erves from poachers. Think of it
that way."

"There is a lot in that, and that's why I like to see Dawn have young
Eweword, who's a man I'd be happy to leave her to; but I daren't say a
word, she's mighty touchy an' would flash up that she'd leave if I
want to get rid of her. But while I've got breath in me body there's
one thing I will set me foot on, an' that's these good-for-nothing
skunks like bankers' sons an' them sort of high an' mighty pauper
nobodies; they're fearful matches for any one. I know too much about
the swells an' the old families of the colony, I'm thankful I ain't
one of them. My father came out here a long time ago, an' I was born
out here. He was a sergeant in the police. I am near seventy-six, an'
can remember plain for seventy years back in the days w'en there was
plenty convicts, an' me father, seein' his position, was put to see
the floggin' of them. Me and another little girl that's dead now used
to climb up a tree an' look over the wall like children would. We was
stationed in Goulburn then, an' I'll never forget the scenes to me
dyin' day. The men used to be stripped to the waist and tied on a
triangle and walloped till they was cut to pieces, till they screamed
like little children for mercy, and poor old wretches that had roamed
the world for sixty years used to screech Mother! Mother! like little
children. It was heart-renderin'! An' what used they be flogged for,
do you think?--for the piggishness of the swells mostly. I'll tell
you. There was a old feller lived out at Kaligiwa--that's more than
twenty miles the other side of Goulburn, an' there's Parry's Lagoon
there called after him till this day. He was a old Lord Muck if ever
there was one, an' by reason of that got a land grant an' men
assigned, an' he ought to have been give to them to kick--would have
been the right thing; an' then he had a lot of skunks of sons,--took
after their father, of course, an' hadn't much chance of bein'
anythink else,--an' w'en they used to ride to town they used to have a
man tied to the stirrup just to hold it."

"What was that for?"

"What was it for?" she raged. "It was because they was those skunks of
swells that think other people is only made as floor wipes for 'em!
An' this feller used to have to run all the way to town, and if he
hadn't strength to run all the way he'd be dragged, an' if he give any
lip the Parrys 'u'd report 'em; an' me father says he's often seen 'em
flogged till their b