CHAPTER V SQUATTLESEA MERE

Pride and successful ambition swelled my breast on that first morning as I looked round on my run. My run! my own station! How fine a sound it had, and how fine a thing it was that I should have the sole occupancy—almost ownership—of about 50,000 acres of "wood and wold," mere and marshland, hill and dale. It was all my own—after a fashion—that is, I had but to receive my squatting license, under the hand of the Governor of the Australias, for which I paid ten pounds, and no white man could in any way disturb, harass, or dispossess me. I have that first license yet, signed by Sir Charles Fitzroy, the Governor-General. It was a valuable document in good earnest, and many latter-day pastoralists with a "Thursday to Thursday" tenure would be truly glad to have such another. There were no free-selectors in those days. No one could buy land except at auction when once the special surveys had been abrogated. There were no travelling reserves, or water reserves, or gold-fields, or mineral licenses, or miners' rights, or any of the new-fangled contrivances for letting the same land to half a dozen people at one and the same time.

There was nothing which some people would consider to be romantic or picturesque in the scenery on which I gazed. But the "light which never was on sea or shore" was there, to shed a celestial glory over the untilled, unfenced, half-unknown waste. Westward stretched the great marshes, through which the Eumeralla flowed, if, indeed, that partially subterranean stream could be said to run or flow anywhere. Northward lay the lava-bestrewn country known as the Mount Eeles rocks, a mass of cooled and cracked lava now matted with a high thick sward of kangaroo grass, but so rough and sharp were the piles and plateaux of scoria that it was dangerous to ride a horse over it. For years after we preferred to work it on foot with the aid of dogs.

On the south lay open slopes and low hills, with flats between. On these last grew the beautiful umbrageous blackwood, or native hickory, one of the handsomest trees in Australia. At the back were again large marshes, with heathy flats and more thickly-timbered forests. Over all was a wonderful sward of grass, luxuriant and green at the time I speak of, and quite sufficient, as I thought, for the sustenance of two or three thousand head of mixed cattle.

There were no great elevations to be seen. It was one of the "low countries" in a literal sense. The only hill in view was that of Mount Eeles, which we could see rising amid the lava levels a few miles to the north-west. The marshes were for the most part free from timber. But a curious formation of "islands," as the stock-rider called them, prevailed, which tended much to the variety and beauty of the landscape.

These were isolated areas, of from ten to one hundred acres, raised slightly above the ordinary winter level of the marshes. The soil on these "islands" was exceptionally good, and, from the fact of their being timbered like the ordinary mainland, they afforded an effective contrast to the miles of water or waving reeds of which the marshes consisted. They served admirably also for cattle camps. To them the cattle always retired at noonday in summer, and at night in winter and spring-time. One "island," not very far from our settlement, was known as "Kennedy's island," the gallant ill-fated explorer who had surveyed a road to the town of Portland some years before my arrival having made his camp there. How far he was to wander from the pleasant green west country, only to die by the spear of a crouching savage, within sight of the ship that had been sent to bring him safely home after his weary desert trail!

We didn't know anything of the nature of dry country in those days. All the land I looked upon was deep-swarded, thickly-verdured as an English meadow. Wild duck swam about in the pools and meres of the wide misty fen, with its brakes of tall reeds and "marish-marigolds"—"the sword-grass and the oat-grass and the bulrush by the pool." Overhead long strings of wild swan clanged and swayed. There were wild beasts (kangaroo and dingoes), Indians (blacks, whose fires in "The Rocks" we could see), a pathless waste, and absolute freedom and independence. These last were the most precious possessions of all. No engagements, no office work, no fixed hours, no sums or lessons of any kind or sort. I felt as if this splendid Robinson Crusoe kind of life was too good to be true. Who was I that I should have had this grand inheritance of happiness immeasurable made over to me? What a splendid world it was, to be sure! Why did people ever repine or complain? I should have made short work of Mr. Mallock, and have settled the argument "Is life worth living?" had it then arisen between us, with more haste than logic. Action, however, must in colonisation never fail to accompany contemplation. To which end I returned to our camp, just in time to partake of the simple, but appetising, meal which Mrs. Burge had prepared for us.

Cold corned beef, hot tea, and a famous fresh damper, the crust of which I still hold to be better than any other species of bread whatever, when accompanied, as in the case referred to, with good, sweet, fresh butter. How splendid one's appetite was after hours spent in the fresh morning air. How complete the satisfaction when it all came to an end.

Then commenced a council of war, in which Joe Burge was a leading spokesman. "Old Tom can look after the cattle. Mr. Cunningham and I will go and fell a tree. I know one handy that'll run out nigh on a hundred slabs, and if you'll bring up the bullocks and dray to the stump, sir, to-night, we'll have a load of slabs ready to take home."

What was the next thing that was necessary to be done?

To build a house.

At present we were living under a dray. Now, a dray is not so bad a covering at night, when extremely sleepy and tired, but in daylight it is valueless. And if it rains—and in the west it often did, and I am informed does still, though not so hard as it did then—the want of a permanent shelter makes itself felt.

The walls of a sod hut were indeed already up. Clean-cut black cubes, rather larger than bricks, when new and moist, make a neat, solid wall. In little more than a day we had a thatched roof completed, so that we were able to have our evening meal in comfort, and even luxury. A couple of fixed bedsteads were placed at opposite corners, in which Mr. Cunningham and I arranged our bedding. Joe Burge and his wife still slept under the "body" of the dray, while Old Tom had a separate section allotted to him under the pole.

But the "hut," of split slabs, with wall-plate top and bottom, and all the refinements of bush carpentry, was to be the real mansion. And at this we soon made a commencement. I say we, because I drove the bullocks and carted the slabs to the site we had pitched on, besides doing a bit of squaring and adzing now and then.

Joe Burge and Mr. Cunningham (who was an experienced bushman, and half a dozen other things to boot) soon "ran out" slabs enough, and fitted the round stuff, most of which I carted in, preferring that section of industry to the all-day, every-day work of splitting. Old Tom looked after the cattle. They needed all his attention for a while, displaying, as they did, a strong desire to march incontinently back to the banks of the Merai.

In two or three weeks the hut was up. How I admired it! The door, the table, the bedsteads, the chairs (three-legged stools), the washstand, were all manufactured by Joe Burge out of the all-sufficing "slab" of the period. A wooden chimney with an inner coating of stone-work worked well without smoking. The roof was neatly thatched with the tall, strong tussock-grass, then so abundant.

Our dwelling transcended that of the lowland Scot, who described his as "a lairge hoose wi' twa rooms intil't," inasmuch as it boasted of three. One was the atrium—being also used as a refectory—and chief general apartment. The rest of the building was bisected by a wooden partition, affording thus two bedrooms. One of these was devoted to Joe Burge and family, the other I appropriated. Mr. Cunningham and Old Tom slept in the large room, where—firewood being plentiful—they kept up a roaring fire, and had rather the best of it in the cold nights which then commenced to visit us.

Excepting a stock-yard, there now remained next to nothing to do, and being rather overmanned for so small a station, Mr. Cunningham, with my free consent, elected to take service with the Dunmore firm, with whom he remained for some years after. I had now attained the acme of worldly felicity. I had always longed to have a station of my own. Now I had one. I had daily work of the kind that exactly suited me. I went over to Dunmore and spent a pleasant evening every now and then, rubbing up my classics and having a little "good talk." I had a few books which I had brought up with me in the dray—Byron, Scott, Shakespeare (there was no Macaulay in those days), with half a score of other authors, in whom there was pabulum mentis for a year or two. I had, besides, the run of the Dunmore library—no mean collection.

So I had work, recreation, companionship, and intellectual occupation provided for me in abundant and wholesome proportion. What else could cast a shadow over my prosperous present and promising future? Well, there was one factor in the sum which I had not reckoned with. "The Amalekite was then in the land," and with the untamed, untutored pre-Adamite it appeared that I was fated to have trouble.

The aboriginal blacks on and near the western coast of Victoria—near Belfast, Warrnambool, and Portland—had always been noted as a breed of savages by no means to be despised. They had been for untold generations accustomed to a dietary scale of exceptional liberality. The climate was temperate; the forests abounded in game; wild-fowl at certain seasons were plentiful; while the sea supplied them with fish of all sorts and sizes, from a whale (stranded) to a whitebait. No wonder that they were a fine race, physically and otherwise—the men tall and muscular, the women well-shaped and fairly good-looking. To some even higher commendation might with truth be applied.

One is often tempted to smile at hearing some under-sized Anglo-Saxon, with no brain power to spare, assert gravely the blacks of Australia were the lowest race of savages known to exist, the connecting link between man and the brute creation, etc. On the contrary, many of the leading members of tribes known to the pioneer squatters were grandly-formed specimens of humanity, dignified in manner, and possessing an intelligence by no means to be despised, comprehending a quick sense of humour, as well as a keenness of perception, not always found in the superior race.

Unfortunately, before I arrived and took up my abode on the border of the great Eumeralla mere, there had been divers quarrels between the old race and the new. Whether the stockmen and shepherds were to blame—as is always said—or whether it was simply the ordinary savage desire for the tempting goods and chattels of the white man, cannot be accurately stated. Anyhow, cattle and sheep had been lifted and speared; blacks had been shot, as a matter of course; then, equally so, hut-keepers, shepherds, and stockmen had been done to death.

Just about that time there was a scare as to the disappearance of a New South Wales semi-civilised aboriginal named Bradbury. He was a daring fellow, a bold rider, and a good shot. As he occasionally stayed at the native camp, and had now not been seen for a month, it began to be rumoured that he had agreed to accept the leadership of the outlawed tribes against the whites. In such a case the prospects of the winter, with thinly-manned homesteads eight or ten miles apart, looked decidedly bad.

However, the discovery of poor Bradbury's bones a short time afterwards set that matter at rest. He always took his gun with him, distrusting—and with good reason—his trans-Murray kin. On this occasion they "laid for him," it seems, and by means of a sable Delilah, who playfully ran off with his double-barrel, took him at a disadvantage. He fought desperately, we were told, even with a spear through his body, but was finally overpowered. Just before they had killed and chopped up a hut-keeper, and at Mount Rouse they had surprised and killed one of Mr. Cox's men, the overseer—Mr. Brock—only saving himself by superior speed of foot, for which he was noted.

I was recommended by my good friends of Dunmore and others of experience to keep the blacks at a distance, and not to give them permission to come about the station.

Being young and foolish—or, let me say, unsuspicious—I chose to disregard this warning and to take my own way. I thought the poor fellows had been hardly treated. It was their country, after all. A policy of conciliation would doubtless show them that some of the white men had their good at heart.

To the westward of our camp lay the great tract of lava country before mentioned. This had been doubtless an outflow in old central-fire days from the crater of Mount Eeles. Now, cooled, hardened, cracked, and decomposed, it annually produced a rich crop of grass. It was full of ravines, boulders, masses of scoria, and had, besides, a lakelet in the centre. It was many miles across, and extended from Mount Eeles nearly to the sea.

It was not particularly easy to walk in. And, as for riding, one day generally saw the end of the most high-couraged, sure-footed horse. As a natural covert for savages it could not be surpassed.

In this peculiar region our "Modocs lay hid." We could see the smoke of their camp fires in tolerable number, but had no means of seeing or having speech of them. One day, however, having probably sent out a scout previously who had made careful examination of us while we were totally unconscious of any such supervision, they debouched from the rocks and came up to camp. They sent a herald in advance, who held up a green bough. Then, "walking delicately," they came up, in number nearly fifty. I was at home, as it happened, as also was the old stockman. How well I remember the day and the scene!

We all carried guns in those days, as might the border settlers in "Injun" territory.

CHAPTER VI THE EUMERALLA WAR

We had been informed that the Eumeralla people, when that station was first taken up by Mr. Hunter for Hughes and Hoskins, of Sydney, always took their guns into the milking-yard with them, for fear of a surprise. The story went that one day a sudden attack "was" made. While the main body was engaged, a wing of the invading force made a flank movement, and bore down upon the apparently undefended homestead. There, however, they were confronted by Mr. William Carmichael, a neighbour of Falstaffian proportions, who stood in the doorway brandishing a rusty cutlass which he had discovered. Whether the blacks were demoralised by the appearance of the fattest man they had ever seen, or awestricken at the fierceness of his bearing, is not known, but they wheeled and fled just as their main army had concluded to fall back on Mount Eeles.

Of Messrs. Gorrie and M'Gregor (uncle and nephew), who were chief among the Eumeralla pioneers, having come down with the original herd of ITH cattle, with which the run was first occupied, many tales are told. The former, a stalwart, iron-nerved, elderly Scot, was the envied possessor of a rifle of great length of barrel and the deadliest performance. The coolness of its owner under fire (of spears) was a matter of legendary lore.

In a raid upon the heathen, shortly after an unprovoked murder on their part, two aboriginals bolted out of their cover immediately in front of Mr. Gorrie. Running their best, and leaping from side to side as they went, the nearer one made frantic signs to the effect that the other man was the real culprit.

"Bide a wee," quoth the calm veteran, as the barrel of the old rifle settled to its aim. "Bide a wee, laddie, and I'll sort ye baith." Which the legend goes on to say he actually did, disposing of the appellant at sight, and knocking over the other before he got out of range of la longue carabine.

One day Mr. M'Gregor was returning through disturbed country. While discovering "Injun sign" to be tolerably plain and recent, his horse at speed fell under him, and rolled over, a tremendous cropper. He picked himself up, and, going over to the motionless steed, found that he was stone dead—he had broken both forelegs and his neck. A moment's thought, and he picked up the saddle and bridle, and, thus loaded, ran the seven or eight miles home at a pace which Deerfoot would have respected.

Things went on prosperously for some months. "The hut," a substantial and commodious structure, arose in all its grandeur. It boasted loopholes on either side of the huge, solid chimney, built out of the cube-shaped basaltic blocks which lay around in profusion. So we were prepared for a siege. A stock-yard was the next necessity; to split and put up this important adjunct, without which we had no real title to call ourselves a cattle station, was imperative. "Four rails and a cap," as the description ran, of the heavy substantial fence then thought necessary for the business, were to be procured. The white-gum timber, though good enough in a splitting sense for slabs, was not the thing for stock-yard work. So, as we knew by report from the "Eumeralla people" that there was a tract of stringy-bark forest about eight miles south of us towards the coast, we determined to get our timber there. The bushman who had put up the Eumeralla huts—one Tinker Woods, an expatriated gipsy, it was said, whom therefore I regarded with great interest—had marked some trees which would serve to guide us. Joe Burge thought he could manage the rest.

The "round stuff" we could cut close about. But the heavy rails, nine feet in length, from three to five inches thick, and as straight as a board paling, we had to get from the forest. As Mr. Cunningham had gone, and the old stockman, Tom, had quite enough to do minding the cattle, the work fell on Joe Burge and myself.

This is how it was managed. At daylight we started one Monday morning, taking the dray and team, with maul and wedges, crosscut saw and axes, bedding, blankets, and a week's rations, not forgetting the guns. When we got to the forest, after finding the Tinker's Tree (it bore the name years after)—an immense stringy bark, with a section of the outside wood split down to see if the grain was free—we soon pitched upon a "good straight barrel," and set to work. Joe cut a good-sized "calf" in it first, and then we introduced the crosscut. I had got through a reasonable amount of manual exercise, and had more than one spell, when the tall tree began to sway, and, as we drew back to the right side of the stump, came crashing down, flattening all the lighter timber in its way.

"Now, sir," quoth Joe, "you give me a hand to crosscut the first length. There'll be two more after that. Them I'll do myself, and now we'll have a pot of tea. You can take the team home, and come back the day after to-morrow. I'll have a load of rails ready for you."

We had our meal in great comfort and contentment. Then I started off to drive the team back. At sunset I saw the thatched roof of our hut. I had walked sixteen miles there and back, besides helping to fell our tree, and unyoking the team afterwards.

I slept soundly that night. I drove the team back to the forest on the day named, and found Joe perfectly well and contented, having split up the whole of the tree into fine, straight, substantial rails, thirty of which were put upon the dray. After helping to cut down another tree, I departed on my homeward journey.

On Saturday the same proceedings took place, and da capo until all the rails were split and drawn in. Joe must have felt pretty lonely at night, camped in a bark gunyah, with the black pillars of the stringy-bark trees around him, and not a soul within reach or ken. But he was not of a nervous temperament—by wood or wold, land or sea, on foot or horseback, hand-to-hand fight, sword or pistol, it was all one to Joe. He was afraid of nothing and nobody. And when, years after, his son returned from India with the Queen's Commission and the Victoria Cross, I knew where the bold blood had come from. Towards the end of our wood-ranging, a rumour got abroad that the blacks had "broken out" and commenced to spear cattle. They had, moreover, "intromitted with the Queen's lieges," as Dugald Dalgetty would have said. Mr. Cunningham, riding through the greenwood at Dunmore, had had three spears thrown at him by blacks, one of which went through his hat. They then (he averred) disappeared into an "impenetrable scrub." Neighbours talked of arming and going out in force to expostulate, if this kind of thing was to go on.

I told Joe of this, and brought a message from Mrs. Burge to say that Old Tom, who knew the blacks well, was getting anxious, that he must not stay away any longer, but had better come home with me.

Joe agreed generally, but said there was one lovely, straight tree that he must run out, and if I would help him fell this, he would come directly it was finished. I tried to persuade him, but it was useless. So we "threw" the tree, and loaded up. I started home again alone.

Now the tree was a large tree; the load heavier than usual. My departure was late in consequence, and the moon rose before I had half finished my homeward journey. To add to my trouble I got into a soft spot in the marsh road, and in the altercation one of my leaders, a hot-tempered animal, slued round and "turned his yoke." Gentlemen who have driven teams will understand the situation. The bows were by this manœuvre placed on the tops of the bullocks' necks, the yoke underneath, and the off-side bullock became the near-side one. I was nearly in despair. I dared not unyoke them, because they, being fresh, would have bolted and left me helpless. So I compromised, and started the team, finding that by keeping pretty wide of my leaders and behaving with patience they would keep the track. The road was moderately open, and they knew they were going home.

At one part of the road I had to pass between two walls of ti-tree, a tall kind of scrub through which I could not see, and which looked in the moonlight very dark and eerie. I began to think about the blacks, and whether or no they might attack us in force. At that very moment I heard a wild shrill cry, which considerably accelerated the circulatory system.

I sprang to the gun, which lay alongside of the rail, just within the side-board of the dray. "I will sell my life dearly," I said to myself; "but oh! if it must be—shall I never see home again?" As I pulled back the hammer another cry, hardly so shrill—much more melodious, indeed, to my ears—sounded, and a flock of low-flying dark birds passed over my head. It was the cry of the wild swan! I was not sorry when I saw the hut fire, and drew up with my load near the yard. I had some trouble with my leader, the off-side bullock not caring to let me approach him, as is the manner of his kind. But I got over the difficulty, and dealt out retributive justice by letting him and his mate go in their yoke, and postponing further operations to daylight.

Mrs. Burge was most anxious about her husband, and inveighed against his foolishly putting his life in jeopardy for a few rails. Old Tom laughed, and said as long as Joe had a good gun he was a match for all the blacks in the country, if they did not take him by surprise.

"We're going to have a bit of trouble with these black varment now," he said, filling his pipe in a leisurely way. "Once they've started killing cattle they won't leave off in a hurry. More by token, they might take a fancy to tackle the hut some day when we're out."

"You leave me a gun, then," said Mrs. Burge, "and I'll be able to frighten 'em a bit if I'm left by myself. But sure, I hardly think they'd touch me after all the flour and bits of things I've given the lubras."

"They're quare people," said the old stockman, meditatively; "there's good and bad among 'em, but the divil resave the blackfellow I'd trust nearer than I could pull the trigger on him, if he looked crooked."

I said little, being vexed that my policy of conciliation had been of no avail. I roused myself, however, out of a reverie on the curious problem afforded by original races of mankind, foredoomed to perish at the approach of higher law.

"They have not touched any of our cattle yet," I said; "that shows they have some feeling of gratitude."

"I wouldn't say that," answered the old man. "I missed a magpie steer to-day, and I didn't see that fat yellow cow with the white flank. Thim's a pair that's always together, and I seen all the leading mob barrin' the two."

"We must have a hunt for them to-morrow," I said, "and the sooner Joe comes in the better, Mrs. Burge."

"Yes, indeed," said that resolute matron, casting a glance at the cradle where lay a plump infant not many weeks old; "and is there any other man in the country that would risk his life for a load of stock-yard rails? Not but it's elegant timber; only he might think of me and the baby."

The argument was a good one, so next day I went out and forcibly brought away Joe and a final cargo of rails, though to the last he asserted "that we were spoiling the yard for the sake of another week's splitting."

I may here state that we got our stock-yard up in due time. It was seven feet high, and close enough—a rat could hardly get through. My share was chiefly the mortising of the huge posts, which afforded considerable scope for amateur execution, by reason of their size and thickness. If the yard is still standing—and nothing less than a stampede of elephants would suffice to level it—I could pick out several of "my posts" with unerring accuracy. "God be with those days," as the Irish idiom runs; they were happy and free. I should like to be drafting there again—if the clock could be put back. But life's time-keeper murmurs sadly with rhythmic pendulum, "Never—for ever: for ever—never!"

All of a sudden war broke out. The reasons for this last resource of nations none could tell. The whites only wished to be let alone. They did not treat the black brother unkindly. Far from it. There were other philanthropists in the district besides myself, notably Mr. James Dawson, of Kangatong, then known as Cox's Heifer Station, distant about twenty miles to the east. Then, as now, my old friend and his amiable family were most anxious to ameliorate his condition. They fed and clothed the lubras and children. They even were sufficiently interested to make a patient study of the language, and to acquire a knowledge of tribal rites, ceremonies, and customs, which has lately been embodied in a valuable volume, praised even by the super-critical Saturday Review. It is a fact, not altogether without bearing on the historical analysis of pioneer squatting, that four of us—rude colonists, as most English writers persist in believing all Australian settlers to be—were, in greater or less degree, authors.

Charles Macknight had a logically clear and trenchant way of putting things. As a political and social essayist he attracted much attention during the latter years of his life. His theories of stock-breeding, culled from contemporary journals, are still prized and acted upon by experienced pastoralists. Of the two brothers Aplin, the elder was a lover of scientific research, and, having a strong natural taste for geology, addressed himself to it with such perseverance that he became second only to Mr. Selwyn, the late Victorian Government geologist, a man of European reputation, and was himself enabled to fill the position of Government geologist for Northern Queensland. His brother Dyson was a poet of by no means ordinary calibre. Mr. Dawson's book is now before the public, and the present writer has more than one book or two to his credit, which the public have been good enough to read, and reviewers to praise.

Before I begin my history of the smaller Sepoy Rebellion, I must introduce Mr. Robert Craufurd, younger, of Ardmillan, a brother of the late Lord Ardmillan. This gentleman dwelt at Eumeralla East, a subdivision of the original run, which, in my time, was the property of the late Mr. Benjamin Boyd. The river divided the two runs. Messrs. Gorrie and M'Gregor had acquired Eumeralla West, with its original homestead and improvements, by what we should call in the present day something very like "jumping." However, I had no better claim to the Doghole-point, which was a part of the old Eumeralla run—as indeed was Dunmore and all the country within twenty or thirty miles—if the original occupant of that station was to be believed. The commissioner—the gallant and autocratic Captain Fyans—settled the matter, as was the wont of those days, by his resistless fiat. He "gave" Messrs. Gorrie and M'Gregor the western side of the Eumeralla, with the homestead and the best fattening country. He restricted Mr. Boyd to the eastern side of the river, giving him his choice, however. That was the reason why Tinker Woods had to build new huts; and he eventually allotted to me Squattlesea Mere, and its dependencies, as far as the Doghole-point, though my friend, Bob Craufurd, on behalf of his employer, strove stoutly to have me turned out.

Mr. Craufurd, like other cadets of good family, had somewhat swiftly got rid of the capital which he imported, and, for lack of other occupation, accepted the berth of manager of Eumeralla East for Mr. Boyd, and a very good manager he was. A fine horseman, shrewd, clear-headed, and energetic on occasion, he did better for that enterprising ill-fated capitalist than he ever did for himself. He and the Dunmore people were old friends and schoolfellows. So, it may be guessed that we often found it convenient to exchange our somewhat lonely and homely surroundings for the comparative luxury and refinement of Dunmore. What grand evenings we used to have there!

He was a special humourist. I often catch myself now laughing at one of "Craufurd's stories"—an inveterate practical joker, a thorough sportsman, a fair scholar, and scribbler of jeux d'esprit, he was the life and soul of our small community. He once counterfeited a warrant, which he caused to be served on Mr. Cunningham for an alleged shooting of a blackfellow. Even that bold Briton turned pale (and a more absolutely fearless man I never knew) when he found himself, as he supposed, within the iron gripe of the law.

We were all pretty good shots. For one reason or other the gun was rarely a day out of our hands. We were therefore in a position to do battle effectively for our homesteads and means of subsistence if these were assailed. Between my abode and the sea was but one other run—a cattle station. Sheep were in the minority in those days. It was occupied by two brothers—the Messrs. Jamieson—Scots also; they seemed to preponderate in the west. Their run rejoiced in the aspiring title of Castle Donnington. It was rather thickly timbered, possessed a good deal of limestone formation, and had a frontage to Darlot's Creek, an ever-flowing true river which there ran into the sea.