Babes in the Bush

Become a capitalist, his instincts revolted against spending money needlessly, when every pound, often less, would buy a cow, which cow would turn into fifty head of cattle in a few years. ‘What could a man do that would pay him half as well? Why employ labour that could be done without? It was all very well for Mr. Willoughby, who had raised his wages gradually from twenty pounds per annum and one ration. Mr. Willoughby was a gentleman with a big station, and threw his money about a bit; but why should he, Mick Donnelly, go keeping and feeding men to put in crops when farming didn’t pay? Therefore his fields might lie fallow and go out of cultivation.’

His boys were getting big lumps of fellows, old enough to help brand and muster. The girls could milk, and break in the heifers, as well as all the men in the country. His wife could cook – there wasn’t much of that; and wash – it didn’t fatigue her; and sweep – that process was economised – as well as ever. Any kind of duds did for working people, as long as they went decent to chapel on Sundays. That they had always done and would do, please God. But all other occasions of spending money were wasteful and unnecessary.

The sole expenses, then, of this large family were in the purchase of flour, tea, sugar, and clothes, none of which articles came to an extravagant sum for the year. While the sales were steady and considerable, Mick and his sons drove many a lot of cattle, fat or store, to the neighbouring markets. The profits of the dairy in butter and bacon, the representatives of which latter product roamed in small herds around the place, paid all the household expenses twice over; while the amount of his credit balance at the Bank of New Holland in Yass would have astonished many a tourist who watched Mick smoking on his stock-yard rails, or riding an unshod mare down the range after a mob of active cattle.

But now a more ambitious idea was evolved from the yeoman’s slowly maturing, but accurate mental processes. He had been noting the relative scale of outlay and income of a neighbouring sheep-farmer. After certain cautious comparisons, he fixed the conclusion that, other things being equal, sheep would pay him better than cattle. He heard from an old comrade of the forced sale of a sheep station in the then half-explored, unstocked district of Monaro, lying between the Great Range and the Snowy River. His offer of cash, at a rate far from remunerative to the late owner, had been accepted.

That part of his plan settled, he sold his freehold to a neighbouring proprietor who was commencing to found an estate, receiving rather more than double his original purchase money. Stock being at a reasonable price, Donnelly determined to sell off the whole of his possessions, merely reserving his dray, team, and a sufficiency of saddle-horses for the family. His herd had become too numerous for the run. His boys and girls would make shepherds and shepherdesses for a while – by no means a picturesque occupation in Australia, but still profitable as of old. He would be enabled to continue independent of hired labour. He trusted to the duplication of stock to do the rest. Hence the clearing-off sale, which a number of farmers in the neighbourhood were likely to attend, and to which Wilfred and his chief servitor were at present wending their way.

On this occasion Wilfred had resisted the idea of mounting any of the strayed horses, still numerous upon the enticing pastures of Warbrok. Having unwittingly placed himself in a false position, he was resolved not to repeat the impropriety.

‘Mr. Churbett had behaved most courteously,’ he said; ‘but it might have been otherwise. I was not aware that it was other than a colonial custom. There must be no more mistakes of this kind, Dick, or you and I shall quarrel. Go to one of the nearest farmers and see if you can hire me a decent hack.’

So Dick, though chafing at the over-delicacy which led his master to pay for a mount while available steeds were eating his grass, proceeded to obey orders, and shortly returned with a substantial half-bred, upon which Wilfred bestowed himself.

Dick Evans was always in good spirits at the prospect of a cruise in foreign parts. Mrs. Evans, on the other hand, was prone to dwell upon the unpleasant side of domestic matters. Her habit of mind had doubtless resulted in the philosophic calm with which her husband bore his frequent, and occasionally protracted, absences from the conjugal headquarters. As before, he mounted his old mare with a distinct air of cheerfulness.

‘The dairy work will get along all right for a day or two, sir,’ he said. ‘Old Andy begins to be a fairish milker – he was dead slow at first – and Mr. Guy’s a great help bailin’ up. There’s nothing brisks me up like a jaunt somewheres – I don’t care where it is, if it was to the Cannibal Islands. God Almighty never intended me to stop long in one place, I expect.’

‘A rolling stone gathers no moss, Dick,’ said Wilfred. ‘You’ll never save up anything if you carry out those ideas always.’

‘I don’t want to save nothing, sir. I’ve no call to keep money in a box; I can find work pretty well wherever I go that will keep me and my old woman in full and plenty. I’m safe of my wages as long as I can work, and when I can’t work no more I shall die – suddent like. I’ve always felt that.’

‘But why don’t you get a bit of land, Dick, and have a place of your own? You could easily save enough money to buy a farm.’

‘Bless your heart, sir, I wouldn’t live on a farm allers, day in, day out, if you’d give me one. I should get that sick of the place as I should come to hate the sight of it. But hadn’t you better settle with yourself like, sir, what kind of stock you’re agoin’ to bid for when we get to Mick’s? There’ll be a lot of people there, and noise, and perhaps a little fighting if there’s any grog goin’, so it’s best to be ready for action, as old Sir Hugh Gough used to tell us.’

‘Mr. Churbett and Mr. Hamilton thought I should buy all the mixed cattle, as many of them would be ready for the butcher before winter.’

‘So they will, sir, or my name’s not Richard Evans, twice corporal in the old 50th, and would have been sergeant, if I’d been cleverer at my book, and not quite so clever at the canteen. But that’s neither here nor there. What I look at is, they’re all dairy-bred cattle, and broke in close to your own run, which saves a power of trouble. If you can get a hundred or two of ’em for thirty shillings or two pound a head, they’ll pay it all back by next season – easy and flippant.’

Finishing up with his favourite adjective, which he used when desirous of showing with what ridiculous ease any given result might be obtained, Mr. Richard Evans lighted his pipe with an air of assurance of success which commenced to infect his employer.

About mid-day they reached the abode of Michael Donnelly, Esq., as such designated by the local papers, who ‘was about to submit to public competition his quiet and well-bred herd of dairy cattle, his choice stud, his equipages, farming implements, teams, carts, harness, etc., with other articles too numerous to mention.’ Other articles there were none, except he had decided to sell the olive branches. Wilfred was shocked at the appearance of the homestead of this thriving farmer. The falling fences, the neglected orchard, the dilapidated hut, the curiously patched and mended stock-yard, partly brush, partly of logs, with here and there a gap, secured by a couple of rude tree-forks, with a clumsy sapling laid across – all these did not look like the surroundings of a man who could give his cheque for several thousand pounds. However, the personal appearance of Mick himself, an athletic, manly, full-bearded fellow, as also that of his family, was decidedly prepossessing. They were busily attending to the various classes of stock, with much difficulty kept apart for purposes of sale. Whatever else these Australian Celts lacked, they had been well nourished in youth and infancy. A finer sample of youthful humanity, physically considered, Wilfred had never seen. The lack of order everywhere visible had in no way reacted upon their faculties. All their lives they had known abundant nutriment, unrestricted range. Healthful exercise had been theirs, congenial labour, and diet unstinted in the great essentials. Few other considerations had entered into the family councils.

And now they were about to migrate, like the world’s elder children, to a land promising more room. Then, as now, a higher life was possible, where the sheep and the oxen, the camels and the asses, would enjoy a wider range. The sale over, they would once more resume that journey which, commencing soon after the marriage day of Michael Donnelly and Bridget Joyce, was not ended yet.

Wilfred Effingham was soon confirmed in his opinion that he had done well to attend. Many of the neighbouring settlers were there, as well as farmers and townspeople from Yass, brought together by the mysterious attraction of an auction sale. One of the townspeople, asking first if he was Mr. Effingham of Warbrok, put into his hand a note which ran as follows: —

‘My dear Wilfred – I thought you were likely to be at Donnelly’s sale, so I send you a line by a parishioner of mine. I have made inquiries about the stock, and consider that you could not do better than buy as many of the cattle as you have grass for. They are known to be quiet, having been used to dairy tending, and are certain to increase in value and number, as you have so much grass at Warbrok. Price about two pounds. A few horses would not be superfluous, and there are some good ones in Donnelly’s lot, or they would hardly have stood his work. Mention my name to Mick, and say he is to let you down easy. I have had a touch of rheumatism lately —et ego in Arcadia– there’s no escape from old age and its infirmities in any climate, however good, or I’d have looked you up before now. Tell your father I’m coming over soon. – Always yours sincerely,

Harley Sternworth.’

The hour of sale having arrived, and indeed passed, the auctioneer, who had driven out from Yass for the purpose, commenced his task, which he did by climbing on to the ‘cap’ of the stock-yard and rapping violently with a hammer-handled hunting-crop. A broad-chested, stout-lunged, florid personage was Mr. Crackemup, and if selling by auction deserved to be ranked as one of the fine arts, he was no mean professor.

‘Ladies and gentlemen!’ he shouted. ‘I say ladies, for I notice quite a number of the fair sex have honoured me with their presence. Let me mention, in the first place, that the owner of this valuable stock we see before us has resolved to leave this part of the country. Yes, my friends, to leave Gumbaragongara for good and all! Why do I mention this fact – why do I dwell upon it? Because, ladies and gentlemen, it makes all the difference as to the bona fide nature of the sale which we are met together to-day to celebrate – that is – a – to carry out – according to these written conditions. My principal, Mr. Donnelly, with the shrewdness which has characterised him through life, seized upon this view of the case. “If I leave the country bodily,” he said to me, “and sell the stock for what they’ll fetch, no one can say that I went away and took the best with me.” No, ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Donnelly departs to-morrow for Monaro, taking only a dray and team, with a few riding-horses, so that all his well-bred, quiet, beautiful herd of dairy cattle, selected with great care from some of the best herds in the colony [here divers of the audience grinned irreverently], I shall have the honour of submitting to public competition this day.

‘The first lot, ladies and gentlemen, is No. 1. Generally so, isn’t it? Ha! ha! One hundred and fifty-four cows and heifers, all broken to bail; most of them with calves at foot, or about to – to – become mothers.’

Mr. Crackemup was a man of delicate ideas, so he euphemised the maternal probabilities.

‘Any one buying this choice lot, with butter at a shilling, and cheese not to be bought, buys a fortune. I will sell a “run out” of twenty head, with the option of taking the lot. “Fifteen shillings a head” – nonsense; one pound, twenty-two and six, twenty-five-thank you, miss; thirty shillings, thirty-five, thirty-seven and six-thank you, sir. One pound seventeen and sixpence, once; one pound seventeen and sixpence, twice; for the third and last time, one pound seventeen shillings and sixpence. Gone! What name shall I say, sir? “Howard Effingham, Warbrok Chase.” Twenty head. Thank you, sir.’

At this critical moment the voice of Dick Evans was heard by Wilfred, in close proximity to his ear: ‘Collar the lot, sir; they’re dirt cheap; soon be in full milk. Don’t let ’em go.’

‘I believe,’ said Wilfred, raising his voice, ‘that I have the option of taking the whole.’

‘Quite correct, sir; but if I might advise – ’

‘I take the lot,’ said Wilfred decisively.

And though there was a murmur from the crowd, and one stalwart dame said, ‘That’s not fair, thin; I med sure I’d get a pen of springers myself,’ the auctioneer confirmed his right, and the dairy lot became his property.

It turned out, as is often the case, that the first offered stock were the most moderate in price. Many of the buyers had been holding back, thinking they would go in lots of twenty, and that better bargains might be obtained. When they found that the stranger had carried off all the best dairy cows, their disappointment was great.

‘Serves you right, boys,’ was heard in the big voice of the proprietor; ‘if you had bid up like men, instead of keeping dark, you’d have choked the cove off taking the lot. Serves you all dashed well right.’

The remaining lots of cattle consisted of weaners, two and three-year-old steers and heifers. Of fat cattle the herd had been pretty well ‘scraped,’ as Donnelly called it, before the sale. For most of these the bidding was so brisk and spirited that Wilfred thought himself lucky in securing forty steers at twenty-five shillings, which completed his drove, and were placed in the yard with the cows.

Then came the horses; nearly a hundred all told – mares, colts, fillies, yearlings, with aged or other riding-horses. These last Donnelly excused himself for selling by the statement that if he took them to Monaro half of them would be lost trying to get back to where they had been bred, and that between stock-riders and cattle-stealers his chance of regaining them would be small.

‘There they are,’ he said; ‘there’s some as good blood among them as ever was inside a horse-skin. They’re there to be sold.’

The spirit of speculation was now aroused in Wilfred, or he would not have bought, as he did, half-a-dozen of the best mares, picking them by make and shape, and a general look of breeding. They were middle-sized animals, more like Arabs than the offspring of English thoroughbreds, but with a look of caste and quality, their legs and feet being faultless, their heads good, and shoulders fair. They fell to a bid of less than ten pounds each, and with foals at foot, Wilfred thought they could not be dear.

‘Them’s the old Gratis lot,’ said Mr. Donnelly. ‘I bought ’em from Mr. Busfield when they was fillies. You haven’t made a bad pick for a new hand, sir. I wish you luck with ’em.’

‘I hope so,’ said Wilfred. ‘If you breed horses at all, they may as well be good ones.’ As he turned away he caught the query from a bystander —

‘Why, you ain’t going to sell old Barragon?’

‘Yes, I am,’ said Mick, who was evidently not a man of sentiment; ‘all fences in the country wouldn’t keep him away from these parts. He’s in mostly runs near the lake, and eats more of that gentleman’s grass than mine. He don’t owe me nothin’.’

‘You buy that horse, sir,’ said Dick, who was acting the part of a moral Mephistopheles. ‘He’s as old as Mick, very near, and as great a dodger after cattle. But you can’t throw him down, and the beast don’t live that can get away from him on a camp.’

Wilfred turned and beheld a very old, grey horse cornered off, and standing with his ears laid back, listening apparently to Mr. Crackemup’s commendations.

‘Here you have, ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Donnelly’s favourite riding-horse Barragon, an animal, he informs me, that has done some of the most wonderful feats ever credited to a horse in any country – some exploits, indeed, which he scarcely likes to tell of. [‘I’ll be bound he don’t,’ drawled out a long, brown-faced bystander.] You have heard the reasons assigned for disposing of him here, rather than, as of course he would prefer to do, still keeping him attached to the fortunes of the family. His instinct is so strong, his intelligence so great, ladies and gentlemen, that he would unerringly find his way back from the farthest point of the Monaro district. What shall I say for him?’

‘May as well have him, sir,’ said his counsellor. ‘He’ll go cheap. He’ll always stick to the lake; and if any one else gets him, they’ll be wanting us to run him in, half the time.’

Wilfred looked at the horse. The type was one to which he had not been accustomed – neither a roadster, a hunter, a hackney, nor a harness horse – he was sui generis, the true Australian stock-horse, now rarely seen, and seldom up to the feats and performances of which grizzled veterans of the stock-whip love to tell.

No one with an eye for a horse could look at the war-worn screw without interest. A long, low horse, partaking more of the Arab type than the English, he possessed the shapes which make for endurance, and more than ordinary speed. The head was lean and well shaped, with a well-opened, still bright eye. The neck was arched, though not long; but the shoulder, to a lover of horses, was truly magnificent. Muscular, fairly high in the wither, and remarkably oblique, it permitted the freest action possible, while the rider who sat behind such a formation might enjoy a feeling of security far beyond the average. Battered and worn, no doubt, were the necessary supports, by cruelly protracted performances of headlong speed and wayfaring. Yet the flat cannon-bones, the iron hoofs, the tough tendons, had withstood the woeful hardships to which they had been subjected, with less damage than might have been expected. The knees slightly bent forward, the strained ligaments, showed partial unsoundness, yet was there no tangible ‘break down.’ What must such a horse have been in his colthood – in his prime?

A sudden feeling of pity arose in Wilfred’s heart as he ran his eye critically over the scarred veteran. At a small price he would, no doubt, be a good investment, old as he was. He would be reasonably useful; and as a matter of charity one might do worse alms before Heaven than save one of the most gallant of God’s creatures from closing his existence in toil and suffering. Mick’s neighbours not being more sentimental than himself, Wilfred found himself the purchaser of the historical courser at a price considerably under five pounds.

‘By George! I’m glad you’ve got him, mister,’ said Mr. Donnelly, with vicarious generosity. ‘I’m not rich enough to pension him, and the money he’s fetched, put into a cow, will be something handsome in ten years. But he’s a long ways from broke down yet; and you’ll have your money’s worth out of him, with luck, before he kicks the bucket. You’d better ride him home, and I’ll send my boy Jack with you as far as Benmohr. He’ll lead Bob Jones’s moke, that you rode here, and leave him in Argyll and Hamilton’s paddock till he’s sent for. You’d as well get off with your mob, if you want to get to Benmohr before dark.’

Wilfred recognised the soundness of this advice, and in a few minutes afterwards found himself upon Barragon. While Dick Evans promptly let out the cattle, Jack Donnelly, a brown-faced young centaur, riding a half-broken colt, and leading his late mount, commanded two eager cattle dogs to ‘fetch ’em up.’ The drove went off at a smart pace, and in five minutes they were out of sight of the yard, the farm, and the crowd, jogging freely along a well-marked track, which Dick stated to be the road to Benmohr.

This cheerful pace was, however, not kept up. The steers at the ‘head’ of the drove were inclined to go even too fast. It was necessary to restrain their ardour. The cows and calves became slow, obstinate, and disposed to spread, needing all the shouting of Dick and young Donnelly, as well as the personal violence of the latter’s dogs, to keep them going. Wilfred rejoiced that he had obeyed the impulse to possess himself of old Barragon, when he found with what ease and comfort he was carried by the trained stock-horse in these embarrassing circumstances. Finally the weather changed, and it commenced to rain in the face of the cortège. Dick once or twice alluded to the uncertainty which would exist as to their getting all the cattle again if anything occurred to cause their loss this night. Lastly, just as matters began to look dark, Wilfred descried Benmohr.

The ‘semi-detached’ cottage which did duty as a spare bedroom had an earthen floor, and was not an ornate apartment; still, a blazing fire gave it an air of comfort after the chill evening air. Needful toilet requisites were provided, and the manifest cleanliness of the bed and belongings guaranteed a sound night’s rest.

Upon entering the cottage, along a raised stone causeway, pointed out by Mr. Hamilton, Wilfred found his former acquaintance Mr. Argyll, and Mr. Churbett, with a neighbour, who was introduced as Mr. Forbes. The table was already laid, and furnished with exceeding neatness for the evening meal. A glowing fire burned in the ample stone chimney, and as the three gentlemen rose to greet him, Wilfred thought he had never seen a more successful union of plainness of living, with the fullest measure of comfort.

‘You have made the port just in time,’ remarked Argyll; ‘the rain is coming down heavily, and the night is as black as a wolf’s throat. You seem to have bought largely at Donnelly’s sale.’

‘All the dairy cows and heifers, and a few steers for fattening,’ answered Wilfred. ‘I suppose we might have had some trouble in collecting them if they had got away from us to-night.’

‘So much that you might have never seen half of them again,’ said Mr. Churbett promptly. ‘You would have been hunting for them for weeks, and picked them up “in twos and threes and mobs of one,” as I did my Tumut store cattle, that broke away the first night I got them home.’

Wilfred felt in a condition to do ample justice to the roast chicken and home-cured ham, and even essayed a shaving of the goodly round of beef, which graced one end of the table. After concluding with coffee, glorified with delicious cream, Wilfred, as they formed a circle round the fire, came to the conclusion, either that it was the best dinner he had eaten in the whole course of his life, or else that he had never been quite so hungry before.

In despite of Mrs. Teviot’s admonitions, none of the party sought their couches much before midnight. There was a rubber of whist – perhaps two. There was much general conversation afterwards, including literary discussion. One of the features of the apartment was a well-filled bookcase. Finally, when Mr. Hamilton escorted Wilfred to his chamber, he said, ‘You needn’t bother about getting up early to-morrow. Trust old Dick to have the cattle away at sunrise; he and the boy can drive them easily now, till you overtake them. We breakfast about nine o’clock, and Fred Churbett will keep you company in lying up.’

The night was murky and drizzling; the morning would probably resemble it. Wilfred was tired. He knew that Dick would be up and away with the dawn. He himself wished to consult his new friends about points of practice germane to his present position. On the whole he thought he could safely take Mr. Hamilton’s advice.

His slumbers that night, in bed-linen fragrant as Ailie Dinmont’s, were deep and dreamless. Surely it could not have been morning, it was so dark, and still raining, when he heard knocking at a window, and a voice thrice repeat the words, ‘Maister Hamilton, are ye awauk?’ but the words melted away – a luxurious drowsiness overpowered his senses. The rain’s measured fall and tinkling plash changed into the mill-wheel dash of his childhood’s wonder in Surrey. When he awoke, the sky was dark, but there was the indefinable sensation that it was not very early. So he dressed, and beholding a large old pair of ‘clodhoppers’ standing temptingly near, he bestowed himself in them and cautiously made towards the milking-yard. He looked across to the enclosure where his cattle had been during the previous night. It was a smooth and apparently deep sea of liquid mud, so sincerely churned had it been during the wet night. He felt grieved for the discomfort of the poor cattle, but relieved to know that they had been hours before on the grass, and were well on their way to Warbrok Chase.