him; a handsome uniform like a cavalry officer; and if
he's a smart, soldierly, good-looking fellow, as he very often is,
he's run after a good deal and can hold his head as high as he pleases.
There's a bit of risk sometimes in apprehending desperate--ahem!--bad
characters, and with bush-rangers and people of that sort, but nothing
more than any young fellow of spirit would like mixed up with his work.
Very often they're men of good family in the old country that have found
nothing to do in this, and have taken to the police. When it was known
that this Ferdinand Morringer was a real baronet and had been an officer
in the Guards, you may guess how the flood of goldfields' talk rose
and flowed and foamed all round him. It was Sir Ferdinand this and Sir
Ferdinand that wherever you went. He was going to lodge at the Royal.
No, of course he was going to stay at the camp! He was married and had
three children. Not a bit of it; he was a bachelor, and he was going to
be married to Miss Ingersoll, the daughter of the bank manager of the
Bank of New Holland. They'd met abroad. He was a tall, fine-looking
man. Not at all, only middle-sized; hadn't old Major Trenck, the
superintendent of police, when he came to enlist and said he had been in
the Guards, growled out, 'Too short for the Guards!'

'But I was not a private,' replied Sir Ferdinand.

'Well, anyhow there's a something about him. Nobody can deny he looks
like a gentleman; my word, he'll put some of these Weddin Mountain chaps
thro' their facin's, you'll see,' says one miner.

'Not he,' says another; 'not if he was ten baronites in one; all the
same, he's a manly-looking chap and shows blood.'

This was the sort of talk we used to hear all round us--from the miners,
from the storekeepers, from the mixed mob at the Prospectors' Arms, in
the big room at night, and generally all about. We said nothing, and
took care to keep quiet, and do and say nothing to be took hold of. All
the same, we were glad to see Sir Ferdinand. We'd heard of him before
from Goring and the other troopers; but he'd been on duty in another
district, and hadn't come in our way.

One evening we were all sitting smoking and yarning in the big room of
the hotel, and Jim, for a wonder--we'd been washing up--when we saw one
of the camp gentlemen come in, and a strange officer of police with
him. A sort of whisper ran through the room, and everybody made up their
minds it was Sir Ferdinand. Jim and I bo