arts."

Sam German chuckled.

"'Maginary line, sir. Of course it is."

"And this line--Oh, I can't explain it, Rifle, can you?"

"Course he can't, sir, nor you nayther. 'Tain't to be done. I knowed
it were a 'maginary line when you said we war crossing it. But just you
look here, sir: 'bout our garden and farm, over which I hope the master
weant be disappointed, but I _know_ he will, for I asks you young gents
this--serusly, mind, as gents as has had your good eddication and growed
up scollards--How can a man make a garden in a country where everything
is upside down?"

"But it isn't upside down, Sam; it's only different," said Norman.

"That's what I say, sir. Here we are in the middle o' December, when,
if the weather's open, you may put in your first crop o' broad Windsor
beans, and you've got your ground all ridged to sweeten in the frost.
And now, look at this. Why, it's reg'lar harvest time and nothing else.
I don't wonder at the natives being black."

"Look, look!" cried Tim suddenly, as he pointed away to where, on an
open plain on the right, some birds were running rapidly.

"I see them! what are they?" cried Rifle, excitedly.

"Somebody's chickens," said Sam, contemptuously.

The boys looked at him and laughed.

"Sam German has got to grow used to the place," said Norman. And then,
as his father cantered up, he pointed off. "Do you see those, father?"

"What, those birds?" said the captain, eagerly. "Comebacks, sir.
Guinea fowls. A bit wild," said Sam, quietly.

"Guinea fowls?" replied the captain, sheltering his eyes. "No; birds
twenty times as large, you might say. Why, boys, those must be emus."

"Emus?" said Rifle. "Oh yes, I remember. Ostrichy-looking things. Are
those what they are?"

"I do not think there's a doubt about it," replied the captain, after
another look at the rapidly-retiring birds, which, after a long stare at
the little train of carts and wains, literally made their legs twinkle
like the spokes of a carriage wheel as they skimmed over the ground and
out of sight.

"Yes," said the captain again, as the last one disappeared. "Emus, the
Australian ostriches. You boys ought to make notes of all the wild
creatures you see."

"We shan't forget them, uncle," said Tim. "Let's see; there was the
black, the snake--"

"Snake? Have you seen one?"

"Oh yes," replied Tim.

"Thirty feet long, wasn't it?" said Norman, giving his brother a look.

"Thirty? Mor