grew tired of the old place and "cleared out," too. She certainly
went away and disappeared so utterly that even her own people did
not know what had become of her; to the younger generation her very
existence was only a vague tradition. But it was whispered here and
muttered there among the Doyles and the Donohoes and their friends
and relations, that old Billy the Bully, on one of his visits to
the interior, had been married to this undesirable lady by a duly
accredited parson, in the presence of responsible witnesses; and
that, when everyone had their own, Carrotty Peg, if alive, would
be the lady of Kuryong. However, she had never come back to prove
it, and no one cared about asking her alleged husband any unpleasant
questions.

So much for the history of its owners; now to describe the homestead
itself. It had originally consisted of the two-roomed slab hut,
which had been added to from time to time. Kitchen, outhouses,
bachelors' quarters, saddle-rooms, and store-rooms had been built
on in a kind of straggling quadrangle, with many corners and unexpected
doorways and passages; and it is reported that a swagman once got
his dole of rations at the kitchen, went away, and after turning
two or three corners, got so tangled up that when Fate led him back
to the kitchen he didn't recognise it, and asked for rations over
again, in the firm belief that he was at a different part of the
house.

The original building was still the principal living-room, but
the house had grown till it contained about twenty rooms. The slab
walls had been plastered and whitewashed, and a wide verandah ran
all along the front. Round the house were acres of garden, with
great clumps of willows and acacias, where the magpies sat in the