I got a couple of bags of potatoes --we could use those that were left over;and I got a small iron plough and a harrow that Little the blacksmith had lying in his yard and let me have cheap --only about a pound more than I told Mary I gave for them.When I took advice,I generally made the mistake of taking more than was offered,or adding notions of my own.
It was vanity,I suppose.If the crop came on well I could claim the plough-and-harrow part of the idea,anyway.(It didn't strike me that if the crop failed Mary would have the plough and harrow against me,for old Corny would plough the ground for ten or fifteen shillings.)Anyway,I'd want a plough and harrow later on,and I might as well get it now;it would give James something to do.
I came out by the western road,by Guntawang,and up the creek home;and the first thing I saw was old Corny George ploughing the flat.
And Mary was down on the bank superintending.She'd got James with the trace-chains and the spare horses,and had made him clear off every stick and bush where another furrow might be squeezed in.
Old Corny looked pretty grumpy on it --he'd broken all his ploughshares but one,in the roots;and James didn't look much brighter.
Mary had an old felt hat and a new pair of 'lastic-side boots of mine on,and the boots were covered with clay,for she'd been down hustling James to get a rotten old stump out of the way by the time Corny came round with his next furrow.
`I thought I'd make the boots easy for you,Joe,'said Mary.
`It's all right,Mary,'I said.`I'm not going to growl.'Those boots were a bone of contention between us;but she generally got them off before I got home.
Her face fell a little when she saw the plough and harrow in the waggon,but I said that would be all right --we'd want a plough anyway.
`I thought you wanted old Corny to plough the ground,'she said.
`I never said so.'
`But when I sent Jim after you about the hoe to put the spuds in,you didn't say you wouldn't bring it,'she said.
I had a few days at home,and entered into the spirit of the thing.
When Corny was done,James and I cross-ploughed the land,and got a stump or two,a big log,and some scrub out of the way at the upper end and added nearly an acre,and ploughed that.James was all right at most Bushwork:he'd bullock so long as the novelty lasted;he liked ploughing or fencing,or any graft he could make a show at.
He didn't care for grubbing out stumps,or splitting posts and rails.
We sliced the potatoes of an evening --and there was trouble between Mary and James over cutting through the `eyes'.
There was no time for the hoe --and besides it wasn't a novelty to James --so I just ran furrows and they dropped the spuds in behind me,and I turned another furrow over them,and ran the harrow over the ground.
I think I hilled those spuds,too,with furrows --or a crop of Indian corn I put in later on.
It rained heavens-hard for over a week:we had regular showers all through,and it was the finest crop of potatoes ever seen in the district.
I believe at first Mary used to slip down at daybreak to see if the potatoes were up;and she'd write to me about them,on the road.
I forget how many bags I got;but the few who had grown potatoes in the district sent theirs to Sydney,and spuds went up to twelve and fifteen shillings a hundredweight in that district.
I made a few quid out of mine --and saved carriage too,for I could take them out on the waggon.Then Mary began to hear (through James)of a buggy that some one had for sale cheap,or a dogcart that somebody else wanted to get rid of --and let me know about it,in an offhand way.
II.Joe Wilson's Luck.
There was good grass on the selection all the year.I'd picked up a small lot --about twenty head --of half-starved steers for next to nothing,and turned them on the run;they came on wonderfully,and my brother-in-law (Mary's sister's husband),who was running a butchery at Gulgong,gave me a good price for them.His carts ran out twenty or thirty miles,to little bits of gold-rushes that were going on at th'Home Rule,Happy Valley,Guntawang,Tallawang,and Cooyal,and those places round there,and he was doing well.
Mary had heard of a light American waggonette,when the steers went --a tray-body arrangement,and she thought she'd do with that.
`It would be better than the buggy,Joe,'she said --`there'd be more room for the children,and,besides,I could take butter and eggs to Gulgong,or Cobborah,when we get a few more cows.'
Then James heard of a small flock of sheep that a selector --who was about starved off his selection out Talbragar way --wanted to get rid of.James reckoned he could get them for less than half-a-crown a-head.We'd had a heavy shower of rain,that came over the ranges and didn't seem to go beyond our boundaries.
Mary said,`It's a pity to see all that grass going to waste,Joe.
Better get those sheep and try your luck with them.Leave some money with me,and I'll send James over for them.Never mind about the buggy --we'll get that when we're on our feet.'
So James rode across to Talbragar and drove a hard bargain with that unfortunate selector,and brought the sheep home.
There were about two hundred,wethers and ewes,and they were young and looked a good breed too,but so poor they could scarcely travel;they soon picked up,though.The drought was blazing all round and Out-Back,and I think that my corner of the ridges was the only place where there was any grass to speak of.We had another shower or two,and the grass held out.Chaps began to talk of `Joe Wilson's luck'.
I would have liked to shear those sheep;but I hadn't time to get a shed or anything ready --along towards Christmas there was a bit of a boom in the carrying line.Wethers in wool were going as high as thirteen to fifteen shillings at the Homebush yards at Sydney,so I arranged to truck the sheep down from the river by rail,with another small lot that was going,and I started James off with them.
