While the Billy Boils | Page 4

round. So he widened the excavation, rolled in
some logs, and set fire to them--with no better result than to scorch the
roots.
Tom persevered. He put the trace harness on his horse, drew in all the
logs within half a mile, and piled them on the windward side of that
gum; and during the night the fire found a soft place, and the tree burnt
off about six feet above the surface, falling on a squatter's boundary
fence, and leaving the ugliest kind of stump to occupy the selector's
attention; which it did, for a week. He waited till the hole cooled, and
then he went to work with pick, shovel, and axe: and even now he gets
interested in drawings of machinery, such as are published in the
agricultural weeklies, for getting out stumps without graft. He thought
he would be able to get some posts and rails out of that tree, but found
reason to think that a cast-iron column would split sooner--and
straighter. He traced some of the surface roots to the other side of the
selection, and broke most of his trace-chains trying to get them out by
horse-power--for they had other roots going down from underneath. He
cleared a patch in the course of time and for several seasons he broke

more ploughshares than he could pay for.
Meanwhile the squatter was not idle. Tom's tent was robbed several
times, and his hut burnt down twice. Then he was charged with killing
some sheep and a steer on the run, and converting them to his own use,
but got off mainly because there was a difference of opinion between
the squatter and the other local J.P. concerning politics and religion.
Tom ploughed and sowed wheat, but nothing came up to speak of--the
ground was too poor; so he carted stable manure six miles from the
nearest town, manured the land, sowed another crop, and prayed for
rain. It came. It raised a flood which washed the crop clean off the
selection, together with several acres of manure, and a considerable
portion of the original surface soil; and the water brought down enough
sand to make a beach, and spread it over the field to a depth of six
inches. The flood also took half a mile of fencing from along the
creek-bank, and landed it in a bend, three miles down, on a dummy
selection, where it was confiscated.
Tom didn't give up--he was energetic. He cleared another piece of
ground on the siding, and sowed more wheat; it had the rust in it, or the
smut--and averaged three shillings per bushel. Then he sowed lucerne
and oats, and bought a few cows: he had an idea of starting a dairy.
First, the cows' eyes got bad, and he sought the advice of a German
cocky, and acted upon it; he blew powdered alum through paper tubes
into the bad eyes, and got some of it snorted and butted back into his
own. He cured the cows' eyes and got the sandy blight in his own, and
for a week or so be couldn't tell one end of a cow from the other, but sat
in a dark corner of the hut and groaned, and soaked his glued eyelashes
in warm water. Germany stuck to him and nursed him, and saw him
through.
Then the milkers got bad udders, and Tom took his life in his hands
whenever he milked them. He got them all right presently--and butter
fell to fourpence a pound. He and the aforesaid cocky made
arrangements to send their butter to a better market; and then the cows
contracted a disease which was known in those parts as "plooro
permoanyer," but generally referred to as "th' ploorer."
Again Tom sought advice, acting upon which he slit the cows' ears, cut
their tails half off to bleed them, and poured pints of "pain killer" into
them through their nostrils; but they wouldn't make an effort, except,

perhaps, to rise and poke the selector when he tried to tempt their
appetites with slices of immature pumpkin. They died peacefully and
persistently, until all were gone save a certain dangerous, barren,
slab-sided luny bovine with white eyes and much agility in jumping
fences, who was known locally as Queen Elizabeth.
Tom shot Queen Elizabeth, and turned his attention to agriculture again.
Then his plough horses took bad with some thing the Teuton called
"der shtranguls." He submitted them to a course of treatment in
accordance with Jacob's advice--and they died.
Even then Tom didn't give in--there was grit in that man. He borrowed
a broken-down dray-horse in return for its keep, coupled it with his
own old riding hack, and started to finish ploughing. The team wasn't a
success. Whenever the draught horse's knees gave