Thamanampalli Surekha

furnished, Sofa, table, chairs, carpet, pianoforte, curtains decorating a French window opening upon a verandah, - every thing had the semblance of wealth and taste, which you might expect in the cities, but certainly not in the bush of Australia. Our host, although more than twelve years a tenant of the bush, had not lost any of the polished manners of the gentleman; and his children, brought up under the care of an amiable and accomplished mother, presented that decorum and obedience which betaken the well-bred family. Those who have read of the barbarous state in which the American squatter, lives from whom the appellation has been derived, as he squats down upon a piece of land in the backwoods, without paying fee or license- are agreeably surprised when they witness the superior condition of the Australian squatter. May, in comparing these gentlemen with the sheep-formers and graziers of the mother country, to whom they are more nearly allied, we must give them the preference in point of education and enterprise. This is not to be wondered at, however, when we inquire into the matter, for we find them composed principally of gentlemen who have retired from the learned and aristocratic professions. Doctors, lawyers, clergymen, military and naval officers, sons of wealthy merchants, who have gone with their savings or loans from the exchange or banking-houses, to invest in these colonial securities of sheep and cattle, as producing the staple commodities of wool and tallow, realising, with ordinary care and prudence, a safe and good interest for the money employed, besides filling up their time by a not unpleasing pursuit. Nine out of ten of these squatters are therefore merely amateur wool-growers and graziers, men who never bred a ewe or an ox in their lives before they set foot in Australia. No doubt they gleaned sufficient knowledge of cattle - breeding and sheep - farming from books and other sources, to pursue either occupation in these colonies, but very few of them have been regularly bred to the business. The fact is, that a knowledge of the management of live stock in Australia is so easily acquired, that any educated man possessed of common shrewdness may be qualified in the course of twelve months to superintend a sheep or cattle station. So that if you are desirous of establishing yourself as a squatter on the waste lands of Australia, it is of greater importance that you should go into the market with a heavy purse than with skill and experience. Of course, the general topic of conversation was concerning this wonderful gold discovery, and the probable effects it would have upon the pastoral interest. Our host and his neighbours complained of the high wages they were obliged to give, and the scarcity of labour to carry on the general business of their stations. At the same time, from, being in the vicinity of the richest gold-field in the colony, they obtained more than recompensed them for these drawbacks, by the sale of their beef and mutton amongst the diggers. And luckily for them that the dry season at the diggings was the time of sheep-shearing throughout the colony, for they found no difficulty in getting shearers, although at an advance of one-half more wages than was given formerly. They were looking forward also to an extensive immigration from the mother country, to neutralise the effects of the absorption of so much labour. Meantime all were reducing their flocks and herds, by sending their surplus stock to the boiling-down pots. Our conversation was interrupted by the appearance of tea, or rather supper, for although it is served up at six a' clock, it is the third and lost meal of the day, and like the other two, there is always animal food served with it. Late suppers are scarcely ever indulged in, not even in the towns. Excepting the dish of hot savoury mutton-chops, the tea-table of our hostess was perfectly orthodox. In the way of cups and saucers it displayed the newest pattern. It is only at the rudest stations in the far interior that tin is used instead of crockery. Upon our expressing our surprise at the comforts and elegancies which surrounded our host, he said his was but a humble mansion compared to many others in the bush, especially in the older colony of New South Wales; and whatever merit it possessed on the score of comfort and elegance was attributable to his amiable partner, who was the presiding genius over the homestead, for his duties took him away to the rougher occupations of the station. " A sorry place indeed would it have been but for her," was his warm ejaculation as she left the room. "When we first settled down upon this spot it was a rough life for the hardiest man to encounter, yet she was not deterred from facing it, even with a young family around her, although she never had experienced what is called country life before. The cheerful countenance with which she tailed through the drudgery of domestic occupations, was what often spurred me on to greater exertion, that I might be able to build a better covering for her and my children than a bark gunya. To us bushmen these are the ministering angels to all our comforts, and you will agree with me when you visit a station where they are not. To a bachelor a bush life is a solitary life at the best, and his mental culture does not improve in the way of refinement during a long absence from the society of his equals, as the case must necessarily be in our thinly-peopled wilderness; while the presence of a wife and family, so for away from the busy haunts of man, throws a halo of domestic comfort and felicity around the bushman's dwelling, which no other pleasure can supply."