g if
Sam hadn't arrived on the scene. Sam is a big, silent chap, and he can
fight anybody in this district. He landed the swaggie first with one
fist and then with the other, and the swaggie reckoned he'd been struck
by a thunderbolt when they fished him out of the creek, where he had
rolled! You see, Sam's very fond of Len, and it annoyed him to see his
eye.

"The swaggie did not do any more resisting. He was like a half-dead,
drowned rat. Len and Sam brought him up to the men at the fire just
after we'd left to try to save Dad's Shropshires, and they and Mr.
Morrison could hardly keep the men off him. He hid behind Sam, and cried
and begged them to protect him. They said it was beastly."

"Rather!" said Harry. "Where's he now?"

"Melbourne Gaol. He got three years," said Jim. "I guess he's reflecting
on the foolishness of using matches too freely!"

"By George!" said Wally, drawing a deep breath. "That was exciting,
Jimmy!"

"Well, fishing isn't," responded Jim pulling up his hook in disgust, an
example followed by the other boys. "What'll we do?"

"I move," said Wally, standing on one leg on the log, "that this meeting
do adjourn from this dead tree. And I move a hearty vote of thanks to
Mr. Jim Linton for spinning a good yarn. Thanks to be paid immediately.
There's mine, Jimmy!"

A resounding pat on the back startled Jim considerably, followed as it
was by a second from Harry. The assaulted one fled along the log, and
hurled mud furiously from the bank. The enemy followed closely, and
shortly the painful spectacle might have been seen of a host lying flat
on his face on the grass, while his guests, sitting on his back, bumped
up and down to his extreme discomfort and the tune of "For He's a Jolly
Good Fellow!"

CHAPTER VII. WHAT NORAH FOUND

Norah, meanwhile, had been feeling somewhat "out of things." It was
really more than human nature could be expected to bear that she should
remain on the log with the three boys, while Jim told amazing yarns
about her. Still it was decidedly lonesome in the jutting root of the
old tree, looking fixedly at the water, in which placidly lay a float
that had apparently forgotten that the first duty of a float is to bob.

Jim's voice, murmuring along in his lengthy recital, came to her softly,
and she could see from her perch the interested faces of the two others.
It mingled drowsily with the dull drone of bees in the ti-tree behind
her, and presently Norah, to