hearty, and delightful to hear.



Chapter X: Swaggers.


Dr. Johnson did not know the somewhat vulgar word which heads this
paper. At least he did not know it as a noun, but gives "swagger:
v.n., to bluster, bully, brag;" but the Slang Dictionary admits it
as a word, springing indeed from the thieves' vocabulary: "one who
carries a swag." Neither of these books however give the least idea
of the true meaning of the expression, which is as fully recognised
as an honest word in both Australia and New Zealand as any other
combination of letters in the English language. A swagger is the
very antithesis then of a swaggerer, for, whereas, the one is full
of pretension and abounds in unjust claims on our notice, the
swagger is humility and civility itself. He knows, poor weary
tramp, that on the favourable impression he makes upon the "boss,"
depends his night's lodging and food, as well as a job of work in
the future. We will leave then the ideal swaggerer to some other
biographer who may draw glowing word-pictures of him in all his
jay's splendour, and we will confine ourselves to describing the
real swagger, clad in flannel shirt, moleskin trowsers, and what
were once thick boots, but might now be used as sieves.

Nothing astonished me so much in my New Zealand Station Life as
these visitors. Even Sir Roger de Coverley himself would have
looked with distrust upon most of our swagger-guests, and yet I
never heard of an instance in our part of the country where the