with a big mob of cattle or a lot for the pound. Father didn't go himself,
and I used to notice that whenever we came up and said we were
Ben Marston's boys both master and super looked rather glum, and then appeared
not to think any more about it. I heard the owner of one of these stations
say to his managing man, `Pity, isn't it? fine boys, too.'
I didn't understand what they meant. I do now.

We could do a few things besides riding, because, as I told you before,
we had been to a bit of a school kept by an old chap that had once seen
better days, that lived three miles off, near a little bush township.
This village, like most of these places, had a public-house
and a blacksmith's shop. That was about all. The publican kept the store,
and managed pretty well to get hold of all the money that was made
by the people round about, that is of those that were `good drinking men'.
He had half-a-dozen children, and, though he was not up to much,
he wasn't that bad that he didn't want his children to have the chance
of being better than himself. I've seen a good many crooked people in my day,
but very few that, though they'd given themselves up as a bad job,
didn't hope a bit that their youngsters mightn't take after them.
Curious, isn't it? But it is true, I can tell you. So Lammerby,
the publican, though he was a greedy, sly sort of fellow, that bought things
he knew were stolen, and lent out money and charged everybody two prices
for the things he sold 'em, didn't like the thought of his children
growing up like Myall cattle, as he said himself, and so he fished out this
old Mr. Howard, that had been a friend or a victim or some kind of pal of his
in old times, near Sydney, and got him to come and keep school.

He was a curious man, this Mr. Howard. What he had been or done
none of us ever knew, but he spoke up to one of the squatters
that said something sharp to him one day in a way that showed us boys