“Oh! a few here and there, in all sorts of places.” Here the stranger shot a searching glance, tinged with suspicion, towards the questioner. “I buy the chance of stray cattle now and then, and pick ’em up as I come across ’em. We’d as well jog along here, it’s better going.”
The track had become more marked. There were no wheel marks, the absence of which had surprised the traveller, since the beginning of his day’s march, but tracks of cattle and unshod horses were numerous; while the ground being less rocky, indeed commencing to be marshy, no difficulty was found in driving the cattle briskly along it. His horse too, having “company,” had become less dilatory and despondent.
“We’re not far off, now,” said his companion, “and it’s just as well. We’ll have rain to-night—may be snow. So a roof and a fire won’t be too bad.”
To this statement the tourist cheerfully assented, his spirits rising somewhat, when another mile being passed, they turned to the north at a sharp angle to the road, and following a devious track, found themselves at the slip-rails of a small but well-fenced paddock, into which the cattle were turned, and permitted to stray at will. Fastening the slip rails with scrupulous care, and following the line of fence for a hundred yards, they came to a hut built of slabs, and neatly roofed with sheets of the stringy bark tree (Eucalyptus obliqua) where his guide unsaddled, and motioned to the guest to do likewise. As also to put the saddle against the wall of the hut, with the stuffing outward. “That’ll dry ’em a bit,” he said; “mine’s wet enough anyhow. Just bring your horse after me.”
Passing through a hand gate, he released his horse, first, however, putting on a pair of hobbles; “the feed’s good,” he said, “but this moke’s just out of the bush, and rather flash—he might jump the fence in the night, so it’s best to make sure. Yours won’t care about anything but filling his belly, not to-night anyhow, so he can go loose. Now we’ll see about a fire, and boil the billy for tea. Come along in.”
Entering the hut, which though small, was neat and clean; it was seen to contain two rooms, the inner one apparently used as a bedroom, there being two bed-places, on each of which was a rude mattress covered with a blanket. A store of brushwood and dry billets had been placed in a corner, from which a fire was soon blazing in the rude stone chimney, while a camp kettle (provincially a “billy”) was on the way to boil without loss of time.
A good-sized piece of corned beef, part of a round, with half a “damper” loaf being extracted from a cupboard or locker, was placed on the rude slab table; after which pannikins and tin plates, with knives and forks, provided from the same receptacle, were brought forth, completing the preparations for a meal that the guest believed he was likely to relish.
“Oh! I nearly forgot,” said the traveller, as his entertainer, dropping a handful of tea into the “billy,” now at the boil, and stirring it with a twig, put on the lid. “I brought a flask, it’s very fair whisky, and a tot won’t hurt either of us, after a long day and a wet one.” Going to his coat, he brought out a flask, and nearly filling the tin cup which was closed over the upper part, offered it to his host. He, rather to the surprise of the Englishman, hesitated and motioned as if to refuse, but on second thoughts smiled in a mysterious way, and taking the tin cup, nodded, and saying “Well, here’s fortune!” tossed it off. Blount took one of the pannikins, and pouring out a moderate allowance, filled it up with the clear spring water, and drank it by instalments.
“I must say I feel better after that,” he observed, “and if a dram needs an excuse, a long, cold ride, stiff legs, and a wetting ought to be sufficient.”
“They don’t look about for excuses up here,” said his new acquaintance, “and some takes a deal more than is good for them. I don’t hold with that, but a nip or two’s neither here nor there, particular after a long day. Help yourself to the meat and damper, you see your supper.”
The traveller needed no second invitation; he did not, like the clerk of Copmanhurst, plunge his fingers into the venison pasty, there being neither venison nor pasty, but after cutting off several slices of the excellent round of beef which had apparently sustained previous assaults, he made good time, with the aid of a well-baked “damper,” and an occasional reference to a pannikin of hot tea, so that as their appetites declined, more leisure was afforded for conversation.
“And now,” he said, after filling up a second pannikin of tea, and lighting his pipe, “I’m sure I’m very much obliged to you, as I hear the rain coming down, and the wind rising. May I ask whose hospitality I’m enjoying? I’m Valentine Blount of Langley in Herefordshire. Not long out, as I dare say you have noticed. Just travelling about to have a look at the country.”
“My name’s John Carter,” said the bushman, with apparent frankness, as he confronted Blount’s steady eye, “but I’m better known from here to Omeo, as ‘Little River Jack’; there’s lots of people knows me by that name, that don’t know me by any other.”
“And what do you do when you get gold—take it to Melbourne to sell?”
“There’s no call to do that. Melbourne’s a good way off, and it takes time to get there. But there’s always gold buyers about townships, that are on for a little business. They give a trifle under market price, but they pay cash, and it suits us mountain chaps to deal that way. Sometimes I’m a buyer myself, along with the cattle-dealing. Look here!” As he spoke, he detached a leather pouch from his belt, looking like one that stockriders wear for carrying pipe and tobacco, which he threw on the table. The grog had inclined to confidences and relaxed his attitude of caution. Blount lifted it, rather surprised at its weight. “This is gold, isn’t it?”
“Yes! a good sample too. Worth four pound an ounce. Like to look at it?”
“Very much. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen gold in the raw state before.”
“Well, here it is—the real thing, and no mistake. Right if a chap could only get enough of it.” Here he opened the mouth of the pouch, which seemed three parts full, and pouring some of it on a tin plate, awaited Blount’s remarks.
As the precious metal, partly in dust, partly in larger fragments, rattled on the plate, Blount looked on with deep interest, and then, on being invited so to do, handled it with the air of a man to whom a new and astonishing object is presented for the first time.
“So,” he said musingly, “here is one of the great lures which have moved the world since the dawn of history. Love, war, and ambition, have been subservient to it. Priests and philosophers, kings and queens, the court beauty and the Prime Minister, have vainly struggled against its influence. But—” he broke off with a laugh, as he noted his companion’s look of wonder, “here am I, another example of its fascination, moralising in a mountain hut and mystifying my worthy entertainer.”
“And now, my friend!” he inquired, relapsing into the manner of everyday life, “what may be the market value of this heavy little parcel?”
“Well—I put it at fifty ounces, or thereabouts,” said Mr. “Little River Jack,” carefully pouring back the contents of the pouch, to the last grain; “at, say four pound an ounce, it’s worth a couple of hundred notes, though we sha’n’t get that price for it. But at Melbourne mint, it’s worth every shilling, maybe a trifle more.” Before closing the pouch, he took out a small nugget of, perhaps, half an ounce in weight, and saying, “You’re welcome to this. It’ll make a decent scarf pin,” handed it to Mr. Blount.
But that gentleman declined it, saying, “Thanks, very much, but I’d rather not.” Then, seeing that the owner seemed hurt, even resentful, qualified the refusal by saying, “But if you would do me a service, which I should value far more, you might introduce me to some party of miners, with whom I could work for a month or two, and learn, perhaps, how to get a few ounces by my own exertions. I think I