t direction,--so will not
attempt to correctly reproduce all that Harold Beecham told me on that
afternoon while leaning against a tree at my feet and looking down at me
as I reclined in the hammock.

There was great mention of bogus bonds, bad investments, liabilities and
assets and personal estates, and of a thing called an official
assignee--whatever that is--voluntary sequestration, and a jargon of such
terms that were enough to mither a Barcoo lawyer.

The gist of the matter, as I gathered it, was that Harold Beecham, looked
upon as such a "lucky beggar", and envied as a pet of fortune, had been
visited by an unprecedented run of crushing misfortunes. He had not been
as rich and sound in position as the public had imagined him to be. The
failure of a certain bank two or three years previously had given him a
great shaking. The tick plague had ruined him as regarded his Queensland
property, and the drought had made matters nearly as bad for him in New
South Wales. The burning of his wool last year, and the failure of the
agents in whose hands he had placed it, this had pushed him farther into
the mire, and now the recent "going bung" of a building society--his sole
remaining prop--had run him entirely ashore.

He had sequestrated his estate, and as soon as practicable was going
through the courts as an insolvent. The personal estate allowed him from
the debris of his wealth he intended to settle on his aunts, and he hoped
it might be sufficient to support them. Himself, he had the same
prospects as the boundary-riders on Five-Bob Downs.

I had nothing to say. Not that Harold was a much-to-be-pitied man when
one contrasted his lot with that of millions of his fellows as deserving
as he; but, on the other hand, considering he had been reared in wealth
and as the master of it since his birth, to be suddenly rendered equal
with a labourer was pretty hard lines.

"Oh, Harold, I am so sorry for you!" I managed to stammer at last.

"Don't worry about me. There's many a poor devil, crippled and ill,
though rolling in millions, who would give all his wealth to stand in my
boots today," he said, drawing his splendid figure to its full height,
while a look of stern pride settled on the strong features. Harold
Beecham was not a whimpering cur. He would never tell anyone his feelings
on the subject; but such a sudden reverse of fortune, tearing from him
even his home, must have been a great blow to him.

"Syb, I have been