Page:In bad company and other stories.djvu/331

 their own then betake themselves to reaping. Billy May and Jack Windsor are quite as ready to back themselves against time in the wheat-field as on the shearing-floor. Harvest over, they find their pockets inconveniently full, so they commence to visit their friends and repay themselves for their toils by a liberal allowance of rest and recreation.

Old Ben and a few other specimens of the olden time get no further than the nearest public-house. Their cheques are handed to the landlord, and a 'sdubendous and derrible spree' sets in. At the end of a week or ten days, that worthy informs them that they have received liquor to the amount of their cheques—something over a hundred pounds—save the mark! They meekly acquiesce, as is their custom. The landlord generously presents them with a glass of grog each, and they take the road for the next shed.

The shearers being despatched, the sheep-washers, a smaller and less regarded force, file up. They number some forty men. Nothing more than fair bodily strength, willingness, and obedience being required in their case, they are more easy to get and replace than shearers. They are a varied and motley lot. That powerful and rather handsome man is a New Yorker, of Irish parentage. Next to him is a slight, neat, quiet individual. He had been a lieutenant in a line regiment. The lad in the rear was a Sandhurst cadet. Then came two navvies and a New Zealander, five Chinamen, a Frenchman, two Germans, Tin Pot, Jerry, and Wallaby—three aboriginal blacks. There are no invidious distinctions as to caste, colour, or nationality. Every one is a man and a brother at sheep-washing. Wage, one pound per week; wood, water, tents, and food provided. Their accounts are simple: so many weeks, so many pounds; store accounts, so much. Hospital? Well, five shillings. Cheque; good-morning.

The wool-pressers, the fleece-rollers, the fleece-pickers, the yardsmen, the washers' cooks, the hut cooks, the spare shepherds—all these and other supernumeraries, inevitable at shearing-time, having been paid off, the snowstorm of cheques which has been fluttering all day comes to an end. Mr. Gordon and the remaining sous-officiers go to rest that night with much of the mental strain removed, which has been telling on every waking moment for the last two months.

The long train of drays and waggons, with loads varying