BOOK III--IN THE WILD INTERIOR.

"IN THIS NEW LAND OF OURS."

There was something in the glorious lonesomeness of Bush-life that

accorded most completely with Archie's notions of true happiness and

independence. His life now, and the lives of all the three, would be

simply what they chose to make them. To use the figurative language of

the New Testament, they had "taken hold of the plough," and they

certainly had no intention of "looking back."

Archie felt (this too is figurative) as the mariner may be supposed to

feel just leaving his native shore to sail away over the broad, the

boundless ocean to far-off lands. His hand is on the tiller; the shore

is receding; his eye is aloft, where the sails are bellying out before

the wind. There is hardly a sound, save the creaking of the blocks, or

rattle of the rudder chains, the joyous ripple of the water, and the

screaming of the sea-birds, that seem to sing their farewells. Away

ahead is the blue horizon and the heaving sea, but he has faith in his

good barque, and faith in his own skill and judgment, and for the time

being he is a Viking; he is "monarch of all he surveys."

"Monarch of all he surveys?" Yes; these words are borrowed from the

poem on Robinson Crusoe, you remember; that stirring story that so

appeals to the heart of every genuine boy.

There was something of the Robinson Crusoe element in Archie's present

mode of living, for he and his friends had to rough it in the same

delightfully primitive fashion. They had to know and to practise a

little of almost every trade under the sun; and while life to the boy--

he was really little more--was very real and very earnest, it felt all

the time like playing at being a man.

But how am I to account for the happiness--nay, even joyfulness--that

appeared to be infused in the young man's very blood and soul? Nay, not

appeared to be only, but that actually was--a joyfulness whose effects

could at times be actually felt in his very frame and muscle like a

proud thrill, that made his steps and tread elastic, and caused him to

gaily sing to himself as he went about at his work. May I try to

explain this by a little homely experiment, which you yourself may also

perform? See, here then I have a small disc of zinc, no larger than a

coat button, and I have also a shilling-piece. I place the former on my

tongue, and the latter between my lower lip and gum, and lo! the moment

I permit the two metallic edges to touch I feel a tingling thrill, and

if my eyes be shut I perceive a flash as well. It is electricity

passing through the bodily medium--my tongue. The one coin becomes _en

rapport_, so to speak, with the other. So in like manner was Archie's

soul within him _en rapport_ with all the light, the life, the love he

saw around him, his body being but the wholesome, healthy, solid medium.

_En rapport_ with the light. Why, by day this was everywhere--in the

sky during its midday blue brightness; in the clouds so gorgeously

painted that lay over the hills at early morning, or over the wooded

horizon near eventide. _En rapport_ with the light dancing and

shimmering in the pool down yonder; playing among the wild flowers that

grew everywhere in wanton luxuriance; flickering through the tree-tops,

despite the trailing creepers; gleaming through the tender greens of

fern fronds in cool places; sporting with the strange fantastic, but

brightly-coloured orchids; turning greys to white, and browns to bronze;

warming, wooing, beautifying all things--the light, the lovely light.

_En rapport_ with the life. Ay, there it was. Where was it not? In

the air, where myriads of insects dance and buzz and sing and poise

hawk-like above flowers, as if inhaling their sweetness, or dart hither

and thither in their zigzag course, and almost with the speed of

lightning; where monster beetles go droning lazily round, as if

uncertain where to alight; where moths, like painted fans, hover in the

sunshine, or fold their wings and go to sleep on flower-tops. In the

forests, where birds, like animated blossoms, living chips of dazzling

colours, hop from boughs, climb stems, run along silvery bark on trees,

hopping, jumping, tapping, talking, chattering, screaming, with bills

that move and throats that heave even when their voices cannot be heard

in the feathered babel. Life on the ground, where thousands of busy

beetles creep, or play hide-and-seek among the stems of tall grass, and

where ants innumerable go in search of what they somehow never seem to

find. Life on the water slowly sailing round, or in and out among the

reeds, in the form of bonnie velvet ducks and pretty spangled teal.

Life in the water, where shoals of fish dart hither and thither, or rest

for a moment in shallows to bask in the sun, their bodies all a-quiver

with enjoyment. Life in the sky itself, high up. Behold that splendid

flock of wonga-wonga pigeons, with bronzen wings, that seem to shake the

sunshine off them in showers of silver and gold, or, lower down, that

mob of snowy-breasted cockatoos, going somewhere to do something, no

doubt, and making a dreadful din about it, but quite a sight, if only

from the glints of lily and rose that appear in the white of their

outstretched wings and tails. Life everywhere.

_En rapport_ with all the love around him. Yes, for it is spring here,

though the autumn tints are on the trees in groves and woods at Burley.

Deep down in the forest yonder, if you could penetrate without your

clothes being torn from your back, you might listen to the soft murmur

of the doves that stand by their nests in the green gloom of fig trees;

you would linger long to note the love passages taking place among the

cosy wee, bright, and bonnie parrakeets; you would observe the hawk

flying silently, sullenly, home to his castle in the inaccessible

heights of the gum trees, but you would go quickly past the forest dens

of lively cockatoos. For everywhere it is spring with birds and beasts.

They have dressed in their gayest; they have assumed their fondest

notes and cries; they live and breathe and buzz in an atmosphere of

happiness and love.

Well, it was spring with Nature, and it was spring in Archie's heart.

Work was a pleasure to him.

That last sentence really deserves a line to itself. Without the ghost

of an intention to moralise, I must be permitted to say, that the youth

who finds an undoubted pleasure in working is sure to get on in

Australia. There is that in the clear, pure, dry air of the back Bush

which renders inactivity an impossibility to anyone except

ne'er-do-wells and born idiots. This is putting it strongly, but it is

also putting it truthfully.

Archie felt he had done with Sydney, for a time at all events, when he

left. He was not sorry to shake the dust of the city from his

half-wellingtons as he embarked on the _Canny Scotia_, bound for

Brisbane.

If the Winslows had not been among the passengers he certainly would

have given vent to a sigh or two.

All for the sake of sweet little Etheldene? Yes, for her sake. Was she

not going to be Rupert's wife, and his own second sister? Oh, he had it

all nicely arranged, all cut and dry, I can assure you!

Here is a funny thing, but it is also a fact. The very day that the

_Canny Scotia_ was to sail, Archie took Harry with him, and the two

started through the city, and bore up for the shop of Mr Glorie.

They entered. It was like entering a gloomy vault. Nothing was

altered. There stood the rows on rows of dusty bottles, with their

dingy gilt labels; the dusty mahogany drawers; the morsel of railinged

desk with its curtain of dirty red; there were the murky windows with

their bottles of crusted yellows and reds; and up there the identical

spider still working away at his dismal web, still living in hopes

apparently of some day being able to catch a fly.

The melancholy-looking new apprentice, who had doubtless paid the new

premium, a long lantern-jawed lad with great eyes in hollow sockets, and

a blue-grey face, stood looking at the pair of them.

"Where is your master, Mr--?"

"Mr Myers, sir. Myers is my name."

"Where is Mr Glorie, Mr Myers?"

"D'ye wish to see'm, sir?"

"Don't it seem like it?" cried Harry, who for the life of him "could not

help putting his oar in."

"Master's at the back, among--the soap."

He droned out the last words in such a lugubrious tone that Archie felt

sorry for him.

Just then, thinking perhaps he scented a customer, Mr Glorie himself

entered, all apron from the jaws to the knees.

"Ah! Mr Glorie," cried Archie. "I really couldn't leave Sydney

without saying ta-ta, and expressing my sorrow for breaking--"

"Your indenture, young sir?"

"No; I'm glad I broke that. I mean the oil-jar. Here is a sovereign

towards it, and I hope there's no bad feeling."

"Oh, no, not in the least, and thank you, sir, kindly!"

"Well, good-bye. Good-bye Mr Myers. If ever I return from the Bush

I'll come back and see you."

And away they went, and away went Archie's feeling of gloom as soon as

he got to the sunny side of the street.

"I say," said Harry, "that's a lively coon behind the counter. Looks to

me like a love-sick bandicoot, or a consumptive kangaroo. But don't you

know there is such a thing as being too honest? Now that old

death-and-glory chap robbed you, and had it been me, and I'd called

again, it would have been to kick him. But you're still the old

Johnnie."

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Now if I were writing all this tale from imagination, instead of

sketching the life and struggles of a real live laddie, I should have

ascended into the realms of romance, and made a kind of hero of him

thus: he should have gone straight away to the bank when he received

that 50 pounds from his uncle, and sent it back, and then gone off to

the bush with twopence halfpenny in his pocket, engaged himself to a

squatter as under-man, and worked his way right up to the pinnacle of

fortune.

But Archie had not done that; and between you and me and the binnacle,

not to let it go any further, I think he did an extremely sensible thing

in sticking to the money.

Oh, but plenty of young men who do not have uncles to send them

fifty-pound notes to help them over their first failures, do very well

without such assistance! So let no intending emigrant be disheartened.

Again, as to Winslow's wild way of borrowing said 50 pounds, and

changing it into 300 pounds, that was another "fluke," and a sort of

thing that might never happen again in a hundred years.

Pride did come in again, however, with a jump--with a gay Northumbrian

bound--when Bob and Harry seriously proposed that Johnnie, as the latter

still called him, should put his money in the pool, and share and share

alike with them.

"No, no, no," said the young Squire, "don't rile me; that would be so

obviously unfair to _you_, that it would be unfair to _myself_."

When asked to explain this seeming paradox, he added:

"Because it would rob me of my feeling of independence."

So the matter ended.

But through the long-headed kindness and business tact of Winslow, all

three succeeded in getting farms that adjoined, though Archie's was but

a patch compared to the united great farms of his chums, that stretched

to a goodly two thousand acres and more, with land beyond to take up as

pasture.

But then there was stock to buy, and tools, and all kinds of things, to

say nothing of men's and boys' wages to be paid, and arms and ammunition

to help to fill the larder.

At this time the railway did not go sweeping away so far west as it does

now, the colony being very much younger, and considerably rougher; and

the farms lay on the edge of the Darling Downs.

This was a great advantage, as it gave them the run of the markets

without having to pay nearly as much in transit and freight as the stock

was worth.

They had another advantage in their selection--thanks once more to

Winslow--they had Bush still farther to the west of them. Not adjacent,

to be sure, but near enough to make a shift of stock to grass lands,

that could be had for an old song, as the saying is.

The selection was procured under better conditions than I believe it is

to be had to-day; for the rent was only about ninepence an acre, and

that for twenty years, the whole payable at any time in order to obtain

complete possession.

[At present agricultural farms may be selected of not more than 1280

acres, and the rent is fixed by the Land Board, not being less than

threepence per acre per annum. A licence is issued to the selector, who

must, within five years, fence in the land or make permanent

improvements of a value equal to the cost of the fence, and must also

live on the selection. If at the end of that time he can prove that he

has performed the above conditions, he will be entitled to a

transferable lease for fifty years. The rent for the first ten years

will be the amount as at first fixed, and the rent for every subsequent

period of five years will be determined by the Land Board, but the

greatest increase that can be made at any re-assessment is fifty per

cent.]

It must not be imagined that this new home of theirs was a land flowing

with milk and honey, or that they had nothing earthly to do but till the

ground, sow seed, and live happy ever after. Indeed the work to be

performed was all earthly, and the milk and honey had all to come.

A deal of the very best land in Australia is covered with woods and

forests, and clearing has to be done.

Bob wished his busy little body of a wife to stay behind in Brisbane

till he had some kind of a decent crib, as he called it, ready to invite

her to.

But Sarah said, "No! Where you go I go. Your crib shall be my crib,

Bob, and I shall bake the damper." This was not very poetical language,

but there was a good deal of sound sense about Sarah, even if there was

but little poetry.

Well, it did seem at first a disheartening kind of wilderness they had

come to, but the site for the homesteads had been previously selected,

and after a night's rest in their rude tents and waggons, work was

commenced. Right joyfully too,--

"Down with them! Down with the lords of the forests."

This was the song of our pioneers. Men shouted and talked, and laughed

and joked, saws rasped and axes rang, and all the while duty went

merrily on. Birds find beasts, never disturbed before in the solitude

of their homes, except by wandering blacks, crowded round--only keeping

a safe distance away--and wondered whatever the matter could be. The

musical magpies, or laughing jackasses, said they would soon settle the

business; they would frighten those new chums out of their wits, and out

of the woods. So they started to do it. They laughed in such loud,

discordant, daft tones that at times Archie was obliged to put his

fingers in his ears, and guns had to be fired to stop the row. So they

were not successful. The cockatoos tried the same game; they cackled

and skraighed like a million mad hens, and rustled and ruffled their

plumage, and flapped their wings and flew, but all to no purpose--the

work went on.

The beautiful lorries, parrakeets, and budgerigars took little notice of

the intruders, but went farther away, deserting half-built nests to

build new ones. The bonnie little long-tailed opossum peeped down from

his perch on the gums, looking exceedingly wise, and told his wife that

not in all his experience had there been such goings on in the forest

lands, and that something was sure to follow it; his wife might mark his

words for that. The wonga-wongas grumbled dreadfully; but great hawks

flew high in the air, swooping round and round against the sun, as they

have a habit of doing, and now and then gave vent to a shrill cry which

was more of exultation than anything else. "There will be dead bones to

pick before long." That is what the hawks thought. Snakes now and then

got angrily up, puffed and blew a bit, but immediately decamped into the

denser cover.

The dingoes kept their minds to themselves until night fell, and the

stars came out; the constellation called the Southern Cross spangled the

heaven's dark blue, then the dingoes lifted up their voices and wept;

and, oh, such weeping! Whoso has never heard a concert of Australian

wild dogs can have no conception of the noise these animals are capable

of. Whoso has once heard it, and gone to sleep towards the end of it,

will never afterwards complain of the harmless musical reunions of our

London cats.

But sleep is often impossible. You have got just to lie in bed and

wonder what in the name of mystery they do it for. They seem to quarrel

over the key-note, and lose it, and try for it, and get it again, and

again go off into a chorus that would "ding doon" Tantallan Castle. And

when you do doze off at last, as likely as not, you will dream of

howling winds and hungry wolves till it is grey daylight in the morning.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

BURLEY NEW FARM.

There was so much to be done before things could be got "straight" on

the new station, that the days and weeks flew by at a wonderful pace. I

pity the man or boy who is reduced to the expedient of killing time.

Why if one is only pleasantly and usefully occupied, or engaged in

interesting pursuits, time kills itself, and we wonder where it has gone

to.

If I were to enter into a minute description of the setting-up of the

stock and agricultural farm, chapter after chapter would have to be

written, and still I should not have finished. I do not think it would

be unprofitable reading either, nor such as one would feel inclined to

skip. But as there are a deal of different ways of building and

furnishing new places the plan adopted by the three friends might not be

considered the best after all. Besides, improvements are taking place

every day even in Bush-life. However, in the free-and-easy life one

leads in the Bush one soon learns to feel quite independent of the finer

arts of the upholsterer.

In that last sentence I have used the adjective "easy;" but please to

observe it is adjoined to another hyphenically, and becomes one with

it--"free-and-easy." There is really very little ease in the Bush. Nor

does a man want it or care for it--he goes there to work. Loafers had

best keep to cities and to city life, and look for their _little_

enjoyments in parks and gardens by day, in smoke-filled billiard-rooms

or glaringly-lighted music-halls by night, go to bed at midnight, and

make a late breakfast on rusks and soda-water. We citizens of the woods

and wilds do not envy them. We go to bed with the birds, or soon after.

We go to sleep, no matter how hard our couches may be; and we do sleep

too, and wake with clear heads and clean tongues, and after breakfast

feel that nothing in the world will be a comfort to us but work. Yes,

men work in the Bush; and, strange to say, though they go there young,

they do not appear to grow quickly old. Grey hairs may come, and Nature

may do a bit of etching on their brows and around their eyes with the

pencil of time, but this does not make an atom of difference to their

brains and hearts. These get a trifle tougher, that is all, but no

older.

Well, of the three friends I think Archie made the best Bushman, though

Bob came next, then Harry, who really had developed his powers of mind

and body wonderfully, which only just proves that there is nothing after

all, even for a Cockney, like rubbing shoulders against a rough world.

A dozen times a week at least Archie mentally thanked his father for

having taught him to work at home, and for the training he had received

in riding to hounds, in tramping over the fields and moors with Branson,

in gaining practical knowledge at the barn-yards, and last, though not

least, in the good, honest, useful groundwork of education received from

his tutor Walton.

There was something else that Archie never failed to feel thankful to

heaven for, and that was the education his mother had given him.

Remember this: Archie was but a rough, harum-scarum kind of a British

boy at best, and religious teaching might have fallen on his soul as

water falls on a duck's back, to use a homely phrase. But as a boy he

had lived in an atmosphere of refinement. He constantly breathed it

till he became imbued with it; and he received the influence also

second-hand, or by reflection, from his brother Rupert and his sister.

Often and often in the Bush, around the log fire of an evening, did

Archie speak proudly of that beloved twain to his companions. His

language really had, at times, a smack of real, downright innocence

about it, as when he said to Bob once: "Mind you, Bob, I never was what

you might call good. I said, and do say, my prayers, and all the like

of that; but Roup and Elsie were so high above me that, after coming in

from a day's work or a day on the hill, it used to be like going into

church on a week-day to enter the green parlour. I felt my own mental

weakness, and I tried to put off my soul's roughness with my dirty boots

in the kitchen."

But Archie was now an excellent superintendent of work. He knew when

things were being well done, and he determined they should be. Nothing

riled him more than an attempt on the part of any of the men to take

advantage of him.

They soon came to know him; not as a tyrant, but simply as one who would

have things rightly done, and who knew when they _were_ being rightly

done, even if it were only so apparently simple a matter as planting a

fence-post; for there is a right way and a wrong way of doing that.

The men spoke of him as the young Boss. Harry being ignored in all

matters that required field-knowledge.

"We don't want nary a plumbline," said a man once, "when the young

Boss's around. He carries a plumbline in his eye."

Archie never let any man know when he was angry; but they knew

afterwards, however, that he had been so from the consequences. Yet

with all his strictness he was kind-hearted, and very just. He had the

happy gift of being able to put himself in the servant's place while

judging betwixt man and master.

Communications were constantly kept up between the station and the

railway, by means of waggons, or drays and saddle-horses. Among the

servants were several young blacks. These were useful in many ways, and

faithful enough; but required keeping in their places. To be in any way

familiar with them was to lose their respect, and they were not of much

consequence after that. When completed, the homestead itself was

certainly not devoid of comfort, though everything was of the homeliest

construction; for no large amount of money was spent in getting it up.

A Scotchman would describe it as consisting of "twa butts and a ben,"

with a wing at the back. The capital letter L, laid down longways

thus--I will give you some notion of its shape. There were two doors in

front, and four windows, and a backdoor in the after wing, also having

windows. The wing portion of the house contained the kitchen and

general sitting-room; the right hand portion the best rooms, ladies'

room included, but a door and passage communicated with these and the

kitchen.

This house was wholly built of sawn wood, but finished inside with lath

and plaster, and harled outside, so that when roofed over with those

slabs of wood, such as we see some old-English church steeples made of,

called "shingles," the building was almost picturesque. All the more so

because it was built on high ground, and trees were left around and near

it.

The kitchen and wing were _par excellence_ the bachelor apartments, of

an evening at all events.

Every thing that was necessary in the way of furnishing found its way

into the homestead of Burley New Farm; but nothing else, with the

exception of that of the guests'-room. Of this more anon.

The living-house was completed first; but all the time that this was

being built men were very busy on the clearings, and the sites were

mapped out for the large wool-shed, with huge adjoining yards, where the

sheep at shearing-time would be received and seen to.

There were also the whole paraphernalia and buildings constituting the

cattle and horse-yards, a killing and milking-yard; and behind these

were slab huts, roofed with huge pieces of bark, rudely but most

artistically fixed, for the men.

These last had fire-places, and though wholly built of wood, there was

no danger of fire, the chimneys being of stone.

Most of the yards and outhouses were separate from each other, and the

whole steading was built on elevated ground, the store-hut being not far

from the main or dwelling-house.

I hardly know what to liken the contents of this store, or the inside of

the place itself, to. Not unlike perhaps the half-deck or fore-cabin of

a Greenland ship on the day when stores are being doled out to the men.

Or, to come nearer home, if ever the reader has been in a remote and

rough part of our own country, say Wales or Scotland, where gangs of

navvies have been encamped for a time, at a spot where a new line of

railway is being pushed through a gully or glen.

Just take a peep inside. There is a short counter of the rudest

description, on which stand scales and weights, measures and knives.

Larger scales stand on the floor, and everywhere around you are heaps of

stores, of every useful kind you could possibly name or imagine, and

these are best divided into four classes--eatables, wearables, luxuries,

and tools.

Harry is at home here, and he has managed to infuse a kind of regularity

into the place, and takes a sort of pride in knowing where all his wares

are stored. The various departments are kept separate. Yonder, for

instance, stand the tea, coffee, and cocoa-nibs, and near them the sugar

of two kinds, the bags of flour, the cheeses (in boxes), the salt (in

casks), soda, soap, and last, but not least, the tobacco and spirits;

this last in a place by itself, and well out of harm's way. Then there

is oil and candles--by-and-bye they will make these on the farm--

matches--and this brings us to the luxuries--mustard, pepper of various

sorts, vinegar, pickles, curry, potted salmon, and meats of many kinds,

and bags of rice. Next there is a small store of medicines of the

simplest, not to say roughest, sorts, both for man and beast, and rough

bandages of flannel and cotton, with a bundle of splints.

Then comes clothing of all kinds--hats, shirts, jackets, boots, shoes,

etc. Then tools and cooking utensils; and in a private cupboard, quite

away in a corner, the ammunition.

It is unnecessary to add that harness and horse-shoes found a place in

this store, or that a desk stood in one corner where account-books were

kept, for the men did not invariably pay down on the nail.

I think it said a good deal for Sarah's courage that she came right away

down into the Bush with her "little man," and took charge of the cooking

department on the station, when it was little, if any, better than

simply a camp, with waggons for bedrooms, and a morsel of canvas for

gentility's sake.

But please to pop your head inside the kitchen, now that the

dwelling-house has been up for some little time. Before you reach the

door you will have to do a bit of stepping, for outside nothing is

tidied up as yet. Heaps of chips, heaps of stones and sticks and

builders' rubbish, are everywhere. Even when you get inside there is a

new smell--a limy odour--to greet you in the passage, but in the kitchen

itself all is order and neatness. A huge dresser stands against the

wall just under the window. The legs of it are a bit rough to be sure,

but nobody here is likely to be hypercritical; and when the dinner-hour

arrives, instead of the vegetables, meat, and odds-and-ends that now

stand thereon, plates, and even knives and forks, will be neatly placed

in a row, and Sarah herself, her cooking apron replaced by a neater and

nattier one, will take the head of the table, one of the boys will say a

shy kind of grace, and the meal will go merrily on.

On a shelf, slightly raised above the floor, stand rows of clean

saucepans, stewpans, and a big, family-looking business of a frying-pan;

and on the wall hang bright, shining dish-covers, and a couple of racks

and shelves laden with delf.

A good fire of logs burns on the low hearth, and there, among ashes

pulled on one side for the purpose, a genuine "damper" is baking, while

from a movable "sway" depends a chain and crook, on which latter hangs a

pot. This contains corned beef--very well, call it _salt_ if you

please. Anyhow, when Sarah lifts the lid to stick a fork into the

boiling mess an odour escapes and pervades the kitchen quite appetising

enough to make the teeth of a Bushman water, if he had done anything

like a morning's work. There is another pot close by the fire, and in

this sweet potatoes are boiling.

It is a warm spring day, and the big window is open to admit the air,

else poor Sarah would be feeling rather uncomfortable.

What is "damper"? It is simply a huge, thick cake or loaf, made from

extremely well-kneaded dough, and baked in the hot ashes of the hearth.

Like making good oat cakes, before a person can manufacture a "damper"

properly, he must be in a measure to the manner born. There is a deal

in the mixing of the dough, and much in the method of firing, and, after

all, some people do not care for the article at all, most useful and

handy and even edible though it be. But I daresay there are individuals

to be found in the world who would turn up their noses at good oat cake.

Ah, well, it is really surprising what the air of the Australian Bush

does in the way of increasing one's appetite and destroying

fastidiousness.

But it is near the dinner-hour, and right nimbly Sarah serves it up; and

she has just time to lave her face and hands, and change her apron, when

in comes Bob, followed by Archie and Harry. Before he sits down Bob

catches hold of Sarah by both hands, and looks admiringly into her face,

and ends by giving her rosy cheek a kiss, which resounds through the

kitchen rafters like the sound of a cattle-man's whip.

"I declare, Sarah lass," he says heartily, "you are getting prettier and

prettier every day. Now at this very moment your lips and cheeks are as

red as peonies, and your eyes sparkle as brightly as a young kangaroo's;

and if any man a stone heavier than myself will make bold to say that I

did wrong to marry you on a week's courtship, I'll kick him over the

river and across the creek. 'For what we are about to receive, the Lord

make us truly thankful. Amen.' Sit in, boys, and fire away. This beef

is delightful. I like to see the red juice following the knife; and the

sweet potatoes taste well, if they don't look pretty. What, Sarah, too

much done? Not a bit o' them."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The creek that Bob talked about kicking somebody across was a kind of

strath or glen not very far from the steading, and lying below it, green

and luxuriant at present. It wound away up and down the country for

miles, and in the centre of it was a stream or river or burn, well

clothed on its banks with bush, and opening out here and there into

little lakes or pools. This stream was--so old Bushmen said--never

known to run dry.

In the winter time it would at times well merit the name of river,

especially when after a storm a "spate" came down, with a bore perhaps

feet high, carrying along in its dreadful rush tree trunks, rocks,

pieces of bank--everything, in fact, that came in its way, or attempted

to withstand its giant power. "Spates," however, our heroes hoped would

come but seldom; for it is sad to see the ruin they make, and to notice

afterwards the carcases of sheep and cattle, and even horses, that

bestrew the haughs, or banks, and give food to prowling dingoes and

birds of the air, especially the ubiquitous crow.

The ordinary state of the water, however, is best described by the word

stream or rivulet, while in droughty summers it might dwindle down to a

mere burn meandering from pool to pool.

The country all around was plain and forest and rolling hills. It was

splendidly situated for grazing of a mixed kind. But our three friends

were not to be content with this, and told off the best part of it for

future agricultural purposes. Even this was to be but a nucleus, and at

this moment much of the land then untilled is yielding abundance of

grain.

Not until the place was well prepared for them were cattle bought and

brought home. Sheep were not to be thought of for a year or two.

With the cattle, when they began to arrive, Winslow, who was soon to pay

the new settlement a visit, sent up a few really good stockmen. And now

Archie was to see something of Bush-life in reality.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

RUNAWAY STOCK--BIVOUAC IN THE BUSH-NIGHT SCENE.

Australian cattle have one characteristic in common with some breeds of

pigeons, notably with those we call "homers." They have extremely good

memories as to localities, and a habit of "making back," as it is

termed, to the pastures from which they have been driven. This comes to

be very awkward at times, especially if a whole herd decamps or takes "a

moonlight flitting."

It would be mere digression to pause to enquire what God-given instinct

it is, that enables half-wild cattle to find their way back to their old

homes in as straight a line as possible, even when they have been driven

to a new station by circuitous routes. Many other animals have this

same homing power; dogs for example, and, to a greater extent, cats.

Swallows and sea-birds, such as the Arctic gull, and the albatross,

possess it in a very high degree; but it is still more wonderfully

displayed in fur seals that, although dispersed to regions thousands and

thousands of miles away during winter, invariably and unerringly find

their road back to a tiny group of wave and wind-swept islands, four in

number, called the Prybilov group, in the midst of the fog-shrouded sea

of Behring. The whole question wants a deal of thinking out, and life

is far too short to do it in.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

One morning, shortly after the arrival of the first great herd of stock,

word was brought to head-quarters that the cattle had escaped by

stampede, and were doubtless on their way to the distant station whence

they had been bought.

It was no time to ask the question, Who was in fault? Early action was

necessary, and was provided for without a moment's hesitation.

I rather think that Archie was glad to have an opportunity of doing a

bit of rough riding, and showing off his skill in horse management. He

owned what Bob termed a clipper. Not a very handsome horse to look at,

perhaps, but fleet enough and strong enough for anything. As

sure-footed as a mule was this steed, and as regards wisdom, a perfect

equine Solomon.

At a suggestion of Bob's he had been named Tell, in memory of the Tell

of other days. Tell had been ridden by Archie for many weeks, so that

master and horse knew each other well. Indeed Archie had received a

lesson or two from the animal that he was not likely to forget; for one

day he had so far forgotten himself as to dig the rowel into Tell's

sides, when there was really no occasion to do anything of the sort.

This was more than the horse could stand, and, though he was not an

out-and-out buck-jumper, nevertheless, a moment after the stirrup

performance, Archie found himself making a voyage of discovery, towards

the moon apparently. He descended as quickly almost as he had gone up,

and took the ground on his shoulder and cheek, which latter was well

skinned. Tell had stood quietly by looking at him, and as Archie patted

him kindly, he forgave him on the spot, and permitted a remount.

Archie and Bob hardly permitted themselves to swallow breakfast, so

anxious were they to join the stockmen and be off.

As there was no saying when they might return, they did not go

unprovided for a night or two out. In front of their saddles were

strapped their opossum rugs, and they carried also a tin billy each, and

provisions, in the shape of tea, damper, and cooked corned beef; nothing

else, save a change of socks and their arms.

Bob bade his wife a hurried adieu, Archie waved his hand, and next

minute they were over the paddocks and through the clearings and the

woods, in which the trees had been ring-barked, to permit the grass to

grow. And such tall grass Archie had never before seen as that which

grew in some parts of the open.

"Is it going to be a long job, think you, Bob?"

"I hardly know, Archie. But Craig is here."

"Oh, yes, Gentleman Craig, as Mr Winslow insists on calling him! You

have seen him."

"Yes; I met him at Brisbane. And a handsome chap he is. Looks like a

prince."

"Isn't it strange he doesn't rise from the ranks, as one might say; that

he doesn't get on?"

"I'll tell you what keeps him back," said Bob, reining his horse up to a

dead stop, that Archie might hear him all the easier.

"I'll tell you what keeps him back now, before you see him. I mustn't

talk loud, for the very birds might go and tell the fellow, and he

doesn't like to be 'minded about it. He drinks!"

"But he can't get drink in the Bush."

"Not so easily, though he has been known before now to ride thirty miles

to visit a hotel."

"A shanty, you mean."

"Well, they call 'em all hotels over here, you must remember."

"And would he just take a drink and come back?"

Bob laughed.

"Heaven help him, no. It isn't one drink, nor ten, nor fifty he takes,

for he makes a week or two of it."

"I hope he won't take any such long rides while he is with us."

"No. Winslow says we are sure of him for six months, anyhow. Then

he'll go to town and knock his cheque down. But come on, Craig and his

lads will be waiting for us."

At the most southerly and easterly end of the selection they met

Gentleman Craig himself.

He rode forward to meet them, lifting his broad hat, and reining up when

near enough. He did this in a beautifully urbane fashion, that showed

he had quite as much respect for himself as for his employers. He was

indeed a handsome fellow, and his rough Garibaldian costume fitted him,

and set him out as if he had been some great actor.

"This is an awkward business," he began, with an easy smile; "but I

think we'll soon catch the runaways up."

"I hope so," Bob said.

"Oh, it was all my fault, because I'm boss of my gang, you know. I

ought to have known better, but a small mob of stray beasts got among

ours, and by-and-by there was a stampede. It was dirty-dark last night,

and looked like a storm, so there wouldn't have been an ounce of use in

following them up."

He flicked his long whip half saucily, half angrily, as he spoke.

"Well, never mind," Bob replied, "we'll have better luck next, I've no

doubt."

Away they went now at a swinging trot, and on crossing the creek they

met Craig's fellows.

They laid their horses harder at it now, Bob and Archie keeping a bit in

the rear, though the latter declared that Tell was pulling like a young

steam-engine.

"Why," cried Archie at last, "this beast means to pull my arms out at

the shoulders. I always thought I knew how to hold the reins till now."

"They have a queer way with them, those bush-ranging horses," said Bob;

"but I reckon you'll get up to them at last."

"If I were to give Tell his head, he would soon be in the van."

"In the van? Oh, I see, in the front!"

"Yes; and then I'd be lost. Why these chaps appear to know every inch

of the ground. To me it is simply marvellous."

"Well, the trees are blazed."

"I've seen no blazed trees. Have you?"

"Never a one. I say, Craig."

"Hullo!" cried the head stockman, glancing over his shoulder.

"Are you steering by blazed trees?"

"No," he laughed; "by tracks. Cattle don't mind blazed trees much."

Perhaps Bob felt green now, for he said no more. Archie looked about

him, but never a trail nor track could he decipher.

Yet on they rode, helter-skelter apparently, but cautiously enough for

all that. Tell was full of fire and fun; for, like Verdant Green's

horse, when put at a tiny tree trunk in his way, he took a leap that

would have carried him over a five-bar-gate.

There was many a storm-felled tree in the way also and many a dead

trunk, half buried in ferns; there were steep stone-clad hills,

difficult to climb, but worse to descend, and many a little rivulet to

cross; but nothing could interfere with the progress of these hardy

horses.

Although the sun was blazing hot, no one seemed to feel it much. The

landscape was very wild, and very beautiful; but Archie got weary at

last of its very loveliness, and was not one whit sorry when the

afternoon halt was called under the pleasant shade of trees, and close

by the banks of a rippling stream.

The horses were glad to drink as well as the men, then they were

hobbled, and allowed to browse while all hands sat down to eat.

Only damper and beef, washed down by a billyful of the clear water,

which, strange to say, was wonderfully cool.

When the sun was sinking low on the forest-clad horizon, there was a

joyful but half-suppressed shout from Craig and his men. Part of the

herd was in sight, quietly browsing up a creek.

Gentleman Craig pointed them out to Archie; but he had to gaze a

considerable time before he could really distinguish anything that had

the faintest resemblance to cattle.

"Your eye is young yet to the Bush," said Craig, laughing, but not in

any unmannerly way.

"And now," he continued, "we must go cautiously or we spoil all."

The horsemen made a wide detour, and got between the bush and the mob;

and the ground being favourable, here it was determined to camp for the

night. The object of the stockmen was not to alarm the herd, but to

prevent them from getting any farther off till morning, when the march

homewards would commence. With this intent, log fires were built here

and there around the herd; and once these were well alight the mob was

considered pretty safe. All, however, had been done very quietly; and

during the livelong night, until grey dawn broke over the hills, the

fellows would have to keep those fires burning.

Supper was a more pleasing meal, for there was the addition of tea;

after which, with their feet to the log fire--Bob and Craig enjoying a

whiff of tobacco--they lay as much at their ease, and feeling every whit

as comfortable, as if at home by the "ingleside." Gentleman Craig had

many stories and anecdotes to relate of the wild life he had had, that

both Archie and Bob listened to with delight.

"I'll take one more walk around," said Craig, "then stretch myself on my

downy bed. Will you come with me, Mr Broadbent?"

"With pleasure," said Archie.

"Mind how you step then. Keep your whip in your hand, but on no account

crack it. We have to use our intellect _versus_ brute force. If the

brute force became alarmed and combined, then our intellect would go to

the wall, there would be another stampede, and another long ride

to-morrow."

Up and down in the starlight, or by the fitful gleams of the log fires,

they could see the men moving like uneasy ghosts. Craig spoke a word or

two kindly and quietly as he passed, and having made his inspection, and

satisfied himself that all was comparatively safe, he returned with

Archie to the fire.

Bob was already fast asleep, rolled snugly in his blanket, with his head

in the hollow of his upturned saddle; and Archie and Craig made speed to

follow his example.

As for Craig, he was soon in the land of Nod. He was a true Bushman,

and could go off sound as a bell the moment he stretched himself on his

"downy bed," as he called it.

But Archie felt the situation far too new to permit of slumber all at

once. He had never lain out thus before; and the experience was so

delightful to him that he felt justified in lying awake a bit, and

looking at the stars. The distant dingoes began to howl, and more than

once some great dark bird flew over the camp, high overhead, but on

silent wings.

His thoughts wandered away over the thousands and thousands of miles

that intervened between him and home, and he began to wonder what they

were all doing at Burley; for it would be broad daylight there, and very

likely his father was trudging over the moors, or through the stubbles.

But dreams came and mingled with his waking thoughts at last, and were

just usurping them all when he became conscious of the approach of

stealthy footsteps.

He lay perfectly still, though his hand sought his ready revolver; for

stories of black fellows stealing on out-sleeping travellers began to

crowd through his mind, and being young to the Bush, he could not

prevent that heart of his from throbbing uneasily and painfully against

his ribs.

How did they brain people, he was wondering, with a boomerang or nullah?

or was it not more common to spear them?

But, greatly to his relief, the figure immediately afterwards revealed

itself in the person of one of the men, silently placing an armful of

wood on the half-dying embers. Then he silently glided away again, and

next minute Archie was wrapt in the elysium of forgetfulness.

The dews lay all about, glittering in the first beams of the sun, when

he awoke, feeling somewhat cold and considerably stiff; but warm tea and

a breakfast of wondrous solidity soon put him all to rights again.

Two nights after this the new stock was safe in the yards; and every

evening before sundown, for many a day to come, they had to be "tailed,"

and brought within the strong bars of the rendezvous.

Branding was the next business. This is no trifling matter with old

cattle. With the calves indeed it is a bit troublesome at times, but

the grown-up ones resent the adding of insult to injury. It is no

uncommon thing for men to be severely injured during the operation.

Nevertheless the agility displayed by the stockmen and their excessive

coolness is marvellous to behold.

Most of those cattle were branded with a "B.H.," which stood for Bob and

Harry; but some were marked with the letters "A.B.," for Archibald

Broadbent, and--I need not hide the truth--Archie was a proud young man

when he saw these marks. He realised now fully that he had commenced

life in earnest, and was a squatter, not only in name, but in reality.

The fencing work and improvements still went gaily on, the ground being

divided into immense paddocks, many of which our young farmers trusted

to see ere long covered with waving grain.

The new herds soon got used to the country, and settled down on it,

dividing themselves quietly into herds of their own making, that were

found browsing together mornings and evenings in the best pastures, or

gathered in mobs during the fierce heat of the middle-day.

Archie quickly enough acquired the craft of a cunning and bold stockman,

and never seemed happier than when riding neck and neck with some

runaway semi-wild bull, or riding in the midst of a mob, selecting the

beast that was wanted. And at a job like the latter Tell and he

appeared to be only one individual betwixt the two of them, like the

fabled Centaur. He came to grief though once, while engaged heading a

bull in as ugly a bit of country as any stockman ever rode over. It

happened. Next chapter, please.

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

A WILD ADVENTURE--ARCHIE'S PRIDE RECEIVES A FALL.

It happened--I was going to say at the end of the other page--that in a

few weeks' time Mr Winslow paid his promised visit to Burley New Farm,

as the three friends called it.

Great preparations had been made beforehand because Etheldene was coming

with her father, and was accompanied by a black maid. Both Etheldene

and her maid had been accommodated with a dray, and when Sarah, with her

cheeks like ripe cherries, and her eyes like sloes, showed the young

lady to her bedroom, Etheldene was pleased to express her delight in no

measured terms. She had not expected anything like this. Real

mattresses, with real curtains, a real sofa, and real lace round the

looking-glass.

"It is almost too good for Bush-life," said Etheldene; "but I am so

pleased, Mrs Cooper; and everything is as clean and tidy as my own

rooms in Sydney. Father, do come and see all this, and thank Mrs

Cooper prettily."

Somewhat to Archie's astonishment a horse was led round next morning for

Etheldene, and she appeared in a pretty dark habit, and was helped into

the saddle, and gathered up the reins, and looked as calm and

self-possessed as a princess could have done.

It was Gentleman Craig who was the groom, and a gallant one he made.

For the life of him Archie could not help envying the man for his

excessive coolness, and would have given half of his cattle--those with

the bold "A.B.'s" on them--to have been only half as handsome.

Never mind. Archie is soon mounted, and cantering away by the young

lady's side, and feeling so buoyant and happy all over that he would not

have exchanged places with a king on a throne.

"Oh, yes," said Etheldene, laughing, as she replied to a question of

Archie's, "I know nearly everything about cattle, and sheep too! But,"

she added, "I'm sure you are clever among them already."

Archie felt the blood mount to his forehead; but he took off his broad

hat and bowed for the compliment, almost as prettily as Gentleman Craig

could have done himself.

Now, there is such a thing as being too clever, and it was trying to be

clever that led poor Archie to grief that day.

The young man was both proud and pleased to have an opportunity of

showing Etheldene round the settlement, all the more so that there was

to be a muster of the herds that day, and neighbour-squatters had come

on horseback to assist. This was a kind of a love-darg which was very

common in Queensland a few years ago, and probably is to this day.

Archie pointed laughingly towards the stock whip Etheldene carried. He

never for a moment imagined it was in the girl's power to use or manage

such an instrument.

"That is a pretty toy, Miss Winslow," he said.

"Toy, do you call it, sir?" said this young Diana, pouting prettily.

"It is only a lady's whip, for the thong is but ten feet long. But

listen."

It flew from her hands as she spoke, and the sound made every animal

within hearing raise head and sniff the air.

"Well," said Archie, "I hope you won't run into any danger."

"Oh," she exclaimed, "danger is fun!" And she laughed right merrily,

and looked as full of life and beauty as a bird in spring time.

Etheldene was tall and well-developed for her age, for girls in this

strange land very soon grow out of their childhood.

Archie had called her Diana in his own mind, and before the day was over

she certainly had given proof that she well merited the title.

New herds had arrived, and had for one purpose or another to be headed

into the stock yards. This is a task of no little difficulty, and

to-day being warm these cattle appeared unusually fidgety. Twos and

threes frequently stampeded from the mob, and went determinedly dashing

back towards the creek and forest, so there was plenty of opportunities

for anyone to show off his horsemanship. Once during a chase like this

Archie was surprised to see Etheldene riding neck and neck for a time

with a furious bull. He trembled for her safety as he dashed onwards to

her assistance. But crack, crack, crack went the brave girl's whip; she

punished the runaway most unmercifully, and had succeeded in turning him

ere her Northumbrian cavalier rode up. A moment more and the bull was

tearing back towards the herd he had left, a stockman or two following

close behind.

"I was frightened for you," said Archie.

"Pray, don't be so, Mr Broadbent. I don't want to think myself a

child, and I should not like you to think me one. Mind, I've been in

the Bush all my life."

But there was more and greater occasion to be frightened for Etheldene

ere the day was done. In fact, she ran so madly into danger, that the

wonder is she escaped. She had a gallant, soft-mouthed horse--that was

one thing to her advantage--and the girl had a gentle hand.

But Archie drew rein himself, and held his breath with fear, to see a

maddened animal, that she was pressing hard, turn wildly round and

charge back on horse and rider with all the fury imaginable. A turn of

the wrist of the bridle hand, one slight jerk of the fingers, and

Etheldene's horse had turned on a pivot, we might almost say, and the

danger was over.

So on the whole, instead of Archie having had a very grand opportunity

for showing off his powers before this young Diana, it was rather the

other way.

The hunt ended satisfactory to both parties; and while Sarah was getting

an extra good dinner ready, Archie proposed a canter "to give them an

appetite."

"Have you got an appetite, Mr Broadbent? I have."

It was evident Etheldene was not too fine a lady to deny the possession

of good health.

"Yes," said Archie; "to tell you the plain truth, I'm as hungry as a

hunter. But it'll do the nags good to stretch their legs after so much

wheeling and swivelling."

So away they rode again, side by side, taking the blazed path towards

the plains.

"You are sure you can find your way back, I suppose?" said Etheldene.

"I think so."

"It would be good fun to be lost."

"Would you really like to be?"

"Oh, we would not be altogether, you know! We would find our way to

some hut and eat damper, or to some grand hotel, I suppose, in the Bush,

and father and Craig would soon find us."

"Father and you have known Craig long?"

"Yes, many, many years. Poor fellow, it is quite a pity for him.

Father says he was very clever at college, and is a Master of Arts of

Cambridge."

"Well, he has taken his hogs to a nice market."

"But father would do a deal for him if he could trust him. He has told

father over and over again that plenty of people would trust him if he

could only trust himself."

"Poor man! So nice-looking too! They may well call him Gentleman

Craig."

"But is it not time we were returning?"

"Look! look!" she cried, before Archie could answer. "Yonder is a

bull-fight. Whom does the little herd belong to?"

"Not to us. We are far beyond even our pastures. We have cut away from

them. This is a kind of no-man's land, where we go shooting at times;

and I daresay they are trespassers or wild cattle. Pity they cannot be

tamed."

"They are of no use to anyone, I have heard father say, except to shoot.

If they be introduced into a herd of stock cattle, they teach all the

others mischief. But see how they fight! Is it not awful?"

"Yes. Had we not better return? I do not think your father would like

you to witness such sights as that."

The girl laughed lightly.

"Oh," she cried, "you don't half know father yet! He trusts me

everywhere. He is very, very good, though not so refined as some would

have him to be."

The cows of this herd stood quietly by chewing their cuds, under the

shade of a huge gum tree, while two red-eyed giant bulls struggled for

mastery in the open.

It was a curious fight, and a furious fight. At the time Archie and his

companion came in sight of the conflict, they had closed, and were

fencing with their horns with as much skill, apparently, as any two men

armed with foils could have displayed. The main points to be gained

appeared to be to unlock or get out of touch of each other's horns long

enough to stab in neck and shoulder, and during the time of being in

touch to force back and gain ground. Once during this fight the younger

bull backed his opponent right to the top of a slight hill. It was a

supreme effort, and evidently made in the hope that he would hurl him

from a height at the other side. But in this he was disappointed; for

the top was level, and the older one, regaining strength, hurled his

enemy down the hill again far more quickly than he had come up. Round

and round, and from side to side, the battle raged, till at long last

the courage and strength of one failed completely. He suffered himself

to be backed, and it was evident was only waiting an opportunity to

escape uncut and unscathed. This came at length, and he turned and,

with a cry of rage, dashed madly away to the forest. The battle now

became a chase, and the whole herd, holloaing good luck to the victor,

joined in it.

As there was no more to be seen, Archie and Etheldene turned their

horses' heads homewards.

They had not ridden far, however, before the vanquished bull himself

hove in sight. He was alone now, though still tearing off in a panic,

and moaning low and angrily to himself.

It was at this moment that what Archie considered a happy inspiration

took possession of our impulsive hero.

"Let us wait till he passes," he said, "and drive him before us to

camp."

Easily said. But how was it to be done?

They drew back within the shadow of a tree, and the bull rushed past.

Then out pranced knight Archie, cracking his stock whip.

The monster paused, and wheeling round tore up the ground with his hoofs

in a perfect agony of anger.

"What next?" he seemed to say to himself. "It is bad enough to be

beaten before the herd; but I will have my revenge now."

The brute's roaring now was like the sound of a gong, hollow and

ringing, but dreadful to listen to.

Archie met him boldly enough, intending to cut him in the face as he

dashed past. In his excitement he dug his spurs into Tell, and next

minute he was on the ground. The bull rushed by, but speedily wheeled,

and came tearing back, sure now of blood in which to dip his ugly hoofs.

Archie had scrambled up, and was near a tree when the infuriated beast

came down on the charge. Even at this moment of supreme danger Archie--

he remembered this afterwards--could not help admiring the excessively

business-like way the animal came at him to break him up. There was a

terrible earnestness and a terrible satisfaction in his face or eyes;

call it what you like, there it was.

Near as Archie was to the tree, to reach and get round it was

impossible. He made a movement to get at his revolver; but it was too

late to draw and fire, so at once he threw himself flat on the ground.

The bull rushed over him, and came into collision with the tree trunk.

This confused him for a second or two, and Archie had time to regain his

feet. He looked wildly about for his horse. Tell was quietly looking

on; he seemed to be waiting for his young master. But Archie never

would have reached the horse alive had not brave Etheldene's whip not

been flicked with painful force across the bull's eyes. That blow saved

Archie, though the girl's horse was wounded on the flank.

A minute after both were galloping speedily across the plain, all danger

over; for the bull was still rooting around the tree, apparently

thinking that his tormentors had vanished through the earth.

"How best can I thank you?" Archie was saying.

"By saying nothing about it," was Etheldene's answer.

"But you have saved my life, child."

"A mere bagatelle, as father says," said this saucy Queensland maiden,

with an arch look at her companion. But Archie did not look arch as he

put the next question.

"Which do you mean is the bagatelle, Etheldene, my life, or the saving

of it?"

"Yes, you may call me Etheldene--father's friends do--but don't, please,

call me child again."

"I beg your pardon, Etheldene."

"It is granted, sir."

"But now you haven't answered my question."

"What was it? I'm so stupid!"

"Which did you mean was the bagatelle--my life, or the saving of it?"

"Oh, both!"

"Thank you."

"I wish I could save Gentleman Craig's life," she added, looking

thoughtful and earnest all in a moment.

"Bother Gentleman Craig!" thought Archie; but he was not rude enough to

say so.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because he once saved mine. That was when I was lost in the Bush, you

know. He will tell you some day--I will ask him to. He is very proud

though, and does not like to talk very much about himself."

Archie was silent for a short time. Why, he was wondering to himself,

did it make him wretched--as it certainly had done--to have Etheldene

look upon his life and the saving of it as a mere bagatelle. Why should

she not? Still the thought was far from pleasant. Perhaps, if he had

been killed outright, she would have ridden home and reported his death

in the freest and easiest manner, and the accident would not have

spoiled her dinner. The girl could have no feeling; and yet he had

destined her, in his own mind, to be Rupert's wife. She was unworthy of

so great an honour. It should never happen if he could prevent it.

Suddenly it occurred to him to ask her what a bagatelle was.

"A bagatelle?" she replied. "Oh, about a thousand pounds. Father

always speaks of a thousand pounds as a mere bagatelle."

Archie laughed aloud--he could not help it; but Etheldene looked merrily

at him as she remarked quietly, "You wouldn't laugh if you knew what I

know."

"Indeed! What is it?"

"We are both lost!"

"Goodness forbid!"

"You won't have grace to say to-day--there will be no dinner; that's

always the worst of being lost."

Archie looked around him. There was not a blazed tree to be seen, and

he never remembered having been in the country before in which they now

rode.

"We cannot be far out," he said, "and I believe we are riding straight

for the creek."

"So do I, and that is one reason why we are both sure to be wrong. It's

great fun, isn't it?"

"I don't think so. We're in an ugly fix. I really thought I was a

better Bushman than I am."

Poor Archie! His pride had received quite a series of ugly falls since

morning, but this was the worst come last. He felt a very crestfallen

cavalier indeed.

It did not tend to raise his spirits a bit to be told that if Gentleman

Craig were here, he would find the blazed-tree line in a very short

time.

But things took a more cheerful aspect when out from a clump of trees

rode a rough-looking stockman, mounted on a sackful of bones in the

shape of an aged white horse.

He stopped right in front of them.

"Hillo, younkers! Whither away? Can't be sundowners, sure-ly!"

"No," said Archie; "we are not sundowners. We are riding straight home

to Burley New Farm."

"'Xcuse me for contradicting you flat, my boy. It strikes me ye ain't

boss o' the sitivation. Feel a kind o' bushed, don't ye?"

Archie was fain to confess it.

"Well, I know the tracks, and if ye stump it along o' me, ye won't have

to play at babes o' the wood to-night."

They did "stump it along o' him," and before very long found themselves

in the farm pasture lands.

They met Craig coming, tearing along on his big horse, and glad he was

to see them.

"Oh, Craig," cried Etheldene, "we've been having such fun, and been

bushed, and everything!"

"I found this 'ere young gent a-bolting with this 'ere young lady," said

their guide, whom Craig knew and addressed by the name of Hurricane

Bill.

"A runaway match, eh? Now, who was in the fault? But I think I know.

Let me give you a bit of advice, sir. Never trust yourself far in the

Bush with Miss Ethie. She doesn't mind a bit being lost, and I can't be

always after her. Well, dinner is getting cold."

"Did you wait for us?" said Etheldene.

"Not quite unanimously, Miss Ethie. It was like this: Mr Cooper and

Mr Harry waited for you, and your father waited for Mr Broadbent. It

comes to the same thing in the end, you know."

"Yes," said Etheldene, "and it's funny."

"What did you come for, Bill? Your horse looks a bit jaded."

"To invite you all to the hunt. Findlayson's compliments, and all that

genteel nonsense; and come as many as can. Why, the kangaroos, drat

'em, are eating us up. What with them and the dingoes we've been having

fine times, I can tell ye!"

"Well, it seems to me, Bill, your master is always in trouble. Last

year it was the blacks, the year before he was visited by bushrangers,

wasn't he?"

"Ye-es. Fact is we're a bit too far north, and a little too much out

west, and so everything gets at us like."

"And when is the hunt?"

"Soon's we can gather."

"I'm going for one," said Etheldene.

"What _you_, Miss?" said Hurricane Bill. "You're most too young, ain't

ye?"

The girl did not condescend to answer him.

"Come, sir, we'll ride on," she said to Archie.

And away they flew.

"Depend upon it, Bill, if she says she is going, go she will, and

there's an end of it."

"Humph!" That was Bill's reply. He always admitted he had "no great

fancy for womenfolks."

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

ROUND THE LOG FIRE--HURRICANE BILL AND THE TIGER-SNAKE--GENTLEMAN

CRAIG'S RESOLVE.

Kangaroo driving or hunting is one of the wild sports of Australia,

though I have heard it doubted whether there was any real sport in it.

It is extremely exciting, and never much more dangerous than a ride

after the hounds at home in a rough country.

It really does seem little short of murder, however, to surround the

animals and slay them wholesale; only, be it remembered, they are

extremely hard upon the herbage. It has been said that a kangaroo will

eat as much as two sheep; whether this be true or not, these animals

must be kept down, or they will keep the squatter down. Every other

species of wild animal disappears before man, but kangaroos appear to

imagine that human beings were sent into the bush to make two blades of

grass grow where only one grew before, and that both blades belong to

them.

The only people from Burley New Farm who went to the Findlayson kangaroo

drive were Harry, Archie, and Etheldene, and Craig to look after her.

Me. Winslow stopped at home with Bob, to give him advice and suggest

improvements; for he well knew his daughter would be safe with Gentleman

Craig.

It was a long ride, however, and one night was to be spent in camp; but

as there was nothing to do, and nothing in the shape of cattle or sheep

to look after, it was rather jolly than otherwise. They found a

delightful spot near a clear pool and close by the forest to make their

pitch on for the night.

Hurricane Bill was the active party on this occasion; he found wood with

the help of Harry, and enough of it to last till the morning. The

beauty, or one of the beauties, of the climate in this part of Australia

is, that with the sun the thermometer sinks, and the later spring and

even summer nights are very pleasant indeed.

When supper was finished, and tea, that safest and best of stimulants,

had been discussed, talking became general; everybody was in good

spirits in the expectation of some fun on the morrow; for a longish ride

through the depth of that gloomy forest would bring them to the plain

and to Findlayson's in time for a second breakfast.

Hurricane Bill told many a strange story of Australian life, but all in

the way of conversation; for Bill was a shy kind of man, and wanted a

good deal of drawing-out, as the dog said about the badger.

Archie gave his experiences of hunting in England, and of shooting and

fishing and country adventure generally in that far-off land, and he had

no more earnest listener than Etheldene. To her England was the land of

romance. Young though she was, she had read the most of Walter Scott's

novels, and had an idea that England and Scotland were still peopled as

we find these countries described by the great wizard, and she did not

wish to be disillusioned. The very mention of the word "castle," or

"ruin," or "coat of mail," brought fancies and pictures into her mind

that she would not have had blotted out on any account.

Over and over again, many a day and many a time, she had made Archie

describe to her every room in the old farm; and his turret chamber high

up above the tall-spreading elm trees, where the rooks built and cawed

in spring, and through which the wild winds of winter moaned and soughed

when the leaves had fallen, was to Etheldene a veritable room in

fairyland.

"Oh," she said to-night, "how I should love it all! I do want to go to

England, and I'll make father take me just once before I die."

"Before ye die, miss!" said Hurricane Bill. "Why it is funny to hear

the likes o' you, with all the world before ye, talkin' about dying."

Well, by-and-by London was mentioned, and then it was Harry's turn. He

was by no means sorry to have something to say.

"Shall I describe to you, Miss Winslow," he said, "some of the wild

sights of Whitechapel?"

"Is it a dreadfully wild place, Mr Brown?"

"It is rather; eh, Johnnie?"

"I don't know much about it, Harry."

"Well, there are slums near by there, miss, that no man with a black

coat and an umbrella dare enter in daylight owing to the wild beasts.

Then there are peelers."

"What are peelers? Monkeys?"

"Yes, miss; they are a sort of monkeys--blue monkeys--and carry sticks

same as the real African ourang-outangs do. And can't they use them

too!"

"Are they very ugly?"

"Awful, and venomous too; and at night they have one eye that shines in

the dark like a wild cat's, and you've got to stand clear when that

eye's on you."

"Well," said Etheldene, "I wouldn't like to be lost in a place like

that. I'd rather be bushed where I am. But I think, Mr Brown, you are

laughing at me. Are there any snakes in Whitechapel?"

"No, thank goodness; no, miss. I can't stand snakes much."

"There was a pretty tiger crept past you just as I was talking though,"

she said with great coolness.

Harry jumped and shook himself. Etheldene laughed.

"It is far enough away by this time," she remarked. "I saw something

ripple past you, Harry, like a whip-thong. I thought my eyes had made

it."

"You brought it along with the wood perhaps," said Craig quietly.

"'Pon my word," cried Harry, "you're a lot of Job's comforters, all of

you. D'ye know I won't sleep one blessed wink to-night. I'll fancy

every moment there is a snake in my blanket or under the saddle."

"They won't come near you, Mr Brown," said Craig. "They keep as far

away from Englishmen as possible."

"Not always," said Bill. "Maybe ye wouldn't believe it, but I was

bitten and well-nigh dead, and it was a tiger as done it. And if I

ain't English, then there ain't an Englishman 'twixt 'ere and Melbourne.

See that, miss?" He held up a hand in the firelight as he spoke.

"Why," said Etheldene, "you don't mean to say the snake bit off half

your little finger?"

"Not much I don't; but he bit me _on_ the finger, miss. I was a

swagsman then, and was gathering wood, as we were to-night, when I got

nipped, and my chum tightened a morsel of string round it to keep the

poison away from the heart, then he laid the finger on a stone and

chopped it off with his spade. Fact what I'm telling you. But the

poison got in the blood somehow all the same. They half carried me to

Irish Charlie's hotel. Lucky, that wasn't far off. Then they stuck the

whiskey into me."

"Did the whiskey kill the poison?" said Archie.

"Whiskey kill the poison! Why, young sir, Charlie's whiskey would have

killed a kangaroo! But nothing warmed me that night; my blood felt

frozen. Well, sleep came at last, and, oh, the dreams! 'Twere worse

ten thousand times than being wi' Daniel in the den o' lions. Next day

nobody hardly knew me; I was blue and wrinkled. I had aged ten years in

a single night."

"I say," said Harry, "suppose we change the subject."

"And I say," said Craig, "suppose we make the beds."

He got up as he spoke, and began to busy himself in preparations for

Etheldene's couch. It was easily and simply arranged, but the

arrangement nevertheless showed considerable forethought.

He disappeared for a few minutes, and returned laden with all the

necessary paraphernalia. A seven-foot pole was fastened to a tree; the

other end supported by a forked stick, which he sharpened and drove into

the ground. Some grass was spread beneath the pole, a blanket thrown

carefully over it, the upturned saddle put down for a pillow, and a tent

formed by throwing over the pole a loose piece of canvas that he had

taken from his saddle-bow, weighted down by some stones, and the whole

was complete.

"Now, Baby," said Craig, handing Etheldene a warm rug, "will you be

pleased to retire?"

"Where is my flat candlestick?" she answered. Gentleman Craig pointed

to the Southern Cross. "Yonder," he said. "Is it not a lovely one?"

"It puts me in mind of old, old times," said Etheldene with a sigh.

"And you're calling me 'Baby' too. Do you remember, ever so long ago in

the Bush, when I was a baby in downright earnest, how you used to sing a

lullaby to me outside my wee tent?"

"If you go to bed, and don't speak any more, I may do so again."

"Good-night then. Sound sleep to everybody. What fun!" Then Baby

disappeared.

Craig sat himself down near the tent, after replenishing the fire--he

was to keep the first watch, then Bill would come on duty--and at once

began to sing, or rather 'croon' over, an old, old song. His voice was

rich and sweet, and though he sang low it could be heard distinctly

enough by all, and it mingled almost mournfully with the soughing of the

wind through the tall trees.

"My song is rather a sorrowful ditty," he had half-whispered to Archie

before he began; "but it is poor Miss Ethie's favourite." But long

before Craig had finished no one around the log fire was awake but

himself.

He looked to his rifle and revolvers, placed them handy in case of an

attack by blacks, then once more sat down, leaning his back against a

tree and giving way to thought.

Not over pleasant thoughts were those of Gentleman Craig's, as might

have been guessed from his frequent sighs as he gazed earnestly into the

fire.

What did he see in the fire? _Tableaux_ of his past life? Perhaps or

perhaps not. At all events they could not have been very inspiriting

ones. No one could have started in life with better prospects than he

had done; but he carried with him wherever he went his own fearful

enemy, something that would not leave him alone, but was ever, ever

urging him to drink. Even as a student he had been what was called "a

jolly fellow," and his friendship was appreciated by scores who knew

him. He loved to be considered the life and soul of a company. It was

an honour dearer to him than anything else; but deeply, dearly had he

paid for it.

By this time he might have been honoured and respected in his own

country, for he was undoubtedly clever; but he had lost himself, and

lost all that made life dear--his beautiful, queenly mother. He would

never see her more. She was _dead_, yet the memory of the love she bore

him was still the one, the only ray of sunshine left in his soul.

And he had come out here to Australia determined to turn over a new

leaf. Alas! he had not done so.

"Oh, what a fool I have been!" he said in his thoughts, clenching his

lists until the nails almost cut the palms.

He started up now and went wandering away towards the trees. There was

nothing that could hurt him there. He felt powerful enough to grapple

with a dozen blacks, but none were in his thoughts; and, indeed, none

were in the forest.

He could talk aloud now, as he walked rapidly up and down past the weird

grey trunks of the gum trees.

"My foolish pride has been my curse," he said bitterly. "But should I

allow it to be so? The thing lies in a nutshell I have never yet had

the courage to say, 'I will not touch the hateful firewater, because I

cannot control myself if I do.' If I take but one glass I arouse within

me the dormant fiend, and he takes possession of my soul, and rules all

my actions until sickness ends my carousal, and I am left weak as a

child in soul and body. If I were not too proud to say those words to

my fellow-beings, if I were not afraid of being laughed at as a

_coward_! Ah, that's it! It is too hard to bear! Shall I face it?

Shall I own myself a coward in this one thing? I seem compelled to

answer myself, to answer my own soul. Or is it my dead mother's spirit

speaking through my heart? Oh, if I thought so I--I--"

Here the strong man broke down. He knelt beside a tree trunk and sobbed

like a boy. Then he prayed; and when he got up from his knees he was

calm. He extended one hand towards the stars.

"Mother," he said, "by God's help I shall be free."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

When the morning broke pale and golden over the eastern hills, and the

laughing jackasses came round to smile terribly loud and terribly

chaffingly at the white men's preparation for their simple breakfast,

Craig moved about without a single trace of his last night's sorrow. He

was busy looking after the horses when Etheldene came bounding towards

him with both hands extended, so frank and free and beautiful that as he

took hold of them he could not help saying:

"You look as fresh as a fern this morning, Baby."

"Not so green, Craig. Say 'Not so green.'"

"No, not so green. But really to look at you brings a great big wave of

joy surging all over my heart. But to descend from romance to

common-sense. I hope you are hungry? I have just been seeing to your

horse. Where do you think I found him?"

"I couldn't guess."

"Why in the water down yonder. Lying down and wallowing."

"The naughty horse! Ah, here come the others! Good morning all."

"We have been bathing," said Archie. "Oh, how delicious!"

"Yes," said Harry; "Johnnie and I were bathing down under the trees, and

it really was a treat to see how quickly he came to bank when I told him

there was an alligator taking stock."

"We scared the ducks though. Pity we didn't bring our guns and bag a

few."

"I believe we'll have a right good breakfast at Findlayson's," said

Craig; "so I propose we now have a mouthful of something and start."

The gloom of that deep forest became irksome at last; though some of its

trees were wondrous to behold in their stately straightness and

immensity of size, the trunks of others were bent and crooked into such

weird forms of contortion, that they positively looked uncanny.

Referring to these, Archie remarked to Craig, who was riding by his

side:

"Are they not grotesquely beautiful?"

Craig laughed lightly.

"Their grotesqueness is apparent anyhow," he replied. "But would you

believe it, in this very forest I was a week mad?"

"Mad!"

"Yes; worse than mad--delirious. Oh, I did not run about, I was too

feeble! but a black woman or girl found me, and built a kind of bark

gunja over me, for it rained part of the time and dripped the rest. And

those trees with their bent and gnarled stems walked about me, and

gibbered and laughed, and pointed crooked fingers at me. I can afford

to smile at it now, but it was very dreadful then; and the worst of it

was I had brought it all on myself."

Archie was silent.

"You know in what way?" added Craig.

"I have been told," Archie said, simply and sadly.

"For weeks, Mr Broadbent, after I was able to walk, I remained among

the blacks doing nothing, just wandering aimlessly from place to place;

but the woods and the trees looked no longer weird and awful to me then,

for I was in my right mind. It was spring--nay, but early summer--and I

could feel and drink in all the gorgeous beauty of foliage, of tree

flowers and wild flowers, nodding palms and feathery ferns; but, oh! I

left and went south again; I met once more the white man, and forgot all

the religion of Nature in which my soul had for a time been steeped. So

that is all a kind of confession. I feel the better for having made it.

We are all poor, weak mortals at the best; only I made a resolve last

night."

"You did?"

"Yes; and I am going to keep it. I am going to have help."

"Help!"

"Yes, from Him who made those stately giants of the forest and changed

their stems to silvery white. He can change all things."

"Amen!" said Archie solemnly.

CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

AT FINDLAYSON'S FARM--THE GREAT KANGAROO HUNT--A DINNER AND CONCERT.

Gentleman Craig was certainly a strange mortal; but after all he was

only the type of a class of men to be found at most of our great

universities. Admirable Crichtons in a small way, in the estimation of

their friends--bold, handsome, careless, and dashing, not to say

clever--they may go through the course with flying colours. But too

often they strike the rocks of sin and sink, going out like the splendid

meteors of a November night, or sometimes--if they continue to float--

they are sent off to Australia, with the hopes of giving them one more

chance. Alas! they seldom get farther than the cities. It is only the

very best and boldest of them that reach the Bush, and there you may

find them building fences or shearing sheep. If any kind of labour at

all is going to make men of them, it is this.

Two minutes after Craig had been talking to Archie, the sweet, clear,

ringing notes of his manly voice were awaking echoes far a-down the dark

forest.

Parrots and parrakeets, of lovely plumage, fluttered nearer, holding low

their wise, old-fashioned heads to look and listen. Lyre-birds hopped

out from under green fern-bushes, raising their tails and glancing at

their figures in the clear pool. They listened too, and ran back to

where their nests were to tell their wives men-people were passing

through the forest singing; but that they, the cock lyre-birds, could

sing infinitely better if they tried.

On and on and on went the cavalcade, till sylvan beauty itself began to

pall at last, and no one was a bit sorry when all at once the forest

ended, and they were out on a plain, out in the scrub, with, away

beyond, gently-rising hills, on which trees were scattered.

The bleating of sheep now made them forget all about the gloom of the

forest. They passed one or two rude huts, and then saw a bigger smoke

in the distance, which Bill told Archie was Findlayson's.

Findlayson came out to meet them. A Scot every inch of him, you could

tell that at a glance. A Scot from the soles of his rough shoes to the

rim of his hat; brown as to beard and hands, and with a good-natured

face the colour of a badly-burned brick.

He bade them welcome in a right hearty way, and helped "the lassie" to

dismount.

He had met "the lassie" before.

"But," he said, "I wadna hae kent ye; you were but a bit gilpie then.

Losh! but ye have grown. Your father's weel, I suppose? Ah, it'll be a

while afore anybody makes such a sudden haul at the diggin' o' gowd as

he did! But come in. It's goin' to be anither warm day, I fear.

"Breakfast is a' ready. You'll have a thistle fu' o' whiskey first, you

men folks. Rin butt the hoose, my dear, and see my sister. Tell her to

boil the eggs, and lift the bacon and the roast ducks."

He brought out the bottle as he spoke. Both Harry and Archie tasted to

please him. But Craig went boldly into battle.

"I'm done with it, Findlayson," he said. "It has been my ruin. I'm

done. I'm a weak fool."

"But a wee drap wadna hurt you, man. Just to put the dust out o' your

wizzen."

Craig smiled.

"It is the wee draps," he replied, "that do the mischief."

"Well, I winna try to force you. Here comes the gude wife wi' the

teapot."

"Bill," he continued, "as soon as you've satisfied the cravins o'

Nature, mount the grey colt, and ride down the Creek, and tell them the

new chums and I will be wi' them in half an hour."

And in little over that specified time they had all joined the hunt.

Black folks and "orra men," as Findlayson called them, were already

detouring around a wide track of country to beat up the kangaroos.

There were nearly a score of mounted men, but only one lady besides

Etheldene, a squatter's bold sister.

The dogs were a sight to look at. They would have puzzled some

Englishmen what to make of them. Partly greyhounds, but larger,

sturdier, and stronger, as if they had received at one time a cross of

mastiff. They looked eminently fit, however, and were with difficulty

kept back. Every now and then a distant shout was heard, and at such

times the hounds seemed burning to be off.

But soon the kangaroos themselves began to appear thick and fast. They

came from one part or another in little groups, meeting and hopping

about in wonder and fright. They seemed only looking for a means of

escape; and at times, as a few rushing from one direction met others,

they appeared to consult. Many stood high up, as if on tiptoe, gazing

eagerly around, with a curious mixture of bewilderment and fright

displayed on their simple but gentle faces.

They got small time to think now, however, for men and dogs were on

them, and the flight and the murder commenced with a vengeance. There

were black fellows there, who appeared to spring suddenly from the

earth, spear-armed, to deal terrible destruction right and left among

the innocent animals. And black women too, who seemed to revel in the

bloody sight. If the whites were excited and thirsty for carnage, those

aborigines were doubly so.

Meanwhile the men had dismounted, Archie and Harry among the rest, and

were firing away as quickly as possible. There is one thing to be said

in favour of the gunners; they took good aim, and there was little

after-motion in the body of the kangaroo in which a bullet had found a

billet.

After all Archie was neither content with the sport, nor had it come up

as yet to his _beau ideal_ of adventure from all he had heard and read

of it. The scene was altogether noisy, wild, and confusing. The blacks

gloated in the bloodshed, and Archie did not love them any the more for

it. It was the first time he had seen those fellows using their spears,

and he could guess from the way they handled or hurled them that they

would be pretty dangerous enemies to meet face to face in the plain or

scrub.

"Harry," he said after a time, "I'm getting tired of all this; let us go

to our horses."

"I'm tired too. Hallo! where is the chick-a-biddy?"

"You mean Miss Winslow, Harry."

"Ay, Johnnie."

"I have not seen her for some time."

They soon found her though, near a bit of scrub, where their own horses

were tied.

She was sitting on her saddle, looking as steady and demure as an

equestrian statue. The sunshine was so finding that they did not at

first notice her in the shade there until they were close upon her.

"What, Etheldene!" cried Archie; "we hardly expected you here."

"Where, then?"

"Following the hounds."

"What! into that mob? No, that is not what I came for."

At that moment Craig rode up.

"So glad," he said, "to find you all here. Mount, gentlemen. Are you

ready, Baby?"

"Ready, yes, an hour ago, Craig."

They met horsemen and hounds not far away, and taking a bold detour over

a rough and broken country, at the edge of a wood, the hounds found a

"forester," or old man kangaroo. The beast had a good start if he had

taken the best advantage of it; but he failed to do so. He had

hesitated several times; but the run was a fine one. A wilder, rougher,

more dangerous ride Archie had never taken.

The beast was at bay before very long, and his resistance to the death

was extraordinary.

They had many more rides before the day was over; and when they

re-assembled in farmer Findlayson's hospitable parlour, Archie was fain

for once to own himself not only tired, but "dead beat."

The dinner was what Harry called a splendid spread. Old Findlayson had

been a gardener in his younger days in England, and his wife was a cook;

and one of the results of this amalgamation was, dinners or breakfasts

either, that had already made the Scotchman famous.

Here was soup that an epicure would not have despised, fish to tempt a

dying man, besides game of different kinds, pies, and last, if not

least, steak of kangaroo.

The soup itself was made from the tail of the kangaroo, and I know

nothing more wholesome and nourishing, though some may think it a little

strong.

While the white folks were having dinner indoors, the black fellows were

doing ample justice to theirs _al fresco_, only they had their own

_cuisine_ and _menu_, of which the least said the better.

"You're sure, Mr Craig, you winna tak' a wee drappie?"

If the honest squatter put this question once in the course of the

evening, he put it twenty times.

"No, really," said Craig at last; "I will not tak' a wee drappie. I've

sworn off; I have, really. Besides, your wife has made me some

delightful tea."

"Weel, man, tak' a wee drappie in your last cup. It'll cheer ye up."

"Take down your fiddle, Findlayson, and play a rattling strathspey or

reel, that'll cheer me up more wholesomely than any amount of 'wee

drappies.'"

"Come out o' doors then."

It was cool now out there in Findlayson's garden--it was a real garden

too. His garden and his fiddle were Findlayson's two fads; and that he

was master of both, their present surroundings of fern and flower, and

delicious scent of wattle-blossom, and the charming strains that floated

from the corner where the squatter stood were proof enough. The fiddle

in his hands talked and sang, now bold or merrily, now in sad and

wailing notes that brought tears to even Archie's eyes. Then, at a

suggestion of Craig's, Etheldene's sweet young voice was raised in song,

and this was only the beginning of the concert. Conversation filled up

the gaps, so that the evening passed away all too soon.

Just as Findlayson had concluded that plaintive and feeling air "Auld

Robin Gray," a little black girl came stealthily, silently up to

Etheldene, and placed a little creature like a rabbit in her lap,

uttering a few words of Bush-English, which seemed to Archie's ear

utterly devoid of sense. Then the black girl ran; she went away to her

own camp to tell her people that the white folks were holding a

corroboree.

The gift was a motherless kangaroo, that at once commenced to make

itself at home by hiding its innocent head under Etheldene's arm.

The party soon after broke up for the night, and next day but one, early

in the morning, the return journey was commenced, and finished that

night; but the sun had gone down, and the moon was shining high and full

over the forest, before they once more reached the clearing.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

A NEW ARRIVAL.

Winslow made months of a stay in the Bush, and his services were of

great value to the young squatters. The improvements he suggested were

many and various, and he was careful to see them carried out.

Dams were made, and huge reservoirs were dug; for, as Winslow said,

their trials were all before them, and a droughty season might mean

financial ruin to them.

"Nevertheless," he added one day, addressing Bob, "I feel sure of you;

and to prove this I don't mind knocking down a cheque or two to the tune

of a thou or three or five if you want them.

"I'll take bank interest," he added, "not a penny more."

Bob thanked him, and consulted the others that evening. True, Archie's

aristocratic pride popped up every now and then, but it was kept well

under by the others.

"Besides, don't you see, Johnnie," said Harry, "this isn't a gift.

Winslow is a business man, and he knows well what he is about."

"And," added Bob, "the fencing isn't finished yet. We have all those

workmen's mouths to fill, and the sooner the work is done the better."

"Then the sheep are to come in a year or so, and it all runs away with

money, Johnnie. Our fortunes are to be made. There is money on the

ground to be gathered up, and all that Winslow proposes is holding the

candle to us till we fill our pockets."

"It is very kind of him," said Archie, "but--"

"Well," said Bob, "I know where your 'buts' will end if you are not

careful. You will give offence to Mr Winslow, and he'll just turn on

his heel and never see us again."

"Do you think so?"

"Think so? Yes, Archie, I'm sure of it. A better-hearted man doesn't

live, rough and all as he is; and he has set his mind to doing the right

thing for us all for your sake, lad, and so I say, think twice before

you throw cold water over that big, warm heart of his."

"Well," said Archie, "when you put it in that light, I can see matters

clearly. I wouldn't offend my good old Uncle Ramsay's friend for all

the world. I'm sorry I ever appeared bluff with him. So you can let

him do as he pleases."

And so Winslow did to a great extent.

Nor do I blame Bob and Harry for accepting his friendly assistance.

Better far to be beholden to a private individual, who is both earnest

and sincere, than to a money-lending company, who will charge double

interest, and make you feel that your soul is not your own.

Better still, I grant you, to wait and work and plod; but this life is

almost too short for much waiting, and after all, one half of the world

hangs on to the skirts of the other half, and that other half is all the

more evenly balanced in consequence.

I would not, however, have my young readers misunderstand me. What I

maintain is this, that although a poor man cannot leave this country in

the expectation that anybody or any company will be found to advance the

needful to set him up in the business of a squatter, still, when he has

worked hard for a time, beginning at the lowermost ring of the ladder,

and saved enough to get a selection, and a few cattle and sheep, then,

if he needs assistance to heave ahead a bit, he will--if everything is

right and square--have no difficulty in finding it.

So things went cheerily on at Burley New Farm. And at last Winslow and

Etheldene took their departure, promising to come again.

"So far, lads," said Winslow, as he mounted his horse, "there hasn't

been a hitch nowheres. But mind keep two hands at the wheel."

Mr Winslow's grammar was not of the best, and his sentences generally

had a smack of the briny about them, which, however, did not detract

from their graphicness.

"Tip us your flippers, boys," he added, "and let us be off. But I'm

just as happy as if I were a father to the lot of you."

Gentleman Craig shook hands with Mr Winslow. He had already helped

Etheldene into her saddle.

Archie was standing by her, the bridle of his own nag Tell thrown

carelessly over his arm; for good-byes were being said quite a mile from

the farm.

"I'll count the days, Etheldene, till you come again," said Archie.

"The place will not seem the same without you."

Craig stood respectfully aside till Archie had bade her adieu, then,

with his broad hat down by his side, he advanced. He took her hand and

kissed it.

"Good-bye, Baby," he said.

There were tears in Etheldene's eyes as she rode away. Big Winslow took

off his hat, waved it over his head, and gave voice to a splendid

specimen of a British cheer, which, I daresay, relieved his feelings as

much as it startled the lories. The "boys" were not slow in returning

that cheer. Then away rode the Winslows, and presently the grey-stemmed

gum trees swallowed them up.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Two whole years passed by. So quickly, too, because they had not been

idle years. Quite the reverse of that, for every day brought its own

duties with it, and there was always something new to be thought about

or done.

One event had taken place which, in Bob's eyes, eclipsed all the

others--a little baby squatter saw the light of day. But I should not

have used the word eclipsed. Little "Putty-face," as Harry most

irreverently called her, did not eclipse anything; on the contrary,

everything grew brighter on her arrival, and she was hailed queen of the

station. The news spread abroad like wildfire, and people came from far

and near to look at the wee thing, just as if a baby had never been born

in the Bush before.

Findlayson dug the child with his forefinger in the cheek, and nodded

and "a-goo-ed" to it, and it smiled back, and slobbered and grinned and

jumped. Findlayson then declared it to be the wisest "wee vision o' a

thing the warld ever saw." Sarah was delighted, so was the nurse--a

young sonsy Scotch lass brought to the station on purpose to attend to

baby.

"But," said Findlayson, "what about bapteezin' the blessed wee vision."

"Oh," said Bob, "I've thought of that! Craig and I are going to

Brisbane with stock, and we'll import a parson."

It so happened that a young missionary was on his way to spread the glad

tidings among the blacks, and it did not need much coaxing on Bob's part

to get him to make a detour, and spend a week at Burley New Farm. So

this was the imported parson.

But being in Brisbane, Bob thought he must import something else, which

showed what a mindful father he was.

He had a look round, and a glance in at all the shop windows in Queen

Street, finally he entered an emporium that took his fancy.

"Ahem!" said Bob. "I want a few toys."

"Yes, sir. About what age, sir?"

"The newest and best you have."

"I didn't refer to the age of the toys," said the urbane shopkeeper,

with the ghost of a smile in his eye. "I should have said, Toys

suitable for what age?"

"For every age," replied Bob boldly.

The shopkeeper then took the liberty of remarking that his visitor must

surely be blessed with a quiverful.

"I've only the one little girl," said Bob. "She fills the book as yet.

But, you see, we're far away in the Bush, and baby will grow out of

gum-rings and rattles, won't she, into dolls and dung-carts? D'ye see?

D'ye understand?"

"Perfectly."

It ended in Bob importing not only the parson in a dray, but a box of

toys as big as a sea-chest, and only Bob himself could have told you all

that was in it. That box would have stocked a toyshop itself and Harry

and Archie had the grandest of fun unpacking it, and both laughed till

they had to elevate their arms in the air to get the stitches out of

their sides.

The amusing part of it was that innocent Bob had bought such a lot of

each species.

A brown paper parcel, for example, was marked "1 gross: gum-rings."

"That was a job lot," said Bob, explaining. "I got them at a reduction,

as the fellow said. Besides, if she has one in each hand, and another

in her mouth, it will keep her out of mischief for a month or two to

begin with."

There was no mistake about it, baby was set up; for a time, at all

events.

Not only did visitors--rough and smooth, but mostly rough--come from

afar, but letters of congratulation also. Winslow said in a letter that

Etheldene was dying to come and see "the vision," and so was he, though

not quite so bad. "Only," he added, "as soon Eth is finished we'll both

run up. Eth is going to Melbourne to be finished, and I think a year

will do the job."

"Whatever does he mean," said stalwart Bob, "by finishing Eth, and doing

the job?"

"Why, you great big brush turkey," said Sarah, "he means finishing her

edication, in coorse!"

"Oh, I see now!" said Bob. "To be sure; quite right. I say, Sarah,

we'll have to send 'the vision' to a slap-up lady's school one of these

days, won't us?"

"Bob," replied Sarah severely, "tell that lazy black chap, Jumper, to

dig some potatoes."

"I'm off, Sarah! I'm off!"

Both Harry and Archie had by this time become perfect in all a

squatter's art.

Both had grown hard and hardy, and I am not sure that Harry was not now

quite as bold a rider as Archie himself, albeit he was a Cockney born,

albeit he had had to rub himself after that first ride of his on

Scallowa, the "Eider Duck."

Well, then, both he and Archie were perfectly _au fait_ at cattle work

in all its branches, and only those who have lived _on_ and had some

interest _in_ farming have an idea what a vast amount of practical work

breeding cattle includes. One has really to be Jack-of-all-trades, and

a veterinary surgeon into the bargain. Moreover, if he be master, and

not merely foreman, there are books to be kept; so he must be a good

accountant, and a good caterer, and always have his weather eye lifting,

and keeping a long lookout for probable changes in the markets.

But things had prospered well at Burley New Station. One chief reason

of this was that the seasons had been good, and that there was every

prospect that the colony of Queensland was to be one of the most

respected and favourite in the little island.

For most of his information on the management of sheep, Archie and his

companions were indebted to the head stockman, Gentleman Craig. He had

indeed been a Godsend, and proved himself a blessing to the station. It

is but fair to add that he had sacredly and sternly kept the vow he had

registered that night.

He did not deny that it had been difficult for him to do so; in fact he

often referred to his own weakness when talking to Archie, whose

education made him a great favourite and the constant companion of

Craig.

"But you don't feel any the worse for having completely changed your

habits, do you?" said Archie one day.

Craig's reply was a remarkable one, and one that should be borne in mind

by those teetotallers who look upon inebriety as simply a species of

moral aberration, and utterly ignore the physiology of the disease.

"To tell you the truth, Mr Broadbent, I am both better and worse. I am

better physically; I am in harder, more robust, muscular health; I'm as

strong in the arms as a kicking kangaroo. I eat well, I sleep fairly

well, and am fit in every way. But I feel as if I had passed through

the vale of the shadow of death, and it had left some of its darkness on

and in my soul. I feel as if the cure had mentally taken a deal out of

me; and when I meet, at Brisbane or other towns, men who offer me drink

I feel mean and downcast, because I have to refuse it, and because I

dared not even take it as food and medicine. No one can give up habits

of life that have become second nature without mental injury, if not

bodily. And I'm more and more convinced every month that intemperance

is a disease of periodicity, just like gout and rheumatism."

"You have cravings at certain times, then?"

"Yes; but that isn't the worst. The worst is that periodically in my

dreams I have gone back to my old ways, and think I am living once again

in the fool's paradise of the inebriate; singing wild songs, drinking

recklessly, talking recklessly, and looking upon life as but a brief

unreality, and upon time as a thing only to be drowned in the wine-cup.

Yes, but when I awake from these pleasantly-dreadful dreams, I thank God

fervidly I have been but dreaming."

Archie sighed, and no more was said on the subject.