only you don't know it; you haven't got the go. If I had your eyes along
with my other attractions, I'd be in trouble on account of a woman about
once a-week.'

'For God's sake shut up, Jack,' I said.

Do you remember the first glimpse you got of your wife? Perhaps not in
England, where so many couples grow up together from childhood; but it's
different in Australia, where you may hail from two thousand miles away
from where your wife was born, and yet she may be a countrywoman of
yours, and a countrywoman in ideas and politics too. I remember the
first glimpse I got of Mary.

It was a two-storey brick house with wide balconies and verandahs all
round, and a double row of pines down to the front gate. Parallel at the
back was an old slab-and-shingle place, one room deep and about eight
rooms long, with a row of skillions at the back: the place was used for
kitchen, laundry, servants' rooms, &c. This was the old homestead before
the new house was built. There was a wide, old-fashioned, brick-floored
verandah in front, with an open end; there was ivy climbing up the
verandah post on one side and a baby-rose on the other, and a grape-vine
near the chimney. We rode up to the end of the verandah, and Jack called
to see if there was any one at home, and Mary came trotting out; so it
was in the frame of vines that I first saw her.

More than once since then I've had a fancy to wonder whether the
rose-bush killed the grape-vine or the ivy smothered 'em both in the
end. I used to have a vague idea of riding that way some day to see. You
do get strange fancies at odd times.

Jack asked her if the boss was in. He did all the talking. I saw a
little girl, rather plump, with a complexion like a New England or Blue
Mountain girl, or a girl from Tasmania or from Gippsland in Victoria.
Red and white girls were very scarce in the Solong district. She had the
biggest and brightest eyes I'd seen round there, dark hazel eyes, as I
found out afterwards, and bright as a 'possum's. No wonder they called
her ''Possum'. I forgot at once that Mrs Jack Barnes was the prettiest
girl in the district. I felt a sort of comfortable satisfaction in the
fact that I was on horseback: most Bushmen look better on horseback. It
was a black filly, a fresh young thing, and she seemed as shy of girls
as I was myself. I noticed Mary glanced in my direction once or twice
to see if she knew me; but, when she looked, the filly took all my
attention. Mary tro