Bunyip Land | Page 2

said. "She won't like my going at first, because it will
seem lonely for her out here; but she'll be as pleased as can be
afterwards. Look here: my mother--"
"Say ma, Master Joe, dear. Doey, please; it's so much more genteel."
"Stuff! it's Frenchy; mother's old English. Mother don't believe father's
dead, does she?"
"Well, no, my dear; she's as obstinate as you are about that."
"And she's right. Why, he's only been away four years, and that isn't so
very long in a country where you have to cut every step of the way."
"Cooey--cooey--woo--woo--woo--woo--why yup!"
"Cooey--cooey!" I echoed back, and nurse held he hands to her ears.
"Now don't you go to him, Master Joseph; now please don't," said the
old lady.
"Mass Joe! hi Mass Joe! Jimmy fine wallaby. Tick fass in big hole big
tree."
Just then my first-lieutenant and Nurse Brown's great object of dislike,

Jimmy, thrust his shiny black face and curly head in at the door.
"Go away, sir," cried nurse.
"Heap fis--come kedge fis--million tousand all up a creek. Jimmy go
way?"
He stood grinning and nodding, with his hands in the pocket holes of
his only garment, a pair of trousers with legs cut off to about mid-thigh.
"If you don't take that nasty black fellow away, Master Joseph, I shall
be obliged to complain to your poor ma," said nurse.
"Get out!" I said; "Jimmy won't hurt you; and though it don't show, he's
as clean as a new pin."
"He isn't clean; he can't be, dear. How can any one be clean who don't
wear clothes, Master Joseph? and look at his toes."
Nurse Brown always fell foul of Jimmy's toes. They fidgeted her, for
they were never still. In fact Jimmy's toes, which had never probed the
recesses of a pair of boots, were more like fingers and thumbs, and had
a way of twiddling about when he was supposed to be standing still--
stand perfectly still he never did--and these toes belonged to feet that in
climbing he could use like hands. More than once I've seen him pick
stones off the ground--just like a monkey, nurse said--or stand talking
to any one and keep his attention while he helped himself to something
he wanted with his feet.
"There, be off Jimmy," I said, for I wanted to stop indoors.
"Come kedge fis."
"No, not to-day."
"Hi--wup--wup--wup!"
Jimmy threw himself into an attitude, snatching a small hatchet from
the waistband of his trousers, and made believe to climb a tree, chop a

hole larger, and draw out an animal, which he seemed to be swinging
round by its tail.
"No, not to-day, Jimmy," I cried.
"Sleep, sleep," said Jimmy, imitating a kangaroo by giving a couple of
hops into the verandah, where he chose a sunny place, well haunted by
flies, curled up, and went to sleep.
"Good morning!" cried a hearty voice, and I ran out to welcome our
neighbour the doctor, whose horse's hoofs had not been heard, and who
was now fastening the rein to the hook in one of the verandah posts.
"Well, Joe," he said as I shook hands and looked up admiringly in his
bold well-bearded face.
"Well, doctor, I'm so glad you've come; walk in."
"Ah! nurse," he cried; "how well you look!"
"Yes, yes; but I am glad you're come," she said. "I want you to look at
Master Joseph."
"I did look at him."
"Isn't he feverish or something, sir? He's that restless as never was."
"Sign he's growing," cried the doctor. "How's mamma?"
"Oh, she's pretty well," I said. "Gone to lie down."
"That's right," said the doctor. "I had to come and look at Bowman's
broken arm, so I came on here to beg a bit of dinner."
"I'm so glad!" I said: for Jimmy, the half-wild black, was my only
companion, there being no boys within miles of our run; "stop a week
and have some fishing."
"And what's to become of my patients?"

"You haven't got any," I said. "You told me so last time."
"True, O King Joseph! I've come to the wrong place; you don't want
many doctors in Australia. Why, nurse, how this fellow grows!"
"I wish he'd grow good," cried the old lady. "He's always doing
something to worry away his poor ma's and my life."
"Why, what's the matter now, nurse?"
"Matter, sir! Why, he's took it into his head to go looking for his poor
dear dead-and-gone pa. Do, do please tell him he mustn't think of such
things."
"Why, Joe!" cried the doctor, turning sharply round to me, and ceasing
to beat his high boots with his long-thonged whip.
"I don't care what anybody says," I cried, stamping my foot. "I've made
up my mind, and mean to go