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A sweat-dripping horse and a half-naked myall, And a message: 'Come out to the back of the run— Be out at the stake-yards by rising of sun! Ride hard and fail not! there's the devil to pay: For the men from Monkyra have mustered the run— Cows and calves, calves of ours, without ever a brand, Fifty head, if there's one, on the camp there they stand. Come out to the stake-yards, nor fail me, or by all The saints they'll be drafted and driven away!' Boot and saddle it was to the rolling of curses: Snatching whip, snatching spurs, where they hung on the nail. In his wrath old McIvor, head stockman, turned pale, Spitting oaths with his head 'neath the flap of his saddle, Taking up the last hole in the girth with his teeth; Then a hand on the pommel, a quick catch of breath, A lift of the body, a swing to the right— And, ten half-broken nags with ten riders astraddle, We sped, arrow-swift, for the heart of the night. Thud of hoofs! thud of hearts! breath of man! breath of beast! With M'Ivor in front, and the rest heel to flank, So we rode in a bunch down the steep river bank, 52