r carriage. We were glad when the
bell rang.

The rain recommenced. We saw another swagman about a mile on struggling
away from the town, through mud and water. He did not seem to have heart
enough to bother about trying to avoid the worst mud-holes. There was a
low-spirited dingo at his heels, whose sole object in life was seemingly
to keep his front paws in his master's last footprint. The traveller's
body was bent well forward from the hips up; his long arms--about six
inches through his coat sleeves--hung by his sides like the arms of a
dummy, with a billy at the end of one and a bag at the end of the
other; but his head was thrown back against the top end of the swag, his
hat-brim rolled up in front, and we saw a ghastly, beardless face which
turned neither to the right nor the left as the train passed him.

After a long while we closed our book, and looking through the window,
saw a hawker's turn-out which was too sorrowful for description.

We looked out again while the train was going slowly, and saw a
teamster's camp: three or four wagons covered with tarpaulins which hung
down in the mud all round and suggested death. A long, narrow man, in a
long, narrow, shoddy overcoat and a damp felt hat, was walking quickly
along the road past the camp. A sort of cattle-dog glided silently and
swiftly out from under a wagon, "heeled" the man, and slithered back
without explaining. Here the scene vanished.

We remember stopping--for an age it seemed--at half a dozen straggling
shanties on a flat of mud and water. There was a rotten weather-board
pub, with a low, dripping veranda, and three wretchedly forlorn horses
hanging, in the rain, to a post outside. We saw no more, but we knew
that there were several apologies for men hanging about the rickety bar
inside--or round the parlour fire. Streams of cold, clay-coloured water
ran in all directions, cutting fresh gutters, and raising a yeasty froth
whenever the water fell a few inches. As we left, we saw a big man in an
overcoat riding across a culvert; the tails of the coat spread over the
horse's rump, and almost hid it. In fancy still we saw him--hanging up
his weary, hungry little horse in the rain, and swaggering into the bar;
and we almost heard someone say, in a drawling tone: "'Ello, Tom! 'Ow
are yer poppin' up?"'

The train stopped (for about a year) within a mile of the next station.
Trucking-yards in the foreground, like any other trucking-yard along the
line;