imagined; the early mornings and evenings and the nights are very
cold, but the hours from 10 A.M. till 5 P.M. are exquisitely bright,
and quite warm. We are glad of a fire at breakfast, which is
tolerably early, but we let it out and never think of relighting it
until dark. Above all, it is calm: I congratulate myself daily on
the stillness of the atmosphere, but F--- laughs and says, "Wait
until the spring." I bask all day in the verandah, carrying my
books and work there soon after breakfast; as soon as the sun goes
down, however, it becomes very cold. In an English house you would
hardly feel it, but with only one plank an inch thick, a
lining-board and canvas and paper, between you and a hard frost, a
good fire is wanted. We burn coal found twelve miles from this; it
is not very good, being only what is called "lignite." I don't know
if that conveys to you a distinct impression of what it really is.
I should say it was a better sort of turf: it smoulders just in the
same way, and if not disturbed will remain many hours alight; it
requires a log of dry wood with it to make a really good blaze.
Fuel is most difficult to get here, and very expensive, as we have
no available "bush" on the Run; so we have first to take out a
licence for cutting wood in the Government bush, then to employ men
to cut it, and hire a drayman who possesses a team of bullocks and a
dray of his own, to fetch it to us: he can only take two journeys a
day, as he has four miles to travel each way, so that by the time
the wood is stacked it costs us at least thirty shillings a cord,
and then there is the labour of sawing and cutting it up. The coal
costs us one pound a ton at the mouth of the pit, and the carriage
exactly doubles its price; besides which it is impossible to get
more, than a small quantity at a time, on account of the effect of
the atmosphere on it. Exposure to the air causes it to crumble into
dust, and although we keep our supply in a little shed for the