ILLUSTRATION 3.]

Then there was a parley. The Parson was smarting and furious. He
had learned the colonial art of blowing along with the language. He
threw down his waddy and said:

"You stockman, Frank, come off that horse, drop your whip, and I'll
fight you fair, same as whitefellow. I am as good a man as you any
day."

"Do you take me for a blooming fool, Parson? No fear. If ever I see
you at that hut again, or anywhere on the run, I'll cut the shirt off
your back. I shall tell Mr. Calvert what you have been after, and
you'll soon find yourself in chokey with a rope round your neck."

The Parson left Nyalong, and when he returned he was dying of rum and
rheumatism.

Frank rode back to the hut. The mother and daughter had stood at the
door watching him flog the Parson. He was in their eyes a hero; he
had scourged their savage enemy, and had driven him to the rocks.
They were weeping beauties--at least the daughter was a beauty in
Frank's eyes--but now they wiped away their tears, smoothed their
hair, and thanked their gallant knight over and over again. Two at a
time they repeated their story, how they saw the blackfellow coming,
how they bolted the door, and how he battered it with his club,
threatening to kill them if they did not open it.

Frank had never before been so much praised and flattered, at least
not since his mother weaned him; but he pretended not to care. He
said:

"Tut, tut, it's not worth mentioning. Say no more about it. I would
of course have done as much for anybody."

Of course he could not leave the ladies again to the mercy of the
Parson, so he waited until the shepherd returned with his flock.

Then Frank rode away with a new sensation, a something as near akin
to love as a rough stockman could be expected to feel.

Neddy, the shepherd, asked Mr. Calvert for the loan of arms, and he
taught his wife and daughter the use of old Tower muskets. He said,
"If ever that Parson comes to the hut again, put a couple of bullets
through him."

After that Frank called at the hut nearly every day, enquiring if the
Parson had been seen anywhere abroad.

"No," said Cecily, "we haven't seen him any more;" and she smiled so
sweetly, and lowered her eyes, and spoke low, with a bewitching
Tasmanian accent.

Frank was in the mud, and sinking daily deeper and deeper. At last
he resolved to turn farmer and leave the run, so he rented the land
adjoining Philip's garden and the forty-