I stuck it ten days, being by that time so blistered, sore and generally used up that I could hardly crawl. I therefore handed in my resignation and left, richer by about £3, and the knowledge that the Atherton country looked heaps better than this, at that time of the year, anyhow.
I waited in Brisbane a while for a mate who wrote he would join me there and come North with me, but when my funds had reached £4 I gave him up, and cadged another railway concession to Gladstone from the Lands Department after making futile efforts to work my passage on shipboard. Got the boat at Gladstone and arrived in Cairns on 3rd December, 1912, with just enough to pay the fare to Atherton, where I arrived at noon next day without sufficient to buy a feed.
I slipped into the lavatory, hastily doffed my glad rags, and climbed into flannel and dungarees once more. Ten minutes after leaving the train I was gaily tramping the long road out to my selection, my old friend "Matilda" caressing my shoulders, penniless, happy and blithely whistling, glad to think I would soon be home again.
I stopped at a cocky's house a mile or two out, and offered him an hour's work for a feed.
"Righto, bloke," he said. "Freeze on to Douglas there and cut us some firewood."
I cut him a good pile, and the decent pot not only gave me a good square feed, but enough to carry along for another as well. Armed with this I marched along to the Barron River, where I found the river was up owing to recent rain, and I nearly got drowned crossing the atrocious ford of slippery stones which the "powers that be" consider safe, wading waist deep in the rushing stream.
I finally reached the barn at 7 p.m., where I found Len and Terry just finishing tea. Their welcome made the welkin ring. I don't quite know what the welkin is, but anyhow it rang. And wasn't I just glad to get back to where I was known and there were friendly faces to greet me! We talked sixteen to the dozen, and at ten o'clock, with hearty good-nights, we turned in, and again I slept the heavy sleep of the tired under the hospitable roof of Braun's old barn.
CHAPTER XII.
Scrub Life.