Elyne Mitchell - The Silver Brumby

essentialmodern classics

ILLUSTRATED BY RALPH THOMPSON

This book was written for Indi who loves horses

Cover

Title Page essential modern classics

Dedication DEDICATION Dedication 1. Born in the Wild Wind 2. Yarraman’s Herd 3. Leading the Foals a Dance 4. Brumby Drive 5. Man, the Invader 6. Invisible in Snow 7. Seeking Grass 8. New Wisdom 9. Fight to the Death 10. Man on a Black Horse 11. A Time to Race with the Wind 12. The Coming of Spring 13. Legends of Thowra 14. Swift Arrow 15. Golden the Beautiful 16. Challenge and Escape 17. Thowra in Flight 18. Horse Hunt: Man Hunt 19. Now Golden was the Prize 20. Thowra Searched All Day 21. King of the Cascades 22. Black Man: Shod Horse 23. The Leap from the Cliff Glossary Postscript About the Author Copyright About the Publisher This book was written for Indi who loves horses

1. Born in the Wild Wind

2. Yarraman’s Herd

3. Leading the Foals a Dance

4. Brumby Drive

5. Man, the Invader

6. Invisible in Snow

7. Seeking Grass

8. New Wisdom

9. Fight to the Death

10. Man on a Black Horse

11. A Time to Race with the Wind

12. The Coming of Spring

13. Legends of Thowra

14. Swift Arrow

15. Golden the Beautiful

16. Challenge and Escape

17. Thowra in Flight

18. Horse Hunt: Man Hunt

19. Now Golden was the Prize

20. Thowra Searched All Day

21. King of the Cascades

22. Black Man: Shod Horse

23. The Leap from the Cliff

Glossary

Postscript

About the Author

Copyright

About the Publisher

ONCE THERE WAS a dark, stormy night in spring, when, deep down in their holes, the wombats knew not to come out, when the possums stayed quiet in their hollow limbs, when the great black flying phallangers that live in the mountain forests never stirred. On this night, Bel Bel, the cream brumby mare, gave birth to a colt foal, pale like herself, or paler, in that wild, black storm.

Bel Bel had chosen the birthplace of the foal wisely. He was on springy snowgrass under a great overhang of granite that sheltered them from the driving rain. There he lay, only a pale bundle in the black dark, while Bel Bel licked him clean and nuzzled him. The wind roared and howled through the granite tors above in the Ramshead Range, where the snow still lay, but there was no single sound of animal or bird except the mournful howl of a dingo – once, twice, it rang out and its echo answered, weird and wild.

Bel Bel lifted her head at the sound, and her nostrils dilated. From the shadowy mass between her forefeet came a faint nickering cry and she nuzzled him again. She was very alone with her newborn foal, and far from her own herd, but that was how she had felt it must be. Perhaps because of her colour, so much more difficult to hide than bay, or brown, black, or grey or chestnut, she had always led a hunted life, and when a foal was going to be born she was very nervous and hid herself far away. Of the three foals she had had, this was the only one creamy, like herself.

Bel Bel felt a surge of pride, but the pride was followed by fear. Her son would be hunted as she was and as her own cream mother had been before her – hunted by man, since they were so strange-looking in the wild herds. And this colt would have another enemy too, every stallion would be doubly against him because of his colour.

The wind roared and the rain was cold, so cold, as if it would turn to snow. Even with the shelter of the rock, the storm was beating down on them, the moving darkness was becoming a thing of terror. The howl of the dingo came again. Bel Bel nosed the tiny colt to get up.

He heaved up his head, stuck his long forelegs out in front of him, and gave a little snort of fear. Bel Bel pushed him up till he stood, his feet far apart, long legs trembling; then she nosed him, wobbling, bending, step by step to the sandy mouth of a cave, and there, just out of the rain, she let him tumble down again.

Soon it would be time to make him drink, but for the moment, out of the wild storm, he could rest. Dawn must come soon, and in this storm there would be no men abroad to see a cream brumby mare lead her newborn foal through the snowgums to where there would be grass for her to eat and longed-for water to drink. Bel Bel really knew that there would be very few men in the mountains till all the snow had gone and they came driving their herds of red-and-white cattle, but the fear of Man was never far from her thoughts.

Dawn came very slowly, showing first the dark outline of the cave mouth against a faintly lighter sky, then, on the hillside below them, reaching long fingers of forest right up to the rocks, the wind-tormented heads of snowgums, driven and lashing as though they must tear themselves up by the roots. The rain had stopped.

Great massing clouds kept racing up over the mountains, but, as the light grew strong, the sky began to look as if it was being torn in shreds by the wind. Flying streamers of rain-washed blue sky appeared and Bel Bel, feeling very hungry herself, decided it was time the foal should drink and that the day would be fair enough for a newborn colt to go with his mother to some better pastures.

“I will call you Thowra,” she said, waking him with her nose, “because that means wind. In wind were you born, and fleet as the wind must you be if you will live.”

On that first day, while the storm blew itself out, Bel Bel did not take Thowra far, only down through the snowgums to a long glade that led to a heather-banked creek where she could drink. That night they went back to the opening of the cave and the foal slept on the dry sand curled up against his mother’s flank.

The next day she decided to take him farther, to a wide, open field in the snowgum forest, where the grass grew very sweetly, even as early in the spring as this, and where the creek ran shallow over a sand and mica bottom.

The storm had died in the night and there was warm spring sunshine. Bel Bel noticed with pride how the foal trotted more strongly by her side. She did not hurry him, often stopping to graze as they moved under the snowgums or in the long glades. She never left the shelter of the trees without first pausing and looking carefully into the open country ahead. Thus it was through a curtain of the leathery snowgum leaves that she looked out on to the wide, sunny field, and saw a bay brumby grazing in the distance by the creek.

Bel Bel became completely still, watching: then she recognised the bay as a mare of her own herd, Mirri, who had been caught by a stockman as a yearling, and managed to get free. Mirri, for this reason, was very nervous of men, and she and Bel Bel had often run together, away from the herd, when they thought the others were too close to the stockmen’s huts.

Now Bel Bel made out a dark shape on the ground near Mirri and knew that the bay mare, too, had her foal. Unafraid, she led Thowra out to join them.