From Chart House To Bush Hut Part 5

CHAPTER VIII.

I START AS A LANDHOLDER.

I went straight to the Land Commissioner in Cairns, and entered his office waving a map. "Look here, sir," says I, "I want 48. How do I get it?"

He laughed. Having got over the shock of my unceremonious entrance, he seemed inclined to enjoy me, setting to work to draw me out, not a hard task in those enthusiastic days. Toil, and long, close acquaintance with Cow, have soured me these times. He asked me what I intended doing with the land, and I at once plunged into a stream of talk which kept his eyes twinkling, and sent his hand to his mouth now and then.

"All right, Mr. Senex," he said at last. "There's n.o.body in for that block, so you won't have to ballot. I'll wire to Brisbane to-day. Come in again first thing to-morrow."

I paid my 5 deposit, thanked him, and withdrew. Next morning, bright and early, I was back, and shortly afterwards the return wire arrived from Brisbane that 48 was allotted to me. With a mind at ease, I spent the day wandering round town, got a skiff and pulled up the Inlet, and otherwise enjoyed myself in my own way. A night spent in slapping myself and swearing at the mosquitoes, then breakfast, the Atherton train again, and so back to what I was beginning to regard as home.

I stopped overnight at the pub and made arrangements for my mult.i.tudinous baggage to go out by six-horse buckboard next day. What a load of useless gear I had, to be sure! It cost me about 8 first and last to bring the stuff up from Newcastle, and not half of it was any good. Next day it took us half an hour to load it all up, including a dozen ten-foot sheets of iron for a house sometime by and bye.

I enjoyed the trip in the forest country, but when we hit the scrub--oh, Lord! The panting prads dragged us up innumerable hills, and slid on their haunches down the succeeding pinch, with the buckboard skidding from side to side of the road after them. On the infrequent levels we went at a slow walk, half-way to the axles in sticky mud, numberless roots and half-submerged stumps, jarring and b.u.mping, occasionally tilting our vehicle at an uncomfortable angle. Heavy going, all right!

We reached Braun's just before dark--it seemed to be at the end of the world after our journey--and found O'Gorman and a mate there, who were to commence falling scrub on the former's place next day. The stranger was introduced to me as Len Vincent, a fine young fellow about twenty years of age, tall, slimly built, active; all wire and whipcord; curly black hair, thoughtful, dark brown eyes, and a full direct glance. An attractive young fellow and an excellent specimen of young Australia.

The two of them had cleaned out the old shack, and, with a roaring fire going, billies boiling, whips of tucker, and a fine bright young moon silvering the clearing outside, the place looked cheerful--even comfortable; and I felt the old romantic feeling return in full force as we sat yarning and smoking round the comfortable blaze after tea. The night was just chilly enough to make the fire acceptable. The dense walls of heavy timber close at hand, the light breeze rustling through the treetops; the sound of the brawling creek, with its legions of croaking frogs; the call of a pair of mopokes, which sounded anything but dismal to me, and the wailing note of some other unknown night-bird in the depths of the scrub--all combined to make up a picture very strange and enchanting to me, who had been used to nothing but sea and sky for thirteen years. I had actually had only about four months ash.o.r.e, in spells of a few days at a time, in all that period.

We were just thinking of turning in, when I nearly jumped out of my skin at a sudden grating, ear-splitting screech right overhead--to be repeated a moment later at the end of the clearing.

"What the devil's that?" I asked.

"Oh," said Len, "it's only an ol' fig-'awk. Bird, you know."

Which rea.s.sured me. But it sounded like a mad woman being tortured. I lay some time looking at the flickering firelight, and finally drifted off to sleep. About five minutes later I was roused by a clattering of plates, and, looking drowsily round, saw the fire blazing up, my two friends dressed and busy cooking. The buckboard driver was still snoring over in his corner.

"Hullo, chaps," said I, with some hazy idea that supper was on. "Aren't you turning-in to-night?"

"Turn in!" laughed Terry. "Why, it's 5.30. Time to turn out."

I jumped up. "Cripes! I thought I'd only been asleep five minutes."

Breakfast of cold salt beef, pickles, bacon, "puftaloons" (a species of fried scone), and unlimited tea was despatched with gusto, and the chorus of birds then warning us of impending daylight, off we set.

Those birds! I wonder now if there is any other country on earth with such a truly cheerful lot. First is the chowchilla--thousands of him in the scrub--with a rich musical note something like water dropping rapidly down a deep well--"Plop! ... plop! ... perloplop." He starts in the dark. Pewee is next; then the jacka.s.s heartily laughs the sleep out of his eyes, closely followed by the sweet-toned magpie. Presently another bird says "Gitterwoork!" in a tone of good-humoured reproach; don't know what his proper name is. We always call him the get-to-work bird. Finally the big pigeons, with their deep cooing notes, join in, and for an hour or more this choir keeps its chorus going, to greet the sun as he slowly rises. There isn't a note in it that isn't cheerful, but as the district opens up, and the idiot with the gun gets his fine work in, I suppose most of them will depart. I have actually seen fools shooting ibises, on suspicion of their eating fruit and corn and distributing weeds, no less! not having the sense to see that the bird's long thin curved beak is incapable of negotiating anything but caterpillars, slugs and such-like. The old Egyptians knew how many beans made five when they declared this bird sacred, with the death penalty for killing one. Pity we didn't have some such law now to check the a.s.s with the yard of gas-pipe.

We three, leaving the buckboard bloke putting his horses in, went across the clearing and through my scrub to Terry's place, getting soaked to the waist en route in the dew-laden gra.s.s. It was broad daylight by this time, and Terry was soon swinging "Douglas" (pet name for axe), and, on Len's introducing me to a brush-hook, we got to work on the undergrowth.

I don't know what malign imp presides over the brus.h.i.+ng department, but no matter where or how you hit anything it invariably falls on top of you, and every d.a.m.n thing has spikes on it. Well, the hooks were sharp, work went with a swing, a fresh breeze fanned our heated faces, and when Terry had the billy boiling at noon, his cheery shout of "She's off, boys!" ringing out through the trees, I ate the salt beef and damper, and jam and damper, with an appet.i.te I hadn't enjoyed for years.

A short spell, then work again, and by the time the setting sun said "knock-off," Len and I had chewed through a couple of acres, and Terry's splintery array of stumps showed that he hadn't been idle. Back to the barn, we rebuilt the fire, shook out our blankets to see no snakes were camped in them, had tea, yarned and smoked a bit, and, my heavy eyelids being quite incapable of being kept up longer, we tumbled into our "naps," and by nine o'clock were enjoying the untroubled sleep of healthily tired manhood.

CHAPTER IX.

CAMP LIFE.

Next day we all set to on my place. I solemnly allowed Terry the honour of cutting the first lawyer-bush on it. We found it fairly easy going, and, after getting a start, I kept on with the brus.h.i.+ng, while the other two commenced falling. They bogged in to such good purpose that I had hard work to keep ahead of them, and by sun-down there was pretty well an acre brushed and felled, and my heart swelled as I looked at it with a feeling of achievement. I really had made a start!

After this my two mates went on working on Terry's place and I on mine, being now fairly well qualified to use a brush-hook; we met at meals, and of course at night. I would be working away, not doing too bad, but thinking I was doing double it, when I'd hear Terry's jovial yell, "She's off, boys; she's off!"

Then away I would go twenty chains or so to where they were working, to find them just making a start. There's an attractive sort of picnicky atmosphere about these al-fresco repasts in the bush. There is the fire in front of us, to be carefully stamped out afterwards; the sooty billy full of tea, with a palatable little tang of wood smoke in it, stands near-by. We, each seated on a bit of bag, or our hat, lean comfortably against the spurs of the handiest tree, the overhanging dense foliage making pleasant shade. In front the fresh-fallen scrub sends forth its characteristic pleasant, sweetish smell. If you are on the side of a hill, you catch a glimpse, over your falling, of miles of rolling scrub--a tangle of all shades of green--with perhaps the blue hills in the far background. We have been working hard, and have appet.i.tes that many "townies," having forgotten what it is like to be naturally, healthily hungry, refer to as savage or voracious. Our digestions might be worth a million dollars to the dyspeptic Rockefeller. Ergo, our beef and damper are food of the G.o.ds, and the black billy tea is pure nectar.

Presently the vacuums (abhorred alike by man and nature) being comfortably filled, we lay back and lazily smoke for a few minutes, watching the white Trade clouds sail majestically overhead. The snoring breeze fans our faces refres.h.i.+ngly; there are no mosquitoes in this favoured place to worry us; it is good to be alive. Then turn to again with a will, slog away till dusk, and so home to the old barn. If you feel like it, run down to the little flat on the creek, where Braun made a garden long ago, and various vegetables are running wild, holding their own with the weeds in this generous climate. We can always get a pumpkin, cuc.u.mber, or some chokoes and beans. Then tea, yarn and smoke, perhaps a game of crib; turn in, read a bit, if not too tired; lights out, and a chorus of snores till morning.

This is in fine weather, like that first week I spent at the barn. When wet, like the succeeding month, well--that's a cow of another colour entirely. You go out grumbling, get wet through almost at once, and have to tramp back home for lunch. You spend half your time picking dozens of bloated leeches off yourself. Every rotten log you touch leaves a legacy of microscopic scrub-itch parasites on you, which drive you nearly frantic at night, until you bathe yourself in kerosene. The sky is a uniform sheet of grey; the trees become a dismal sage-green, half-hidden by the grey rain squalls drifting across the clearing. A dank weeping fog settles down 'tween squalls, which drifts in and wets everything.

You are wet through, your pants cling coldly and stiffly, like canvas, and all is misery. Home at night, and the wood is damp and burns badly, emitting volumes of stinging smoke, which an erratic breeze blows back in clouds into the main room--to hang about in clouds impossible to dissipate. Your "nap" is clammy and uninviting. Everything feels sticky, as if wet sugar had touched it, and your best boots get covered with a green moss. But it's an ill wind, etc., and the neighbouring cow c.o.c.kies screech with joy to see the gra.s.s grow an inch a day, as it can do up here, while their collective Strawberry likens herself unto a barrel of generous proportions, and her udder swells beyond the (c.o.c.ky's) dreams of avarice.

Frogs are a bit of a nuisance sometimes. They have a habit of coming into the camp o' nights, and often you wake with a start as something clammy and cold comes plop on your face or chest. Going out at night with a hurricane lamp, you tread on dozens. You can always tell when you tread on a frog. He goes "pop," like a cork coming out of a bottle.

There are countless millions of them, all sizes and colours, from the great black fellow as big as your boot down to the beautiful little light green tree-frog, about the size of the top joint of your little finger. He's a handsome little chap, with two narrow myrtle-green stripes down the back, red gold s.h.i.+ning eyes, and queer little spatulated fingers and toes.

We took it in turns to be cook of the mess, and a h.e.l.l of a mess I did cook up, my first attempt at damper. However, I got into the way of it, and was soon a fair cook, even rising to the height of boiled puddings occasionally. Sat.u.r.days were was.h.i.+ng days, and the three of us would knock off at dinner time, go down to the clear rus.h.i.+ng creek, strip, have a "bogie," and wash the discarded change before donning the clean duds. Afterwards one of us would tramp two miles or so to where the storekeeper's cart came out, for the week's tucker. Sometimes he didn't come, and that meant a weary tramp of ten miles into the towns.h.i.+p, and a still wearier tramp back again, with perhaps a thirty-pound load slung on your shoulders, arriving back after dark, utterly deadbeat, covered in mud from various and frequent falls. Queer how soon one learns to pick up a track. I used to wonder at first how blokes found their way round in day-time in the scrub; yet in three weeks or so behold your humble servant cautiously picking his way along a pad in the scrub at night, and getting through all right. It's a fool's game though in the dark, for if an old man carpet snake happens to be in your road, and you step on him, well--you'll get hurt!

I had a narrow squeak once. It was pitch dark, and I had just crawled through a slip-rail, making for a pad to Braun's, when I brought up all standing, with my outstretched hands on a horse's rump. Braun had come out on a visit to his place, and it was his frisky young colt that had poked his way through the scrub trying to get back. If that happened a hundred times, in ninety-nine the bloke would be kicked to death before he could say "knife." I was the lucky one.

[Ill.u.s.tration: I had some 20 acres brushed, and two or three felled.]

I went on working for about six weeks, by which time I had some twenty acres brushed and two or three felled--not so bad for a new hand. Then one day I had a good long think over my affairs. It was mid-May, and my licence to occupy would not be issued before September. Until I had that doc.u.ment I would not be able to borrow from the Agricultural Bank, and my slender resources were reduced to about 20. Right here I made one of the biggest mistakes in my life. I ought to have stayed on, working away and cutting expenses (one could live very comfortably on ten s.h.i.+llings a week those times); then in July gone down to the sugar mills below the range in the Mulgrave Valley, coming back at the end of the year to burn off, with a good cheque in my pocket, never being more than twenty miles away. Instead of that, I came to the decision to go South and get away to sea again for six months or so. Unfortunately, I didn't know anything about the Mills, and didn't like to palm myself off as an expert mill hand. I thought even the "rat-gangers" had to be skilled men. Afterwards I was one of a rat-gang myself for a while, and found one only had to be expert at "dodging Pompey." However, I had to learn by experience, so I let a contract to young Len to fall what I had brushed at thirty-five s.h.i.+llings an acre, paid him 16 in advance as _bona fides_, and the end of May found me in Townsville, dead broke, wondering if I'd have to tramp the way down to Newcastle, and how the devil I was to earn the cash to pay Len for the balance of my falling.

CHAPTER X.

COLONIAL EXPERIENCE.

It was the first time in my life I had been "stoney," and I didn't like it a little bit--especially in Townsville, where there was so little doing at that time. I went down to the wharf, with some hazy idea of being able to stow away aboard one of the boats. Walking along pretty disconsolately, I came on a Liverpool tramp just completing discharging.

"Ten to one," thought I, "she's bound for Newcastle. If only--well, here goes. They can only chuck me ash.o.r.e." So I went aboard, saw the mate, and explained my position. He was kindness itself.

"Wait till I see the old man," he said. A few minutes' wait, then, "Come along. Skipper wants to see you."

I went up with him, and found the "old man" in the chart-house. A stoutish, good-natured man, with pince-nez and a black spade beard.

"Ah! good day, Mr.--er--thank you!--Senex. Have you your papers? Let me see them please." A short investigation; then to the mate, "All right, Mr. Andrews, make your own arrangements."

"Thanks, sir," said he. Then to me, as the skipper nodded and we left the chart-house: "Good enough, old chap. You'll take the settee in my room till we hit Newcastle. Run up town for your duds. We're sailing just after lunch."

I wrung his hand. Talk about thankful! I didn't waste much time up town, and got back aboard inside the hour. She was a happy s.h.i.+p, as is always the case when the skipper is a decent sort, and it was quite a holiday trip. Always having been a good hand with palm and needle, I managed to make myself useful during the pa.s.sage. Arrived in Newcastle, I ceased to be a gentleman of leisure, and started that soul-wearying business--looking for a job. Nothing doing! So I borrowed a few pounds from the s.h.i.+p's tailor (I found now the advantage of always having dealt square when I was mate before) and went down to Sydney. Same thing there.

Oh! those weary, weary days, tramping round and trying to keep my appearance sufficiently smart. I always hated towns in general, and from that time loathed Sydney in particular, as being a.s.sociated with my period of submersion. From sneaking furtively into sixpenny hash-joints I got to going in brazenly, and the day I spent my last sixpence I plumbed the depths by pocketing some slabs of bread off the table. I think I ought to say here that I was surprised at the quality and quant.i.ty of the grub these places dispense. Don't know how they do it at the price. I'll bet there's any amount of men bless them--as I did--when down on one's luck.