As a matter of course, Bertie’s Nellie quietly gathered the reins of management into her own hands, and as a matter of course, Jimmy’s Nellie indulged in ear-splitting continuous protest, and Brown of the Bulls expressed himself as satisfied, so far, with the entertaining powers of the homestead.

As a matter of course, we left the servant problem to work out its own solution, and, also as a matter of course, the Sanguine Scot was full of plans for the future but particularly bubbling over with the news that he had secured Tam-o’-Shanter for a partner in the brumby venture.

“He’ll be along in a few days,” he explained, confident that he was “in luck this time all right,” and remembering Tam among the horses at the Katherine, we congratulated him.

As a matter of course, our conversation was all of brumbies, and Mac was also convinced that “when you reckoned everything up there was a good thing in it.”

“Of course it’ll take a bit of jumping round,” he agreed. But the Wet was to be devoted to the building of a strong holding-yard, a “trap,” and a “wing,” so as to be able to get going directly the Wet lifted; and knowing the run well, and the extent of the brumby mobs on it, Mac then and there set to work to calculate the “sized mob” that could be “got together after the Wet,” listening with interest to the account of our brumby encounters out east.

But long before we had done with brumbies Cheon was announcing dinner in his own peculiar way.

“Din-ner! Mis-sus! Boss! All about!” he chanted, standing in the open doorway nearest to us; and as we responded to his call, he held the door of the dining-net and glided into the details of his menu: “Veg-e-table Soooup!” he sang: “Ro-oast Bee-ef! Pee-es! Bee-ens! Too-mar-toos! Mar-row!” and listening, we felt Brown of the Bulls was being right royally welcomed with as many vegetables as were good for him. But the sweets shrank into a simple “bakee custard!”

“This is what you might call style!” Mac and Brown of the Bulls declared, as Cheon waved them to seats with the air of an Emperor, and for two courses the dinner went forward according to its menu, but at the third course tinned peaches had usurped the place of the “bakee custard.”

Every one looked surprised, but, being of the bush-folk, accepted peaches and cream without comment, until Cheon, seeing the surprise, and feeling an explanation was due—anyway to the missus—bent over her and whispered in a hoarse aside. “Pussy cat been tuck-out custard.”

For a moment the bushmen bent over their plates, intent on peaches and cream; but there is a limit to even a bushman’s dignity, and with a choking gulp Mac exploded, and Brown of the Bulls joining in with a roar dragged down the Măluka’s self-control; and as Cheon reiterated: “What name all about laugh, missus,” chuckled in sympathy himself. Brown of the Bulls pulled himself together for a moment, once more to assure us that he was “Satisfied so far.”

But the day’s entertainment was only just beginning for after comparing weights and heights, Mac, Jack, Dan and Brown of the Bulls, entered into a trial of strength, and a heavy rail having been brought down from the stackyard, the “caber” was tossed before an enthusiastic company. The homestead thoroughfare was the arena and around it stood or sat the onlookers: the Quarters travellers, Happy Dick, some of the Line Party, the Măluka, the missus, and others, and as the caber pitched and tossed, Cheon came and went, cheering every throw lustily with charming impartiality, beating up a frothy cake mixture the while, until, finally, the cakes being in the oven, he was drawn, with others, into the competition.

A very jaunty, confident Cheon entered the lists, but a very surprised, chagrined Cheon retired in high dudgeon. “What’s ’er matter!” he said indignantly. “Him too muchee heavy fellow. S’pose him little fellow me chuck him all right,” explaining a comical failure with even more comical explanations. Soon after the retirement of our crestfallen Cheon, hot cakes were served by a Cheon all rotundity and chuckles once more, but immediately afterwards, a snort of indignation riveted our attention on an exceedingly bristling, dignified Cheon, who was glaring across the enclosure at two of our neighbour’s black-boys, one of whom was the bearer of a letter, and the other, of a long yellow vegetable-marrow.

Right up to the house verandah they came, and the letter was presented to the Măluka, and the marrow to the missus in the presence of Cheon’s glare and an intense silence; for most of the bush-folk had heard of the cabbage insult. Cheon had seen to that.

“Hope you will wish me luck while enjoying my little gift,” said the letter, and mistaking its double meaning, I felt really vexed with our neighbour, and passing the marrow to Cheon, reflected a little of his bristling dignity as I said: “This is of no use to any one here, Cheon; you had better take it away”; and as Cheon accepted it with a grateful look, those about the verandah, and those without the garden, waited expectantly.

But there was to be no unseemly rage this time. In dignified silence Cheon received the marrow—a sinuous yellow insult, and as the homestead waited he raised it above his head, and stalking majestically from us towards the finished part of the fence, flung it from him in contemptuous scorn, adding a satisfied snort as the marrow, striking the base of a fence post, burst asunder, and the next moment, after a flashing swoop, he was grovelling under the wires, making frantic efforts to reach a baby bottle of whisky that had rolled from within the marrow away beyond the fence. “Cognac!” he gasped, as he struggled, and then, as shouts greeted his speedy success, he sat up, adding comically: “My word! Me close up smash him Cognac.” At the thought came his inevitable laughter, and as he leant against the fence post, surrounded by the shattered marrow, he sat hopelessly gurgling, and choking, and shaking, and hugging his bottle, the very picture of a dissolute old Bacchanalian. (Cheon would have excelled as a rapid change artist). And as Cheon gurgled, and spluttered, and shook, the homestead rocked with yells of delight, while Brown of the Bulls rolled and writhed in a canvas lounge, gasping between his shouts: “Oh, chase him away, somebody; cover him up. Where did you catch him?”

Finally Cheon scrambled to his feet, and, perspiring and exhausted, presented the bottle to the Măluka. “My word, me cross fellow!” he said weakly, and then, bubbling over again at the recollection, he chuckled: “Close up smash him Cognac all right.” And at the sound of the chuckle Brown of the Bulls broke out afresh:

“Chase him away!” he yelled. “You’ll kill me between you! I never struck such a place! Is it a circus or a Wild West Show?”

Gravely the Măluka accepted the bottle, and with the same mock gravity answered Brown of the Bulls. “It is neither, my man,” he said; “neither a circus, nor a Wild West Show. This is the land the poets sing about, the land where dull despair is king.”

Brown of the Bulls naturally wished “some of the poets were about now,” and Dan, having joined the house party, found a fitting opportunity to air one of his pet grievances.

“I’ve never done wishing some of them town chaps that write bush yarns ’ud come along and learn a thing or two,” he said. “Most of ’em seem to think that when we’re not on the drink we’re whipping the cat or committing suicide.” Rarely had Dan any excuse to offer for those “town chaps,” who, without troubling to learn “a thing or two,” first, depict the bush as a pandemonium of drunken orgies, painted women, low revenge, remorse, and suicide; but being in a more magnanimous mood than usual, as the men-folk flocked towards the Quarters he waited behind to add, unconscious of any irony: “Of course, seeing it’s what they’re used to in town, you can’t expect ’em to know any better.”

Then in the Quarters “Luck to our neighbour” was the toast—“luck,” and the hope that all his ventures might be as successfully carried through as his practical joke. After that the Măluka gravely proposed “Cheon,” and Cheon instantly became statuesque and dignified, to the further diversion of Brown of the Bulls—gravely accepting a thimbleful for himself, and, as gravely, drinking his own health, the Măluka just as gravely “clinking glasses” with him. And from that day to this when Cheon wishes to place the Măluka on a fitting pedestal, he ends his long, long tale with a triumphant: “Boss bin knock glass longa me one time.”

Happy Dick and Peter filled in time for the Quarters until sundown, when Cheon announced supper there with an inspired call of “Cognac!” And then, as if to prove that we are not always on the drink, or “whipping the cat, or committing suicide,” that we can love and live for others besides self, Neaves’ mate came down from the little rise beyond the slip-rails, where he had spent his day carving a headstone out of a rough slab of wood that now stood at the head of our sick traveller’s grave.

Not always on the drink, or whipping the cat, or committing suicide, but too often at the Parting of the Ways, for within another twelve hours the travellers, Happy Dick, the Line Party, Neaves’ mate, Brown of the Bulls, and Mac, had all gone or were going their ways, leaving us to go ours—Brown back to hold his bulls at the Red Lilies until further showers should open up all roads, and Mac to “pick up Tam.” But in the meantime Dan had become Showman of the Showers.

“See anything?” he asked, soon after sun-up, waving his hands towards the northern slip-rails, as we stood at the head of the thoroughfare speeding our parting guests; and then he drew attention to the faintest greenish tinge throughout the homestead enclosure—such a clean-washed-looking enclosure now.

“That’s going to be grass soon,” he said, and, the sun coming out with renewed vigour after another shower, by midday he had gathered a handful of tiny blades half an inch in length with a chuckling “What did I tell you?”

By the next midday, grass, inches tall, was rippling all around the homestead in the now prevalent northwest breeze, and Dan was preparing for a trip out-bush to see where the showers had fallen, and Mac and Tam coming in as he went out, Mac greeted us with a jocular: “The flats get greener every year about the Elsey.”

“Indeed!” we said, and Mac, overcome with confusion, spluttered an apology: “Oh, I say! Look here! I didn’t mean to hit off at the missus, you know!” and then catching the twinkle in Tam’s eyes, stopped short, and with a characteristic shrug “reckoned he was making a fair mess of things.”

Mac would never be other than our impetuous brither Scot, distinct from all other men, for the bush never robs her children of their individuality. In some mysterious way she clean-cuts out the personality of each of them, and keeps it sharply clean-cut; and just as Mac stood apart from all men, so Tam also stood apart, the quiet self-reliant man, though, we had seen among the horses, for that was the real man; and as Mac built castles, and made calculations, Tam put his shoulder to the drudgery, and before Mac quite knew what had happened, he was hauling logs and laying foundations for a brumby trap in the south-east country, while Bertie’s Nellie found herself obliged to divide her attention between the homestead and the brumby camp.

As Mac hauled and drudged, the melons paid their first dividend; half-past eleven four weeks drew near; “Just-So Stories” did all they could, and Dan coming in found the Quiet Stockman away back in the days of old, deep in a simply written volume of Scottish history.

Dan had great news of the showers, but had to find other audience than Jack, for he was away in a world all his own, and, bent over the little volume, was standing shoulder to shoulder with his Scottish fathers, fighting with them for his nation. All evening he followed where they led, enduring and suffering, and mourning with them and rejoicing over their final victory with a ringing “You can’t beat the Scots,” as the little volume, coming to with a bang, roused the Quarters at midnight.

“You can’t beat the Scots, missus!” he repeated, coming over in the morning for “more of that sort,” all unconscious how true he was to type, as he stood there, flushed with the victories of his forefathers, a strong, young Scot, with a newly conquered world of his own at his feet.

As we hunted for “more of that sort,” through a medley of odds and ends, the Quiet Stockman scanned titles and dipped here and there into unknown worlds, and Dan coming by, stared open-eyed.

“You don’t say he’s got the whole mob mouthed and reined and schooled in all the paces?” he gasped; but Jack put aside the word of praise. “There’s writing and spelling yet,” he said, and Dan, with his interest in book-learning reviving, watched the square chin setting squarer, and was bewildered. “Seems to have struck a mob of brumbies,” he commented.

But before Jack could “get properly going” with the brumbies, two travellers rode into the homestead, supporting between them a third rider, a man picked up off the track delirious with fever, and foodless; and at the sight of his ghastly face our hearts stood still with fear. But the man was one of the Scots—another Mac—of the race that loves a good fight, and his plucky heart stood by him so well that within twenty-four hours he was lying contentedly in the shade of the Quarters, looking on, while the homestead shared the Fizzer’s welcome with Mac and Tam and a traveller or two.

Out of the south came the Fizzer, lopping once more in his saddle, with the year’s dry stages behind him, and the set lines all gone from his shoulders, shouting as he came: “Hullo! What ho! Here’s a crowd of us!” but on his return trip the Fizzer was a man of leisure, and we had to wait for news until his camp was fixed up.

“Now for it!” he shouted, at last joining the company, and Mac felt the time was ripe for his jocular greeting and, ogling the Fizzer, noticed that “The flats get greener every year about the Elsey.”

But the Fizzer was a dangerous subject to joke with. “So I’ve noticed,” he shouted as, improving on Mac’s ogle, he singled him out from the company, then dropping his voice to an insinuating drawl he challenged him to have a deal.

Instantly the Sanguine Scot became a Canny Scot, for Mac prided himself on a horse-deal. And as no one had yet got the better of the Fizzer the company gathered round to enjoy itself.

“A swop,” suggested the Fizzer, and Mac agreeing with a “Right ho!” a preliminary hand-shake was exchanged before “getting to business”; and then, as each made a great presence of mentally reviewing his team, each eyed the other with the shrewdness of a fighting cock.

“My brown mare!” Mac offered at last, and knowing the staunch little beast, the homestead wondered what Mac had up his sleeve.

We explained our suspicions in asides to the travellers, but the Fizzer seemed taken by surprise. “By George!” he said. “She’s a stunner! I’ve nothing fit to put near her excepting that upstanding chestnut down there.”

The chestnut was standing near the creek-crossing, and every one knowing him well, and sure of that “something” up Mac’s sleeve, feared for the Fizzer as Mac’s hand came out with a “Done!” and the Fizzer gripped it with a clinching “Right ho!”

Naturally we waited for the dÉnouement, and the Fizzer appearing unsuspicious and well-pleased with the deal, we turned our attention to the Sanguine Scot.

Mac felt the unspoken flattery, and with an introductory cough, and a great show of indifference, said: “By the way! Perhaps I should have mentioned it, but the brown mare’s down with the puffs since the showers,” and looked around the company for approval.

But the Fizzer was filling the homestead with shoutings: “Don’t apologise,” he yelled. “That’s nothing! The chestnut’s just broken his leg; can’t think how he got here. This’ll save me the trouble of shooting him.” Then dropping back to that chuckling drawl, and re-assuming the ogle, he added: “The—flats—get—greener—every—year—about—the Elsey,” and with a good-humoured laugh Mac asked if “any other gentleman felt on for a swop.”

Naturally, for a while the conversation was all of horse deals, until, Happy Dick coming in, it turned as naturally to dog-fights as Peter and Brown stalked aggressively about the thoroughfare.

Daily we hinted to Happy Dick that Peter’s welcome was wearing out, and daily Happy Dick assured us that he “couldn’t keep him away nohow.” But then Happy Dick’s efforts to keep him away were peculiar, taking the form of monologues as Peter trotted beside him towards the homestead—reiterations of:

“We’re not the sort to say nuff, are we, Peter? We’ll never say die, will we, Peter? We’ll win if we don’t lose, won’t we, Peter?” Adding, after his arrival at the homestead, a subdued “S—s—ss, go it, Peter!” whenever Brown appeared in the thoroughfare.

But the homestead’s hour of triumph was at hand, for as the afternoon wore on, Happy Dick found the very best told recital a poor substitute for the real thing, and thirsting for a further “Peter’s latest,” hissed: “S—ss—s, go it, Peter!” once too often. For, well, soon afterwards—figuratively speaking—Peter was carried off the field on a stretcher.

True, Brown had only one sound leg left to stand on, but by propping the other three carefully against it, he managed to cut a fairly triumphant figure. But Brown’s victory was not to be all advantage to the homestead, for never again were we to hear “Peter’s latest.”

“Can’t beat the Elsey for a good dog-fight! Can you, Peter?” the Fizzer chuckled, as Peter lay licking his wounds at Happy Dick’s feet; but the Quarters, feeling the pleasantry ill-timed, delicately led the conversation to cribbage, and at sun-up next morning Happy Dick “did a get” to his work, with bulging pockets, leaving the Fizzer packing up and declaring that “half a day at the Elsey gave a man a fresh start.”

But Dan also was packing up—a “duplicate” brought in by the Fizzer having necessitated his presence in Darwin, and as he packed up he assured us he would be back in time for the Christmas celebrations, even if he had to swim for it but before he left he paid a farewell visit to the Christmas dinner. “In case of accidents,” he explained, “mightn’t see it again. Looks like another case of one apiece,” he added, surveying with interest the plumpness of six young pullets Cheon was cherishing under a coop.

“Must have pullet longa Clisymus,” Cheon had said, and all readily agreeing, “Of course!” he had added “must have really good Clisymus”; and another hearty “Of course” convincing him we were at one with him in the matter of Christmas, he entered into details.

“Must have big poodinn, and almond, and Clisymus cake, and mince pie,” he chuckled, and then after confiding to us that he had heard of the prospective glories of a Christmas dinner at the Pine Creek “Pub.,” the heathen among us urged us to do honour to the Christian festival.

“Must have top-fellow Clisymus longa Elsey,” he said, and even more heartily we agreed, “of course,” giving Cheon carte blanche to order everything as he wished us to have it. “We were there to command,” we assured him; and accepting our services, Cheon opened the ball by sending the Dandy in to the Katherine on a flying visit to do a little shopping, and, pending the Dandy’s return we sat down and made plans.

The House and the Quarters should join forces that day, Cheon suggested, and dine under the eastern verandah “No good two-fellow dinner longa Clisymus,” he said. And the blacks, too, must be regaled in their humpy. “Must have Vealer longa black fellow Clisymus,” Cheon ordered, and Jack’s services being bespoken for Christmas Eve, to “round up a Vealer,” it was decided to add a haunch of “Vealer” to our menu as a trump card—Vealers being rarities at Pine Creek. Our only regret was that we lived too far from civilisation to secure a ham. Pine Creek would certainly have a ham; but we had a Vealer and faith in Cheon, and waited expectantly for the Dandy, sure the Elsey would “come out top-fellow.”

And as we waited for the Dandy, the Line Party moved on to our northern boundary, taking with it possible Christmas guests; the Fizzer came in and went on, to face a “merry Christmas with damper and beef served in style on a pack-bag,” also regretting empty mail-bags—the Southern mail having been delayed en route. Tam and the Sanguine Scot accepted invitations to the Christmas dinner; and the Wet broke in one terrific thunderclap, as the heavens, opening, emptied a deluge over us.

In that mighty thunderclap the Wet rushed upon us with a roar of falling waters, and with them Billy Muck appeared at the house verandah dripping like a beaver, to claim further credit.

“Well?” he said again, “Me rainmaker, eh?” and the Măluka shouted above the roar and din:

“You’re the boy for my money, Billy! Keep her going!” and Billy kept her going to such purpose that by sun-up the billabong was a banker, Cheon was moving over the face of the earth with the buoyancy of a child’s balloon, and Billy had five inches of rain to his credit. (So far, eleven inches was the Territory record for one night). Also the fringe of birds was back at the billabong, having returned with as little warning as it had left, and once more its ceaseless chatter became the undertone of the homestead.

At sun-up Cheon had us in his garden, sure now that Pine Creek could not possibly outdo us in vegetables and the Dandy coming in with every commission fulfilled we felt ham was a mere detail.

But Cheon’s cup of happiness was to brim over that day, for after answering every question hurled at him, the Dandy sang cheerfully: “He put in his thumb and pulled out a plum,” and dragged forth a ham from its hiding-place, with a laughing, “What a good boy am I.”

With a swoop Cheon was on it, and the Dandy, trying to regain it, said, “Here, hold hard! I’ve to present it to the missus with a bow and the compliments of Mine Host.” But Cheon would not part with it, and so the missus had the bow and the compliments, and Cheon the ham.

Lovingly he patted it and asked us if there ever was such a ham? or ever such a wonderful man as Mine Host? or ever such a fortunate woman as the missus? Had any other woman such a ham or such a friend in need? And bubbling over with affection for the whole world, he sent Jackeroo off for mistletoe, and presently the ham, all brave in Christmas finery, was hanging like a gay wedding-bell in the kitchen doorway. Then the kitchen had to be decorated, also in mistletoe, to make a fitting setting for the ham, and after that the fiat went forth. No one need expect either eggs or cream before “Clisymus”—excepting, of course, the sick Mac—he must be kept in condition to do justice to our “Clisymus” fare.

What a week it was—all festivities, and meagre fare, and whirring egg-beaters, and thunderstorms, and downpours, and water-melon dividends, and daily visits to the vegetable patch; where Happy Dick was assured, during a flying visit, that we were sure of seven varieties of vegetables for “Clisymus.”

But alas for human certainty! Even then swarms of grasshoppers were speeding towards us, and by sundown were with us.

In vain Cheon and the staff, the rejected, Bett-Bett, every shadow and the missus, danced war-dances in the vegetable patch, and chivied and chased, and flew all ways at once; the grasshoppers had found green stuff exactly to their liking, and coming in clouds, settled, and feasted, and flew upwards, and settled back, and feasted, and swept on, leaving poor Cheon’s heart as barren of hope as the garden was of vegetables. Nothing remained but pumpkins, sweet potatoes, and Cheon’s tardy watermelons, and the sight of the glaring blotches of pumpkins filled Cheon with fury.

“Pumpee-kin for Clisymus!” he raved, kicking furiously at the hideous wens. Not if he knew it! and going to some stores left in our care by the Line Party, he openly stole several tins of preserved vegetables. “Must have vegetable longa Clisymus,” he said, feeling his theft amply justified by circumstances, but salved his conscience by sending a gift of eggs to the Line Party as a donation towards its “Clisymus.”

Then finding every one sympathetic, he broached a delicate subject. By some freak of chance, he said, the missus was the only person who had succeeded in growing good melons this year, and taking her to the melon beds, which the grasshoppers had also passed by, he looked longingly at three great fruits that lay like mossy green boulders among the rich foliage. “Just chance,” he reiterated, and surely the missus would see that chance also favoured our “Clisymus.” “A Clisymus without dessert would be no Clisymus at all,” he continued, pressing each fruit in turn between loving hands until it squeaked in response. “Him close up ripe, missus. Him sing out!” he said, translating the squeak.

But the missus appeared strangely inattentive, and in desperation Cheon humbled himself and apologised handsomely for former scoffings. Not chance, he said, but genius! Never was there white woman like the missus! “Him savey all about,” he assured the Măluka. “Him plenty savey gardin.” Further, she was a woman in a thousand! A woman all China would bow down to! Worth ninety-one-hundred pounds in any Chinese matrimonial market. “A valuable asset,” the Măluka murmured.

It was impossible to stand against such flattery. Billy Muck was hastily consulted, and out of his generous heart voted two of the mossy boulders to the white folk, keeping only one for “black fellow all about.” Poor old Billy! He was to pay dearly for his leaning to the white folk.

Nothing was amiss now but Dan’s non-appearance; and the egg-beater whirring merrily on, by Christmas Eve, the Dandy and Jack, coming in with wild duck for breakfast and the Vealer, found the kitchen full of triumphs and Cheon wrestling with an immense pudding. “Four dozen egg sit down,” he chuckled, beating at the mixture. “One bottle port wine, almond, raisin, all about, more better’n Pine Creek all right”; and the homestead taking a turn at the beating “for luck,” assured him that it “knocked spots off Pine Creek.”

“Must have money longa poodin’!” Cheon added, and our wealth lying also in a cheque book, it was not until after a careful hunt that two threepenny bits were produced, when one, with a hole in it, went in “for luck,” and the other followed as an omen for wealth.

The threepenny bits safely in, it took the united efforts of the homestead to get the pudding into a cloth and thence into a boiler, while Cheon explained that it would have been larger if only we had had a larger boiler to hold it. As it was, it had to be boiled out in the open, away from the buildings, where Cheon had constructed an ingenious trench to protect the fire from rain and wind.

Four dozen eggs in a pudding necessitates an all-night boiling, and because of this we offered to share “watches” with Cheon, but were routed in a body. “We were better in bed,” he said. What would happen to his dinner if any one’s appetite failed for want of rest? There were too few of us as it was, and, besides, he would have to stay up all night in any case, for the mince pies were yet to be made, in addition to brownie and another plum-pudding for the “boys,” to say nothing of the hop-beer, which if made too soon would turn with the thunder and if made too late would not “jump up” in time. He did not add that he would have trusted no mortal with the care of the fires that night.

He did add, however, that it would be as well to dispatch the Vealer over night, and that an early move (about fowl-sing-out) would not be amiss; and, always obedient to Cheon’s will, we all turned in, in good time, and becoming drowsy, dreamed of “watching” great mobs of Vealers, with each Vealer endowed with a plum-pudding for a head.