“Yes; I never expected to show it to you again.”
“Do you always keep presents like that, Mat?”
“No; but that is the only present I ever had from a lady who was kind to me, and I was pleased when it was washed up from the wreck. By-the-bye, would you like to see my journal? I have been writing it out as carefully as I can, because a publisher in Sydney has offered me a good price if I’ll let him print it, and it will be so nice if Tim and I can make a few pounds by it.”
“I should like to hear it, if you will read it to me, Mat.”
Mat fetched the manuscript, and, taking his seat by Annie said,—
“I won’t give you all this beginning part, because you heard most of that at the lecture; but do listen to this page, because, when I read that part to the publisher, he threw himself back in his chair, shoved his spectacles on the top of his forehead, put his thumbs into his waistcoat, and said, ‘Um—ah!—yes; just so. I believe there are some curious freaks of nature in those northern parts, but this is—well—er—er—a little strong.’ What he really meant was—‘You and your brother are terrible liars.’
“This is the account, as I wrote it, only I’ve had the ‘wording’ improved:—
“Tim and I were returning to the camp on a moonlight night, along a chain of small water-holes, which were fringed with ‘blady’ grass, when some beast or other suddenly floundered into the water, but never rose to the surface again. Whilst I watched, Tim went off to the camp close by, and soon returned with half a dozen blacks with their clap-nets. These entered the little pool, and, after working their nets for some time, one of them jumped out with a fish of about six pounds in his net. ‘Very good,’ I said to my black friend, ‘but that is not the beast we heard in the dry grass.’ ‘Yes, that is it,’ he replied. ‘Look! he has two sorts of legs on his stomach, and he eats grass at night, like a kangaroo, and we call him “Barramundi” (Ceratodus forsteri); and sometimes we have caught him on the banks of water-holes on moonlight nights. He can breathe in the water because he has these things, showing me his gills; and he can breathe on land because he has these—I will show you;’ upon which the black cut open the fish, and showed me his lungs.”
“I can only say,” said Mat, as he stopped reading, “that we both saw all this, and, after all, it’s not much more wonderful than some of the tree-snakes. I can show you, on the next one I kill, two little short points or legs under his stomach, to help him to grip getting about trees.”
Before Mat could continue his journal they were summoned to dinner, so Annie took up the book, saying,—