No
persuasions would induce him either to wear a coat or sheathe the knife.
The grey was brought round to the veranda steps, with Mr. Hassal's
own splendid horse. Mr. Gillet was there on a well-groomed roan;
he had three stock-whips, two quite sixteen feet long, the third
shorter one, which he presented to Pip.
The boy's face glowed. "Hurrah, Fizz!" he said; standing up in
his saddle and brandishing it round his head. "What 'ud you give to
change places?"
He dug his heels into the animal's sides and went helter-skelter
at a wild gallop down the hill.
It was a mile and a half to the cattle yards, and here was the
strongest excitement.
Pip could not think where all the men had sprung from. There were
some twenty or thirty of them, stockmen, shearers "on the
wallaby," as their parlance expressed lack of employment, two
Aboriginals, exclusive of Tettawonga, who was smoking and looking
on with sleepy enjoyment, and several other of the station hands.
In the first yard there were five hundred cattle that had been driven
there the night before, and that just now presented the appearance of
a sea of wildly lashing tails and horns. Such horns!--great,
branching, terrific-looking things that they gored and fought each
other madly with, seeing they could not get to the common enemy
outside.
Pages:
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173