G. A. Henty – The Complete Collection

Chapter 62

"As long as daylight lasted the old people had done very well, and had kept the blacks at a distance; and we saw, by the marks of blood in the morning, that they must have killed or wounded eight or ten of them; but if we hadn't come up before the blacks had darkness to cover them, it would have gone hard with them. Of course we knew that, and calculated so as to get there before nightfall."

"What became of the bush ranger?" Reuben asked.

"Well, curiously enough, that was the last time he ever troubled the settlements. We never knew exactly what became of him, but it was said that the blacks killed and eat him. I know that was very often the end of those fellows. As long as all went on well, the blacks were friendly enough with them, and were glad to follow their lead; but after a repulse like that they got at our station, or perhaps as a result of some quarrel about the division of the plunder, or their gins, or something of that sort, they would fall suddenly on their white friends, and make cooked meat of them."

"I suppose the blacks seldom spare any whites who fall into their hands?" Reuben asked.

"Scarcely ever," Mr. Blount replied. "That was why they were more dreaded than the bush rangers. The latter would kill, if they were in the humour for it; but if there was no serious resistance, and none of their number got hurt, more often than not they contented themselves by leaving everyone tied, hand and foot, till somebody came to unloose them.

"I remember one horrible case, in which they so tied up three white men at a lonely station, and nobody happened to go near it for three weeks afterwards. It struck someone that none of them had been seen, for some time; and a couple of men rode over and, to their horror, found the three men dead of hunger and thirst.

"Now the black fellows don't do that sort of thing. When they do attack a station and take it, they kill every soul; man, woman, and child."

"I suppose, in that affair you were telling us of," Reuben asked, "both of your ticket-of-leave men were killed?"

"Yes. One seemed to have been surprised and speared at once. The other had made a stout fight of it, for the bodies of three natives were found near him."

"I remember one case," one of the others said, "in which the blacks did spare one of the party, in a station which they attacked. It was a little girl of about three years old. Why they did so I don't know; perhaps the chief took a fancy to her. Maybe he had lost a child of the same age, and thought his gin would take to the little one. Anyhow, he carried her off.

"The father happened to be away at the time. He had gone down to Sydney with a waggon, for stores; and when he got back he found the house burned, and the bodies of his wife, two boys, and two men, but there was no trace of that of the child.

"He was nearly out of his mind, poor fellow. The neighbours all thought that the body must have been burned with the house; but he would have it that there would have been some sign of her. No one else thought so; and besides, it wasn't the custom of the blacks to carry off anyone. The father got a party to try and follow the blacks, but of course it was no use. They had pretty near two days' start.

"The father never took to his farm again, but hung about the out stations, doing a job here and there for his grub. Sometimes he would be away for a bit, and when he came back, though he never talked about it, everyone knew he had been out hunting the blacks.

"I do not know how many of them he killed, but I know he never spared one, when he got him outside the settlement. After a time the blacks never troubled that part. So many of them had been killed that they got a superstitious fear of the man, and believed he was possessed of an evil spirit; and I don't believe twenty of them, together, would have dared to attack him.

"At last, from some of the half-tamed blacks in the settlement, he got to hear some sort of rumour that there was a white girl, living with one of the tribes far out in their country, and he set out. He was away four months, and he never said what he had been doing all the time. In fact, he started almost directly for the port, and went home by the next ship.

"However, he brought his child back with him. It was four years since she had been carried off, and she was a regular little savage, when she arrived in the settlement with him. Of course she could not speak a word of English, and was as fierce as a little wildcat. I expect she got all right, after a bit.

"I didn't see the man, but I heard he was worn to a shadow, when he got back. He must have had an awful time of it, in the bush. What with hunger and thirst, and dodging the blacks, I don't know how he lived through it; but he looked contented and happy, in spite of his starvation, and they say it was wonderful to see how patient he was with the child.

"They got up a subscription, at Sydney, to send them both home. I heard that the captain of the ship he went in said, when he came back the next voyage, that the child had taken to him, and had got civilized and like other children before they got to England."

"Of course, such fellows as Cockeye and Fothergill are the exceptions, and not the rule," Mr. Blount said. "Were there many of such scoundrels about, we should have to abandon our settlements and make war upon them; for there would be no living in the colony till they were exterminated. Most of these fellows are the colonial version of the highwaymen, at home. It is just 'Stand and deliver.' They content themselves with taking what they can find in a traveller's pockets, or can obtain by a flying visit to his station."

"Yes, I had several of those in my last district," Reuben said. "They were just mounted robbers, and gave us a good deal of trouble in hunting them down. But none of them had shed blood during their career, and they did not even draw a pistol when we captured them. That style of bush ranger is a nuisance, but no more. Men seldom carry much money about with them here, and no great harm was done."

"You see," d**k Caister said, "these fellows have a remarkable objection to putting their necks in the way of a noose; so that although they may lug out a pistol and shout 'Bail up!' they will very seldom draw a trigger, if you show fight. So long as they do not take life they know that, if they are caught, all they have to expect is to be kept at hard work during the rest of their sentence, and perhaps for a bit longer. They don't mind the risk of that. They have had their outing, sometimes a long one; but if they once take life, they know its hanging when they are caught; and are therefore careful not to press too hard upon their triggers.

"But once they have killed a man, they don't generally care how many more lives they take. They are desperate, then, and seem to exult in devilry of all kinds. As to being stuck up by an ordinary bush ranger, one would think no more of it than of having one's pockets picked, in England.

"It's lucky for us, on the whole, that the black fellows have such a hatred of the white men. Were it not for that, a good many of these fellows would go all lengths, relying on taking to the bush when they had made the colony too hot to hold them. But there are only a few of them that have ever got on well with the blacks, and many a man who has gone out into the bush has found his end there. You see, there's no explaining to a dozen natives, who jump up and begin to throw spears and boomerangs at you, that you are a bad white fellow, and not a colonist on the search for fresh runs.

"No, the bush rangers on the whole are not such a bad lot of fellows. I suppose there is not one of us, here, who hasn't had men ride up and ask for food; who were, he knew pretty well, bush rangers. Of course they got their food, as anyone else would who rode up to a station and asked for it.

"Once, only, I was told to hand over any money I had in the house. As, fortunately, I had only a few pounds I gave it up without making a fight for it. It's no use risking one's life, unless for something worth fighting for. I suppose most of us here have had similar experiences."

There was a general chorus of assent among the settlers.

"Many of them are poor-spirited wretches. Two of them bailed up a waggoner of mine, coming out with a load from the port. He pretended to give in and, as they were opening some of the boxes, he knocked one over with the butt end of his whip. The other fired a hasty shot, and then jumped on to his horse and galloped off again; and my man brought in the fellow he had stunned."

"Did you hand him over to the police?" Reuben asked.

"Not I," the settler laughed. "I thought he had got what he deserved, so I bandaged up his head and let him go. Those poor beggars of convicts have a dreadful hard time of it, and I don't think there are many settlers who would hand over any man who had escaped, and taken to the bush, even if he had occasionally bailed up a waggoner or so. We know what a flogging the poor wretch would get and, as long as it's only an occasional robbery, to keep themselves from starving, we don't feel any great animosity against them. It's different, altogether, when they take to murder. Then, of course, they must be hunted down like wild beasts.

"And now I vote that we have a nap. My pipe's out, and I suppose we shall be on the tramp again, as soon as it is dark."

Chapter 13

: Bush Rangers.

As soon as it became dark, the journey was renewed.

"Now, Jim, you must keep your eyes well open," Reuben said. "There is no saying when we may come upon them, now."

"I tink dey not berry far off, sah. Dose sheep too tired to go far. Black fellow glad to stop and rest, when he see no one coming after him.

"De ground more up and down here. Must no make noise. May come upon dem sudden."

It was nearly midnight when Jim suddenly halted.

"What is it, Jim?" Reuben asked, in a low voice.

Jim stood sniffing the air.

"Me smell fire, captain."

Reuben sniffed the air, but shook his head.

"I don't smell anything, Jim."

"I smell him, sah, sure enough; not very close, perhaps, but in de air."

"What is it, Captain Whitney?" Mr. Blount asked, as he came forward and joined them.

"Jim says he smells fire, but I can't smell it."

"Oh, you can trust Jim's nose," the settler said. "It is wonderful how keen is the scent of these natives. They are like dogs in that respect; and can perceive the smell of a fire, when the wind brings it down to them, miles away."