failing impeded my progress in the times I am telling you about.
Nevertheless I enjoyed myself, went up George Street and purchased a
good rig-out, and then went round sight-seeing and very soon I was on my
beam ends again. I was lucky enough to fall in with an English fellow
who lodged with me in a side street out at “The Glebe.” He and I became
good comrades and as soon as he got to understand my position and
dubious future he took me also into his confidence and we eventually
became partners in the flower seed business which he carried on from an
office in “The Royal Arcade.” It sounds a big address, but it was only a
small office. I think the rent was eight shillings a week. In that
little office we packed up the flower seeds together and I myself
blossomed into a real business youth once again, but it was not half as
lonely as that teashop of mine which I have told you about.
Off we would go each morning out into Sydney suburbs, each with a little
bag crammed to the brim with choice seeds of English flowers. I at once
wrote home a letter pouring over with enthusiasm about my dreams of
future wealth, coming from a prosperous business, but the hard work soon
began to tell on my temperament, and my resolution to get on in the
world by doing work oozed away as I perspired at the doors of the wooden
houses out in Burwood and Paramatta, while my chum stood illustrating to
the open-mouthed colonial women the height and beauty of the flowers
that would glorify their gardens if they bought our seed.
Well, to cut it short, my comrade went off to Melbourne to some
relatives and handed me over the whole show. This turn of affairs
renewed my old trust in the business, and though I was sorry to lose my
friend I bucked up and kept on with the business. Indeed, it was my only
hope; my best clothes were in pawn, also my violin. I went next morning
to the office and filled up hundreds of bags with seed which I thought
corresponded with the flowers illustrated upon them and off I went,
taking a book with me full of the names of customers, and very soon I
ingratiated myself into their favour and they all promised to deal with
me as they had done with my comrade.
How it all happened I don’t know, but I had made a mistake and placed a
hundredweight of turnip and cabbage seed into the choice flower packets,
and when I went off to Paramatta, my best district, a week or so after,
I was met at the doors by irate men and women who swore that I had
deliberately played a trick upon them, and when I arrived at the house
of a nursery garden manager who had bought a whole year’s stock from me
and found that the whole of the specially laid flower beds were
producing nothing else but cabbages and turnips, I had to fly for my
life. One old woman raced after me down the Paramatta main road swearing
that she would do for me; by Jove, I did run as she waddled shouting far
behind! And that was the end of the flower seed business. All of those
people knew my business address, as it was on the packets in large
crimson lettering, so I crept into the office early next morning, packed
the scales up, locked the door and bolted off. The scales were the only
things in the office that I could raise money on and I sold them for
fifteen shillings and that same day I took a berth on a coaster for
Brisbane.
I think it took three days to get round. I was delighted to see the old
place again. I had taken my violin out of pawn and the day after I
arrived I went away up country and got a job on a ranch about fifty
miles from Cooktown, and there I blossomed into a real “boundary rider,”
as they call them out there. My boss was an Irishman, his wife was
English, and a dear creature she was too. There was an old Chinaman
working for them and he got fearfully jealous of me as soon as I became
a favourite with the girls, for Kelly, that was my boss’s name, had
three daughters and one son. I did not like the son, he was a grumpy
ignorant chap, and I had as little to do with him as possible.
Ethel, the eldest daughter, and I became good friends and I taught her
to play the violin; she was not what the world would call good-looking,
but I saw something in her face that put good looks in the shade. She
had fine grey eyes, and one evening when we were sitting by the
homestead in the bush, and the parrots were settling to roost in the
gums and orange-trees around us, I leaned over her to show her how to
hold the violin bow in professional style, and she gazed up at me with
an earnest look, and before I could help myself I held her closely to me
and kissed her. She blushed and we forgot all about the violin practice
and many were the nights that she and I went out into the beautiful
bushlands together and I made her happy. I knew that she loved me; her
mother was in the secret and gave me every encouragement, and though I
got to hate the monotony of bush life I put up with it all gladly so as
to keep near that simple bush girl. I thank God that I did too, for the
first great sorrow of my life came out of my affection for her. Suddenly
she became sick; to our horror she developed typhoid fever and I was the
last to kiss her dead face. I cannot tell you any more about it even
after all these years; a part of my heart is in that lonely bush grave
away across the world in Queensland.
I was terribly cut up over that sorrow, and though that homestead of the
bush became more lonesome to me than ever, I stayed on for nearly two
months for the sake of the stockman’s wife whom I became very fond of as
she knew my feelings and I knew hers. I am not ashamed to tell you that
when at last I wished her good-bye I broke down and kissed her as a boy
would his mother. I often wrote to her afterwards and I have some of her
letters now, and beautiful letters they are too.
I did not care much where I went at that time. On an old Australian hack
I rode away intending to go to Cooktown so that I could get round to
Brisbane, but the spirit of adventure was in my blood and I altered my
course and left the track and travelled north-west. I had a good swag of
provisions made up for me by the stockman’s wife, and so I felt secure
as far as food was concerned as I rode over the scrub-covered rolling
hills of that lonely country. That night I made a fire just to keep me
company and camping there alone with the birds and trees around me I
slept with my heart in that bush grave.
[Illustration: HOMESTEAD SCENE, QUEENSLAND]
Next morning I rose early and started off again and before sunset I came
across a shanty wherein lived an old bushman. He was very kind to me and
asked me to stay the night, which I did. I slept on a trestle bed by him
in the one dingy small room. He was an old man, and as the moonlight
crept through the small window-pane and revealed his sleeping face I
noticed that he had lost all his teeth, and every time he breathed his
lips would puff out and then go inwards, making a ghostly chanting noise
at regular intervals throughout the whole night. I got quite nervous and
never slept a wink till daylight crept across the tree-tops outside and
a kind of sweet reality stole over the hut-bedroom as I closed my weary
eyes and slumbered, but only for about ten minutes, for he had slept
well and waking up with the light he started to make a deuce of a row,
chopping wood. I left early that morning and from that day to this I
have never slept with toothless old men.
He was a real Australian bushman, I could tell that by his conversation,
which consisted of about twelve words during my stay, the longest
sentence of all was the first at our meeting by his hut door when he
looked at me for a minute and then said, “Want some tucker?” meaning
food. “Yes, thanks,” I answered, and when I had eaten up ravenously all
he put before me he sat and smoked by the door, and after an hour’s
silence said, “Turn in?” Again I answered “Yes,” and when I left in the
morning he simply said, “Good luck, chum,” and closed the door on me.
This sounds a bit far-fetched, but it’s true enough! Through living in
the bush they all get taken that way and almost forget their own
language and look upon you as a nuisance if you ask more than one
question a day.
Once more on my own, as they say out there, I started off. It was
sweltering hot. I did my best to keep in the shelter of the tall gum
forest that covered the hills for miles around me, and seeing no more
signs of houses about the whole day I began to consider it would be best
for me to alter my course and make for Cooktown as I originally intended
doing. I did so, and camping on the steeps that night I saw a ring of
smoke curling up almost opposite to the side of the slope whereon I had
camped. Leading my horse I went over the rim of the hill expecting to
see a homestead, and as I looked down a swarm of black awful-looking
faces huddled around a bush fire looked up at me with startled eyes. I
had stumbled across a camp of the roving Queensland blacks! There they
sat, black, pot-bellied, nude women and men, some of them holding short
clay pipes between their thick protruding lips. I had heard that they
were quite harmless, and so I bravely walked down the slopes and
introduced myself. The head of the band was a stalwart ferocious-looking
fellow and tried to speak to me. “White fella all lone,” he said. I
shook my head and said “No,” at the same time pointing behind me over
the hills so as to let him think that I was not alone. There is nothing
like being too careful with blacks; they are harmless enough, so I had
heard, but I did not want to give them a chance to profit over their old
instincts. There are even white men in lonely bush lands who would crack
you over the head if their exchequer was getting low and the addition of
another man’s would make the outlook brighter, and so I was wise in my
answer.
I shall never forget the sight of those aboriginals and their startled
eyes as, squatting there, some huddled in dirty Government blankets,
they watched their meal cooking, which consisted of green frog and fat
lizards that bubbled and squeaked in the glowing fire ash. One fat,
awful-looking woman asked me in broken English if “white man got baccy.”
I felt relieved to think I could do her a good turn, and quickly gave
her a small piece of ship’s plug tobacco, which she snatched out of my
hand without a word of thanks. They were all nearly naked; there were
four women and about a dozen men and they all continued to stare up at
me as I stood by them, their bright dark eyes shining through their
thick matted hair. The old woman to whom I had given the tobacco quickly
tore it up with her long fingers and sat there with her chin on her
knees puffing at her short clay pipe, her lips dribbling and smacking
together like the flapping wet sails of a becalmed ship as she puffed
away.
It was terribly hot, and as the sunset died away behind the gum clump on
the skyline I took off my coat and vest and kept only my pants on, tied
the legs of my horse so that she would not roam too far off and sat down
by those wild bush blacks and taking my violin out of my swag I started
to play a jig. Their eyes lit up at once with wonder and I was obliged
to let them all carefully examine the instrument. They looked inside of
it, turned the pegs and even smelt it, but could not understand where
the music came from, and the one baby that clung by its mother looked at
me as though it would have a fit each time that I started to play. They
had no idea of melody but a good idea of time, and all started to move
their bodies to and fro as I extemporised a strain which I thought would
suit the occasion. One old fellow with extraordinary thin legs and a big
protruding belly started off in one of their native dances. Up went his
legs skyward and once or twice he almost turned a somersault, and his
shadow in the moonlight mimicked him on the slope side as its head
bobbed out of the gum-tree tops that towered just over him. I did not
like the idea of sleeping with them, so I packed my violin in my swag
and pointed to the hills and intimated to them by nods and signs that I
must go and join my comrades, and off I went over the slope, and as soon
as I thought I was clear away from them I camped at the bottom of a
steep gully and, tired out, I fell asleep.
When I awoke the sun was blazing through the trees at the side of the
gully height, and I sat up, and looking round I missed my swag. Running
to the top of the slope I looked around; my horse too had vanished. As
quickly as I could hurry along I went down to where I had left the
blacks. There was the fire ash and round it a circle of naked foot
prints, but not a sign of them in sight. They had crept over the hills
while I had slept and stolen my swag and horse and left me standing
alone in that wild country perfectly helpless with nothing on but a pair
of pants!
I gazed like one in a dream on those footprints and the camp fire ash. I
was terribly thirsty and at once started off to find water. I was soon
successful and on my knees I blew the scum off the creek pool and drank.
I don’t know how I got through that day, but I did, and before nightfall
I had reached a wooden house on top of a hill. I crawled round to the
side door and knocked. A young girl opened it and seeing me in such a
state quickly slammed it and the stockman came rushing to the door to
see what was the matter, a gun in his hand, and if I hadn’t been quick,
as it was nearly dark, I really think I should have been shot. I soon
explained matters to him and he proved a kind fellow, gave me an old
suit and I stayed there for three weeks and helped him to build an
outhouse. He paid me well and I arrived back in Brisbane with nearly
five pounds in my pocket.
I had had enough of the Australian bush and made up my mind to get
employment in the towns. Before my money had gone again I started to
look for work, but only succeeded in getting a job in a restaurant in
Queen’s Street. My duty was to wash the dishes and wait on the
customers. It was not at all in my line, and I could not get any sleep.
The first night was an unpleasant one; my bed was one of a number in a
dirty top room and up till about two in the morning the door would keep
opening as those who were partially sober carried in men who were blind
drunk and placed them on the beds by me. I sat up in my bed utterly
miserable and watched one red-nosed, black-bearded besotted-looking man
drivel at the mouth, swear and groan as he made vain attempts to get his
boots off, and once or twice he looked round at me with an idiot-like
stare and said, “Hello, maish, s-how are you?” and bending towards me
affectionately, tumbled on the floor. And another one in the far corner
would often stick his head out of the dirty sheets and shout, “Wash’s
the time?” So no one will blame me when I tell you that I crept
downstairs at daybreak and bolted. About a week after I was covered with
a tremendous rash and was the most miserable youth in Australia. I took
a motherly woman into my confidence and I soon got rid of them: bugs and
fleas are real comrades compared to those terrible things that I took
away with me when I left that restaurant bedroom. I can assure you that
I never worked in a restaurant again and even now I am nervous in the
presence of drunken men whom I do not know well. Hornecastle was bad
enough, but there was something about him that inspired confidence as
well as disgust.
I always found the motherly women were my best friends when I was in
trouble, for though I had not got a cent they generally took me in and
waited till I obtained employment. I suppose they saw that I was young
and respectable, and in the colonies, in those days, there were hundreds
of young fellows on their beam ends who were trying to make a way for
themselves, and as they always paid up at the first opportunity these
women generally had faith in the derelicts that tramped about the towns
of “the land of the golden fleece” looking for work.
I got a job in a furniture warehouse and stayed there for quite three
months until business got slack. I being a new hand received the “sack.”
My roaming instincts took me down to the wharf and I was in with the
seafaring men again, heard once more the wonderful tales of adventure on
the seas and in far countries, but I was not quite so interested as I
had previously been, for I too had seen a bit of the world and no longer
believed all that those sea-beaten old salts told me. Nevertheless I
liked their companionship; they were so frank and jovial in their
narratives. I came across two or three of the men whom I had known when
I was first stranded in Brisbane and several of us got a job painting
the side of a large sailing ship that lay alongside. I slept on board
with the crew in the fo’c’sle and got in with a young German who had
worked his way out at “a shilling a month” and had not got the pluck to
leave the ship, and so intended to work his passage back to London.
Influenced by me, however, he altered his mind and stayed behind. He was
a steady fellow, older than I was, I think about twenty years of age. He
had one failing which I well remember: he was always running after the
girls and thought of little else.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
XXIII
I stow away—Rescued by Sailors—Emigrant Derelicts—I go up
Country—Memories
THERE was a large tramp steamer alongside of the wharf; she was getting
up steam to go away and was bound for London. I thought it was a fine
opportunity to try and get a berth together, but it was no go, as they
say, so my German friend and I made up our minds to stow away. I had
about two shillings in my pocket, so went up into the town and bought
two loaves of bread and one pound of cheese, and that night without any
trouble we stole aboard and went down the stokehold and hid away in a
coal bunker, and being young and optimistic we both slept well. In the
morning we sat side by side in the blackness of that ship’s hold and
heard the noise overhead as they hammered the main hatch down and the
rusty rattle of chains as the tug boat took her in tow.
“Do you think they will lock us down?” my friend said, and I began to
feel in a bit of a funk; she was still alongside, and we both crawled
out of our hiding-place to see if the bunker lid where we had crawled
through was still open. It was shut! I am sure that we both turned white
at that moment, but we were feeling desperate and my comrade climbed up
and, pushing the bunker lid, to our intense relief it opened and let in
the light.
“Let’s get out of it,” I said, and in a moment we both crawled out on to
the deck. We were then on the starboard side; the funnel was smoking
away and the crew all on the port side drawing in the tackling;
otherwise we should have been noticed. Quickly creeping along the deck I
saw the forward hatchway open.
“Let’s get down here,” I said, and in a trice I jumped down and falling
on a bale of cargo slipped to the lower hold. She was carrying a light
cargo and was evidently going to call somewhere else before fastening
down for the long voyage across the world. I had fallen with a fearful
smash, and looking up to see what had become of my chum I saw his face
peep over the hatch-side and then dodge away as the crew overhead lifted
up the hatchway covering and down it came with a crash. All was at once
dark. I was then alone, a prisoner at the bottom of that ship’s hold.
At first I felt dazed and strangely calm; then I suddenly realised my
position and cried out at the top of my voice and scrambled about in the
dark over the bales of cargo trying to get up to the hatchway and make
myself heard. What happened to my friend I don’t know; he certainly
never told the crew about me, and though I hoped he had done so I hoped
on in vain and lay there almost breathless with horror as the time went
on. Then I felt the motion of the vessel as she moved away and before
nightfall I heard the seas beating against the ship’s iron side as I sat
imprisoned in the dark below the water line in the worst predicament
that I ever was in in my life. To make things worse out came the rats!
It seemed to me that there were thousands of them scampering about the
cargo as I shouted myself hoarse, praying to God that I should at last
be heard, and when everything seemed hopeless I sat for a time and felt
pretty bad.
Presently a reaction set in and I started exploring, thinking that if I
could get up forward toward the fo’c’sle I could thump on the deck and
the sailors in the off watch would hear me. I began to feel terribly
sick as the vessel pitched and rolled and the smell of the cargo
thickened the already stifling atmosphere till I heard myself breathing
heavily.
Crawling slowly along I managed to get to between-decks, and to my
intense relief I saw a wisp of light through a chink. You can imagine my
delight at that moment as I made towards it. It was the forepeak
hatchway. I heard voices; someone was sitting on it! Placing my mouth
against that crack I shouted “Hello!” and I heard the voices suddenly
cease and someone jump; as quickly as possible I shouted once more
through the crack. “It’s all right, I’m a stowaway! Don’t give me away.”
“Who are you, matey?” came the answer. All my old courage returned to me
when I heard that gruff kindly voice, and I quickly enlightened the
questioner, and in ten minutes I was out and snug in the fo’c’sle
sitting on a sea-chest, the crew around me. They were English sailors
and you can bet they did not give me away. I discovered that we were
calling in at Sydney. It was an easy matter to keep me hidden for two
days in there among them. The only one I had to keep out of sight from
was the bos’n.
We had a fine time that night; one of the men had a banjo and another a
fiddle. I borrowed it from them and we had a concert to ourselves. They
fed me up too, I can assure you that sailors are the finest men in the
world to fall in with when you are down on your luck. It was an easy
matter when we arrived in Sydney Harbour for me to get away, and they
managed it. As soon as the anchor dropped and we got alongside they gave
me the tip, down the gangway I went, and some of them stood grinning on
the deck as I stood on the wharf safe and waved my hand back to them.
I had a good wash and brush up and soon looked very different to what I
did when those sailors first discovered me, begrimed, smothered in coal
dust and perspiration. There I was, once more thrown up on the beach in
Sydney.
I will draw a veil over a good many of the days of my life after that
time. I fell in with the ne’er-do-wells of the Australian cities, the
happy-go-lucky castaways of “better times,” who slept out on the
“Domain,” in dustbins and in the cave holes of the rocky shore round by
the Botanical Gardens, where you could sleep and hear the waters
creeping, singing up the shore by your pillow all night long, as you
slept a penniless beggar far from your native land. You could open your
eyes in the silent hours of the night and see the outbound sailing ships
as the rigging flitted across the moonlight and the crew sang some
homebound song as the ship met the outer foams and started on the long,
long track home. The awful stench from Woolloomoolloo Bay came on the
wind round the bend at intervals, like the hot breath of reality across
your dreams.
I read some wonderful poems in those days, sad ones too, poems with
weary eyes that told the remorse, the long remembering, but not the tale
itself. Dressed in rags I have seen them sleeping on “the rocks” as the
white Australian moonlight revealed pinched refined faces; men they were
from the cities of the world, who were hiding from their homeland
disgrace, and some who had believed the Arabian Night tales from the
Land of the Golden Fleece, sold up their all in England to sink to the
lowest depths of poverty and humiliation in the country where it is
every man for himself and God for the lot.