gentlemen."

"Oh!" ejaculated Nic; and the warder smiled at his surprise.

"That's it, sir, and I say a good thing too. Here's a new country with
plenty of room in it, and the judges and people at home sentence men to
be transported for fourteen or twenty-one years, or perhaps for life."

"Yes, I know all that," said Nic, nodding his head.

"Then, sir, the law says lots of these men are not all bad, and they're
sorry for what they've done; so if they are, and show that they want to
lead a new life, we'll give 'em a chance. Then all those who have
earned a good character in the convict lines and mean work are assigned
to settlers who want labourers and shepherds and stockmen; and if they
behave themselves, and show that the punishment has cured them of their
bad ways, all they've got to do is to report themselves from time to
time; and so long as they don't try to escape out of the country they
can do pretty well as they like, and plenty of them out there are doing
far better than they would have done at home."

"That's very good," said Nic.

"To be sure it is, sir; and that's why I say to you, be a little
careful, and not be ready to trust the convicts. Plenty of them you'll
find good fellows; but there are plenty more who are very smooth and
artful, and only waiting their time. But you'll soon learn which are
sheep and which are goats. Now, here's a chap coming round here--
Thirty-three, sir. What do you say to him? He's got fourteen years for
robbing his employers. Embezzlement they call it. Now, he's been a
well-brought-up sort of man--good education, always well dressed, and
lived on the fat of the land. He looks at you, I suppose, when I'm not
here, as much as to say, `Isn't it cruel to shut me up with these
ruffians and murderous wretches? I'm a poor, innocent, ill-used man!'"

"Yes, that is how he always does look at me," cried Nic. "Yes, sir, and
at everybody else; but if he was an innocent, ill-used man, he'd wrinkle
up his forehead and look bitter and savage-like, ready to treat
everybody as his enemy. That chap's a sneak, sir, and I've no
hesitation in saying he deserves all he has got. Don't you listen to
him if ever he speaks, and don't you break no rules by petting him with
anything good from the cabin."

"I certainly shan't," said Nic. "I don't like him."

The warder turned sharply, and looked hard at Nic, as he said, smiling:

"You'll do sir. Dame Nature's made you a bit of a ju