Bush Studies Read online

  However, Jyne was not to be outdone even by her own mother, and the narrative of her last, assisted in many minor details by Jinny, aged eleven, left little to be desired in the way of hardihood.

  Liz kept her teething baby respectfully silent by industriously rubbing its lower gum with a dirty thumb. She expressed her surprise at Jyne’s phenomenal endurance by little clicks of the tongue, shakes of the head, and other signs indicative of admiration and astonishment. When Jyne finished, she began eagerly on an experience of her own. “Well, w’en I wus took with Drary” (short for Adrarian) “think I could fin’ ther sissers?”

  Jyne, who knew that the recital of a daring feat was coming, inquired, “W’en yer wus took with Joey?”

  “No,” said Liz, stopping short with a nervous click in her voice, and looking at Ned.

  The next item was ventriloquizing by Jyne per medium of Tilly’s uneasy baby. “My mammy, she sez, yer dot me all o’a hoo, she sez. No wunny, she sez, me can’t keep goody, she sez, ’ith me cosey all o’a hoo, she sez.” She had been examining the baby’s undergear, and at this stage her tone of baby banter suddenly changed to one of professional horror. “My Gawd, Tilly!” she cried, the drooping corners of her mouth nearly covering her upper teeth. “Look w’er ’er little belly-bands is—nearly un’er ’er arms,” she explained, probably to the company, but looking directly at the clergyman. And, with true professional acumen, she intimated that had she not been on the spot, an intricate part of the little one’s anatomy in another minute would “’a bust out a bleedin’ an’ not all ther doctors in ther worl’ couldn’ astoppt it.”

  The minister was very busy, meanwhile, blushing and getting his books in order, and with his congregation of ten adults and eighteen children he began, “Dearly beloved brethren—”

  Jim Lumber gripped his bullock brand, took a swift look at him and turned to Tilly. It had been settled between them that she was to do the talking. Alick, who, despite his father’s efforts to enlighten him as to the nature of a church service, and encouraged by Jyne’s remark that “they’d eat nothin’”, had also brought his valuable documents in his shirt front, thrust in a groping hand.

  For a few minutes the adults listened and watched intently, but the gentle voice of the parson, and his nervous manner, soon convinced them that they nad nothing to fear from him. Ned had been “pokin’ borak” at them again; they added it to the long score they owed him.

  The children wandered about the room. Jinny and Sis invited their little sister to “Cum an’ see ther pooty picters in the man’s book,” and they assisted the minister to turn over the leaves of his Bible.

  Alick’s father, who was from the North of Ireland, and, for all his forty years in the bush, had not lost his reverence for the cloth, bade his grand-daughters beseechingly to “quet”, whereupon Jinny showed him quite two inches of inky tongue. Ink was a commodity unknown in Jinny’s home, and all the unknown is edible to the bush child.

  “Woman!” he said, appealing to Jinny’s mother, “whybut you bid ’er to quet?”

  “You orter be in er glars’ ban’ box w’er ther ain’t no children; thet’s w’er you orter be,” answered Jyne.

  He beckoned to one straggler, a girl of six, with Alick’s face, who came to him promptly and sat on his knee.

  Presently her brown hand stroked his old cheek. “Gran’-dad,” she said.

  “Choot, darlin’,” he whispered, reverently.

  The child looked at him wonderingly. “I says you’s gran’-dad, she repeated, “not ole Alick.”

  He laid his white head on hers.

  “Gran’-dad, ole Tommy Tolbit’s dead.”

  Turning his glistening face to Liz in momentary forgetfulness, he said solemnly, “The knowledge of this chile!”

  “Ole Talbert” had been dead for two years, and the knowledgeable child had been surprising him so, at least twice a week.

  “We have erred and strayed from Thy ways like lost sheep,” murmured the minister.

  The smaller children wandered in and out of the bedrooms, carrying their spoils with them. But Jinny and Sis had drawn the now disabled rocking-chair up to the window, and were busy poking faces at two of Liz’s children, who were standing on the couch inside. One of these made a vicious smack with a hair-brush at Jinny’s tongue, flattened against the glass. The ensuing crash stopped even the parson for a moment.

  Bravely he began again. He paused occasionally for a sudden subterranean laugh to cease or to put one book after another on the shelf behind him out of the children’s reach. Just as he read the last line of the Te Deum, “Oh Lord in Thee have I trusted, let me never be confounded,” one of Liz’s children tugged at his trousers, with a muzzled request that his teeth might be freed from a square of pink soap. Another offered to the baby Liz was nursing a pincushion she brought from the bedroom.

  “Jyne,” called Jinny from the veranda, “’ere cums young Tommy Tolbit by ’isself. You wus right, Jyne; she ain’t cummin’!”

  Even Jyne’s gums gleamed; she looked triumphantly at Alick her husband, at Liz, then at all but Ned.

  In shambled Tommy, moist and panting. He had been a drover, and had recently taken up a selection on the run. He was a bridegroom of a month’s standing. His missus had been a servant at one of the hotels in the township.

  “Made a start!” he remarked. His voice gave the impression that he did not mind their not waiting for him.

  “Missus ain’t comin’?” inquired Alick, trying to atone to Jyne for overloading Polly.

  “Not ter day,” said the bridegroom, but his voice intimated that in all probability she would have been able to come tomorrow.

  “No!” said Jyne, putting him under fire, and trying to keep the crow out of her voice.

  “Ain’t very well, is she? Didn’ eat a very ’earty break-fuss this mornin’?” And a further remark suggested that even if the meal had been hearty, the usual process of assimilation had not taken place.

  “Ow’s Polly?” he inquired.

  “Cooked,” said Jyne, instantly diverted.

  “Go on!” said the bridegroom, with well feigned astonishment. His breathless and perspiring state had been caused by his “going on” to capture one of the wild suckers that had been eating Polly.

  “Let us pray,” said the minister. His host, hostess, and Alick’s father knelt, but the rest sat as usual.

  The knowledgeable child, considering the grandfather’s position an invitation to mount, climbed on his back. Making a bridle of the handkerchief round the old fellow’s neck, and digging two heels into his sides, she talked horse to him. The protesting old man bucked vigorously, but it was no easy task to throw her.

  The clergyman gave out his text, and the sermon began.

  Jyne’s children commenced to complain of being “’ungry” and a fair-sized damper was taken from a pillow-slip. This, together with two tin tots and a bottle of goat’s milk, was given to Jinny and she was told to do “ther sharin’”·

  The hostess asked Jyne in a whisper to send them to the veranda, and for a time there was comparative quiet. Such interruptions as “Jinny won’t gimme nun, Arnie” (Auntie) from Liz’s children being checked by Jyne with “Go an’ play an’ doan’ ’ave ser much gab, like yer father.”

  “Thet greedy wretch uv er Jinny is guzzlin’ all ther milk inter ’er, Jyne,” from her own children, was appeased by her promise to “break ther young faggit’s back w’en I get ’ome.”

  There was a wail of anguished hunger from Liz’s empty children that aroused paternal sympathy in Ned. “Sep me Gord,” he said, “some wimmen is like cows. They’ll give ther own calf a suck, but if anyone else’s calf cums anigh ’em they lif’ their leg an’ kick it ter blazes.”

  Jyne tossed her head and, with a derisive laugh, expressed the opinion that “It ’ed fit sum people better if ther munny wasted in buyin’ flash coats an’ rediclus ’ats wus spent in flour bags.”

  For a short space only the voice of the preac
her sounded, as, in studied stoicism, he pursued his thankless task. Occasionally they looked at him to see “’oo ’e wus speakin’ ter”, but finding nothing directly personal, even this attention ceased.

  Liz leant across to Tilly Lumber and asked, “Fowl layin’?”

  “Ketch ’em er layin’ et Chrissermus.”

  Ned told how he had brought home a number of law books from Sydney, and that he and an old man he had picked up “wus readin’ ’em”. It was his intention to absorb such an amount of knowledge that all he would have to do with the lessee of the run—an ex-barrister—would be to put him in a bail. What would follow was graphically illustrated by Ned’s dropping his head, gripping an imaginary bucket between his knees, and opening and shutting his hands in rhythmic up and down movements. Some of his audience, remembering his threats and warnings against the parson, thought this pantomime must have an ominous meaning for the preacher.

  But sceptical Jyne was not impressed. “Upon me soul,” she said, “sum people is the biggest lyin’ blowers that ever cockt er lip.”

  Alick, always for peace, stepped into the breach. “Comin’ along jes’ now,” he said, shifting his plug of tobacco from one side to the other, and aiming at the flies in the fireplace with the juice, “we ’as a yarn with Mick Byrnes. ’E ’as ther luck of er lousy calf. ’E sez ’e got eightpence orl roun’ fer ’ees kangaroo-skins. Damned if I can.”

  “Now a good plan ’ed be,” said Ned, “ter get a good lot, sen’ ’em down ter them Sydney blocks. Slip down yerself, go ter ther sale, don’ let on ’oo yer are, an’ run ’em up like blazes. Thet’s wot I’ll do with my wool nex’ year.”

  This plan seemed commendable to Alick. “By Goey,” he said, his mild eyes blinking.

  Jyne never, on any occasion, showed the slightest interest or attention when Ned was speaking, unless to sniff and lay bare her bottom teeth, but here she remarked, “Sum people ’ud keep runnin’ ter Sydney till ’e ’asen’ er penny ter fly with.”

  “If sum people with ser much jawr, an’ er mouth es big es ’er torn pocket, belonged ter me,” said Ned, “I’d smash ’er ugly jawr.”

  Jyne slewed hers to an awful angle in his direction. “I’d like ter see yer try it.”

  A look of agony came into the eyes of the grazier’s wife as she heard the door of the dining-room open. The children were so quiet, that she knew they were up to mischief.

  She heard Jinny’s hoarse whisper, “Orl of yez wait an’ I’ll bring yer sumsin’.” On the dining-room table was the cold food prepared for the clergyman’s dinner. She looked across at her husband with dumb entreaty. He, with eyes devoutly on the carpet, was listening intently to Ned’s account of how he nearly made the squatter take a “sugar doodle” (back somersault) when he heard that he had been to Sydney.

  “‘Day Keogh,’ sez I.

  “‘’Oo ’ave I ther ’oner of speakin’ ter?’ sez ’e.

  “‘Mr Stennard,’ I sez.

  “‘Oh indeed,’ ’e sez, ‘very ’appy ter make yer acquaintance, Mr Stennard, Esquire,’ ’e sez.

  “‘Never mind no blarsted acquaintance,’ I sez, ‘w’en are yer goin’ ter take yer flamin’ jumbucks orf my lan’?’ I sez.

  “‘Your lan’,’ ’e sez, ‘I didn’ know you ’ad any lan’ about ’ere,’ ’e sez.

  “‘Oh didn’ yer,’ I sez, ‘you ner ther Lan’ Agent won’ frighten me orf,’ I sez, ‘gammonin’ I’m on er reserve,’ sez I, ‘I’ve paid me deposit, an’ I’ve been ter Sydney,’ I sez, ‘I put me name ter a cheque,’ sez I, ‘an’—’”

  Jyne ceased sniffing, to laugh long and loudly. “Gawd, eh!” she said, with her eyes on the ceiling and apparently appealing to the flies. “Wot ’erbout sech game-cocks bullyin’ w’en we fust kem out ’ere?”

  Ned went hastily out at the front door “ter squint at ther jumbucks”, three miles away. Joey, who had been peering round that door, now appeared at the back.

  “Come in, Joey,” snorted Jyne. “No one ain’t game ter ’it yer w’en I’m ’ere.”

  The minister still preached, but he had only old Alick for a listener.

  The hostess’s mental picture of Jinny “sharin’” her dinner for three among that voracious brood was distracting. Only the fear of suffering in the clergyman’s mind as one of “them” kept her to her seat. She could give the sermon no attention, but listened to Sis licking her fingers, and wondered if it was the vinegar or the wine that caused Jinny’s cough. Presently Jinny set that doubt at rest by coming in odorous, and with the front of her dress wine-stained.

  “Little ’un snoozin’!” Jinny remarked, lurching giddily towards her to merrily twirl her fist in the snoozer. The snoozer’s mother wondered if they had shut the dining-room door. Soon the noise of the fowls scattering the crockery told her they had not.

  “Thum busted fowls is eatin’ orl yer dinner,” said Jinny dreamily.

  “’Unt ’em out an’ shet ther door,” said sympathetic Jyne.

  “You go, Sis, I’m tired.” Jinny laid her giddy head on the floor, and went to sleep.

  “Liz,” said Jyne, maliciously, for she immediately grudged Sis’s efforts to chase the fowls out of the dining-room. “Wot’s thet there flower?” pointing to the vase.

  “Wile huniyon,” said Liz, promptly.

  “Er, is it? Thet’s orl yer know. Thet’s a bulbers, thet is. Thet’s ther noo name fer it.” She looked at the grazier’s wife and laughed ironically.

  “Bulbers! yer goat,” said Liz, laughing dutifully.

  The sermon was over, and the worried minister began the christening.

  The naming of the hostess’s baby was plain sailing. He then drew towards him a child of about two years, and asked, “What is this child’s name?”

  “Adrarian,” said Liz. An old shepherd reading to her a love-story had so pronounced the hero’s name. It staggered the minister, until his hostess spelt “Adrian”.

  “What is its age?”

  “About two year.”

  This was too vague for him, and he pressed for dates. But for these dwellers in the bush the calendar had no significance. The mother thought it might be in November. “Cos it wus shearin’, an’ I’d ter keep Teddy at ’ome ter do ther work.” Teddy was “about ten”. From these uncertainties the clergyman had to supply the dates for his official returns to the Government.

  “But Lawd,” as Jyne remarked to ease his perplexity, “wot did it matter fer a brat of er boy?” She had a family of six, and all were girls.

  There was much the same difficulty with all the others, an exception being Tilly Lumber’s baby of under a fortnight. A cowardly look came into the minister’s eyes as he turned to this grotesque atom already in the short coat stage. He remembered Jyne’s awful discovery of a little while back, and shirked the duty of holding it even for a moment.

  The christening was a matter that had some personal interest for the elders, and they grouped round the minister. Bridegroom Tommy, striking the mossy back of Alick’s old father, suggested that he and Jyne’s mother should get spliced, and he expressed the opinion of the fruitfulness of such union within record time as a set-off dig at Jyne.

  She instantly balanced matters between herself and the incautiously smiling Liz and the laughing unfilial Ned. “Stop scratchin’ yer ’ed, miss; anyone ’ud think there wus anythink in it,” she said to Liz’s eldest girl, who was brushing the christening water from her hair. Ned’s stepson she invited to come nearer, and tell her who had blackened his poor eye. She advised the silent lad “ter get a waddy ther nex’ time anyone bigger’n yer goes ter ’it yer”. And she gave him directions by twirling an imaginary waddy swiftly, its circuit suddenly diverting in a line with Ned’s skull.

  It was long past noon when the ceremony was ended. The minister drained his glass of water, mopped his face, and heaved a deep sigh. As the whole congregation still sat on, he gave them a hint that “church” was out, and their presence no longer required. He spoke with a show of concern o
f how very hot they would find the walk home, and to further emphasize his meaning, he shook hands with all the adults, and walked to the veranda. Without the slightest concern they sat on, listening intently to the sounds the hostess made in trying to scrape together a meal for the clergyman. Apparently they all meant to stay the day.

  The grazier’s wife appeared for a moment to beckon him to go round the house into the dining-room. He sat down to the remains of the dinner the children had left.

  At that moment Jinny, who had been awakened for the christening, looked round the door. “Our Sis wants ter know w’en’s ’er supper’s goin’ ter be!” she said.

  This perhaps was an acknowledgement that Sis had already dined.

  THE CHOSEN VESSEL

  SHE laid the stick and her baby on the grass while she untied the rope that tethered the calf. The length of the rope separated them. The cow was near the calf, and both were lying down. Feed along the creek was plentiful, and every day she found a fresh place to tether it, since tether it she must, for if she did not, it would stray with the cow out on the plain. She had plenty of time to go after it, but then there was baby; and if the cow turned on her out on the plain, and she with baby—she had been a town girl and was afraid of the cow, but she did not want the cow to know it. She used to run at first when it bellowed its protest against the penning up of its calf. This satisfied the cow, also the calf, but the woman’s husband was angry, and called her—the noun was cur. It was he who forced her to run and meet the advancing cow, brandishing a stick, and uttering threatening words till the enemy turned and ran. “That’s the way!” the man said, laughing at her white face. In many things he was worse than the cow, and she wondered if the same rule would apply to the man, but she was not one to provoke skirmishes even with the cow.

  It was early for the calf to go “to bed”—nearly an hour earlier than usual; but she had felt so restless all day. Partly because it was Monday, and the end of the week that would bring her and baby the companionship of its father, was so far off. He was a shearer, and had gone to his shed before daylight that morning. Fifteen miles as the crow flies separated them.