Books: On Our Selection
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Steele Rudd (Arthur Hoey Davis) >> On Our Selection
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But we had a lot to feel thankful for. Besides a sympathetic mother,
every other facility was afforded us to become accomplished. Abundance of
freedom; enthusiastic sisters; and no matter how things were going--whether
the corn would n't come up, or the wheat had failed, or the pumpkins had
given out, or the water-hole run dry--we always had a concertina in the
house. It never failed to attract company. Paddy Maloney and the
well-sinkers, after belting and blasting all day long, used to drop in at
night, and throw the table outside, and take the girls up, and prance
about the floor with them till all hours.
Nearly every week Mother gave a ball. It might have been every night only
for Dad. He said the jumping about destroyed the ground-floor--wore it
away and made the room like a well. And whenever it rained hard and the
water rushed in he had to bail it out. Dad always looked on the dark side
of things. He had no ear for music either. His want of appreciation of
melody often made the home miserable when it might have been the merriest
on earth. Sometimes it happened that he had to throw down the plough-reins
for half-an-hour or so to run round the wheat-paddock after a horse or an
old cow; then, if he found Dave, or Sal, or any of us, sitting inside
playing the concertina when he came to get a drink, he would nearly go mad.
"Can't y' find anything better t' do than everlastingly playing at that
damn thing?" he would shout. And if we did n't put the instrument down
immediately he would tear it from our hands and pitch it outside. If we
DID lay it down quietly he would snatch it up and heave it out just as
hard. The next evening he would devote all his time to patching the
fragments together with sealing-wax.
Still, despite Dad's antagonism, we all turned out good players. It cost
us nothing either. We learnt from each other. Kate was the first that
learnt. SHE taught Sal. Sal taught Dave, and so on. Sandy Taylor was
Kate's tutor. He passed our place every evening going to his selection,
where he used to sleep at night (fulfilling conditions), and always
stopped at the fence to yarn with Kate about dancing. Sandy was a fine
dancer himself, very light on his feet and easy to waltz with--so the
girls made out. When the dancing subject was exhausted Sandy would drag
some hair out of his horse's mane and say, "How's the concertina?" "It's
in there," Kate would answer. Then turning round she would call out,
"J--OE, bring the concer'."
In an instant Joe would strut along with it. And Sandy, for the fiftieth
time, would examine it and laugh at the kangaroo-skin straps that Dave had
tacked to it, and the scraps of brown paper that were plastered over the
ribs of it to keep the wind in; and, cocking his left leg over the pommel
of his saddle, he would sound a full blast on it as a preliminary. Then
he would strike up "The Rocky Road to Dublin", or "The Wind Among the
Barley,", or some other beautiful air, and grind away untiringly until it
got dark--until mother came and asked him if he would n't come in and have
supper. Of course, he always would. After supper he would play some more.
Then there would be a dance.
A ball was to be held at Anderson's one Friday night, and only Kate and
Dave were asked from our place. Dave was very pleased to be invited; it
was the first time he had been asked anywhere, and he began to practise
vigorously. The evening before the ball Dad sent him to put the draught
horses in the top paddock. He went off merrily with them. The sun was
just going down when he let them go, and save the noise of the birds
settling to rest the paddock was quiet. Dave was filled with emotion and
enthusiastic thoughts about the ball.
He threw the winkers down and looked around. For a moment or two he stood
erect, then he bowed gracefully to the saplings on his right, then to the
stumps and trees on his left, and humming a tune, ambled across a small
patch of ground that was bare and black, and pranced back again. He
opened his arms and, clasping some beautiful imaginary form in them, swung
round and round like a windmill. Then he paused for breath, embraced his
partner again, and "galloped" up and down. And young Johnson, who had
been watching him in wonder from behind a fence, bolted for our place.
"Mrs. Rudd! Mrs. Rudd!" he shouted from the verandah. Mother went out.
"Wot's--wot's up with Dave?"
Mother turned pale.
"There's SOMETHING--!"
"My God!" Mother exclaimed--" WHATEVER has happened?"
Young Johnson hesitated. He was in doubt.
"Oh! What IS it?" Mother moaned.
"Well" (he drew close to her) "he's--he's MAD!"
"OH-H!"
"He IS. I seen 'im just now up in your paddick, an' he's clean off he's
pannikin."
Just then Dave came down the track whistling. Young Johnson saw him
and fled.
For some time Mother regarded Dave with grave suspicion, then she
questioned him closely.
"Yairs," he said, grinning hard, "I was goin' through th' FUST SET."
It was when Kate was married to Sandy Taylor that we realised what a
blessing it is to be able to dance. How we looked forward to that
wedding! We were always talking about it, and were very pleased it would
be held in our own house, because all of us could go then. None of us
could work for thinking of it--even Dad seemed to forget his troubles
about the corn and Mick Brennan's threat to summon him for half the fence.
Mother said we would want plenty of water for the people to drink, so
Sandy yoked his horse to the slide, and he, Dad, and Joe started for the
springs.
The slide was the fork of a tree, alias a wheel-less water-trolly. The
horse was hitched to the butt end, and a batten nailed across the prongs
kept the cask from slipping off going uphill. Sandy led the way and
carried the bucket; Dad went ahead to clear the track of stones; and Joe
straddled the cask to keep her steady.
It always took three to work the slide.
The water they brought was a little thick--old Anderson had been down and
stirred it up pulling a bullock out; but Dad put plenty ashes in the cask
to clear it.
Each of us had his own work to do. Sandy knocked the partition down and
decorated the place with boughs; Mother and the girls cooked and covered
the walls with newspapers, and Dad gathered cow-dung and did the floor.
Two days before the wedding. All of us were still working hard. Dad was
up to his armpits in a bucket of mixture, with a stack of cow-dung on one
side, and a heap of sand and the shovel on the other. Dave and Joe were
burning a cow that had died just in front of the house, and Sandy had gone
to town for his tweed trousers.
A man in a long, black coat, white collar, and new leggings rode up, spoke
to Dad, and got off. Dad straightened up and looked awkward, with his
arms hanging wide and the mixture dripping from them. Mother came out.
The cove shook hands with her, but he did n't with Dad. They went
inside--not Dad, who washed himself first.
Dave sent Joe to ask Dad who the cove was. Dad spoke in a whisper and
said he was Mr. Macpherson, the clergyman who was to marry Kate and Sandy.
Dave whistled and piled more wood on the dead cow. Mother came out and
called Dave and Joe. Dave would n't go, but sent Joe.
Dave threw another log on the cow, then thought he would see what was
going on inside.
He stood at the window and looked in. He could n't believe his eyes at
first, and put his head right in. There were Dad, Joe, and the lot of
them down on their marrow-bones saying something after the parson. Dave
was glad that he did n't go in.
How the parson prayed! Just when he said "Lead us not into temptation"
the big kangaroo-dog slipped in and grabbed all the fresh meat on the
table; but Dave managed to kick him in the ribs at the door. Dad groaned
and seemed very restless.
When the parson had gone Dad said that what he had read about "reaping the
same as you sow" was all rot, and spoke about the time when we sowed two
bushels of barley in the lower paddock and got a big stack of rye from it.
The wedding was on a Wednesday, and at three o'clock in the afternoon.
Most of the people came before dinner; the Hamiltons arrived just after
breakfast. Talk of drays!--the little paddock could n't hold them.
Jim Mullins was the only one who came in to dinner; the others mostly sat
on their heels in a row and waited in the shade of the wire-fence. The
parson was the last to come, and as he passed in he knocked his head
against the kangaroo-leg hanging under the verandah. Dad saw it swinging,
and said angrily to Joe: "Did n't I tell you to take that down this
morning?"
Joe unhooked it and said: "But if I hang it anywhere else the dog'll
get it."
Dad tried to laugh at Joe, and said, loudly, "And what else is it for?"
Then he bustled Joe off before he could answer him again.
Joe did n't understand.
Then Dad said (putting the leg in a bag): "Do you want everyone to know
we eat it, ---- you?"
Joe understood.
The ceremony commenced. Those who could squeeze inside did so--the others
looked in at the window and through the cracks in the chimney.
Mrs. M'Doolan led Kate out of the back-room; then Sandy rose from the
fire-place and stood beside her. Everyone thought Kate looked very
nice----and orange blossoms! You'd think she was an orange-tree with a new
bed-curtain thrown over it. Sandy looked well, too, in his snake-belt
and new tweeds; but he seemed uncomfortable when the pin that Dave put in
the back of his collar came out.
The parson did n't take long; and how they scrambled and tumbled over each
other at the finish! Charley Mace said that he got the first kiss; Big
George said HE did; and Mrs. M'Doolan was certain she would have got it
only for the baby.
Fun! there WAS fun! The room was cleared and they promenaded for a
dance--Sandy and Kate in the lead. They continued promenading until one
of the well-sinkers called for the concertina--ours had been repaired till
you could get only three notes out of it; but Jim Burke jumped on his
horse and went home for his accordion.
Dance! they did dance!--until sun-rise. But unless you were dancing you
could n't stay inside, because the floor broke up, and talk about
dust!--before morning the room was like a drafting-yard.
It was a great wedding; and though years have since passed, all the
neighbours say still it was the best they were ever at.
Chapter XIII.
The Summer Old Bob Died.
It was a real scorcher. A soft, sweltering summer's day. The air
quivered; the heat drove the fowls under the dray and sent the old dog to
sleep upon the floor inside the house. The iron on the skillion cracked
and sweated--so did Dad and Dave down the paddock, grubbing--grubbing, in
130 degrees of sunshine. They were clearing a piece of new land--a
heavily-timbered box-tree flat. They had been at it a fortnight, and if
any music was in the ring of the axe or the rattle of the pick when
commencing, there was none now.
Dad wished to be cheerful and complacent. He said (putting the pick down
and dragging his flannel off to wring it): "It's a good thing to sweat
well." Dave did n't say anything. I don't know what he thought, but he
looked up at Dad--just looked up at him--while the perspiration filled his
eyes and ran down over his nose like rain off a shingle; then he hitched
up his pants and "wired in" again.
Dave was a philosopher. He worked away until the axe flew off the handle
with a ring and a bound, and might have been lost in the long grass for
ever only Dad stopped it with his shin. I fancy he did n't mean to stop
it when I think how he jumped--it was the only piece of excitement there
had been the whole of that relentlessly solemn fortnight. Dad got
vexed--he was in a hurry with the grubbing--and said he never could get
anything done without something going wrong. Dave was n't sorry the axe
came off--he knew it meant half-an-hour in the shade fixing it on again.
"Anyway," Dad went on, "we'll go to dinner now."
On the way to the house he several times looked at the sky--that cloudless,
burning sky--and said--to no one in particular, "I wish to God it would
rain!" It sounded like an aggravated prayer. Dave did n't speak, and I
don't think Dad expected he would.
Joe was the last to sit down to dinner, and he came in steaming hot. He
had chased out of sight a cow that had poked into the cultivation. Joe
mostly went about with green bushes in his hat, to keep his head cool, and
a few gum-leaves were now sticking in his moist and matted hair.
"I put her out, Dad!" he said, casting an eager glare at everything on the
table. "She tried to jump and got stuck on the fence, and broke it all
down. On'y I could n't get anything, I'd er broke 'er head--there was n't
a thing, on'y dead cornstalks and cow-dung about." Then he lunged his fork
desperately at a blowfly that persistently hovered about his plate, and
commenced.
Joe had a healthy appetite. He had charged his mouth with a load of cold
meat, when his jaws ceased work, and, opening his mouth as though he were
sleepy, he leaned forward and calmly returned it all to the plate. Dad
got suspicious and asked Joe what was up; but Joe only wiped his mouth,
looked sideways at his plate, and pushed it away.
All of us stopped eating then, and stared at each other. Mother said,
"Well, I--I wrapped a cloth round it so nothing could get in, and put it
in the safe--I don't know where on earth to put the meat, I'm sure; if I
put it in a bag and hang it up that thief of a dog gets it."
"Yes," Dad observed, "I believe he'd stick his nose into hell itself,
Ellen, if he thought there was a bone there--and there ought to be lots by
this time." Then he turned over the remains of that cold meat, and,
considering we had all witnessed the last kick of the slaughtered beast,
it was surprising what animation this part of him yet retained. In vain
did Dad explore for a really dead piece--there was life in all of it.
Joe was n't satisfied. He said he knew where there was a lot of eggs, and
disappeared down the yard. Eggs were not plentiful on our selection,
because we too often had to eat the hens when there was no meat--three or
four were as many as we ever saw at one time. So on this day, when Joe
appeared with a hatful, there was excitement. He felt himself a hero.
We thought him a little saviour.
"My!" said Mother, "where did you get all those?"
"Get 'em! I've had these planted for three munce--they're a nest I found
long ago; I thought I would n't say anythink till we really wanted 'em."
Just then one of the eggs fell out of the hat and went off "pop" on
the floor.
Dave nearly upset the table, he rose so suddenly; and covering his nose
with one hand he made for the door; then he scowled back over his shoulder
at Joe. He utterly scorned his brother Joe. All of us deserted the table
except Dad--he stuck to his place manfully; it took a lot to shift HIM.
Joe must have had a fine nerve. "That's on'y one bad 'n'," he said,
taking the rest to the fireplace where the kettle stood. Then Dad, who
had remained calm and majestic, broke out. "Damn y', boy!" he yelled,
"take th' awful things outside--YOU tinker!" Joe took them out and tried
them all, but I forget if he found a good one.
Dad peered into the almost-empty water-cask and again muttered a short
prayer for rain. He decided to do no more grubbing that day, but to run
wire around the new land instead. The posts had been in the ground some
time, and were bored. Dave and Sarah bored them. Sarah was as good as
any man--so Dad reckoned. She could turn her hand to anything, from
sewing a shirt to sinking a post-hole. She could give Dave inches in arm
measurements, and talk about a leg! She HAD a leg--a beauty! It was as
thick at the ankle as Dad's was at the thigh, nearly.
Anyone who would know what real amusement is should try wiring posts.
What was to have been the top wire (the No. 8 stuff) Dad commenced to put
in the bottom holes, and we ran it through some twelve or fifteen posts
before he saw the mistake--then we dragged it out slowly and savagely; Dad
swearing adequately all the time.
At last everything went splendidly. We dragged the wire through panel
after panel, and at intervals Dad would examine the blistering sky for
signs of rain. Once when he looked up a red bullock was reaching for his
waistcoat, which hung on a branch of a low tree. Dad sang out. The
bullock poked out his tongue and reached higher. Then Dad told Joe to
run. Joe ran--so did the bullock, but faster, and with the waistcoat that
once was a part of Mother's shawl half-way down his throat. Had the
shreds and ribbons that dangled to it been a little longer, he might have
trodden on them and pulled it back, but he did n't. Joe deemed it his
duty to follow that red bullock till it dropped the waistcoat, so he
hammered along full split behind. Dad and Dave stood watching until
pursued and pursuer vanished down the gully; then Dad said something about
Joe being a fool, and they pulled at the wire again. They were nearing a
corner post, and Dad was hauling the wire through the last panel, when
there came the devil's own noise of galloping hoofs. Fifty or more cattle
came careering along straight for the fence, bellowing and kicking up
their heels in the air, as cattle do sometimes after a shower of rain.
Joe was behind them--considerably--still at full speed and yelping like a
dog. Joe loved excitement.
For weeks those cattle had been accustomed to go in and out between the
posts; and they did n't seem to have any thoughts of wire as they bounded
along. Dave stood with gaping mouth. Dad groaned, and the wire's-end he
was holding in his hand flew up with a whiz and took a scrap of his ear
away. The cattle got mixed up in the wires. Some toppled over; some were
caught by the legs; some by the horns. They dragged the wire twenty and
thirty yards away, twisted it round logs, and left a lot of the posts
pointing to sunset.
Oh, Dad's language then! He swung his arms about and foamed at the mouth.
Dave edged away from him.
Joe came up waving triumphantly a chewed piece of the waistcoat. "D-d-did
it g-give them a buster, Dad?" he said, the sweat running over his face as
though a spring had broken out on top of his head. Dad jumped a log and
tried to unbuckle his strap and reach for Joe at the same time, but
Joe fled.
That threw a painful pall over everything. Dad declared he was sick and
tired of the whole thing, and would n't do another hand's-turn. Dave
meditated and walked along the fence, plucking off scraps of skin and hair
that here and there clung to the bent and battered wire.
We had just finished supper when old Bob Wren, a bachelor who farmed about
two miles from us, arrived. He used to come over every mail-night and
bring his newspaper with him. Bob could n't read a word, so he always got
Dad to spell over the paper to him. WE did n't take a newspaper.
Bob said there were clouds gathering behind Flat Top when he came in, and
Dad went out and looked, and for the fiftieth time that day prayed in his
own way for rain. Then he took the paper, and we gathered at the table to
listen. "Hello," he commenced, "this is M'Doolan's paper you've got, Bob."
Bob rather thought it was n't.
"Yes, yes, man, it IS," Dad put in; "see, it's addressed to him."
Bob leaned over and LOOKED at the address, and said: "No, no, that's
mine; it always comes like that." Dad laughed. We all laughed. He
opened it, anyway. He had n't read for five minutes when the light
flickered nearly out. Sarah reckoned the oil was about done, and poured
water in the lamp to raise the kerosene to the wick, but that did n't last
long, and, as there was no fat in the house, Dad squatted on the floor and
read by the firelight.
He plodded through the paper tediously from end to end, reading the
murders and robberies a second time. The clouds that old Bob said were
gathering when he came in were now developing to a storm, for the wind
began to rise, and the giant iron-bark tree that grew close behind the
house swayed and creaked weirdly, and threw out those strange sobs and
moans that on wild nights bring terror to the hearts of bush children. A
glimmer of lightning appeared through the cracks in the slabs. Old Bob
said he would go before it came on, and started into the inky darkness.
"It's coming!" Dad said, as he shut the door and put the peg in after
seeing old Bob out. And it came--in no time. A fierce wind struck the
house. Then a vivid flash of lightning lit up every crack and hole, and a
clap of thunder followed that nearly shook the place down.
Dad ran to the back door and put his shoulder against it; Dave stood to
the front one; and Sarah sat on the sofa with her arms around Mother,
telling her not to be afraid. The wind blew furiously--its one aim seemed
the shifting of the house. Gust after gust struck the walls and left them
quivering. The children screamed. Dad called and shouted, but no one
could catch a word he said. Then there was one tremendous crack--we
understood it--the iron-bark tree had gone over. At last, the shingled
roof commenced to give. Several times the ends rose (and our hair too)
and fell back into place again with a clap. Then it went clean away in
one piece, with a rip like splitting a ribbon, and there we stood,
affrighted and shelterless, inside the walls. Then the wind went down and
it rained--rained on us all night.
Next morning Joe had been to the new fence for the axe for Dad, and was
off again as fast as he could run, when he remembered something and called
out, "Dad, old B-B-Bob's just over there, lyin' down in the gully."
Dad started up. "It's 'im all right--I w-w-would n'ter noticed, only
Prince s-s-smelt him."
"Quick and show me where!" Dad said.
Joe showed him.
"My God!" and Dad stood and stared. Old Bob it was--dead. Dead as Moses.
"Poor old Bob!" Dad said. "Poor-old-fellow!" Joe asked what could have
killed him? "Poor-old-Bob!"
Dave brought the dray, and we took him to the house--or what remained of it.
Dad could n't make out the cause of death--perhaps it was lightning. He
held a POST-MORTEM, and, after thinking hard for a long while, told Mother
he was certain, anyway, that old Bob would never get up again. It was a
change to have a dead man about the place, and we were very pleased to be
first to tell anyone who did n't know the news about old Bob.
We planted him on his own selection beneath a gum-tree, where for years
and years a family of jackasses nightly roosted, Dad remarking: "As there
MIGHT be a chance of his hearin', it'll be company for the poor old cove."
Chapter XIV.
When Dan Came Home.
One night after the threshing. Dad lying on the sofa, thinking; the rest
of us sitting at the table. Dad spoke to Joe.
"How much," he said, "is seven hundred bushels of wheat at six shillings?"
Joe, who was looked upon as the brainy one of our family, took down his
slate with a hint of scholarly ostentation.
"What did y' say, Dad--seven 'undred BAGS?"
"Bushels! BUSHELS!"
"Seven 'un-dered bush-els-of wheat--WHEAT was it, Dad?"
"Yes, WHEAT!"
"Wheat at...At WHAT, Dad?"
"Six shillings a bushel."
"Six shil-lings-a.... A, Dad? We've not done any at A; she's on'y showed
us PER!"
"PER bushel, then!"
"Per bush-el. That's seven 'undered bushels of wheat at six shillin's per
bushel. An' y' wants ter know, Dad--?"
"How much it'll be, of course."
"In money, Dad, or--er----?"
"Dammit, yes; MONEY!" Dad raised his voice.
For a while, Joe thought hard, then set to work figuring and rubbing out,
figuring and rubbing out. The rest of us eyed him, envious of his learning.
Joe finished the sum.
"Well?" from Dad.
Joe cleared his throat. We listened.
"Nine thousan' poun'."
Dave laughed loud. Dad said, "Pshaw!" and turned his face to the wall.
Joe looked at the slate again.
"Oh! I see," he said, "I did n't divide by twelve t' bring t' pounds,"
and laughed himself.
More figuring and rubbing out.
Finally Joe, in loud, decisive tones, announced, "FOUR thousand, NO
'undered an' twenty poun', fourteen shillin's an'--"
"Bah! YOU blockhead!" Dad blurted out, and jumped off the sofa and went
to bed.
We all turned in.
We were not in bed long when the dog barked and a horse entered the yard.
There was a clink of girth-buckles; a saddle thrown down; then a thump,
as though with a lump of blue-metal, set the dog yelping lustily. We lay
listening till a voice called out at the door--"All in bed?" Then we knew
it was Dan, and Dad and Dave sprang out in their shirts to let him in.
All of us jumped up to see Dan. This time he had been away a long while,
and when the slush-lamp was lit and fairly going, how we stared and
wondered at his altered looks! He had grown a long whisker, and must have
stood inches higher than Dad.
Dad was delighted. He put a fire on, made tea, and he and Dan talked till
near daybreak--Dad of the harvest, and the Government dam that was
promised, and the splendid grass growing in the paddock; Dan of the great
dry plains, and the shearing-sheds out back, and the chaps he had met
there. And he related in a way that made Dad's eyes glisten and Joe's
mouth open, how, with a knocked-up wrist, he shore beside Proctor and big
Andy Purcell, at Welltown, and rung the shed by half a sheep.
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