Produced by Col Choat. HTML version by Al Haines.
On Our Selection
Steele Rudd (Arthur Hoey Davis)
PIONEERS OF AUSTRALIA!
To You "Who Gave Our Country Birth;"
to the memory of You
whose names, whose giant enterprise, whose deeds of
fortitude and daring
were never engraved on tablet or tombstone;
to You who strove through the silences of the Bush-lands
and made them ours;
to You who delved and toiled in loneliness through
the years that have faded away;
to You who have no place in the history of our Country
so far as it is yet written;
to You who have done MOST for this Land;
to You for whom few, in the march of settlement, in the turmoil
of busy city life, now appear to care;
and to you particularly,
GOOD OLD DAD,
This Book is most affectionately dedicated.
"STEELE RUDD."
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. STARTING THE SELECTION
CHAPTER II. OUR FIRST HARVEST
CHAPTER III. BEFORE WE GOT THE DEEDS
CHAPTER IV. WHEN THE WOLF WAS AT THE DOOR
CHAPTER V. THE NIGHT WE WATCHED FOR WALLABIES
CHAPTER VI. GOOD OLD BESS
CHAPTER VII. CRANKY JACK
CHAPTER VIII. A KANGAROO HUNT FROM SHINGLE HUT
CHAPTER IX. DAVE'S SNAKEBITE
CHAPTER X. DAD AND THE DONOVANS
CHAPTER XI. A SPLENDID YEAR FOR CORN
CHAPTER XII. KATE'S WEDDING
CHAPTER XIII. THE SUMMER OLD BOB DIED
CHAPTER XIV. WHEN DAN CAME HOME
CHAPTER XV. OUR CIRCUS
CHAPTER XVI. WHEN JOE WAS IN CHARGE
CHAPTER XVII. DAD'S "FORTUNE"
CHAPTER XVIII. WE EMBARK IN THE BEAR INDUSTRY
CHAPTER XIX. NELL AND NED
CHAPTER XX THE COW WE BOUGHT
CHAPTER XXI. THE PARSON AND THE SCONE
CHAPTER XXII. CALLAGHAN'S COLT
CHAPTER XXIII. THE AGRICULTURAL REPORTER
CHAPTER XXIV. A LADY AT SHINGLE HUT
CHAPTER XXV. THE MAN WITH THE BEAR-SKIN CAP
CHAPTER XXVI. CHRISTMAS
On Our Selection.
Chapter I.
Starting the Selection.
It's twenty years ago now since we settled on the Creek. Twenty years!
I remember well the day we came from Stanthorpe, on Jerome's
dray--eight of us, and all the things--beds, tubs, a bucket, the two
cedar chairs with the pine bottoms and backs that Dad put in them, some
pint-pots and old Crib. It was a scorching hot day, too--talk about
thirst! At every creek we came to we drank till it stopped running.
Dad did n't travel up with us: he had gone some months before, to put
up the house and dig the waterhole. It was a slabbed house, with
shingled roof, and space enough for two rooms; but the partition was
n't up. The floor was earth; but Dad had a mixture of sand and fresh
cow-dung with which he used to keep it level. About once every month
he would put it on; and everyone had to keep outside that day till it
was dry. There were no locks on the doors: pegs were put in to keep
them fast at night; and the slabs were not very close together, for we
could easily see through them anybody coming on horseback. Joe and I
used to play at counting the stars through the cracks in the roof.
The day after we arrived Dad took Mother and us out to see the paddock
and the flat on the other side of the gully that he was going to clear
for cultivation. There was no fence round the paddock, but he pointed
out on a tree the surveyor's marks, showing the boundary of our ground.
It must have been fine land, the way Dad talked about it! There was
very valuable timber on it, too, so he said; and he showed us a place,
among some rocks on a ridge, where he was sure gold would be found, but
we were n't to say anything about it. Joe and I went back that evening
and turned over every stone on the ridge, but we did n't find any gold.
No mistake, it was a real wilderness--nothing but trees, "goannas,"
dead timber, and bears; and the nearest house--Dwyer's--was three miles
away. I often wonder how the women stood it the first few years; and I
can remember how Mother, when she was alone, used to sit on a log,
where the lane is now, and cry for hours. Lonely! It WAS lonely.
Dad soon talked about clearing a couple of acres and putting in
corn--all of us did, in fact--till the work commenced. It was a
delightful topic before we started,; but in two weeks the clusters of
fires that illumined the whooping bush in the night, and the crash upon
crash of the big trees as they fell, had lost all their poetry.
We toiled and toiled clearing those four acres, where the haystacks are
now standing, till every tree and sapling that had grown there was
down. We thought then the worst was over; but how little we knew of
clearing land! Dad was never tired of calculating and telling us how
much the crop would fetch if the ground could only be got ready in time
to put it in; so we laboured the harder.
With our combined male and female forces and the aid of a sapling lever
we rolled the thundering big logs together in the face of Hell's own
fires; and when there were no logs to roll it was tramp, tramp the day
through, gathering armfuls of sticks, while the clothes clung to our
backs with a muddy perspiration. Sometimes Dan and Dave would sit in
the shade beside the billy of water and gaze at the small patch that
had taken so long to do; then they would turn hopelessly to what was
before them and ask Dad (who would never take a spell) what was the use
of thinking of ever getting such a place cleared? And when Dave wanted
to know why Dad did n't take up a place on the plain, where there were
no trees to grub and plenty of water, Dad would cough as if something
was sticking in his throat, and then curse terribly about the squatters
and political jobbery. He would soon cool down, though, and get hopeful
again.
"Look at the Dwyers," he'd say; "from ten acres of wheat they got
seventy pounds last year, besides feed for the fowls; they've got corn
in now, and there's only the two."
It was n't only burning off! Whenever there came a short drought the
waterhole was sure to run dry; then it was take turns to carry water
from the springs--about two miles. We had no draught horse, and if we
had there was neither water-cask, trolly, nor dray; so we humped
it--and talk about a drag! By the time you returned, if you had n't
drained the bucket, in spite of the big drink you'd take before leaving
the springs, more than half would certainly be spilt through the vessel
bumping against your leg every time you stumbled in the long grass.
Somehow, none of us liked carrying water. We would sooner keep the
fires going all day without dinner than do a trip to the springs.
One hot, thirsty day it was Joe's turn with the bucket, and he managed
to get back without spilling very much. We were all pleased because
there was enough left after the tea had been made to give each a drink.
Dinner was nearly over; Dan had finished, and was taking it easy on the
sofa, when Joe said:
"I say, Dad, what's a nater-dog like?" Dad told him: "Yellow, sharp
ears and bushy tail."
"Those muster bin some then thet I seen--I do n't know 'bout the bushy
tail--all th' hair had comed off." "Where'd y' see them, Joe?" we
asked. "Down 'n th' springs floating about--dead."
Then everyone seemed to think hard and look at the tea. I did n't want
any more. Dan jumped off the sofa and went outside; and Dad looked
after Mother.
At last the four acres--excepting the biggest of the iron-bark trees
and about fifty stumps--were pretty well cleared; and then came a
problem that could n't be worked-out on a draught-board. I have
already said that we had n't any draught horses; indeed, the only thing
on the selection like a horse was an old "tuppy" mare that Dad used to
straddle. The date of her foaling went further back than Dad's, I
believe; and she was shaped something like an alderman. We found her
one day in about eighteen inches of mud, with both eyes picked out by
the crows, and her hide bearing evidence that a feathery tribe had made
a roost of her carcase. Plainly, there was no chance of breaking up
the ground with her help. We had no plough, either; how then was the
corn to be put in? That was the question.
Dan and Dave sat outside in the corner of the chimney, both scratching
the ground with a chip and not saying anything. Dad and Mother sat
inside talking it over. Sometimes Dad would get up and walk round the
room shaking his head; then he would kick old Crib for lying under the
table. At last Mother struck something which brightened him up, and he
called Dave.
"Catch Topsy and--" He paused because he remembered the old mare was
dead.
"Run over and ask Mister Dwyer to lend me three hoes."
Dave went; Dwyer lent the hoes; and the problem was solved. That was
how we started.