Such Is Life

Runnymede. To

osed by my random election of dates; but just notice that perversity, that untowardness, that cussedness in the affairs of men, which brings me back to Runnymede, above all places in the spacious south-western quarter of the Mother Province. The unforeseen sequences of that original option are masters of the situation, till they run their course-and most tyrannical

hich would in the meantime be forwarded from our Central Office to Mr. Montgomery. Twelve hours' riding had brought me to the stat

and a great deal too vile for the boss's hou

rs, or even money, is more accurately weighed on a right-t

, has imagination bodied forth, or tradition handed down, any such vagary as might imply that a wage-slave saw the inside of the house or the barracks. And a narangy will always avoid your eye as he relates how, on some momentous occasion, the boss invited him to step in and take a seat. In the accurately-graded society of a proper station, you have a reproduction of the Temple economy under the old Jewish ritual. The manager's house is a Sanctum

ble equivalent to the baron's crude and lop-sided camaraderie-this having been a necessary condition of vassal loyalty in olden time. Without vassal loyalty, or abject vassal fear, the monopolist's sleep can never be secure. Domination, to be unassailable, must have overwhelming force in reserve- moral force, as in the feudal system, or physical force, as in our police system. The labour-leader, of accredited integrity and capability, though (so to speak) ducally weedy, has moral forc

the blucher treads on the heel of the tan boot, and galls its stitches. The average share of that knowledge which is power is undoubtedly in favour of the tan boot; but the preponderant moiety is just as surely held by the blucher. In our democracy, the sum of cultivated intelligence, and corresponding sensitiveness to affront, is dangerously high, and becoming higher. On the other hand, the squatter, even if pliant by disposition, cannot spring to the strain; social usage being territorial rather than pers

was the nearest approach to money in my possession. I had left my cattle-tracks, and was approaching the home-station, when I met Mr. Montgomery himself. I told him my story. 'Oh, well; go to the store and get your rations,' said he disgustedly. 'And, see-if those steers of yours are on the run, get them off as quick as possible. Fence-breakers, no doubt. Come! hurry-up, or the store will be closed!' The storekeepe

n, with five-ton-seventeen of wire. Montgomery met me, as before. 'You're Collins, aren't you? I've got the duplicate. We won't di

to sit at meat with the narangies, where we were waited on by a menial. If my social evolution had continued-if I had expanded, for instance, into a literary tourist, of sound Conservative principles- I would have seen the inside of

udies; and O, how I longed for a few days' untroubled leisure, just to break ground on the work. Those notes had been written in noisy huts, or by flickering firelight, or on horseback-written in eager activity of mind, and in hope of such an opportunity for amplification as I was now letting slip. But I have one besetting sin; and this Delilah, scissors in hand, had dogged

n. Here twelve or fifteen years' continuous trampling by the worst-smelling of ruminants (bar the billygoat) on ground theretofore untrodden except by blackfellows, birds, and marsupials, had developed a pond, sometimes a couple of acres in area

I noticed my empty clothes lying on the bank, and found myself sliding through the lukewarm water, recklessly and wickedl

ut, prompts me to the foregoing confession-a confession which I cannot but regard as da

mplied in the dim background, and recent literature certainly proves this to be one of them. There is nothing dainty or picturesque in the presentment of a naked character washing himself; yet how few of our later novels or notes of travel are without that bit of description; generally set-off by an ungainly reflection on the dirt of some other person, class,

n-women to attend a Northern Victoria Agricultural Show, in their literary capacity, you would see proof of this. Each would write her catalogue of aristocratic visitors, her unfavourable impressions re quality of refreshments, her sarcastic notice of other women's attire, and her fragmentary observations on the floral exhibits; but not one would wind-up her memoir with an ac

tub' themselves on paper is added to the humiliation of the disclosure itself. In a word, just as I lost my vigour in the swimming-hole, I lose my individuality

flies, etc.; the fire to salamanders, imps, unbaptised babies, etc.; and she strictly penalises the trespass of each class on the domain of any other. Natu

nclination. But the Minister of Ahriman the Evil is not far off. The able-bodied mother seizes the mite of a bambino by the wrist, and carries him at arm's-length to the kitchen. It is to no purpose that he becomes alternately rigid and flaccid, lifting up his voice in clamorous protest, and making himself as heavy as a bag of shot. That misguided woman denudes him, washes him, rubs soap into his eyes, spanks him, re-arrays him, and sets him in a clean place, giving him a teaspoon to play with. Then she resumes her household work; whereupon Ormuzd whispers in the pledge's projecting ear, and that heaven-directed bimbo straightway turns his head toward the dust-hole, and, again illustrating the first clause of the Sphynx's not very compl

tanding between Mrs. Beaudesart, the housekeeper, and Ida,

losure, into the hands of a brainy and nosey financier. People who had known the poor gentleman when he was very emphatically in the flesh, and had listened to his palaver, and noticed his feckless way of going about things, were not surprised at the misfortune that had struck Buckley. Mrs. B. had then taken a small villa, near Sydney, wher

th lenient treatment, got a tenner hard. About the same time, Miss Buckley-then a singularly handsome young lady- became a veritable heroine of romance. A German prin

property-owner, whose hobby was to collect his own rents. Bottoming on gold this time, she buried the old man within eighteen months, and paid probate duty on ?25,000. After three years of something like life, she accepted the addresses of the Hon. Henry Beaudesart, a social refugee from Belgravia (whereve

the continuous labour of at least fifty average industrious women. And when the industrious women were not to the fore, where were the elegancies to come from? Where, indeed! It is a question which has broken many a gentler heart than Maud Beaudesart's, and will break many more. It is a cruel question; but not to put it would be more cruel still. For while this or that gentlewoman is in dange

ious widow as a fixture, had insisted upon her having some definite status on the place, and she was therefore installed as housekeeper. Little wonder that the poor gentlewoman, remembering her own departed greatness, and chafing u

they knew my real standing, whereas they did n't, seemed to weigh so much in my favour as to make their banter any

had to beat time with a woman like Maud. In spite of my chivalrous disinclination to flaunt superior descent in the face of a lady, our shuddersome intimacy deepened; and the necessity for keeping up my accompaniment seemed to grow more imperative as it became more difficult. But even at this distance of time, it soothes me to remember that I went through the ordeal without any sacrifice of veracity-partly by modest reticence touching my forbears, and the rest by a little diplomacy. For instance, in remarkin

se sordid greed and unspeakable arrogance has yet to be said or sung. Socially, she knew something fie-fie about most of our old nobility; and her class-sympathy, supported by the

because we took especial care to let nobody hear us, the jealousy of our inferiors manifested itself in that badinage so dear to the middle-class mind. 'Inferiors,' I say advisedly, for there was an indescribable something about us two when we got together, a something too subtle for expression in the vulgar tongue, which made us feel the station aristocracy

er twelve years' manful struggle with a bad selection, had hanged himself in the stable; whereupon the storekeeper had sold the movables, and the mortgagee the farm. Runnymede was Ida's first situation. Her wages, month by month, went to the support of her broken-down mother, then living fr

the same colour, in lieu of the short, silky moustache which is the piquant trade-mark of our country-women. Besides this, she was lame, on account of the back-sinew of one of her ankles having been cut through by a reaping-machine; and in addition to all this, the fingers of her left hand had been snipped to a uniform length, through getting into the feed of a chaff-cutter. Montgomery ha

self-denying girl, transparently honest in word and deed; the gentle soul shining through its homely mask, like a candle in a bottle. Upon the whole, ugly, illit

here-remembering how rancorously I once hated another boy because he came from the Isle of Wight.) Yet the two mammals' chronic state of friction was p

your shallow romancists; but, to the philosophic mind, its pathos is nothing to that of ugliness in distress. At the best of times, poor Ida was heart-breaking; her sunniest smile wrung my soul with commiseration; and when the sympathy naturally accorded to helpless anguish was superimposed upon that which she claimed as her birth

a well-conducted household; so when I consider it my duty to instruct you in the decencies of life, you mustn't take it ill. People have to suffer for their ignorance, Mary, as well as

d to keep their home together," pro

tribution justly falls on their children; part, of course, on themselves. Your father, I venture to say, often envied the life of the domestic animals on the station where he had selected. But he aimed at independence-independence! A fine word, Mary, but a poor reality. This idea of independence is

a rejoinder; and there was a harder ring in th

osition for which their birth and education fitted them, you would have been spared many

im rest in his grav

Providence it is for people of the lower classes to have notions above what their Maker intends for them. And you know how prone you are to forget your place-as you did this morning. Susan has the same fault, I'm sorry to say; but I condone it t

; and her tears rained hot and fast on the ba

ajority; but the movement is still attended by certain disadvantages. A female whose looks approach repulsiveness should, at least, have a character beyond suspicion; and for any woman to run away from the neighbourhood where her doings are known, is not the way to inspire confidence. And though it has pleased God, for your own good, to remove the snare of beauty far from y

fronted her fellow-mammal. The latter faltered, and paused.

t breathing heavily. "Ain't I miserable enough without you lyin' away my c

eeper haughtily, though still quailing before th

ll as mine, she is-an' we'll git her to write to a dozen people that knows me since I

dy, moistening her lips. "Leave the ap

An' I won't leave the apartment to please you, so I won't! Think God made me for the likes o' you to wipe your feet on? Think I bin behavin' myself decent all my life, fo

r, with quiet dignity. "She seems to have taken leave of her sens

An' look here, Mrs. Bodyzart: I bin full up o' your nag-nag ever since I come to this house: an' I put up with it for the s

pursuit of the matter entirely in my hands. Whilst she remains in this establishment, I must continue to shield her from the penalties to which she insists upon exposing herself. Come, Mary; dry

slur on me," faltered Ida apologe

r, who was the senior of our company. "Be ma saul, an A hid ony s

esart in your goodwill," remarked young Moone

. "I can imagine your feelings; but M'Murdo

replied Mac defiantly. "Od! air ye no din greetin' the yet, lassie?" he continued,

It was Priestley, a bullock driver who had drawn up to the store on the previous-evening; a decent sort of vu

ing has a more intimate connection with bread-winning than working can possibly have. Such a man finds himself born unto trouble, as the sparks fly in all directions; but he is merely aware of undergoing a chastening process, just as the tethered calf is aware that he always turns a flying somersault when he impetuously charges in any direction away from his peg; and this simply because the man knows as much about the Order of Things as the calf knows about Euclid's definition of a radial line. The fact is, that the Order of Things-rightly un

our nobility, with a hand on each door-post. "Hope you're enjoyin' y

replied the young storekeeper. "I

o take the buggy-track to Nalrookar? See, I could make the Fog-a-bolla Tank to-night; an' there's boun' to be a bit o' blue-bush, if not crows-foot, on them sand-hills. Then

o consideration when you load

to myself, 'Well, I'll chance her-make a spoon, or spoil a horn.' That's the way I reasoned it out. See, if I got to turn roun', an' foller the main track back agen to the Cane-grass Swamp, an' take the Nalrookar track from there, I won't

y the boss would let you

'd be a d--d f

timber in the Quondong Paddock, the other day, they were n't five mile from the main road-and a gate to go through-but he made them come right back by the station; thirty mile of

some road," said the bullock driver

twenty-two," remarked Mo

his. I couldn't crush a poor, decent, hard-working devil like that. I'd give him a thorough good blackguarding for calculating upon crossing

rs; Moriarty, with a ring of keys in his hand, sauntered across to the store; and I managed to drag myself out to a seat built against the south s

; his tilted wagonette, blazoned with his name and title, JOSEPH PAWSOME, SADDLER, standing close by. Watching these lewd fellows of the baser sort at their sordid toil, my mind reverted to certain incidents of the preceding

of them may have whetted

is only fair

on Castor and Pollux (in the House of Gemini). Also, her horizontal attitude was so full of menace that Rigel and Betelgeux (in Orion) seemed to wilt under her sinister supremacy. Sirius (in Canis Major), strongest and most malevolent of the astral powers, hung southwest of the zenith, reinforcing the evil bias of the time, and thus, from his commanding position, overruling the

d to observe in Procyon a firmness which I attributed to the evident support of Regulus (in the House of Leo); but the most reassuring element in an extreme

in the lunar and stellar outlook that, for comfort, I turned

sombre way. The time, the place, the supermundane conditions, acting together on a half-drowned mind, gave to the whole scene a weird reality which writing cannot convey; so, after pinching myself to make sure I w

ve to suffer for it if Montgomery knew of anything trespassing here. But how had they g

n', Co

estley. Worki

Dangerous-ain't it?

else st

e as regular as cloc

d you

o to blame; but I'll be clear by that time; an' I must guard agen comin' in contract with Runnymede till the st-nk blows off o' this transa

ley. Mind, it's only f

nig

ight, o

eard a suppressed commotion inside, followed by soothing gibberish, in a very low voice. This was bad. Priestley's bu

ry's pair of greys, tied, one in each back corner of the stable, whilst Pawsome's horses-a white and a piebald- were occupying the two stalls, and voraciously tearing down mouthfuls of g

d the wizard, in the same

wo hours ago, an' I med

y been down for a swim

ollins-do

og, that he should

wship, and displaying a knowledge of the Bible rare amongst hi

," I replied dejectedly, as I wit

house. Toby, the half-caste, was cantering away toward Clarke's, for the weekly mail. Priestley, at his wagon, was bullocking even more desperately than usual, with a view to getting out of sight of the station as soon as poss

carried to

ry beds

fought to g

through (

perform ungrudgingly; and, to any illuminated mind, the secret of these old fellows' greatness is very plain. Bathing, though an ancient heresy, has been of strictly local prevalence, and, for the best of reasons, of transient continuance. Our relapse belongs to the present generation. Though our better-class grandsires understood no science unconnected with the gloves, a marvellous instinct taught

, for I notice you're bothered with them slippin' down. O, Mr. Collins!"-and the poor unlovely face was suddenly distorted with anguish and wet with tears-"ain't Mrs. Bodyzart wicked to put a

you from the window, over there. You poor thing! you should n't tro

lls the truth, there's nobody in the world can say black is th

to give Pup a

in-water aside him; but if p

and don't come fooling about me, o

ive this life over, I thought; and I will give it over; an I do not, I am a villain. After all, there are not two sides to this question; there is only one; and you may trust an

Would a large estate ruin you? Bathing did the business for Italy, as it does the business for all its victims. If Rome had left to the soft Capuan his baths and his perfumes, she would have pulled-through. But think of the polished Roman debating the question of survival with the superlatively dirty barbarian of the North! Polished is good, for, in the ruins of the fatal Roman baths, the innumerable strigulae, used by the bathers to polish their skins, bear sad

ed? Prouder in his rags than the Emperor in his purple! and justly too, for he achieved the very apotheosis of dirt-animate, no doubt, as well as inanimate. Or take the first Teutonic Emperor of Rome-conqueror, arbitrator, legislator, and what not. In those middle ages, you know, it was the custom to n

that ever trod English soil; and think what a large percentage of those Muse-invokers, according to their historian, carried a fair quantity of that soil perennially on their hides. And speaking of the Diogenes of Fleet Street himself, we know, on good authority, that his antipat

greatness as we have- soaking ourselves in water, as if we were possums, and our virility a eucalyptus flavour that we sought to

gloried in the fiendish adage of, 'Two hours' sleep for a man, three for a woman, and four for a fool'; now, my livelist ambition is to gaze my fill on yon calm deep, then, like an infant, sink asleep on this form, and so remain till dinner-time- lunch-time, I should say; belonging, as I do, to the better classes. Then, I

s; they done with them in the house. O, Mr. Collins!"-and the girl's tears broke forth afresh, whilst

." The information acted like a charm; her crying was ov

ne word o' truth in it," s

r idea of p

n the Bible," she

ontroversy-considering that you r

e who knows it-on the third of July, it was-an' I would n't care tuppence if her ladyship snoke roun' tellin'

urs. Why, if she charged me with stooping to folly, I would merely say, 'Sorry to undeceive you, ma'am; but I've been too much given to letting "I dare not" wait

ifferent," replie

ched the exfoliation of the Inscrutable; and, you know, these things are altogether beyond

een forty miles. So I just lay on the seat, clean, frail, and inert, as a recumbent statue, moulded in blanc-mange; whilst the ancient t'other-sider oscillated his frame-saw, and the pious Pawsome lightened his toil with selections from Sankey, and the perspiring Priestley hurried up his bullocks from the ration-paddock, and Sling Muck, the ga

ch Ida's conversation had suggested. Finding this impossible, I made a mental memo. of the inspiration-and by the same

n quitted their work, and went to dinner. Priestley had started an

for the barracks? As head boundary man, decidedly not; but as recent proprietor of a small station absorbed by Runnymede, he was not destitute of pretensions. Out in the open air, he was, of course, as good a

ion beyond the Murrumbidgee who could confer the Purple Degree. For, owing to an inherent haziness in the theses and aims of Orangeism, there are Orders in the Society as hard to attain as those

dred miles who knew less of Irish History than Martin, and that man was Moriarty; consequently, the two jostled each other as they rushed into that branch of learning where scholars fear to tread-each repeatedly appealing to me for confirmation of h

nctum Sanctorum. Then Martin mounted his horse, and rode away; and presently the tribesman, Jerry, brought a buggy and pair to the front door. Montgomery and Folkestone-the latter

t and drink to me to see a clown; by my faith, we that have good w

nced with the indescribably weary step of a station man when the

aving one of your quiet palavers

oy; I profit not by t

like a snake, while you're looking round for a stick. Singular how a person can't remember a thing for the lif

," said I,

d parse it yourself, as clever as you think you are. Beggar

as you do now?" I

anyone that knows as much as I do; but people won't pay any attention to a you

ntly. "I did n't hear

urself some of these times. I wish Toby was back with

rt a great fool," I sighed. "What

r another; and no more chance of distinguishing myself than if I was in jail. I can't stand it much longer, and what's more, I won't. I wish the mail was in. I've got a presentiment of something good this time. If you don't specul

he rise when you get i

e? There's a great future sticking out for a f

s? Fine opening for an inventive genius there-

when you were my age,"

iving. Everything

Then why not take up some interesting study, and work it

t," replied the young

distingui

nch of some scientific study, and restrict yourself to that. Sa

e w

ral. It embraces all the d

t them except that they make different kinds of hills, and give different kinds of bites. Th

the gates of Futurity for the Australian pioneer of poetry-fiction-philosophy-

e got the talent, right enough, but I haven't

swimming-hole, b

o that. I haven't been t

ight if I h

mured; "what would he

mself in one direction.

n twenty-four notes on the regatta, besides my chance of the station sweep on the big Flemington, let alone private

is out?" I asked. "By-the-way, didn't I incidentall

intention. I made sure of scooping; and, for that matter, I make sure of it still. But whatever you do, don't begin to preach about the evils of gambling-not now, Collins; not till after we get news of these events. Doesn't everybody gamble, from the Govern

sked, indicating a hors

ngs him from that direction? Come, Collins-will you give me

you won'

much so, that I felt inclined to lose a trifle to him, even as a teetotaller would administer a nip to a man who was beginning to see things. "Come!" he continued recklessly; "I'll give you two

to understand that if Toby has letters for the station and none for me, you win; if he has letters f

it. Are

a hundred

hundred to o

men even of aristocratic lineage are compelled to carry. I placed the little coi

sked petulantly. "I migh

isagreeable tha

inty? Lay it on the window-sill, if you like, and pick it up when you can read your title clear. If you don't spe

arty and myself-the strangest coincidence, perhaps, within the personal experience of either of us-a conjuncture, in fact, which for a moment threw us both staggering

, and had given the animal a slap with the latter. Now he was depositing those equipments in the shed. Now he approached

. "Don't say I never gave

j.) Mor

he prince sternly; "very laconic, indeed, I must say. If I was you, I would n't

Collins," said the heir-apparent; "she's a day

you managed to come without the mai

gomery at Bailey's Tank, an' he told me to go like blazes to Scandalous Sandy's hut, on Nalrooka, an' tell him a

o to Scandalous Sandy

comes out o' your pocket, I got great pleasure informin' you I met ole Gl

won the regatta?" asked

ince. "Think you Port Ph

claimed Moriarty,

ee what Collins' paper says. An' now I feel like as if I

of our diffusive clan, for I could make neither head nor tail of it; nothing, indeed, but heart, and such heart as it has nev

h an effort. "I'll never clear myself-nev

arison with the sanctimo

herly tone, as I to

eel something like an ov

t presently. But see

nd lett

3

25

e of Unconsid

February

. Col

n the I7th prox. You are required to attend the Office of the Department in that townshi

m,

nnnn

nynn

ant-Under-

hirty miles to be done in seven days-and the country in such a state. This is the balsam that the usuring senate pours into captains' wounds. Never mind The time is only too near, when I'll sit in my sumptuous office, retaliati

e. He was as punctiliously honourable in some ways as he wa

e, how much are you out, even if the Flemi

clear it, right enough, if I'm not rushed,

nalogy, you're also badl

y. "How much does t

replied, steadying his voice by an ef

bling altogether till

an extend the time-say

fellow dubiously. "Anyway, I give you my solemn promise. But, I say,"

st intuitions of the higher philosophy, are a trifle more trustworthy than yours; and I have a pre

m doing. If you tell

cide, or

ndescend to undermine you, you storekeep

mbled the young fool;

her when you get you

ined a stern and stony silence, whilst his eyes met mine w

t the time; and she told Butler, and Mooney, and me, across the gate of the flower-garden, the same evening.

og!" I remar

this seat if I'm not telling you th

y wealth would wake me," I

to marry her,

you suppose I

on't mar

'm going to marry her, I must do it, to keep her in countenance. How, in the fiend's name, can I slink out of it, now that I'm accepted? Can I tell her I've examined my heart, and I find I can only love her as a sister? Now, would n't that sound well? No, no; I'm a done man. Of course, she had no business to accept me unawares; but as she ha

g, with one glance, the whole horizon of expediency and possibility, I caught sight of the

re's another condition that I didn't think of. As a sort of payment on accoun

imed the young fellow,

lie when I'm driven to i

own dirt

Jove, I'll

the posting was usually done, and what results might be exp

d he, swallowing the

plied quietly. "However, the s

t under

you would be a ruined man for the rest of your life-you would be a defaulting gambler, a byword, a hissing, an astonishment, with the curse of Cain upon your brow. Then she would spurn me with contumely, and I would be my own man again. I would be in sanctuary, so to spe

up. "Gosh! I'll give you a character to

time, the scandal won't even fizz on my inner consciousness. In fact, I'll feel myself taking a rise out of everyone that believes

iabilities, was by no means desperate; and his elastic temperament asserted itself at once. I may add, in

atch my horses," sai

riarty; "here comes T

cook also re-entered, at the opposite side. Then the prince bounded out through the front door, with a triumphant grin on his brown face, and an enormous cockroach of black sugar in his hand. The ne

ince, picking up his hat, while the baffled coo

kfellow or a half-caste can always clear himself when his horse comes down? The first thing a whitefellow thinks about, when he feels his horse gone, is to get out of the way of what's coming; but it's an even wager that he's pinned. Never so with the infe

at last na

ame-considering that neither the owners nor the horses had ever met before? Well, Young Jack was to ride Admiral Crichton; and I had such faith in the horse, with Jack up, that I plunged thundering heavy on him. So did Nelson. But, by jingo, the mo

st oblige me with the name and

lted altogether; and came flying into the straight, a dozen lengths to the good. Of course, losing the race made a difference of a note to Toby; so he caught the horse's shoulder with his spur, and turned him upside down, going at that bat. Then, to keep himself out of a row, he gammoned dead till we poured a pint of beer down his throat; and he lay groaning for two solid hours, w

jist for eatin' your (adj.) tucker an' orderin' people about? I done my day's work. Fork over that plug o' tobacker you're ow

ome of these times," r

coming

le son!" laughed the pri

en, tare-an'-ouns! whirro

"if I had a gun in my hand, I'd shoot you like a wild-dog. But

his cockroach, like Ugolini at the living skull of Ruggieri, in Dante's airy concept

own origin and antecedents, it would assist you to approximate your relative position

. B.; and imitation is the sincerest fl

varmin like you? Permit me to remind you that Mrs. Montgom

d the prince, with just

ugh to give a blanket for

ol

ing; "I must take a bit off the

aps," interposed the

ses for you. I was on

uire; jist to learn him n

e was striding down the

stoc

absent, four or five tribesmen slowly collected under Pawsome's shed,

id I believe. He's always getting music by post from Sydney. Montgomery had heard him sing and play, some time or other; and when old Mooney was here, just before last shearing, he sent Toby to tell Alf to come to the house in the evening, and bring his fiddle; and Alf came, very much against his grain. Young Mooney was asked into the house, on

maker?" I

mis-m

ious ch

o.-mis

a syn

at out of his pants. Nosey came out and apologised for the dog, and brought Nelson in to have some supper; and Nelson stayed till about twelve; but devil a squeak of the fiddle, or a line of a song, could he get out of Alf. But, as the boss says, Alf's only mad enough to know the difference between an eagle-hawk and a saw-foolish expression, it seems to me. Best boundary man on the station, Alf is. Been in the Round Swamp Padd

ersing everything? A man would have to stand on his head to un

e got to go. We'll start afresh to please you. Through here- along here-and follow the

hat your line's north and south?-and did you ever see a pine-ridge running north and

and at directing; but, by gosh, y

e primeval t'other-sider-"can

e Nalrookar track, mind, t' wot time you see a gate hin the fence as you're a-kerryin' hon yer right shoulder. Gate's sebm mile f'm 'ere. Nalrookar track goes through that gate; b't neb' you mind; you keep straight ahead pas' the gate, hon a pad you'll 'ar'ly see; han jist hat the fur hend o' the pine-ridge you'll strike hanuthe

udently continued-"It would suit some of t

men; but now boys his men, an' men's"-(I did n't catch the rest of the sentence). "Han what were the hupshot? W'y, fact was Cunnigam an' Thompson 'ad bin workin' hon hour ram-paddick wun night; an' six Wogger steers got away, an' a stag amongst 'em; makin' f'r home; an' they left a whaler mindin' the wagons; an' the two o' them hover'auled the steers way down hin hour Sedan Paddick. Well, heverybody-Muster Magomery his self, no less-heverybody ses, 'Ole h

nterposed. "Well,

harter. 'Shove 'em in 'e yaad, Toby,' ses Muster Magomery. Presinkly, up comes Half, an 'is 'oss hall of a lather. 'Take yer dem mongr

ight," I agreed. "Wel

hall gates hopen; fetches Nosey's place harter dark; houts file, an' hin with 'is mob, an' gives 'm a g-tful. Course, 'e

wisely. "Well

for it," chuc

ps horter take a lessing horf o' you, Jack,' ses you, jist now. You're right, Collings. Did n' Hi say, las' lambin'-did n' Hi say we war a-gwain ter hev sich anuther year as sixty-hate? Mostly kettle wot we

rk cut out for him," I re

s on this station, Jack.

tra's head, and drew the near one a little the tightest. He s

as a bulldog," observed the horse-driver. "Shake the

identially. "He's just dropped to this fellow's style. Boss wanted t

h a spur trailing at his right

one. I'd like to try that saddle," he added, by way of excuse. "Minds me o' one I got shook, five months ago, with a redheaded galoot I'd bin treatin' like a b

but it's only playfulness." So I swung into the deep seat of the stole

guarded strain on the dragging reins. Also a tranquil cognisance of favourable comment, exchanged by competent judges- no excitement, no admiration, remember;

g punctuated by necessity, rather than by choice. Magnificent, but-not w

mere-m

le the-fit wi

ient as the

olden couplets

e will-sit

slightly panting, it is true, but with la

to see about getting up an appetite for supper, Moria

d like a shot of a gun; the very question I wanted to ask you a couple of hours ago. I know it's been asked before; in fact, I met with it in an English magazi

ows, a Marlborough-temper is by no means the least in importance. I looked down in the ingenuous face of

orning is the right time to enter on that inquiry. For the present, we must leave the world-wearied prince to rest in his ancestral vault, where

it?" suggested Mo

I si

anything in that sort of an answer,"

uld. I would you had but the wit; 'twere better than

oung Jack, or Jack the Shel

hap that offered t

k Fr

. And remember o

Depend your life o

had n't got on the wrong side of the fence,

oothe and purify like the canter; nothing strengthen and exhilarate like the gallop. The trot is passed over with such contempt as it deserves. S

utary check on his growing propensity; if from beneath, it must have been a last desperate attempt to decoy into evil ways one who was, perhaps, better worth enlisting than the average fat-head. To which of these sources would you tr

ding through pine, wilga, needle-bush, quondong, and so forth. Two miles of this; then on my right appeared the white gate, through whic

uggy, turned toward home, was on the track in front of me, and Montgomery was resuming his se

hat business, and where I intended staying that night, whe

through this gate, the track would be lovely, the wagon would chase the bullocks; evening would soon be on; he would fetch feed and water at the Faugh-a-ballagh Tank, in the quiet moonlight; moreover, if he met a boundary man, he could easily say he had permission from the boss; in any case, it would soon be not worth while to order him back; and he would be off the run some time to-morrow forenoon. I could re

ur's loafing, at any time during the day, would have timed his arrival so as not only to obviate the present dan

eary team; often looking back to see the wagon clear the trees, but never, by any chance, looking forward against the blaze of the declining sun intently enough to notice the

that Jupiter was starting a hot favourite for the Flemington. And all this time, the unconscious son of perdition was crawling nearer; not a jolt nor a clic

turday too," continued the squatter courteously. "The bar

once. "Well, I must be moving," I mumbled hastily, glancing behind me at the sun, and backing Cl

th, Collins-you've be

ued Montgomery. "Lovers'

were so pettish as t

only going at the call of duty. I'll show"--here it struck me

th hideous dilatoriness. "I see it's a roll of music. Better take it. And his newspaper.

backing Cleopatra a little further into the scrub, and clearing my

of the buggy; and Priestley, pre-occupied in laying out fresh work f

mmed between them, whilst deliberately filling and lighting his pipe. Meanwhile, Priestley, in silent communion with his Maker, stood by his team as if waiting to be photographed. The buggy was in a co

sper me soul to soul. I re

he barracks!" I continued hurriedly, as I turned Cleopatra back toward the station, and bounded off at a canter. I had n't gone five strides, when, flick! went the buggy-whip; the vehicle started afte

his buggy round on the lock, skilfully threading the trees and scrub, till he resumed his old position, but now facing t

with emphasis; "it is a bad job; it's a (adj.) bad job. Way

t interested in the transaction," retorted Montgome

y, the proper road for me would 'a' been back along the main track to the Cane-grass Swamp, an' from there

t you'd just cut acros

s (adj.) certain. But if I'd 'a' though

d have done. You've ac

ested the bullock driver, in a

nearest way to the main road is past the station. Here! rouse up your d--d mongrels, and make a start along this track. I'll see that you're escorted. If you loo

erently to all his betters; yet there was deeper pathos in the

there's three o' them bullocks'll drop in yoke before I fetch the station. Would you like to see the bones layin' aside this track, every time you drive past? I bet you what you like, yo

the remembrance of so much consideration at your hands m the past, encourages me. There's a great deal in what Priestley says; my own experience in bullock driving brings it home to me; and I sympathise with him,

Montgomery's sunburnt face; and I

as to render Priestley, as well as myself, invisible even to bird's eye view. But the small soul, rattling about loose in the large, well-fed body, could n't let it pass at that. On my interposing, he placed a gold-mounted

erson, Montgom

re could possibly have made him a boor; take me as saying that these had been powerless to avert the misfortune. He was a gentleman by the grace of God and the flunkeyism of man. Montgomery was also a gentleman, but only by virtue of his position. So that, for instance, Priestley's personal fac-s

ther for the defence is-bandies words with you on the other fellow's behalf. I confess I rather like his style. I expected to hear him address you as 'old boy,' or 'my dear fellow,' or by some such affectionate title. Pardon my warmth, I say, Montgomery! but this phase of colonial life is new to me. Placed in your position (if my opinion, as a landlord, be worth anything), I should make an example of the trespassing scoundrel; par

ning avenue of escape. But to the bullock driver's troubled mind it appeared that he had managed to wander inside the wings of the stockyard of Fate, and that Folkestone was

pacific by nature, and self-schooled to forbearance by the second-strongest of inspirations, meets deadly public insult by the softest of answers-'calm, dishonourable, vile submission,' his friend calls it. But the slaying of that friend touches Romeo's 212°Fahrenheit-then! 'Away to heaven, respective lenity, and fire-eyed fury be my conduct now!' Whereupon, Tybalt,

nd ultra-royalism of the pre-Revolutionary French-and lives to wonder at the course of events. Macaulay's diction rolls like the swelling of Jordan, as he expatiates on the absolute subserviency, the settled incapacity for resistance, of the Bengalee-till pres

wrath to come, all solicitude for wife and children, vanished from his mind, leaving him fit for treasons,

't blame Magomery for bein' nasty; he's got a right to blaggard me, the way things is; an' I give him credit. But you! Cr

f-amused, half-tired smile the outlaw's tirade. Then he rose, drew

, Montgomery," said he, a

as a man of

the big, hairy blacksmith; and this to the perfect satisfaction of both parties, if they are worthy the name of Englishmen. Also, the English gentleman may take off his coat to the potsherd of the earth; and so excellent is his discrimination that the combat will surely end even as your novelist describes; simply because no worshipper can make headway against his god, when

, except in patches of suitable soil. For instance, when bar-loafer meets pimp, at ?1 a side, then comes the raw-meat business. The back-country man, though saturnine, is very rarely quarrelsome, and almost never a pugilist; nevertheless, his foot on his native salt-bush, it is not advisable to assault him with any feebler weapon than rifle-and-bayonet. There is a radical difference

pstick would snap, supplying a nilla-nilla which would make him an over-match for a dozen Folkestones in rotation. My hand was on Cleopatra's mane, and my off-foot clear of the stirrup; it would be

ip, whilst gazing steadily northward through the narrow fringe of timber. Following hi

r, Collins?" dema

to bear on the horsem

till. Sig

profile changed to a narrow line, and I returned to the buggy, followed, at a decent i

quietly. "You have my permission to fol

it some slant

ndary, and see that he keeps the track."-A frown gathered on the young fellow's face, reinforced by a burning blush as Montgomery went on-"Perhaps you scarcely expected me to concur in your opinion, that one ought to spring a bit in a season like this; yet I have no intention of crushing a poor, decent, hard-working devil-that is, if

Montgomery,"

n for your pocket-book?" he asked, wit

all the time-wonder how

sted the squatter. "She won't be at all displeas

in placed his glass in his eye, and stared a

o have a drink of tea at Jack's hut. I'll be back in three or four hours. Pity you're not allowed to loose-out, for there's a grand bit of crow's-foot round that pine tree in the hollow. Don't kindle a fire, unless you want to get lagged.' And Priestley would get to the boundary by ten o'clock on the morrow, withou

This paper, however, happened to be the latest available issue of a Melbourne daily, and contained a copious account of the regatta, followed by the coarsely-executed portrait of a young man, with the neck and shoulders-and, by one of Nature's sad, yet just, compensations, also the face and head-of the average athlete. Rude as the engraving was, the subject of it at once suggested what the Life-Assurance canvassers call an 'excellent risk'; and underneath ran the title: Mr. RUDOLP

us of five or six yards from the door had been swept with a broom; while some kerosene-tins, containing garden-flowers, occupied the angle formed by the chimney

ough the gate, and he met me outside the hut; his hands washed, and his shirt-sleeves buttoned. He stood by, scarcely speaking, whilst I introduced myself, gave him his parcel and newspaper, and unsaddled my horses. Then

o my discourse on the mutability of things. By the time he had poured out my tea, he was a vanquished man. He filled a cup for himself, to keep me company, and guardedl

a little shorter, or a little wider, or not quite so wide. Or perhaps you wish the isthmus between your eyes a little higher or the ridge of the peninsula a little straighter, or the south cape a little more, or less, obtuse. Or possibly you wish that the front elevation (elevation is good) did not admit, through the natural grottoes above your moustache, so clear a perspect

e feature which will least bear tampering with. The upper half of his nose was represented by an irregular scar, running off toward the left eye, which was dull and opaque; the other was splendid, soft, and luminous. And as he sat in the full light of the lamp, wi

ion to a girl. It is well and widely known that this oversight, small as it looks, will free a man for life from any rude inquiry as to when he is going to burn off the scrub. Alf had no scrub to burn off, except a faint moustache, unnoticeable but for its dark colour. For the rest, he was slightly above medium height and by no means a good stamp of a man- taperin

, and curtained on the front. I rose and inspected the collection: fifty or sixty volumes altogether-poetry, drama, popular

ame in the country?" remarked the b

nickname or to the inexpensive, but lasting, gift of his god

hardly know one

of," I replied. "Have

ie Venne ' lying on to

nah More; now it's by Zola, and smutty enough at that; it has undergone about twenty intermediate metamo

n any good to read Zola," rema

wn tinct; but Holmes has only one phase, namely, pharisaism. Zola, even as we know him here in Riverina, has this advantage, that he gives you no rest for the sole of your foot-or rather, for the foot of your

ike Holmes's poe

d would be sorry to lose; but why did n't he write

is nature to denounce

. He has achieved the distinction of being the only American poet of note who blandly ignores Slavery, and takes part with the aristocrat, as against the lowly. The same spirit runs through all his writings. He has a range of about three notes: a flunkeyish koo-to

y, and wool the other; and it's mostly black, or maroon, or"--he stopped with a gasp. "Why don't yo

wenty feet high, with a fork at the top, through which ran a piece of clothes-line. I followed him to the door, discoursing on literature, whilst he attached one end of the clothes-line to the turkey's legs, hauled it up to the fork,

hing, dropped nght int

have anything wrong wi

at proved to be a small ant; then he went out to th

mmiseration, after we had sat in silence for a minute. "I could n't see to catch a horse; and it took m

Alf had lit a meek and lowly meerschaum, whilst a large grey cat had jumped on his knees, and settled itself for repose. "You asked me awhile ago whether I knew anyone

" asked the boundary ma

rri

ll him so, then?

last, I reached the Yellow Tank-about forty miles from here, isn't it? I left my saddle and things at the tank, and was taking

before?" murmure

tain

a marri

dow

, almost in a whisper.

ably dangerous women who sing men to destruction-one of those t

ha

ied good-humouredly. "More app

d, shrinking, defiant look, whilst drawing his seat a little further away. Ah! years of solitary life, with the haunting conscious

op-bush," I continued, "wi

e matter, A

his morning, tightening some nuts, when a bit of rust, or something, fell straight into my eye. Frightful pain; and it's affecting the other eye already; giving me a foretaste of hell. No doubt it's

id the boundary

e, so I whittled a bit of wood to a point, and essayed the task in which I cla

on the coloured part, which we term the iris-or, strictly speaking, on that part of the cornea

. I don't know what Alf thought of it at the time, but I considered it a lovely operation. When

e cause of his trouble wasn't a flake of rust, after all; but a small, barbed speck of clean iron, embedded in the white of the eye. I discovered something else. Alf's eyes are as blue as those of Zola's Nana; and in the iris of the affected one t

n's voice trembled as he spoke, and his splendid eye blazed with sudden resentment. But the fit passed

I replied. "He was cam

the junction of Avon

ary man. "But, of course, you can't tell. It's a foolis

autiful moonlight; and I replied, "Most likely I'll never see him again. These wool-tracks,

natic, swaying on his seat, whilst

ne four or five months' journey due north, in charge of three teams loaded with lares and penates and tools, and cooking utensils, and rations, and other things too numerou

pa?" asked the boundary man, pantin

o a Melbourne company, and is going to be worked for all it's worth. And I'm thinking of the carrier, coming down with the survivo

the hall, and the

was cleft by the

asked Alf, wit

s with Antony, 'tis one of those odd tri

ng of the Christian squatter, and so, no doubt

na when he delivers the loadin

ho

Alf Mo

o. I know he doe

table, and one hand, as usual, across the middle of his face, I noticed hi

ou sic

ttle," he

er-bag, and set it before

much of a talker myself, but I'm a good listener. Tell us some yarn to pass the time. Anything you l

he subject of an earlier chapter, whilst an occasional inquiry, or an apprec

time, having just got through five notes-three from Stewart, and two from Alf. I got a bob's worth of brandy to straighte

see Mr. Wentworth St. John Ffrench, Terrible Tommy's boss. Next morning, a wagonette came from Avondale, with a few parcels of eatables, and a few bottles of drinkables, and other sinful lusts of the fle

unharness the horses, and hobble them out where they could get a bite of grass. Altogether, Stewart stayed about half a day. In a few days more, Alf was able to yoke and unyoke a few quiet bullocks; then he and Bob started

sed to lig

as left Riverina for good?" as

t, innoffensive sundowner-nobody's enemy but his own-and experience has taught

" said the boundar

to a proper conclusion. I heard the rest of it from Stewart, on the occasion I speak of. Stewart has bought his plant, and engaged him permanently. His first business is to take Stewart's teams to their destination-no easy matter at this time of the year, and such a year as this; but if any man can do it, that man is Alf. He started some weeks ago, a little shaky after his sickness, but recovering fast. Entirely changed

a permanent thing for him?

I'm sorry to s

hy

Christian sleeps with his fathers, and his dirty-flash son reigns in his stead. Such, again, is life. But this won't affect Alf's interests to any ruinous extent. He has a stockingful of his own. It's a well-known fact that few carriers of Riverina cleared as much money as he did, and probably not one spe

light his empty pipe, his hands trembling, and his breath quickeni

hompson and Cunningham for duffing in your

out it," replied the bound

g about your hut that night like a guardian angel, while his twenty bullocks had their knife-bars going double-speed on your grass, and you s

e same paling of the lips I had noticed before; then he drank the remaining water out of the cup,

and, shoring up one of the posts with my shoulder, looked out

; when snow-laden branches break; when all ponderable bodies, of relatively slight restraint, are most apt to lose their hold. This may be definitely and satisfactorily accounted for by the mere operation of Newton's Law. At the time, and under the conditions, specified, the conjoined attraction of sun and moon-an attraction sufficient to sway mill

nd. When we can explain the nature of this force adherent to moonlight, and to no other light, we may inquire why, in all ages and in all lands, the verdict of experience points to moonlight as a factor in the production and aggravation of lunacy. An empirical hypothesis, of course; but in the better sense, as well as in the worse. For the perturbing influence of moonlight, if it be a myth, i

causes, and is therefore variously stated. The highest accepted ratio is 600,000 to 1.; the lowest 200,000 to 1. A constutional repugnance t

the floor with my back against the door-post, unbound the instrument from its square stick, and began to play. It is not the highest class of music, I am well aware; and this paragraph is dictated by no shallow

lf move uneasily on his bed; but, knowing the effect of music on my own mind, and remembering Moriarty's and Montgomery's independ

usic?" asked A

nd musician. As it is, I'm not much of a player, and still less of a vocalist; but I'll give yo

music?" interrupted Alf

s a jews-harp; and this is the very best I could find in the market. Humble as it looks, and humble as it undeniably is, it has sounded in every nook and corner of Riverina. Last time I took it ou

olin, if you like," exclaimed m

k-you

ark-brown violin. Then he turned down the lamp till a mere bead of flame showed above the burner

strument to the ear by pulsations of the atmosphere, or of some other intervening medium. Music is thus reduced to a series of definite vibrations, a certain number of which constitute a note. Each separate note has three distinct properties, or attributes. First, its intensity, or loudness, which is governed by the height, depth

r sense of hearing is susceptible, has been placed at 75 feet from node to node-or 15 vibrations per second. This total range of audibleness covers 12 octaves; running, of course, far above and far below the domain of music. The ex

of the spheres'-apt term for that celestial harmony of motion which guides the myriad orbs of the Universe in their career through Space. But, to take an illustration from the visual faculty: any sound beyond the highest limit of audibleness would resemble a surface lined so minutely and closely as to appear perfectly plain; whilst a sound too low in pitch to be heard would be represented by supe

rd with one produced by 120-each node of the former coinciding with each alternate node of the latter. 60 and 90 will also chord; 60 and 70 will produce discord; 60 and 65, worse discor

e better media than the atmosphere, for the transmission of sound. But sound may be transmitted without vibration of intervening sound-media. The electric current, passing alo

the complex machinery of music, and with about equal scientific knowledge of what they are doing. To the philosophic mind, however, they are not playing or singing; they are producing and controlling sound-vibrations, arbitrarily varied in duration and quality; a series of such pulsations constituting a note; a series of notes constituting an air.

word by word; and the verbal appeal, however imaginative or spiritual, comes in concrete form-that is, in the nature of information. Spoken words inform the emotional side of our nature, through th

iversal, it raises to highest daring, or suffuses with tenderness, to-day and here, as once on Argo's deck, or in the halls of Persepolis. Purely material in origin and analysis, easily explicable in mere physical operation, its influence is one of the things that are not dreamt of in the philosophy of Science. Why should a certain psychological effect ensue upon certain untranslatable sounds being placed in a given

blaze of ten thousand homes glutted his Imperial lust for spectacle. Divorce the unworthy song, stay the voluptuous dance, and the music suffers no clinging defilement; the redeemed melodies, stainless as fresh-fallen snow, may be wedded to songs of gallant aspir

t Hebrew brow crowned in Jehovah's despite-the story of the mighty prophet Elisha, fettered to earth by wrath and scorn till, at his own command, the music swelled, and his enfranchised spirit rose on its viewless wings

e dark with shade of evergreen trees, and cool with ripple of never-failing streams-yet is the universal art so intertwined with ideal bliss that no heaven of conscious enjoyment has been pictured by belated humanity but music rings for ever there. For alas! what else of mundane achievement can fancy conceive as reproduced in regi

ed a certain artificiality which, in the judgment of the uninitiated, generally accompanies musical skill. His was no triumphant mastery of a complicated and perplexing score; he was a sympathetic interpreter, a life-breathing, magic-lending exponent of his composer's revelations, now his own. Solitary practice, with no one but himself to

u,' or words to similar effect. Alf at last grew tired of my non-committal remarks and replies, and, with a tact which impressed me more afterward than at the time, named each tune before and after playing it. For instance, the yearning tenderness of an exquisitely rendered air would seem to bring back some lost consciousness of an earlier and happier existence, suffusing my whole being with a pens

n across his knees, and, after a pause, his voice rose in one of the sweetest songs ever woven from words. And such a voice!-rich, soft, transcendent, yet suggesting ungauged resources of enchantment unconsciously held in re

s sel' wear

a-comin' f

hat's aye

and o' t

eens are

been left a

a' mee

and o' t

, and leave him to rest with his forgiving Saviour," murmured the boundary man, laying his violin on the table, whil

beautiful songs in th

author. The song was

not for men to write

she had a good dea

d Alf sadly, and then added, with sudden interest, "But what difference do you

n grace. This is not strange, for grace is, after all, a display of force, an aspect of strength. But in the quality of sincerity, woman is a good first. Take

never married,"

ength and the writers have adopted the same iambic octo-syllable, with alternate rhymes. Now, my ancestor's poem is not excelled in grace by anything within the range of our literature; but there's nothing els

of a spontaneous school," replied Alf, with the contradictive impulse which amusingly accompanied his teachableness. "

u'll find the distinction I've pointed-out hold good in a greater or less degree throughout literature; you'll find examples by the thousand, and o

nt on, with a certain constraint in his voice; the constraint we are apt to feel when forced to plump out the word 'love,' in its narrower sense-"When women love, they don't know why they love; they just love because they do-so they say, and we're bound to believe them. But when we love women, why do we love them? Being more logical, we ou

my finding. When I'm allowed to work-out these things in my own circuitous way-which is seldom the case-there are few questions in moral or psychological philoso

'll sing the songs as they come to m

nes as an assumed name, Nomenology would be at fault here; yet knowing already, by a kind of incommunicable intuition, that he was a Sydney-sider, and had been in some way connected with the drapery-business, I expected to have my knowledge s

d, unfortunately); and some salient experience, some fire-graven thought, some clinging hope, is the plectrum which strikes the passive chords. An old t

ational inspiration; no broad human sympathies; no echo of the oppressed ones' cry; no stern challenge of wrong; only a hopeless, undying love, and an unspeakable self-pity. He wasn't even a lyre; he was a pipe for Fortune's finger to sound wh

she? th

away-'She is far from the Land where Her Young Hero Sleeps.' Then the boundary rider lit his pipe, and slightly mov

, seeing that you're gifted as you are? Maestros, and highclass critics, and other unwholesomely cultured people, might possibly sit on you, or damn you with faint praise; but you could afford to take chance of that, for beyond all doubt, the million would idolise you. I'm not looking at th

only for the disfigurement of my f

ed German students value scars on the face more than academic honours. Believe me, Alf, while a man merely conducts himself as a man, his scars need n't cost him a thought; but if he's an artist, as you are, what might otherwise be a disfigurement becomes the highest claim to respect and

two sobbed like a child. It was dreadful to see him. He was worse than Ida, in an argument with Mrs. Bea

h a low, pathetic whine, following him. Perceiving that he was off again, I turned

not wel

his dog, crouched at the bedside, was silently licking the brown fingers. Then my eye happened to fall on th

how to apologise for kee

lf-past

. Alf had risen, and rolled his blankets back off the bed. He now took out the m

d I. "One characteristic of childhood I still ret

you sleep in this hu

He handed me hi

I'll chain Pup to the fence. He likes to go in and out at his own

open to-night

permit. Sleeping with your clothes on is slovenly; sleeping with your spurs

ues, each of which must be followed out to its re-intersection with the main line of argument, if we wish to leave our conclusion unassailable at any point. The question

and this ideal is not absolute; it is elastic in respect of races and civilisations, though each type may be regarded as more or less rigid within its own domain. Passing over such racial ideals as the Hottentot Venus,

assic Greece-directly, or through Rome-we naturally accepted the ideal of beauty then and there current. Attila or Abderrahman might have deflected the European standard of beauty into a widely different ideal, but it was not to be. And we're too prone to accept our classic ideal as being identified with civilisation and refinement. We should remember that the flat features of the C

?" asked Alf, gentl

, and his primary one to teach us habits of industry, so the secondary use of the hen is to lay eggs, and her primary one to teach us proper hours. But, unfortunately, we don't avail ourselves of the les

and again, until, actuated by compassion rather than curiosity, I crept to the door, and looked out. Six or eight yards away, Alf was kneeling a

and half-resentful in the presence of a distress which seemed proof against palliative, let alone antidote. At length the moon disappeared; then the boundary man's forehead sank on his arms, a calm came over him, and I knew that

lf, with a short veil of crape concealing the middle of his face, was frying cho

till attached to the loosened rope, were all that remained of the turkey. Probably he had stood on his hind-feet, scratching at the rope, till the hitch, hurriedly secured in the first place,

for years," he remarke

many kangaro

h; and when the rain comes, the dirt sticks between his toes, and annoys him. Windy weather is bad for him, too; and frost puts a set on him altogether. Then he's always swarming with fleas, and in addition to that, the flies have a particular fancy for him. And, seeing that one half of the population is always plotting to steal him, an

Alf. And he related some marvellous stories of the animal's sa

n naturally drifted to horses, until about ten o'clock, when we stopped at

e gate. "You'll strike the track in six miles. Can I do anything for y

you'll be so good. When

ed. "I'm not going

m Bunyip's pack; and this

Track, l

r J

galoot had stolen from you, you displayed a creditable acuteness, combined with a still more

how the p

iven, nor le

ke

the saddle is honestly worth about twice that amount, my conscience now acquits me in the matter; moreover, my official salary is so judiciously proportioned to my frugal req

a manner o

S COL

id the boundary man, with amusing solemnity, as

damper at this work; for no man's ability is comprehensive enough to cover musical proficiency such as yours, and leave the narrowest flap available for anything else. I can see through you like glass. I could write your biography. And, believ

he crape mask I saw his lips move, as he

perspective of the line of fence. There was something impressive in the recollection that, during the whole of our companio