Page:An Australian Parsonage.djvu/263

234 the rest of her family had no water to drink but such as was daily brought in a keg by a boy, who fetched it from three miles distance on a pony, pony and boy being met on their return by every child, dog, and fowl belonging to the homestead, all racing out to obtain a taste of the contents of the keg. Nevertheless custom, which can reconcile us to so many things, causes even a moderate quantity of salt to be forgotten, and a colonist, who once paid us a visit, accounted for his horse appearing but little to relish the water of our pool by the fact of the animal having been so long used to a brackish well in his own field as to prefer it to water which was quite fresh.