Great hordes of travelling sheep laid waste a portion of the run, eating every available particle of herbage within a mile of either side of the road. At first Ernest was inclined to treat these devourers of every green (or dry) thing with consideration, but found that he would speedily possess a herd of cattle and no appreciable grass for them to eat if that policy was persevered with. So Mr. Banks had orders to ‘shepherd’ every lot through the run, and to describe the proprietor as a violent and ferocious person given to impounding and every legal oppression.
With the colony of selectors amicable relations commenced to be endangered.
Their cattle, having much increased, required a considerable range of pasture. Their owners commenced to grumble if the Rainbar cattle fed over their grazing rights, quite unconscious of their wholesale unnoticed trespass up to the present time. One of the conditional purchasers, indeed, after a brisk argument with Jack Windsor, informed that gentleman that grass was grass now, and that they intended to stand upon their rights. They were poor men, and couldn’t see that they were to starve their cattle for Mr. Neuchamp or Mr. Old-champ either. If he hadn’t expected to get some pull out of them, he would never have persuaded them to come there. They didn’t see as they owed him anything.
This was one of the unkindest cuts of the very hard fortune of the hard season. Ernest felt the ingratitude of his ‘plantation’ settlers more deeply than any one of them could have supposed.
To make matters pleasanter, he received a letter from Messrs. Oldstile and Crampton, informing him that his account was overdrawn, and that he could by no means have any more money until the credit side of his balance was substantially reinforced.
He was commencing to fall upon evil days, certainly. What to do he did not exactly know. He was unwilling to write to Paul Frankston and state the case. It would have appeared like a simple asking for a loan. He was ready enough to accept Paul’s advice, friendship, and hospitality. He did not wish to be directly indebted to him for money.
And yet, quoi faire, without an advance of some sort? For, even on cattle stations, where you are not always putting your hand into your pocket, as with sheep, various occasions for expenditure arise, and money is indispensable.
He had been sufficiently learned in the ways of land to know that store cattle were nearly always saleable, and that one could generally dispose of a large lot more easily than fat ones. But during this terribly dry weather, he reasoned that no one would desire store cattle at any price. Buyers were uncertain as to when it would rain, and would delay making purchases until definite assurance of a change of weather. Of fat cattle he had none; they had enough to keep themselves in a pinched, independent manner, but no more. The situation resolved itself into this: money must positively be raised for station expenses for the next six months.
After much extremely unpleasant cogitation about money, for the first time in his life, Mr. Neuchamp finally decided to write to Messrs. Oldstile and Crampton, stating his position, and his reasonable expectation of receiving aid from his brother in England. He made this explanation, requesting at the same time that they would permit him to draw for the sum of five hundred pounds in advance, on the strength of five thousand pounds which he had grounds for expecting that he would obtain from his brother.
This important letter being despatched, Ernest felt more at ease than had been his lot for some time past. In money difficulties, like other matters, the chief misery lies in the stage of doubt or procrastination. This being passed, and a definite course of action entered upon, mental relief ensues. Happy the man whose temperament leads him to bestow the same amount of curative anxiety upon the earlier stages of ‘chest complaint’ that the majority are compelled to furnish during the more aggravated phases of the disorder.