In Bad Company, and other Stories/After Long Years
AFTER LONG YEARS
'This is the place; stand still, my steed, let me review the scene!' Quite correct, this is the place, though so changed that I hardly recognise the homestead which I built when I 'took up the Run' still known as 'Squattlesea Mere,' so many a year ago. Can it be possible that half a century should have passed—fleeted by like a dream—as a tale that is told and that I should again stand here, looking at the work of my hands in that old time, whereof the memory is so fresh? The huts, the stock-yards, the cottage wherein we dwelt in peaceful contentment, nearly all are there, though much decayed and showing manifest signs of old Time—edax rerum—with his slow but sure attrition. The fruit trees in the garden, planted with my own hands, are of great age and size, and still bearing abundantly in a soil and climate so favourable to their growth. I find it almost impossible to realise that in June 1844, being then a stripling of eighteen, I should have established this 'lodge in the wilderness,' now developed into a fair-sized freehold, besides supporting a number of families in comfort and respectability on the selected portions.
Well do I remember the dark night when I reached this very spot, on a tired horse, having ridden from Grasmere on the Merrai that day, nearly fifty miles, without food for man or beast. The black marauders of the period held revel on a cape of the lava-bestrewn land which jutted out upon the marsh, near the Native Dog's Well. I had stumbled on to their camp, not seeing it until I was amid their dimly-burning fires. Relations were strained between us, and as they were then engaged in banqueting upon one of my milch cows (name Matilda), there is no saying what might have happened to the chronicler if my colt, a great-grandson of Skeleton (own brother to Drone), had not responded to the spur.
The overseer and I, arming ourselves, rode to the scene of the entertainment next morning, which presented an appearance much resembling the locality in Robinson Crusoe's island after the savages had finished their repast. Portions of the murdered milker were visible, also her orphaned calf, lowing in lament after his kind. But our sable neighbours had vanished.
••••••
I drove over the identical spot last week. How different its aspect! Drained and fenced—the black soil of the fen showing by depth and colour what crops it is destined to grow—a wire fence, a dog-leg ditto, all sorts of queer enclosures. Only the volcanic trap ridges remain unchanged, and the 'Blue Alsatian Mountains,' as typified by Mount Eeles and Mount Napier, which seem to 'watch and wait alway.'
Yes. The landscape has an altered appearance. What we used to call 'the smooth side' of the Eumeralla—as differentiated from the 'stones' of Mount Eeles, then, as now, rough enough in all conscience—has since our day been almost wholly denuded of timber. The handsome, umbrageous, blackwood trees (Acacia melanoxylon) which marked and shaded the 'islands' in the great mere, are dead and gone.
The marsh lands, then divided into islands, flats, and reed-beds, now present one apparently dead level, less picturesque, but more profitable, as fields of oats and barley are now to be seen where the 'wild drake quacked and the bittern boomed.'
Yon broad arterial drain is responsible for this transformation. More complete reticulation will in time turn the ancient fen, I doubt not, into one of the most productive agricultural areas in the Port Fairy district.
Still, with the increase of population and the onward march of civilisation, one natural enemy of the grazier comes forward as another is displaced. The dingo and kangaroo, with our poor relations, the aborigines, have mostly disappeared. But the rabbit in countless multitudes has arrived and come to stay; while the hero of our nursery tales and I wot not of what mediaeval legends, Master Reynard, the fox, has found the climate suit his constitution. He raids the good-wife's turkeys, not wholly neglecting lambs, much as he might have done in the midland counties of England. Charles Kingsley's father (he tells us) took him into the garden one night to hear a fox bark, believing that the breed would soon be extinct in England; but he has held his own so far in the old country, and as I was told of a vixen with six cubs discovered in a log at Snaky Creek last week, I doubt whether we should not be able to re-export him, like the hares and rabbits, if a demand sprang up for the Australian Reynard.
Squattlesea Mere was certainly a good place for game. Snipe were plentiful, and might be shot, so to speak, from the parlour window. Wild ducks, geese, turkeys, quail, and the beautiful bronze-wing pigeon also. The kangaroo was then in the land, and helped our larder (notably with his tail, which made excellent soup), and an occasional dish of steak or hashed wallaby. The flesh tasted something between lean beef and veal, not at all a bad substitute for salt junk, when well cooked. A couple of hundred rabbits at least must have crossed the road, running eastward, in two or three miles, as we drove along this morning.
How such a sight would have astonished us formerly! Hares, too, from time to time. Our kangaroo dogs were then nearly as fast as the pure greyhounds now so plentiful on every estate, and what good sport we should have had! Driving by coach between the towns of Hamilton and Macarthur, I observed with satisfaction that the old stations survived in the form of respectable, though not overgrown, freehold estates. And although the owners are no longer the same, they still bear their old names, and are thus distinguished from the smaller-sized arable and grazing farms which have occupied the remaining areas.
'Monivae' (the first in order along the Macarthur road), from which I have more than once seen Acheson Ffrench driving his four-in-hand, now boasts a mansion and excellent fencing. The old cottage, however, yet stands, surrounded by the station buildings, where the merry girls and boys grew up, and where we used to be glad to be asked to stop for a night in the 'dear dead days beyond recall.' Werongurt too, where John Cox held sway, where the first orchard was planted, where the choice Herefords roamed at will, where The Caliph and The Don were located, may still be recognised. There the rye-grass and clover—in after-years destined to overspread the land—were introduced; and more wonderful still, where the first swing-gate for drafting cattle was put up in 1842 or 1843 (pace Mr. Lockhart Morton). At the thriving township of Macarthur I had the pleasure of renewing my acquaintance with my old friend Mr. Joe Twist, formerly the crack stock-rider of the Port Fairy district.
At a little distance on the old Port Fairy road to Hamilton, now left untouched by the present railway, is Lyne, once the station of Messrs. Lang and Elms. At Macarthur, where I again beheld the deep, unruffled waters of the Eumeralla, still exists a compact freehold, running back to Mount Eeles and the volcanic country, which is now, I am afraid, an extensive rabbit preserve. This is known as Eumeralla West, at present in the occupation of Mr. John Learmonth, in whose hands it presents a thriving well-managed appearance. On the other side of the river is Eumeralla East, cut off from the original run by an authoritative decision of Mr. Commissioner Fyans, and now in the possession of Mr. Staughton.
Dunmore alone—once a show station for the quality of its sheep, cattle, and horses—has suffered a melancholy change. The last of the three partners, Messrs. Campbell, Macknight, and Irvine, strong in youthful hope and sanguine trust in fortune when I first knew the district, died but a few months since.
'Tis a saddening task to run over the list of the companions of one's youth and to note how the summons of death, the warning, the unsparing hand of time, has thinned or menaced their ranks.
Poor dear old Dunmore! How many a jolly muster have we shared in there! How many a loving 'look through' the stud—how many a race had we talked over with the first owners! It was taken up only a year or two before Squattlesea Mere. What dances and picnics, rides and drives, had we there joined in! What musters of well-bred bullocks, fat and high-priced, had we escorted from Paradise Camp when 'Long John Mooney' reigned as king of the cattle-dealers! And now, to think of all this greatness departed! The pity of it! No herd of cattle, no stud—Traveller and Clifton, The Premier, Tramp, Triton and Trackdeer, St. George, The Margravine, Lord of Clyde, Mormon—all dead and gone! Equine shadows and phantoms of the 'brave days of old.'
Hospitably received by the present proprietor of Squattlesea Mere, with whom I had much in common, as we had shared the changing seasons and varying profits of the Riverina in the sixties, I stayed a day at the old place. Once more I slept in the old chamber, sat at the table in the parlour where so many a cheerful evening had been passed by the young people who then formed our family circle, and for whom for a decade it was so safe and healthy a shelter. Again I heard the roll of the surges, as they beat in days of old on the shore. Again I felt as I rose at sunrise the fresh, pure air of early morn, and wondered if I should have the horses run into the stock-yard to pick out those wanted for the day's work.
Tempora mutantur, indeed. Where are now the overseer, the groom, the stock-rider, who, well mounted, and high-mettled as their steeds, were wont to fare forth with me for a long day's muster of 'the lower end of the run'? Where, indeed? Frank, the groom, most patient and cool-couraged of rough-riders good alike on camp or road is dead. The trusty overseer, who could ride all day and night at a pinch, or stride through the Mount Eeles rocks for hours at a time, now walks with a stick and is restricted to a buggy with a quiet horse for locomotion. And the gay Irish stock-rider, who took so kindly to the trade, though not to 'the manner born,' would, I fear me, distinctly decline to sit in the saddle for ten hours of a winter's day, wet to the waist and splashed to the eyes, as many a time and oft was our custom.
There is no doubt we are Rip Van Winkle. All the intervening life which has passed like a dream and left so few traces, must be in the nature of a magic slumber.
We could think so, were it not for certain changes we wot of.
The knight has been to the wars, and though shrewdly wounded, has escaped with life, and once more beholds the walls of the old keep. It sadly recalls the ballad—
Hawk, hound and steed roam masterless,
His serving-men grow grey,
His roofs are mossed —'tis thirty years
Since the warrior went away.
My next stage was past Orford, on the Shaw River, locally known in that olden time 'before the gold' as the 'Crossing Place,' now a township with inhabitants. The brothers Horan, my faithful servitors, were the principal business men there, after the Free Selector's Act of Sir Gavan Duffy altered the pastoral proprietary so materially.
One kept the hotel, The Horse and Jockey, built and first opened by the Dunmore stud-groom, Baker. He trained Triton, Tramp, Trackdeer, and other Tr-named descendants of Traveller. A good jock and finished horseman in his day, but grown too heavy for the trade, he took to the general stud business, and subsided into hotel-keeping. Death, the inexorable, had claimed Mr. Michael Horan, but his widow still holds the license, with a goodly number of young people, mostly settled in life, to uphold the family name and fame.
Mr. Patrick Horan owns the general store which supplies the wants of the township, but the hardships of bush life have told on the once active and athletic frame, and though the dark blue eyes are still bright and clear, the white beard and faded lineaments might well accompany an older man. However, men can't live for ever, even in the cool and temperate clime of Port Fairy.
Pat and I are still in the land of the living. For that, and the moderate enjoyment of life, let us be duly thankful; and though neither of us, I venture to say, will ride buck-jumpers any more, or follow the fast-receding herd through the forest thickets, some reasonable recreation may yet be meted out to us in our 'declining days.'
Melancholy-sounding phrase! But triste or otherwise the reality has arrived. And we must make the best of it.