Part 37 (1/2)

ma feyther afore me Syne, A hae been a' ip an' doon Ayrsheer, frae yin fair till anither wi' nowte Brawly dae A ken Mossgeil, an' Mauchline, an' Loughlea, an' the auld Brig o' Doon, firbye a wheen ither spotes ye 'se aiblins hear tell o'”

”Ye'll hae seen Alloway Kirk?” I conjectured

”Seen't! ay,” he replied nificently ”A thocht naethin' o”t!”

”Ye what?” I retorted, in the mere wantonness of power ”Ye hae seen yon auld hauntet kirk, whaur witches an' warlocks Hang an' loupit, an'

Auld Nick hiart them skirl, till roof an' rafters a' did dirl! ye hae keekit intil yon eerie auld ruin!--an' syne ye daunert awa', an' thocht naethin' o' 't! Be ma saul, Bobbie Birns didna' think naethin' o' 't! Heh!”

To the table Hesled to his face showed that the Irresistible had scored again

But one of the most unpleasant experiences I can now recall tofellow-mortal to his soda-bread and cold mutton, while I smiled, and smiled, and was a Scotche we all carry, made me feel as mean as a liveried servant; and when To, and sat with his elbow on the table and his face reverently veiled by his hand, whilst I wove a protracted and incoherent grace from the Lowland vocabulary, I seemed to sink to the level of a prince's equerry In fact, I would alo through such an ordeal again

My truthfulness--perhaps the only quality in which I attain an insulting pre-eed to the limit of endurance as I looked forward to the inevitable detection, soon or late, of the i and developing like a snake-lie, or an election squabble

However, I contentedthe rest to Tommy It transpired that he had been four months in his present situation, and only nine in the country altogether

He had got eed only for six ht be baptised into the billet, to the pero Bill

For menial employment on Avondale was like membershi+p in a Church, only that, to the carnal mind, there was reater ceremony, and the possibility of expulsion was kept further in the background Once adht turn out a white sheep or a black one; but he was still a sheep, whilst all outside the fold, white or black, as the case oats This iven To of an unbaptised believer, provisionally adave o Bill, sitting on the sa afterward narrated the episode fully

Two years before the date of this record, Bendigo Bill's old at Mount Brown As tiht of northward-bound drays and pack-horses revived the old lunacy in its ave formal notice of his intention to leave the station, and push his fortune on the diggings His resignation was in due course forwarded to Captain Royce; whereupon that potentate sent him a peremptory order to mind his paddock, and not make an infernal exhibition of himself

The demon quaked and collapsed for the time, and Bill, in his proper person, acquiesced with the humility customarily manifested by Avondale people when Captain Royce was conducting the other side of the argument

But the evil spirit was scotched, not killed; and Bill beca on old ti hione to Mount Brown, he could have told by the lay of the country, unerringly, and at the first glance, where the gold was

Things being in this posture, there reached Avondale, in the winter of '83, a vague, intangible bruit of so to hit it on Mount Brown; and, shortly afterward, Bill, in a vision of the night, found hiround for a free, lively, six-inch wash, running soh, shotty, water-worn gold

Next night the dream was repeated, but with this addition, that the drea out of a sort of pocket in the pipeclay a flat, daet that he could hardly lift

The third night found the ground richer than ever; but Bill, knowing it to be a dreaht get under such conditions, very wisely contented hi accurate observations of his landain when he saw it by daylight Whilst so engaged, his attention was attracted by two emus, which resolved theee--the latter being an old mate of his own, accidentally killed on the Jim Crow, about fifteen years before This made the assurance of the thrice-repeated dreas a person can dreaood as an old boot thrown by that awesoeeoverslop in all directions--Mick having been, in the days of his vanity, a ht luck with hiround

So Bill wiped fro except the picture of a place where two gullies met, after the fashi+on of a Y, and fores broken here and there by the outcrop of a hungry white quartz His dreae that the surrounding country had been prospected for a few floaters, and the creek, lower down, rooted-up for bare tucker, while this little spur of s of the Y, reain Bill, eht froer; this ti-cart fro his oo horses Then came Captain Royce's ukase, to the effect that no ed and homeless, with the story in hison Avondale for ten years Therefore, Bill's notice was passed over with the conte ranted; and the er was instructed to eer who presented hiiven to understand that he was only in the loosest sense of the word an Avondale eh, he should be reinstated, and all would be forgiven; if he failed to return, such default would be taken as evidence of contumacy; excommunication would promptly follow, and the station would thereby be acquitted of all responsibility touching any destitute old bu the country with the yarn that he had been boundary riding on Avondale for ten years Captain Royce could be stern enough when he let hi thus partly fulfilled, Bill clutched at a release in any form; and it happened that, simultaneously with the arrival of Captain Royce'sand hison the Yanko The us Cochrane, plumped Tom into the vacancy, and supplied him with a couple of old station horses Bill re Toer slacked-off, and Bill harnessed his horse and fled northward--not because he disliked Avondale, but because he liked it so well that he was impatient to make Captain Royce such a bid for the property as that nabob could n't think of refusing, with any hope of luck afterward

OnAlf's bullocks, Tonuhts before, and had nextfound twenty bullocks and a bay horse on the Avondale side of the fence He knew that the Chow had passed them on to him to save trouble, so he i, his neighbour had re-delivered the, To Asiatic had the, Tom did what he should have done at first--put them across the river on to the station fro adventures of the bullocks you already know

Tos, the boundarythe say of his race His title, after all, was no more quizzical in its application than that of Ivan the Terrible; and to understand how nasty a station vassal can so the manners none and customs beastly of the time and place wherein our scene is laid

And, to h Tom had never met Alf personally, the unfortunate outlaas his Doctor Fell too And the very spirit of Leviticus breathed in his tone as he inforit tae yon ill-hairtet raff, he wad hae whummelt the syne, an' no fashi+t hi but extreme caution would do here The brutal truth of my unwarranted solicitude for the sick ht spoil all So, in a feell-chosen words, I informed Tom that there was a trifle between Alf and me; and he was sick, just when I wanted to keep him on his feet for a while Would Tom (and my patois became so hideously homely that, for the reader's sake, I have to paraphrase it)--would Tom, as a personal favour to , for a few days, and in the meantime keep his bullocks safe?

No answer The silken bond of our nationality would n't stand such a strain

Then I slowly drew out h of a thrifty man, handed my compatriot one of the four one-pound notes which excluded , half-sullenly, that he could n't be expected to take all this trouble for nothing; and though I was a poor ain And, considering that a bullock driver often has it in his power to do a good turn for a boundary ested, for Tom to do all this on his own account, without a whisper concerning my interposition?

I had known better than to make such a proposition to Sollicker

That impracticable animal--ould have uncovered his head to receive backsheesh, as backsheesh, froentle; and woe to Alf's bullocks if he had caught theain! But I was n't surprised to find my modus vivendi accepted by this passive product of a social code fabricated and co of Thrift, frankly teaches the poor to grind each other without scruple, whilst religiously avoiding all inquiry into the clai of the fat pig a work holy unto the Lord

The keen selfishness of my proposal touched a kindred chord in poor To ofa mackerel after many days, awoke his ade to hih it all

Yet, under this crust of clannishness, cunning, and er, there lay a fine manhood I saw the latter come to the surface a few months afterward But that is another episode; and I must confine myself to the case before the Court