“Go over to the station and git this lady’s bag. Is there much to carry?”
“There are only four portmanteaux and three bags, and two boxes and a hat-box, and a roll of rugs; and please be careful of the hat-box.”
“You’d better git the barrer, Dan.”
“Better git the bloomin’ bullock-dray,” growled Dan, quite keen to see this aggregation of luggage; and foreseeing something to talk about for the next three months. “She must ha’ come up to start a store, I reckon,” said Dan; and off he went to struggle with boxes for the next half-hour or so.
Over Mary Grant’s experiences at the Tarrong Hotel we will not linger. The dirty water, peopled by wriggling animalculae, that she poured out of the bedroom jug; the damp, cloudy, unhealthy-smelling towel on which she dried her face; the broken window through which she could hear herself being discussed by loafers in the yard; all these things are matters of course in bush townships, for the Australian, having a soul above details, does not shine at hotel-keeping. The breakfast was enlivened by snatches of song from the big, good-natured bush-girl who waited at table, and who “fancied” her voice somewhat, and marched into the breakfast-room singing in an ear-splitting Soprano:
“It’s a vilet from me”—
(spoken.) “What you’ll have, there’s chops, steaks, and bacon and eggs”—“Chops, please.”
(singer continues.) “Sainted mother’s”—
(spoken.) “Tea or coffee”—“Tea, please.”
(singer finishes.)—“grave.”