After this capture and disposal of our highwaymen, the land had rest for a season. One of the consequences of the outbreak might have had an ending calculated to surprise the European wool-buyer. Just before the bale of broken fleece referred to was filled up and put into the press, Mrs. Boldrewood recollected that she had never seen the box of ammunition since the day they were huddled into the wool-bale. It was hastily examined and the explosives hauled out, just as the press was being put down; great was the laughter in the shed, as the men thought of the faces of the wool-brokers in a London saleroom when the 'mixed pieces' were turned out for inspection.
I never got my watch back, though my cousin recovered his. The police heard that the bushrangers had, holding out a hatful of watches, invited the stock-rider to choose one, for his noble conduct and 'moral support' in my affair. He chose my young friend's, which he afterwards returned to him. But mine I saw never again, having to content me with a silver one of small value for the next decade.
A TRANSFORMATION SCENE
'Look alive, boys,' said Hugh Tressider; 'we must slog on for the next hour or two. Pitch dark, and going to be a wet night; but if we don't lose the road we shall pull Barallan before bedtime. There we're sure of a yard and a welcome. A night's sleep won't do us any harm.'
'A night's sleep? Dashed if I've had any for a week,' growled the head stock-rider. 'I'm fit to drop off my bloomin' moke this minute; and he's just the size to kick me for falling. Them blessed B.R. cattle's like a mob of kangaroos for breaking and rushin' if so much as a 'possum squeals or a stick breaks. But I know Mr. Bayard's is a regular stunning place to stop at. Gentle or simple, it's all one to him. He's a gentleman as is a gentleman; and every workin' man in the district 'll say the same.'
'All right, Joe; then stir up those lads and the blackfellow a bit; don't let the tail cattle struggle, whatever you do. I'll go on with the lead; my old horse will keep the track.'
'What a thundering wild night it's going to be,' said the drover to himself as he threaded his way through the thick-growing timber, skirting the half-seen wildish herd, which, but a week from the pastures where they had been bred, were still troublesome and prone to break back at the smallest opportunity. The rain, which had held off during the gusty, stormy day, now came down in driving sleety showers, ice-cold, and wetting to the skin the dogged, silent horsemen, who, by the nature of things, were incompletely clothed for resisting so serious a downfall. The cattle, beginning to low with discomfort and uneasiness, were with difficulty restrained from facing towards the opposite point of the compass, away from the blinding storm, which now drove full in their teeth. To those unacquainted with the skill, acquired by long experience in this particular occupation, it would have seemed little short of a miracle that four men and a black boy, who had also the special care of a pack-horse, could guide six hundred head of unwilling, half-wild cattle through a thickly-timbered country on so dark a night, with rain and storm to complicate matters withal.
But it was possible. It was done well and effectively. The leader's horse, an Arab-looking grey, visible from time to time, denoted each turn and direction of the road. The quick eyes of the stock-riders were seldom at fault, and detecting each straggling animal, they were instant to urge a wheel before separation from the main body took place. The gregarious habit of cattle was in their favour, as also their indisposition to straggle overmuch in the darkness. When they were doubtful, the piercing organ of the man of the woods was called into play. His decision was prompt and unerring.
It was, 'Me see 'um two fellows cow and that one red bullock yan along a gully, likit picaninny way. You hold 'em, this one pack-horse, me fetch 'um.' And back they came accordingly. One hour, then another, had slowly passed. The rain had ceased, but the heavens were ebon black and murky. Still rode the man, who had first spoken, at the head of the great drove, which, lowing from time to time, kept plodding monotonously forward, at other times silent and all but soundless as a procession of ghostly beeves, escorted by a company of spectre horsemen.
Wet and weary, chilled to the bone, too dispirited to speak—indeed conversation would have been difficult under the circumstances of compulsory separation—the jaded stock-riders moved on; the rain-drops showering from the leaves as they brushed from time to time under the low-growing shrubs and sapling eucalyptus, the horses' feet sinking deeply in the clay and decomposed gravel of the forest; or splashing shoulder-deep through the mountain streams that crossed their track; their watchful outlook strained and concentrated to the fullest, each man at his allotted station. It was a phase of Australian backwoods life not always credited to the much-enduring bushman.