But he can't, father. They're fighting the fire now, and they'll be +burnt out before the morning if they don't get help--for God's sake, +father, act like a Christian and send the men. Remember it is +Christmas-time, father. You're surely not going to see a neighbour +burnt out." + +"Yes, I am," shouted Wall. "I'd like to see every selector in the +country burnt out, hut and all! Get off that horse and go inside. If +a man leaves the station to-night he needn't come back." (This last +for the benefit of the men's hut.) + +"But, father--" + +"Get off that horse and go inside," roared Wall. + +"I--I won't." + +"What!" He darted forward as though to drag her from the saddle, +but she swung her horse away. + +"Stop! Where are you going?" + +"To help Ross," said Mary. "He had no one to send for help." + +"Then go the same way as your brother!" roared her father; "and +if you show your nose back again I'll horse-whip you off the run!" + +"I'll go, father," said Mary, and she was away. + + +IV + +THE FIRE AT ROSS'S FARM + +Ross's farm was in a corner between the ridges and the creek. The +fire had come down from the creek, but the siding on that side was +fairly clear, and they had stopped the fire there. It went behind the +ridge and ran up and over. The ridge was covered thickly with scrub +and dead grass; the wheat-field went well up the siding, and along the +top was a bush face with only a narrow bridle-track between it and the +long dead grass. Everything depended on the wind. Mary saw Ross and +Mrs Ross and the daughter Jenny, well up the siding above the fence, +working desperately, running to and fro, and beating out the fire with +green boughs. Mary left her horse, ran into the hut, and looked +hurriedly round for something to wear in place of her riding-skirt. +She only saw a couple of light print dresses. She stepped into a +skillion room, which happened to be Bob's room, and there caught sight +of a pair of trousers and a coat hanging on the wall. + +Bob Ross, beating desperately along a line of fire that curved +down-hill to his right, and half-choked and blinded with the smoke, +almost stumbled against a figure which was too tall to be his father. + +"Why! who's that?" he gasped. + +"It's only me, Bob," said Mary, and she lifted her bough again. + +Bob stared. He was so astonished that he almost forgot the fire +and the wheat. Bob was not thin--but-- + +"Don't look at me, Bob!" said Mary, hurriedly. "We're going to +be married, so it doesn't matter. Let us save the wheat." + +There was no time to waste; there was a breeze now from over the +ridges, light, but enough to bear the fire down on them. Once, when +they had breathing space, Mary ran to the creek for a billy of water. +They beat out the fire all along the siding to where a rib of granite +came down over the ridge to the fence, and then they thought the wheat +was safe. They came together here, and Ross had time to look and see +who the strange man was; then he stared at Mary from under his black, +bushy eyebrows. Mary, choking and getting her breath after her +exertions, suddenly became aware, said "Oh!" and fled round the +track beyond the point of granite. She felt a gust of wind and looked +up the ridge. The bush fence ended here in a corner, where it was met +by a new wire fence running up from the creek. It was a blind gully +full of tall dead grass, and, glancing up, Mary saw the flames coming +down fast. She ran back. + +"Come on!" she cried, "come on! The fire's the other side of the +rocks!" + + +Back at the station, Wall walked up and down till he cooled. He went +inside and sat down, but it was no use. He lifted his head and saw +his dead wife's portrait on the wall. Perhaps his whole life ran +before him in detail--but this is not a psychological study. + +There were only two tracks open to him now: either to give in, or go +on as he was going--to shut himself out from human nature and become +known as "Mean Wall," "Hungry Wall," or "Mad Wall, the Squatter." +He was a tall, dark man of strong imagination and more than ordinary +intelligence. And it was the great crisis of his ruined life. +He walked to the top of a knoll near the homestead and saw the fire +on the ridges above Ross's farm. As he turned back he saw a +horseman ride up and dismount by the yard. + +"Is that you, Peter?" + +"Yes, boss. The fences is all right." + +"Been near Ross's?" + +"No. He's burnt out by this time." + +Wall walked to and fro for a few minutes longer. Then he suddenly +stopped and called, "Peter!" + +"Ay, ay!" from the direction of the huts. + +"Turn out the men!" and Wall went into a shed and came out with his +saddle on his arm. + + +The fire rushed down the blind gully. Showers of sparks fell on +the bush fence, it caught twice, and they put it out, but the third +time it blazed and roared and a fire-engine could not have stopped it. + + +"The wheat must go," said Ross. "We've done our best," and he +threw down the blackened bough and leaned against a tree, and covered +his eyes with a grimy hand. + +The wheat was patchy in that corner--there were many old stumps of +trees, and there were bare strips where the plough had gone on each +side of them. Mary saw a chance, and climbed the fence. + +"Come on, Bob," she cried, "we might save it ye. Mr Ross, pull out +the fence along there," and she indicated a point beyond the fire. +They tramped down and tore up the wheat where it ran between the +stumps--the fire was hissing and crackling round and through it, and +just as it ran past them in one place there was a shout, a clatter of +horses' hoofs on the stones, and Mary saw her father riding up the +track with a dozen men behind him. She gave a shriek and ran straight +down, through the middle of the wheat, towards the hut. + +Wall and his men jumped to the ground, wrenched green boughs from the +saplings, and, after twenty minutes' hard fighting, the crop was +saved--save for a patchy acre or so. When it was all over Ross sat +down on a log and rested his head on his hands, and his shoulders +shook. Presently he felt a hand on his shoulder, looked up, and saw +Wall. + +"Shake hands, Ross," he said. + +And it was Christmas Day. + + +But in after years they used to nearly chaff the life out of Mary. +"You were in a great hurry to put on the breeches, weren't you, +Mary?" "Bob's best Sunday-go-meetin's, too, wasn't they, Mary?" +"Rather tight fit, wasn't they, Mary?" "Couldn't get 'em on now, +could you, Mary?" + +"But," reflected old Peter apart to some cronies, "it ain't every +young chap as gits an idea of the shape of his wife afore he marries +her--is it? An' that's sayin' somethin"' + +And old Peter was set down as being an innercent sort of ole cove. + + + + +THE HOUSE THAT WAS NEVER BUILT + + +There had been heavy rain and landslips all along the branch railway +which left the Great Western Line from Sydney just beyond the Blue +Mountains, and ran through thick bush and scrubby ridgy country and +along great alluvial sidings--were the hills on the opposite side of +the wide valleys (misty in depths) faded from deep blue into the pale +azure of the sky--and over the ends of western spurs to the little +farming, mining and pastoral town of Solong, situated in a circle of +blue hills on the banks of the willow-fringed Cudgegong River. + +The line was hopelessly blocked, and some publicans at Solong had put +on the old coach-road a couple of buggies, a wagonette, and an old +mail coach--relic of the days of Cobb & Co., which had been +resurrected from some backyard and tinkered up--to bring the train +passengers on from the first break in the line over the remaining +distance of forty miles or so. Capertee Station (old time, "Capertee +Camp"--a teamster's camp) was the last station before the first +washout, and there the railway line and the old road parted company +for the last time before reaching Solong--the one to run round by the +ends of the western spurs that spread fanlike, and the other to go +through and over, the rough country. + +The train reached Capertee about midnight in broad moonlight that was +misty in the valleys and round the blue of Crown Ridge. I got a +"box-seat" beside the driver on the old coach. It was a grand old +road--one of the old main coach-roads of New South Wales--broad and +white, metalled nearly all the way, and in nearly as good condition as +on the day when the first passenger train ran into Solong and the +last-used section of the old road was abandoned. It dated back to the +bushranging days--right back to convict times: it ran through tall +dark bush, up over gaps or "saddles" in high ridges, down across +deep dark gullies, and here and there across grey, marshy, +curlew-haunted flats. Cobb & Co's coach-and-six, with "Royal Mail" +gilded on the panels, had dashed over it in ten and twelve-mile stages +in the old days, the three head-lamps flashing on the wild dark bush +at night, and maybe twenty-four passengers on board. The biggest +rushes to richest goldfields in the west had gone over this old road +on coaches, on carts, on drays, on horse and bullock wagons, on +horseback, and on foot; new chums from all the world and from all +stations in life. + + When many a step was on the mountains, + Marching west to the land of gold. + +And a few came back rich--red, round-faced and jolly--on the box-seat +of Cobb & Co's, treating the driver and all hands, "going home" to +sweethearts or families. (Home people will never feel the meaning of +those two words, "going home," as it is felt in a new land.) And +many came back broken men, tramping in rags, and carrying their swags +through the dusty heat of the drought in December or the bitter, +pelting rain in the mountains in June. Some came back grey who went +as boys; and there were many who never came back. + +I remembered the old mile-trees, with a section of bark cut away and +the distances cut in Roman letters in the hardened sap--the distance +from Bowenfels, the railway terminus then. It was a ghostly old road, +and if it wasn't haunted it should have been. There was an old +decaying and nearly deserted coaching town or two; there were +abandoned farms and halfway inns, built of stone, with the roofs gone +and nettles growing high between the walls; the remains of an orchard +here and there--a few gnarled quince-trees--and the bush reclaiming +its own again. It was a haunted ride for me, because I had last +ridden over this old road long ago when I was young--going to see the +city for the first time--and because I was now on my way to attend the +funeral of one of my father's blood from whom t had parted in anger. + +We slowly climbed, and almost as slowly descended, the steep siding of +a great hill called Aaron's Pass, and about a mile beyond the foot of +the hill I saw a spot I remembered passing on the last journey down, +long ago. Rising back from the road, and walled by heavy bush, was a +square clearing, and in the background I saw plainly, by the broad +moonlight, the stone foundations for a large house; from the front an +avenue of grown pines came down to the road. + +"Why!" I exclaimed, turning to the driver, "was that house burnt +down?" + +"No," he said slowly. "That house was never built." + +I stared at the place again and caught sight of a ghostly-looking +light between the lines of the foundations, which I presently made out +to be a light in a tent. + +"There's someone camping there," I said. + +"Yes," said the driver, "some old swaggy or `hatter.' I seen him +comin' down. I don't know nothing about that there place." (I +hadn't "shouted" for him yet.) + +I thought and remembered. I remembered myself, as a boy, being sent a +coach journey along this road to visit some relatives in Sydney. We +passed this place, and the women in the coach began to talk of the +fine house that was going to be built there. The ground was being +levelled for the foundations, and young pines had been planted, with +stakes round them to protect them from the cattle. I remembered being +mightily interested in the place, for the women said that the house +was to be a two-storied one. I thought it would be a wonderful thing +to see a two-storied house there in the bush. The height of my +ambition was to live in a house with stairs in it. The women said +that this house was being built for young Brassington, the son of the +biggest squatter then in the district, who was going to marry the +daughter of the next biggest squatter. That was all I remember +hearing the women say. + +Three or four miles along the road was a public-house, with a post +office, general store, and blacksmith shop attached, as is usual in +such places--all that was left of the old pastoral and coaching town +of Ilford. I "shouted" for the driver at the shanty, but got +nothing further out of him concerning the fate of the house that was +never built. I wanted that house for a story. + +However, while yarning with some old residents at Solong, I mentioned +the Brassingtons, and picked up a few first links in the story. The +young couple were married and went to Sydney for their honeymoon. The +story went that they intended to take a trip to the old country and +Paris, to be away a twelve-month, and the house was to be finished and +ready for them on their return. Young Brassington himself had a big +sheep-run round there. The railway wasn't thought of in those days, +or if it was, no Brassington could have dreamed that the line could +have been brought to Solong in any other direction than through the +property of the "Big Brassingtons," as they were called. Well, the +young couple went to Sydney, but whether they went farther the old +residents did not know. All they knew was that within a few weeks, +and before the stone foundations for the brick walls of the house were +completed, the building contract was cancelled, the workmen were +dismissed, and the place was left as I last saw it; only the +ornamental pines had now grown to trees. The Brassingtons and the +bride's people were English families and reserved. They kept the +story, if there was a story, to themselves. The girl's people left +the district and squatted on new stations up-country. The Big +Brassingtons came down in the world and drifted to the city, as many +smaller people do, more and more every year. Neither young +Brassington nor his wife was ever again seen or heard of in the +district. + +I attended my relative's funeral, and next day started back for +Sydney. + +Just as we reached Ilford, as it happened, the pin of the fore +under-carriage of the coach broke, and it took the blacksmith several +hours to set it right. The place was dull, the publican was not +communicative--or else he harped on the old local grievance of the +railway not having come that way--so about half an hour before I +thought the coach would be ready, I walked on along the road to +stretch by legs. I walked on and on until I came, almost unaware, to +the site of the house that was never built. The tent was still there, +in fact, it was a permanent camp, and I was rather surprised to see +the man working with a trowel on a corner of the unfinished +foundations of the house. At first I thought he was going to build a +stone hut in the corner, but when I got close to him I saw that he was +working carefully on the original plan of the building: he was +building the unfinished parts of the foundation walls up to the +required height. He had bricklayer's tools, a bag of lime, and a +heap of sand, and had worked up a considerable quantity of mortar. It +was a rubble foundation: he was knocking off the thin end of a piece +of stone to make it fit, and the clanging of the trowel prevented his +hearing my footsteps. + +"Good day, mate," I said, close beside him. + +I half expected he'd start when I spoke, but he didn't: he looked +round slowly, but with a haunted look in his eyes as if I might have +been one of his ghosts. He was a tall man, gaunt and haggard-eyed, as +many men are in the bush; he may have been but little past middle age, +and grey before his time. + +"Good day," he said, and he set the stone in its place, carefully +flush with the outer edge of the wall, before he spoke again. Then he +looked at the sun, which was low, laid down his trowel, and asked me +to come to the tent-fire. "It's turning chilly," he said. It was a +model camp, everything clean and neat both inside the tent and out; he +had made a stone fireplace with a bark shelter over it, and a table +and bench under another little shed, with shelves for his tin cups and +plates and cooking utensils. He put a box in front of the fire and +folded a flour-bag on top of it for a seat for me, and hung the billy +over the fire. He sat on his heels and poked the burning sticks, +abstractedly I thought, or to keep his hands and thoughts steady. + +"I see you're doing a bit of building," I said. + +"Yes," he said, keeping his eyes on the fire; "I'm getting on with +it slowly." + +I don't suppose he looked at me half a dozen times the whole while I +was in his camp. When he spoke he talked just as if he were sitting +yarning in a row of half a dozen of us. Presently he said suddenly, +and giving the fire a vicious dig with his poker: + +"That house must be finished by Christmas." + +"Why?" I asked, taken by surprise. "What's the hurry?" + +"Because," he said, "I'm going to be married in the New +Year--to the best and dearest girl in the bush." + +There was an awkward pause on my part, but presently I pulled myself +together. + +"You'll never finish it by yourself," I said. "Why don't you put +on some men?" + +"Because," he said, "I can't trust them. Besides, how am I to +get bricklayers and carpenters in a place like this?" + +I noticed all through that his madness or the past in his mind was +mixed up with the real and the present. + +"Couldn't you postpone the marriage?" I asked. + +"No!" he exclaimed, starting to his feet. "No!" and he looked +round wildly on the darkening bush. There was madness in his tone +that time, the last "No!" sounding as if from a man who was begging +for his life. + +"Couldn't you run up a shanty then, to live in until the house is +ready?" I suggested, to soothe him. + +He gave his arm an impatient swing. "Do you think I'd ask that girl +to live in a hut?" he said. "She ought to live in a palace!" + +There seemed no way out of it, so I said nothing: he turned his back +and stood looking away over the dark, low-lying sweep of bush towards +sunset. He folded his arms tight, and seemed to me to be holding +himself. After a while he let fall his arms and turned and blinked at +me and the fire like a man just woke from a doze or rousing himself +out of a deep reverie. + +"Oh, I almost forgot the billy!" he said. "I'll make some tea--you +must be hungry." + +He made the tea and fried a couple of slices of ham; he laid the +biggest slice on a thick slice of white baker's bread on a tin plate, +and put it and a pint-pot full of tea on a box by my side. "Have it +here, by the fire," he said; "it's warmer and more comfortable." + +I took the plate on my knee, and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed that +meal. The bracing mountain air and the walk had made me hungry. The +hatter had his meal standing up, cutting his ham on a slice of bread +with a clasp-knife. It was bush fashion, and set me thinking of some +old times. He ate very little, and, as far as I saw, he didn't smoke. +Non-smokers are very scarce in the bush. + +I saw by the way his tent was pitched and his camp arranged generally, +and by the way he managed the cooking, that he must have knocked about +the bush for some years. + +He put the plates and things away and came and sat down on the other +empty gin-case by my side, and fell to poking the fire again. He +never showed the least curiosity as to who I was, or where I came +from, or what I was doing on this deserted track: he seemed to take me +as a matter of course--but all this was in keeping with bush life in +general. + +Presently he got up and stood looking upwards over the place where the +house should have been. + +"I think now," he said slowly, "I made a mistake in not having the +verandas carried all round the house." + +"I--I beg pardon!" + +"I should have had the balcony all round instead of on two sides +only, as the man who made the plan suggested; it would have looked +better and made the house cooler in summer." + +I thought as I listened, and presently I saw that it was a case of +madness within madness, so to speak: he was mad on the idea that he +could build the house himself, and then he had moods when he imagined +that the house had been built and he had been married and had reared a +family. + +"You could easily get the balcony carried round," I said; "it +wouldn't cost much--you can get good carpenters at Solong." + +"Yes," he said. "I'll have it done after Christmas." Then he +turned from the house and blinked down at me. "I am sorry," he +said, "that there's no one at home. I sent the wife and family to +Sydney for a change. I've got the two boys at the Sydney Grammar +School. I think I'll send the eldest to King's School at Parramatta. +The girls will have to get along with a governess at home and learn to +help their mother--" + +And so he went on talking away just as a man who has made money in the +bush, and is married and settled down, might yarn to an old bachelor +bush mate. + +"I suppose I'll have to get a good piano," he went on. "The girls +must have some amusement: there'll be no end of balls and parties. I +suppose the boys will soon be talking of getting `fivers' and +`tenners' out of the `guvner' or `old man.' It's the way of the +world. And they'll marry and leave us. It's the way of the world--" + +It was awful to hear him go on like this, the more so because he never +smiled--just talked on as if he had said the same thing over and over +again. Presently he stopped, and his eyes and hands began to wander: +he sat down on his heel to the fire again and started poking it. I +began to feel uneasy; I didn't know what other sides there might be to +his madness, and wished the coach would come along. + +"You've knocked about the bush a good deal?" I asked. I couldn't +think of anything else to say, and I thought he might break loose if I +let him brood too long. + +"Yes," he said, "I have." + +"Been in Queensland and the Gulf country, I suppose?" + +"I have." + +His tone and manner seemed a bit more natural. He had knocked about +pretty well all over Australia, and had been in many places where I +had been. I had got him on the right track, and after a bit he +started telling bush yarns and experiences, some of them awful, some +of them very funny, and all of them short and good; and now and then, +looking at the side of his face, which was all he turned to me, I +thought I detected the ghost of a smile. + +One thing I noticed about him; when he spoke as a madman, he talked +like a man who had been fairly well educated (or sometimes, I fancied, +like a young fellow who was studying to be a school-teacher); his +speech was deliberate and his grammar painfully correct--far more so +than I have made it; but when he spoke as an old bushman, he dropped +his g's and often turned his grammar back to front. But that reminds +me that I have met English college men who did the same thing after +being a few years in the bush; either they dropped their particular +way of speaking because it was mimicked, because they were laughed and +chaffed out of it, or they fell gradually into the habit of talking as +rough bushmen do (they learnt Australian), as clean-mouthed men fall, +in spite of themselves, into the habit of swearing in the heat and +hurry and rough life of a shearing-shed. And, coming back into +civilized life, these men, who had been well brought up, drop into +their old manner and style of speaking as readily as the +foulest-mouthed man in a shed or camp--who, amongst his fellows, +cannot say three words without an oath--can, when he finds himself in +a decent home in the woman-and-girl world, yarn by the hour without +letting slip a solitary little damn. + +The hatter warmed up the tea-billy again, got out some currant buns, +which he had baked himself in the camp-oven, and we were yarning +comfortably like two old bushmen, and I had almost forgotten that he +was "ratty," when we heard the coach coming. I jumped up to hurry +down to the road. This seemed to shake him up. He gripped my hand +hard and glanced round in his frightened, haunted way. I never saw +the eyes of a man look so hopeless and helpless as his did just then. + +"I'm sorry you're going," he said, in a hurried way. "I'm sorry +you're going. But--but they all go. Come again, come again--we'll +all be glad to see you." + +I had to hurry off and leave him. "We all," I suppose, meant +himself and his ghosts. + +I ran down between the two rows of pines and reached the road just as +the coach came up. I found the publican from Ilford aboard--he was +taking a trip to Sydney. As the coach went on I looked up the +clearing and saw the hatter standing straight behind the fire, with +his arms folded and his face turned in our direction. He looked +ghastly in the firelight, and at that distance his face seemed to have +an expression of listening blindness. I looked round on the dark +bush, with, away to the left, the last glow of sunset fading from the +bed of it, like a bed of reddening coals, and I looked up at the black +loom of Aaron's Pass, and thought that never a man, sane or mad, was +left in such a depth of gloomy loneliness. + +"I see you've been yarning with him yonder," said the publican, who +seemed to have relaxed wonderfully. + +"Yes." + +"You know these parts, don't you?" + +"Yes. I was about here as a boy." + +He asked me what my name might be. I told him it was Smith. He +blinked a while. + +"I never heard of anyone by the name of Smith in the district," he +said. + +Neither had I. I told him that we lived at Solong, and didn't stay +long. It saved time. + +"Ever heard of the Big Brassingtons?" + +"Yes." + +"Ever heard the yarn of the house that wasn't built?" + +I told him how much I had heard of it. + +"And that's about all any on 'em knows. Have you any idea who that +man back yonder is?" + +"Yes, I have." + +"Well, who do you think it is?" + +"He is, or rather he was, young Brassington." + +"You've hit it!" said the publican. "I know--and a few others." + +"And do you know what became of his wife?" I asked. + +"I do," said the shanty-keeper, who had a generous supply of whisky +with him, and seemed to have begun to fill himself up for the trip. + +He said no more for a while, and when I had remained silent long +enough, he went on, very deliberately and impressively: + +"One yarn is that the girl wasn't any good; that when she was married +to Brassington, and as soon as they got to Sydney, she met a chap +she'd been carrying on with before she married Brassington (or that +she'd been married to in secret), an' she cleared off with him, +leaving her fortnight-old husband. That was one yarn." + +"Was it?" I said. + +"Yes," said the publican. "That yarn was a lie." He opened a +flask of whisky and passed it round. + +"There was madness in the family," he said, after a nip. + +"Whose?" I asked. "Brassington's?" + +"No," said the publican, in a tone that implied contempt at my +ignorance, in spite of its innocence, "the girl's. Her mother had +been in a 'sylum, and so had her grandmother. It was--it was +heridited. Some madnesses is heridited, an' some comes through worry +and hard graft (that's mine), an' some comes through drink, and some +through worse, and, but as far as I've heard, all madnesses is pretty +much the same. My old man was a warder in a 'sylum. They have their +madnesses a bit different, the same as boozers has their d.t.'s +different; but, takin' it by the lump, it's pretty much all the +same. The difference is accordin' to their natures when they're sane. +All men are--" + +"But about young Mrs Brassington," I interrupted. + +"Young Mrs Brassington? Rosy Webb she was, daughter of Webb the +squatter. Rosy was the brightest, best, good-heartedest, an' most +ladylike little girl in the district, an' the heriditry business come +on her in Sydney, about a week after she was married to young +Brassington. She was only twenty. Here--" He passed the flask round. + + +"And what happened?" I asked. + +"What happened?" he repeated. Then he pulled himself together, as +if conscious that he had shown signs of whisky. "Everything was +done, but it was no use. She died in a year in a 'sylum." + +"How do you know that?" + +"How do I know that?" he repeated in a tone of contempt. "How do I +know that? Well, I'll tell you how. _My old wife_ was in +service at Brassington's station at the time--the oldest servant--an' +young Brassington wired to her from Sydney to come and help him in his +trouble. Old Mrs Brassington was bedridden, an' they kep' it from +her." + +"And about young Brassington?" + +"About young Brassington? He took a swag an' wandered through the +bush. We've had him at our place several times all these years, but +he always wandered off again. My old woman tried everything with him, +but it was all no use. Years ago she used to get him to talk of +things as they was, in hopes of bringin' his mind back, but he was +always worse after. She does all she can for him even now, but he's +mighty independent. The last five or six years he's been taken with +the idea of buildin' that cursed house. He'll stay there till he gets +short of money, an' then he'll go out back, shearin', stock-ridin', +drovin', cookin', fencin'--anything till he gets a few pounds. Then +he'll settle down and build away at that bloody house. He's knocked +about so much that he's a regular old bushman. While he's an old +bushman he's all right an' amusin' an' good company;--but when he's +Brassington he's mad--Don't you ever let on to my old woman that I told +you. I allers let my tongue run a bit when I get out of that hole +we're living in. We've kept the secret all these years, but what does +it matter now?--I ask you." + +"It doesn't matter much," I said. + +"Nothing matters much, it seems to me, nothing matters a damn. The +Big Brassingtons come down years ago; the old people's gone, and the +young scattered God knows where or how. The Webbs (the girl's people) +are away up in new country, an' the girls (they was mostly all girls) +are married an' settled down by this time. We kept the secret, an' +the Webbs kept the secret--even when the dirty yarns was goin' +round--so's not to spoil the chances of the other girls. What about the +chances of their husbands? Some on 'em might be in the same hell as +Brassington for all I know. The Brassingtons kept the secret because +I suppose they reckoned it didn't matter much. Nothing matters much +in this world--" + +But I was thinking of another young couple who had +married long ago, whose married life was twenty long years of shameful +quarrels, of useless brutal recrimination--not because either was bad, +but because their natures were too much alike; of the house that was +built, of the family that was reared, of the sons and daughters who +"went wrong," of the father and mother separated after twenty years, +of the mother dead of a broken heart, of the father (in a lunatic +asylum), whose mania was not to build houses, but to obtain and +secrete matches for the purpose of burning houses down. + + + +"BARNEY, TAKE ME HOME AGAIN" + +This is a sketch of one of the many ways in which a young married +woman, who is naturally thick-skinned and selfish--as most women +are--and who thinks she loves her husband, can spoil his life because +he happens to be good-natured, generous, sensitive, weak or soft, +whichever you like to call it. + +Johnson went out to Australia a good many years ago with his young +wife and two children, as assisted emigrants. He should have left his +wife and children with her mother, in a street off City Road, N., and +gone out by himself and got settled down comfortably and strengthened +in the glorious climate and democratic atmosphere of Australia, and in +the knowledge that he could worry along a while without his wife, +before sending for her. That bit of knowledge would have done her +good also, and it would have been better for both of them. But no man +knows the future, and few can prescribe for their own wives. If we +saw our married lives as others see them, half of us would get +divorced. But Johnson was sentimental, he could not bear to part from +his wife for a little while. Moreover, man is instinctively against +leaving his wife behind; it may be either a natural or a cowardly +instinct-but we won't argue that. I don't believe that Johnson was a +coward in that direction; I believe that he trusted his wife +implicitly, or rather that he never dreamed of such a thing--as is the +way with most married men. Sentiment is selfishness, perhaps, but we +won't argue that, such arguments come to nothing. + +I heard from a fellow-passenger of Johnson's that he had "a hell of a +voyage" because of his young wife's ignorant selfishness and his own +sensitiveness; he bribed stewards for better food and accommodation +for his wife and children, paid the stewardess to help with the +children, got neither rest, nor peace, nor thanks for himself, and +landed in Sydney a nervous wreck, with five pounds out of the ten he +started with. + +Johnson was a carpenter. He got work from a firm of contractors in +Sydney, who, after giving him a fortnight's trial, sent him up-country +to work on the railway station buildings, at the little pastoral +mining and farming town of Solong. The railway having come to Solong, +things were busy in the building line, and Johnson settled there. + +Johnson was thin when he came to Solong; he had landed a living +skeleton, he said, but he filled out later on. The democratic +atmosphere soothed his mind and he soon loved the place for its +unconventional hospitality. He worked hard and seemed to have plenty +of energy--he said he got it in Australia. He said that another year +of the struggle in London would have driven him mad. He fished in the +river on Saturday afternoons and Sundays, and, perhaps for the first +month or so, he thought that he had found peace. Johnson's wife was a +rather stout, unsympathetic-looking young woman, with the knit of +obstinacy in her forehead; she had that stamp of "hardness" on her +face which is the rule amongst English and the exception amongst +Australian women. We of Solong thought her hard, selfish and +narrow-minded, and paltry; later on we thought she was a "bit +touched;" but local people often think that of strangers. + +By her voice and her habit of whining she should have been a thin, +sharp-faced, untidy, draggled-tailed woman in a back street in London, +or a worn-out selector's wife in the bush. She whined about the +climate. "It will kill the children! It will kill the children! +We'll never rear them here!" She whined about the "wretched hole in +the bush" that her husband had brought her to; and to the women whom +she condescended to visit--because a woman must have a woman to talk +to--she exaggerated the miseries of the voyage until the thing became +a sing-song from repetition. Later on she settled down to endless +accounts of her home in London, of her mother and sisters, of the way +they lived. "And I'll never see it any more. I'll never see them +any more." + +The Solong climate was reckoned the best in Australia; the "wretched +hole" was a pretty little town on the banks of a clear, +willow-bordered river, with vineyards on the slopes, and surrounded by +a circle of blue hills and peaks. We knew nothing of London, so she +had her own way there. + + +"She'll feel a bit lonely at first, but she'll soon get used to +Australia," said Johnson. He seemed to me to go out of his way to +excuse his wife. + +Johnson had had a few contracts in England at one time; they had been +in "better circumstances"--that was the time she looked back to in +England; the last two years of bitter, black struggle at "home" +seemed a blank in her mind--but that's how women jump over facts when +they have a selfish fad. + +Johnson rented a cottage and garden on the bank of the sunny river. +He said he took the place because there was ivy growing on the +cottage, and it might cheer his wife; but he had lost sight of the +fact that, while he had been born in an English village, his wife had +been born and bred in London, and had probably never noticed ivy. She +said it was worse than living in a slum. + +Johnson was clever at his trade, and at many other things, but his +wife didn't seem aware of it. He was well liked, he grew to be +popular, but she didn't seem proud of the fact; she never seemed +interested in him or his prospects. She only wanted him to take her +home again. We mustn't forget that while he had a rush of work to +occupy his mind she had not. + +But Johnson grew stouter and prospered in spite of his wife--for a +year or so. New schools were being built in the district and the town +was practically re-built. Johnson took contracts for brickwork, +plumbing and house-painting, as well as carpentering, and had at one +time as many as ten men in his employ. He was making money. + +I was working at my trade then, house-painting, and worked for +Johnson. I lodged at his cottage for a while, but soon got tired of +hearing about London, and Mrs Johnson's mother and sisters, and the +house they lived in, and the street it was in, and the parks where +they used to take their babies, and the shopping on Saturday +afternoon. That woman was terrible. She was at Johnson all the time +about taking her home. "We'll surely be able to go home this year, +Will." "You promised to take me home by the end of the year." +"Mother says in her last letter, that Jack says there's more building +going on about London than ever." "You'll do just as well in London +as you'll do here." "What chance have the children got in a hole +like this?" And the rest of it--every night. When he took a new +contract, it would be, "What did you want to take that new contract +for, Will, when we're going home? You know you promised me you +wouldn't take any more contracts." First he'd try to cheer her, then +he'd argue; but she'd only sit with the knit in her forehead deep, +looking as obstinate as a mule. Then she'd sit down to a little +harmonium he'd bought her and play and sing "Barney, take me Home +again," and "The Old Folks at Home," and "Swannie Ribber," till I +felt like hanging myself--and I wasn't an exile. Sometimes Johnson +would flare up and there'd be a row and he'd go to the pub. Gentle +persuasion, argument, or swearing, it was all the same with her. + +Bosses and men were different towards each other in Solong to what +they are in London; besides, when I wasn't Johnson's sub-contractor I +was his foreman--so we often had a few drinks together; and one night +over a beer (and after a breeze at home, I think) he said to me: + +"I can't make it out, Harry; there was nothing but struggle and worry +and misery for us in England, and London was smothering me, my chest +was bad and the wife was always in ill-health; but I suppose I'll have +to take her home in the end or else she'll go melancholy mad!" And +he drew a breath that was more like a gasp than a sigh. + +"Why not send her home for a trip, or a year or so, boss?" I asked. +"As likely as not she'll be just as eager to get back; and that will +be the end of it." + +"I couldn't do that, Harry," said Johnson. "I couldn't stay here +and work alone. It would be like beginning life again; I've started +twice and couldn't start the third time. You'll understand when +you're married, Harry." + +Well, in the end, she wore Johnson out--or wore into him rather. He +drank more, and once or twice I saw him drinking alone. Sometimes +he'd "round on us" at work for nothing at all, and at other times +he'd take no interest in the jobs--he'd let the work go on anyhow. +Some thought that Johnson was getting too big for his boots, that's +how men are misjudged. He grew moody and melancholy and thin again. +Johnson was homesick himself. No doubt it was the misery of his +domestic life in Australia that made him so. + +Towards the end of the third or fourth year Johnson threw up a couple +of contracts he had on hand, sacrificed a piece of land which he had +bought and on which he had built a cottage in the short time he had +been in Solong, and, one lovely day in June, when the skies were their +fairest, the hills their bluest, the river its widest and clearest, +and the grass was waving waist high after rain--one blue and green and +golden day the Johnsons left Solong, with the trunks they had brought +out with them, for Sydney, _en route_ for smoky London. + +Mrs Johnson was a woman transformed--she was happy and looked it. The +last few weeks she had seemed in every way the opposite of the woman +we had known: cheerful, kind to neighbours in sickness and trouble, +even generous; she made many small presents in the way of mantelshelf +ornaments, pictures, and house-linen. But then it was Johnson who had +to pay for that in the end. + +He looked worn and worried at the railway station--more like himself +as he was when he first came to Solong--and as the train moved off I +thought he looked--well, frightened. + +That must have been nearly twenty years ago. + + +London last winter. It was one of those days when London's lurid sun +shows up for a little while like a smoky danger signal. The snow had +melted from the house-tops and the streets were as London streets are +after the first fall of snow of the season. But I could stand the +flat no longer, I had to go out and walk. I was sun-sick--I was +heart-sick for the sun, for the sunny South--for grassy plains, blue +mountains, sweeps of mountain bush and sunny ocean beaches. I walked +hard; I walked till I was mud-splashed to the shoulders; I walked +through the squalid, maddening sameness of miles of dingy, +grimy-walled blocks and rows of four-storied houses till I felt +smothered--jailed, hopelessly. "Best get home and in, and draw the +blinds on it," I said, "or my brain will turn." + +I was about to ask a policeman where I was when I saw, by the name on +a corner of the buildings, that I was in City Road, North. All the +willow-fringed rivers and the sunny hills of Solong flashed before me +at the sight of the name of that street. I had not been able to +recall the name of the street off City Road in which the Johnsons +lived, though I had heard it often enough in the old days from the +tongue of Mrs Johnson. + +I felt it would be a relief to see anyone who had been in Australia. +"Now," I thought, "if I walk along City Road and see the name of +that street I'll remember it"--and I did. It was a blind street, +like the long, narrow yard of a jail, walled by dark houses, all +alike. The next door but one to that at which I knocked to inquire +was where the Johnsons lived; they lived in a four-storied house, or +rather a narrow section of a four-storied terrace. I found later on +that they paid the land-lord, or nearly paid him, by letting lodgings. +They lived in one room with the use of the parlour and the kitchen +when the lodgers weren't using them, and the son shared a room with a +lodger. The back windows looked out on the dead wall of a poorhouse +of some kind, the front on rows of similar windows opposite--rows of +the same sort of windows that run for miles and miles in London. In +one a man sat smoking in his shirtsleeves, from another a slavey +leaned out watching a fourwheeler that had stopped next door, in a +third a woman sat sewing, and in a fourth a woman was ironing, with a +glimpse of a bedstead behind her. And all outside was gloom and soot +and slush. + +I would never have recognized the Johnsons. I have visited them +several times since and their faces are familiar to me now, but I +don't know whether any traces of the old likenesses worked up in my +memory. I found Johnson an old man--old and grey before his time. He +had a grizzly stubble round his chin and cheeks towards the end of the +week, because he could only afford a shave on Saturday afternoon. He +was working at some branch of his trade "in the shop" I understood, +but he said he felt the work come heavier on him every winter. "I've +felt very poorly this last winter or two," he said, "very poorly +indeed." He was very sad and gentle. + +Mrs Johnson was old and thin-looking, but seemed cheerful and +energetic. Some chest trouble kept her within doors most of the +winter. + +"I don't mind so long as I can manage," she said, "but Johnson gets +so depressed." + +They seemed very kind towards each other; they spoke little of +Australia, and then only as an incident in their lives which was not +of any importance--had long been past and done with. It was all +"before we went to Australia" or "after we came back from +Australia," with Mrs Johnson. + +The son, whom I remembered as a bright, robust little fellow, was now +a tall, white-faced, clean-shaven young man, a clerk on thirty +shillings a week. He wore, on Saturday afternoons and Sundays, a tall +hat and a frock coat and overcoat made cheaply in the latest fashion, +so he couldn't afford to help the old folk much. + +"David is very extravagant," said the old man, gently. "He won't +wear anything when once the gloss is off it. But," with a sad smile, +"I get the left-off overcoats." + +He took me across to see his daughter. She had married a tradesman +and they were having a hard struggle in three rooms in a workman's +dwelling. She was twenty-five, thin, yellow, and looking ten years +older. + +There were other children who had died. "I think we might have done +better for the children in Australia," said the old man to me, sadly, +when we got outside, "but we did our best." + +We went into a hotel and had a drink. Johnson had treated last +time--twenty years before. We call treating "shouting" in +Australia. Presently Johnson let fall a word or two of Australian +slang, and brightened up wonderfully; we got back out into Australia +at once and stayed there an hour or so. Being an old man, Johnson's +memory for the long ago was better than mine, and I picked up links; +and, in return, I told him what Solong was like now, and how some men +he knew, who were going up, had gone down, and others, who were going +to the dogs in his time, had gone up--and we philosophized. About one +he'd say, "Ah, well! who'd have thought it! I never thought that +boy would come to any good;" about another, "Ah, well! and he might +have been an independent man." How familiar that expression +sounded!--I think it is used more often in Australia than in any other +country: "He might have been an independent man." + +When I left Johnson I felt less lonely in London, and rather humbled +in spirit. He seemed so resigned--I had never seen such gentle +sadness in a man's eyes, nor heard it in a man's voice. I could get +back to Australia somehow and start life again, but Johnson's day had +been dead for many years. "Besides, assisted emigration's done away +with now," he said, with his sad, sad smile. + +I saw the Johnsons again later on. "Things have been going very +sadly with us, very sadly indeed," said the old man, when we'd +settled down. He had broken down at the beginning of the winter, he +had dragged himself out of bed and to work and back again until he +could do so no longer; he had been laid up most of the winter. Mrs +Johnson had not been outside the door for months. + +"It comes very hard on us," she said, "and I'm so poorly, and David +out of work, too. I wouldn't mind if I could get about. But," she +went on in her energetic manner, "we've had the house full all the +winter; we've had very good luck with the lodgers, all respectable +people, and one of them answers the door and that keeps me away from +the draught--so it might be worse, mightn't it? But Johnson doesn't +seem to mend at all, and he gets so terribly depressed. But the warm +weather coming on, etc." + +They and the Lord only knew how they managed to live, for they are +honest people and the lodgers scarcely pay the rent of the house. +There was only David between them and the poorhouse, as far as I could +see. + +Johnson came out with me a piece and we had a drink or two +together--his was gin hot. He talked a good deal about Australia, but +sadly and regretfully on this occasion. + +"We could have done well in Australia," he said, "very well indeed. +I might have been independent and the children well started in life. +But we did things for the best. Mrs Johnson didn't like Australia, +you know. It was a pity we didn't stay there, a great pity. We would +have done far better than in England. I'd go out again now if I had +the money, but I'm getting too old." + +"Would Mrs Johnson go out?" I asked. + +"Oh, yes. But I'm afraid she wouldn't stand the voyage. . . . Things +have been very sad with us ever since we came back to England, very +sad indeed." And after a while he suddenly caught his breath. + +"It takes me that way sometimes," he said. "I catch my breath just +as if I was going to lose it." + + + +A DROVING YARN + + +Andy Maculloch had heard that old Bill Barker, the well-known overland +drover, had died over on the Westralian side, and Dave Regan told a +yarn about Bill. + +"Bill Barker," said Dave, talking round his pipe stem, "was the +_quintessence_ of a drover--" + +"The whatter, Dave?" came the voice of Jim Bentley, in startled +tones, from the gloom on the far end of the veranda. + +"The quintessence," said Dave, taking his pipe out of his mouth. +"You shut up, Jim. As I said, Bill Barker was the quintessence of +a drover. He'd been at the game ever since he was a nipper. He run +away from home when he was fourteen and went up into Queensland. +He's been all over Queensland and New South Wales and most of South +Australia, and a good deal of the Western, too: over the great stock +routes from one end to the other, Lord knows how many times. +No man could keep up with him riding out, and no one could bring a +mob of cattle or a flock of sheep through like him. He knew every +trick of the game; if there was grass to be had Bill'd get it, +no matter whose run it was on. One of his games in a dry season was +to let his mob get boxed with the station stock on a run where there +was grass, and before Bill's men and the station-hands could cut 'em +out, the travelling stock would have a good bellyful to carry them on +the track. Billy was the daddy of the drovers. Some said that he +could ride in his sleep, and that he had one old horse that could jog +along in his sleep too, and that--travelling out from home to take +charge of a mob of bullocks or a flock of sheep--Bill and his horse +would often wake up at daylight and blink round to see where they +were and how far they'd got. Then Bill would make a fire and boil +his quart-pot, and roast a bit of mutton, while his horse had a +mouthful of grass and a spell. + +"You remember Bill, Andy? Big dark man, and a joker of the loud +sort. Never slept with a blanket over him--always folded under him on +the sand or grass. Seldom wore a coat on the route--though he always +carried one with him, in case he came across a bush ball or a funeral. +Moleskins, flannel waistcoat, cabbage-tree hat and 'lastic-side boots. +When it was roasting hot on the plains and the men swore at the heat, +Jim would yell, `Call this hot? Why, you blanks, I'm freezin'! +Where's me overcoat?' When it was raining and hailing and freezing on +Bell's Line in the Blue Mountains in winter, and someone shivered and +asked, `Is it cold enough for yer now, Bill?' `Cold!' Bill would +bellow, `I'm sweatin'!' + +"I remember it well. I was little more than a youngster then--Bill +Barker came past our place with about a thousand fat sheep for the +Homebush sale-yards at Sydney, and he gave me a job to help him down +with them on Bell's Line over the mountains, and mighty proud I was to +go with him, I can tell you. One night we camped on the Cudgegong +River. The country was dry and pretty close cropped and we'd been +"sweating" the paddocks all along there for our horses. You see, +where there weren't sliprails handy we'd just take the tomahawk and +nick the top of a straight-grained fence-post, just above the mortise, +knock out the wood there, lift the top rail out and down, and jump the +horses in over the lower one--it was all two-rail fences around there +with sheep wires under the lower rail. And about daylight we'd have +the horses out, lift back the rail, and fit in the chock that we'd +knocked out. Simple as striking matches, wasn't it? + +"Well, the horses were getting a good bellyful in the police horse +paddock at night, and Bill took the first watch with the sheep. It +was very cold and frosty on the flat and he thought the sheep might +make back for the ridges, it's always warmer up in the ridges in +winter out of the frost. Bill roused me out about midnight. `There's +the sheep,' he says, pointing to a white blur. `They've settled down. +I think they'll be quiet till daylight. Don't go round them; there's +no occasion to go near 'em. You can stop by the fire and keep an eye +on 'em.' + +"The night seemed very long. I watched and smoked and toasted my +shins, and warmed the billy now and then, and thought up pretty much +the same sort of old things that fellers on night watch think over all +over the world. Bill lay on his blanket, with his back to the fire +and his arm under his head--freezing on one side and roasting on the +other. He never moved. I itched once or twice to turn him over and +bake the front of him--I reckoned he was about done behind. + +"At last daylight showed. I took the billy and started down to the +river to get some water to make coffee; but half-way down, near the +sheep camp, I stopped and stared, I was never so surprised in my life. +The white blur of sheep had developed into a couple of acres of long +dead silver grass! + +"I woke Bill, and he swore as I never heard a man swear before--nor +since. He swore at the sheep, and the grass, and at me; but it would +have wasted time, and besides I was too sleepy and tired to fight. +But we found those sheep scattered over a scrubby ridge about seven +miles back, so they must have slipped away back of the grass and +started early in Bill's watch, and Bill must have watched that blessed +grass for the first half of the night and then set me to watch it. He +couldn't get away from that. + +"I wondered what the chaps would say if it got round that Bill +Barker, the boss overland drover, had lost a thousand sheep in clear +country with fences all round; and I suppose he thought that way too, +for he kept me with him right down to Homebush, and when he paid me +off he threw in an extra quid, and he said: + +"`Now, listen here, Dave! If I ever hear a word from anyone about +watching that gory grass, I'll find you, Dave, and murder you, if +you're in wide Australia. I'll screw your neck, so look out.' + +"But he's dead now, so it doesn't matter." + + +There was silence for some time after Dave had finished. The chaps +made no comment on the yarn, either one way or the other, but sat +smoking thoughtfully, and in a vague atmosphere as of sadness--as if +they'd just heard of their mother's death and had not been listening +to an allegedly humorous yarn. + +Then the voice of old Peter, the station-hand, was heard to growl from +the darkness at the end of the hut, where he sat on a three-bushel bag +on the ground with his back to the slabs. + +"What's old Peter growlin' about?" someone asked. + +"He wants to know where Dave got that word," someone else replied. + +"What word?" + +"_Quint-essents_." + +There was a chuckle. + +"He got it out back, Peter," said Mitchell, the shearer. "He got +it from a new chum." + +"How much did yer give for it, Dave?" growled Peter. + +"Five shillings, Peter," said Dave, round his pipe stem. "And +stick of tobacco thrown in." + +Peter seemed satisfied, for he was heard no more that evening. + + + + +GETTIN' BACK ON DAVE REGAN + +A RATHER FISHY YARN FROM THE BUSH + +(AS TOLD BY JAMES NOWLETT, BULLOCK-DRIVER) + + +You might work this yarn up. I've often thought of doin' it meself, +but I ain't got the words. I knowed a lot of funny an' rum yarns +about the bush, an' I often wished I had the gift o' writin'. I could +tell a lot better yarns than the rot they put in books sometimes, but +I never had no eddication. But you might be able to work this yarn +up--as yer call it. + +There useter be a teamster's camp six or seven miles out of Mudgee, at +a place called th' Old Pipeclay, in the days before the railroad went +round to Dubbo, an' most of us bullickies useter camp there for the +night. There was always good water in the crick, an' sometimes we'd +turn the bullicks up in the ridge, an' gullies behind for grass, an' +camp there for a few days, and do our washin' an' mendin', and make +new yokes perhaps, an tinker up the wagons. + +There was a woman livin' on a farm there named Mrs Hardwick--an' she +_was_ a hard wick. Her husban', Jimmy Hardwick was throwed from +his horse agenst a stump one day when he was sober, an' he was +killed--an' she was a widder. She had a tidy bit o' land, an' a nice +bit of a orchard an' vineyard, an some cattle, an' they say she had a +tidy bit o' money in the bank. She had the worst tongue in the +district, no one's character was safe with her; but she wasn't old, an' +she wasn't bad-lookin'--only hard--so there was some fellers hangin' +round arter her. An' Dave Regan's horse was hangin' up outside her +place as often as anybody else's. Dave was a native an' a bushy, an' +drover an' a digger, an' he was a bit soft in them days--he got hard +enough arterwards. + +Mrs Hardwick hated bullick-drivers--she had a awful down on +bullickies--I dunno why. We never interfered with her fowls, an' as +for swearin'! why, she could swear herself. Jimmy Hardwick was a +bullick-driver when she married him, an' p'r'aps that helped to +account for it. She wouldn't let us boil our billies at her kitchen +fire, same as any other bushwoman, an' if one of our bullicks put his +nose under her fence for a mouthful of grass, she'd set her dogs onter +him. An' one of her dogs got something what disagreed with him one +day, an' she accused us of layin' poisoned baits. An', arter that, +she 'pounded some of our bullicks that got into her lucerne paddick +one night when we was on the spree in Mudgee, an' put heavy damages on +'em. She'd left the sliprails down on purpose, I believe. She talked +of puttin' the police onter us, jest as if we was a sly-grog shop. +(If _she'd_ kept a sly-grog shop she'd have had a different +opinion about bullick-drivers.) An' all the bullick-drivers hated her +because she hated bullickies. + +Well, one wet season half a dozen of us chaps was camped there for a +fortnight, because the roads was too boggy to travel, an' one night +they got up a darnce at Peter Anderson's shanty acrost the ridges, an' +a lot of gals an' fellers turned up from all round about in spite of +the pourin' rain. Someone had kidded Dave Regan that Mother Hardwick +was comin', an' he turned up, of course, in spite of a ragin' +toothache he had. He was always ridin' the high horse over us +bullickies. It was a very cold night, enough to cut the face an' +hands off yer, so we had a roarin' fire in the big bark-an'-slab +kitchen where the darncin' was. It was one of them big, +old-fashioned, clay-lined fire-places that goes right acrost the end +of the room, with a twenty-five foot slab-an'-tin chimbly outside. + +Dave Regan was pretty wild about being had, an' we copped all the gals +for darncin'; he couldn't get one that night, an' when he wasn't +proddin' out his tooth with a red-hot wire some one was chaffin' him +about Mrs Hardwick. So at last he got disgusted an' left; but before +he went he got a wet three-bushel flour-bag an' climbed up very +quietly onter the roof by the battens an' log weights an' riders, an' +laid the wet bag very carefully acrost the top of the chimbly flue. + +An' we was a mortal hour tryin' to find out what was the matter with +that infernal chimbly, and tackin' bits o' tin an' baggin' acrost the +top of the fire-place under the mantelshelf to try an' stop it from +smokin', an' all the while the gals set there with the water runnin' +out of their eyes. We took the green back log out an' fetched in a +dry one, but that chimbly smoked worse than ever, an' we had to put +the fire out altogether, an' the gals set there shiverin' till the +rain held up a bit an' the sky cleared, an' then someone goes out an' +looks up an' sings out, "Why, there's somethin' acrost the top of the +blazin' chimbly!" an' someone else climbs up an' fetches down the +bag. But the darnce was spoilt, an' the gals was so disgusted that +they went off with their fellers while the weather held up. They +reckoned some of us bullickies did it for a lark. + +An' arter that Dave'd come ridin' past, an' sing out to know if we +knew of a good cure for a smokin' chimbly, an' them sorter things. +But he always got away before we could pull him off of his horse. +Three of us chased him on horseback one day, but we didn't ketch him. + +So we made up our minds to git back on Dave some way or other, an' it +come about this way. + +About six months arter the smoked-out darnce, four or five of us same +fellers was campin' on th' Pipeclay agen, an' it was a dry season. It +was dryer an' hotter than it was cold 'n' wet the larst time. Dave +was still hangin' round Mrs Hardwick's an' doin' odd jobs for her. +Well, one very hot day we seen Dave ridin' past into Mudgee, an' we +knowed he'd have a spree in town that night, an' call at Mrs +Hardwick's for sympathy comin' out next day; an' arter he'd been gone +an hour or two, Tom Tarrant comes drivin' past on his mail-coach, an' +drops some letters an' papers an' a bag o' groceries at our camp. + +Tom was a hard case. I remember wonst I was drivin' along a lonely +bit o' track, an' it was a grand mornin', an' I felt great, an' I got +singin' an' practisin' a recitation that I allers meant to give at a +bush darnce some night. (I never sung or spouted poetry unless I was +sure I was miles away from anyone.) An' I got worked up, an' was +wavin' me arms about an' throwin' it off of me chest, when Tom's coach +comes up behind, round a bend in the road, an' took me by surprise. +An' Tom looked at me very hard an' he says, "What are yer shoutin' +an' swearin' an' darncin' an' goin' on at the bullicks like that for, +Jimmy? They seem to be workin' all right." It took me back, I can +tell yer. The coach was full of grinnin' passengers, an' the worst of +it was that I didn't know how long Tom had been drivin' slow behind me +an' takin' me out of windin'. There's nothin' upsets a cove as can't +sing so much as to be caught singin' or spoutin' poetry when he thinks +he's privit'. + +An' another time I remember Tom's coach broke down on the track, an' +he had to ride inter town with the mails on horseback; an' he left a +couple of greenhides, for Skinner the tanner at Mudgee, for me to take +on in the wagon, an' a bag of potatoes for Murphy the storekeeper at +Home Rule, an' a note that said: "Render unto Murphy the things which +is murphies, and unto Skinner them things which is skins." Tom was a +hard case. + +Well, this day, when Tom handed down the tucker an' letters, he got +down to stretch his legs and give the horses a breathe. The coach was +full of passengers, an' I noticed they all looked extra glum and +sulky, but I reckoned it was the heat an' dust. Tom looked extra +solemn, too, an' no one was talkin'. Then I suddenly began to notice +something in the atmosphere, as if there was a dead beast not far +away, an' my mates started sniffin' too. An' that reminds me, it's +funny why some people allers sniff hard instead of keepin' their noses +shut when there's a stink; the more it stinks the more they sniff. +Tom spit in the dust an' thought a while; then he took a parcel out of +the boot an' put it on the corner post of the fence. "There," he +said, "There's some fresh fish that come up from Sydney by train an' +Cobb & Co's coach larst night. They're meant for White the publican +at Gulgong, but they won't keep this weather till I git out there. +Pity to waste them! you chaps might as well have a feed of 'em. I'll +tell White they went bad an' I had to throw them out," says Tom. +Then he got on to the coach agen an' drove off in a cloud of dust. We +undone the brown paper, an' the fish was in a small deal box, with a +lid fastened by a catch. We nicked back the catch an' the lid flew +open, an' then we knowed where the smell comed from all right. There +wasn't any doubt about that! We didn't have to put our noses in the +box to see if the fish was bad. They was packed in salt, but that +made no difference. + +You know how a smell will start sudden in the bush on a hot, still +day, an' then seem to take a spell, an' then get to work agen stronger +than ever. You might be clost alongside of a horse that has been dead +a fortnight an' smell nothin' particular till you start to walk away, +an' the further you go the worse it stinks. It seems to smell most +round in a circle of a hundred yards or so. But these fish smelt from +the centre right out. Tom Tarrant told us arterwards that them fish +started to smell as soon as he left Mudgee. At first they reckoned it +was a dead horse by the road; but arter a while the passengers +commenced squintin' at each other suspicious like, an' the +conversation petered out, an' Tom thought he felt all their eyes on +his back, an' it was very uncomfortable; an' he sat tight an' tried to +make out where the smell come from; an' it got worse every hundred +yards--like as if the track was lined with dead horses, an' every one +dead longer than the last--till it was like drivin' a funeral. An' +Tom never thought of the fish till he got down to stretch his legs and +fetched his nose on a level with the boot. + +Well, we shut down the lid of that box quick an' took it an' throwed +it in the bushes a good way away from the camp, but next mornin', +while we was havin' breakfast, Billy Grimshaw got an idea, an' arter +breakfast he wetted a canvas bag he had an' lit up his pipe, an' went +an' got that there box o' fish, an' put it in the wet bag, an' wrapped +it tight round it an' tied it up tight with string. Billy had a +nipper of a nephew with him, about fourteen, named Tommy, an' he was a +sharp kid if ever there was one. So Billy says, "Look here, Tommy, +you take this fish up to Mrs Hardwick's an' tell her that Dave Regan +sent 'em with his compliments, an' he hopes she'll enjoy 'em. Tell +her that Dave fetched 'em from Mudgee, but he's gone back to look for +a pound note that he dropped out of a hole in his pocket somewheers +along the road, an' he asked you to take the fish up." So Tommy +takes the fish an' goes up to the house with 'em. When he come back +he says that Mrs Hardwick smiled like a parson an' give him a +shillin'--an' he didn't wait. We watched the house, an' about half an +hour arterwards we seen her run out of the kitchen with the open box +in her hand, an' run a good way away from the house an' throw the fish +inter the bushes, an' then go back quick, holdin' her nose. + +An' jest then, as luck would have it, we seen Dave Regan ridin' up +from the creek towards the house. He got down an' went into the +kitchen, an' then come backin' out agen in a hurry with her in front +of him. We could hear her voice from where we was, but we couldn't +hear what she said. But we could see her arms wavin' as if she was +drivin' fowls, an' Dave backed all the way to his horse and gets on +an' comes ridin' away quick, she screamin' arter him all the time. +When he got down opposite the camp we sung out to know what was the +matter. "What have you been doin' to Mrs Hardwick, Dave?" we says. +"We heerd her goin' for yer proper jest now." "Damned if I know," +says Dave. "I ain't done nothin' to her that I knows of. She's +called me everything she can lay her tongue to, an' she's ravin' about +my stinkin' fish, or somethin'. I can't make it out at all. I +believe she's gone ratty." + +"But you _must_ have been doin' somethin' to the woman," we +says, "or else she wouldn't have gone on at yer like that." + +But Dave swore he hadn't, an' we talked it over for a while an' +couldn't make head nor tail of it, an' we come to the conclusion that +it was only a touch o' the sun. + + +"Never mind, Dave," we says. "Go up agen in a day or two, when she's +cooled down, an' find out what the matter is. Or write to her. It +might only have been someone makin' mischief. That's what it is." + +But Dave only sat an' rubbed his head, an' presently he started home +to wherever he was hangin' out. He wanted a quiet week to think. + +"Her chimbly might have been smokin', Dave," we shouted arter him, +but he was too dazed like to ketch on. + +Well, in a month or two we was campin' there agen, an' we found she'd +fenced in a lane to the crick she had no right to, an' we had to take +the bullicks a couple o' miles round to grass an' water. Well, the +first mornin' we seen her down in the corner of her paddick near the +camp drivin' some heifers, an' Billy Grimshaw went up to the fence an' +spoke to her. Billy was the only one of us that dared face her and he +was the only one she was ever civil to--p'r'aps because Billy had a +squint an' a wall eye and that put her out of countenance. + +Billy took off his hat very respectful an' sings out, "Mrs +Hardwick." (It was Billy's bullicks she'd "pounded," by the way.) + +"What is it?" she says. + +"I want to speak to you, Mrs Hardwick," says Billy. + +"Well, speak," she says. "I've got no time to waste talkin' to +bullick-drivers." + +"Well, the fact is, Mrs Hardwick," says Billy, "that I want to +explain somethin', an' apologize for that young scamp of a nephew o' +mine, young Tommy. He ain't here or I'd make him beg your pardon +hisself, or I'd cut him to pieces with the bullick-whip. I heard all +about Dave Regan sendin' you that stinkin' fish, an' I think it was a +damned mean, dirty thing to do--to send stinkin' fish to a woman, an' +especially to a widder an' an unprotected woman like you, Mrs +Hardwick. I've had mothers an' sisters of me own. An' I want to tell +you that I'm sorry a relation o' mine ever had anythin' to do with it. +As soon as I heerd of it I give young Tommy a lambastin' he won't +forgot in a hurry." + +"Did Tommy know the fish was bad?" she says. + +"It doesn't matter a rap," says Billy; "he had no right to go +takin' messages from nobody to nobody." + + +Mrs Hardwick thought a while. Then she says: "P'r'aps arter all Dave +Regan didn't know the fish was bad. I've often thought I might have +been in too much of a hurry. Things goes bad so quick out here in +this weather. An' Dave was always very friendly. I can't understand +why he'd do a dirty thing on me like that. I never done anything to +Dave." + +Now I forgot to tell you that Billy had a notion that Dave helped +drive his bullicks to pound that time, though I didn't believe it. So +Billy says: + +"Don't you believe that for a minute, Mrs Hardwick. Dave knew what +he was a-doin' of all right; an' if I ketch him _I'll_ give him a +beltin' for it if no one else is man enough to stand up for a woman!" +says Billy. + +"How d'yer know Dave knew?" says Mrs Hardwick. + +"Know!" says Billy. "Why, he talked about it all over the +district." + +"What!" she screamed out, an' I moved away from that there fence, +for she had a stick to drive them heifers with. But Billy stood his +ground. "Is that the truth, Billy Grimshaw?" she screams. + +"Yes;" he says. "I'll-take me oath on it. He blowed about it all +over the district, as if it was very funny, an' he says--" An' Billy +stopped. + +"What did he say?" she shouted. + +"Well, the fact is," says Billy, "that I hardly like to tell it to +a lady. I wouldn't like to tell yer, Mrs Hardwick." + +"But you'll have to tell me, Billy Grimshaw," she screams. "I have +a right to know. If you don't tell me I'll pull him next week an' +have it dragged out of you in the witness-box!" she says. "An' I'll +have satisfaction out of him in the felon's dock of a court of law!" +she says. "What did the villain say?" she screams. + + +"Well," says Billy, "if yer must have it--an', anyway, I'm hanged +if I'm goin' to stand by an' see a woman scandalized behind her +back--if yer must have it I'll tell yer. Dave said that the fish +didn't smell no worse than your place anyway." + +We got away from there then. She cut up too rough altogether. I +can't tell you what she said--I ain't got the words. She went up to +the house, an' we seen the farm-hand harnessin' up the horse, an' we +reckoned she was goin' to drive into town straight away an' take out a +summons agenst Dave Regan. An' jest then Dave hisself comes ridin' +past--jest when he was most wanted, as usual. He always rode fast +past Mrs Hardwick's nowadays, an' never stopped there, but Billy +shouted after him: + +"Hullo, Dave! I want to speak to yer," shouts Billy. An' Dave +yanks his horse round. + +"What is it, Billy?" he says. + +"Look here, Dave," says Billy. "You had your little joke about the +chimbly, an' we had our little joke about the fish an' Mrs Hardwick, +so now we'll call it quits. A joke's a joke, but it can go too far, +an' this one's gettin' too red-hot altogether. So we've fixed it up +with Mrs Hardwick." + +"What fish an' what joke?" says Dave, rubbin' his head. "An' what +have yer fixed up with Mrs Hardwick? Whatever are yer talkin' about, +Billy?" + +So Billy told him all about us sendin' the stinkin' fish to Mrs +Hardwick by Tommy, an' sayin' Dave sent 'em--Dave rubbin' the back of +his neck an' starin' at Billy all the time. "An' now," says Billy, +"I won't say anything about them bullicks; but I went up and seen Mrs +Hardwick this mornin', an' told her the whole truth about them fish, +an' how you knowed nothin' about it, an' I apologized an' told her we +was very sorry; an' she says she was very sorry too on your account, +an' wanted to see yer. I promised to tell yer as soon as I seen yer. +It ought to be fixed up. You ought to go right up to the house an' +see her now. She's awfully cut up about it." + +"All right," says Dave, brightenin' up. "It was a dirty, mean +trick anyway to play on a cove; but I'll go up an' see her." An' he +went there 'n' then. + +An' about fifteen minutes arterwards he comes boltin' back from the +house one way an' his horse the other. The horse acted as if it had a +big scare, an' so did Dave. Billy went an' ketched Dave's horse for +him, an' I got Dave a towel to wipe the dirty dish-water off of his +face an' out of his hair an' collar, an' I give him a piece of soap to +rub on the places where he'd been scalded. + +"Why, the woman must be ravin' mad," I says. "Whatever did yer say +to her this time, Dave? Yer allers gettin' inter hot water with +her." + +"I didn't say nothin'," says Dave. "I jest went up laughin' like, +an' says, `How are yer, Mrs Hardwick?' an' she ups an' lets me have a +dish of dirty wash-up water, an' then on top of that she let fly with +a dipper of scaldin'-hot, greasy water outer the boiler. She's gone +clean ravin' mad, I think." + +"She's as mad as a hatter, right enough, Dave," says Billy Grimshaw. +"Don't you go there no more, Dave, it ain't safe." An' we lent Dave +a hat an' a clean shirt, an' he went on inter town. "You ought to +have humoured her," says Billy, as Dave rode away. "You ought to +have told her to put a wet bag over her chimbly an' hang the fish +inside to smoke." But Dave was too stunned to ketch on. He went on +inter the town an' got on a howlin' spree. An' while he was soberin' +up the thing began to dawn on him. An' the nex' time he met Billy +they had a fight. An' Dave got another woman to speak to Mrs +Hardwick, an' Mrs Hardwick ketched young Tommy goin' past her place +one day an' bailed him up an' scared the truth out of him. + +"Look here!" she says to him, "I want the truth, the whole truth, +an' nothin' but the truth about them fish, an' if I don't get it outer +you I'll wring yer young neck for tryin' to poison me, an' save yer +from the gallust!" she says to Tommy. + +So he told her the whole truth, swelp him, an' got away; an' he +respected Mrs Hardwick arter that. + +An' next time we come past with the teams we seen Dave's horse hangin' +up outside Mrs Hardwick's, an' we went some miles further along the +road an' camped in a new place where we'd be more comfortable. An' +ever arter that we used to always whip up an' drive past her place as +if we didn't know her. + + + +"SHALL WE GATHER AT THE RIVER?" + + God's preacher, of churches unheeded, + God's vineyard, though barren the sod, + Plain spokesman where spokesman is needed, + Rough link 'twixt the Bushman and God. + The Christ of the Never. + + TOLD BY JOE WILSON + + +I never told you about Peter M'Laughlan. He was a sort of bush +missionary up-country and out back in Australia, and before he died he +was known from Riverina down south in New South Wales to away up +through the Never-Never country in western Queensland. + +His past was a mystery, so, of course, there were all sorts of yarns +about him. He was supposed to be a Scotchman from London, and some +said that he had got into trouble in his young days and had had to +clear out of the old country; or, at least, that he had been a +ne'e-er-do-well and had been sent out to Australia on the remittance +system. Some said he'd studied for the law, some said he'd studied +for a doctor, while others believed that he was, or had been, an +ordained minister. I remember one man who swore (when he was +drinking) that he had known Peter M'Laughlan as a medical student in a +big London hospital, and that he had started in practice for himself +somewhere near Gray's Inn Road in London. Anyway, as I got to know +him he struck me as being a man who had looked into the eyes of so +much misery in his life that some of it had got into his own. + +He was a tall man, straight and well built, and about forty or +forty-five, when I first saw him. He had wavy dark hair, and a close, +curly beard. I once heard a woman say that he had a beard like you +see in some Bible pictures of Christ. Peter M'Laughlan seldom smiled; +there was something in his big dark brown eyes that was scarcely +misery, nor yet sadness--a sort of haunted sympathy. + +He must have had money, or else he got remittances from home, for he +paid his way and helped many a poor devil. They said that he gave +away most of his money. Sometimes he worked for a while himself as +bookkeeper at a shearing-shed, wool-sorter, shearer, even rouseabout; +he'd work at anything a bushman could get to do. Then he'd go out +back to God-forgotten districts and preach to bushmen in one place, +and get a few children together in another and teach them to read. He +could take his drink, and swear a little when he thought it necessary. +On one occasion, at a rough shearing-shed, he called his beloved +brethren "damned fools" for drinking their cheques. + +Towards the end of his life if he went into a "rough" shed or shanty +west of the Darling River--and some of them _were_ rough--there +would be a rest in the language and drinking, even a fight would be +interrupted, and there would be more than one who would lift their +hats to Peter M'Laughlan. A bushman very rarely lifts his hat to a +man, yet the worst characters of the West have listened bareheaded to +Peter when he preached. + +It was said in our district that Peter only needed to hint to the +squatter that he wanted fifty or a hundred pounds to help someone or +something, and the squatter would give it to him without question or +hesitation. + +He'd nurse sick boundary-riders, shearers, and station-hands, often +sitting in the desolate hut by the bedside of a sick man night after +night. And, if he had time, he'd look up the local blacks and see how +they were getting on. Once, on a far outback sheep station, he sat +for three nights running, by the bedside of a young Englishman, a +B.A. they said he was, who'd been employed as tutor at the homestead +and who died a wreck, the result of five years of life in London and +Paris. The poor fellow was only thirty. And the last few hours of +his life he talked to Peter in French, nothing but French. Peter +understood French and one or two other languages, besides English and +Australian; but whether the young wreck was raving or telling the +story of a love, or his life, none of us ever knew, for Peter never +spoke of it. But they said that at the funeral Peter's eyes seemed +haunted more than usual. + +There's the yarn about Peter and the dying cattle at Piora Station one +terrible drought, when the surface was as bare as your hand for +hundreds of miles, and the heat like the breath of a furnace, and the +sheep and cattle were perishing by thousands. Peter M'Laughlan was +out on the run helping the station-hands to pull out cattle that had +got bogged in the muddy waterholes and were too weak to drag +themselves out, when, about dusk, a gentlemanly "piano-fingered" +parson, who had come to the station from the next town, drove out in +his buggy to see the men. He spoke to Peter M'Laughlan. + +"Brother," he said, "do you not think we should offer up a +prayer?" + +"What for?" asked Peter, standing in his shirt sleeves, a rope in his +hands and mud from head to foot. + +"For? Why, for rain, brother," replied the parson, a bit surprised. + +Peter held up his finger and said "Listen!" + +Now, with a big mob of travelling stock camped on the plain at night, +there is always a lowing, soughing or moaning sound, a sound like that +of the sea on the shore at a little distance; and, altogether, it +might be called the sigh or yawn of a big mob in camp. But the long, +low moaning of cattle dying of hunger and thirst on the hot barren +plain in a drought is altogether different, and, at night there is +something awful about it--you couldn't describe it. This is what +Peter M'Laughlan heard. + +"Do you hear that?" he asked the other preacher. + +The little parson said he did. Perhaps _he_ only heard the weak +lowing of cattle. + +"Do you think that God will hear us when He does not hear +_that_?" asked Peter. + +The parson stared at him for a moment and then got into his buggy and +drove away, greatly shocked and deeply offended. But, later on, over +tea at the homestead, he said that he felt sure that that +"unfortunate man," Peter M'Laughlan, was not in his right mind; that +his wandering, irregular life, or the heat, must have affected him. + +I well remember the day when I first heard Peter M'Laughlan preach. I +was about seventeen then. We used sometimes to attend service held on +Sunday afternoon, about once a month, in a little slab-and-bark +school-house in the scrub off the main road, three miles or so from +our selection, in a barren hole amongst the western ridges of the +Great Dividing Range. School was held in this hut for a few weeks or +a few months now and again, when a teacher could be got to stay there +and teach, and cook for himself, for a pound a week, more or less +contributed by the parents. A parson from the farming town to the +east, or the pastoral town over the ridges to the west, used to come +in his buggy when it didn't rain and wasn't too hot to hold the +service. + +I remember this Sunday. It was a blazing hot day towards the end of a +long and fearful drought which ruined many round there. The parson +was expected, and a good few had come to "chapel" in spring-carts, +on horseback, and on foot; farmers and their wives and sons and +daughters. The children had been brought here to Sunday-school, +taught by some of the girls, in the morning. I can see it all now +quite plain: The one-roomed hut, for it was no more, with the stunted +blue-grey gum, scrub all round. The white, dusty road, so hot that +you could cook eggs in the dust. The horses tied up, across the road, +in the supposed shade under clumps of scraggy saplings along by the +fence of a cattle-run. The little crowd outside the hut: selectors in +washed and mended tweeds, some with paper collars, some wearing +starched and ironed white coats, and in blucher boots, greased or +blackened, or the young men wearing "larstins" (elastic-side boots). +The women and girls in prints and cottons (or cheap "alpaca," etc.), +and a bright bit of ribbon here and there amongst the girls. The +white heat blazed everywhere, and "dazzled" across light-coloured +surfaces--dead white trees, fence-posts, and sand-heaps, like an +endless swarm of bees passing in the sun's glare. And over above the +dry boxscrub-covered ridges, the great Granite Peak, glaring like a +molten mass. + +The people didn't like to go inside out of the heat and sit down +before the minister came. The wretched hut was a rough school, +sometimes with a clay fire-place where the teacher cooked, and a +corner screened off with sacking where he had his bunk; it was a camp +for tramps at other times, or lizards and possums, but to-day it was a +house of God, and as such the people respected it. + +The town parson didn't turn up. Perhaps he was unwell, or maybe the +hot, dusty ten-mile drive was too much for him to face. One of the +farmers, who had tried to conduct service on a previous occasion on +which the ordained minister had failed us, had broken down in the +middle of it, so he was out of the question. We waited for about an +hour, and then who should happen to ride along but Peter M'Laughlan, +and one or two of the elder men asked him to hold service. He was on +his way to see a sick friend at a sheep station over the ridges, but +he said that he could spare an hour or two. (Nearly every man who was +sick, either in stomach or pocket, was a friend of Peter M'Laughlan.) +Peter tied up his horse under a bush shed at the back of the hut, and +we followed him in. + +The "school" had been furnished with a rough deal table and a wooden +chair for "the teacher," and with a few rickety desks and stools +cadged from an old "provisional" school in town when the new public +school was built; and the desks and stools had been fastened to the +floor to strengthen them; they had been made for "infant" classes, +and youth out our way ran to length. But when grown men over six feet +high squeezed in behind the desks and sat down on the stools the +effect struck me as being ridiculous. In fact, I am afraid that on +the first occasion it rather took my attention from the sermon, and I +remember being made very uncomfortable by a school chum, Jack Barnes, +who took a delight in catching my eye and winking or grinning. He +could wink without changing a solemn line in his face and grin without +exploding, and I couldn't. The boys usually sat on seats, slabs on +blocks of wood, along the wall at the far end of the room, which was +comfortable, for they had a rest for their backs. One or two of the +boys were nearing six feet high, so they could almost rest their chins +on their knees as they sat. But I squatted with some of my tribe on a +stool along the wall by the teacher's table, and so could see most of +the congregation. + +Above us bare tie-beams and the round sapling rafters (with the bark +still on), and the inner sides of the sheets of stringybark that +formed the roof. The slabs had been lined with sacking at one time, +but most of it had fallen or dry-rotted away; there were wide cracks +between the slabs and we could see the white glare of sunlight +outside, with a strip of dark shade, like a deep trench in the white +ground, by the back wall. Someone had brought a canvas water-bag and +hung it to the beam on the other side of the minister's table, with a +pint-pot over the tap, and the drip, drip from the bag made the whole +place seem cooler. + +I studied Peter M`Laughlan first. He was dressed in washed and mended +tweed vest and trousers, and had on a long, lightcoloured coat of a +material which we called "Chinese silk." He wore a "soft" cotton +shirt with collar attached, and blucher boots. He gave out a hymn in +his quiet, natural way, said a prayer, gave out another hymn, read a +chapter from the Bible, and then gave out another hymn. They liked to +sing, out in those places. The Southwicks used to bring a cranky +little harmonium in the back of their old dog-cart, and Clara +Southwick used to accompany the hymns. She was a very pretty girl, +fair, and could play and sing well. I used to think she had the +sweetest voice I ever heard. But--ah, well--- + +Peter didn't sing himself, at first. I got an idea that he couldn't. +While they were singing he stood loosely, with one hand in his +trouser-pocket, scratching his beard with his hymn-book, and looking +as if he were thinking things over, and only rousing himself to give +another verse. He forgot to give it once or twice, but we got through +all right. I noticed the wife of one of the men who had asked Peter +to preach looking rather black at her husband, and I reckoned that +he'd get it hotter than the weather on the way home. + +Then Peter stood up and commenced to preach. He stood with both hands +in his pockets, at first, his coat ruffled back, and there was the +stem of a clay pipe sticking out of his waistcoat pocket. The pipe +fascinated me for a while, but after that I forgot the pipe and was +fascinated by the man. Peter's face was one that didn't strike you at +first with its full strength, it grew on you; it grew on me, and +before he had done preaching I thought it was the noblest face I had +ever seen. + +He didn't preach much of hope in this world. How could he? The +drought had been blazing over these districts for nearly a year, with +only a shower now and again, which was a mockery--scarcely darkening +the baked ground. Wheat crops came up a few inches and were parched +by the sun or mown for hay, or the cattle turned on them; and last +year there had been rust and smut in the wheat. And, on top of it +all, the dreadful cattle plague, pleuro-pneumonia, had somehow been +introduced into the district. One big farmer had lost fifty milkers +in a week. + +Peter M'Laughlan didn't preach much of hope in this world; how could +he? There were men there who had slaved for twenty, thirty, forty +years; worked as farmers have to work in few other lands--first to +clear the stubborn bush from the barren soil, then to fence the +ground, and manure it, and force crops from it--and for what? There +was Cox, the farmer, starved off his selection after thirty years and +going out back with his drays to work at tank-sinking for a squatter. +There was his eldest son going shearing or droving--anything he could +get to do--a stoop-shouldered, young-old man of thirty. And behind +them, in the end, would be a dusty patch in the scrub, a fencepost +here and there, and a pile of chimney-stones and a hardwood slab or +two where the but was--for thirty hard years of the father's life and +twenty of the son's. + +I forget Peter's text, if he had a text; but the gist of his sermon +was that there was a God--there was a heaven! And there were men +there listening who needed to believe these things. There was old +Ross from across the creek, old, but not sixty, a hard man. Only last +week he had broken down and fallen on his knees on the baked sods in +the middle of his ploughed ground and prayed for rain. His frightened +boys had taken him home, and later on, the same afternoon, when they +brought news of four more cows down with "the pleuro" in an outer +paddock, he had stood up outside his own door and shaken his fist at +the brassy sky and cursed high heaven to the terror of his family, +till his brave, sun-browned wife dragged him inside and soothed him. +And Peter M'Laughlan knew all about this. + +Ross's family had the doctor out to him, and persuaded him to come to +church this Sunday. The old man sat on the front seat, stooping +forward, with his elbow resting on the desk and his chin on his hand, +bunching up his beard over his mouth with his fingers and staring +gloomily at Peter with dark, piercing eyes from under bushy eyebrows, +just as I've since seen a Scotchman stare at Max O'Rell all through a +humorous lecture called "A nicht wi' Sandy." + +Ross's right hand resting on the desk was very eloquent: horny, +scarred and knotted at every joint, with broken, twisted nails, and +nearly closed, as though fitted to the handle of an axe or a spade. +Ross was an educated man (he had a regular library of books at home), +and perhaps that's why he suffered so much. + +Peter preached as if he were speaking quietly to one person only, but +every word was plain and every sentence went straight to someone. I +believe he looked every soul in the eyes before he had done. Once he +said something and caught my eye, and I felt a sudden lump in my +throat. There was a boy there, a pale, thin, sensitive boy who was +eating his heart out because of things he didn't understand. He was +ambitious and longed for something different from this life; he'd +written a story or two and some rhymes for the local paper; his +companions considered him a "bit ratty" and the grown-up people +thought him a "bit wrong in his head," idiotic, or at least +"queer." And during his sermon Peter spoke of "unsatisfied +longings," of the hope of something better, and said that one had to +suffer much and for long years before he could preach or write; and +then he looked at that boy. I knew the boy very well; he has risen in +the world since then. + +Peter spoke of the life we lived, of the things we knew, and used +names and terms that we used. "I don't know whether it was a blanky +sermon or a blanky lecture," said long swanky Jim Bullock afterwards, +"but it was straight and hit some of us hard. It hit me once or +twice, I can tell yer." Peter spoke of our lives: "And there is +beauty--even in this life and in this place," he said. "Nothing is +wasted--nothing is without reason. There is beauty even in this +place---" + +I noticed something like a hint of a hard smile on Ross's face; he +moved the hand on the desk and tightened it. + +"Yes," said Peter, as if in answer to Ross's expression and the +movement of his hand, "there is beauty in this life here. After a +good season, and when the bush is tall and dry, when the bush-fires +threaten a man's crop of ripened wheat, there are tired men who run +and ride from miles round to help that man, and who fight the fire all +night to save his wheat--and some of them may have been wrangling with +him for years. And in the morning, when the wheat is saved and the +danger is past, when the fire is beaten out or turned, there are +blackened, grimy hands that come together and grip-hands that have not +joined for many a long day." + +Old Palmer, Ross's neighbour, moved uneasily. He had once helped Ross +to put a fire out, but they had quarrelled again since. Ross still +sat in the same position, looking the hard man he was. Peter glanced +at Ross, looked down and thought a while, and then went on again: + +"There is beauty even in this life and in this place. When a man +loses his farm, or his stock, or his crop, through no fault of his +own, there are poor men who put their hands into their pockets to help +him." + +Old Kurtz, over the ridge, had had his stacked crop of wheat in sheaf +burned--some scoundrel had put a match to it at night--and the farmers +round had collected nearly fifty pounds for him. + +"There is beauty even in this life and in this place. In the blazing +drought, when the cattle lie down and cannot rise from weakness, +neighbours help neighbours to lift them. When one man has hay or +chaff and no stock, he gives it or sells it cheaply to the poor man +who has starving cattle and no fodder." + +I only knew one or two instances of this kind; but Peter was preaching +of what man should do as well as what they did. + +"When a man meets with an accident, or dies, there are young men who +go with their ploughs and horses and plough the ground for him or his +widow and put in the crop." + +Jim Bullock and one or two other young men squirmed. They had +ploughed old Leonard's land for him when he met with an accident in +the shape of a broken leg got by a kick from a horse. They had also +ploughed the ground for Mrs Phipps when her husband died, working, by +the way, all Saturday afternoon and Sunday, for they were very busy at +home at that time. + +"There is beauty even in this life and in this place. There are +women who were friends in girlhood and who quarrelled bitterly over a +careless word, an idle tale, or some paltry thing, who live within a +mile of each other and have not spoken for years; yet let one fall +ill, or lose husband or child, and the other will hurry across to her +place and take off her bonnet and tuck up her sleeves, and set to work +to help straighten things, and they will kiss, and cry in each other's +arms, and be sisters again." + +I saw tears in the eyes of two hard and hard-faced women I knew; but +they were smiling to each other through their tears. + +"And now," said Peter, "I want to talk to you about some other +things. I am not preaching as a man who has been taught to preach +comfortably, but as a man who has learned in the world's school. I +know what trouble is. Men," he said, still speaking quietly, "and +women too! I have been through trouble as deep as any of +yours--perhaps deeper. I know how you toil and suffer, I know what +battles you fight, I know. I too fought a battle, perhaps as hard as +any you fight. I carry a load and am fighting a battle still." His +eyes were very haggard just them. "But this is not what I wanted to +talk to you about. I have nothing to say against a young man going +away from this place to better himself, but there are young men who go +out back shearing or droving, young men who are goodhearted but +careless, who make cheques, and spend their money gambling or drinking +and never think of the old folk at home until it is too late. They +never think of the old people, alone, perhaps, in a desolate but on a +worked-out farm in the scrub." + +Jim Bullock squirmed again. He had gone out back last season and made +a cheque, and lost most of it on horse-racing and cards. + +"They never think--they cannot think how, perhaps, long years agone +in the old days, the old father, as a young man, and his brave young +wife, came out here and buried themselves in the lonely bush and +toiled for many years, trying--it does not matter whether they failed +or not--trying to make homes for their children; toiled till the young +man was bowed and grey, and the young wife brown and wrinkled and worn +out. Exiles they were in the early days--boy-husbands and girl-wives +some of them, who left their native lands, who left all that was dear, +that seemed beautiful, that seemed to make life worth living, and +sacrificed their young lives in drought and utter loneliness to make +homes for their children. I want you young men to think of this. +Some of them came from England, Ireland, Bonnie Scotland." Ross +straightened up and let his hands fall loosely on his knees. "Some +from Europe--your foreign fathers--some from across the Rhine in +Germany." We looked at old Kurtz. He seemed affected. + +Then Peter paused for a moment and blinked thoughtfully at Ross, then +he took a drink of water. I can see now that the whole thing was a +battle between Peter M'Laughlan and Robert Ross--Scot met Scot. "It +seemed to me," Jim Bullock said afterwards, "that Peter was only +tryin' to make some of us blanky well blubber." + +"And there are men," Peter went on, "who have struggled and +suffered and failed, and who have fought and failed again till their +tempers are spoiled, until they grow bitter. They go in for +self-pity, and self-pity leads to moping and brooding and madness; +self-pity is the most selfish and useless thing on the face of God's +earth. It is cruel, it is deadly, both to the man and to those who +love him, and whom he ought to love. His load grows heavier daily in +his imagination, and he sinks down until it is in him to curse God and +die. He ceases to care for or to think of his children who are +working to help him." (Ross's sons were good, steady, hard-working +boys.) "Or the brave wife who has been so true to him for many hard +years, who left home and friends and country for his sake. Who bears +up in the blackest of times, and persists in looking at the bright +side of things for his sake; who has suffered more than he if he only +knew it, and suffers now, through him and because of him, but who is +patient and bright and cheerful while her heart is breaking. He +thinks she does not suffer, that she cannot suffer as a man does. My +God! he doesn't know. He has forgotten in her the bright, +fresh-faced, loving lassie he loved and won long years agone--long +years agone---" + +There was a sob, like the sob of an over-ridden horse as it sinks down +broken-hearted, and Ross's arms went out on the desk in front of him, +and his head went down on them. He was beaten. + +He was steered out gently with his wife on one side of him and his +eldest son on the other. + +"Don't be alarmed, my friends," said Peter, standing by the +water-bag with one hand on the tap and the pannikin in the other. +"Mr Ross has not been well lately, and the heat has been too much for +him." And he went out after Ross. They took him round under the +bush shed behind the hut, where it was cooler. + +When Peter came back to his place he seemed to have changed his whole +manner and tone. "Our friend, Mr Ross, is much better," he said. +"We will now sing"--he glanced at Clara Southwick at the +harmonium--"we will now sing `Shall We Gather at the River?'" We +all knew that hymn; it was an old favourite round there, and Clara +Southwick played it well in spite of the harmonium. + +And Peter sang--the first and last time I ever heard him sing. +I never had an ear for music; but I never before nor since heard +a man's voice that stirred me as Peter M'Laughlan's. We stood like +emus, listening to him all through one verse, then we pulled +ourselves together. + + Shall we gather at the River, + Where bright angels' feet have trod-- + +The only rivers round there were barren creeks, the best of them only +strings of muddy waterholes, and across the ridge, on the sheep-runs, +the creeks were dry gutters, with baked banks and beds, and perhaps a +mudhole every mile or so, and dead beasts rotting and stinking every +few yards. + + Gather with the saints at the River, + That flows by the throne of God. + +Peter's voice trembled and broke. He caught his breath, and his eyes +filled. But he smiled then--he stood smiling at us through his tears. + + The beautiful, the beautiful River, + That flows by the throne of God. + +Outside I saw women kiss each other who had been at daggers drawn ever +since I could remember, and men shake hands silently who had hated +each other for years. Every family wanted Peter to come home to tea, +but he went across to Ross's, and afterwards down to Kurtz's place, +and bled and inoculated six cows or so in a new way, and after tea he +rode off over the gap to see his friend. + + + +HIS BROTHER'S KEEPER + + By his paths through the parched desolation, + Hot rides and the terrible tramps; + By the hunger, the thirst, the privation + Of his work in the furthermost camps; + + By his worth in the light that shall search men + And prove--ay! and justify each-- + I place him in front of all Churchmen + Who feel not, who _know_ not--but preach! + --The Christ of the Never. + +I told you about Peter M'Laughlan, the bush missionary, and how he +preached in the little slab-and-bark school-house in the scrub on +Ross's Creek that blazing hot Sunday afternoon long ago, when the +drought was ruining the brave farmers all round there and breaking +their hearts. And how hard old Ross, the selector, broke down at the +end of the sermon, and blubbered, and had to be taken out of church. + +I left home and drifted to Sydney, and "back into the Great +North-West where all the rovers go," and knocked about the country +for six or seven years before I met Peter M'Laughlan again. I was +young yet, but felt old at times, and there were times, in the hot, +rough, greasy shearing-shed on blazing days, or in the bare "men's +hut" by the flicker of the stinking slush-lamp at night, or the +wretched wayside shanty with its drink-madness and blasphemy, or +tramping along the dusty, endless track--there were times when I +wished I could fall back with all the experience I'd got, and sit once +more in the little slab-and-bark "chapel" on Ross's Creek and hear +Peter M'Laughlan and the poor, struggling selectors sing "Shall We +Gather at the River?" and then go out and start life afresh. + +My old school chum and bush mate, Jack Barnes, had married pretty +little Clara Southwick, who used to play the portable harmonium in +chapel. I nearly broke my heart when they were married, but then I +was a young fool. Clara was a year or so older than I, and I could +never get away from a boyish feeling of reverence for her, as if she +were something above and out of my world. And so, while I was +worshipping her in chapel once a month, and at picnics and parties in +between, and always at a distance, Jack used to ride up to Southwick's +place on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, and on other days, and hang +his horse up outside, or turn it in the paddock, and argue with old +Southwick, and agree with the old woman, and court Clara on the sly. +And he got her. + +It was at their wedding that I first got the worse for drink. + +Jack was a blue-eyed, curly black-haired, careless, popular young +scamp; as good-hearted as he was careless. He could ride like a +circus monkey, do all kinds of bush work, add two columns of figures +at once, and write like copper-plate. + +Jack was given to drinking, gambling and roving. He steadied up when +he got married and started on a small selection of his own; but within +the year Clara was living in a back skillion of her father's house and +Jack was up-country shearing. He was "ringer" of the shed at Piora +Station one season and made a decent cheque; and within a fortnight +after the shed "cut out" he turned up at home in a very bad state +from drink and with about thirty shillings in his pockets. He had +fallen from his horse in the creek near Southwick's, and altogether he +was a nice sort of young husband to go home to poor, heart-broken +Clara. + +I remember that time well. She stopped me one day as I was riding +past to ask me if I'd seen Jack, and I got off my horse. Her chin and +mouth began to twitch and tremble and I saw her eyes filling with +tears. She laid her hand on my arm and asked me to promise not to +drink with Jack if I met him, but to try and persuade him to come +home. And--well, have you, as a man, ever, with the one woman that +you can't have, and no matter at what time or place, felt a sudden mad +longing to take her in your arms and kiss her--and damn the world? I +got on my horse again. She must have thought me an ignorant brute, +but I felt safer there. And when I thought how I had nearly made a +fool of myself, and been a cowardly brute, and a rotten mate to my +mate, I rode ten miles to find Jack and get him home. + +He straightened up again after a bit and went out and got another +shed, and they say that Peter M'Laughlan got hold of him there. I +don't know what Peter did to him then--Jack never spoke of it, even to +me, his old mate; but, anyway, at the end of the shearing season +Jack's cheque came home to Clara in a registered envelope, addressed +in Peter's hand-writing, and about a week later Jack turned up a +changed man. + +He got work as a temporary clerk in the branch government land office +at Solong, a pretty little farming town in a circle of blue hills on +the banks of a clear, willow-fringed river, where there were rich, +black-soil, river-flat farms, and vineyards on the red soil slopes, +and blue peaks in the distance. It was a great contrast to Ross's +Creek. Jack paid a deposit on an allotment of land, a bit out of +town, on the river bank, and built a little weather-board box of a +cottage in spare times, and planted roses and grape-vines to hide its +ugliness by and by. It wasn't much of a place, but Clara was mighty +proud of it because it was "our house." They were very happy, and +she was beginning to feel sure of Jack. She seemed to believe that +the miserable old time was all past and gone. + +When the work at the land's office gave out, Jack did all sorts of +jobs about town, and at last, one shearing season, when there was a +heavy clip of wool, and shearers were getting L1 a hundred, he decided +to go out back. I know that Clara was against it, but he argued that +it was the only chance for him, and she persuaded herself that she +could trust him. I was knocking about Solong at the time, and Jack +and I decided to go out together and share his packhorse between us. +He wrote to Beenaway Shed, about three hundred: miles north-west in +the Great Scrubs, and got pens for both of us. + +It was a fine fresh morning when we started; it was in a good season +and the country looked grand. When I rode up to Jack's place I saw +his horse and packhorse tied up outside the gate. He had wanted me to +come up the evening before and have tea with them and camp at his +place for the night. "Come up! man alive!" he said. "We'll make +you a shake-down!" But I wouldn't; I said I had to meet a chap. +Jack wouldn't have understood. I had been up before, but when I saw +him and Clara so happy and comfortable, and thought of the past and my +secret, and thought of myself, a useless, purposeless, restless, +homeless sort of fellow, hanging out at a boarding-house, it nearly +broke me up, and I had to have a drink or two afterwards. I often +wonder if Clara guessed and understood. You never know how much a +woman knows; but--ah, well! + +Jack had taken my things home with him and he and Clara had packed +them. I found afterwards that she had washed, dried and ironed some +collars and handkerchiefs of mine during the night. Clara and Jack +came out to the gate, and as I wouldn't go in to have a cup of tea +there was nothing for it but to say good-bye. She was dressed in a +fresh-looking print blouse and dark skirt, and wore a white hood that +fell back from her head; she was a little girl, with sweet, small, +freckled features, and red-gold hair, and kind, sympathetic grey eyes. +I thought her the freshest, and fairest, and daintiest little woman in +the district. + +I was Jack's mate, so she always treated me as a sort of +brother-in-law, and called me by my Christian name. Mates are closer +than brothers in the bush. + +I turned my back and pretended to tighten the straps and girths on the +packhorse while she said good-bye to Jack. I heard her speaking +earnestly to him, and once I heard her mention Peter M`Laughlan's +name. I thought Jack answered rather impatiently. "Oh, that's all +right, Clara," he said, "that's all over--past and gone. I wish you +would believe it. You promised never to speak of that any more." + +I know how it was. Jack never cared to hear about Peter; he was too +ashamed of the past, perhaps; besides, deep down, we feel a sort of +resentment towards any reference to a man who has helped or saved us +in the past. It's human nature. + +Then they spoke in low tones for a while, and then Jack laughed, and +kissed her, and said, "Oh, I'll be back before the time's up." Then +he ran into the house to say good-bye to Mary's sister, who was +staying with her, and who was laid up with a sprained ankle. + +Then Clara stepped up to me and laid her fingers on my shoulder. +I trembled from head to foot and hoped she didn't notice it. + +"Joe," she said, looking at me with her big, searching grey eyes, +"I believe I can trust you. I want you to look after Jack. You know +why. Never let him have one drink if you can help it. One drink--the +first drink will do it. I want you to promise me that you will never +have a drink with Jack, no matter what happens or what he says." + +"I never will," I said, and I meant it. + +"It's the first time he's been away from me since he gave up +drinking, and if he comes back all right this time I will be sure of +him and contented. But, Joe, if he comes back wrong it will kill me; +it will break my heart. I want you to promise that if anything +happens you will ride or wire for Peter M'Laughlan. I hear he's +wool-sorting this year at Beenaway Station. Promise me that if +anything happens you will ride for Peter M'Laughlan and tell him, no +matter what Jack says." + +"I promise," I said. + +She half-held out her hand to me, but I kept both mine behind my back. +I suppose she thought I didn't notice that she wanted to shake hands +on the bargain; but the truth was that my hands shook so, and I didn't +want her to notice _that_. + +I got on my horse and felt steadier. Then, "Good-bye, +Clara"--"Good-bye, Jack." She bore up bravely, but I saw her eyes +brimming. Jack got on his horse, and I bent over and shook hands with +her. Jack bent down and kissed her while she stood on tiptoe. +"Good-bye, little woman," he said. "Cheer up, and I'll be back +before you know where you are! You mustn't fret--you know why." + +"Good-bye, Jack!"--she was breaking down. + +"Come on, Jack!" I said, and we rode off, turning and waving our +hats to her as she stood by the gate, looking a desolate little thing, +I thought, till we turned down a bend of the road into the river. + +As we jogged along with the packhorse trotting behind us, and the +quart-pots and hobble-chains jingling on the packsaddle, I pictured +Clara running inside, to cry a while in her sister's arms, and then to +bustle round and cheer up, for Jack's sake--and for the sake of +something else. + + +"I'll christen him after you, Joe," said Jack, later on, when we'd +got confidential over our pipes after tea in our first camp. It never +seemed to enter his head that there was the ghost of a chance that it +might be a girl. "I'm glad he didn't come along when I was +drinking," he said. + +And as we lay rolled in our blankets under the stars I swore a big +oath to myself. + +We got along comfortably and reached Beenaway Station in about a week, +the day before the shearers' roll-call. Jack never showed the +slightest inclination to go into a shanty; and several times we talked +about old times and what damned fools we'd been throwing away our +money over shanty bars shouting for loafers and cadgers. "Isn't this +ever so-much better, Joe!" said Jack, as we lay on our blankets +smoking one moonlight night. "There's nothing in boozing, Joe, you +can take it from me. Just you sling it for a year and then look back; +you won't want to touch it again. You've been straight for a couple +of months. Sling it for good, Joe, before it gets a hold on you, like +it did on me." + + +It was the morning after cut-out at Beenaway Shed, and we were glad. +We were tired of the rush and roar and rattle and heat and grease and +blasphemy of the big, hot, iron machine shed in that dusty patch in +the barren scrubs. Swags were rolled up, saddle-bags packed, horses +had been rounded up and driven in, the shearers' cook and his mate had +had their fight, and about a hundred men--shearers, rouseabouts, and +wool-washers--were waiting round the little iron office to get their +cheques. + +We were about half through when one bushman said to another: "Stop +your damned swearin', Jim. Here's Peter M'Laughlan!" Peter walked +up and the men made way for him and he went into the office. There +was always considerably less swearing for a few feet round about where +Peter M'Laughlan happened to be working in a shearing-shed. It seemed +to be an understood thing with the men. He took no advantages, never +volunteered to preach at a shed where he was working, and only spoke +on union subjects when the men asked him to. He was "rep." +(Shearers' Union representative) at this shed, but squatters and +station managers respected him as much as the men did. + +He seemed much greyer now, but still stood square and straight. And +his eyes still looked one through. + +When Peter came out and the crowd had cleared away he took Jack aside +and spoke to him in a low voice for a few minutes. I heard Jack say, +"Oh, that's all right, Peter! You have my word for it," and he got +on his horse. I heard Peter say the one word, "Remember!" "Oh, +that's all right," said Jack, and he shook hands with Peter, shouted, +"Come on, Joe!" and started off with the packhorse after him. + +"I wish I were going down with you, Joe," said Peter to me, "but I can't +get away till to-morrow. I've got that sick rouseabout on my hands, +and I'll have to see him fixed up somehow and started off to the +hospital" (the nearest was a hundred miles away). "And, by the way, +I've taken up a collection for him; I want a few shillings from you, +Joe. I nearly forgot you. The poor fellow only got in about a +fortnight's work, and there's a wife and youngsters in Sydney. I'll +be down after you to-morrow. I promised to go to Comesomehow* and get +the people together and start an agitation for a half-time school +there. Anyway, I'll be there by the end of the week. Good-bye, Joe. I +must get some more money for the rouser from some of those chaps +before they start." + +[ * There is a postal district in new South Wales called "Come-by-Chance"] + +Comesomehow was a wretched cockatoo settlement, a bit off the track, +about one hundred and fifty miles on our road home, where the settlers +lived like savages and the children ran wild. I reckoned that Peter +would have his work cut out to start a craving for education in that +place. + +By saying he'd be there I think he intended to give me a hint, in case +anything happened. I believe now that Jack's wife had got anxious and +had written to him. + +We jogged along comfortably and happily for three or four days, and as +we passed shanty after shanty, and town after town, without Jack +showing the slightest inclination to pull up at any of them, I began +to feel safe about him. + +Then it happened, in the simplest way, as most things of this sort +happen if you don't watch close. + +The third night it rained, rained heavens-hard, and rainy nights can +be mighty cold out on those plains, even in midsummer. Jack and I +rigged up a strip of waterproof stuff we had to cover the swags on the +packhorse, but the rain drove in, almost horizontally, and we got wet +through, blankets, clothes and all. Jack got a bad cold and coughed +fit to break himself; so about daylight, when the rain held up a bit, +we packed up and rode on to the next pub, a wretched little +weather-board place in the scrub. + +Jack reckoned he'd get some stuff for his cold there. I didn't like +to speak, but before we reached the place I said, "You won't touch a +drink, Jack." + +"Do you think I'm a blanky fool?" said Jack, and I shut up. + +The shanty was kept by a man who went by the name of Thomas, a +notorious lamber-down,* as I found out afterwards. He was a big, +awkward bullock of a man, a selfish, ignorant brute, as anyone might +have seen by his face; but he had a loud voice, and adopted a careless, +rollicking, hail-fellow-well-met! come-in-and-sit-down-man-alive! +clap-you-on-the-back style, which deceived a good many, or which a +good many pretended to believe in. His "missus" was an animal of his +own species, but she was duller and didn't bellow. + +[ * "Lamber-down," a shanty keeper who entices cheque-men to drink. ] + +He had a rather good-looking girl there--I don't know +whether she was his daughter or not. They said that when he saw the +shearers coming he'd say, "Run and titivate yourself, Mary; here comes +the shearers!" + +But what surprised me was that Jack Barnes didn't seem able to see +through Thomas; he thought that he was all right, "a bit of a rough +diamond." There are any amount of scoundrels and swindlers knocking +about the world disguised as rough diamonds. + +Jack had a fit of coughing when we came in. + +"Why, Jack!" bellowed Thomas, "that's a regular churchyarder you've +got. Go in to the kitchen fire and I'll mix you a stiff toddy." + +"No, thank you, Thomas," said Jack, glancing at me rather +sheepishly, I thought. "I'll have a hot cup of coffee presently, +that'll do me more good." + +"Why, man alive, one drink won't hurt you!" said Thomas. "I know +you're on the straight, and you know I'm the last man that 'ud try to +get you off it. But you want something for that cold. You don't want +to die on the track, do you? What would your missus say? That cough +of yours is enough to bust a bullock." + +"Jack isn't drinking, Thomas," I said rather shortly, "and neither +am I." + +"I'll have a cup of coffee at breakfast," said Jack; "thank you all +the same, Thomas." + +"Right you are, Jack!" said Thomas. "Mary!" he roared at the girl, +"chuck yerself about and get breakfast, and make a strong cup of +coffee; and I say, missus" (to his wife), "git some honey and +vinegar in a cup, will yer? or see if there's any of that cough stuff +left in the bottle. Go into the kitchen, you chaps, and dry +yourselves at the fire, you're wringing wet." + +Jack went through into the kitchen. I stepped out to see if the +horses were all right, and as I came in again through the bar, Thomas, +who had slipped behind the counter, crooked his finger at me and +poured out a stiff whisky. "I thought you might like to have it on +the quiet," he whispered, with a wink. + +Now, there was this difference between Jack and me. When I was on the +track, and healthy and contented, I could take a drink, or two drinks, +and then leave it; or at other times I could drink all day, or all +night, and be as happy as a lord, and be mighty sick and repentant all +next day, and then not touch drink for a week; but if Jack once +started, he was a lost man for days, for weeks, for, months--as long +as his cash or credit lasted. I felt a cold coming on me this +morning, and wanted a whisky, so I had a drink with Thomas. Then, of +course, I shouted in my turn, keeping an eye out in case Jack should +come in. I went into the kitchen and steamed with Jack for a while in +front of a big log fire, taking care to keep my breath away from him. +Then we went in to breakfast. Those two drinks were all I meant to +have, and we were going right on after breakfast. + +It was a good breakfast, ham and eggs, and we enjoyed it. The two +whiskies had got to work. I hadn't touched drink for a long time. I +shouldn't like to say that Thomas put anything in the drink he gave +me. Before we started breakfast he put a glass down in front of me +and said: + +"There's a good ginger-ale, it will warm you up." + +I tasted it; it was rum, hot. I said nothing. What could I say? + +There was some joke about Jack being married and settled and steadied +down, and me, his old mate, still on the wallaby; and Mrs Thomas said +that I ought to follow Jack's example. And just then I felt a touch +of that loneliness that some men feel when an old drinking mate turns +teetotaller. + +Jack started coughing again, like an old cow with the pleuro. + +"That cough will kill you, Jack," said Thomas. "Let's put a drop +of brandy in your coffee, that won't start you, anyhow; it's real +`Three Star.'" And he reached a bottle from the side-table. + +I should have stood up then, for my manhood, for my mate, and for +little Clara, but I half rose from my chair, and Jack laughed and said, +"Sit down, Joe, you old fool, you're tanked. I know all about your +seeing about the horses and your ginger-ales. It's all right, old man. +Do you think I'm going on the booze? Why, I'll have to hold you on the +horse all day." + +"Here's luck, Joe!" said Jack, laughing, and lifting up his cup of +coffee with the brandy in it. "Here's luck, Joe." + +Then suddenly, and as clearly as I ever heard it, came Clara's voice +to my ear: "Promise me, whatever you do, that you will never have a +drink with Jack." And I felt cold and sick to the stomach. + +I got up and went out. They thought that the drink had made me sick, +but if I'd stayed there another minute I would have tackled Thomas; +and I knew that I needed a clear head to tackle a bullock like him. I +walked about a bit, and when I came in again Jack and Thomas were in +the bar, and Jack had a glass before him. + +"Come on, Joe, you old bounder," said Jack, "come and have a +whisky-and-soda; it will straighten you up." + +"What's that you're drinking, Jack?" I asked. + +"Oh, don't be a fool!" said Jack. "One drink won't hurt me. Do +you think I'm going on the booze? Have a soda and straighten up; we +must make a start directly." + +I remember we had two or three whiskies, and then suddenly I tackled +Thomas, and Jack was holding me back, and laughing and swearing at me +at the same time, and I had a tussle with him; and then I was suddenly +calmer and sensible, and we were shaking hands all round, and Jack was +talking about just one more spree for the sake of old times. + +"A bit of a booze won't hurt me, Joe, you old fool," he said. +"We'll have one more night of it, for the sake of Auld Lang Syne, and +start at daylight in the morning. You go and see to the horses, it +will straighten you up. Take the saddle off and hobble 'em out." + +But I insisted on starting at once, and Jack promised he would. We +were gloriously happy for an hour or so, and then I went to sleep. + +When I woke it was late in the afternoon. I was very giddy and shaky; +the girl brought me a whisky-and-soda, and that steadied me. Some +more shearers had arrived, and Jack was playing cards with two of them +on top of a cask in the bar. Thomas was dead drunk on the floor, or +pretending to be so, and his wife was behind the bar. I went out to +see to the horses; I found them in a bush yard at the back. The +packhorse was rolling in the mud with the pack-saddle and saddlebags +on. One of the chaps helped me take off the saddles and put them in +the harness-room behind the kitchen. + +I'll pass over that night. It wouldn't be very edifying to the great, +steady-living, sober majority, and the others, the never-do-wells, the +rovers, wrecks and failures, will understand only too well without +being told--only too well, God help them! + +When I woke in the morning I couldn't have touched a drink to save my +life. I was fearfully shaky, and swimming about the head, but I put +my head over a tub under the pump and got the girl to pump for a +while, and then I drank a pint of tea and managed to keep it down, and +felt better. + +All through the last half of the night I'd kept saying, in a sort of +drink nightmare, "I'll go for Peter M'Laughlan in the morning. I'll +go for Peter as soon as I can stand!" and repeating Clara Barnes's +words, "Ride for Peter if anything happens. Ride for Peter +M'Laughlan." + +There were drunken shearers, horsemen and swagmen sleeping all over +the place, and in all sorts of odd positions; some on the veranda with +their heads on their swags, one sitting back against the wall, and one +on the broad of his back with his head on the bare boards and his +mouth open. There was another horse rolling in its saddle, and I took +the saddle off. The horse belonged to an English University man. + +I went in to see how Jack was. He was lying in the parlour on a +little, worn-out, horse-hair sofa, that might have seen better days in +some clean home in the woman-and-girl world. He had been drinking and +playing cards till early that morning, and he looked awful--he looked +as if he'd been boozing for a month. + +"See what you've done!" he said, sitting up and glaring at me; then +he said, "Bring me a whisky-and-soda, Joe, for God's sake!" + +I got a whisky-and-soda from the girl and took it to him. + +I talked to him for a while, and at last he said, "Well, go and get +the horses and we'll start." + +I got the horses ready and brought them round to the front, but by +that time he'd had more drink, and he said he wanted to sleep before +he started. Next he was playing cards with one of the chaps, and +asked me to wait till he'd finished that game. I knew he'd keep +promising and humbugging me till there was a row, so at last I got him +aside and said: + +"Look here, Jack, I'm going for Peter M'Laughlan---" + +"Go to hell!" said Jack. + +I put the other horses back in the yard, the saddles in the skillion, +got on my horse and rode off. Thomas and the others asked me no +questions, they took no notice. In a place like that a man could +almost do anything, short of hanging himself, without anyone +interfering or being surprised. And probably, if he did hang himself, +they'd let him swing for a while to get a taste of it. + +Comesomehow was about fifteen miles back on a track off the main road. +I reckoned that I could find Peter and bring him on by the afternoon, +and I rode hard, sick as I was. I was too sick to smoke. + +As it happened, Peter had started early from his last camp and I +caught him just as he was turning off into Comesomehow track. + +"What's up, Joe?" he asked as I rode up to him--but he could see. + +"Jack Barnes is on the booze at Thomas's," I said. + +Peter just looked right through me. Then he turned his horse's head +without a word, and rode back with me. And, after a while, he said, +as if to himself: + +"Poor Clara! Poor little lassie!" + +By the time we reached the shanty it was well on in the afternoon. A +fight was stopped in the first round and voices lowered when the chaps +caught sight of us. As Peter walked into the bar one or two drunks +straightened themselves and took off their hats with drunken +sentiment. + +"Where is Jack Barnes, Thomas?" asked Peter, quietly. + +"He's in there if you want to see him," said Thomas, jerking his +head towards the parlour. + +We went in, and when Peter saw Jack lying there I noticed that swift, +haunted look came into his eyes, as if he'd seen a ghost of the past. +He sat down by the sofa to wait until Jack woke. I thought as he sat +there that his eyes were like a woman's for sympathy and like a dog's +for faithfulness. I was very shaky. + +Presently Thomas looked in. "Is there anything I can do for you, +M'Laughlan?" he asked in as civil a tone as he could get to. + +"Yes," said Peter, "bring me a flask of your best whisky--your own, +mind--and a glass. + +"We shall need the whisky for him on the track, Joe," said Peter, +when the flask came. "Get another glass and a bottle of soda; you +want a nip." He poured out a drink for himself. + +"The first thing we've got to do is to get him away; then I'll soon +put him on his feet. But we'll let him sleep a while longer. I find +I've got business near Solong, and I'm going down with you." + +By and by Jack woke up and glared round, and when he caught sight of +Peter he just reached for his hands and said, "Peter! Thank God +you've come!" Then he said, "But I must have a drink first, Peter." + +"All right, Jack, you shall have a drink," said Peter; and he gave +him a stiff nobblerq. It steadied Jack a bit. + +"Now listen to me, Jack," said Peter. "How much money have you got +left?" + +"I--I can't think," said Jack. "I've got a cheque for twenty pounds +here, sewn inside my shirt." + +"Yes; but you drew thirty-six in three cheques. Where's the rest?" + +"Thomas has ten," said Jack, "and the six--well, the six is gone. +I was playing cards last night." + +Peter stepped out into the bar. + +"Look here, Thomas," he said quietly, "you've got a ten-pound +cheque from Barnes." + +"I know I have." + +"Well, how much of it does he owe you?" + +"The whole, and more." + +"Do you mean to tell me that? He has only been here since yesterday +morning." + +"Yes; but he's been shoutin' all round. Look at all these chaps +here." + +"They only came yesterday afternoon," said Peter. "Here, you had +best take this and give me the cheque;" and Peter laid a five-pound +note on the bar. Thomas bucked at first, but in the end he handed over +the cheque--he had had several warnings from the police. Then he +suddenly lost all control over himself; he came round from behind the +bar and faced Peter. + +"Now, look here, you mongrel parson!" he said. "What the --- do +you mean by coming into my bar and, interfering with me. Who the --- +are you anyway? A ---!" He used the worst oaths that were used in +the bush. "Take off your --- coat!" he roared at last, shaping up +to Peter. + +Peter stepped back a pace and buttoned his coat and threw back his +head. + +"No need to take off my coat, Thomas," he said, "I am ready." + +He said it very quietly, but there was a danger-signal--a red light in +his eyes. He was quiet-voiced but hard-knuckled, as some had reason +to know. + +Thomas balked like a bull at a spread umbrella. Jack lurched past me +as I stood in the parlour door, but I caught him and held him back; +and almost at the same moment a wretched old boozer that we called +"Awful Example," who had been sitting huddled, a dirty bundle of +rags and beard and hair, in the corner of the bar, struggled to his +feet, staggered forward and faced Thomas, looking once again like +something that might have been a man. He snatched a thick glass +bottle from the counter and held it by the neck in his right hand. + + +"Stand back, Thomas!" he shouted. "Lay a hand--lay a finger on +Peter M'Laughlan, and I'll smash your head, as sure as there's a God +above us and I'm a ruined man!" + +Peter took "Awful" gently by the shoulders and sat him down. "You +keep quiet, old man," he said; "nothing is going to happen." +Thomas went round behind the bar muttering something about it not +being worth his while to, etc. + +"You go and get the horses ready, Joe," said Peter to me; "and you +sit down, Jack, and keep quiet." + +"He can get the horses," growled Thomas, from behind the bar, "but +I'm damned if he gets the saddles. I've got them locked up, and I'll +something well keep them till Barnes is sober enough to pay me what he +owes me." + +Just then a tall, good-looking chap, with dark-blue eyes and a long, +light-coloured moustache, stepped into the bar from the crowd on the +veranda. + +"What's all this, Thomas?" he asked. + +"What's that got to do with you, Gentleman Once?" shouted Thomas. + +"I think it's got something to do with me," said Gentleman Once. +"Now, look here, Thomas; you can do pretty well what you like with us +poor devils, and you know it, but we draw the line at Peter +M'Laughlan. If you really itch for the thrashing, you deserve you +must tempt someone else to give it to you." + +"What the --- are you talking about?" snorted Thomas. "You're drunk +or ratty!" + +"What's the trouble, M'Laughlan?" asked Gentleman Once, turning to +Peter. "No trouble at all, Gentleman Once," said Peter; "thank you +all the same. I've managed worse men than our friend Thomas. Now, +Thomas, don't you think it would pay you best to hand over the key of +the harness-room and have done with this nonsense? I'm a patient +man--a very patient man--but I've not always been so, and the old +blood comes up sometimes, you know." + +Thomas couldn't stand this sort of language, because he couldn't +understand it. He threw the key on the bar and told us to clear out. + +We were all three very quiet riding along the track that evening. +Peter gave Jack a nip now and again from the flask, and before we +turned in in camp he gave him what he called a soothing draught from a +little medicine chest that he carried in his saddle-bag. Jack seemed +to have got rid of his cough; he slept all night, and in the morning, +after he'd drunk a pint of mutton-broth that Peter had made in one of +the billies, he was all right--except that he was quiet and ashamed. +I had never known him to be so quiet, and for such a length of time, +since we were boys together. He had learned his own weakness; he'd +lost all his cocksureness. I know now just exactly how he felt. He +felt as if his sober year had been lost and he would have to live it +all over again. + +Peter didn't preach. He just jogged along and camped with us as if he +were an ordinary, every-day mate. He yarned about all sorts of +things. He could tell good yarns, and when he was fairly on you could +listen to him all night. He seemed to have been nearly all over the +world. Peter never preached except when he was asked to hold service +in some bush pub, station-homestead or bush church. But in a case +like ours he had a way of telling a little life story, with something +in it that hit the young man he wanted to reform, and hit him hard. +He'd generally begin quietly, when we were comfortable with our pipes +in camp after tea, with "I once knew a young man--" or "That +reminds me of a young fellow I knew--" and so on. You never knew +when he was going to begin; or when he was going to hit you. In our +last camp, before we reached Solong, he told two of his time-fuse +yarns. I haven't time to tell them now, but one stuffed up my pipe +for a while, and made Jack's hand tremble when he tried to light his. +I'm glad it was too dark to see our faces. We lay a good while +afterwards, rolled in our blankets, and couldn't get to sleep for +thinking; but Peter seemed to fall asleep as soon as he turned in. + +Next day he told Jack not to tell Clara that he'd come down with us. +He said he wouldn't go right into Solong with us; he was going back +along another road to stay a day or two with an old friend of his. + +When we reached Solong we stopped on the river-bank just out of sight +of Jack's house. Peter took the ten-pound cheque from his pocket and +gave it to Jack. Jack hadn't seen Peter give the shanty-keeper the +five-pound note. + +"But I owed Thomas something," said Jack, staring. "However did +you manage to get the cheque out of him?" + +"Never mind, Jack, I managed," said Peter. + +Jack sat silent for a while, then he began to breathe hard. + +"I don't know what to say, Peter." + +"Say nothing, Jack. Only promise me that you will give Clara the +cheques as soon as you go home, and let her take care of the cash for +a while." + +"I will," said Jack. + +Jack looked down at the ground for a while, then he lifted his head +and looked Peter in the eyes. + +"Peter," he said, "I can't speak. I'm ashamed to make a promise; +I've broken so many. I'll try to thank you in a year's time from now." + +"I ask for no promises," said Peter, and he held out his hand. Jack +gripped it. + +"Aren't you coming home with me, Joe?" he asked. + +"No," I said; "I'll go into town. See you in the morning." + +Jack rode on. When he got along a piece Peter left his horse and +moved up to the head of the lane to watch Jack, and I followed. As +Jack neared the cottage we saw a little figure in a cloak run out to +the front gate. She had heard the horses and the jingle of the +camp-ware on the pack-saddle. We saw Jack jump down and take her in +his arms. I looked at Peter, and as he watched them, something, that +might have been a strange look of the old days, came into his eyes. + +He shook hands with me. "Good-bye, Joe." + +He rode across the river again. He took the track that ran +along the foot of the spurs by the river, and up over a gap in the +curve of blue hills, and down and out west towards the Big Scrubs. +And as he rounded the last spur, with his packhorse trotting after +him, I thought he must have felt very lonely. And I felt lonely too. + + + + +THE STORY OF "GENTLEMAN ONCE" + + They learn the world from black-sheep, + Who know it all too well. + -Out Back. + +Peter M'Laughlan, bush missionary, Joe Wilson and his mate, Jack +Barnes, shearers for the present, and a casual swagman named Jack +Mitchell, were camped at Cox's Crossing in a bend of Eurunderee Creek. + +It was a grassy little flat with gum-trees standing clear and clean +like a park. At the back was the steep grassy siding of a ridge, and +far away across the creek to the south a spur from the Blue Mountain +range ran west, with a tall, blue granite peak showing clear in the +broad moonlight, yet dream-like and distant over the sweeps of dark +green bush. + +There was the jingle of hobble-chains and a crunching at the grass +where the horses moved in the soft shadows amongst the trees. Up the +creek on the other side was a surveyors' camp, and from there now and +again came the sound of a good voice singing verses of old songs; and +later on the sound of a violin and a cornet being played, sometimes +together and sometimes each on its own. + +Wilson and Barnes were on their way home from shearing out back in the +great scrubs at Beenaway Shed. They had been rescued by Peter +M`Laughlan from a wayside shanty where they had fallen, in spite of +mutual oaths and past promises, sacred and profane, because they had +got wringing wet in a storm on the track and caught colds, and had +been tempted to take just one drink. + +They were in a bad way, and were knocking down their cheques +beautifully when Peter M'Laughlan came along. He rescued them and +some of their cash from the soulless shanty keeper, and was riding +home with them, on some pretence, because he had known them as boys, +because Joe Wilson had a vein of poetry in him--a something in +sympathy with something in Peter; because Jack Barnes had a dear +little girl-wife who was much too good for him, and who was now +anxiously waiting for him in the pretty little farming town of Solong +amongst the western spurs. Because, perhaps, of something in Peter's +early past which was a mystery. Simply and plainly because Peter +M'Laughlan was the kindest, straightest and truest man in the West-- +a "white man." + +They all knew Mitchell and welcomed him heartily when he turned up in +their camp, because he was a pathetic humorist and a kindly cynic--a +"joker" or "hard case" as the bushmen say. + +Peter was about fifty and the other three were young men. + +There was another man in camp who didn't count and was supposed to be +dead. Old Danny Quinn, champion "beer-chewer" of the district, was +on his way out, after a spree, to one of Rouse's stations, where, for +the sake of past services--long past--and because of old times, he was +supposed to be working. He had spent his last penny a week before and +had clung to his last-hope hotel until the landlord had taken him in +one hand and his swag in the other and lifted them clear of the +veranda. Danny had blundered on, this far, somehow; he was the last +in the world who could have told how, and had managed to light a fire; +then he lay with his head on his swag and enjoyed nips of whisky in +judicious doses and at reasonable intervals, and later on a tot of +mutton-broth, which he made in one of the billies. + +It was after tea. Peter sat on a log by the fire with Joe and Jack +Mitchell on one side and Jack Barnes on the other. Jack Mitchell sat +on the grass with his back to the log, his knees drawn up, and his +arms abroad on them: his most comfortable position and one which +seemed to favour the flow of his philosophy. They talked of bush +things or reflected, sometimes all three together, sometimes by turns. + +From the surveyors' camp: + + I remember, I remember, + The house where I was born, + The little window where the sun + Came peeping in at morn--- + +The breeze from the west strengthened and the voice was blown +away. + +"That chap seems a bit sentimental but he's got a good voice," +said Mitchell. Then presently he remarked, round his pipe: + +"I wonder if old Danny remembers?" And presently Peter said +quietly, as if the thought had just occurred to him: + +"By the way, Mitchell, I forgot to ask after your old folk. I knew +your father, you know." + +"Oh, they're all right, Peter, thank you." + +"Heard from them lately?" asked Peter, presently, in a lazy tone. + +Mitchell straightened himself up. "N--no. To tell the truth, Peter, I +haven't written for--I don't know how long." + +Peter smoked reflectively. + +"I remember your father well, Jack," he said. "He was a big-hearted man." + +Old Danny was heard remonstrating loudly with spirits from a warmer +clime than Australia, and Peter stepped over to soothe him. + +"I thought I'd get it, directly after I opened my mouth," said +Mitchell. "I suppose it will be your turn next, Joe." + +"I suppose so," said Joe, resignedly. + +The wind fell. + + I remember, I remember, + And it gives me little joy, + To think I'm further off from heaven, + Than when I was a boy! + +When Peter came back another thought seemed to have occurred to him. + +"How's your mother getting on, Joe?" he asked. "She shifted to +Sydney after your father died, didn't she?" + +"Oh, she's getting on all right!" said Joe, without elaboration. + +"Keeping a boarding-house, isn't she?" + +"Yes," said Joe. + +"Hard to make ends meet, I suppose?" said Peter. "It's almost a +harder life than it could have been on the old selection, and there's +none of the old independence about it. A woman like your mother must +feel it, Joe." + +"Oh, she's all right," said Joe. "She's used to it by this time. +I manage to send her a few pounds now and again. I send her all I +can," he added resentfully. + +Peter sat corrected for a few moments. Then he seemed to change the +subject. + +"It's some time since you were in Sydney last, isn't it, Joe?' + +"Yes, Peter," said Joe. "I haven't been there for two years. I +never did any good there. I'm far better knocking about out back." + +There was a pause. + +"Some men seem to get on better in one place, some in another," +reflected Mitchell, lazily. "For my part, I seem to get on better in +another." + +Peter blinked, relit his pipe with a stick from the fire and +reflected. + +The surveyor's song had been encored: + + I remember, I remember--- + +Perhaps Peter remembered. Joe did, but there were no vines round the +house where he was born, only drought and dust, and raspy voices +raised in recrimination, and hardship most times. + +"I remember," said Peter, quietly, "I remember a young fellow at +home in the old country. He had every advantage. He had a +first-class education, a great deal more money than he needed--almost +as much as he asked for, and nearly as much freedom as he wanted. His +father was an English gentleman and his mother an English lady. They +were titled people, if I remember rightly. The old man was proud, but +fond of his son; he only asked him to pay a little duty or respect now +and again. We don't understand these things in Australia--they seem +formal and cold to us. The son paid his respects to his father +occasionally--a week or so before he'd be wanting money, as a rule. +The mother was a dear lady. She idolized her son. She only asked for +a little show of affection from him, a few days or a week of his +society at home now and then--say once in three months. But he +couldn't spare her even that--his time was taken up so much in +fashionable London and Paris and other places. He would give the +world to be able to take his proud, soft old father's hand now and +look into his eyes as one man who understands another. He would be +glad and eager to give his mother twelve months out of the year if he +thought it would make her happier. It has been too late for more than +twenty years." + +Old Danny called for Peter. + +Mitchell jerked his head approvingly and gave a sound like a sigh +and chuckle conjoined, the one qualifying the other. + +"I told you you'd get it, Joe," he said. + +"I don't see how it hits me," said Joe. + +"But it hit all the same, Joe." + +"Well, I suppose it did," said Joe, after a short pause. + +"He wouldn't have hit you so hard if you hadn't tried to parry," +reflected Mitchell. "It's your turn now, Jack." + +Jack Barnes said nothing. + +"Now I know that Peter would do anything for a woman or child, or an +honest, straight, hard-up chap," said Mitchell, straightening out his +legs and folding his arms, "but I can't quite understand his being so +partial to drunken scamps and vagabonds, black sheep and +never-do-wells. He's got a tremendous sympathy for drunks. He'd do +anything to help a drunken man. Ain't it marvellous? It's my private +opinion that Peter must have been an awful boozer and scamp in his +time." + +The other two only thought. Mitchell was privileged. He was a young +man of freckled, sandy complexion, and quizzical grey eyes. "Sly +Joker" "could take a rise out of anyone on the quiet;" "You could +never tell when he was getting at you;" "Face of a born comedian," +as bushmen said of Mitchell. But he would probably have been a dead +and dismal failure on any other stage than that of wide Australia. + +Peter came back and they sat and smoked, and maybe they reflected +along four very different back-tracks for a while. + +The surveyor started to sing again: + + I have heard the mavis singing + Her love-song to the morn. + I have seen the dew-drop clinging + To the rose just newly born. + +They smoked and listened in silence all through to the end. It was +very still. The full moon was high. The long white slender branches +of a box-tree stirred gently overhead; the she-oaks in the creek +sighed as they are always sighing, and the southern peak seemed ever +so far away. + + That has made me thine for ever! + Bonny Mary of Argyle. + +"Blarst my pipe!" exclaimed Mitchell, suddenly. "I beg your +pardon, Peter. My pipe's always getting stuffed up," and he +proceeded to shell out and clear his pipe. + +The breeze had changed and strengthened. They heard the violin +playing "Annie Laurie." + +"They must be having a Scotch night in that camp tonight," said +Mitchell. The voice came again: + + Maxwelton Braes are bonny-- + Where early fa's the dew, + For 'twas there that Annie Laurie + Gie me her promise true--- + +Mitchell threw out his arm impatiently. "I wish they wouldn't play +and sing those old songs," he said. "They make you think of damned +old things. I beg your pardon, Peter." + +Peter sat leaning forward, his elbows resting on his knees and his +hands fingering his cold pipe nervously. His sad eyes had grown +haggard and haunted. It is in the hearts of exiles in new lands that +the old songs are felt. + +"Take no thought of the morrow, Mitchell," said Peter, abstractedly. +"I beg your pardon, Mitchell. I mean---" + +"That's all right, Peter," said Mitchell. "You're right; to-morrow +is the past, as far as I'm concerned." + + Peter blinked down at him as if he were a new species. + +"You're an odd young man, Mitchell," he said. "You'll have to take +care of that head of yours or you'll be found hanging by a +saddle-strap to a leaning tree on a lonely track, or find yourself in +a lunatic asylum before you're forty-five." + +"Or else I'll be a great man," said Mitchell. "But--ah, well!" + +Peter turned his eyes to the fire and smiled sadly. "Not enjoyment +and not sorrow, is our destined end or way," he repeated to the fire. + +"But we get there just the same," said Mitchell, "destined or +not." + + But to live, that each to-morrow, + Finds us further than to-day! + +"Why, that just fits my life, Peter," said Mitchell. "I might have +to tramp two or three hundred miles before I get a cut* or a job, +and if to-morrow didn't find me nearer than to-day I'd starve or die +of thirst on a dry stretch." + +[ * Cut--a pen or "stand" in a shearing shed ] + +"Why don't you get married and settle down, Mitchell?" asked Peter, +a little tired. "You're a teetotaller." + +"If I got married I couldn't settle down," said Mitchell. "I +reckon I'd be the loneliest man in Australia." Peter gave him a +swift glance. "I reckon I'd be single no matter how much married I +might be. I couldn't get the girl I wanted, and--ah, well!" + +Mitchell's expression was still quaintly humorous round the lower part +of his face, but there was a sad light in his eyes. The strange light +as of the old dead days, and he was still young. + +The cornet had started in the surveyors' camp. + +"Their blooming tunes seem to fit in just as if they knew what we were +talking about," remarked Mitchell. + +The cornet: + + You'll break my heart, you little bird, + That sings upon the flowering thorn + Thou mind'st me of departed joys, + Departed never to return. + +"Damn it all," said Mitchell, sitting up, "I'm getting +sentimental." Then, as if voicing something that was troubling him, +"Don't you think a woman pulls a man down as often as she lifts him +up, Peter?" + +"Some say so," said Peter. + +"Some say so, and they write it, too," said Mitchell. + +"Sometimes it seems to me as if women were fated to drag a man down +ever since Adam's time. If Adam hadn't taken his wife's advice--but +there, perhaps he took her advice a good many times and found it good, +and, just because she happened to be wrong this time, and to get him +into a hole, the sons of Adam have never let the daughters of Eve hear +the last of it. That's human nature." + +Jack Barnes, the young husband, who was suffering a recovery, had been +very silent all the evening. "I think a man's a fool to always +listen to his wife's advice," he said, with the unreasonable +impatience of a man who wants to think while others are talking. +"She only messes him up, and drives him to the devil as likely as +not, and gets a contempt for him in the end." + +Peter gave him a surprised, reproachful look, and stood up. He paced +backwards and forwards on the other side of the fire, with his hands +behind his back for a while; then he came and settled himself on the +log again and filled his pipe. + +"Yes," he said, "a man can always find excuses for himself when his +conscience stings him. He puts mud on the sting. Man at large is +beginning all over the world to rake up excuses for himself; he +disguises them as `Psychological studies,' and thinks he is clean and +clever and cultured, or he calls 'em problems--the sex problem, for +instance, and thinks he is brave and fearless." + +Danny was in trouble again, and Peter went to him. He complained that +when he lay down he saw the faces worse, and he wanted to be propped +up somehow, so Peter got a pack-saddle and propped the old man's +shoulders up with that. + +"I remember," Peter began, when he came back to the fire, "I remember +a young man who got married---" + +Mitchell hugged himself. He knew Jack Barnes. He knew that Jack had +a girl-wife who was many times too good for him; that Jack had been +wild, and had nearly broken her heart, and he had guessed at once that +Jack had broken out again, and that Peter M'Laughlan was shepherding +him home. Mitchell had worked as mates with Jack, and liked him +because of the good heart that was in him in spite of all; and, +because he liked him, he was glad that Jack was going to get a +kicking, so to speak, which might do him good. Mitchell saw it coming, +as he said afterwards, and filled his pipe, and settled himself +comfortably to listen. + +"I remember the case of a naturally selfish young man who got +married" said Peter. "He didn't know he was selfish; in fact, he +thought he was too much the other way--but that doesn't matter now. +His name was--well, we'll call him--we'll call him, `Gentleman Once.'" + +"Do you mean Gentleman Once that we saw drinking back at Thomas's +shanty?" asked Joe. + +"No," said Peter, "not him. There have been more than one in the +bush who went by the nickname of `Gentleman Once.' I knew one or two. +It's a big clan, the clan of Gentleman Once, and scattered all over +the world." + +"By the way," said Mitchell--"excuse me for interrupting, +Peter--but wasn't old Danny, there, a gentleman once? I've heard +chaps say he was." + +"I know he was," said Peter. + +"Gentleman Once! Who's talking about Gentleman Once?" said an awful +voice, suddenly and quickly. "About twenty or thirty years ago I was +called Gentleman Once or Gentleman Jack, I don't know which--Get out! +_Get out_, I say! It's all lies, and you're the devil. There's +four devils sitting by the fire. I see them." + +Two of the four devils by the fire looked round, rather startled. + +Danny was sitting up, his awful bloodshot eyes glaring in the +firelight, and his ruined head looking like the bloated head of a +hairy poodle that had been drowned and dried. Peter went to the old +man and soothed him by waving off the snakes and devils with his +hands, and telling them to go. + +"I've heard Danny on the Gentleman Once racket before," remarked +Mitchell. + +"Seems funny, doesn't it, for a man to be proud of the fact that he +was called `Gentleman Once' about twenty years ago?" + +"Seems more awful than funny to me," said Joe. + +"You're right, Joe," said Mitchell. "But the saddest things are +often funny." + +When Peter came back he went on with his story, and was +only interrupted once or twice by Danny waking up and calling him to +drive off the snakes, and green and crimson dogs with crocodile heads, +and devils with flaming tails, and those unpleasant sorts of things +that force their company on boozers and madmen. + +"Gentleman Once," said Peter, "he came from the old country with a +good education and no character. He disgraced himself and family +once too often and came, or was sent, out to Australia to reform. +It's a great mistake. If a man is too far gone, or hasn't the strength +to live the past down and reform at home, he won't do it in a new +country, unless a combination of circumstances compels him to it. +A man rises by chance; just as often he falls by chance. Some men +fall into the habit of keeping steady and stick to it, for the +novelty of it, until they are on their feet and in their sane minds +and can look at the past, present and future sensibly. I knew one +case--But that's got nothing to do with the story. + +"Gentleman Once came out on the remittance system. That system is +fatal in nine cases out of ten. The remittance system is an insult to +any manhood that may be left in the black sheep, and an insult to the +land he is sent to. The cursed quarterly allowance is a stone round +his neck which will drag him down deeper in a new land than he would +have fallen at home. You know that remittance men are regarded with +such contempt in the bush that a man seldom admits he is one, save +when he's drunk and reckless and wants money or credit. When a +ne'er-do-well lands in Melbourne or Sydney without a penny he will +probably buck-up and do something for himself. When he lands with +money he will probably spend it all in the first few months and then +straighten up, because he has to. But when he lands on the remittance +system he drinks, first to drown homesickness. He decides that he'll +wait till he gets his next quarter's allowance and then look round. +He persuades himself that it's no use trying to do anything: that, in +fact, he can't do anything until he gets his money. When he gets it +he drifts into one `last' night with chums he has picked up in second +and third-rate hotels. He drinks from pure selfishness. No matter +what precautions his friends at home take, he finds means of getting +credit or drawing on his allowance before it is due--until he is two +or three quarters behind. He drinks because he feels happy and jolly +and clever and good-natured and brave and honest while he is drinking. +Later on he drinks because he feels the reverse of all these things +when he is sober. He drinks to drown the past and repentance. He +doesn't know that a healthy-minded man doesn't waste time in +repenting. He doesn't know how easy it is to reform, and is too +weak-willed to try. He gets a muddled idea that the past can't be +mended. He finds it easy to get drink and borrow money on the +strength of his next quarter's allowance, so he soon gets a quarter or +two behind, and sometimes gets into trouble connected with borrowed +money. He drifts to the bush and drinks, to drown the past only. The +past grows blacker and blacker until it is a hell without repentance; +and often the black sheep gets to that state when a man dreads his +sober hours. And the end? Well, you see old Danny there, and you saw +old Awful Example back at Thomas's shanty--he's worse than Danny, if +anything. Sometimes the end comes sooner. I saw a young +new-land-new-leaf man dying in a cheap lodging-house in Sydney. He +was a schoolmate of mine, by the way. For six weeks he lay on his +back and suffered as I never saw a man suffer in this world; and I've +seen some bad cases. They had to chloroform him every time they +wanted to move him. He had affected to be hard and cynical, and I +must say that he played it out to the end. It was a strong character, +a strong mind sodden and diseased with drink. He never spoke of home +and his people except when he was delirious. He never spoke, even to +me, of his mental agony. That was English home training. You young +Australians wouldn't understand it; most bushmen are poets and +emotional. + +"My old schoolmate was shifted to the Sydney Hospital at last, and +consented to the amputation of one leg. But it was too late. He was +gone from the hips down. Drink--third-rate hotel and bush shanty +drink--and low debauchery." + +Jack Barnes drew up his leg and rubbed it surreptitiously. He had +"pins and needles." Mitchell noticed and turned a chuckle into a +grunt. + +"Gentleman Once was a remittance man," continued Peter. "But +before he got very far he met an Australian girl in a boarding-house. +Her mother was the landlady. They were bush people who had drifted to +the city. The girl was pretty, intelligent and impulsive. She pitied +him and nursed him. He wasn't known as Gentleman Once then, he hadn't +got far enough to merit the nickname." + +Peter paused. Presently he jerked his head, as if he felt a spasm of +pain, and leaned forward to get a stick from the fire to light his +pipe. + +"Now, there's the girl who marries a man to reform him, and when she +has reformed him never lets him hear the last of it. Sometimes, as a +woman, she drives him back again. But this was not one of that sort +of girls. I once held a theory that sometimes a girl who has married +a man and reformed him misses in the reformed man the something which +attracted her in the careless scamp, the something which made her love +him--and so she ceases to love him, and their married life is a far +more miserable one than it would have been had he continued drinking. +I hold no theory of that kind now. Such theories ruin many married +lives." + +Peter jerked his head again as if impatient with a thought, and +reached for a fire-stick. + +"But that's got nothing to do with the story. When Gentleman Once +reformed his natural selfishness came back. He saw that he had +made a mistake. It's a terrible thing for a young man, a few months, +perhaps a few weeks after his marriage, to ask himself the question, +`Have I made a mistake?' But Gentleman Once wasn't to be pitied. +He discovered that he had married beneath him in intellect and +education. Home training again. He couldn't have discovered that +he had married beneath him as far as birth was concerned, for his +wife's father had been a younger son of an older and greater family +than his own--But Gentleman Once wouldn't have been cad enough to +bother about birth. I'll do him that much justice. He discovered, +or thought he did, that he and his wife could never have one thought +in common; that she couldn't possibly understand him. I'll tell you +later on whether he was mistaken or not. He was gloomy most times, +and she was a bright, sociable, busy little body. When she tried to +draw him out of himself he grew irritable. Besides, having found +that they couldn't have a thought in common he ceased to bother to +talk to her. There are many men who don't bother talking to their +wives; they don't think their wives feel it--because the wives cease +to complain after a while; they grow tired of trying to make the man +realize how they suffer. Gentleman Once tried his best--according to +his lights--and weakness. Then he went in for self-pity and all the +problems. He liked to brood, and his poor little wife's energy and +cheerfulness were wearying to him. He wanted to be left alone. +They were both high-spirited, in different ways; she was highly strung +and so was he--because of his past life mostly. They quarrelled badly +sometimes. Then he drank again and she stuck to him. Perhaps the +only time he seemed cheerful and affectionate was when he had a few +drinks in him. It was a miserable existence--a furnished room in a +cheap lodging-house, and the use of the kitchen. + +"He drank alone. + +"Now a dipsomaniac mostly thinks he is in the right--except, perhaps, +after he has been forced to be sober for a week. The noblest woman in +the world couldn't save him--everything she does to reform him +irritates him; but a strong friend can save him sometimes--a man who +has been through it himself. The poor little wife of Gentleman Once +went through it all. And she stuck to him. She went into low pubs +after him." + +Peter shuddered again. "She went through it all. He swore promises. +He'd come home sober and fill her with hope of future happiness, and +swear that he'd never take another glass. `And we'll be happy yet, my +poor boy,' she'd say, `we'll be happy yet. I believe you, I trust +you' (she used to call him her `bonny boy' when they were first +married). And next night he'd come home worse than ever. And one day +he--he struck her!" + +Peter shuddered, head and shoulders, like a man who had accidentally +smashed his finger. + +"And one day he struck her. He was sober when he did it--anyhow he +had not taken drink for a week. A man is never sober who gets drunk +more than once a week, though he might think he is. I don't know how +it happened, but anyway he struck her, and that frightened him. He +got a billet in the Civil Service up-country. No matter in what town +it was. The little wife hoped for six months. + +"I think it's a cruel thing that a carelessly selfish young man +cannot realize how a sensitive young wife suffers for months after he +has reformed. How she hopes and fears, how she dreads the moment he +has to leave her, and frets every hour he is away from home--and +suffers mental agony when he is late. How the horror of the wretched +old past time grows upon her until she dares not think of it. How she +listens to his step and voice and watches his face, when he comes +home, for a sign of drink. A young man, a mate of mine, who drank +hard and reformed, used to take a delight in pretending for a few +minutes to be drunk when he came home. He was good-hearted, but +dense. He said he only did it to give his wife a pleasant surprise +afterwards. I thought it one of the most cruel things I had ever +seen. + +"Gentleman Once found that he could not stand the routine of office +work and the dull life in that place. He commenced to drink again, +and went on till he lost his billet. They had a little boy, a bright +little boy, yet the father drank. + +"The last spree was a terrible one. He was away from home a +fortnight, and in that fortnight he got down as deep as a man could +get. Then another man got hold of him and set him on his feet, and +straightened him up. The other man was a ruined doctor, a wreck whose +devil was morphia. I don't hold that a man's salvation is always in +his own hands; I've seen mates pull mates out of hell too often to +think that. + +"Then Gentleman Once saw the past as he had never seen it before--he +saw hope for the future with it. And he swore an oath that he felt he +would keep. + +"He suffered from reaction on his way home, and, as he neared the +town, a sudden fear, born of his nervous state, no doubt, sent a cold, +sick emptiness through him: `Was it too late?' + +"As he turned into the street where he lived, he noticed a little +group of bush larrikins standing at the corner. And they moved +uneasily when they caught sight of him, and, as he passed, they +touched and lifted their hats to him. Now he knew that he had lost +the respect even of bush larrikins; and he knew enough of the bush to +know that a bushman never lifts his hat to a man--only to death, and a +woman sometimes. He hurried home and read the truth in his wife's +eyes. His little boy was dead. He went down under the blow, and she +held his head to her breast and kept saying. `My poor boy, my poor +boy!' + +"It was he that she meant, not the boy she had lost. She knew him, +she understood him better than he did himself, and, heart-broken as +she was, she knew how he was going to suffer, and comforted him. `My +poor boy, my poor, foolish boy!' + +"He mended the past, as far as he could, during the next two years, +and she seemed happy. He was very gentle, he was very kind to her. +He was happy, too, in a new, strange way. But he had learned what it +was to suffer through his own fault, and now he was to learn what it +was to suffer through no fault of his own, and without the consolation +of saying `I was wrong! I was to blame!' At the end of the two years +there was another child, and his wife died." + +The four sat silently smoking until Jack Barnes asked: + +"And what did he do then, Peter?" + +"Who?" said Peter, abstractedly. + +"Why, Gentleman Once." + +Peter roused himself. + +"Well, I've told the story, and it is about time to turn in," he +said. "I can't say exactly what Gentleman Once did when his wife +died. He might have gone down to a deeper depth than Danny's. He +might have risen higher than he had ever been before. From what I +knew of his character he would never have gone down an easy slope as +Danny has done. He might have dropped plump at first and then climbed +up. Anyway, he had the memory of the last two years to help him. + +"Then there's the reformed drunkard who has trained himself to take a +drink when he needs it, to drink in moderation--he's the strongest +character of all, I think--but it's time to turn in." + +The cornet up the creek was playing a march. + +Peter walked across and looked at Danny, who seemed to be sleeping as +peacefully as could be expected of him. + +Jack Barnes got up and walked slowly down the creek in the moonlight. +He wanted to think. + +Peter rolled out his blankets on the grass and arranged his +saddle-bags for a pillow. Before he turned in Mitchell shook hands +with him, a most unusual and unnecessary proceeding in camp. But +there's something in the bush grip which means "I know," or "I +understand." + +Joe Wilson rolled out his blankets close to Mitchell's camp; he wanted +to enjoy some of Mitchell's quiet humour before he went to sleep, but +Mitchell wasn't in a philosophical mood. He wanted to reflect. + +"I wonder who Gentleman Once was?" said Joe to Mitchell. "Could he +have been Danny, or old Awful Example back there at the shanty?" + +"Dunno," said Mitchell. He puffed three long puffs at his pipe, and +then said, reflectively: + +"I've heard men tell their own stories before to-night Joe." + +It was Joe who wanted to think now. + + +About four o'clock Mitchell woke and stood up. Peter was lying rolled +in his blanket with his face turned to the west. The moon was low, +the shadows had shifted back, and the light was on Peter's face. +Mitchell stood looking at him reverently, as a grown son might who +sees his father asleep for the first time. Then Mitchell quietly got +some boughs and stuck them in the ground at a little distance from +Peter's head, to shade his face from the bright moonlight; and then he +turned in again to sleep till the sun woke him. + + + + +THE GHOSTS OF MANY CHRISTMASES + + +Did you ever trace back your Christmas days?--right back to the days +when you were innocent and Santa Claus was real. At times you thought +you were very wicked, but you never realize how innocent you were +until you've grown up and knocked about the world. + +Let me think! + +Christmas in an English village, with bare hedges and trees, and +leaden skies that lie heavy on our souls as we walk, with overcoat and +umbrella, sons of English exiles and exiles in England, and think of +bright skies and suns overhead, and sweeps of country disappearing +into the haze, and blue mountain ranges melting into the azure of +distant lower skies, and curves of white and yellow sand beaches, and +runs of shelving yellow sandstone sea-walls--and the glorious Pacific! +Sydney Harbour at sunrise, and the girls we took to Manly Beach. + +Christmas in a London flat. Gloom and slush and soot. It is not the +cold that affects us Australians so much, but the horrible gloom. We +get heart-sick for the sun. + +Christmas at sea--three Christmases, in fact--one going saloon from +Sydney to Westralia early in the Golden Nineties with funds; and one, +the Christmas after next, coming back steerage with nothing but the +clothes we'd slept in. All of which was bad judgment on our part--the +order and manner of our going and coming should have been reversed. + +Christmas in a hessian tent in "th' Westren," with so many old mates +from the East that it was just old times over again. We had five +pounds of corned beef and a kerosene-tin to boil it in; and while we +were talking of old things the skeleton of a kangaroo-dog grabbed the +beef out of the boiling water and disappeared into the scrub--which +made it seem more like old times than ever. + +Christmas going to New Zealand, with experience, by the s.s. +_Tasmania_. We had plum duff, but it was too "soggy" for +us to eat. We dropped it overboard, lest it should swamp the +boat--and it sank to the ooze. The Tasmania was saved on that +occasion, but she foundered next year outside Gisborne. Perhaps the +cook had made more duff. There was a letter from a sweetheart of mine +amongst her mails when she went down; but that's got nothing to do +with it, though it made some difference in my life. + +Christmas on a new telegraph line with a party of lining gangmen in +New Zealand. There was no duff nor roast because there was no +firewood within twenty miles. The cook used to pile armfuls of +flax-sticks under the billies, and set light to them when the last man +arrived in camp. + +Christmas in Sydney, with a dozen invitations out to dinner. The one +we accepted was to a sensible Australian Christmas dinner; a typical +one, as it should be, and will be before the Commonwealth is many +years old. Everything cold except the vegetables, the hose playing on +the veranda and vines outside, the men dressed in sensible pyjama-like +suits, and the women and girls fresh and cool and jolly, instead of +being hot and cross and looking like boiled carrots, and feeling like +boiled rags, and having headaches after dinner, as would have been the +case had they broiled over the fire in a hot kitchen all the blazing +forenoon to cook a scalding, indigestible dinner, as many Australian +women do, and for no other reason than that it was the fashion in +England. One of those girls was very pretty and--ah, well!-- + +Christmas dinner in a greasy Sydney sixpenny restaurant, that opened a +few days before with brass band going at full blast at the door by way +of advertisement. "Roast-beef, one! Cabbage and potatoes, one! +Plum pudding, two!" (That was the first time I dined to music.) The +Christmas dinner was a good one, but my appetite was spoilt by the +expression of the restaurant keeper, a big man with a heavy jowl, who +sat by the door with a cold eye on the sixpences, and didn't seem to +have much confidence in human nature. + + +Christmas--no, that was New Year--on the Warrego River, out back (an +alleged river with a sickly stream that looked like bad milk). We +spent most of that night hunting round in the dark and feeling on the +ground for camel and horse droppings with which to build fires and +make smoke round our camp to keep off the mosquitoes. The mosquitoes +started at sunset and left off at daybreak, when the flies got to work +again. + +Christmas dinner under a brush shearing-shed. Mutton and plum +pudding--and fifty miles from beer! + +An old bush friend of mine, one Jimmy Nowlett, who ranked as a +bullock-driver, told me of a Christmas time he had. He was cut off by +the floods with his team, and had nothing to eat for four days but +potatoes and honey. He said potatoes dipped in honey weren't so bad; +but he had to sleep on bullock yokes laid on the ground to keep him +out of the water, and he got a toothache that paralysed him all down +one side. + +And speaking of plum pudding, I consider it one of the most barbarous +institutions of the British. It is a childish, silly, savage +superstition; it must have been a savage inspiration, looking at it +all round--but then it isn't so long since the British were savages. + +I got a letter last year from a mate of mine in Western +Australia--prospecting the awful desert out beyond White +Feather--telling me all about a "perish" he did on plum pudding. He +and his mates were camped at the Boulder Soak with some three or four +hundred miles--mostly sand and dust--between them and the nearest +grocer's shop. They ordered a case of mixed canned provisions from +Perth to reach them about Christmas. They didn't believe in plum +pudding--there are a good many British institutions that bushmen don't +believe in but the cook was a new chum, and he said he'd go home to +his mother if he didn't have plum pudding for Christmas, so they +ordered a can for him. Meanwhile, they hung out on kangaroo and +damper and the knowledge that it couldn't last for ever. It was in a +terrible drought, and the kangaroos used to come into the "Soak" for +water, and they were too weak to run. Later on, when wells were dug, +the kangaroos used to commit suicide in them--there was generally a +kangaroo in the well in the morning. + +The storekeeper packed the case of tinned dog, etc., but by some +blunder he or his man put the label on the wrong box, and it went per +rail, per coach, per camel, and the last stage per boot, and reached +my friends' camp on Christmas Eve, to their great joy. My friend +broke the case open by the light of the camp-fire. + +"Here, Jack!" he said, tossing out a can, "here's your plum +pudding." + +He held the next can in his hand a moment longer and read the label +twice. + +"Why! he's sent two," he said, "and I'm sure I only ordered one. +Never mind--Jack'll have a tuck-out." + +He held the next can close to the fire and blinked at it hard. "I'm +damned if he hasn't sent three tins of plum pudding. Never mind, +we'll manage to scoff some of it between us. You're in luck's way +this trip, Jack, and no mistake." + +He looked harder still at the fourth can; then he read the labels on +the other tins again to see if he'd made a mistake. + +He didn't tell me what he said then, but a milder mate suggested that +the storekeeper had sent half a dozen tins by mistake. But when they +reached the seventh can the language was not even fit to be written +down on a piece of paper and handed up to the magistrate. The +storekeeper had sent them an unbroken case of canned plum pudding, and +probably by this time he was wondering what had become of that blanky +case of duff. + +The kangaroos disappeared about this time and my friend tells me that +he and his mates had to live for a mortal fortnight on canned plum +pudding. They tried it cold and they tried it boiled, they tried it +baked, they had it fried, and they had it toasted, they had it for +breakfast, dinner and tea. They had nothing else to think, or talk, +or argue and quarrel about; and they dreamed about it every night, my +friend says. It wasn't a joke--it gave them the nightmare and +day-horrors. + +They tried it with salt. They picked as many of the raisins out as +they could and boiled it with salt kangaroo. They tried to make +Yorkshire pudding out of it; but it was too rich. + +My friend was experimenting and trying to discover a simple process +for separating the ingredients of plum pudding when a fresh supply of +provisions came along. He says he was never so sick of anything in +his life, and he has had occasion to be sick of a good many things. + +The new-chum jackaroo is still alive, but he won't ever eat plum +pudding any more, he says. It cured him of homesickness. He wouldn't +eat it even if his bride made it. + + +Christmas on the goldfields in the last of the roaring days, in the +palmy days of Gulgong and those fields. Let's see! it must be nearly +thirty years ago! Oh, how the time goes by! + +Santa Claus, young, fresh-faced and eager; Santa Claus, blonde and +flaxen; Santa Claus, dark; Santa Claus with a brogue and Santa Claus +speaking broken English; Santa Claus as a Chinaman (Sun Tong Lee & +Co. storekeepers), with strange, delicious sweets that melted in our +mouths, and rum toys and Chinese dolls for the children. + + +Lucky diggers who were with difficulty restrained from putting pound +notes and nuggets and expensive lockets and things into the little +ones' stockings. Santa Claus in flannel shirt and clay-covered +moleskins. Diggers who bought lollies by the pound and sent the +little ones home with as much as they could carry. + +Diggers who gave a guinea or more for a toy for a child that reminded +them of some other child at home. Diggers who took as many children +as they could gather on short notice into a store, slapped a +five-pound note down on the counter and told the little ones to call +for whatever they wanted. Who set a family of poor children side by +side on the counter and called for a box of mixed children's +boots--the best--and fitted them on with great care and anxiety and +frequent inquiries as to whether they pinched. Who stood little girls +and boys on the counter and called for the most expensive frocks, the +latest and best in sailor suits, and the brightest ribbons; and things +came long distances by bullock dray and were expensive in those days. +Impressionable diggers--and most of them were--who threw nuggets to +singers, and who, sometimes, slipped a parcel into the hands of a +little boy or girl, with instructions to give it to an elder sister +(or young mother, perhaps) whom the digger had never spoken to, only +worshipped from afar off. And the elder sister or young mother, +opening the parcel, would find a piece of jewellery or a costly +article of dress, and wonder who sent it. + +Ah, the wild generosity of luck-intoxicated diggers of those days! +and the reckless generosity of the drinkers. "We thought it was +going to last for ever!" + +"If I don't spend it on the bairns I'll spend it on the drink," +Sandy Burns used to say. "I ha' nane o' me own, an' the lass who was +to gi' me bairns, she couldn't wait." + +Sandy had kept steady and travelled from one end of the world to the +other, and roughed it and toiled for five years, and the very day he +bottomed his golden hole on the Brown Snake Lead at Happy Valley he +got a letter from his girl in Scotland to say she had grown tired of +waiting and was married. Then he drank, and drink and luck went +together. + +Gulgong on New Year's Eve! Rows and rows of lighted tents and +camp-fires, with a clear glow over it all. Bonfires on the hills and +diggers romping round them like big boys. Tin kettling--gold dishes +and spoons, and fiddles, and hammers on pointing anvils, and sticks +and empty kerosene-tins (they made a row); concertinas and cornets, +shot-guns, pistols and crackers, all sorts of instruments, and "Auld +Lang Syne" in one mighty chorus. And now--a wretched little pastoral +town; a collection of glaring corrugated-iron hip-roofs, and maybe a +rotting propped-up bark or weather-board humpy or two--relics of the +roaring days; a dried-up storekeeper and some withered hags; a waste +of caved-in holes with rain-washed mullock heaps and quartz and gravel +glaring in the sun; thistles and burrs where old bars were; drought, +dryness, desolation and goats. + +Lonely graves in the bush and grey old diggers here and there, +anywhere in the world, doing anything for a living, lonely yet because +of the girls who couldn't wait, but prospecting and fossicking here +and there, and dreaming still. + +They thought it was going to last for ever. + + +Christmas at Eurunderee Creek, amongst the old selection farms in the +western spurs of the Blue Mountains. They used to call it "Th' +Pipeclay" thirty years ago, but the old black names have been +restored. They make plum puddings yet, weeks beforehand, and boil +them for hours and hang them in cloths to the rafters to petrify; then +they take them down and boil them again. On Christmas Eve the boys +cut boughs or young pines on the hills, and drag them home and lash +them to the veranda-posts. + +Ted has turned up with his wife and children from his selection out +back. The wheat is in and shearing is over on the big stations. +Tom--steady-going old Tom--clearing or fencing or dam-sinking +up-country, hides his tools in the scrub and gets his horse and rides +home. Aunt Emma (to everyone's joy) has arrived from Sydney with +presents (astonishing bargains in frocks, etc.) and marvellous +descriptions of town life. + +Joe, "poor" Mary's husband, who has been droving in Queensland since +the Christmas before last--while poor Mary, who is afraid to live +alone, shared a skillion and the family quarrels at home--Joe rides +day and night and reaches home at sunrise on Christmas morning, tired +and dusty, gaunt and haggard, but with his last cheque intact. He +kisses his wife and child and throws himself on the bed to sleep till +dinner-time, while Mary moves round softly, hushes the baby, dresses +it and herself, lays out Joe's clean things, and bends over him now +and then, and kisses him, perhaps, as he sleeps. + +In the morning the boys and some of the men go down to the creek for a +swim in the big shady pool, under the she-oaks and take their Sunday +clothes with them and dress there. + +Some of them ride into town to church, and some of the women and +children drive in in spring-carts--the children to go to Sunday +school, leaving mother and the eldest daughter--usually a hard-worked, +disappointed, short-tempered girl--at home to look after the cooking. + +There is some anxiety (mostly on mother's part) about Jim, who is +"wild," and is supposed to be somewhere out back. There was "a +piece of blue paper" out for Jim on account of sweating (illegally +using) a horse, but his mother or father has got a hint--given in a +kindly way by the police-sergeant--that Jim is free to come home and +stay at home if he behaves himself. (There is usually a horse missing +when Jim goes out back.) + +Jim turns up all right--save that he has no money--and is welcomed +with tearful affection by his favourite sister Mary, shakes hands +silently with his father, and has a long whispered conversation with +his mother, which leaves him very subdued. His brothers forbear to +sneer at him, partly because it is Christmas, partly on mother's +account, and thirdly, because Jim can use his hands. Aunt Emma, who +is fond of him, cheers him up wonderfully. + +The family sit down to dinner. "An old mate of your father's"--a +bearded old digger--has arrived and takes the place of honour. ("I +knowed yer father, sonny, on the diggings long afore any of you was +ever thought on.") + +The family have only been a few hours together, yet there is an +undercurrent of growling, that, to the stranger, mysterious yet +evident undercurrent of nastiness and resentment which goes on in all +families and drags many a promising young life down. But Aunt Emma +and the old mate make things brighter, and so the dinner--of hot roast +and red-hot plum pudding--passes off fairly well. + +The men sleep the afternoon away and wake up bathed in perspiration +and helpless; some of the women have headaches. After tea they gather +on the veranda in the cool of the evening, and that's the time when +the best sides of their natures and the best parts of the past have a +chance of coming uppermost, and perhaps they begin to feel a bit sorry +that they are going to part again. + +The local races or "sports" on Boxing Day. There is nothing to keep +the boys home over New Year. Ted and his wife go back to their lonely +life on their selection; Tom returns to his fencing or tank-sinking +contract; Jim, who has borrowed "a couple of quid" from Tom, goes +out back with strong resolutions for the New Year, and shears +"stragglers," breaks in horses, cooks and clerks for survey parties, +and gambles and drinks, and gets into trouble again. Maybe Joe +"knocks about" the farm a bit before going into the Great North-West +with another mob of cattle. + +The last time I saw the Old Year out at Eurunderee the bushfires were +burning all over the ranges, and looked like great cities lighted up. +No need for bonfires then. Christmas in Bourke, the metropolis of the +great pastoral scrubs and plains, five hundred miles west, with the +thermometer one-hundred-and-something-scarey in the shade. The rough, +careless shearers come in from stations many dusty miles out in the +scrubs to have their Christmas sprees, to drink and "shout" and +fight--and have the horrors some of them--and be run in and locked up +with difficulty, within sound of a church-going bell. + +The Bourke Christmas is a very beery and exciting one. The hotels +shut up in front on Christmas Day to satisfy the law (or out of +consideration for the feelings of the sergeant in charge of the police +station), and open behind to satisfy the public, who are supposed to +have made the law. + +Sensible cold dinners are the fashion in Bourke, I think, with the +hose going, and free-and-easy costumes. + +The free males take their blankets and sleep in the "park;" the +women sleep with doors and windows open, and the married men on +mattresses on the verandas across the open doors--in case of +accidents. + +Christmas in Sydney, though Christmas holidays are not so popular as +Easter, or even Anniversary Day, in the Queen city of the South. +Buses, electric, cable and the old steam trams crowded with +holiday-makers with baskets. Harbour boats loaded down to the water's +edge with harbour picnic-parties. "A trip round the harbour and to +the head of Middle Harbour one shilling return!" Strings of tourist +trains running over the Blue Mountains and the Great Zigzag, and up +the coast to Gosford and Brisbane Water, and down the south coast to +beautiful Illawarra, until after New Year. Hundreds of young fellows +going out with tents to fish in lonely bays or shoot in the mountains, +and rough it properly like bushmen--not with deck chairs, crockery, a +piano and servants. For you can camp in the grand and rugged solitude +of the bush within a stone's throw of the city, so to speak. + +Jolly camps and holiday parties all round the beautiful bays of the +harbour, and up and down the coast, and all close to home. Camps in +the moonlight on sandy beaches under great dark bluffs and headlands, +where yellow, shelving, sandstone cliffs run, broken only by +sandy-beached bays, and where the silver-white breakers leap and roar. + +And Manly Beach on a holiday! Thousands of people in fresh summer +dress, hundreds of bare-legged, happy children running where the +"blue sea over the white sand rolls," racing in and out with the +rollers, playing with the glorious Pacific. Manly--"Our Village" +--Manly Beach, where we used to take our girls, with the most +beautiful harbour in the world on one side, and the width of the +grandest ocean on the other. Ferny gullies and "fairy dells" to +north and south, and every shady nook its merry party or happy couple. + +Manly Beach--I remember five years ago (oh, how the time goes +by!)--and two names that were written together in the sand when the +tide was coming in. And the boat home in the moonlight, past the +Heads, where we felt the roll of the ocean, and the moonlit +harbour--and the harbour lights of Sydney--the grandest of them all. + + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + +Henry Lawson 17th June 1867 - 2nd September 1922. + +These stories were first published as a collection in 1902. +Republished as "Send Round the Hat" and "The Romance of +the Swag" in 1907. + + + +Notes on Australianisms. Based on my own speech over the years, with +some checking in the dictionaries, e.g. "Macquarie Book of Slang" +(2000), Oxford English Dictionary. Not all of these are peculiar to +Australian slang, but are important in Lawson's stories, and carry +overtones. + + + anabranch: A bend in a river that has been cut through by the stream. + The main current now runs straight, the anabranch diverges and then + rejoins. See billabong. + Barcoo-rot. "Persistent ulceration of the skin, chiefly on the hands, + and often originating in abrasions". (Morris, Australian + English). Barcoo is a river in Queensland. + billabong. Based on an aboriginal word. Sometimes used for an + anabranch, but more often used for one that, in dry season or droughts + especially, is cut off at either or both ends from the main stream. + It is often just a muddy pool, and may indeed dry up completely. + blackfellow: condescending for Australian Aboriginal + blackleg: someone who is employed to cross a union picket line to + break a workers' strike. As Molly Ivins said, she was brought up + on the three great commandments: do not lie; do not steal; never + cross a picket line. Also scab. + blanky or --- : Fill in your own favourite word. Usually however used + for "bloody"--see crimson/gory. + blooming: actually used in speech instead of "bloody" (see crimson). + bluey: swag. Explanation in Lawson's "The romance of the Swag" here. + bob: one shilling + bullocky: Bullock driver. A man who drove teams of bullocks yoked to + wagons carrying e.g. wool bales or provisions. Proverbially rough and + foul mouthed. + bummer: A cadger or bludger. Someone who begs for food. Interesting + Americanism already. Also, tramp. (Different meaning today) + bush: originally referred to the low tangled scrubs of the semi-desert + regions (cf. `mulga' and `mallee'), and hence equivalent to + "outback". Now used generally for remote rural areas ("the + bush") and scrubby forest. + bushfire: wild fires: whether forest fires or grass fires. + bushman/bushwoman: someone who lives an isolated existence, far from + cities, "in the bush". (today: a "bushy") + bushranger: an Australian "highwayman", who lived in the `bush'-- + scrub--and attacked especially gold carrying coaches and banks. + Romanticised as anti-authoritarian Robin Hood figures--cf. Ned + Kelly--but usually very violent. + bunyip: Aboriginal monster, inhabiting waterholes, billabongs + particularly. Adopted into European legends. + caser: Five shillings (12 pence to the shilling, 20 shillings to the + pound ("quid")). As a coin, a crown piece. + chaffing: teasing, mocking good-humouredly + churchyarder: Sounding as if dying--ready for the churchyard = cemetery + crimson = gory: literary substitutes for "bloody"--the "colonial oath", + unacceptable in polite company. Why, is a complete mystery. + Popularly explained as contraction of "by Our Lady". Unproved. + In reproducing (badly) a German's pronunciation of Australian, + Lawson retains the word, but spells it "pluddy". + dood: Dude. A classy/cool dresser. + drover: one who "droves" + droving: driving on horseback cattle or sheep from where they were + fattened to a a city, or later, a rail-head. + fiver: a five pound note + gory, see crimson + Homebush: Saleyard, market area in Sydney + humpy: rough shack + half-caser: Two shillings and sixpence. As a coin, a half-crown. + jackaroo: (Jack + kangaroo; sometimes jackeroo)--someone, in early + days a new immigrant from England, learning to work on a + sheep/cattle station (U.S. "ranch".) + jim-jams: the horrors, d.t.'s + jumbuck: a sheep (best known from Waltzing Matilda: "where's that + jolly jumbuck, you've got in your tucker bag".) + larrikin: anything from a disrespectful young man to a violent member + of a gang ("push"). Was considered a major social problem in + Sydney of the 1880's to 1900. The _Bulletin_, a magazine in + which much of Lawson was published, spoke of the "aggressive, + soft-hatted stoush brigade". Anyone today who is disrespectful of + authority or convention is said to show the larrikin element in the + Australian character. + lucerne: Alfalfa in US + mallee: dwarfed eucalyptus trees growing in very poor soil and under + harsh rainfall conditions. Usually many stems emerging from the + ground, creating a low thicket. + mateship: See Lawson story, "Mateship". A heavily romanticised, + but nevertheless very practical form of (male) loyalty to a (male) + companion who travels with/works with him. A "mate" provides not + only companionship, but help in emergencies. Typical of an + Australian in the "outback"--or "Never-Never", or under war + conditions. A man without a mate was a "hatter"--"his hat + covers his family". Such a person might go "ratty" (see further + in The romance of the Swag). + Equivalent to the "buddy system" in SCUBA diving. + metalled: of a road, covered in crushed rock (e.g. "blue metal") + mulga: Acacia sp. ("wattle" in Australian) especially Acacia aneura; + growing in semi-desert conditions. Used as a description of such + a harsh region. + mullock: the tailings left after gold has been removed. In Lawson + generally mud (alluvial) rather than rock + myall: aboriginal living in a traditional--pre-conquest--manner + nobbler: a drink + nuggety: compact but strong physique; small but well-muscled + pastoralist: OED sees it a equivalent to "squatter", but in + Lawson someone often someone managing a large cattle/sheep + "station" for a "pastoral company" rather than an individual. + Seen as ultimate capitalist oppression. + pluddy: see crimson + quid: monetary unit; one pound + ratty: insane--or, very eccentric, "cranky". + ringer: the champion sheep shearer in a shed that season + rouseabout: Labourer in a (sheep) shearing shed. Considered to be, + as far as any work is, unskilled labour. + sawney: silly, gormless + scab: see blackleg + shout: In a group; to stand (pay for) a round of drinks. Bad form + to leave before your turn comes around. Much peer pressure to + drink more than one wished. One can also "shout" for everyone + in the pub. + skillion(-room): A "lean-to", a room built up against the back of + some other building, with separate roof. + spifflicated: punished, thrashed without mercy. + spree: prolonged drinking bout--days, weeks. + squatter: Someone who took up large areas of land, originally without + official permission ("squatted"), for sheep especially. Became + the "landed aristocracy" of Australia. + ("Up rode the squatter, mounted on his thoroughbred") + steever: Originally a Dutch coin. Used here like "penny"--or brass razoo. + sundowner: a swagman (see) who is NOT looking for work, but a + "handout". Lawson explains the term as referring to someone who + turns up at a station at sundown, just in time for "tea" i.e. the + evening meal. Line (2494) of actual text (not counting + P.G. matter). + swagman (swaggy): Generally, anyone who is walking in the "outback" + with a swag. (See "The Romance of the Swag".) Lawson also + restricts it at times to those whom he considers to be tramps, + not looking for work but for "handouts". In view of the Great + Depression (1890->. In 1892 it was reckoned 1/3 men were out of + work) perhaps unfairly. Perhaps because he _was_ there. + See `travellers'. + Tattersalls: The earliest public lottery in Australia. (1881) + tenner: a ten pound note. + tin-kettling: making noise by striking metal pots/pans. May be + celebratory (weddings--in this collection, New Year's Eve), or may + indicate extreme social disapproval of someone. + travellers: "shearers and rouseabouts travelling for work" (Lawson). + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Children of the Bush, by Henry Lawson + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHILDREN OF THE BUSH *** + +This file should be named chbsh10.txt or chbsh10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, chbsh11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, chbsh10a.txt + +Produced by Geoffrey Cowling; gcowling@laurel.ocs.mq.edu.au + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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