some indigestible
compound for at least three days, as it was of no use attempting to
make proper bread until the yeast had worked. Then the well needed to
be deepened, a kitchen garden had to be made, shelter to be provided
for the fowls and pigs; a shed to be put up for coals; a thousand things
which entailed thought and trouble, had to be done.

It is true these rough jobs were not exactly in my line, but indoors I
was just as busy trying to make big things fit into little spaces and
_vice versa_. We could not afford to take things coolly and do a little
every day, for at that time of year an hour's change in the wind might
have brought a heavy fall of snow, or a sharp frost, or a; deluge of
rain down upon the uncovered and defenceless heads of our live stock.
The poor dear sheep, the source of our income, were after all the least
well-cared for creatures on the Station. A well grassed and watered
run, with sunny vallies for winter feeding, and green hills for summer
pasturage, had been provided by antipodean Nature for them, and to
these advantages we only added some twenty or twenty-five miles of
wire fencing, and then they were left to themselves, with a couple of
shepherds to look after fifteen thousand sheep all the year round.

But yet, busy as we were, we found time to look up a congregation. The
very first Sunday afternoon, whilst we were still in the midst of a
chaos of chips and big boxes and straw and empty china-barrels, our own
shepherds came over, by invitation, and the only very near neighbours we
had--a Scotch head-shepherd and his charming young wife,--and we held a
Service in the half-furnished drawing room. After it was ended we had a
long talk with the men, and they confessed that they had enjoyed it
very much, and would like to come regularly. When questioned as to
the feasibility of inducing others to join, they said that it might
be suggested to more than one distant, lonely hill-shepherd, but his
uncontrollable shyness would probably prevent his attendance.

"Jim Salter, and Joe Bennett, and a lot more on 'em, would be glad enow
to come, if so be they could feel as how they was truly wellcombe," said
our shepherd, Pepper, who prided himself on the elegance and correctness
of his phraseology. He added, after a reflective pause, turning
bashfully away, "If so be as the lady would just look round and give 'em
a call, they'd be to be persuaded belike."

So the scheme was Pepper's after all, you