there was danger of his growing fat of body and soft of soul in the
quartermaster's store, but he was rescued in time, and after months of
exciting researches into canine history among the bones of the tombs of
Egypt he earned renown at Armentieres, as his body was found in No
Man's Land with his head in the cold hand of a comrade to whom he had
attached himself, and I believe his spirit has joined the deathless
army of the unburied dead that watch over our patrols and inspire our
sentries with the realization that on an Australian front No Man's Land
has shrunk and our possession reaches right up to the enemy barbed wire.

[1] Mrs. A. H. Spicer, Chicago.

CHAPTER III

HUMAN SNOWBALLS

'Way out back in the Never Never Land of Australia there lives a
patriotic breed of humans who know little of the comforts of civilized
life, whose homes are bare, where coin is rarely seen, but who have as
red blood and as clean minds as any race on earth.

The little town of Muttaburra, for instance, has a population of two
hundred, one-half of whom are eligible for military service.

They live in galvanized-iron humpies with dirt floors,
newspaper-covered walls, sacking stretched across poles for beds,
kerosene-boxes for chairs, and a table made from saplings. The water
for household uses is delivered to the door by modern Dianas driving a
team of goats at twenty-five cents per kerosene-tin, which is not so
dear when you know that it has to be brought from a "billabong" [1] ten
miles away.

Most of the men in such towns work as "rouseabouts" (handy men) on the
surrounding sheep and cattle stations. At shearing-time the "gaffers"
(grandfathers) and young boys get employment as "pickers-up" and
"rollers." Every shearer keeps three men at high speed attending to
him. One picks up the fleece in such a manner as to spread it out on
the table in one throw; another one pulls off the ends and rolls it so
that the wool-classer can see at a glance the length of the wool and
weight of the fleece; another, called the "sweeper," gathers into a
basket the trimmings and odd pieces. These casual laborers and
rouseabouts are paid ten dollars a week, while the shearer works on
piece work, receiving six dollars for each hundred sheep shorn, and it
is a slow man who does not average one hundred and fifty per day. All
the shearing is done by machine, and in Western Queensland good
shearers are in constant employment for ten months of