The Quiet Stockman was a Scotchman, and, like many Scotchmen, a strange contradiction of shy reserve and quiet, dignified self-assurance. Having made up his mind on women in general, he saw no reason for changing it; and as he went about his work, thoroughly and systematically avoided me. There was no slinking round corners though; Jack couldn’t slink. He had always looked the whole world in the face with his honest blue eyes, and could never do otherwise. He only took care that our paths did not cross more often than was absolutely necessary; but when they did, his Scotch dignity asserted itself, and he said what had to be said with quiet self-possession, although he invariably moved away as soon as possible.

“It’s just Jack’s way,” the Sanguine Scot said, anxious that his fellow Scot should not be misunderstood. “He’ll be all there if ever you need him. He only draws the line at conversations.”

But when I mounted the stockyard fence one morning, to see the breaking-in of the colts, he looked as though he “drew the line” at that too.

Fortunately for Jack’s peace of mind, horse-breaking was not the only novelty at the homestead. Only a couple of changes of everything, in a tropical climate, meant an unbroken cycle of washing-days, while, apart from that, Sam Lee was full of surprises, and the lubras’ methods of house-cleaning were novel in the extreme.

Sam was bland, amiable, and inscrutable, and obedient to irritation; and the lubras were apt, and merry, and open-hearted, and wayward beyond comprehension. Sam did exactly as he was told, and the lubras did exactly as they thought fit, and the results were equally disconcerting.

Sam was asked for a glass of milk, and the lubras were told to scrub the floor. Sam brought the milk immediately, and the lubras, after scrubbing two or three isolated patches on the floor, went off on some frolic of their own.

At afternoon tea there was no milk served. “There was none,” Sam explained blandly. “The missus had drunk it all. Missus bin finissem milk all about,” he said When the lubras were brought back,theysaidtheyhad “knocked up longa scrub,” and finished the floor under protest.

The Măluka offered assistance; but I thought I ought to manage them myself, and set the lubras to clean and strip some feathers for a pillow—the Măluka had been busy with a shot-gun—and suggested to Sam that he might spend some of his spare time shooting birds.

Mac had been right when he said the place was stiff with birds. A deep fringe of birds was constantly moving in and about and around the billabong; and the perpetual clatter of the plovers and waders formed an undercurrent to the life at the homestead.

The lubras worked steadily for a quarter of an hour at the feathers; then a dog-fight demanding all their attention, the feathers were left to the mercy of the winds, and were never gathered together. At sundown Sam fired into a colony of martins that Mac considered the luck of the homestead. Right into their midst he fired, as they slept in long, graceful garlands one beside the other along the branches of a gum-tree, each with its head snugly tucked away out of sight.

“Missus want feather!” Sam said, with his unfathomable smile, when Mac flared out at him, and again the missus appeared the culprit.

The Măluka advised making the orders a little clearer, and Sam was told to use more discretion in his obedience, and, smiling and apologetic, promised to obey.

The lubras also promised to be more painstaking, reserving only the right to rest if they should “knock up longa work.”

The Măluka, Mac and the Dandy, looked on in amusement while the missus wrestled with the servant question; and even the Quiet Stockman grinned sympathetically at times, unconsciously becoming interested in a woman who was too occupied to ask questions.

For five days I “wrestled”; and the only comfort I had was in Bertie’s Nellie, a gentle-faced old lubra—almost sweet-faced. She undoubtedly did her best, and, showing signs of friendship, was invaluable in “rounding up” the other lubras when they showed signs of “knocking up.”

On the morning of the sixth day Sam surpassed himself in obedience. I had hinted that breakfast should be a little earlier, adding timidly that he might use a little more ingenuity in the breakfast menu, and at the first grey streak of dawn breakfast was announced, and, dressing hurriedly, we sat down to what Sam called “Pump-pie-King pie with raisins and mince.” The expression on Sam’s face was celestial. No other word could describe it. There was also an underlying expression of triumph which made me suspicious of his apparent ingenuousness, and as the lubras had done little else but make faces at themselves in the looking-glass for two days (I was beginning to hate that looking-glass), I appealed to the Măluka for assistance.

He took Sam in hand, and the triumph slipped away from beneath the stolid face, and a certain amount of discrimination crept into his obedience from henceforth.

Then the Sanguine Scot said that he would “tackle the lubras for her,” and in half an hour everywhere was swept and garnished, and the lubras were meek and submissive.

“You’ll need to rule them with a rod of iron,” Mac said, secretly pleased with his success. But there was one drawback to his methods, for next day, with the exception of Nellie, there were no lubras to rule with or without a rod of iron.

Jimmy, the water-carrier and general director of the woodheap gossip, explained that they had gone off with the camp lubras for a day’s recreation; “Him knock up longa all about work,” he said, with an apologetic smile. Jimmy was either apologetic or condescending.

Nellie rounded them up when they returned, and the Măluka suggested, as a way out of the difficulty, that I should try to make myself more attractive than the camp lubras, which Mac said “shouldn’t be difficult,” and then coughed, doubtful of the compliment.

I went down to the Creek at once to carry out the Măluka’s suggestion, and succeeded so well that I was soon the centre of a delighted dusky group, squatting on its haunches, and deep in fascinations of teaching an outsider its language. The uncouth mispronunciations tickled the old men beyond description, and they kept me gurgling at difficult gutturals, until, convulsed at the contortion of everyday words and phrases, they echoed Dan’s opinion in queer pidgin-English that the “missus needed a deal of education.” Jimmy gradually became loftily condescending, and as for old Nellie, she had never enjoyed anything quite so much.

Undoubtedly I made myself attractive to the blackfellow mind; for, besides having proved an unexpected entertainment, I had made every one feel mightily superior to the missus. That power of inspiring others with a sense of superiority is an excellent trait to possess when dealing with a black fellow, for there were more than enough helpers next day, and the work was done quickly and well, so as to leave plenty of time for merry-making.

The Măluka and Mac were full of congratulations. “You’ve got the mob well in hand now,” Mac said, unconscious that he was about to throw everything into disorder again.

For six years Mac had been in charge of the station, and when he heard that the Măluka was coming north to represent the owners, he had decided to give bullock-punching a turn as a change from stock-keeping. Sanguine that “there was a good thing in it,” he had bought a bullock waggon and team while in at the Katherine, and secured “loading” for “inside.” Under these circumstances it was difficult to understand why he had been so determined in his blocking, the only reason he could ever be cajoled into giving being “that he was off the escorting trick, and, besides, the other chaps had to be thought of.”

He was now about to go to “see to things,” taking Bertie, his right-hand boy, with him, but leaving Nellie with me. Bertie had expressed himself quite agreeable to the arrangement, but at the eleventh hour refused to go without Nellie; and Nellie, preferring the now fascinating homestead to the company of her lord and master, refused to go with him, and Mac was at his wits’ end.

It was impossible to carry her off by force, so two days were spent in shrill ear-splitting arguments the threads of Nellie’s argument being that Bertie could easily “catch nuzzer lubra,” and that the missus “must have one good fellow lubra on the staff.”

Mac, always chivalrous, said he would manage somehow without Bertie, rather than “upset things”; but the Măluka would not agree, and finally Nellie consented to go, on condition that she would be left at the homestead when the waggons went through.

Then Mac came and confessed a long-kept secret. Roper belonged to the station, and he had no claim on him beyond fellowship. “I’ve ridden him ever since I came here, that’s all,” he said, his arm thrown across the old horse. “I’d have stuck to him somehow, fair means or foul, if I hadn’t seen you know how to treat a good horse.”

The Măluka instantly offered fair means, but Mac shook his head. “Let the missus have him,” he said, “and they’ll both have a good time. But I’m first offer when it comes to selling.” So the grand old horse was passed over to me to be numbered among the staunchest and truest of friends.

“Oh, well,” Mac said in good-bye. “All’s well that end’s well,” and he pointed to Nellie, safely stowed away in a grove of dogs that half filled the back of the buck-board.

But all had not ended for us. So many lubras put themselves on the homestead staff to fill the place left vacant by Nellie, that the one room was filled to overflowing while the work was being done, and the Măluka was obliged to come to the rescue once more. He reduced the house staff to two, allowing a shadow or two extra in the persons of a few old black fellows and a piccaninny or two, sending the rejected to camp.

In the morning there was a free fight in camp between the staff and some of the camp lubras, the rejected, led by Jimmy’s lubra—another Nellie—declaring the Măluka had meant two different lubras each day.

Again there was much ear-splitting argument, but finally a compromise was agreed on. Two lubras were to sit down permanently, while as many as wished might help with the washing and watering. Then the staff and the shadows settled down on the verandah beside me to watch while I evolved dresses for two lubras out of next to nothing in the way of material, and as I sewed, the Măluka, with some travellers who were “in” to help him, set to work to evolve a garden also out of next to nothing in the way of material.

Hopeless as it looked, oblong beds were soon marked out at each of the four corners of the verandah, and beyond the beds a broad path was made to run right round the House. “The wilderness shall blossom like the rose,” the Măluka said, planting seeds of a vigorous-growing flowering bean at one of the corner posts.

The travellers were deeply interested in the servant wrestle, and when the Staff was eventually clothed, and the rejected green with envy, decided that the “whole difficulty was solved, bar Sam.”

Sam, however, was about to solve his part of the difficulty to every one’s satisfaction. A master as particular over the men’s table as his own was not a master after Sam’s heart, so he came to the Măluka, and announced, in the peculiar manner of Chinese cooks, that he was about to write for a new cook for the station, who would probably arrive within six weeks, when Sam, having installed him to our satisfaction, would, with our permission, leave our service.

The permission was graciously given, and as Sam retired we longed to tell him to engage some one renowned for his disobedience. We fancied later that our willingness piqued Sam, for after giving notice he bestirred himself to such an extent that one of our visitors tried to secure his services for himself, convinced we were throwing away a treasure.

In that fortnight we had several visitors, travellers passing through the station, and as each stayed a day or two, a few of the visits overlapped, and some merry hours were spent in the little homestead.

Some of the guests knew beforehand of the arrival of a missus at the station, and came ready groomed from their last camp; but others only heard of her arrival when inside the homestead enclosure, and there was a great application of soap, and razors, and towels before they considered themselves fit for presentation.

With only one room at our disposal it would seem to the uninitiated that the accommodation of the homestead must have been strained to bursting point; but “out-bush” every man carries a “bluey” and a mosquito net in his swag, and as the hosts slept under the verandah, and the guests on the garden paths, or in their camps among the forest trees, spare rooms would only have been superfluous. With a billabong at the door, a bathroom was easily dispensed with; and as every one preferred the roomy verandahs for lounging and smoking, the House had only to act as a dressing-room for the hosts and a dining-room for all.

The meals, of course, were served on the dining-table; but no apology seemed necessary for the presence of a four-poster bed and a washing stand in the reception-room. They were there, and our guests knew why they were there, and words, like the spare rooms, would have been superfluous.

Breakfast at sun-up or thereabouts, dinner at noon and supper at sun-down, is the long-established routine of meals on all cattle-runs of the Never-Never, and at all three meals Sam waited, bland and smiling.

The missus, of course, had one of the china cups, and the guests enamel ware; and the flies hovering everywhere in dense clouds, saucers rested on the top of the cups by common consent. Bread, scones, and such thing were covered over with serviettes throughout all meals while hands were kept busy “shooing” flies out of prospective mouthfuls.

Everything lacked conventionality, and was accepted as a matter of course; and although at times Sam sorely taxed my gravity by using the bed for a temporary dumb waiter, the bushmen showed no embarrassment, simply because they felt none, and retained their self-possession with unconscious dignity. They sat among the buzzing swarms of flies, light-hearted and self-reliant, chatting of their daily lives of lonely vigils, of cattle-camps and stampedes, of dangers and privations, and I listened with a dawning consciousness that life “out-bush” is something more than mere existence.

Being within four miles of the Overland Telegraph—that backbone of the overland route—rarely a week was to pass without someone coming in, and at times our travellers came in twos and threes, and as each brought news of that world outside our tiny circle, carrying in perhaps an extra mail to us, or one out for us, they formed a strong link in the chain that bound us to Outside.

In them every rank in bush life was represented, from cattle-drovers and stockmen to the owners of stations, from swag-men and men “down in their luck” to telegraph operators and heads of government departments, men of various nationalities with, foremost among them, the Scots, sons of that fighting race that has everywhere fought with and conquered the Australian bush. Yet, whatever their rank or race, our travellers were men, not riff-raff; the long, formidable stages that wall in the Never-Never have seen to that, turning back the weaklings and worthless to the flesh-pots of Egypt, and proving the worth and mettle of the brave-hearted: all men, every one of them, and all in need of a little hospitality, whether of the prosperous and well-doing or “down in their luck,” and each was welcomed according to that need; for out-bush rank counts for little: we are only men and women there. And all who came in, and went on, or remained, gave us of their best while with us; for there was that in the Măluka that drew the best out of all men. In life we generally find in our fellow-men just what we seek, and the Măluka, seeking only the good, found only the good and drew much of it into his own sympathetic, sunny nature. He demanded the best and was given the best, and while with him, men found they were better men than at other times.

Some of our guests sat with us at table, some with the men, and some “grubbed in their camps.” All of them rode in strangers and many of them rode out life-long friends, for such is the way of the bushfolk: a little hospitality, a day or two of mutual understanding, and we have become part of the other’s life. For bush hospitality is something better than the bare housing and feeding of guests, being just the simple sharing of our daily lives with a fellow-man—a literal sharing of all that we have; of our plenty or scarcity, our joys or sorrows, our comforts or discomforts, our security or danger; a democratic hospitality, where all men are equally welcome, yet so refined in its simplicity and wholesomeness, that fulsome thanks or vulgar apologies have no part in it, although it was whispered among the bushfolk that those “down in their luck” learned that when the Măluka was filling tucker-bags, a timely word in praise of the missus filled tucker-bags to over-flowing.

Two hundred and fifty guests was the tally for that year, and earliest among them came a telegraph operator, who as is the way with telegraphic operators out-bush invited us to “ride across to the wire for a shake hands with Outside”; and within an hour we came in sight of the telegraph wire as our horses mounted the stony ridge that overlooks the Warloch ponds, when the wire was forgotten for a moment in the kaleidoscope of moving, ever-changing colour that met our eyes.

Two wide-spreading limpid ponds, the Warloch lay before us, veiled in a glory of golden-flecked heliotrope and purple water-lilies, and floating deep green leaves, with here and there gleaming little seas of water, opening out among the lilies, and standing knee-deep in the margins a rustling fringe of light reeds and giant bulrushes. All round the ponds stood dark groves of pandanus palms, and among and beyond the palms tall grasses and forest trees, with here and there a spreading colabar festooned from summit to trunk with brilliant crimson strands of mistletoe, and here and there a gaunt dead old giant of the forest, and everywhere above and beyond the timber deep sunny blue and flooding sunshine. Sunny blue reflected, with the gaunt old trees, in the tiny gleaming seas among the lilies, while everywhere upon the floating leaves myriads and myriads of grey and pink “gallah” parrots and sulphur-crested cockatoos preened feathers, or rested, sipping at the water—grey and pink verging to heliotrope and snowy white, touched here and there with gold, blending, flower-like, with the golden-flecked glory of the lilies.

For a moment we waited, spell-bound in the brilliant sunshine; then the dogs running down to the water’s edge, the gallahs and cockatoos rose with gorgeous sunrise effect: a floating gray-and-pink cloud, backed by sunlit flashing white. Direct to the forest trees they floated and, settling there in their myriads, as by a miracle the gaunt, gnarled old giants of the bush all over blossomed with garlands of grey, and pink, and white, and gold.

But the operator, being unpoetical, had ridden on to the “wire,” and presently was “shinning up” one of its slender galvanised iron posts as a preliminary to the “handshake”; for tapping the line being part of the routine of a telegraph operator in the Territory, “shinning up posts,” is one of his necessary accomplishments.

In town, dust, and haste, and littered papers, and nerve-racking bustle seem indispensable to the sending of a telegram; but when the bush-folk “shake hands” with Outside all is sunshine and restfulness, soft beauty and leisurely peace. With the murmuring bush about us, in the clear space kept always cleared beneath those quivering wires, we stood all dressed in white, first looking up at the operator as, clinging to his pole, he tapped the line, and then looking down at him as he knelt at our feet with his tiny transmitter beside him clicking out our message to the south folk. And as we stood, with our horses’ bridles over our arms and the horses nibbling at the sweet grasses, in touch with the world in spite of our isolation, a gorgeous butterfly rested for a brief space on the tiny instrument, with gently swaying purple wings, and away in the great world men were sending telegrams amid clatter and dust, unconscious of that tiny group of bushfolk, or that Nature, who does all things well, can beautify even the sending of a telegram.

In the heart of the bush we stood yet listening to the clatter of the townsfolk, for, business over, the little clicking instrument was gossiping cheerily with us—the telegraph wire in the Territory being such a friendly wire. Daily it gathers gossip, and daily whispers it up and down the line, and daily news and gossip fly hither and thither: who’s “inside,” who has gone out, whom to expect, where the mailman is, the newest arrival in Darwin and the latest rainfall at Powell’s Creek.

Daily the telegraph people hear all the news of the Territory, and in due course give the news to the public, when the travellers gathering it, carry it out to the bushfolk, scattering it broadcast, until everybody knows every one else, and all his business and where it has taken him; and because of that knowledge, and in spite of those hundreds of thousands of square miles of bushland, the people of the Territory are held together in one great brotherhood.

Among various items of news the little instrument told us that Dan was “packing up for the return trip”; and in a day or two he came in, bringing a packet of garden seeds and a china teapot from Mine Host, Southern letters from the telegraph, and, from little Johnny, news that he was getting tools together and would be along in no time.

Being in one of his whimsical moods, Dan withheld congratulations.

“I’ve been thinking things over, boss,” he said, assuming his most philosophical manner “and I reckon any more rooms’ll only interfere with getting the missus educated.”

Later on he used the servant question to hang his argument on. “Just proves what I was saying” he said. “If the cleaning of one room causes all this trouble and worry, where’ll she be when she’s got four to look after? What with white ants, and blue mould, and mildew, and wrestling with lubras, there won’t be one minute to spare for education.”

He also professed disapproval of the Măluka’s devices for making the homestead more habitable. “If this goes on we’ll never learn her nothing but loafin’,” he declared when he found that a couple of yards of canvas and a few sticks had become a comfortable lounge chair. “Too much luxury!” and he sat down on his own heels to show how he scorned luxuries. A tree sawn into short lengths to provide verandah seats for all comers he passed over as doubtful. He was slightly reassured however, when he heard that my revolver practice had not been neglected, and condescended to own that some of the devices were “handy enough.” A neat little tray, made from the end of a packing-case and a few laths, interested him in particular. “You’ll get him dodged for ideas one of these days,” he said, alluding to the Măluka’s ingenuity, and when, a day or two later, I broke the spring of my watch and asked helplessly, “However was I going to tell the time till the waggons came with the clock?” Dan felt sure I had set an unsolvable problem.

“That ’ud get anybody dodged,” he declared; but it took more than that to “dodge” the Măluka’s resourcefulness. He spent a little while in the sun with a compass and a few wooden pegs, and a sundial lay on the ground just outside the verandah.

Dan declared it just “licked creation,” and wondered if “that ’ud settle ’em,” when I asked for some strong iron rings for a curtain. But the Dandy took a hobble chain to the forge, and breaking the links asunder, welded them into smooth round rings.

The need for curtain rings was very pressing, for, scanty as it was, the publicity of our wardrobe hanging in one corner of the reception room distressed me, but with the Dandy’s rings and a chequered rug for curtain, a corner wardrobe was soon fixed up.

Dan looked at it askance, and harked back to the sundial and education. “It’s ’cute enough,” he said. “But it won’t do, boss. She should have been taught how to tell the time by the sun. Don’t you let ’em spoil your chances of education, missus. You were in luck when you struck this place; never saw luck to equal it. And if it holds good, something’ll happen to stop you from ever having a house, so as to get you properly educated.”

My luck “held good” for the time being; for when Johnny came along in a few days he announced, in answer to a very warm welcome, that “something had gone wrong at No. 3 Well” and that “he’d promised to see to it at once.”

“Oh, Johnny!” I cried reproachfully, but the next moment was “toeing the line” even to the Head Stockman’s satisfaction; for with a look of surprise Johnny had added: “I—I thought you’d reckon that travellers’ water for the Dry came before your rooms.” Out-bush we deal in hard facts.

“Thought I’d reckon!” I said, appalled to think my comfort should even be spoken of when men’s lives were in question. “Of course I do; I didn’t understand, that was all.”

“We haven’t finished her education yet,” Dan explained, and the Măluka added, “But she’s learning.”

Johnny looked perplexed. “Oh, well! That’s all right, then,” he said, rather ambiguously. “I’ll be back as soon as possible, and then we shan’t be long.”

Two days later he left the homestead bound for the well, and as he disappeared into the Ti-Tree that bordered the south track, most of us agreed that “luck was out.” Only Dan professed to think differently. “It’s more wonderful than ever,” he declared; “more wonderful than ever, and if it holds good we’ll never see Johnny again.”