Later, after supper, there is a sudden arrival in the darkness of the night. We hear a stamping on the verandah outside, and a loud, lusty, half-remembered voice addressing the Mayor.
"Have they come, I say? Where are they, then?"
The door of the room we are sitting in bursts open, and a burly, bearded man, rough and savage enough in outward appearance, sooth to say, rushes in upon us. He seizes our hands in a grip that brings the tears to our eyes, he shakes them up and down with vehemence, and while we are trying to make out whether this Old Colonial can really and truly be our sometime schoolfellow, he exclaims—
"Well, this is good! I am glad to see you! Now we'll have a splendid time! Now we'll make this old place hum round! Oh, but this is glorious!"
Thus, and much more; and so, with the true, hearty good-fellowship of the bush, are we welcomed to our future home.
And now that we have arrived at the scene of our future work, let this chapter close. No need any longer to pursue our history as new-chums. In the pages that follow we will resume the story at a further date, when we have arrived at the full estate of settlers and colonists. Such thread of narrative as these sketches possess shall henceforth be unwound off another reel.