I can't make out their faces. I can just make out the pavement and the
houses close at hand, and all the rest is a sort of white blur.” He
looked up: “That ceiling is a kind of white, ain't it? And this,”
tapping the wall and putting his nose close to it, “is a sort of green,
ain't it?” The ceiling might have been whiter. The prevalent tints of
the wall-paper had originally been blue and red, but it was mostly green
enough now--a damp, rotten green; but I was ready to swear that the
ceiling was snow and that the walls were as green as grass if it would
have made him feel more comfortable. His sight began to get bad about
six years before, he said; he didn't take much notice of it at first,
and then he saw a quack, who made his eyes worse. He had already the
manner of the blind--the touch of every finger, and even the gentleness
in his speech. He had a boy down with him--a “sorter cousin of his,” and
the boy saw him round. “I'll have to be sending that youngster back,”
he said, “I think I'll send him home next week. He'll be picking up and
learning too much down here.”
I happened to know the district he came from, and we would sit by the
hour and talk about the country, and chaps by the name of this and chaps
by the name of that--drovers mostly, whom we had met or had heard of.
He asked me if I'd ever heard of a chap by the name of Joe Scott--a big
sandy-complexioned chap, who might be droving; he was his brother, or,
at least, his half-brother, but he hadn't heard of him for years;
he'd last heard of him at Blackall, in Queensland; he might have gone
overland to Western Australia with Tyson's cattle to the new country.
We talked about grubbing and fencing and digging and droving and
shearing--all about the bush--and it all came back to me as we talked.
“I can see it all now,” he said once, in an abstracted tone, seeming to
fix his helpless eyes on the wall opposite. But he didn't see the dirty
blind wall, nor the dingy window, nor the skimpy little bed, nor the
greasy wash-stand; he saw the dark blue ridges in the sunlight, the
grassy sidings and flats, the creek with clumps of she-oak here and
there, the course of the willow-fringed river below, the distant peaks
and ranges fading away into a lighter azure, the granite ridge in
the middle distance, and the rocky rises, the stringy-bark and the
apple-tree flats, the scrubs, and the sunlit plains--and all. I could
see it, too--plainer than ever I did.
He had done a bit of fencing in his time, and we got talking about
timber. He didn't believe in having fencing-posts with big butts; he
reckoned it was a mistake. “You see,” he said, “the top of the butt
catches the rain water and makes the post rot quicker. I'd back posts
without any butt at all to last as long or longer than posts with
'em--that's if the fence is well put up and well rammed.” He had
supplied fencing stuff, and fenced by contract, and--well, you can get
more posts without butts out of a tree than posts with them. He also
objected to charring the butts. He said it only made more work--and
wasted time--the butts lasted longer without being charred.
I asked him if he'd ever got stringy-bark palings or shingles out of
mountain ash, and he smiled a smile that did my heart good to see, and
said he had. He had also got them out of various other kinds of trees.
We talked about soil and grass, and gold-digging, and many other things
which came back to one like a revelation as we yarned.
He had been to the hospital several times. “The doctors don't say they
can cure me,” he said, “they say they might, be able to improve my sight
and hearing, but it would take a long time--anyway, the treatment would
improve my general health. They know what's the matter with my eyes,”
and he explained it as well as he could. “I wish I'd seen a good
doctor when my eyes first began to get weak; but young chaps are always
careless over things. It's harder to get cured of anything when you're
done growing.”
He was always hopeful and cheerful. “If the worst comes to the worst,”
he said, “there's things I can do where I come from. I might do a bit
o' wool-sorting, for instance. I'm a pretty fair expert. Or else when
they're weeding out I could help. I'd just have to sit down and they'd
bring the sheep to me, and I'd feel the wool and tell them what it
was--being blind improves the feeling, you know.”
He had a packet of portraits, but he couldn't make them out very well
now. They were sort of blurred to him, but I described them and he told
me who they were. “That's a girl o' mine,” he said, with reference
to one--a jolly, good-looking bush girl. “I got a letter from her
yesterday. I managed to scribble something, but I'll get you, if you
don't mind, to write something more I want to put in on another piece of
paper, and address an envelope for me.”
Darkness fell quickly upon him now--or, rather, the “sort of white blur”
increased and closed in. But his hearing was better, he said, and he was
glad of that and still cheerful. I thought it natural that his hearing
should improve as he went blind.
One day he said that he did not think he would bother going to the
hospital any more. He reckoned he'd get back to where he was known. He'd
stayed down too long already, and the “stuff” wouldn't stand it. He was
expecting a letter that didn't come. I was away for a couple of days,
and when I came back he had been shifted out of the room and had a bed
in an angle of the landing on top of the staircase, with the people
brushing against him and stumbling over his things all day on their way
up and down. I felt indignant, thinking that--the house being full--the
boss had taken advantage of the bushman's helplessness and good nature
to put him there. But he said that he was quite comfortable. “I can get
a whiff of air here,” he said.
Going in next day I thought for a moment that I had dropped suddenly
back into the past and into a bush dance, for there was a concertina
going upstairs. He was sitting on the bed, with his legs crossed, and
a new cheap concertina on his knee, and his eyes turned to the patch of
ceiling as if it were a piece of music and he could read it. “I'm trying
to knock a few tunes into my head,” he said, with a brave smile, “in
case the worst comes to the worst.” He tried to be cheerful, but seemed
worried and anxious. The letter hadn't come. I thought of the many blind
musicians in Sydney, and I thought of the bushman's chance, standing at
a corner swanking a cheap concertina, and I felt sorry for him.
I went out with a vague idea of seeing someone about the matter, and
getting something done for the bushman--of bringing a little influence
to his assistance; but I suddenly remembered that my clothes were worn
out, my hat in a shocking state, my boots burst, and that I owed for a
week's board and lodging, and was likely to be thrown out at any moment
myself; and so I was not in a position to go where there was influence.
When I went back to the restaurant there was a long, gaunt
sandy-complexioned bushman sitting by Jack's side. Jack introduced him
as his brother, who had returned unexpectedly to his native district,
and had followed him to Sydney. The brother was rather short with me
at first, and seemed to regard the restaurant people--all of us, in
fact--in the light of spielers who wouldn't hesitate to take advantage
of Jack's blindness if he left him a moment; and he looked ready
to knock down the first man who stumbled against Jack, or over his
luggage--but that soon wore off. Jack was going to stay with Joe at the
Coffee Palace for a few weeks, and then go back up-country, he told me.
He was excited and happy. His brother's manner towards him was as if
Jack had just lost his wife, or boy or someone very dear to him. He
would not allow him to do anything for himself, nor try to--not even
lace up his boot. He seemed to think that he was thoroughly helpless,
and when I saw him pack up Jack's things, and help him at the table and
fix his tie and collar with his great brown hands, which trembled all
the time with grief and gentleness, and make Jack sit down on the
bed whilst he got a cab and carried the trap down to it, and take
him downstairs as if he were made of thin glass, and settle with the
landlord--then I knew that Jack was all right.
We had a drink together--Joe, Jack, the cabman, and I. Joe was very
careful to hand Jack the glass, and Jack made joke about it for Joe's
benefit. He swore he could see a glass yet, and Joe laughed, but looked
extra troubled the next moment.
I felt their grips on my hand for five minutes after we parted.
ARVIE ASPINALL'S ALARM CLOCK
In one of these years a paragraph appeared in a daily paper to the
effect that a constable had discovered a little boy asleep on the steps
of Grinder Bros' factory at four o'clock one rainy morning. He awakened
him, and demanded an explanation.
The little fellow explained that he worked there, and was frightened
of being late; he started work at six, and was apparently greatly
astonished to hear that it was only four. The constable examined a small
parcel which the frightened child had in his hand. It contained a clean
apron and three slices of bread and treacle.
The child further explained that he woke up and thought it was late,
and didn't like to wake mother and ask her the time “because she'd been
washin'.” He didn't look at the clock, because they “didn't have one.”
He volunteered no explanations as to how he expected mother to know the
time, but, perhaps, like many other mites of his kind, he had unbounded
faith in the infinitude of a mother's wisdom. His name was Arvie
Aspinall, please sir, and he lived in Jones's Alley. Father was dead.
A few days later the same paper took great pleasure in stating, in
reference to that “Touching Incident” noticed in a recent issue, that
a benevolent society lady had started a subscription among her friends
with the object of purchasing an alarm-clock for the little boy found
asleep at Grinder Bros' workshop door.
Later on, it was mentioned, in connection with the touching incident,
that the alarm-clock had been bought and delivered to the boy's mother,
who appeared to be quite overcome with gratitude. It was learned, also,
from another source, that the last assertion was greatly exaggerated.
The touching incident was worn out in another paragraph, which left no
doubt that the benevolent society lady was none other than a charming
and accomplished daughter of the House of Grinder.
It was late in the last day of the Easter Holidays, during which Arvie
Aspinall had lain in bed with a bad cold. He was still what he called
“croopy.” It was about nine o'clock, and the business of Jones's Alley
was in full swing.
“That's better, mother, I'm far better,” said Arvie, “the sugar and
vinegar cuts the phlegm, and the both'rin' cough gits out. It got out to
such an extent for the next few minutes that he could not speak. When he
recovered his breath, he said:
“Better or worse, I'll have to go to work to-morrow. Gimme the clock,
mother.”
“I tell you you shall not go! It will be your death.”
“It's no use talking, mother; we can't starve--and--s'posin' somebody
got my place! Gimme the clock, mother.”
“I'll send one of the children round to say you're ill. They'll surely
let you off for a day or two.”
“Tain't no use; they won't wait; I know them--what does Grinder Bros
care if I'm ill? Never mind, mother, I'll rise above 'em all yet. _Give
me the clock_, mother.”
She gave him the clock, and he proceeded to wind it up and set the
alarm.
“There's somethin' wrong with the gong,” he muttered, “it's gone wrong
two nights now, but I'll chance it. I'll set the alarm at five, that'll
give me time to dress and git there early. I wish I hadn't to walk so
far.”
He paused to read some words engraved round the dial:
Early to bed and early to rise
Makes a man healthy and wealthy and wise.
He had read the verse often before, and was much taken with the swing
and rhythm of it. He had repeated it to himself, over and over again,
without reference to the sense or philosophy of it. He had never dreamed
of doubting anything in print--and this was engraved. But now a new
light seemed to dawn upon him. He studied the sentence awhile, and then
read it aloud for the second time. He turned it over in his mind again
in silence.
“Mother!” he said suddenly, “I think it lies.” She placed the clock on
the shelf, tucked him into his little bed on the sofa, and blew out the
light.
Arvie seemed to sleep, but she lay awake thinking of her troubles. Of
her husband carried home dead from his work one morning; of her eldest
son who only came to loaf on her when he was out of jail; of the second
son, who had feathered his nest in another city, and had no use for her
any longer; of the next--poor delicate little Arvie--struggling manfully
to help, and wearing his young life out at Grinder Bros when he should
be at school; of the five helpless younger children asleep in the next
room: of her hard life--scrubbing floors from half-past five till
eight, and then starting her day's work--washing!--of having to rear her
children in the atmosphere of the slums, because she could not afford to
move and pay a higher rent; and of the rent.
Arvie commenced to mutter in his sleep.
“Can't you get to sleep, Arvie?” she asked. “Is your throat sore? Can I
get anything for you?”
“I'd like to sleep,” he muttered, dreamily, “but it won't seem more'n a
moment before--before--”
“Before what, Arvie?” she asked, quickly, fearing that he was becoming
delirious.
“Before the alarm goes off!”
He was talking in his sleep.
She rose gently and put the alarm on two hours. “He can rest now,” she
whispered to herself.
Presently Arvie sat bolt upright, and said quickly, “Mother! I thought
the alarm went off!” Then, without waiting for an answer, he lay down as
suddenly and slept.
The rain had cleared away, and a bright, starry dome was over sea and
city, over slum and villa alike; but little of it could be seen from the
hovel in Jones's Alley, save a glimpse of the Southern Cross and a few
stars round it. It was what ladies call a “lovely night,” as seen from
the house of Grinder--“Grinderville”--with its moonlit terraces and
gardens sloping gently to the water, and its windows lit up for an
Easter ball, and its reception-rooms thronged by its own exclusive set,
and one of its charming and accomplished daughters melting a select
party to tears by her pathetic recitation about a little crossing
sweeper.
There _was_ something wrong with the alarm-clock, or else Mrs Aspinall
had made a mistake, for the gong sounded startlingly in the dead of
night. She woke with a painful start, and lay still, expecting to hear
Arvie get up; but he made no sign. She turned a white, frightened face
towards the sofa where he lay--the light from the alley's solitary lamp
on the pavement above shone down through the window, and she saw that he
had not moved.
Why didn't the clock wake him? He was such a light sleeper! “Arvie!”
she called; no answer. “Arvie!” she called again, with a strange ring
of remonstrance mingling with the terror in her voice. Arvie never
answered.
“Oh! my God!” she moaned.
She rose and stood by the sofa. Arvie lay on his back with his arms
folded--a favourite sleeping position of his; but his eyes were wide
open and staring upwards as though they would stare through ceiling and
roof to the place where God ought to be.
STRAGGLERS
An oblong hut, walled with blue-grey hardwood slabs, adzed at the ends
and set horizontally between the round sapling studs; high roof of the
eternal galvanized iron. A big rubbish heap lies about a yard to the
right of the door, which opens from the middle of one of the side walls;
it might be the front or the back wall--there is nothing to fix it.
Two rows of rough bunks run round three sides of the interior; and a
fire-place occupies one end--the kitchen end. Sleeping, eating, gambling
and cooking accommodation for thirty men in about eighteen by forty
feet.
The rouseabouts and shearers use the hut in common during shearing.
Down the centre of the place runs a table made of stakes driven into the
ground, with cross-pieces supporting a top of half-round slabs set with
the flat sides up, and affording a few level places for soup-plates; on
each side are crooked, unbarked poles laid in short forks, to serve as
seats. The poles are worn smoothest opposite the level places on the
table. The floor is littered with rubbish--old wool-bales, newspapers,
boots, worn-out shearing pants, rough bedding, etc., raked out of the
bunks in impatient search for missing articles--signs of a glad and
eager departure with cheques when the shed last cut out.
To the west is a dam, holding back a broad, shallow sheet of grey water,
with dead trees standing in it.
Further up along this water is a brush shearing-shed, a rough framework
of poles with a brush roof. This kind of shed has the advantage of being
cooler than iron. It is not rain-proof, but shearers do not work in
rainy weather; shearing even slightly damp sheep is considered the
surest and quickest way to get the worst kind of rheumatism. The floor
is covered with rubbish from the roof, and here and there lies a rusty
pair of shears. A couple of dry tar-pots hang by nails in the posts. The
“board” is very uneven and must be bad for sweeping. The pens are formed
by round, crooked stakes driven into the ground in irregular lines, and
the whole business reminds us of the “cubby-house” style of architecture
of our childhood.
Opposite stands the wool-shed, built entirely of galvanized iron; a
blinding object to start out of the scrub on a blazing, hot day. God
forgive the man who invented galvanized iron, and the greed which
introduced it into Australia: you could not get worse roofing material
for a hot country.
The wool-washing, soap-boiling, and wool-pressing arrangements are
further up the dam. “Government House” is a mile away, and is nothing
better than a bush hut; this station belongs to a company. And the
company belongs to a bank. And the banks belong to England, mostly.
Mulga scrub all round, and, in between, patches of reddish sand where
the grass ought to be.
It is New Year's Eve. Half a dozen travellers are camping in the hut,
having a spell. They need it, for there are twenty miles of dry lignum
plain between here and the government bore to the east; and about
eighteen miles of heavy, sandy, cleared road north-west to the next
water in that direction. With one exception, the men do not seem hard
up; at least, not as that condition is understood by the swagmen of
these times. The least lucky one of the lot had three weeks' work in a
shed last season, and there might probably be five pounds amongst the
whole crowd. They are all shearers, or at least they say they are. Some
might be only “rousers.”
These men have a kind of stock hope of getting a few stragglers to shear
somewhere; but their main object is to live till next shearing. In order
to do this they must tramp for tucker, and trust to the regulation--and
partly mythical--pint of flour, and bit of meat, or tea and sugar, and
to the goodness of cooks and storekeepers and boundary-riders. You can
only depend on getting tucker _once_ at one place; then you must tramp
on to the next. If you cannot get it once you must go short; but there
is a lot of energy in an empty stomach. If you get an extra supply you
may camp for a day and have a spell. To live you must walk. To cease
walking is to die.
The Exception is an outcast amongst bush outcasts, and looks better
fitted for Sydney Domain. He lies on the bottom of a galvanized-iron
case, with a piece of blue blanket for a pillow. He is dressed in a blue
cotton jumper, a pair of very old and ragged tweed trousers, and one
boot and one slipper. He found the slipper in the last shed, and the
boot in the rubbish-heap here. When his own boots gave out he walked
a hundred and fifty miles with his feet roughly sewn up in pieces of
sacking from an old wool-bale. No sign of a patch, or an attempt at
mending anywhere about his clothes, and that is a bad sign; when a
swagman leaves off mending or patching his garments, his case is about
hopeless. The Exception's swag consists of the aforesaid bit of blanket
rolled up and tied with pieces of rag. He has no water-bag; carries
his water in a billy; and how he manages without a bag is known only to
himself. He has read every scrap of print within reach, and now lies on
his side, with his face to the wall and one arm thrown up over his
head; the jumper is twisted back, and leaves his skin bare from hip to
arm-pit. His lower face is brutal, his eyes small and shifty, and ugly
straight lines run across his low forehead. He says very little, but
scowls most of the time--poor devil. He might be, or at least _seem_, a
totally different man under more favourable conditions. He is probably a
free labourer.
A very sick jackaroo lies in one of the bunks. A sandy, sawney-looking
Bourke native takes great interest in this wreck; watches his every
movement as though he never saw a sick man before. The men lie about in
the bunks, or the shade of the hut, and rest, and read all the soiled
and mutilated scraps of literature they can rake out of the rubbish, and
sleep, and wake up swimming in perspiration, and growl about the heat.
It _is_ hot, and two shearers' cats--a black and a white one--sit in one
of the upper bunks with their little red tongues out, panting like dogs.
These cats live well during shearing, and take their chances the rest of
the year--just as shed rouseabouts have to do. They seem glad to see
the traveller come; he makes things more homelike. They curl and sidle
affectionately round the table-legs, and the legs of the men, and purr,
and carry their masts up, and regard the cooking with feline interest
and approval, and look as cheerful as cats can--and as contented. God
knows how many tired, dusty, and sockless ankles they rub against in
their time.
Now and then a man takes his tucker-bags and goes down to the station
for a bit of flour, or meat, or tea, or sugar, choosing the time when
the manager is likely to be out on the run. The cook here is a “good
cook,” from a traveller's point of view; too good to keep his place
long.
Occasionally someone gets some water in an old kerosene-tin and washes
a shirt or pair of trousers, and a pair or two of socks--or
foot-rags--(Prince Alfreds they call them). That is, he soaks some of
the stiffness out of these articles.
Three times a day the black billies and cloudy nose-bags are placed on
the table. The men eat in a casual kind of way, as though it were only
a custom of theirs, a matter of form--a habit which could be left off if
it were worth while.
The Exception is heard to remark to no one in particular that he'll give
all he has for a square meal.
“An' ye'd get it cheap, begod!” says a big Irish shearer. “Come and have
dinner with us; there's plenty there.”
But the Exception only eats a few mouthfuls, and his appetite is gone;
his stomach has become contracted, perhaps.
The Wreck cannot eat at all, and seems internally disturbed by the sight
of others eating.
One of the men is a cook, and this morning he volunteered good-naturedly
to bake bread for the rest. His mates amuse themselves by chyacking him.
“I've heard he's a dirty and slow cook,” says one, addressing Eternity.
“Ah!” says the cook, “you'll be glad to come to me for a pint of flour
when I'm cooking and you're on the track, some day.”
Sunset. Some of the men sit at the end of the hut to get the full
benefit of a breeze which comes from the west. A great bank of
rain-clouds is rising in that direction, but no one says he thinks it
will rain; neither does anybody think we're going to have some rain.
None but the greenest jackaroo would venture that risky and foolish
observation. Out here, it can look more like rain without raining, and
continue to do so for a longer time, than in most other places.
The Wreck went down to the station this afternoon to get some medicine
and bush medical advice. The Bourke sawney helped him to do up his swag;
he did it with an awed look and manner, as though he thought it a great
distinction to be allowed to touch the belongings of such a curiosity.
It was afterwards generally agreed that it was a good idea for the Wreck
to go to the station; he would get some physic and, a bit of tucker to
take him on. “For they'll give tucker to a sick man sooner than to a
chap what's all right.”
The Exception is rooting about in the rubbish for the other blucher
boot.