Page:In bad company and other stories.djvu/14

 Crown Land, had paid up two shillings per acre of the upset price, leaving the balance of eighteen shillings, to be paid off when convenient. He had constructed thereon, chiefly with his own hands, a comfortable, four-roomed cottage, of the 'slab' architecture of the period, and after fencing in his property and devoting the proceeds of a couple of shearings to a modest outlay in furniture, had married Jenny Dawson, a good-looking, well-conducted young woman, whom he had known ever since he was big enough to crack a stockwhip.

In her way she was as clever and capable; exceptionally well adapted for the position of a farmer's wife, towards which occupation her birth and surroundings had tended. She was strong and enduring in her way, as were her husband and brothers in theirs. She could milk cows and make excellent butter, wasn't afraid of a turbulent heifer in the dairy herd, or indisposed to rise before daylight in the winter mornings and drive in the milkers through the wet or frozen grass. She could catch and saddle her own riding-horse or drive the spring cart along an indifferent road to the country town. She knew all about the rearing of calves, pigs, and poultry; could salt beef and cure bacon—in a general way attend to all the details of a farm. Her father had acquired a small grant in the early colonial days, and from its produce and profits reared a family of healthy boys and girls.

They had not been educated up to the State school standard now considered necessary for every dweller in town or country, but they could read and write decently; had also such knowledge of arithmetic as enabled them to keep their modest accounts. Such having been the early training of Bill's helpmate, it was a fair augury that, with luck and good conduct, they were as likely as any young couple of their age to prosper reasonably, so as eventually to acquire a competence, or even, as indeed not a few of their old friends and neighbours had done, to attain to that enviable position generally described as 'making a fortune.'

For the first few years nothing could have been more promising than the course of affairs at Chidowla or 'Appletree Flat,' as their homestead was formerly named, in consequence of the umbrageous growth of the 'angophora' in the meadow by the mountain creek, which bordered their farm. Bill stayed at home and worked steadily, until he had put in his