e Jim and I do all the rough jobs of
mending the fences, getting firewood, milking the cows, and, after a
bit, ploughing the bit of flat we kept in cultivation.

Jim and I, when we were fifteen and thirteen--he was bigger for his
age than I was, and so near my own strength that I didn't care about
touching him--were the smartest lads on the creek, father said--he
didn't often praise us, either. We had often ridden over to help at the
muster of the large cattle stations that were on the side of the range,
and not more than twenty or thirty miles from us.

Some of our young stock used to stray among the squatters' cattle, and
we liked attending the muster because there was plenty of galloping
about and cutting out, and fun in the men's hut at night, and often a
half-crown or so for helping some one away with a big mob of cattle or
a lot for the pound. Father didn't go himself, and I used to notice that
whenever we came up and said we were Ben Marston's boys both master and
super looked rather glum, and then appeared not to think any more about
it. I heard the owner of one of these stations say to his managing man,
'Pity, isn't it? fine boys, too.' I didn't understand what they meant. I
do now.

We could do a few things besides riding, because, as I told you before,
we had been to a bit of a school kept by an old chap that had once seen
better days, that lived three miles off, near a little bush township.
This village, like most of these places, had a public-house and a
blacksmith's shop. That was about all. The publican kept the store, and
managed pretty well to get hold of all the money that was made by the
people round about, that is of those that were 'good drinking men'. He
had half-a-dozen children, and, though he was not up to much, he wasn't
that bad that he didn't want his children to have the chance of being
better than himself. I've seen a good many crooked people in my day, but
very few that, though they'd given themselves up as a bad job, didn't
hope a bit that their youngsters mightn't take after them. Curious,
isn't it? But it is true, I can tell you. So Lammerby, the publican,
though he was a greedy, sly sort of fellow, that bought things he knew
were stolen, and lent out money and charged everybody two prices for the
things he sold 'em, didn't like the thought of his children growing up
like Myall cattle, as he said himself, and so he fished out this old Mr.
Howard, that had been a friend or a victim or