art; would ride back to the diggings by way of Geelong.

Chapter VI

In a whitewashed parlour of "Beamish's Family Hotel" some few miles
north of Geelong, three young women, in voluminous skirts and with
their hair looped low over their ears, sat at work. Books lay open on
the table before two of them; the third was making a bookmark. Two were
fair, plump, rosy, and well over twenty; the third, pale-skinned and
dark, was still a very young girl. She it was who stitched magenta
hieroglyphics on a strip of perforated cardboard.

"Do lemme see, Poll," said the eldest of the trio, and laid down her
pen. "You 'AVE bin quick about it, my dear."

Polly, the brunette, freed her needle of silk and twirled the bookmark
by its ribbon ends. Spinning, the mystic characters united to form the
words: "Kiss me quick."

Her companions tittered. "If ma didn't know for certain 'twas meant for
your brother John, she'd never 'ave let you make it," said the second
blonde, whose name was Jinny.

"Girls, what a lark it 'ud be to send it up to Purdy Smith, by Ned!"
said the first speaker.

Polly blushed. "Fy, Tilly! That wouldn't be ladylike."

Tilly's big bosom rose and fell in a sigh. "What's a lark never is."

Jinny giggled, agreeably scandalized: "What things you do say, Till!
Don't let ma 'ear you, that's all."

"Ma be blowed!--'Ow does this look now, Polly?" And across the
wax-cloth Tilly pushed a copybook, in which she had laboriously
inscribed a prim maxim the requisite number of times.

Polly laid down her work and knitted her brows over the page.

"Well ... it's better than the last one, Tilly," she said gently,
averse to hurting her pupil's feelings. "But still not quite good
enough. The f's, look, should be more like this." And taking a steel
pen she made several long-tailed f's, in a tiny, pointed hand.

Tilly yielded an ungrudging admiration. "'Ow well you do it, Poll! But
I HATE writing. If only ma weren't so set on it!"

"You'll never be able to write yourself to a certain person, 'oos name
I won't mention, if you don't 'urry up and learn," said Jinny, looking
sage.

"What's the odds! We've always got Poll to write for us," gave back
Tilly, and lazily stretched out a large, plump hand to recover the
copybook. "A certain person'll never know--or not till it's too late."

"Here, Polly dear," said Jinny, and held out a book. "I know it now."

Again Polly put down her embroidery. She took the book. "Plough!