"Dear me," said the Secretary; "have you been stationed nearly three years on this coast, and ask how a man could possibly be in good condition living in those scrubby heaths?"
"Bad-looking country; eh?" said the Captain.
"Small cattle-stations, sir," said the Secretary, "I can see at a glance. Salt beef, very tough, and very little of it. I shall run a bill through the House for the abolition of small cattle-stations next session."
"Better get your estimates through first, old fellow. The bagpipes will play quite loud enough over them to last for some time."
"I know it, but tremble not," replied the undaunted Secretary; "I have got used to it. I fancy I hear Callaghan beginning now: 'The unbridled prodigality, sir, and the reckless profligacy, sir, of those individuals who have so long, under the name of government——'"
"That'll do, now," said the Captain; "you are worse than the reality. I shall go ashore, and take my chance of getting breakfast. Will you come?"
"Not if I know it, sir, with pork chops for breakfast in the cabin. Blockstrop, have you duly reflected what you are about to do? You are about to land alone, unarmed, unprovisioned, among the offscourings of white society, scarcely superior in their habits of life to the nomadic savages they have unjustly displaced. Pause and reflect, my dear fellow. What guarantee have you that they will not propose to feed you on damper, or some other nameless abomination of the same sort?"
"It was only the other day, in the House," said the Captain, "that you said the small squatters and freehold farmers represented the greater part of the intelligence and education of the colony, and now——"
"Sir! sir!" said the Secretary, "you don't know what you are talking about. Sir, we are not in the House now. Are you determined, then?"
The Captain was quite determined, and they went down to the waist. They were raising a bag of potatoes from somewhere, and the Colonial Secretary, seizing two handfuls of them, presented them to the Captain.