Rolf Boldrewood - Babes in the Bush

‘Quite delicious,’ said Annabel. ‘But everything that is nice is improper, so, of course, I shouldn’t be let go. Not even Rosamond, who is prudence personified. I’m afraid there is no more liberty for poor women in a new country than an old one. That is the bell – I was sure of it. Mr. Churbett, allow me to invite you to dinner – an early one, which is about the extent of my privileges.’

Mr. Churbett accepted the invitation, as he no doubt would have acceded to any proposition emanating from the speaker even less manifestly beneficial. He kept the whole party amused, and lingered until he declared he should have to gallop Grey Surrey all the way home to get there before dark.

‘He’s like me,’ he explained, upon being charged with cruelty; ‘he only does a day’s work now and then, and he doesn’t mind it when it does come.’

Resisting all invitation to stop for the night, on the plea that the effort necessary in his case must be made some time and might as well be undergone now, he departed in the odour of high consideration, if not of sanctity.

In order that no opportunities might be lost, Wilfred commenced the habit of rising at dawn and joining Dick at the stock-yard, where the old man had initiated a dairy, with the aid of the few cows of the O’Desmond brand which had produced calves. Here he was attended by Andrew, who sturdily proceeded to take his share of the work, in spite of Dick’s sarcastic attitude. He evidently considered the dairy to be his province, and regarded Andrew as an interloper.

‘Na, na, Maister Wilfred,’ said Andrew, ‘I hae been acquent in my time wi’ a’ manner o’ kye, and had a collie following me these thretty years. It’s no because we’re in a new land that I’m to turn my back on ilka occupa-ation that will bring in profit to the laird and his bairns. Jeanie can mak’ as sweet butter as ever a gudewife in Lothian, and we hae to depend maistly on the butter-keggies, for what I see.’

‘You’ll find that garden of yours, when the weeds come up, quite enough for one, I’m thinking. There’s enough of us here, if Mr. Wilfred takes to it kind, as he seems to do. But if you’re such a dab hand at milking, you can tek that red cow that’s come in this morning.’

‘And a gra-and show o’ milk she has,’ quoth Andrew, ‘maist unco-omon!’

Dick commenced, with a stolid expression, to arrange the slip-rails, which apparently took time to adjust. Andrew, meanwhile, proud of the opportunity of exhibiting his familiarity with the art and science of milking, moved the red cow into one of the bails, or stalls, in which cows are ordinarily milked in Australia.

Sitting upon a three-legged stool, he commenced his ancient and classical task. He had succeeded in, perhaps, drawing a pint from the over-full udder of the red cow aforesaid, when she suddenly raised her hind leg and caught him with such emphasis that man and milk, pail and stool, went clattering down into the corner of the yard.

‘Gude save us!’ exclaimed Andrew, picking himself up, and rubbing his person, while he collected all that was recoverable of the scattered properties. ‘What garred the fell beastie act sae daft-like. I hae milket a hunner coos, and ne’er was whummled like yon.’

‘Perhaps they was Scotch cows, and understood your talk, Mr. Cargill,’ said Dick, with great politeness, covering a grim enjoyment; ‘but in this country we mostly leg-ropes cows when we bail ’em up, for fear of accidents.’

‘Weel, I winna say that these queys, being brocht up in a mair savage fashion than in bonnie Scotland, wadna need head and heel fastenings. But, ma certie, they would glower in my part of the country, gin ye tied a coo’s leg like a thrawn ox at the smithy.’

‘I suppose “we must do at Rome, etc.,” and all the rest of it, Andrew,’ said Wilfred. ‘Here, Dick, make a beginning with your cow, and Andrew and I will put a leg-rope on this one. Never too late to mend. I’ll back Andrew to hold his own yet in the milking-yard, or anywhere else.’

Old Dick, having satisfied his grudge by compassing the downfall of Andrew, whom he had shrewdly guessed never to have been accustomed to a leg-rope, condescended to instruct Wilfred in the proper way to knot it. The cows were eventually milked secundum artem , and when the full buckets, foaming over with creamy fluid, stood on a bench outside the yard, Wilfred saw with distinct gratification the first dividend from the cattle investment.

‘We must calculate now, Andrew,’ he said, as they walked over to the house, ‘how much butter can be made from the milk of these cows. It is a small matter, of course; but multiplied by ten – as we shall have at least fifty cows in milk, Dick says, before Christmas – it will not be so bad.’

‘After conseederin’ the matter maist carefully,’ said Andrew, ‘I am free to give it as ma deleeberate opeenion that gin the pasture keeps aye green and plenteous we may mak’ baith butter and cheese o’ the best quality. As to price, I canna yet say, havin’ nae knowledge o’ the mairkets.’

‘Well, we have made a beginning, Andrew, and that is a great matter. If we can only pay current expenses, without employing more hands, we shall be doing well, I consider.’

‘We must work gey and close at the first gang aff, Maister Wilfred, and then dinna ye fear. Wi’ the Lord’s blessing, we’ll be spared to set up our horn on high, as weel as thae prood Amalekites, that have had the first grip o’ this gra-and Canaan. I was doon yestreen and lookit at the field o’ victual – the paddock, as yon auld carle ca’s it. It’s maist promising – forbye ordinar’ – maist unco-omon.’

Among the list of indispensable investments which Dick Evans had urged upon Wilfred, but which he had not at present thought it necessary to undertake, were another lot of cattle, a dozen horses (more or less), and some kind of taxed cart, or light vehicle. Apparently these would be advantageous and profitable, but Wilfred had determined to be most sparing in all outlay, lest the reserve fund of the family should come to a premature end.

On this day it seemed that the advanced guard of the neighbouring gentry had commenced to lay formal siege to Warbrok Chase. On his return to the house in the afternoon, Wilfred descried two good-looking horses hanging up to the garden fence, and upon entering the sitting-room beheld their owners in amicable converse with his mother and sisters. He was promptly introduced to Mr. Argyll and Mr. Charles Hamilton. Both men were well, even fashionably dressed, and bore about them the nameless air which stamps the holder of a degree in the university of society.

‘We should have called before,’ said Mr. Argyll, a tall fair-haired man, whose quick glancing blue eye and mobile features betrayed natural impetuosity, kept under by training; ‘but my partner here is such an awfully hard-working fellow, that he would not quit the engineering with which he was busied, to visit the Queen of Sheba, if she had just settled in the neighbourhood.’

‘I was not aware,’ said Mr. Hamilton coolly, and with an air of settled conviction upon his regular and handsome features, ‘of the extent of my sacrifice to duty. I may venture to assure Mrs. Effingham that my neighbourly duties for the future will not be neglected.’

‘I hope not,’ said Mrs. Effingham; ‘for, now that the excitement of settling in such a very different world has passed away, we begin to feel rather lonely – may I say dull?’

‘No, mamma,’ said Rosamond, ‘you must not say that. We are all so fully occupied, from morning to dusk, that we have no time to be dull.’

‘Oh, but we cannot get on without society,’ remarked Annabel. ‘I feel in the highest spirits as long as there is so much to do, that there is no time for thinking; indeed, I hate to have a moment to myself. But in the afternoons, when papa and the boys are out, I begin to realise our solitary position, and the feeling becomes oppressive.’