“Mr. Bruce doesn’t look as if he suffered from any of the ills of life,” said Blount, gazing at his fair companion, as who should say, “How could any man be unhappy who has such a charming sister-in-law, not to mention a delightful wife and a nice baby?” However he did not wish for a catalogue of his host’s annoyances. He wanted to hear his companion’s appreciation of the grand scheme of colour, tone, light and shadow, just opening out before them, as the “glorious sun uprist” amid clouds which had recently rolled away, leaving full in view the forest-clothed uplands, the silent gorges, and the glittering summit of the majestic alp.
Right joyous are the pastimes connected with horse and hound in the older land whence our fathers came, amid the wide pastures, the hedge-bordered fields of green England.
With the hog-spear and rifle on the dusty plains and sudden appearing nullahs of Hindostan, Arab and Waler, by riders of world wide fame, are hard pressed in rivalry. In equestrian tournaments, in the polo gymkhana, and other military contests, there are trials of skill and horsemanship, with a suspicion of danger, to stir a man’s blood. But a gallop through the glades of an Australian forest, in the autumnal season of the year, or even in the so-called mid-winter under the cloudless skies and glowing sun of the southern hemisphere, yields to no sport on earth, in keenness of enjoyment or the excitement generated by the pride of horsemanship.
When the company is illumined by a suitable proportion of dames and demoiselles, right royally mounted, and practised in the manège, the combination is perfect.
CHAPTER V
And, in the joyous days of youth, the glorious, the immortal, the true, the ever-adorable deity of the soul’s childhood, unheeding, careless of the future, thinking, like charity, no evil, revelling in the purely sensuous enjoyment of the fair present, which of the so-called pleasures of the future can claim equality of richness or flavour, with those of that unsurpassable period of the mysterious human pageant! “Carpe Diem!” oh! fortunate heir of life’s richest treasure-house, is the true, the only true philosophy. Enjoy, while the pulse is high, the vigour of manhood untouched by Time, the spirit unsaddened by distrust of the future.
For you, glows that cloudless azure; for you the streams murmur, the breezes sigh, the good horse bounds freely over the elastic sward; for you shine the eyes of the beauteous maiden with a fore-taste of the divine dream of love. Thank the kind gods, that have provided so bounteous a feast of soul and sense! Oh! happy thou, that art bidden to such a banquet of the immortals; quaff the ambrosia, while the light still glows on Olympus, and Nemesis is as yet an unimagined terror.
In the days which were to come, in the destiny which the Fates were even then weaving for him, Valentine Blount told himself that never in his whole life had so many conditions of perfect enjoyment been combined as in that memorable riding party.
The sun rays prophetic of an early summer, for which the men of a thousand shearing sheds were even now mustering, were warm, yet tempered by the altitude of the region and the proximity of the snow fields. All nature seemed to recognise the voice of spring. The birds came forth from their leafy coverts, their wild but not unmusical notes sounding strangely unfamiliar to the English stranger. An occasional kangaroo dashed across their path, flying with tremendous bounds to its home on the mountain side. A lot of half-wild cattle stood gazing for a few moments, then “cleared,” as Miss Imogen expressed it, for more secluded regions.
“I wonder if I could ‘wheel’ them,” she said, as her bright glance followed the receding drove; “I see Ned and Paddy on the other wing; Mr. Blount, you can follow, but don’t pass me, whatever you do;” and in spite of Mrs. Bruce’s prudential “Oh! Imogen, don’t be rash!” away went the wilful damsel, through the thickening timber, at a pace with which the visitor, excellently mounted as he was, on a trained stock-horse, found it no easy task to keep up. Directly this enterprising movement on the part of the young lady was observed by the watchful Paddy, he called to Mr. Bruce, “Miss Immy wheel ’em, my word. Marmy! you man’em this one piccanniny yarraman, me ‘back up.’” Paddy’s old stock horse dashed off at speed, little inferior to that of the young lady’s thoroughbred, and appeared on the “off side wing” just as the fair Diana had wheeled (or turned) the leaders to the right. Paddy riding up to them on the left and menacing with his stockwhip, caused them to turn towards Imogen. This manœuvre persevered with, was finally crowned with success; inasmuch as the two protagonists, working together and causing the drove to “ring” or keep moving in a circle, finally persuaded them to stop and be examined, when with heaving flanks they bore testimony to the severity of the pace.