y, and no mistake. One day we saw a stoutish man drive
up Main Street to the camp, with a well-groomed horse, in a dogcart, and
a servant with him; and who was this but old George? He didn't twig us.
He drove close alongside of Jim, who was coming back from the creek,
where he'd been puddling, with two shovels and a pick over his shoulder,
and a pair of old yellow trousers on, and him splashed up to the eyes.
George didn't know him a bit. But we knew him and laughed to ourselves
to see the big swell he had grown into. He stopped at the camp and left
his dogcart outside with his man. Next thing we saw was the Commissioner
walking about outside the camp with him, and talking to him just as if
he was a regular intimate friend.

The Commissioner, that was so proud that he wouldn't look at a digger or
shake hands with him, not if he was a young marquis, as long as he was
a digger. 'No!' he used to say, 'I have to keep my authority over these
thousands and tens of thousands of people, some of them very wild and
lawless, principally by moral influence, though, of course, I have the
Government to fall back upon. To do that I must keep up my position,
and over-familiarity would be the destruction of it.' When we saw him
shaking hands with old George and inviting him to lunch we asked one
of the miners next to our claim if he knew what that man's name and
occupation was there.

'Oh!' he says, 'I thought everybody knew him. That's Storefield, the
great contractor. He has all the contracts for horse-feed for the camps
and police stations; nearly every one between here and Kiandra. He's
took 'em lucky this year, and he's making money hand over fist.'

Well done, steady old George! No wonder he could afford to drive a good
horse and a swell dogcart. He was getting up in the world. We were a bit
more astonished when we heard the Commissioner say--

'I am just about to open court, Mr. Storefield. Would you mind taking a
few cases with me this morning?'

We went into the courthouse just for a lark. There was old George
sitting on the bench as grave as a judge, and a rattling good magistrate
he made too. He disagreed from the Commissioner once or twice, and
showed him where he was right, too, not in the law but in the facts of
the case, where George's knowing working men and their ways gave him
the pull. He wasn't over sharp and hard either, like some men directly
they're raised up a bit, just to show their power. But just seemed to