Up North—or was it down South—a talkative gentleman with a glass eye (named—the man's I mean—Blank), keeps a store. One day, ipse dixit, he was shoeing a restive horse. The flies were very bad. His glass eye suddenly pained him; and when he made effort to take it out of its socket, to his horror, he found he couldn't. The flies had bunged it!
That is the man's story, not mine. I can only vouch for their infinite capacity to bung eyes not made of glass—and to imperil souls.
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None of the eye-protecting fixings seem to be satisfactory for use by a cyclist in country where careful steering is called for. Those which will keep out the flies are objectionable, for various reasons. The principal being that they also obscure the vision.
At Oodnadatta, a fly-guard made of very fine meshed wire was given to me, and I carried it right through to Palmerston. It was made as a very large pair of spectacles, and when folded occupied but very little space. Because of a few faults, I did not often wear it. It darkened the ground, got uncomfortably hot at times, and when a fly did get underneath, the little wretch invariably wagged its tail with joy at having a whole eye to itself, and "wired in" so avariciously, that hunting it out became an instant necessity. And then outsiders, dozens of them, would hang on to the wires and search for a wide opening, shoving their stings through now and again in the hope of reaching something. Nevertheless, if one of these wire-meshed guards could be had to fit close all round the eyes, it would be as good as, if not better, than most of the others. Goggles with colourless glass were not to be had. The netting of the ordinary hat-veil is too open; a cyclist when riding does not shake his head about so the flies soon enter through. Cheese or mosquito nettings are hot, sticky and uncomfortable; and dangling corks are too ornamental.
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There were several of the ant-repulsing citadels at Kelly's Well, and in one of them, close by a bush to which I could fasten Diamond, I spread my sheet of waterproof. But my camp companions pressed upon me some of their own blankets—generosity of a prince was that encountered from first to last.
Well-fed, and kicking about under warm blanketing, with a sense of safety, and with food and water at one's hands—yes, certainly these things have their advantages.
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