for purposes of defence.

This one strong room covered in, and the boarded sides nailed on, the
building of a kitchen at the side became a comparatively easy task, and
was gone on with more slowly, for another job had to be commenced.

"I consider it wonderful, boys, that they have escaped," said the
captain; "but we have been tempting fate. We must fence in a good space
for the cattle, a sort of home close, where we know that they will be
safe, before the enemy comes and drives them off some night while we are
asleep."

This enclosure was then made, the posts and rails on one side coming
close up to the space intended for a garden; and a further intention was
to board it closely for a defence on that side when time allowed.

Every day saw something done, and in their busy life and immunity from
danger all thought of peril began to die out. They even began to
imagine that the weather was always going to be fine, so glorious it
remained all through their building work. But they were soon undeceived
as to that, a wet season coming on, and the boys getting some few
examples of rain which made Sam German declare that it came down in
bucketfuls; while Rifle was ready to assert, one afternoon when he was
caught, that he almost swam home through it, after a visit to the lower
part of the captain's land, to see that the sheep were all driven on to
high ground, up to which they had laboured with their fleeces holding
water in a perfect load.

And hence it was that, to the astonishment of all, they found that a
whole year had passed away, and the captain said, with a perplexed look,
that they seemed hardly to have done anything.

But all the same, there was the Dingo Station, as he had dubbed it, on
account of the wild dogs which prowled about, with a substantial little
farmhouse, some small out-buildings, paddocks enclosed with rails, and
their farming stock looking healthy and strong. Sam German, too, had
contrived to get something going in the way of a garden, and plans
innumerable were being made for the future in the way of beautifying the
place, though nature had done much for them before they came.

As for the elders, they did not look a day older, and all were in robust
health. The change was in the boys:

Norman and Rifle had grown brown and sturdy to a wonderful degree, while
Tim had shot up to such an extent that his cousins laughingly declared
that he ought to wear a leaden hat to keep him down.

"It al