some intelligence, so after spending a whole day in
employment that forbade our using the smallest atom, we would seek
during the night a "safety-valve."

The camp was in the show-ground, which naturally divided the young
animals in training into different sorts--the elite had the grand
stand, horse-boxes were grabbed by the N. C. O.'s, prize-cattle stalls
were clean enough, but some line of mental association must have caused
the powers that be to allot the "pig-and-dog" section to the military
police and their prey.

It was fun on the arrival of a fresh contingent who were told "they
could take what accommodation was left in the grand stand, the
remainder having to bunk in the animal stalls," to see them rush the
lower tiers, appropriating their six-foot length by dumping their
"blueys" upon it, but that same night they would be convinced of their
mistake as the old hands, living above them, exhibited their joy at
having dodged the guard, returning in the small hours, by walking on
every one possible on their way up top. Next morning there would be
more applications for "horse-and-cattle" stalls, but the best ones
would be gone, and they would have to be content to lie, six in a box,
where a flooring-board was missing through which the rats would make
their nightly explorations. But even this was better than the lower
tiers of the grand stand, as the rats would not always wake you running
across your face, but a husky in military boots stepping on it would
rouse even the deadest in slumber. As he would step on about twenty
others as well, the mutual recriminations would continue for hours, and
as the real culprit would settle down in the dark into his own place
without a word no one would know who it was. There would come from up
above: "Shut up, there!" "What the h---- are you makin' all that row
about?" and the answer: "So would you make a row if a b-- b-- elephant
stepped on your face!" "Go and bag your head! Anyway, there are two
hundred men who didn't step on your face trying to go to sleep, and it
will be reveille in an hour or so."

These grand-stand couches were bad places at the best of times. They
may have been high and dry, but were open to every breeze that blew and
were sheltered only on the side from which the rain never came. The
Bendigo show committee must have faced them that way so that the sun
and weather would be right in the eyes of the onlookers and prevent
them seeing any "crook ridi