Page:While the Billy Boils, 1913.djvu/112

 better cooked. Pint-pot and sugar-bags are groped out and brought to the kitchen hut, and each man fills his pannikin; the Irishman keeps a thumb on the edge of his, so as to know when the pot is full, for it is very dark, and there is no more firewood. You soon know this way, especially if you are in the habit of pressing lighted tobacco down into your pipe with the top of your thumb. The old slush-lamps are all burnt out.

Each man feels for the mouth of his sugar-bag with one hand while he keeps the bearings of his pot with the other.

The Irishman has lost his match-box, and feels for it all over the table without success, He stoops down with his hands on his knees, gets the table-top on a level with the flicker of firelight, and 'moons' the object, as it were.

Time to turn in. It is very dark inside and bright moonlight without; and every crack seems like a ghost peering in.

Some of the men will roll up their swags on the morrow and depart; and some will take another day's spell. It is all according to the tucker.