The Cow We Bought.
When Dad received two hundred pounds for the wheat he saw nothing but
success and happiness ahead. His faith in the farm and farming
swelled. Dad was not a pessimist--when he had two hundred pounds.
"Say what they like," he held forth to Anderson and two other men
across the rails one evening--"talk how they will about it, there's
money to be made at farming. Let a man WORK and use his HEAD and know
what to sow and when to sow it, and he MUST do well." (Anderson stroked
his beard in grave silence; HE had had no wheat). "Why, once a farmer
gets on at all he's the most independent man in the whole country."
"Yes! Once he DOES!" drawled one of the men,--a weird, withered fellow
with a scraggy beard and a reflective turn of mind.
"Jusso," Dad went on, "but he must use his HEAD; it's all in th'
head." (He tapped his own skull with his finger). "Where would I be
now if I had n't used me head this last season?"
He paused for an answer. None came.
"I say," he continued, "it's a mistake to think nothing's to be made at
farming, and any man" ("Come to supper, D--AD!"--'t was Sal's voice)
"ought t' get on where there's land like this."
"LAND!" said the same man--"where IS it?"
"Where IS it?" Dad warmed up--"where IS N'T it? Is n't this land?"
(Looking all round.) "Is n't the whole country land from one end to
the other? And is there another country like it anywhere?"
"There is n't!" said the man.
"Is there any other country in th' WORLD" (Dad lifted his voice) "where
a man, if he likes, can live" ("Dad, tea!") "without a shilling in his
pocket and without doing a tap of work from one year's end to the
other?"
Anderson did n't quite understand, and the weird man asked Dad if he
meant "in gaol."
"I mean," Dad said, "that no man should starve in this country when
there's kangaroos and bears and"--(Joe came and stood beside Dad and
asked him if he was DEAF)--"and goannas and snakes in thousands. Look
here!" (still to the weird man), "you say that farming"--(Mother,
bare-headed, came out and stood beside Joe, and asked Anderson if Mrs.
Anderson had got a nurse yet, and Anderson smiled and said he believed
another son had just arrived, but he had n't seen it)--"that farming
don't pay"--(Sal came along and stood near Mother and asked Anderson
who the baby was like)--"don't pay in this country?"
The man nodded.
"It will pay any man who----"
Interruption.
Anderson's big dog had wandered to the house, and came back with nearly
all that was for supper in his mouth.
Sal squealed.
"DROP IT--DROP IT, Bob!" Anderson shouted, giving chase. Bob dropped
it on the road.
"DAMN IT!" said Dad, glaring at Mother, "wot d' y' ALL want out
'ere?...Y-YOU brute!" (to the dog, calmly licking its lips).
Then Anderson and the two men went away.
But when we had paid sixty pounds to the storekeeper and thirty pounds
in interest; and paid for the seed and the reaping and threshing of the
wheat; and bought three plough-horses, and a hack for Dave; and a
corn-sheller, and a tank, and clothes for us all; and put rations in
the house; and lent Anderson five pounds; and improved Shingle Hut; and
so on; very little of the two hundred pounds was left.
Mother spoke of getting a cow. The children, she said, could n't live
without milk and when Dad heard from Johnson and Dwyer that Eastbrook
dairy cattle were to be sold at auction, he said he would go down and
buy one.
Very early. The stars had scarcely left the sky. There was a lot of
groping and stumbling about the room. Dad and Dave had risen and were
preparing to go to the sale.
I don't remember if the sky was golden or gorgeous at all, or if the
mountain was clothed in mist, or if any fragrance came from the
wattle-trees when they were leaving; but Johnson, without hat or boots,
was picking splinters off the slabs of his hut to start his fire with,
and a mile further on Smith's dog was barking furiously. He was a
famous barker. Smith trained him to it to keep the wallabies off.
Smith used to chain him to a tree in the paddock and hang a piece of
meat to the branches, and leave him there all night.
Dad and Dave rode steadily along and arrived at Eastbrook before
mid-day. The old station was on its last legs. "The flags were flying
half-mast high." A crowd of people were there. Cart-horses with
harness on, and a lot of tired-looking saddle-hacks, covered with dry
sweat, were fastened to cart-wheels, and to every available post and
place. Heaps of old iron, broken-down drays and buggies and
wheel-barrows, pumps and pieces of machinery, which Dad reckoned were
worth a lot of money, were scattered about. Dad yearned to gather them
all up and cart them home. Rows of unshaven men were seated high on
the rails of the yards. The yards were filled with cattle--cows,
heifers, bulls, and calves, all separate--bellowing, and, in a friendly
way, raking skins and hair off each other with their horns.
The station-manager, with a handful of papers and a pencil behind his
ear, hurried here and there, followed by some of the crowd, who asked
him questions which he did n't answer. Dad asked him if this was the
place where the sale was to be. He looked all over Dad.
A man rang a bell violently, shouting, "This way for the dairy cows!"
Dad went that way, closely followed by Dave, who was silent and
strange. A boy put a printed catalogue into Dad's hand, which he was
doubtful about keeping until he saw Andy Percil with one. Most of the
men seated on the rails jumped down into an empty yard and stood round
in a ring. In one corner the auctioneer mounted a box, and read the
conditions of sale, and talked hard about the breed of the cattle.
Then:
"How much for the imported cow, Silky? No.1 on the catalogue. How
much to start her, gentlemen?"
Silky rushed into the yard with a shower of sticks flying after her and
glared about, finally fixing her gaze on Dad, who was trying to find
her number in the catalogue.
"A pure-bred 'Heereford,' four years old, by The Duke out of Dolly, to
calve on the eighth of next month," said the auctioneer. "How much to
start her?"
All silent. Buyers looked thoughtful. The auctioneer ran his restless
eyes over them.
Dad and Dave held a whispered consultation; then Dad made a movement.
The auctioneer caught his eye and leant forward.
"FIVE BOB!" Dad shouted. There was a loud laugh. The auctioneer
frowned. "We're selling COWS, old man," he said, "not running a
shilling-table."
More laughter. It reached Dave's heart, and he wished he had n't come
with Dad.
Someone bid five pounds, someone else six; seven-eight-nine went round
quickly, and Silky was sold for ten pounds.
"Beauty" rushed in.
Two station-hands passed among the crowd, each with a bucket of beer
and some glasses. Dad hesitated when they came to him, and said he did
n't care about it. Dave the same.
Dad ran "Beauty" to three pound ten shillings (all the money he had),
and she was knocked down at twelve pounds.
Bidding became lively.
Dave had his eye on the men with the beer--he was thirsty. He noticed
no one paid for what was drunk, and whispered his discovery to Dad.
When the beer came again, Dad reached out and took a glass. Dave took
one also.
"Have another!" said the man.
Dave grinned, and took another.
Dad ran fifteen cows, successively, to three pounds ten shillings.
The men with the beer took a liking to Dave. They came frequently to
him, and Dave began to enjoy the sale.
Again Dad stopped bidding at three pounds ten shillings.
Dave began to talk. He left his place beside Dad and, hat in hand,
staggered to the middle of the yard. "WOH!" he shouted, and made an
awkward attempt to embrace a red cow which was under the hammer.
"SEV'N POUN'--SEV'N POUN'--SEV'N POUN'," shouted the auctioneer,
rapidly. "Any advance on sev'n POUN'?"
"WENNY (hic) QUID," Dave said.
"At sev'n poun' she's GOING?"
"Twenny (hic) TWO quid," Dave said.
"You have n't twenty-two PENCE," snorted the auctioneer.
Then Dave caught the cow by the tail, and she pulled him about the yard
until two men took him away.
The last cow put up was, so the auctioneer said, station-bred and in
full milk. She was a wild-looking brute, with three enormous teats and
a large, fleshy udder. The catalogue said her name was "Dummy."
"How much for 'Dummy,' the only bargain in the mob--how much for her,
gentlemen?"
Dad rushed "Dummy." "Three poun' ten," he said, eagerly.
The auctioneer rushed Dad. "YOURS," he said, bringing his hammer down
with a bang; "you deserve her, old man!" And the station-manager
chuckled and took Dad's name--and Dad's money.
Dad was very pleased, and eager to start home. He went and found Dave,
who was asleep in a hay-stack, and along with Steven Burton they drove
the cow home, and yarded her in the dark.
Mother and Sal heard the noise, and came with a light to see Dad's
purchase, but as they approached "Dummy" threatened to carry the yard
away on her back, and Dad ordered them off.
Dad secured the rails by placing logs and the harrow against them, then
went inside and told Mother what a bargain he'd made.
In the morning Dad took a bucket and went to milk "Dummy." All of us
accompanied him. He crawled through the rails while "Dummy" tore the
earth with her fore-feet and threw lumps of it over the yard. But she
was n't so wild as she seemed, and when Dad went to work on her with a
big stick she walked into the bail quietly enough. Then he sat to milk
her, and when he took hold of her teats she broke the leg-rope and
kicked him clean off the block and tangled her leg in the bucket and
made a great noise with it. Then she bellowed and reared in the bail
and fell down, her head screwed the wrong way, and lay with her tongue
out moaning.
Dad rose and spat out dirt.
"Dear me!" Mother said, "it's a WILD cow y' bought."
"Not at all," Dad answered; "she's a bit touchy, that's all."
"She tut-tut--TUTCHED YOU orright, Dad," Joe said from the top of the
yard.
Dad looked up. "Get down outer THAT!" he yelled. "No wonder the damn
cow's frightened."
Joe got down.
Dad brought "Dummy" to her senses with a few heavy kicks on her nose,
and proceeded to milk her again. "Dummy" kicked and kicked. Dad
tugged and tugged at her teats, but no milk came. Dad could n't
understand it. "Must be frettin'," he said.
Joe owned a pet calf about a week old which lived on water and a long
rope. Dad told him to fetch it to see if it would suck. Joe fetched
it, and it sucked ravenously at "Dummy's" flank, and joyfully wagged
its tail. "Dummy" resented it. She plunged until the leg-rope parted
again, when the calf got mixed up in her legs, and she trampled it in
the ground. Joe took it away. Dad turned "Dummy" out and bailed her
up the next day--and every day for a week--with the same result. Then
he sent for Larry O'Laughlin, who posed as a cow doctor.
"She never give a drop in her life," Larry said. "Them's BLIND tits
she have."
Dad one day sold "Dummy" for ten shillings and bought a goat, which
Johnson shot on his cultivation and made Dad drag away.