cartridge, gave one terrified yell, and took to the Bush. The yellow dog
followed him to the fence and then ran back to see what he had dropped.

Nearly a dozen other dogs came from round all the corners and under the
buildings--spidery, thievish, cold-blooded kangaroo-dogs, mongrel sheep-
and cattle-dogs, vicious black and yellow dogs--that slip after you in
the dark, nip your heels, and vanish without explaining--and yapping,
yelping small fry. They kept at a respectable distance round the nasty
yellow dog, for it was dangerous to go near him when he thought he had
found something which might be good for a dog to eat. He sniffed at the
cartridge twice, and was just taking a third cautious sniff when----

It was very good blasting powder--a new brand that Dave had recently got
up from Sydney; and the cartridge had been excellently well made. Andy
was very patient and painstaking in all he did, and nearly as handy as
the average sailor with needles, twine, canvas, and rope.

Bushmen say that that kitchen jumped off its piles and on again. When
the smoke and dust cleared away, the remains of the nasty yellow dog
were lying against the paling fence of the yard looking as if he had
been kicked into a fire by a horse and afterwards rolled in the dust
under a barrow, and finally thrown against the fence from a distance.
Several saddle-horses, which had been 'hanging-up' round the verandah,
were galloping wildly down the road in clouds of dust, with broken
bridle-reins flying; and from a circle round the outskirts, from every
point of the compass in the scrub, came the yelping of dogs. Two of them
went home, to the place where they were born, thirty miles away, and
reached it the same night and stayed there; it was not till towards
evening that the rest came back cautiously to make inquiries. One was
trying to walk on two legs, and most of 'em looked more or less singed;
and a little, singed, stumpy-tailed dog, who had been in the habit of
hopping the back half of him along on one leg, had reason to be glad
that he'd saved up the other leg all those years, for he needed it
now. There was one old one-eyed cattle-dog round that shanty for years
afterwards, who couldn't stand the smell of a gun being cleaned. He it
was who had taken an interest, only second to that of the yellow dog, in
the cartridge. Bushmen said that it was amusing to slip up on his blind
side and stick a dirty ramrod under his nose: he wouldn't wait to brin