Her prayer was heard, for Mat came riding up to the garden fence with two cattle dogs, which began barking at the strangers. Mat said:
"Hello, you coves, is it robbing my garden ye are?"
Mr. Tyers looked towards Mat and spoke, but his voice was weak, his mouth full of peas, and Mat could not tell what he was saying. He dismounted, hung the bridle on to a post, and came into the garden. He looked at the men, and soon guessed what was the matter with them; he had often seen their complaint in Ireland.
"Poor craythurs," he said, "it's hungry ye are, and hunger's a killing disorder. Stop ating they pays to wonst, or they'll kill ye, and come into the house, and we'll give ye something better."
The men muttered, but kept snatching off the peas. Norah had unbolted the door, and was standing with the musket in her hand.
"Take away the gun, Norah, and put the big billy on the fire, and we'll give 'em something warm. The craythurs are starving. I suppose they are runaway prisoners, and small blame to 'em for that same, but we can't let 'em die of hunger."
The strangers had become quite idiotic, and wou'd not leave the peas, until Mat lost all patience, bundled them one by one by main force into his hut, and shut the door.
He had taken the pledge from Father Mathew before he left Ireland, and had kept it faithfully; but he was not strait-laced. He had a gallon of rum in the hut, to be used in case of snake-bite and in other emergencies, and he now gave each man a little rum and water, and a small piece of damper.
Rum was a curse to the convicts, immigrants, and natives. Its average price was then about 4s. 3d. per gallon. The daily ration of a soldier consisted of one pound of bread, one pound of fresh meat, and one-seventh of a quart of rum. But on this day, to Mr. Tyers and his men, the liquor was a perfect blessing. He was sitting on the floor with his back to the slabs.
"You don't know me, Mat?"