Abraham Freeman replied that they did not see that they had anything to thank him for, particularly that they had left good homes to come to this confounded dry sand-heap of a country. That they intended to stick up for their pre-emptives, as the cattle were all their dependence now, and that if he wanted to make terms with them, they would be satisfied with that portion of the run—with the river frontage, of course—which lay to the westward of their settlement. If he just gave them the use of that bit of country—it was only five or six miles in length, and didn’t go far back—then they would bind themselves not to take up any more of his run.
This last implied threat completed the obliteration of the last shred of Mr. Neuchamp’s patience. These heartless, unprincipled wretches, whom he had raised from a position of indifferently paid toil, akin to daily labour, to that of thriving graziers, basely forgetful of his exceptional benevolence, were actually trading upon their power of annoyance and injurious occupation of his run! Very bitter were Mr. Neuchamp’s reflections when this evil growth of human nature was thus indisputably proved. Had it not been so bad a season he might have overlooked it. But now, when fate and the very skies were at war with him, this instance of ingratitude overpowered all philosophic calmness.
He immediately convened a meeting of the heads of families of the house of Freeman, and informed them, in sufficiently decided tones, that he found himself to have been mistaken in his estimate of their principles and characters; that he had sought to benefit them chiefly; had already assisted them to a partial independence, and that he had looked for some decent recognition of his efforts for their sole advantage. They had chosen to deceive and to threaten. He was resolved now to confine them strictly to their land, to require repayment of the money which he had lent, and to hold no terms of any kind whatever with them.
Messrs. Freeman Brothers were somewhat astonished by Ernest’s capacity for righteous indignation. They had not expected anything of the sort. They had looked for unlimited toleration. They now began to consider that a declaration of war might possibly result injuriously to their own interests, and they possibly had the grace to remember that, up to this stage of the affair, Mr. Neuchamp had been considerate, or, in their phraseology, ‘soft,’ to an extent altogether unprecedented in their experience of the pastoral tenants of the Crown. They would have no more loading, an easy way of providing themselves with the very moderate amount of cash necessary for their ordinary expenditure.
Certainly they did not need any large outlay. There are few lands under the sun, the Coral Islands of that charmed main the Great South Sea excepted, where there is such a possibility of tranquil, joyous progress along life’s pathway, without the use of the circulating medium, as in the settlements of the older colonies of Australia.
For instance, the Freemans had, as it were for nothing, house-room, fuel, water, and light. Their garden supplied them with an annual crop of pumpkins, melons, and other esculents, which gave them vegetable food for the greater part of the year. Far larger crops might have been produced by a comparatively trifling increase of labour or thought. They had milk, butter, and meat from their herd, in ordinary years in profusion. The few necessaries which they were absolutely reduced to import or purchase were clothes, of which, owing to the mildness of the climate, they needed but few; tea and sugar, salt and flour, with a trifling stock of household utensils and furniture. With respect to the tea and sugar, a large reduction might have been made in this section had it been the fashion, as it was the exceptional practice, of isolated settlers to substitute milk for the former, as an ordinary adjunct to the three meals of the day.
But tea in Australia, grateful alike in the burning heat of summer and in the bitter frosts and sleet of winter—portable, innocuous, nutritive, and slightly stimulating—is the beer of the common people; and we know from experience that the attempt ‘to rob a poor man of his beer’ has always hitherto proved unpopular and unsuccessful.
We must therefore assume that a half-chest of tea and a couple of bags of medium brown sugar must be added to the expenditure of the small farmer, or ‘free selector,’ as he is now universally called.
Australia is not a good game country. Still the different varieties of the kangaroo are palatable and nutritious, more resembling the flesh of the hare and rabbit, with a flavour of veal, than beef or mutton. With the aid of a brace of rough greyhounds—the kangaroo-dog of the colonists—these are easily procured in any quantity. The skins are worth a shilling each, and are useful as mats or for coverings. The rivers and creeks, particularly the larger watercourses, are generally filled with fresh-water codfish and several other divisions of the perch family. These are considered to afford valuable supplementary aid to the perhaps scanty supply of butchers’ meat, on many a far-out farm in summer time.
With regard to the condition of the rather exclusive settlement formed and owned by the Freeman family, they had each made shift to bring from a couple to half a dozen brood mares, perhaps originally purchased for from half-a-crown to half-a-sovereign each, out of the Bowning pound. These hardy, though not perhaps well-bred, animals had increased wonderfully since their arrival, and were now, of themselves, quite a small herd. The younger members of the Freeman families could of course ride like Comanches, and no inconsiderable portion of their time was spent in running in these swift and half-wild mustangs, breaking them, losing them, finding them; and in all these operations and employment galloping around and across the Rainbar run, to the wrath and constant annoyance of Jack Windsor and Charley Banks.