Page:The New Arcadia (Tucker).djvu/239

Rh "Well, this news from Queensland is not cheering. If I had gone in with my cousin, as he urged me to do, my fortune would be made at this minute. He writes—you have not read the letter yet—that the Artesian bore has struck water, and has converted the chain of dried-up holes into miles and miles of perpetually flowing streams."

"But did you not say it was costing £1 foot to sink the bore, and that they had got two thousand feet down in two places? Think of the risk and the expense," said the calculating wife.

"That's all over now. He's a made man! What's £5000 to pay for such a boon! Think of it—a river drawn from underground! Mitchell plains, with abundance of water, is the finest country on earth. The entire north of our continent will be fertilized in another few years by Artesian waters."

"Never mind, dear boy, you stayed here for my father's sake and for others——"

"Yes, and I'll see it through. But the pace is getting hot. I had a brush with some of the fellows this morning. They have no gratitude and no sense, and I, alas! little patience. See those flying-foxes sweeping down on the peaches—and those 'possums, too! 'Pon my word I must get my gun."

In a moment he returned with it. The foxes, like bats the size of bull-dogs, were darting about—ill-omened birds or beasts of night. Larry brought down two or three.

"Now why should God make such ugly, mischievous creatures?" he remarked, prodding an expiring fox with his gun. "Why link each pair of feet together so as to enable such uncanny flesh to fly and extend their depredations? So with some two-legged nuisances,