ound the grave arterwards ter keep the stock
out), an' send the buggy agen for a parson, an'--Well, what's a man ter
do? I couldn't let him wander away an' die like a dog in the scrub, an'
be shoved underground like a dog, too, if his body was ever found. The
Government might pay ter bury him, but there ain't never been a
pauper funeral from my house yet, an' there won't be one if I can help
it--except it be meself.

An' then there's the bother goin' through his papers to try an' find out
who he was an' where his friends is. An' I have ter get the missus to
write a letter to his people, an' we have ter make up lies about how
he died ter make it easier for 'em. An' goin' through his letters, the
missus comes across a portrait an' a locket of hair, an' letters from
his mother an' sisters an' girl; an' they upset her, an' she blubbers
agin, an' gits sentimental--like she useter long ago when we was first
married.

There was one bit of poetry--I forgit it now--that that there jackaroo
kep' sayin' over an' over agen till it buzzed in me head; an', weeks
after, I'd ketch the missus mutterin' it to herself in the kitchen till
I thought she was goin' ratty.

An' we gets a letter from the jackaroo's friends that puts us to a lot
more bother. I hate havin' anythin' to do with letters. An' someone's
sure to say he was lambed down an' cleaned out an' poisoned with bad
bush liquor at my place. It's almost enough ter make a man wish there
_was_ a recorin' angel.

An' what's the end of it? I got the blazin' bailiff in the place now!
I can't shot him out because he's a decent, hard-up, poor devil from
Bourke, with consumption or somethin', an' he's been talkin' to the
missus about his missus an' kids; an' I see no chance of gittin' rid
of him, unless the shearers come along with their cheques from
West-o'-Sunday nex' week and act straight by me. Like as not I'll have
ter roll up me swag an' take the track meself in the end. They say
publicans are damned, an' I think so, too; an' I wish I'd bin operated
on before ever I seen a pub.

THE SHEARER'S DREAM

Mitchell and I rolled up our swags after New Year and started to tramp
west. It had been a very bad season after a long drought. Old Baldy
Thompson had only shorn a few bales of grass-seed and burrs, so he said,
and thought of taking the track himself; but we hoped to get on shearing
stragglers at West-o'-Sunday or one of the stations of the Hungerford
track.

It was ve