And there was sorrow round the place, for Denver was a man;
Jack Denver's wife bowed down her head--her daughter's grief was wild,
And big Ben Duggan by the bed stood sobbing like a child.
But big Ben Duggan saddled up, and galloped fast and far,
To raise the longest funeral ever seen on Talbragar.

-_Ben Duggan_.


Both funerals belonged to Big Ben Duggan in a way, though Jack Denver
was indirectly the cause of both.

Jack Denver was reckoned the most popular man in the district (outside
the principal township)--a white man and a straight man--a white boss
and a straight sportsman. He was a squatter, though a small one; a
real squatter who lived on his run and worked with his men--no dummy,
super, manager for a bank, or swollen cockatoo about Jack Denver. He
was on the committees at agricultural shows and sports, great at
picnics and dances, beloved by school children at school feasts (I
wonder if they call them feasts still), giver of extra or special
prizes, mostly sovs. and half-sovs., for foot races, etc.; leading
spirit for the scrub district in electioneering campaigns--they went
as right as men could go in the politics of those days who watched and
went the way Jack Denver went; header of subscription lists for
burnt-out, flooded-out, sick, hurt, dead or killed or otherwise
knocked-out selectors and others, or their families; barracker and
agitator for new provisional schools, assister of his Reverence and
little bush chapels, friend of all manner of wanderers--careless,
good-hearted scamps in trouble, broken-hearted new chums, wrecks and
failures and outcasts of any colour or creed, and especially of old