SQUATTLESEA MERE
Pride and successful ambition swelled my breast on that first morning as
I looked round on my run. My run! my own station! How fine a sound it
had, and how fine a thing it was that I should have the sole
occupancy--almost ownership--of about 50,000 acres of "wood and wold,"
mere and marshland, hill and dale. It was all my own--after a
fashion--that is, I had but to receive my squatting license, under the
hand of the Governor of the Australias, for which I paid ten pounds, and
no white man could in any way disturb, harass, or dispossess me. I have
that first license yet, signed by Sir Charles Fitzroy, the
Governor-General. It was a valuable document in good earnest, and many
latter-day pastoralists with a "Thursday to Thursday" tenure would be
truly glad to have such another. There were no free-selectors in those
days. No one could buy land except at auction when once the special
surveys had been abrogated. There were no travelling reserves, or water
reserves, or gold-fields, or mineral licenses, or miners' rights, or
any of the new-fangled contrivances for letting the same land to half a
dozen people at one and the same time.
There was nothing which some people would consider to be romantic or
picturesque in the scenery on which I gazed. But the "light which never
was on sea or shore" _was there_, to shed a celestial glory over the
untilled, unfenced, half-unknown waste. Westward stretched the great
marshes, through which the Eumeralla flowed, if, indeed, that partially
subterranean stream could be said to run or flow anywhere. Northward lay
the lava-bestrewn country known as the Mount Eeles rocks, a mass of
cooled and cracked lava now matted with a high thick sward of kangaroo
grass, but so rough and sharp were the piles and plateaux of scoria that
it was dangerous to ride a horse over it. For years after we preferred
to work it on foot with the aid of dogs.
On the south lay open slopes and low hills, with flats between. On these
last grew the beautiful umbrageous blackwood, or native hickory, one of
the handsomest trees in Australia. At the back were again large marshes,
with heathy flats and more thickly-timbered forests. Over all was a
wonderful sward of grass, luxuriant and green at the time I speak of,
and quite sufficient, as I thought, for the sustenance of two or three
thousand head of mixed cattle.
There were no great elevations to be seen. It was one of the "low
countries" in a literal sense. The only hill in view was that of Mount
Eeles, which we could see rising amid the lava levels a few miles to the
north-west. The marshes were for the most part free from timber. But a
curious formation of "islands," as the stock-rider called them,
prevailed, which tended much to the variety and beauty of the landscape.
These were isolated areas, of from ten to one hundred acres, raised
slightly above the ordinary winter level of the marshes. The soil on
these "islands" was exceptionally good, and, from the fact of their
being timbered like the ordinary mainland, they afforded an effective
contrast to the miles of water or waving reeds of which the marshes
consisted. They served admirably also for cattle camps. To them the
cattle always retired at noonday in summer, and at night in winter and
spring-time. One "island," not very far from our settlement, was known
as "Kennedy's island," the gallant ill-fated explorer who had surveyed a
road to the town of Portland some years before my arrival having made
his camp there. How far he was to wander from the pleasant green west
country, only to die by the spear of a crouching savage, within sight of
the ship that had been sent to bring him safely home after his weary
desert trail!
We didn't know anything of the nature of dry country in those days. All
the land I looked upon was deep-swarded, thickly-verdured as an English
meadow. Wild duck swam about in the pools and meres of the wide misty
fen, with its brakes of tall reeds and "marish-marigolds"--"the
sword-grass and the oat-grass and the bulrush by the pool." Overhead
long strings of wild swan clanged and swayed. There were wild beasts
(kangaroo and dingoes), Indians (blacks, whose fires in "The Rocks" we
could see), a pathless waste, and absolute freedom and independence.
These last were the most precious possessions of all. No engagements, no
office work, no fixed hours, no sums or lessons of any kind or sort. I
felt as if this splendid Robinson Crusoe kind of life was too good to be
true. Who was I that I should have had this grand inheritance of
happiness immeasurable made over to me? What a splendid world it was, to
be sure! Why did people ever repine or complain? I should have made
short work of Mr. Mallock, and have settled the argument "Is life worth
living?" had it then arisen between us, with more haste than logic.
Action, however, must in colonisation never fail to accompany
contemplation. To which end I returned to our camp, just in time to
partake of the simple, but appetising, meal which Mrs. Burge had
prepared for us.
Cold corned beef, hot tea, and a famous fresh damper, the crust of which
I still hold to be better than any other species of bread whatever, when
accompanied, as in the case referred to, with good, sweet, fresh butter.
How splendid one's appetite was after hours spent in the fresh morning
air. How complete the satisfaction when it all came to an end.
Then commenced a council of war, in which Joe Burge was a leading
spokesman. "Old Tom can look after the cattle. Mr. Cunningham and I will
go and fell a tree. I know one handy that'll run out nigh on a hundred
slabs, and if you'll bring up the bullocks and dray to the stump, sir,
to-night, we'll have a load of slabs ready to take home."
What was the next thing that was necessary to be done?
To build a house.
At present we were living under a dray. Now, a dray is not so bad a
covering at night, when extremely sleepy and tired, but in daylight it
is valueless. And if it rains--and in the west it often did, and I am
informed does still, though not so hard as it did then--the want of a
permanent shelter makes itself felt.
The walls of a sod hut were indeed already up. Clean-cut black cubes,
rather larger than bricks, when new and moist, make a neat, solid wall.
In little more than a day we had a thatched roof completed, so that we
were able to have our evening meal in comfort, and even luxury. A couple
of fixed bedsteads were placed at opposite corners, in which Mr.
Cunningham and I arranged our bedding. Joe Burge and his wife still
slept under the "body" of the dray, while Old Tom had a separate section
allotted to him under the pole.
But the "hut," of split slabs, with wall-plate top and bottom, and all
the refinements of bush carpentry, was to be the real mansion. And at
this we soon made a commencement. I say we, because I drove the bullocks
and carted the slabs to the site we had pitched on, besides doing a bit
of squaring and adzing now and then.
Joe Burge and Mr. Cunningham (who was an experienced bushman, and half a
dozen other things to boot) soon "ran out" slabs enough, and fitted the
round stuff, most of which I carted in, preferring that section of
industry to the all-day, every-day work of splitting. Old Tom looked
after the cattle. They needed all his attention for a while, displaying,
as they did, a strong desire to march incontinently back to the banks
of the Merai.
In two or three weeks the hut was up. How I admired it! The door, the
table, the bedsteads, the chairs (three-legged stools), the washstand,
were all manufactured by Joe Burge out of the all-sufficing "slab" of
the period. A wooden chimney with an inner coating of stone-work worked
well without smoking. The roof was neatly thatched with the tall, strong
tussock-grass, then so abundant.
Our dwelling transcended that of the lowland Scot, who described his as
"a lairge hoose wi' twa rooms intil't," inasmuch as it boasted of three.
One was the atrium--being also used as a refectory--and chief general
apartment. The rest of the building was bisected by a wooden partition,
affording thus two bedrooms. One of these was devoted to Joe Burge and
family, the other I appropriated. Mr. Cunningham and Old Tom slept in
the large room, where--firewood being plentiful--they kept up a roaring
fire, and had rather the best of it in the cold nights which then
commenced to visit us.
Excepting a stock-yard, there now remained next to nothing to do, and
being rather overmanned for so small a station, Mr. Cunningham, with my
free consent, elected to take service with the Dunmore firm, with whom
he remained for some years after. I had now attained the acme of worldly
felicity. I had always longed to have a station of my own. Now I had
one. I had daily work of the kind that exactly suited me. I went over to
Dunmore and spent a pleasant evening every now and then, rubbing up my
classics and having a little "good talk." I had a few books which I had
brought up with me in the dray--Byron, Scott, Shakespeare (there was no
Macaulay in those days), with half a score of other authors, in whom
there was _pabulum mentis_ for a year or two. I had, besides, the run of
the Dunmore library--no mean collection.
So I had work, recreation, companionship, and intellectual occupation
provided for me in abundant and wholesome proportion. What else could
cast a shadow over my prosperous present and promising future? Well,
there was one factor in the sum which I had not reckoned with. "The
Amalekite was then in the land," and with the untamed, untutored
pre-Adamite it appeared that I was fated to have trouble.
The aboriginal blacks on and near the western coast of Victoria--near
Belfast, Warrnambool, and Portland--had always been noted as a breed of
savages by no means to be despised. They had been for untold generations
accustomed to a dietary scale of exceptional liberality. The climate was
temperate; the forests abounded in game; wild-fowl at certain seasons
were plentiful; while the sea supplied them with fish of all sorts and
sizes, from a whale (stranded) to a whitebait. No wonder that they were
a fine race, physically and otherwise--the men tall and muscular, the
women well-shaped and fairly good-looking. To some even higher
commendation might with truth be applied.
One is often tempted to smile at hearing some under-sized Anglo-Saxon,
with no brain power to spare, assert gravely the blacks of Australia
were the lowest race of savages known to exist, the connecting link
between man and the brute creation, etc. On the contrary, many of the
leading members of tribes known to the pioneer squatters were
grandly-formed specimens of humanity, dignified in manner, and
possessing an intelligence by no means to be despised, comprehending a
quick sense of humour, as well as a keenness of perception, not always
found in the superior race.
Unfortunately, before I arrived and took up my abode on the border of
the great Eumeralla mere, there had been divers quarrels between the old
race and the new. Whether the stockmen and shepherds were to blame--as
is always said--or whether it was simply the ordinary savage desire for
the tempting goods and chattels of the white man, cannot be accurately
stated. Anyhow, cattle and sheep had been lifted and speared; blacks had
been shot, as a matter of course; then, equally so, hut-keepers,
shepherds, and stockmen had been done to death.
Just about that time there was a scare as to the disappearance of a New
South Wales semi-civilised aboriginal named Bradbury. He was a daring
fellow, a bold rider, and a good shot. As he occasionally stayed at the
native camp, and had now not been seen for a month, it began to be
rumoured that he had agreed to accept the leadership of the outlawed
tribes against the whites. In such a case the prospects of the winter,
with thinly-manned homesteads eight or ten miles apart, looked decidedly
bad.
However, the discovery of poor Bradbury's bones a short time afterwards
set that matter at rest. He always took his gun with him,
distrusting--and with good reason--his trans-Murray kin. On this
occasion they "laid for him," it seems, and by means of a sable Delilah,
who playfully ran off with his double-barrel, took him at a
disadvantage. He fought desperately, we were told, even with a spear
through his body, but was finally overpowered. Just before they had
killed and chopped up a hut-keeper, and at Mount Rouse they had
surprised and killed one of Mr. Cox's men, the overseer--Mr. Brock--only
saving himself by superior speed of foot, for which he was noted.
I was recommended by my good friends of Dunmore and others of experience
to keep the blacks at a distance, and not to give them permission to
come about the station.
Being young and foolish--or, let me say, unsuspicious--I chose to
disregard this warning and to take my own way. I thought the poor
fellows had been hardly treated. It was their country, after all. A
policy of conciliation would doubtless show them that some of the white
men had their good at heart.
To the westward of our camp lay the great tract of lava country before
mentioned. This had been doubtless an outflow in old central-fire days
from the crater of Mount Eeles. Now, cooled, hardened, cracked, and
decomposed, it annually produced a rich crop of grass. It was full of
ravines, boulders, masses of scoria, and had, besides, a lakelet in the
centre. It was many miles across, and extended from Mount Eeles nearly
to the sea.
It was not particularly easy to walk in. And, as for riding, one day
generally saw the end of the most high-couraged, sure-footed horse. As a
natural covert for savages it could not be surpassed.
In this peculiar region our "Modocs lay hid." We could see the smoke of
their camp fires in tolerable number, but had no means of seeing or
having speech of them. One day, however, having probably sent out a
scout previously who had made careful examination of us while we were
totally unconscious of any such supervision, they debouched from the
rocks and came up to camp. They sent a herald in advance, who held up a
green bough. Then, "walking delicately," they came up, in number nearly
fifty. I was at home, as it happened, as also was the old stockman. How
well I remember the day and the scene!
We all carried guns in those days, as might the border settlers in
"Injun" territory.