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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/4221-h.zip b/4221-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6dd5595 --- /dev/null +++ b/4221-h.zip diff --git a/4221-h/4221-h.htm b/4221-h/4221-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6f29281 --- /dev/null +++ b/4221-h/4221-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1640 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<HTML> +<HEAD> + +<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> + +<TITLE> +The Project Gutenberg E-text of Shearing in the Riverina, New South Wales, +by Rolf Boldrewood +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: small } + +P.letter {text-indent: 0%; + font-size: small ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.footnote {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.finis { font-size: larger ; + text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Shearing in the Riverina, New South Wales, by +Rolf Boldrewood + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Shearing in the Riverina, New South Wales + +Author: Rolf Boldrewood + +Posting Date: June 30, 2009 [EBook #4221] +Release Date: July, 2003 +First Posted: December 8, 2001 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHEARING IN THE RIVERINA *** + + + + +Produced by Col Choat. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +SHEARING IN THE RIVERINA,<BR> +NEW SOUTH WALES. +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +by +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +Rolf Boldrewood +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P> +"Shearing commences to-morrow!" These apparently simple words were +spoken by Hugh Gordon, the manager of Anabanco station, in the district +of Riverina, in the colony of New South Wales, one Monday morning in +the month of August. The utterance had its importance to every member +of a rather extensive "CORPS DRAMATIQUE" awaiting the industrial drama +about to be performed. +</P> + +<P> +A low sand-hill a few years since had looked out over a sea of grey +plains, covered partly with grass, partly with salsiferous bushes and +herbs. Two or three huts built of the trunks of the pine and roofed +with the bark of the box-tree, and a skeleton-looking cattle-yard with +its high "gallows" (a rude timber stage whereon to hang slaughtered +cattle) alone broke the monotony of the plain-ocean. A comparatively +small herd of cattle, 2000 or 3000, found more than sufficient +pasturage during the short winter and spring, but were always compelled +to migrate to mountain pastures when the swamps, which alone in those +days formed the water-stores of the run, were dried up. But two or +three, or at most half-a-dozen, stockmen were ever needed for the +purpose of managing the herd, so inadequate in number and profitable +occupation to this vast tract of grazing country. +</P> + +<P> +But, a little later, one of the great chiefs of the wool-producing +interest—a shepherd-king, so to speak, of shrewdness, energy, and +capital—had seen, approved and purchased the lease of this waste +kingdom. Almost at once, as if by magic, the scene changed. Great gangs +of navvies appeared, wending their way across the silent plain. Dams +were made, wells were dug. Tons of fencing wire were dropped on the +sand by the long line of teams which seemed never tired of arriving. +Sheep by thousands, and tens of thousands, began to come, grazing and +cropping up to the lonely sandhill—now swarming with blacksmiths, +carpenters, engineers, fencers, shepherds, bullock-drivers—till the +place looked like a fair on the borders of Tartary. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile everything was moving with calculated force and cost, under +the "reign of law". The seeming expense was merely the economic truth +of doing all the necessary work at once, rather than by instalments. +One hundred men for one day rather than one man for one hundred days. +Results soon began to demonstrate themselves. In twelve months the dams +were full, the wells sending up their far-fetched priceless water, the +wire fences erected, the shepherds gone, and 17,000 sheep cropping the +herbage of Anabanco. Tuesday was the day fixed for the actual +commencement of the momentous, almost solemn transaction—the pastoral +Hegira, so to speak, as the time of most station events is +calculated with reference to it, as happening before or after shearing. +But before the first shot is fired which tells of the battle begun, +what raids and skirmishes, what reconnoitring and vedette duty must +take place! +</P> + +<P> +First arrives the cook-in-chief to the shearers, with two assistants to +lay in a few provisions for the week's consumption of 70 able-bodied +men. I must here explain that the cook of a large shearing-shed is a +highly paid and tolerably irresponsible official. He is paid and +provided by the shearers. Payment is generally arranged on the scale of +half-a-crown a head weekly from each shearer. For this sum he must +provide punctual and effective cooking, paying out of his own pocket as +many "marmitons" as may be needful for that end, and to satisfy his +tolerably exacting and fastidious employers. +</P> + +<P> +In the present case he confers with the storekeeper, Mr de Vere, a +young gentleman of aristocratic connexions who is thus gaining an +excellent practical knowledge of the working of a large station and to +this end has the store-keeping department entrusted to him during +shearing. +</P> + +<P> +He does not perhaps look quite fit for a croquet party as he stands +now, with a flour-scoop in one hand and a pound of tobacco in the +other. But he looks like a man at work, and also like a gentleman, as +he is. "Jack the Cook" thus addresses him: +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Mr de Vere, I hope there's not going to be any humbugging about +my rations and things! The men are all up in their quarters, and as +hungry as free selectors. They've been a-payin' for their rations for +ever so long, and of course now shearing's on, they're good for a +little extra!" +</P> + +<P> +"All right, Jack," returns de Vere, good-temperedly, "all your lot was +weighed out and sent away before breakfast. You must have missed the +cart. Here's the list. I'll read it out to you: three bags flour, half +a bullock, two bags sugar, a chest of tea, four dozen of pickles, four +dozen of jam, two gallons of vinegar, five pounds pepper, a bag of +salt, plates, knives, forks, ovens, frying-pans, saucepans, iron pots, +and about a hundred other things. Now, mind you, return all the cooking +things safe, or PAY FOR THEM—that's the order! You don't want +anything more, do you? You've got enough for a regiment of cavalry, I +should think." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I don't know. There won't be much left in a week if the weather +holds good," makes answer the chef, as one who thought nothing too +stupendous to be accomplished by shearers, "but I knew I'd forgot +something. As I'm here I'll take a few dozen boxes of sardines, and a +case of pickled salmon. The boys likes 'em, and, murder alive! haven't +we forgot the plums and currants? A hundredweight of each, Mr de Vere! +They'll be crying out for plum-duff and currant buns for the afternoon; +and bullying the life out of me, if I haven't a few trifles like. It's +a hard life, surely, a shearers' cook. Well, good-bye, sir, you have +'em all down in the book." +</P> + +<P> +Lest the reader should imagine that the role of Mr Gordon at +Anabanco was a reign of luxury and that waste which tendeth to penury, +let him be aware that all shearers in Riverina are paid at a certain +rate, usually that of ONE pound per hundred sheep shorn. They agree, on +the other hand, to pay for all supplies consumed by them at certain +prices fixed before the shearing agreement is signed. Hence, it is +entirely their own affair whether their mess bills are extravagant or +economical. They can have anything within the rather wide range of the +station store. PATES DE FOIE GRAS, ortolans, roast ostrich, novels, +top-boots, double-barrelled guns, IF THEY LIKE TO PAY FOR THEM—with +one exception. No wine, no spirits! Neither are they permitted to bring +these stimulants "on to the grounds" for their private use. Grog at +shearing? Matches in a powder-mill! It's very sad and bad; but our +Anglo-Saxon industrial or defensive champion cannot be trusted with the +fire-water. Navvies, men-of-war's men, soldiers, AND shearers—fine +fellows all. But though the younger men might only drink in moderation, +the majority and the older men are utterly without self-control once in +the front of temptation. And wars, 'wounds without cause,' hot heads, +shaking hands, delay and bad shearing, would be the inevitable results +of spirits A LA DISCRETION. So much is this a matter of certainty from +experience that a clause is inserted, and cheerfully signed, in most +shearing agreements, "that any man getting drunk or bringing spirits on +to the station during shearing, LOSES THE WHOLE OF the money earned by +him." The men know that the restriction is for their benefit, as well +as for the interest of the master, and join in the prohibition +heartily. +</P> + +<P> +Let us give a glance at the small army of working-men assembled at +Anabanco—one out of hundreds of stations in the colony of New South +Wales, ranging from 100,000 sheep downwards. There are seventy +shearers; about fifty washers, including the men connected with the +steam-engine, boilers, bricklayers and the like; ten or twelve +boundary-riders, whose duty it is to ride round the large paddocks, +seeing that the fences are all intact, and keeping a general look-out +over the condition of the sheep; three or four overseers; half-a-dozen +young gentlemen acquiring a practical knowledge of sheep-farming, or, +as it is generally phrased, "colonial experience"—a comprehensive +expression enough; a score or two of teamsters, with a couple of +hundred horses or bullocks, waiting for the high-piled wool bales, +which are loaded up and sent away almost as soon as shorn; +wool-sorters, pickers-up, pressers, yardsmen, extra shepherds. It may +easily be gathered from this outline what an 'army with banners' is +arrayed at Anabanco. While statistically inclined, it may be added that +the cash due for the shearing alone (less the mess bill) amounts to +1700 pounds; for the washing (roughly), 400 pounds, exclusive of +provisions consumed, hutting, wood, water, cooking. Carriage of wool +1500 pounds. Other hands from 30 pounds to 40 pounds per week. All of +which disbursements take place within from eight to twelve weeks after +the shears are in the first sheep. +</P> + +<P> +Tuesday comes "big with fate." As the sun tinges the far +skyline, the shearers are taking a slight refection of coffee and +currant buns to enable them to withstand the exhausting interval +between six and eight o'clock, when the serious breakfast occurs. +Shearers always diet themselves on the principle that the more they eat +the stronger they must be. Digestion, as preliminary to muscular +development, is left to take its chance. They certainly do get through +a tremendous amount of work. The whole frame is at its utmost tension, +early and late. But the preservation of health is due to their natural +strength of constitution rather than to their profuse and unscientific +diet. Half-an-hour after sunrise Mr Gordon walks quietly into the vast +building which contains the sheep and their shearers—called "the +shed," par excellence. Everything is in perfect cleanliness and order—the +floor swept and smooth, with its carefully planed boards of pale +yellow aromatic pine. Small tramways, with baskets for the fleeces, run +the wool up to the wool tables, superseding the more general plan of +hand picking. At each side of the shed floor are certain small areas, +four or five feet square, such space being found by experience to be +sufficient for the postures and gymnastics practised during the +shearing of a sheep. Opposite to each square is an aperture, +communicating with a long narrow paled yard, outside of the shed. +Through this each man pops his sheep when shorn, where he remains in +company with the others shorn by the same hand, until counted out. This +being done by the overseer or manager supplies a check upon hasty or +unskilful work. The body of the woolshed, floored with battens placed +half an inch apart, is filled with the woolly victims. This enclosure +is subdivided into minor pens, of which each fronts the place of two +shearers, who catch from it until the pen is empty. When this takes +place, a man for the purpose refills it. As there are local +advantages, an equitable distribution of places for shearing has to be +made by lot. +</P> + +<P> +On every subdivision stands a shearer, as Mr Gordon walks, with an air +of calm authority, down the long aisle. Seventy men, chiefly in their +prime, the flower of the working-men of the colony, they are variously +gathered. England, Ireland, and Scotland are represented in the +proportion of one half of the number; the other half is composed of +native-born Australians. +</P> + +<P> +Among these last—of pure Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Celtic descent—are to +be seen some of the finest men, physically considered, the race is +capable of producing. Taller than their British-born brethren, with +softer voices and more regular features, they inherit the powerful +frames and unequalled muscular development of the breed. Leading lives +chiefly devoted to agricultural labour, they enjoy larger intervals of +leisure than is permissible to the labouring classes of Europe. The +climate is mild, and favourable to health. They have been accustomed +from childhood to abundance of the best food; opportunities of +intercolonial travel are frequent and common. Hence the +Anglo-Australian labourer without, on the one hand, the sharpened +eagerness which marks his Transatlantic cousin, has yet an air +of independence and intelligence, combined with a natural grace of +movement, unknown to the peasantry of Britain. +</P> + +<P> +An idea is prevalent that the Australians are, as a race, physically +inferior to the British. It is asserted that they grow too fast, tend +to height and slenderness, and do not possess adequate stamina and +muscle. The idea is erroneous. The men reared in the cities on the +seaboard, living sedentary lives in shops, banks, or counting-houses, +are doubtless more or less pale and slight of form. So are they who +live under such conditions all over the world. But those youngsters who +have followed the plough on the upland farms, or lived a wilder life on +the stations of the far interior, who have had their fill of wheaten +bread and beefsteaks since they could walk, and snuffed up the free +bush breezes from infancy, they are MEN.— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + Stout of heart and ready of hand,<BR> + As e'er drove prey from Cumberland;<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +—a business, I may remark, at which many of them would have +distinguished themselves. +</P> + +<P> +Take Abraham Lawson as he stands there in a natural and unstudied +attitude, 6 feet 4 inches in his stockings, wide-chested, stalwart, +with a face like that of a Greek statue. Take Billy May, fair-haired, +mild, insouciant, almost languid, till you see him at work. Then, +again, Jack Windsor, handsome, saucy, and wiry as a bull-terrier and +like him with strong natural inclination for the combat; good for any +man of his weight, or a trifle over, with the gloves or without. +</P> + +<P> +It is curious to note how the old English practice of settling disputes +with nature's weapons has taken root in Australia. It would 'gladden +the sullen souls' of the defunct gladiators to watch two lads, whose +fathers had never trodden England's soil, pull off their jackets and go +to work "hammer and tongs," with all the savage silence of the true +island type. +</P> + +<P> +It is now about seven o'clock. Mr Gordon moves forward. As he does so, +every man leans towards the open door of the pen in front of which he +stands. The bell sounds! With the first stroke each one of the seventy +men has sprung upon a sheep—has drawn it out—placed its head across +his knee—and is working his shears as if the "last man out" was to be +flogged, or tarred and feathered at the least. Four minutes—James +Steadman, who learned last year, has shorn down one side of his sheep; +Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are well down the other sides of theirs; +when Billy May raises himself with a jerking sigh, and releases his +sheep, perfectly clean-shorn from the nose to the heels, through the +aperture of his separate enclosure. With the same effort apparently he +calls out 'Wool!' and darts upon another sheep. Drawing this second +victim across his knee, he buries his shear-points in the long wool of +its neck. A moment after a lithe and eager boy has gathered up fleece +number one, and tossed it into the train-basket, the shearer is halfway +down the sheep's side, the wool hanging in one fleece like a great +glossy mat, before you have done wondering whether he did really +shear the first sheep, or whether he had not a ready-shorn one in his +coat-sleeve—like a conjuror. +</P> + +<P> +By this time Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are 'out,' or finished; and +the cry of "Wool!' Wool!" seems to run continuously up and down the +long aisles of the shed, like a single note upon some rude instrument. +Now and then the "refrain" is varied by "Tar!" being shouted instead, +when a piece of skin is snipped off as well as the wool. Great healing +properties are attributed to this extract in the shed. And if a shearer +slice off a piece of flesh from his own person, as occasionally +happens, he gravely anoints it with the universal remedy, and considers +that the onus then lies with Providence, there being no more that man +can do. Though little time is lost, the men are by no means up to the +speed which they will attain in a few days, when in full practice and +training. Their nerve, muscle, eye, endurance, will be all at, so to +speak, concert-pitch, and sheep after sheep will be shorn with a +precision and celerity even awful to the unprofessional observer. +</P> + +<P> +The unpastoral reader may be informed that speed and completeness of +denudation are the grand desiderata in shearing; the employer thinks +principally of the latter, the shearer principally of the former. To +adjust equitably the proportion is one of those incomplete aspirations +which torment humanity. Hence the contest—old as human society—between +labour and capital. +</P> + +<P> +This is the first day. According to old-established custom, a kind of +truce obtains. It is before the battle, the "salut," when no hasty word +or too demonstrative action can be suffered by the canons of good +taste. Red Bill, Flash Jack, Jem the Scooper, and other roaring blades, +more famous for expedition than faithful manipulation, are shearing +today with a painstaking precision, as of men to whom character is +everything. +</P> + +<P> +Mr Gordon marches softly up and down, regarding the shearers with a +paternal and gratified expression, occasionally hinting at slight +improvements of style, or expressing unqualified approval as a sheep is +turned out shaven rather than shorn. All goes on well. Nothing is heard +but expressions of goodwill and enthusiasm for the general welfare. It +is a triumph of the dignity of labour. +</P> + +<P> +One o'clock. Mr Gordon moved on to the bell and sounded it. At the +first stroke several men on their way to the pens stopped abruptly and +began to put on their coats. One fellow of an alert nature (Master Jack +Windsor) had just finished his sheep and was sharpening his shears, +when his eye caught Mr Gordon's form in proximity to the final bell. +With a bound like a wild cat, he reached the pen and drew out his sheep +a bare second before the first stroke, amidst the laughter and +congratulations of his comrades. Another man had his hand on the +pen-gate at the same instant, but by the Median law was compelled to +return sheepless. He was cheered, but ironically. Those whose sheep +were in an unfinished stage quietly completed them; the others moving +off to their huts, where their board literally smoked with +abundance. +</P> + +<P> +An hour passed. The meal was concluded; the smoke was over; and the +more careful men were back in the shed sharpening their shears by two +o'clock. Punctually at that hour the bell repeated its summons DE CAPO. +The warm afternoon gradually lengthened its shadows; the shears clicked +in tireless monotone; the pens filled and became empty. The +wool-presses yawned for the mountain of fleeces which filled the bins +in front of them, divided into various grades of excellence, and +continuously disgorged them, neatly and cubically packed and branded. +</P> + +<P> +At six o'clock the bell brought the day's work to a close. The sheep of +each man were counted in his presence, and noted down with scrupulous +care, the record being written out in full and hung up for public +inspection in the shed next day. This important ceremony over, master +and men, manager, labourers and supernumeraries, betook themselves to +their separate abodes, with such keen avoidance of delay that in five +minutes not a soul was left in or near the great building lately so +busy and populous, except the boys who were sweeping up the floor. The +silence of ages seems to fall and settle upon it. +</P> + +<P> +Next morning at a rather earlier hour every man is at his post. +Business is meant decidedly. Now commences the delicate and difficult +part of the superintendence which keeps Mr Gordon at his post in the +shed, nearly from daylight till dark, for from eight to ten weeks. +During the first day he has formed a sort of gauge of each man's temper +and workmanship. For now, and henceforth, the natural bias of each +shearer will appear. Some try to shear too fast, and in their haste +shear badly. Some are rough and savage with the sheep, which do +occasionally kick and become unquiet at critical times; and it must be +confessed are provoking enough. Some shear very fairly and handsomely +to a superficial eye, but commit the unpardonable offence of "leaving +wool on." Some are deceitful, shearing carefully when overlooked, but +"racing" and otherwise misbehaving directly the eye of authority is +diverted. These and many other tricks and defects require to be noted +and abated, quietly but firmly, by the manager of the shed—firmly +because evil would develop and spread ruinously if not checked; quietly +because immense loss might be incurred by a strike. Shearing differs +from other work in this wise: it is work against time, more especially +in Riverina. If the wool be not off the backs of the sheep before +November, all sorts of draw-backs and destructions supervene. The +spear-shaped grass-seeds, specially formed as if in special collusion +with the Evil One, hasten to bury themselves in the wool, and even in +the flesh of the tender victims. Dust rises in red clouds from the +unmoistened, betrampled meadows so lately verdurous and +flower-spangled. From snowy white to an unlovely dark brown turn the +carefully washed fleeces, causing anathema from overseers and +depreciation from brokers. All these losses of temper, trouble, and +money become inevitable if shearing be protracted, it may be, beyond a +given week. +</P> + +<P> +Hence, as in harvest with a short allowance of fair weather, +discipline must be tempered with diplomacy. Lose your temper, and be +over particular: off go Billy May, Abraham Lawson, and half-a-dozen of +your best men, making a weekly difference of perhaps two or three +thousand sheep for the remainder of the shearing. Can you not replace +them? Not so! Every shed in Riverina will be hard at work during this +present month of September and for every hour of October. Till that +time not a shearer will come to your gate, except, perhaps, one or two +useless, characterless men. Are you to tolerate bad workmanship? Not +that either. But try all other means with your men before you resort to +harshness; and be quite certain that your sentence is just, and that +you can afford the defection. +</P> + +<P> +So our friend Mr Gordon, wise from many tens of thousands of shorn +sheep that have been counted out past his steady eye, criticises +temperately, but watchfully. He reproves sufficiently, and no more, any +glaring fault; makes his calculation as to who are really bad shearers, +and can be discharged without loss to the commonwealth, or who can +shear fairly and can be coached up to a decent average. One division, +slow, and good only when slow, have to be watched lest they emulate +"the talent," and so come to grief. Then "the talent" has to be mildly +admonished from time to time lest they force the pace, set a bad +example, and lure the other men on to "racing." This last leads to +slovenly shearing, ill-usage of the sheep, and general dissatisfaction. +</P> + +<P> +Tact, temper, patience, and firmness are each and all necessary in that +Captain of Industry who has the very delicate and important task of +superintending a large woolshed. Hugh Gordon had shown all in such +proportion as would have made a distinguished man anywhere, had fortune +not adjusted for him this particular profession. Calm with the +consciousness of strength, he was kind and considerate in manner as in +nature, until provoked by glaring dishonesty or incivility. Then the +lion part of his nature woke up, so that it commonly went ill with the +aggressor. As this was matter of public report, he had little occasion +to spoil the repose of his bearing. Day succeeds day, and for a +fortnight the machinery goes on smoothly and successfully. The sheep +arrive at an appointed day and hour by detachments and regiments at the +washpen. They depart thence, like good boys on Saturday night, redolent +of soap and water, and clean to a fault. They enter the shed white and +flossy as newly combed poodles to emerge, on the way back to their +pasturage, slim, delicate, agile, with a bright black A legibly branded +with tar on their paper-white skins. +</P> + +<P> +The Anabanco world—stiffish but undaunted—is turning out of bed one +morning. Ha! what sounds are these? And why does the room look so dark? +Rain, as I'm alive. "Hurrah!" says Master Jack Bowles, one of the young +gentlemen. He is learning (more or less) practical sheep-farming, +preparatory to having (one of these days) an Anabanco of his own. +"Well, this is a change, and I'm not sorry for one," quoth Mr. +Jack, "I'm stiff all over. No one can stand such work long. Won't the +shearers growl! No shearing to-day, and perhaps none tomorrow either." +Truth to tell, Mr Bowles' sentiments are not confined to his ingenuous +bosom. Some of the shearers grumble at being stopped "just as a man was +earning a few shillings." Those who are in top pace and condition don't +like it. But to many of the rank and file—working up to and a little +beyond their strength—with whom swelled wrists and other protests of +nature are becoming apparent, it is a relief, and they are glad of the +respite. So at dinner-time all the sheep in the sheds, put in overnight +in anticipation of such a contingency, are reported shorn. All hands +are then idle for the rest of the day. The shearers dress and avail +themselves of various resources. Some go to look at their horses, now +in clover, or its equivalent, in the Riverina graminetum. Some play +cards, others wash or mend their clothes. A large proportion of the +Australians having armed themselves with paper, envelopes, and a +shilling's worth of stamps from the store, bethink themselves of +neglected or desirable correspondents. Many a letter for Mrs Leftalone, +Wallaroo Creek, or Miss Jane Sweetapple, Honeysuckle Flat, as the case +may be, will find its way into the post-bag tomorrow. A pair of +youngsters are having a round or two with the gloves; while to complete +the variety of recreations compatible with life at a woolshed, a +selected troupe are busy in the comparative solitude of that building, +at a rehearsal of a tragedy and a farce, with which they intend, the +very next rainy day, to astonish the population of Anabanco. +</P> + +<P> +At the home-station a truce to labour's "alarms" is proclaimed except +in the case and person of Mr de Vere. So far is he from participation +in the general holiday that he finds the store thronged with shearers, +washers, and "knock-about men," who being let loose, think it would be +nice to go and buy something "pour passer le temps." He therefore +grumbles slightly at having no rest like other people. +</P> + +<P> +"That's all very fine," says Mr Jack Bowles, who, seated on a case, is +smoking a large meerschaum and mildly regarding all things, "but what +have you got to do when we're all HARD AT WORK at the shed?" He speaks +with an air of great importance and responsibility. +</P> + +<P> +"That's right, Mr Bowles," chimes in one of the shearers, "stand up for +the shed. I never see a young gentleman work as hard as you do." +</P> + +<P> +"Bosh!" growls de Vere, "as if anybody couldn't gallop about from the +shed to the washpen, and carry messages, and give half of them wrong! +Why, Mr Gordon said the other day, he should have to take you off and +put on a Chinaman—that he couldn't make more mistakes." +</P> + +<P> +"All envy and malice, and t'other thing, de Vere, because you think I'm +rising in the profession," returns the good-natured Bowles, "Mr +Gordon's going to send 20,000 sheep, after shearing, to the Lik Lak +paddock, and he said I should go in charge." +</P> + +<P> +"Charge be hanged!" laughs de Vere, with two very bright-patterned +Crimean shirts, one in each hand, which he offers to a tall young +shearer for inspection. "There's a well there, and whenever +either of the two men, of whom you'll have CHARGE, gets sick or runs +away, you'll have to work the whim in his place, till another man's +sent out, if it's a month." +</P> + +<P> +This appalling view of station promotion rather startles Mr Jack, who +applies himself to his meerschaum, amid the ironical comments of the +shearers. However, not easily daunted or "shut up," according to the +more familiar station phrase, he rejoins, after a brief interval of +contemplation, "that accidents will happen, you know, de Vere, my +boy—apropos of which moral sentiment, I'll come and help you in your +dry-goods business; and then, look here, if YOU get ill or run away, +I'll have a profession to fall back upon." +</P> + +<P> +This is held to be a Roland of sufficient pungency for de Vere's +Oliver. Everyone laughed. And then the two youngsters betook themselves +to a humorous puffing of the miscellaneous contents of the store: +tulip-beds of gorgeous Crimean shirts, boots, books, tobacco, canvas +slippers, pocket-knives, Epsom salts, pipes, pickles, painkillers, +pocket handkerchiefs, pills, sardines, saddles, shears and sauces: in +fact everything which every kind of man might want, and which +apparently every man did want, for large and various were the +purchases, and great the flow of conversation. Finally, everything was +severely and accurately debited to the purchasers, and the store was +cleared and locked up. A large store is a necessity of a large station; +not by any means because of the profit upon goods sold, but it +obviously would be bad economy for old Bill, the shepherd, or Barney, +the bullock-driver, to visit the next township, from ten to thirty +miles distant, as the case may be, every time the former wanted a pound +of tobacco, or the latter a pair of boots. They might possibly obtain +these necessary articles as good in quality, as cheap in price. But +there are wolves in that wood, oh, my weak brothers! In all towns +dwells one of the 'sons of the Giant'—the Giant Grog—red-eyed, with +steel muscles and iron claws; once in these, which have held many and +better men to the death, neither Barney nor Bill emerges, save pale, +fevered, nerveless, and impecunious. So arose the station store. Barney +befits himself with boots without losing his feet; Bill fills his +pocket with match-boxes and smokes the pipe of sobriety, virtuous +perforce till his carnival, after shearing. +</P> + +<P> +The next day was wet, and threatened further broken weather. Matters +were not too placid with the shearers. A day or two for rest is very +well, but continuous wet weather means compulsory idleness, and gloom +succeeds repose; for not only are all hands losing time and earning no +money, but they are, to use the language of the stable "eating their +heads off" the while. The rather profuse mess and general expenditure, +which caused little reflection when they were earning at the rate of +two or three hundred pounds a year, became unpleasantly suggestive, now +that all is going out and nothing coming in. Hence loud and deep were +the anathemas as the discontented men gazed sadly or wrathfully at the +misty sky. +</P> + +<P> +A few days showery weather having, therefore, wellnigh driven +our shearers to desperation, out comes the sun in all his glory. He is +never far away or very faint in Riverina. All the pens are filled for +the morrow; very soon after the earliest sunbeams the bell sounds its +welcome summons, and the whole force tackles to the work with an ardour +proportioned to the delay, every man working as if for the ransom of +his whole family from slavery. How men work spurred on by the double +excitement of acquiring social reputation and making money rapidly! Not +an instant is lost; not a nerve, limb, or muscle doing less than the +hardest task-master could flog out of a slave. Occasionally you see a +shearer, after finishing his sheep, walk quickly out and not appear for +a couple of hours, or perhaps not again during the day. Do not put him +down as a sluggard; be assured that he has tasked nature dangerously +hard, and has only given in just before she does. Look at that silent +slight youngster, with a bandage round his swollen wrist. Every "blow" +of the shears is agony to him, yet he disdains to give in, and has been +working "in distress" for hours. The pain is great, as you can see by +the flush which occasionally surges across his brown face, yet he goes +on manfully to the last sheep, and endures to the very verge of +fainting. +</P> + +<P> +There was now a change in the manner and tone of the shed, especially +towards the end of the day. It was now the ding of the desperate fray, +when the blood of the fierce animal man is up, when mortal blows are +exchanged, and curses float upward with the smoke and dust. The +ceaseless clicking of the shears—the stern earnestness of the men, +toiling with a feverish and tireless energy—the constant succession +of sheep shorn and let go, caught and commenced—the occasional savage +oath or passionate gesture, as a sheep kicked and struggled with +perverse delaying obstinacy—the cuts and stabs, with brief decided +tones of Mr Gordon, in repression or command—all told the spectator +that tragic action was introduced into the performance. Indeed, one of +the minor excitements of shearing was then and there transacted. Mr +Gordon had more than once warned a dark sullen-looking man that he did +not approve of his style of shearing. He was temporarily absent, and on +his return found the same man about to let go a sheep whose appearance, +as a shorn wool-bearing quadruped, was painful and discreditable in the +extreme. +</P> + +<P> +"Let your sheep go, my man," said Gordon, in a tone which somehow +arrested the attention of nearly all the shearers, "but don't trouble +yourself to catch another!" +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" said the delinquent, sulkily. +</P> + +<P> +"You know very well why not!" replied Gordon, walking closely up to +him, and looking straight at him with eyes that began to glitter, +"you've had fair warning. You've not chosen to take it. Now you can +go!" +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose you'll pay a man for the sheep he's shorn?" growled +out the ruffian. +</P> + +<P> +"Not one shilling until after shearing. You can come then if you like," +answered Gordon, with perfect distinctness. +</P> + +<P> +The cowed bully looked savagely at him; but the tall powerful frame and +steady eye were not inviting for personal arbitration of the matter in +hand. He put up his two pairs of shears, put on his coat, and walked +out of the shed. The time was passed when Red Bill or Terrible Dick +(ruffians whom a sparse labour-market rendered necessary evils) would +have flung down his shears upon the floor and told the manager that if +he didn't like that shearing he could shear his———sheep himself and +be hanged to him; or, on refusal of instant payment, would have +proposed to bury his shears in the intestines of his employer by way of +adjusting the balance between Capital and Labour. Many wild tales are +told of woolshed rows. I knew of one squatter stabbed mortally with +that fatal and convenient weapon, a shear-blade. +</P> + +<P> +The man thus summarily dealt with could, like most of his companions, +shear very well if he took pains. Keeping to a moderate number of +sheep, his workmanship could be good. But he must needs try and keep up +with Billy May or Abraham Lawson, who can shear from 100 to 130 sheep +per day, and do them beautifully. So in "racing" he works hastily and +badly, cuts the skin of his luckless sheep nearly as often as the wool, +and leaves wool here and there on them, grievous and exasperating to +behold. So sentence of expulsion goes forth fully against him. Having +arrayed himself for the road he makes one more effort for a settlement +and some money wherewith to pay for board and lodging on the road. Only +to have a mad carouse at the nearest township, however; after which he +will tell a plausible story of his leaving the shed on account of Mr +Gordon's temper, and avail himself of the usual free hospitality of the +bush to reach another shed. He addresses Mr Gordon with an attempt at +conciliation and deference. +</P> + +<P> +"It seems very 'ard, sir, as a man can't get the trifle of money coming +to him, which I've worked 'ard for." +</P> + +<P> +"It's very hard you won't try and shear decently," retorts Mr Gordon, +by no means conciliated. "Leave the shed!" +</P> + +<P> +Ill-conditioned rascal as the shearer is, he has a mate or +travelling-companion in whose breast exists some rough idea of +fidelity. He now takes up the dialogue. +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose if Jim's shearing don't suit, mine won't either." +</P> + +<P> +"I did not speak to you," answered Mr Gordon, as calmly as if he had +expected the speech, "but of course you can go." +</P> + +<P> +He said this with an air of studied unconcern, as if he would rather +like a dozen more men to knock off work. The two men walk out, but the +epidemic does not spread, and several take the lesson home and mend +their ways accordingly. +</P> + +<P> +The weather now was splendid; not a cloud specked the bright blue +sky. The shearers continue to work at the same express-train +pace; fifty bales of wool roll every day from the wool-presses; as fast +as they reach that number they are loaded upon the numerous drays and +wagons which have been waiting for weeks. Tall brown men have been +recklessly cutting up hides for the last fortnight, wherewith to lash +the bales securely. It is considered safer practice to load wool as +soon as may be; fifty bales represent about a thousand pounds sterling. +In a building, however secure, should a fire break out, a few hundred +bales are easily burned; but once on the dray, this much-dreaded "edax +rerum" in a dry country has little chance. The driver, responsible to +the extent of his freight, generally sleeps under his dray; hence both +watchman and insulation are provided. +</P> + +<P> +The unrelaxing energy with which the work was pushed at this stage was +exciting and contagious; at or before daylight every soul in the great +establishment was up. The boundary-riders were always starting off for +a twenty or thirty mile ride, and bringing tens of thousands of sheep +to the wash-pen. At that huge lavatory there was splashing and soaking +all day with an army of washers; not a moment is lost from daylight +till dark, or used for any purpose save the all-engrossing work and +needful food. At nine o'clock p.m. luxurious dreamless sleep, given +only to those whose physical powers have been taxed to the utmost and +who can bear without injury the daily tension. +</P> + +<P> +Everything and everybody were in splendid working order, nothing out of +gear. Rapid and regular as a steam-engine the great host of toilers +moved onward daily with a march which promised an unusually early +completion. Mr Gordon was not in high spirits, for so cautious and +far-seeing a captain rarely felt himself so independent of +circumstances as to indulge in that reckless mood—but much satisfied +with the prospect. Whew! The afternoon darkens, and the night is +delivered over to water-spouts and hurricanes, as it appears. Next day +was raw, gusty, with chill heavy showers; drains had to be cut, roofs +to be seen to; shorn sheep were shivering, washers all playing +pitch-and-toss, shearers sulky; everybody but the young gentlemen +wearing a most injured expression of countenance. "Looks as if it would +rain for a month," says Long Jack. "If we hadn't been delayed might +have had the shearing over by this." Reminded that there are 50,000 +sheep yet remaining to be shorn, and that by no possibility could they +have been finished, he answers, "Suppose so, always the same, +everything sure to go agin the poor man." The weather did not clear up. +Winter seemed to have taken thought, and determined to show even this +land of eternal summer that he had his rights. The shed would be +filled, and before the sheep so kept dry were shorn, down would come +the rain again. Not a full day's shearing for ten days. Then the clouds +disappeared as if the curtain of a stage had been rolled up, and lo! +the golden sun, fervid and impatient to obliterate the track of winter. +</P> + +<P> +The first day after the recommencement, matters went much as usual. +Steady work and little talk, as if everyone was anxious to make +up for the lost time. But on the second morning after breakfast, when +the bell sounded, instead of the usual cheerful dash at the sheep, +every man stood silent and motionless in his place. Someone uttered the +words "roll up!". Then the seventy men converged, and slowly, but with +one impulse, walked up to the end of the shed where stood Mr Gordon. +</P> + +<P> +The concerted action of any body of men bears with it an element of +power which commands respect. The weapon of force is theirs; it is at +their option to wield it with or without mercy. At one period of +Australian colonisation a superintendent in Mr Gordon's position might +have had good ground for uneasiness. Mr Jack Bowles saw in it an EMEUTE +of a democratic and sanguinary nature, regretted deeply his absent +revolver, but drew up to his leader prepared to die by his side. That +calm centurion felt no such serious misgivings. He knew that there had +been dire grumbling among the shearers in consequence of the weather. +He knew that there were malcontents among them. He was prepared for +some sort of demand on their part, and had concluded to make certain +concessions of a moderate degree. So looking cheerfully at the men, he +quietly awaited the deputation. As they neared him there was a little +hesitation, and then three delegates came to the front. These were Old +Ben, Abraham Lawson, and Billy May. Ben Thornton had been selected for +his age and long experience of the rights and laws of the craft. He was +a weather-beaten, wiry old Englishman, whose face and accent, darkened +as the former was by the Australian summers of half a century, still +retained the trace of his native Devonshire. It was his boast that he +had shorn for forty years, and as regularly "knocked-down" (or spent in +a single debauch) his shearing money. Lawson represented the small +free-holders, being a steady, shrewd fellow, and one of the fastest +shearers. Billy May stood for the fashion and "talent," being the +"Ringer," or fastest shearer of the whole assembly, and as such truly +admirable and distinguished. +</P> + +<P> +"Well now, men," quoth Mr Gordon, cheerily meeting matters half-way, +"what's it all about?" The younger delegate looked at Old Ben, who, now +that it "was demanded of him to speak the truth," or such dilution +thereof as might seem most favourable to the interests of the shed, +found a difficulty like many wiser men about his exordium. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Muster Gordon," at length he broke forth, "look'ee here, sir. +The weather's been awful bad, and clean agin shearing. We've not been +earning our grub, and—" +</P> + +<P> +"So it has," answered the manager, "so it has. But can I help the +weather? I'm as anxious as you are to have the shearing over quickly. +We're both of one mind about that, eh?" +</P> + +<P> +"That's all right enough, sir," struck in Abraham Lawson, who felt that +Ben was getting the worst of the argument, and was moreover far less +fluent than usual, probably from being deprived of the aid of the +customary expletives, "but we're come to say this, sir, that the +season's turned out very wet indeed. We've had a deal of broken +time, and the men feel it very hard to be paying for a lot of rations, +and hardly earning anything. We're shearing the sheep very close and +clean. You won't have 'em done no otherways. Not like some sheds where +a man can 'run' a bit and make up for lost time. Now we've all come to +think this, sir, that if we're to go on shearing the sheep well, and to +stick to them, and get them done before the dust and grass-seed come +in, that you ought to make us some allowance. We know we've agreed for +so much a hundred, and all that. Still as the season's turned so +out-and-out bad, we hope you'll consider it and make it up to us +somehow." +</P> + +<P> +"Never knew a worse year," corroborated Billy May, who thought it +indispensable to say something. "Haven't made enough, myself, to pay +the cook." +</P> + +<P> +This was not strictly true, at any rate, as to Master Billy's own +earnings; he being such a remarkably fast shearer (and good withal), +that he had always a respectable sum credited to him for his days' +work, even when many of the slower men came off short enough. +</P> + +<P> +However, enough had been said to make Mr Gordon fully comprehend the +case. The men were dissatisfied. They had come in a roundabout way to +the conclusion that some pecuniary concession, not mentioned in their +bond, should come from the side of capital to that of labour. Whether +wages, interest of capital, share of profits, reserve fund, they knew +not nor cared. This was their stand. And being Englishmen they intended +to abide by it. +</P> + +<P> +The manager had considered the situation before it actually arose. He +now rapidly took in the remaining points of debate. The shearers had +signed a specific agreement for a stipulated rate of payment, +irrespective of the weather. By the letter of the law, they had no +case. Whether they made little or much profit was not his affair. But +he was a just and kindly man, as well as reasonably politic. They had +shorn well, and the weather had been discouraging. He knew too that an +abrupt denial might cause a passive mutiny, if not a strike. If they +set themselves to thwart him, it was in their power to shear badly, to +shear slowly, and to force him to discharge many of them. He might have +them fined, perhaps imprisoned by the police-court. Meanwhile, how +could shearing go on? Dust and grass-seeds would soon be upon them. He +resolved on a compromise, and spoke out at once in a firm and decided +tone as the men gathered up yet more closely around him. +</P> + +<P> +"Look here, all of you! You know very well that I'm not bound to find +you in fine weather. Still I am aware that the season has been against +you. You have shorn pretty well, so far, though I've had to make +examples, and am quite ready to make more. What I am willing to do is +this: to every man who works on till the finish and shears to my +satisfaction, I will make a fair allowance in the ration account. That +is, I will make no charge for the beef. Does that suit you?" There +was a chorus of "All right sir, we're satisfied. Mr Gordon +always does the fair thing." &c. And work was immediately resumed with +alacrity. +</P> + +<P> +The clerk of the weather, too gracious even in these regions as far as +the absence of rain is concerned, was steadily propitious. Cloudless +skies and a gradually ascending thermometer alone were the signs that +spring was changing into summer. The splendid herbage ripened and +dried; patches of bare earth began to be discernible amid the late +thick-swarded pastures, dust to rise and cloud-pillars of sand to float +and eddy—the desert genii of the Arab. But the work went on at a high +rate of speed, outpacing the fast-coming summer; and before any serious +disasters arose, the last flock was "on the battens," and, amid +ironical congratulations, the "cobbler," or last sheep was seized, and +stripped of his rather dense and difficult fleece. In ten minutes the +vast woolshed, lately echoing with the ceaseless click of the shears, +the jests, the songs, the oaths of the rude congregation, was silent +and deserted. The floors were swept, the pens closed, the sheep on +their way to a distant paddock. Not a soul remains about the building +but the pressers, who stay to work at the rapidly lessening piles of +fleeces in the bins, or a meditative teamster who sits musing on a +wool-bale, absorbed in a calculation as to when his load will be made +up. +</P> + +<P> +It is sundown, a rather later time of closing than usual, but rendered +necessary by the possibility of the "grand finale." The younger men +troop over to the hut, larking like schoolboys. Abraham Lawson throws a +poncho over his broad shoulders, lights his pipe, and strides along, +towering above the rest, erect and stately as a guardsman. Considerably +more so than you or I, reader, would have been, had we shorn 130 sheep, +as he has done to-day. Billy May has shorn 142, and he puts his hand on +the five-foot paling fence of the yard and vaults over it like a deer, +preparatory to a swim in the creek. At dinner you will see them all +with fresh Crimeans and Jerseys, clean, comfortable, and in grand +spirits. Next morning is settling-day. The book-keeping departments at +Anabanco being severely correct, all is in readiness. Each man's tally +or number of sheep shorn has been entered daily to his credit. His +private and personal investments at the store have been as duly +debited. The shearers, as a corporation, have been charged with the +multifarious items of their rather copious mess-bill. This sum total is +divided by the number of the shearers, the extract being the amount for +which each man is liable. This sum varies in its weekly proportion at +different sheds. With an extravagant cook, or cooks, the weekly bill is +often alarming. When the men and their functionary study economy it may +be kept very reasonably low. +</P> + +<P> +The men have been sitting or standing about the office for half-an-hour +when Mr Jack Bowles rushes out, and shouts "William May!" That young +person, excessively clean, attired in a quiet tweed suit, with his hair +cut very correctly short, advances with an air of calm intrepidity, and +faces Mr Gordon. Gordon, now seated at a long table, wearing a +judicial expression of countenance. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, May, here's your account":— +</P> + +<PRE> + So many sheep, at 1 pound per 100... xxxx pounds + Cook, so many weeks................. xxxx pounds + Shearing store account.............. xxxx pounds + Private store account............... xxxx pounds + —— + Total............................... xxxx pounds + —— +</PRE> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Is the tally of your sheep right?" "Oh! I daresay it's all right, Mr +Gordon, I made it so and so; about ten less." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, well! Ours is correct, no doubt. Now I want to make up a good +subscription for the hospital this year. How much will you give? You've +done pretty well, I think." +</P> + +<P> +"Put me down a pound, sir." +</P> + +<P> +"Very well, that's fair enough. If every one gives what they can +afford, you men will always have a place to go to when you're hurt or +laid up. So I put your name down, and you'll see it in the published +list. Now about the shearing, May. I consider that you've done your +work very well, and behaved very well all through. You're a fast +shearer, but you shear closely, and don't knock your sheep about. I +therefore do not charge you for any part of your meat bill, and I pay +you at the rate of half-a-crown a hundred for all your sheep, over and +above your agreement. Will that do?" +</P> + +<P> +"Very well, indeed, and I'm much obliged to you, Mr Gordon." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, good-bye May! Always call when you're passing, and if any work +is going on you'll get your share. Here's your cheque. Send in Lawson!" +Exit May, in high spirits, having cleared about three pounds per week, +during the whole term of shearing, and having lived a far from +unpleasant life, indeed akin to that of a fighting cock, from the +commencement to the end of that period. +</P> + +<P> +Lawson's interview may be described as having very similar results. He, +also, was a first-class shearer, though not so artistic as the gifted +Billy. Jack Windsor's saucy blue eyes twinkled merrily as he returned +to his companions, and incontinently leaped on the back of his +wild-eyed colt. After these three worthies came a shearer named +Jackson; he belonged to quite a different class; he could shear very +well if he pleased, but had a rooted disbelief that honesty was the +best policy, and a fixed determination to shear as many sheep as he +could get the manager to pass. By dint of close watching, constant +reprimand, and occasional "raddling" (marking badly-shorn sheep and +refusing to count them) Mr Gordon had managed to tone him down to +average respectability of execution. Still he was always uneasily aware +that whenever his eye was not upon him, Jackson was doing what he ought +not to do with might and main. Gordon had, indeed, kept him on from +sheer necessity, but he intended none the less to mark his opinion of +him. +</P> + +<P> +"Come in, Jackson! Your tally is so-and-so. Is that right?" +</P> + +<P> +Jackson.—"I suppose so." +</P> + +<P> +"Cook and store account, so much; shearing account so much." +</P> + +<P> +Jackson.—"And a good deal too." +</P> + +<P> +"That is your affair," said Mr Gordon, sternly enough. "Now look here! +You're in my opinion a bad shearer and a bad man. You have given me a +great deal of trouble, and I should have kicked you out of the shed +weeks ago if I had not been short of men. I shall make a difference +between you and men who have tried to do their best. I make you no +allowance of any sort, I pay you by the strict agreement. There's your +cheque. Go!" +</P> + +<P> +Jackson goes out with a very black countenance. He mutters with a surly +oath that if "he'd known how he was going to be served he'd ha' +'blocked' 'em a little more." He is pretty well believed to have been +served right, and he secures no sympathy whatever. Working-men of all +classes are shrewd and fair judges generally. If an employer does his +best to mete out justice he is always appreciated and supported by the +majority. These few instances will serve as a description of the whole +process of settling with the shearers. The horses have all been got in. +Great catching and saddling-up has taken place all the morning. By the +afternoon the whole party are dispersed to the four winds; some, like +Abraham Lawson and his friends, to sheds "higher up," in a colder +climate, where shearing necessarily commences later. From these they +will pass to others, until the last sheep in the mountain runs are +shorn. Then those who have not farms of their own betake themselves to +reaping. Billy May and Jack Windsor are quite as ready to back +themselves against time in the wheat-field as on the shearing-floor. +Harvest over, they find their pockets inconveniently full, so they +commence to visit their friends and repay themselves for their toils by +a tolerably liberal allowance of rest and recreation. +</P> + +<P> +Old Ben and a few choice specimens of the olden time get no further +than the nearest public house. Their cheques are handed to the landlord +and a "stupendous and terrible spree" sets in. At the end of a week he +informs them that they have received liquor to the amount of their +cheques—something over a hundred pounds—save the mark! They meekly +acquiesce, as is their custom. The landlord generously presents them +with a glass of grog each, and they take the road for the next +woolshed. +</P> + +<P> +The shearers being despatched, the sheep-washers, a smaller and less +regarded force, file up. They number some forty men. Nothing more than +fair bodily strength, willingness and obedience being required in their +case, they are more easy to get and to replace than shearers. They are +a varied and motley lot. That powerful and rather handsome man is a New +Yorker, of Irish parentage. Next to him is a slight, neat, quiet +individual. He was a lieutenant in a line regiment. The lad in the rear +was a Sandhurst cadet. Then came two navvies and a New Zealander, +five Chinamen, a Frenchman, two Germans, Tin Pot, Jerry, and +Wallaby—three aboriginal blacks. There are no invidious distinctions +as to caste, colour, or nationality. Every one is a man and a brother +at sheep-washing. Wage, one pound per week; wood, water, tents and food +"A LA DISCRETION." Their accounts are simple: so many weeks, so many +pounds; store account, so much; hospital? well, five shillings; cheque, +good-morning. +</P> + +<P> +The wool-pressers, the fleece-rollers, the fleece-pickers, the +yardsmen, the washers' cooks, the hut cooks, the spare shepherds; all +these and a few other supernumeraries inevitable at shearing-time, +having been paid off, the snowstorm of cheques which has been +fluttering all day comes to an end. Mr Gordon and the remaining +"sous-officiers" go to rest that night with much of the mental strain +removed which has been telling on every waking moment for the last two +months. +</P> + +<P> +The long train of drays and wagons, with loads varying from twenty to +forty-five bales, has been moving off in detachments since the +commencement. In a day or two the last of them will have rolled heavily +away. The 1400 bales, averaging three and a half hundredweight, are +distributed, slow journeying, along the road, which they mark from +afar, standing huge and columnar like guide tumuli, from Anabanco to +the waters of the Murray. Between the two points there is neither a +hill nor a stone. All is the vast monotonous sea of plain—at this +season a prairie-meadow exuberant with vegetation; in the late summer, +or in the occasional and dreaded phenomenon of a DRY WINTER, dusty, and +herbless as a brickfield, for hundreds of miles. +</P> + +<P> +Silence falls on the plains and waters of Anabanco for the next six +months. The woolshed, the washpen, and all the huts connected with them +are lone and voiceless as caravanserais in a city of the plague. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Shearing in the Riverina, New South +Wales, by Rolf Boldrewood + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHEARING IN THE RIVERINA *** + +***** This file should be named 4221-h.htm or 4221-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/4/2/2/4221/ + +Produced by Col Choat. HTML version by Al Haines. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Shearing in the Riverina, New South Wales + +Author: Rolf Boldrewood + +Posting Date: June 30, 2009 [EBook #4221] +Release Date: July, 2003 +First Posted: December 8, 2001 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHEARING IN THE RIVERINA *** + + + + +Produced by Col Choat. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + + + + + + +SHEARING IN THE RIVERINA, NEW SOUTH WALES. + + +by + +Rolf Boldrewood + + + + + +"Shearing commences to-morrow!" These apparently simple words were +spoken by Hugh Gordon, the manager of Anabanco station, in the district +of Riverina, in the colony of New South Wales, one Monday morning in +the month of August. The utterance had its importance to every member +of a rather extensive "CORPS DRAMATIQUE" awaiting the industrial drama +about to be performed. + +A low sand-hill a few years since had looked out over a sea of grey +plains, covered partly with grass, partly with salsiferous bushes and +herbs. Two or three huts built of the trunks of the pine and roofed +with the bark of the box-tree, and a skeleton-looking cattle-yard with +its high "gallows" (a rude timber stage whereon to hang slaughtered +cattle) alone broke the monotony of the plain-ocean. A comparatively +small herd of cattle, 2000 or 3000, found more than sufficient +pasturage during the short winter and spring, but were always compelled +to migrate to mountain pastures when the swamps, which alone in those +days formed the water-stores of the run, were dried up. But two or +three, or at most half-a-dozen, stockmen were ever needed for the +purpose of managing the herd, so inadequate in number and profitable +occupation to this vast tract of grazing country. + +But, a little later, one of the great chiefs of the wool-producing +interest--a shepherd-king, so to speak, of shrewdness, energy, and +capital--had seen, approved and purchased the lease of this waste +kingdom. Almost at once, as if by magic, the scene changed. Great gangs +of navvies appeared, wending their way across the silent plain. Dams +were made, wells were dug. Tons of fencing wire were dropped on the +sand by the long line of teams which seemed never tired of arriving. +Sheep by thousands, and tens of thousands, began to come, grazing and +cropping up to the lonely sandhill--now swarming with blacksmiths, +carpenters, engineers, fencers, shepherds, bullock-drivers--till the +place looked like a fair on the borders of Tartary. + +Meanwhile everything was moving with calculated force and cost, under +the "reign of law". The seeming expense was merely the economic truth +of doing all the necessary work at once, rather than by instalments. +One hundred men for one day rather than one man for one hundred days. +Results soon began to demonstrate themselves. In twelve months the dams +were full, the wells sending up their far-fetched priceless water, the +wire fences erected, the shepherds gone, and 17,000 sheep cropping the +herbage of Anabanco. Tuesday was the day fixed for the actual +commencement of the momentous, almost solemn transaction--the pastoral +Hegira, so to speak, as the time of most station events is +calculated with reference to it, as happening before or after shearing. +But before the first shot is fired which tells of the battle begun, +what raids and skirmishes, what reconnoitring and vedette duty must +take place! + +First arrives the cook-in-chief to the shearers, with two assistants to +lay in a few provisions for the week's consumption of 70 able-bodied +men. I must here explain that the cook of a large shearing-shed is a +highly paid and tolerably irresponsible official. He is paid and +provided by the shearers. Payment is generally arranged on the scale of +half-a-crown a head weekly from each shearer. For this sum he must +provide punctual and effective cooking, paying out of his own pocket as +many "marmitons" as may be needful for that end, and to satisfy his +tolerably exacting and fastidious employers. + +In the present case he confers with the storekeeper, Mr de Vere, a +young gentleman of aristocratic connexions who is thus gaining an +excellent practical knowledge of the working of a large station and to +this end has the store-keeping department entrusted to him during +shearing. + +He does not perhaps look quite fit for a croquet party as he stands +now, with a flour-scoop in one hand and a pound of tobacco in the +other. But he looks like a man at work, and also like a gentleman, as +he is. "Jack the Cook" thus addresses him: + +"Now, Mr de Vere, I hope there's not going to be any humbugging about +my rations and things! The men are all up in their quarters, and as +hungry as free selectors. They've been a-payin' for their rations for +ever so long, and of course now shearing's on, they're good for a +little extra!" + +"All right, Jack," returns de Vere, good-temperedly, "all your lot was +weighed out and sent away before breakfast. You must have missed the +cart. Here's the list. I'll read it out to you: three bags flour, half +a bullock, two bags sugar, a chest of tea, four dozen of pickles, four +dozen of jam, two gallons of vinegar, five pounds pepper, a bag of +salt, plates, knives, forks, ovens, frying-pans, saucepans, iron pots, +and about a hundred other things. Now, mind you, return all the cooking +things safe, or PAY FOR THEM--that's the order! You don't want +anything more, do you? You've got enough for a regiment of cavalry, I +should think." + +"Well, I don't know. There won't be much left in a week if the weather +holds good," makes answer the chef, as one who thought nothing too +stupendous to be accomplished by shearers, "but I knew I'd forgot +something. As I'm here I'll take a few dozen boxes of sardines, and a +case of pickled salmon. The boys likes 'em, and, murder alive! haven't +we forgot the plums and currants? A hundredweight of each, Mr de Vere! +They'll be crying out for plum-duff and currant buns for the afternoon; +and bullying the life out of me, if I haven't a few trifles like. It's +a hard life, surely, a shearers' cook. Well, good-bye, sir, you have +'em all down in the book." + +Lest the reader should imagine that the role of Mr Gordon at +Anabanco was a reign of luxury and that waste which tendeth to penury, +let him be aware that all shearers in Riverina are paid at a certain +rate, usually that of ONE pound per hundred sheep shorn. They agree, on +the other hand, to pay for all supplies consumed by them at certain +prices fixed before the shearing agreement is signed. Hence, it is +entirely their own affair whether their mess bills are extravagant or +economical. They can have anything within the rather wide range of the +station store. PATES DE FOIE GRAS, ortolans, roast ostrich, novels, +top-boots, double-barrelled guns, IF THEY LIKE TO PAY FOR THEM--with +one exception. No wine, no spirits! Neither are they permitted to bring +these stimulants "on to the grounds" for their private use. Grog at +shearing? Matches in a powder-mill! It's very sad and bad; but our +Anglo-Saxon industrial or defensive champion cannot be trusted with the +fire-water. Navvies, men-of-war's men, soldiers, AND shearers--fine +fellows all. But though the younger men might only drink in moderation, +the majority and the older men are utterly without self-control once in +the front of temptation. And wars, 'wounds without cause,' hot heads, +shaking hands, delay and bad shearing, would be the inevitable results +of spirits A LA DISCRETION. So much is this a matter of certainty from +experience that a clause is inserted, and cheerfully signed, in most +shearing agreements, "that any man getting drunk or bringing spirits on +to the station during shearing, LOSES THE WHOLE OF the money earned by +him." The men know that the restriction is for their benefit, as well +as for the interest of the master, and join in the prohibition +heartily. + +Let us give a glance at the small army of working-men assembled at +Anabanco--one out of hundreds of stations in the colony of New South +Wales, ranging from 100,000 sheep downwards. There are seventy +shearers; about fifty washers, including the men connected with the +steam-engine, boilers, bricklayers and the like; ten or twelve +boundary-riders, whose duty it is to ride round the large paddocks, +seeing that the fences are all intact, and keeping a general look-out +over the condition of the sheep; three or four overseers; half-a-dozen +young gentlemen acquiring a practical knowledge of sheep-farming, or, +as it is generally phrased, "colonial experience"--a comprehensive +expression enough; a score or two of teamsters, with a couple of +hundred horses or bullocks, waiting for the high-piled wool bales, +which are loaded up and sent away almost as soon as shorn; +wool-sorters, pickers-up, pressers, yardsmen, extra shepherds. It may +easily be gathered from this outline what an 'army with banners' is +arrayed at Anabanco. While statistically inclined, it may be added that +the cash due for the shearing alone (less the mess bill) amounts to +1700 pounds; for the washing (roughly), 400 pounds, exclusive of +provisions consumed, hutting, wood, water, cooking. Carriage of wool +1500 pounds. Other hands from 30 pounds to 40 pounds per week. All of +which disbursements take place within from eight to twelve weeks after +the shears are in the first sheep. + +Tuesday comes "big with fate." As the sun tinges the far +skyline, the shearers are taking a slight refection of coffee and +currant buns to enable them to withstand the exhausting interval +between six and eight o'clock, when the serious breakfast occurs. +Shearers always diet themselves on the principle that the more they eat +the stronger they must be. Digestion, as preliminary to muscular +development, is left to take its chance. They certainly do get through +a tremendous amount of work. The whole frame is at its utmost tension, +early and late. But the preservation of health is due to their natural +strength of constitution rather than to their profuse and unscientific +diet. Half-an-hour after sunrise Mr Gordon walks quietly into the vast +building which contains the sheep and their shearers--called "the +shed," par excellence. Everything is in perfect cleanliness and order--the +floor swept and smooth, with its carefully planed boards of pale +yellow aromatic pine. Small tramways, with baskets for the fleeces, run +the wool up to the wool tables, superseding the more general plan of +hand picking. At each side of the shed floor are certain small areas, +four or five feet square, such space being found by experience to be +sufficient for the postures and gymnastics practised during the +shearing of a sheep. Opposite to each square is an aperture, +communicating with a long narrow paled yard, outside of the shed. +Through this each man pops his sheep when shorn, where he remains in +company with the others shorn by the same hand, until counted out. This +being done by the overseer or manager supplies a check upon hasty or +unskilful work. The body of the woolshed, floored with battens placed +half an inch apart, is filled with the woolly victims. This enclosure +is subdivided into minor pens, of which each fronts the place of two +shearers, who catch from it until the pen is empty. When this takes +place, a man for the purpose refills it. As there are local +advantages, an equitable distribution of places for shearing has to be +made by lot. + +On every subdivision stands a shearer, as Mr Gordon walks, with an air +of calm authority, down the long aisle. Seventy men, chiefly in their +prime, the flower of the working-men of the colony, they are variously +gathered. England, Ireland, and Scotland are represented in the +proportion of one half of the number; the other half is composed of +native-born Australians. + +Among these last--of pure Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Celtic descent--are to +be seen some of the finest men, physically considered, the race is +capable of producing. Taller than their British-born brethren, with +softer voices and more regular features, they inherit the powerful +frames and unequalled muscular development of the breed. Leading lives +chiefly devoted to agricultural labour, they enjoy larger intervals of +leisure than is permissible to the labouring classes of Europe. The +climate is mild, and favourable to health. They have been accustomed +from childhood to abundance of the best food; opportunities of +intercolonial travel are frequent and common. Hence the +Anglo-Australian labourer without, on the one hand, the sharpened +eagerness which marks his Transatlantic cousin, has yet an air +of independence and intelligence, combined with a natural grace of +movement, unknown to the peasantry of Britain. + +An idea is prevalent that the Australians are, as a race, physically +inferior to the British. It is asserted that they grow too fast, tend +to height and slenderness, and do not possess adequate stamina and +muscle. The idea is erroneous. The men reared in the cities on the +seaboard, living sedentary lives in shops, banks, or counting-houses, +are doubtless more or less pale and slight of form. So are they who +live under such conditions all over the world. But those youngsters who +have followed the plough on the upland farms, or lived a wilder life on +the stations of the far interior, who have had their fill of wheaten +bread and beefsteaks since they could walk, and snuffed up the free +bush breezes from infancy, they are MEN.-- + + Stout of heart and ready of hand, + As e'er drove prey from Cumberland; + +--a business, I may remark, at which many of them would have +distinguished themselves. + +Take Abraham Lawson as he stands there in a natural and unstudied +attitude, 6 feet 4 inches in his stockings, wide-chested, stalwart, +with a face like that of a Greek statue. Take Billy May, fair-haired, +mild, insouciant, almost languid, till you see him at work. Then, +again, Jack Windsor, handsome, saucy, and wiry as a bull-terrier and +like him with strong natural inclination for the combat; good for any +man of his weight, or a trifle over, with the gloves or without. + +It is curious to note how the old English practice of settling disputes +with nature's weapons has taken root in Australia. It would 'gladden +the sullen souls' of the defunct gladiators to watch two lads, whose +fathers had never trodden England's soil, pull off their jackets and go +to work "hammer and tongs," with all the savage silence of the true +island type. + +It is now about seven o'clock. Mr Gordon moves forward. As he does so, +every man leans towards the open door of the pen in front of which he +stands. The bell sounds! With the first stroke each one of the seventy +men has sprung upon a sheep--has drawn it out--placed its head across +his knee--and is working his shears as if the "last man out" was to be +flogged, or tarred and feathered at the least. Four minutes--James +Steadman, who learned last year, has shorn down one side of his sheep; +Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are well down the other sides of theirs; +when Billy May raises himself with a jerking sigh, and releases his +sheep, perfectly clean-shorn from the nose to the heels, through the +aperture of his separate enclosure. With the same effort apparently he +calls out 'Wool!' and darts upon another sheep. Drawing this second +victim across his knee, he buries his shear-points in the long wool of +its neck. A moment after a lithe and eager boy has gathered up fleece +number one, and tossed it into the train-basket, the shearer is halfway +down the sheep's side, the wool hanging in one fleece like a great +glossy mat, before you have done wondering whether he did really +shear the first sheep, or whether he had not a ready-shorn one in his +coat-sleeve--like a conjuror. + +By this time Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are 'out,' or finished; and +the cry of "Wool!' Wool!" seems to run continuously up and down the +long aisles of the shed, like a single note upon some rude instrument. +Now and then the "refrain" is varied by "Tar!" being shouted instead, +when a piece of skin is snipped off as well as the wool. Great healing +properties are attributed to this extract in the shed. And if a shearer +slice off a piece of flesh from his own person, as occasionally +happens, he gravely anoints it with the universal remedy, and considers +that the onus then lies with Providence, there being no more that man +can do. Though little time is lost, the men are by no means up to the +speed which they will attain in a few days, when in full practice and +training. Their nerve, muscle, eye, endurance, will be all at, so to +speak, concert-pitch, and sheep after sheep will be shorn with a +precision and celerity even awful to the unprofessional observer. + +The unpastoral reader may be informed that speed and completeness of +denudation are the grand desiderata in shearing; the employer thinks +principally of the latter, the shearer principally of the former. To +adjust equitably the proportion is one of those incomplete aspirations +which torment humanity. Hence the contest--old as human society--between +labour and capital. + +This is the first day. According to old-established custom, a kind of +truce obtains. It is before the battle, the "salut," when no hasty word +or too demonstrative action can be suffered by the canons of good +taste. Red Bill, Flash Jack, Jem the Scooper, and other roaring blades, +more famous for expedition than faithful manipulation, are shearing +today with a painstaking precision, as of men to whom character is +everything. + +Mr Gordon marches softly up and down, regarding the shearers with a +paternal and gratified expression, occasionally hinting at slight +improvements of style, or expressing unqualified approval as a sheep is +turned out shaven rather than shorn. All goes on well. Nothing is heard +but expressions of goodwill and enthusiasm for the general welfare. It +is a triumph of the dignity of labour. + +One o'clock. Mr Gordon moved on to the bell and sounded it. At the +first stroke several men on their way to the pens stopped abruptly and +began to put on their coats. One fellow of an alert nature (Master Jack +Windsor) had just finished his sheep and was sharpening his shears, +when his eye caught Mr Gordon's form in proximity to the final bell. +With a bound like a wild cat, he reached the pen and drew out his sheep +a bare second before the first stroke, amidst the laughter and +congratulations of his comrades. Another man had his hand on the +pen-gate at the same instant, but by the Median law was compelled to +return sheepless. He was cheered, but ironically. Those whose sheep +were in an unfinished stage quietly completed them; the others moving +off to their huts, where their board literally smoked with +abundance. + +An hour passed. The meal was concluded; the smoke was over; and the +more careful men were back in the shed sharpening their shears by two +o'clock. Punctually at that hour the bell repeated its summons DE CAPO. +The warm afternoon gradually lengthened its shadows; the shears clicked +in tireless monotone; the pens filled and became empty. The +wool-presses yawned for the mountain of fleeces which filled the bins +in front of them, divided into various grades of excellence, and +continuously disgorged them, neatly and cubically packed and branded. + +At six o'clock the bell brought the day's work to a close. The sheep of +each man were counted in his presence, and noted down with scrupulous +care, the record being written out in full and hung up for public +inspection in the shed next day. This important ceremony over, master +and men, manager, labourers and supernumeraries, betook themselves to +their separate abodes, with such keen avoidance of delay that in five +minutes not a soul was left in or near the great building lately so +busy and populous, except the boys who were sweeping up the floor. The +silence of ages seems to fall and settle upon it. + +Next morning at a rather earlier hour every man is at his post. +Business is meant decidedly. Now commences the delicate and difficult +part of the superintendence which keeps Mr Gordon at his post in the +shed, nearly from daylight till dark, for from eight to ten weeks. +During the first day he has formed a sort of gauge of each man's temper +and workmanship. For now, and henceforth, the natural bias of each +shearer will appear. Some try to shear too fast, and in their haste +shear badly. Some are rough and savage with the sheep, which do +occasionally kick and become unquiet at critical times; and it must be +confessed are provoking enough. Some shear very fairly and handsomely +to a superficial eye, but commit the unpardonable offence of "leaving +wool on." Some are deceitful, shearing carefully when overlooked, but +"racing" and otherwise misbehaving directly the eye of authority is +diverted. These and many other tricks and defects require to be noted +and abated, quietly but firmly, by the manager of the shed--firmly +because evil would develop and spread ruinously if not checked; quietly +because immense loss might be incurred by a strike. Shearing differs +from other work in this wise: it is work against time, more especially +in Riverina. If the wool be not off the backs of the sheep before +November, all sorts of draw-backs and destructions supervene. The +spear-shaped grass-seeds, specially formed as if in special collusion +with the Evil One, hasten to bury themselves in the wool, and even in +the flesh of the tender victims. Dust rises in red clouds from the +unmoistened, betrampled meadows so lately verdurous and +flower-spangled. From snowy white to an unlovely dark brown turn the +carefully washed fleeces, causing anathema from overseers and +depreciation from brokers. All these losses of temper, trouble, and +money become inevitable if shearing be protracted, it may be, beyond a +given week. + +Hence, as in harvest with a short allowance of fair weather, +discipline must be tempered with diplomacy. Lose your temper, and be +over particular: off go Billy May, Abraham Lawson, and half-a-dozen of +your best men, making a weekly difference of perhaps two or three +thousand sheep for the remainder of the shearing. Can you not replace +them? Not so! Every shed in Riverina will be hard at work during this +present month of September and for every hour of October. Till that +time not a shearer will come to your gate, except, perhaps, one or two +useless, characterless men. Are you to tolerate bad workmanship? Not +that either. But try all other means with your men before you resort to +harshness; and be quite certain that your sentence is just, and that +you can afford the defection. + +So our friend Mr Gordon, wise from many tens of thousands of shorn +sheep that have been counted out past his steady eye, criticises +temperately, but watchfully. He reproves sufficiently, and no more, any +glaring fault; makes his calculation as to who are really bad shearers, +and can be discharged without loss to the commonwealth, or who can +shear fairly and can be coached up to a decent average. One division, +slow, and good only when slow, have to be watched lest they emulate +"the talent," and so come to grief. Then "the talent" has to be mildly +admonished from time to time lest they force the pace, set a bad +example, and lure the other men on to "racing." This last leads to +slovenly shearing, ill-usage of the sheep, and general dissatisfaction. + +Tact, temper, patience, and firmness are each and all necessary in that +Captain of Industry who has the very delicate and important task of +superintending a large woolshed. Hugh Gordon had shown all in such +proportion as would have made a distinguished man anywhere, had fortune +not adjusted for him this particular profession. Calm with the +consciousness of strength, he was kind and considerate in manner as in +nature, until provoked by glaring dishonesty or incivility. Then the +lion part of his nature woke up, so that it commonly went ill with the +aggressor. As this was matter of public report, he had little occasion +to spoil the repose of his bearing. Day succeeds day, and for a +fortnight the machinery goes on smoothly and successfully. The sheep +arrive at an appointed day and hour by detachments and regiments at the +washpen. They depart thence, like good boys on Saturday night, redolent +of soap and water, and clean to a fault. They enter the shed white and +flossy as newly combed poodles to emerge, on the way back to their +pasturage, slim, delicate, agile, with a bright black A legibly branded +with tar on their paper-white skins. + +The Anabanco world--stiffish but undaunted--is turning out of bed one +morning. Ha! what sounds are these? And why does the room look so dark? +Rain, as I'm alive. "Hurrah!" says Master Jack Bowles, one of the young +gentlemen. He is learning (more or less) practical sheep-farming, +preparatory to having (one of these days) an Anabanco of his own. +"Well, this is a change, and I'm not sorry for one," quoth Mr. +Jack, "I'm stiff all over. No one can stand such work long. Won't the +shearers growl! No shearing to-day, and perhaps none tomorrow either." +Truth to tell, Mr Bowles' sentiments are not confined to his ingenuous +bosom. Some of the shearers grumble at being stopped "just as a man was +earning a few shillings." Those who are in top pace and condition don't +like it. But to many of the rank and file--working up to and a little +beyond their strength--with whom swelled wrists and other protests of +nature are becoming apparent, it is a relief, and they are glad of the +respite. So at dinner-time all the sheep in the sheds, put in overnight +in anticipation of such a contingency, are reported shorn. All hands +are then idle for the rest of the day. The shearers dress and avail +themselves of various resources. Some go to look at their horses, now +in clover, or its equivalent, in the Riverina graminetum. Some play +cards, others wash or mend their clothes. A large proportion of the +Australians having armed themselves with paper, envelopes, and a +shilling's worth of stamps from the store, bethink themselves of +neglected or desirable correspondents. Many a letter for Mrs Leftalone, +Wallaroo Creek, or Miss Jane Sweetapple, Honeysuckle Flat, as the case +may be, will find its way into the post-bag tomorrow. A pair of +youngsters are having a round or two with the gloves; while to complete +the variety of recreations compatible with life at a woolshed, a +selected troupe are busy in the comparative solitude of that building, +at a rehearsal of a tragedy and a farce, with which they intend, the +very next rainy day, to astonish the population of Anabanco. + +At the home-station a truce to labour's "alarms" is proclaimed except +in the case and person of Mr de Vere. So far is he from participation +in the general holiday that he finds the store thronged with shearers, +washers, and "knock-about men," who being let loose, think it would be +nice to go and buy something "pour passer le temps." He therefore +grumbles slightly at having no rest like other people. + +"That's all very fine," says Mr Jack Bowles, who, seated on a case, is +smoking a large meerschaum and mildly regarding all things, "but what +have you got to do when we're all HARD AT WORK at the shed?" He speaks +with an air of great importance and responsibility. + +"That's right, Mr Bowles," chimes in one of the shearers, "stand up for +the shed. I never see a young gentleman work as hard as you do." + +"Bosh!" growls de Vere, "as if anybody couldn't gallop about from the +shed to the washpen, and carry messages, and give half of them wrong! +Why, Mr Gordon said the other day, he should have to take you off and +put on a Chinaman--that he couldn't make more mistakes." + +"All envy and malice, and t'other thing, de Vere, because you think I'm +rising in the profession," returns the good-natured Bowles, "Mr +Gordon's going to send 20,000 sheep, after shearing, to the Lik Lak +paddock, and he said I should go in charge." + +"Charge be hanged!" laughs de Vere, with two very bright-patterned +Crimean shirts, one in each hand, which he offers to a tall young +shearer for inspection. "There's a well there, and whenever +either of the two men, of whom you'll have CHARGE, gets sick or runs +away, you'll have to work the whim in his place, till another man's +sent out, if it's a month." + +This appalling view of station promotion rather startles Mr Jack, who +applies himself to his meerschaum, amid the ironical comments of the +shearers. However, not easily daunted or "shut up," according to the +more familiar station phrase, he rejoins, after a brief interval of +contemplation, "that accidents will happen, you know, de Vere, my +boy--apropos of which moral sentiment, I'll come and help you in your +dry-goods business; and then, look here, if YOU get ill or run away, +I'll have a profession to fall back upon." + +This is held to be a Roland of sufficient pungency for de Vere's +Oliver. Everyone laughed. And then the two youngsters betook themselves +to a humorous puffing of the miscellaneous contents of the store: +tulip-beds of gorgeous Crimean shirts, boots, books, tobacco, canvas +slippers, pocket-knives, Epsom salts, pipes, pickles, painkillers, +pocket handkerchiefs, pills, sardines, saddles, shears and sauces: in +fact everything which every kind of man might want, and which +apparently every man did want, for large and various were the +purchases, and great the flow of conversation. Finally, everything was +severely and accurately debited to the purchasers, and the store was +cleared and locked up. A large store is a necessity of a large station; +not by any means because of the profit upon goods sold, but it +obviously would be bad economy for old Bill, the shepherd, or Barney, +the bullock-driver, to visit the next township, from ten to thirty +miles distant, as the case may be, every time the former wanted a pound +of tobacco, or the latter a pair of boots. They might possibly obtain +these necessary articles as good in quality, as cheap in price. But +there are wolves in that wood, oh, my weak brothers! In all towns +dwells one of the 'sons of the Giant'--the Giant Grog--red-eyed, with +steel muscles and iron claws; once in these, which have held many and +better men to the death, neither Barney nor Bill emerges, save pale, +fevered, nerveless, and impecunious. So arose the station store. Barney +befits himself with boots without losing his feet; Bill fills his +pocket with match-boxes and smokes the pipe of sobriety, virtuous +perforce till his carnival, after shearing. + +The next day was wet, and threatened further broken weather. Matters +were not too placid with the shearers. A day or two for rest is very +well, but continuous wet weather means compulsory idleness, and gloom +succeeds repose; for not only are all hands losing time and earning no +money, but they are, to use the language of the stable "eating their +heads off" the while. The rather profuse mess and general expenditure, +which caused little reflection when they were earning at the rate of +two or three hundred pounds a year, became unpleasantly suggestive, now +that all is going out and nothing coming in. Hence loud and deep were +the anathemas as the discontented men gazed sadly or wrathfully at the +misty sky. + +A few days showery weather having, therefore, wellnigh driven +our shearers to desperation, out comes the sun in all his glory. He is +never far away or very faint in Riverina. All the pens are filled for +the morrow; very soon after the earliest sunbeams the bell sounds its +welcome summons, and the whole force tackles to the work with an ardour +proportioned to the delay, every man working as if for the ransom of +his whole family from slavery. How men work spurred on by the double +excitement of acquiring social reputation and making money rapidly! Not +an instant is lost; not a nerve, limb, or muscle doing less than the +hardest task-master could flog out of a slave. Occasionally you see a +shearer, after finishing his sheep, walk quickly out and not appear for +a couple of hours, or perhaps not again during the day. Do not put him +down as a sluggard; be assured that he has tasked nature dangerously +hard, and has only given in just before she does. Look at that silent +slight youngster, with a bandage round his swollen wrist. Every "blow" +of the shears is agony to him, yet he disdains to give in, and has been +working "in distress" for hours. The pain is great, as you can see by +the flush which occasionally surges across his brown face, yet he goes +on manfully to the last sheep, and endures to the very verge of +fainting. + +There was now a change in the manner and tone of the shed, especially +towards the end of the day. It was now the ding of the desperate fray, +when the blood of the fierce animal man is up, when mortal blows are +exchanged, and curses float upward with the smoke and dust. The +ceaseless clicking of the shears--the stern earnestness of the men, +toiling with a feverish and tireless energy--the constant succession +of sheep shorn and let go, caught and commenced--the occasional savage +oath or passionate gesture, as a sheep kicked and struggled with +perverse delaying obstinacy--the cuts and stabs, with brief decided +tones of Mr Gordon, in repression or command--all told the spectator +that tragic action was introduced into the performance. Indeed, one of +the minor excitements of shearing was then and there transacted. Mr +Gordon had more than once warned a dark sullen-looking man that he did +not approve of his style of shearing. He was temporarily absent, and on +his return found the same man about to let go a sheep whose appearance, +as a shorn wool-bearing quadruped, was painful and discreditable in the +extreme. + +"Let your sheep go, my man," said Gordon, in a tone which somehow +arrested the attention of nearly all the shearers, "but don't trouble +yourself to catch another!" + +"Why not?" said the delinquent, sulkily. + +"You know very well why not!" replied Gordon, walking closely up to +him, and looking straight at him with eyes that began to glitter, +"you've had fair warning. You've not chosen to take it. Now you can +go!" + +"I suppose you'll pay a man for the sheep he's shorn?" growled +out the ruffian. + +"Not one shilling until after shearing. You can come then if you like," +answered Gordon, with perfect distinctness. + +The cowed bully looked savagely at him; but the tall powerful frame and +steady eye were not inviting for personal arbitration of the matter in +hand. He put up his two pairs of shears, put on his coat, and walked +out of the shed. The time was passed when Red Bill or Terrible Dick +(ruffians whom a sparse labour-market rendered necessary evils) would +have flung down his shears upon the floor and told the manager that if +he didn't like that shearing he could shear his------sheep himself and +be hanged to him; or, on refusal of instant payment, would have +proposed to bury his shears in the intestines of his employer by way of +adjusting the balance between Capital and Labour. Many wild tales are +told of woolshed rows. I knew of one squatter stabbed mortally with +that fatal and convenient weapon, a shear-blade. + +The man thus summarily dealt with could, like most of his companions, +shear very well if he took pains. Keeping to a moderate number of +sheep, his workmanship could be good. But he must needs try and keep up +with Billy May or Abraham Lawson, who can shear from 100 to 130 sheep +per day, and do them beautifully. So in "racing" he works hastily and +badly, cuts the skin of his luckless sheep nearly as often as the wool, +and leaves wool here and there on them, grievous and exasperating to +behold. So sentence of expulsion goes forth fully against him. Having +arrayed himself for the road he makes one more effort for a settlement +and some money wherewith to pay for board and lodging on the road. Only +to have a mad carouse at the nearest township, however; after which he +will tell a plausible story of his leaving the shed on account of Mr +Gordon's temper, and avail himself of the usual free hospitality of the +bush to reach another shed. He addresses Mr Gordon with an attempt at +conciliation and deference. + +"It seems very 'ard, sir, as a man can't get the trifle of money coming +to him, which I've worked 'ard for." + +"It's very hard you won't try and shear decently," retorts Mr Gordon, +by no means conciliated. "Leave the shed!" + +Ill-conditioned rascal as the shearer is, he has a mate or +travelling-companion in whose breast exists some rough idea of +fidelity. He now takes up the dialogue. + +"I suppose if Jim's shearing don't suit, mine won't either." + +"I did not speak to you," answered Mr Gordon, as calmly as if he had +expected the speech, "but of course you can go." + +He said this with an air of studied unconcern, as if he would rather +like a dozen more men to knock off work. The two men walk out, but the +epidemic does not spread, and several take the lesson home and mend +their ways accordingly. + +The weather now was splendid; not a cloud specked the bright blue +sky. The shearers continue to work at the same express-train +pace; fifty bales of wool roll every day from the wool-presses; as fast +as they reach that number they are loaded upon the numerous drays and +wagons which have been waiting for weeks. Tall brown men have been +recklessly cutting up hides for the last fortnight, wherewith to lash +the bales securely. It is considered safer practice to load wool as +soon as may be; fifty bales represent about a thousand pounds sterling. +In a building, however secure, should a fire break out, a few hundred +bales are easily burned; but once on the dray, this much-dreaded "edax +rerum" in a dry country has little chance. The driver, responsible to +the extent of his freight, generally sleeps under his dray; hence both +watchman and insulation are provided. + +The unrelaxing energy with which the work was pushed at this stage was +exciting and contagious; at or before daylight every soul in the great +establishment was up. The boundary-riders were always starting off for +a twenty or thirty mile ride, and bringing tens of thousands of sheep +to the wash-pen. At that huge lavatory there was splashing and soaking +all day with an army of washers; not a moment is lost from daylight +till dark, or used for any purpose save the all-engrossing work and +needful food. At nine o'clock p.m. luxurious dreamless sleep, given +only to those whose physical powers have been taxed to the utmost and +who can bear without injury the daily tension. + +Everything and everybody were in splendid working order, nothing out of +gear. Rapid and regular as a steam-engine the great host of toilers +moved onward daily with a march which promised an unusually early +completion. Mr Gordon was not in high spirits, for so cautious and +far-seeing a captain rarely felt himself so independent of +circumstances as to indulge in that reckless mood--but much satisfied +with the prospect. Whew! The afternoon darkens, and the night is +delivered over to water-spouts and hurricanes, as it appears. Next day +was raw, gusty, with chill heavy showers; drains had to be cut, roofs +to be seen to; shorn sheep were shivering, washers all playing +pitch-and-toss, shearers sulky; everybody but the young gentlemen +wearing a most injured expression of countenance. "Looks as if it would +rain for a month," says Long Jack. "If we hadn't been delayed might +have had the shearing over by this." Reminded that there are 50,000 +sheep yet remaining to be shorn, and that by no possibility could they +have been finished, he answers, "Suppose so, always the same, +everything sure to go agin the poor man." The weather did not clear up. +Winter seemed to have taken thought, and determined to show even this +land of eternal summer that he had his rights. The shed would be +filled, and before the sheep so kept dry were shorn, down would come +the rain again. Not a full day's shearing for ten days. Then the clouds +disappeared as if the curtain of a stage had been rolled up, and lo! +the golden sun, fervid and impatient to obliterate the track of winter. + +The first day after the recommencement, matters went much as usual. +Steady work and little talk, as if everyone was anxious to make +up for the lost time. But on the second morning after breakfast, when +the bell sounded, instead of the usual cheerful dash at the sheep, +every man stood silent and motionless in his place. Someone uttered the +words "roll up!". Then the seventy men converged, and slowly, but with +one impulse, walked up to the end of the shed where stood Mr Gordon. + +The concerted action of any body of men bears with it an element of +power which commands respect. The weapon of force is theirs; it is at +their option to wield it with or without mercy. At one period of +Australian colonisation a superintendent in Mr Gordon's position might +have had good ground for uneasiness. Mr Jack Bowles saw in it an EMEUTE +of a democratic and sanguinary nature, regretted deeply his absent +revolver, but drew up to his leader prepared to die by his side. That +calm centurion felt no such serious misgivings. He knew that there had +been dire grumbling among the shearers in consequence of the weather. +He knew that there were malcontents among them. He was prepared for +some sort of demand on their part, and had concluded to make certain +concessions of a moderate degree. So looking cheerfully at the men, he +quietly awaited the deputation. As they neared him there was a little +hesitation, and then three delegates came to the front. These were Old +Ben, Abraham Lawson, and Billy May. Ben Thornton had been selected for +his age and long experience of the rights and laws of the craft. He was +a weather-beaten, wiry old Englishman, whose face and accent, darkened +as the former was by the Australian summers of half a century, still +retained the trace of his native Devonshire. It was his boast that he +had shorn for forty years, and as regularly "knocked-down" (or spent in +a single debauch) his shearing money. Lawson represented the small +free-holders, being a steady, shrewd fellow, and one of the fastest +shearers. Billy May stood for the fashion and "talent," being the +"Ringer," or fastest shearer of the whole assembly, and as such truly +admirable and distinguished. + +"Well now, men," quoth Mr Gordon, cheerily meeting matters half-way, +"what's it all about?" The younger delegate looked at Old Ben, who, now +that it "was demanded of him to speak the truth," or such dilution +thereof as might seem most favourable to the interests of the shed, +found a difficulty like many wiser men about his exordium. + +"Well, Muster Gordon," at length he broke forth, "look'ee here, sir. +The weather's been awful bad, and clean agin shearing. We've not been +earning our grub, and--" + +"So it has," answered the manager, "so it has. But can I help the +weather? I'm as anxious as you are to have the shearing over quickly. +We're both of one mind about that, eh?" + +"That's all right enough, sir," struck in Abraham Lawson, who felt that +Ben was getting the worst of the argument, and was moreover far less +fluent than usual, probably from being deprived of the aid of the +customary expletives, "but we're come to say this, sir, that the +season's turned out very wet indeed. We've had a deal of broken +time, and the men feel it very hard to be paying for a lot of rations, +and hardly earning anything. We're shearing the sheep very close and +clean. You won't have 'em done no otherways. Not like some sheds where +a man can 'run' a bit and make up for lost time. Now we've all come to +think this, sir, that if we're to go on shearing the sheep well, and to +stick to them, and get them done before the dust and grass-seed come +in, that you ought to make us some allowance. We know we've agreed for +so much a hundred, and all that. Still as the season's turned so +out-and-out bad, we hope you'll consider it and make it up to us +somehow." + +"Never knew a worse year," corroborated Billy May, who thought it +indispensable to say something. "Haven't made enough, myself, to pay +the cook." + +This was not strictly true, at any rate, as to Master Billy's own +earnings; he being such a remarkably fast shearer (and good withal), +that he had always a respectable sum credited to him for his days' +work, even when many of the slower men came off short enough. + +However, enough had been said to make Mr Gordon fully comprehend the +case. The men were dissatisfied. They had come in a roundabout way to +the conclusion that some pecuniary concession, not mentioned in their +bond, should come from the side of capital to that of labour. Whether +wages, interest of capital, share of profits, reserve fund, they knew +not nor cared. This was their stand. And being Englishmen they intended +to abide by it. + +The manager had considered the situation before it actually arose. He +now rapidly took in the remaining points of debate. The shearers had +signed a specific agreement for a stipulated rate of payment, +irrespective of the weather. By the letter of the law, they had no +case. Whether they made little or much profit was not his affair. But +he was a just and kindly man, as well as reasonably politic. They had +shorn well, and the weather had been discouraging. He knew too that an +abrupt denial might cause a passive mutiny, if not a strike. If they +set themselves to thwart him, it was in their power to shear badly, to +shear slowly, and to force him to discharge many of them. He might have +them fined, perhaps imprisoned by the police-court. Meanwhile, how +could shearing go on? Dust and grass-seeds would soon be upon them. He +resolved on a compromise, and spoke out at once in a firm and decided +tone as the men gathered up yet more closely around him. + +"Look here, all of you! You know very well that I'm not bound to find +you in fine weather. Still I am aware that the season has been against +you. You have shorn pretty well, so far, though I've had to make +examples, and am quite ready to make more. What I am willing to do is +this: to every man who works on till the finish and shears to my +satisfaction, I will make a fair allowance in the ration account. That +is, I will make no charge for the beef. Does that suit you?" There +was a chorus of "All right sir, we're satisfied. Mr Gordon +always does the fair thing." &c. And work was immediately resumed with +alacrity. + +The clerk of the weather, too gracious even in these regions as far as +the absence of rain is concerned, was steadily propitious. Cloudless +skies and a gradually ascending thermometer alone were the signs that +spring was changing into summer. The splendid herbage ripened and +dried; patches of bare earth began to be discernible amid the late +thick-swarded pastures, dust to rise and cloud-pillars of sand to float +and eddy--the desert genii of the Arab. But the work went on at a high +rate of speed, outpacing the fast-coming summer; and before any serious +disasters arose, the last flock was "on the battens," and, amid +ironical congratulations, the "cobbler," or last sheep was seized, and +stripped of his rather dense and difficult fleece. In ten minutes the +vast woolshed, lately echoing with the ceaseless click of the shears, +the jests, the songs, the oaths of the rude congregation, was silent +and deserted. The floors were swept, the pens closed, the sheep on +their way to a distant paddock. Not a soul remains about the building +but the pressers, who stay to work at the rapidly lessening piles of +fleeces in the bins, or a meditative teamster who sits musing on a +wool-bale, absorbed in a calculation as to when his load will be made +up. + +It is sundown, a rather later time of closing than usual, but rendered +necessary by the possibility of the "grand finale." The younger men +troop over to the hut, larking like schoolboys. Abraham Lawson throws a +poncho over his broad shoulders, lights his pipe, and strides along, +towering above the rest, erect and stately as a guardsman. Considerably +more so than you or I, reader, would have been, had we shorn 130 sheep, +as he has done to-day. Billy May has shorn 142, and he puts his hand on +the five-foot paling fence of the yard and vaults over it like a deer, +preparatory to a swim in the creek. At dinner you will see them all +with fresh Crimeans and Jerseys, clean, comfortable, and in grand +spirits. Next morning is settling-day. The book-keeping departments at +Anabanco being severely correct, all is in readiness. Each man's tally +or number of sheep shorn has been entered daily to his credit. His +private and personal investments at the store have been as duly +debited. The shearers, as a corporation, have been charged with the +multifarious items of their rather copious mess-bill. This sum total is +divided by the number of the shearers, the extract being the amount for +which each man is liable. This sum varies in its weekly proportion at +different sheds. With an extravagant cook, or cooks, the weekly bill is +often alarming. When the men and their functionary study economy it may +be kept very reasonably low. + +The men have been sitting or standing about the office for half-an-hour +when Mr Jack Bowles rushes out, and shouts "William May!" That young +person, excessively clean, attired in a quiet tweed suit, with his hair +cut very correctly short, advances with an air of calm intrepidity, and +faces Mr Gordon. Gordon, now seated at a long table, wearing a +judicial expression of countenance. + +"Well, May, here's your account":-- + + So many sheep, at 1 pound per 100... xxxx pounds + Cook, so many weeks................. xxxx pounds + Shearing store account.............. xxxx pounds + Private store account............... xxxx pounds + ---- + Total............................... xxxx pounds + ---- + + +"Is the tally of your sheep right?" "Oh! I daresay it's all right, Mr +Gordon, I made it so and so; about ten less." + +"Well, well! Ours is correct, no doubt. Now I want to make up a good +subscription for the hospital this year. How much will you give? You've +done pretty well, I think." + +"Put me down a pound, sir." + +"Very well, that's fair enough. If every one gives what they can +afford, you men will always have a place to go to when you're hurt or +laid up. So I put your name down, and you'll see it in the published +list. Now about the shearing, May. I consider that you've done your +work very well, and behaved very well all through. You're a fast +shearer, but you shear closely, and don't knock your sheep about. I +therefore do not charge you for any part of your meat bill, and I pay +you at the rate of half-a-crown a hundred for all your sheep, over and +above your agreement. Will that do?" + +"Very well, indeed, and I'm much obliged to you, Mr Gordon." + +"Well, good-bye May! Always call when you're passing, and if any work +is going on you'll get your share. Here's your cheque. Send in Lawson!" +Exit May, in high spirits, having cleared about three pounds per week, +during the whole term of shearing, and having lived a far from +unpleasant life, indeed akin to that of a fighting cock, from the +commencement to the end of that period. + +Lawson's interview may be described as having very similar results. He, +also, was a first-class shearer, though not so artistic as the gifted +Billy. Jack Windsor's saucy blue eyes twinkled merrily as he returned +to his companions, and incontinently leaped on the back of his +wild-eyed colt. After these three worthies came a shearer named +Jackson; he belonged to quite a different class; he could shear very +well if he pleased, but had a rooted disbelief that honesty was the +best policy, and a fixed determination to shear as many sheep as he +could get the manager to pass. By dint of close watching, constant +reprimand, and occasional "raddling" (marking badly-shorn sheep and +refusing to count them) Mr Gordon had managed to tone him down to +average respectability of execution. Still he was always uneasily aware +that whenever his eye was not upon him, Jackson was doing what he ought +not to do with might and main. Gordon had, indeed, kept him on from +sheer necessity, but he intended none the less to mark his opinion of +him. + +"Come in, Jackson! Your tally is so-and-so. Is that right?" + +Jackson.--"I suppose so." + +"Cook and store account, so much; shearing account so much." + +Jackson.--"And a good deal too." + +"That is your affair," said Mr Gordon, sternly enough. "Now look here! +You're in my opinion a bad shearer and a bad man. You have given me a +great deal of trouble, and I should have kicked you out of the shed +weeks ago if I had not been short of men. I shall make a difference +between you and men who have tried to do their best. I make you no +allowance of any sort, I pay you by the strict agreement. There's your +cheque. Go!" + +Jackson goes out with a very black countenance. He mutters with a surly +oath that if "he'd known how he was going to be served he'd ha' +'blocked' 'em a little more." He is pretty well believed to have been +served right, and he secures no sympathy whatever. Working-men of all +classes are shrewd and fair judges generally. If an employer does his +best to mete out justice he is always appreciated and supported by the +majority. These few instances will serve as a description of the whole +process of settling with the shearers. The horses have all been got in. +Great catching and saddling-up has taken place all the morning. By the +afternoon the whole party are dispersed to the four winds; some, like +Abraham Lawson and his friends, to sheds "higher up," in a colder +climate, where shearing necessarily commences later. From these they +will pass to others, until the last sheep in the mountain runs are +shorn. Then those who have not farms of their own betake themselves to +reaping. Billy May and Jack Windsor are quite as ready to back +themselves against time in the wheat-field as on the shearing-floor. +Harvest over, they find their pockets inconveniently full, so they +commence to visit their friends and repay themselves for their toils by +a tolerably liberal allowance of rest and recreation. + +Old Ben and a few choice specimens of the olden time get no further +than the nearest public house. Their cheques are handed to the landlord +and a "stupendous and terrible spree" sets in. At the end of a week he +informs them that they have received liquor to the amount of their +cheques--something over a hundred pounds--save the mark! They meekly +acquiesce, as is their custom. The landlord generously presents them +with a glass of grog each, and they take the road for the next +woolshed. + +The shearers being despatched, the sheep-washers, a smaller and less +regarded force, file up. They number some forty men. Nothing more than +fair bodily strength, willingness and obedience being required in their +case, they are more easy to get and to replace than shearers. They are +a varied and motley lot. That powerful and rather handsome man is a New +Yorker, of Irish parentage. Next to him is a slight, neat, quiet +individual. He was a lieutenant in a line regiment. The lad in the rear +was a Sandhurst cadet. Then came two navvies and a New Zealander, +five Chinamen, a Frenchman, two Germans, Tin Pot, Jerry, and +Wallaby--three aboriginal blacks. There are no invidious distinctions +as to caste, colour, or nationality. Every one is a man and a brother +at sheep-washing. Wage, one pound per week; wood, water, tents and food +"A LA DISCRETION." Their accounts are simple: so many weeks, so many +pounds; store account, so much; hospital? well, five shillings; cheque, +good-morning. + +The wool-pressers, the fleece-rollers, the fleece-pickers, the +yardsmen, the washers' cooks, the hut cooks, the spare shepherds; all +these and a few other supernumeraries inevitable at shearing-time, +having been paid off, the snowstorm of cheques which has been +fluttering all day comes to an end. Mr Gordon and the remaining +"sous-officiers" go to rest that night with much of the mental strain +removed which has been telling on every waking moment for the last two +months. + +The long train of drays and wagons, with loads varying from twenty to +forty-five bales, has been moving off in detachments since the +commencement. In a day or two the last of them will have rolled heavily +away. The 1400 bales, averaging three and a half hundredweight, are +distributed, slow journeying, along the road, which they mark from +afar, standing huge and columnar like guide tumuli, from Anabanco to +the waters of the Murray. Between the two points there is neither a +hill nor a stone. All is the vast monotonous sea of plain--at this +season a prairie-meadow exuberant with vegetation; in the late summer, +or in the occasional and dreaded phenomenon of a DRY WINTER, dusty, and +herbless as a brickfield, for hundreds of miles. + +Silence falls on the plains and waters of Anabanco for the next six +months. The woolshed, the washpen, and all the huts connected with them +are lone and voiceless as caravanserais in a city of the plague. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Shearing in the Riverina, New South +Wales, by Rolf Boldrewood + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHEARING IN THE RIVERINA *** + +***** This file should be named 4221.txt or 4221.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/4/2/2/4221/ + +Produced by Col Choat. HTML version by Al Haines. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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The utterance had its importance to every member +of a rather extensive "CORPS DRAMATIQUE" awaiting the industrial drama +about to be performed. + +A low sand-hill a few years since had looked out over a sea of grey +plains, covered partly with grass, partly with salsiferous bushes and +herbs. Two or three huts built of the trunks of the pine and roofed +with the bark of the box-tree, and a skeleton-looking cattle-yard with +its high "gallows" (a rude timber stage whereon to hang slaughtered +cattle) alone broke the monotony of the plain-ocean. A comparatively +small herd of cattle, 2000 or 3000, found more than sufficient +pasturage during the short winter and spring, but were always compelled +to migrate to mountain pastures when the swamps, which alone in those +days formed the water-stores of the run, were dried up. But two or +three, or at most half-a-dozen, stockmen were ever needed for the +purpose of managing the herd, so inadequate in number and profitable +occupation to this vast tract of grazing country. + +But, a little later, one of the great chiefs of the wool-producing +interest--a shepherd-king, so to speak, of shrewdness, energy, and +capital--had seen, approved and purchased the lease of this waste +kingdom. Almost at once, as if by magic, the scene changed. Great gangs +of navvies appeared, wending their way across the silent plain. Dams +were made, wells were dug. Tons of fencing wire were dropped on the +sand by the long line of teams which seemed never tired of arriving. +Sheep by thousands, and tens of thousands, began to come, grazing and +cropping up to the lonely sandhill--now swarming with blacksmiths, +carpenters, engineers, fencers, shepherds, bullock-drivers--till the +place looked like a fair on the borders of Tartary. + +Meanwhile everything was moving with calculated force and cost, under +the "reign of law". The seeming expense was merely the economic truth +of doing all the necessary work at once, rather than by instalments. +One hundred men for one day rather than one man for one hundred days. +Results soon began to demonstrate themselves. In twelve months the dams +were full, the wells sending up their far-fetched priceless water, the +wire fences erected, the shepherds gone, and 17,000 sheep cropping the +herbage of Anabanco. Tuesday was the day fixed for the actual +commencement of the momentous, almost solemn transaction--the pastoral +Hegira, so to speak, as the time of most station events is +calculated with reference to it, as happening before or after shearing. +But before the first shot is fired which tells of the battle begun, +what raids and skirmishes, what reconnoitring and vedette duty must +take place! + +First arrives the cook-in-chief to the shearers, with two assistants to +lay in a few provisions for the week's consumption of 70 able-bodied +men. I must here explain that the cook of a large shearing-shed is a +highly paid and tolerably irresponsible official. He is paid and +provided by the shearers. Payment is generally arranged on the scale of +half-a-crown a head weekly from each shearer. For this sum he must +provide punctual and effective cooking, paying out of his own pocket as +many "marmitons" as may be needful for that end, and to satisfy his +tolerably exacting and fastidious employers. + +In the present case he confers with the storekeeper, Mr de Vere, a +young gentleman of aristocratic connexions who is thus gaining an +excellent practical knowledge of the working of a large station and to +this end has the store-keeping department entrusted to him during +shearing. + +He does not perhaps look quite fit for a croquet party as he stands +now, with a flour-scoop in one hand and a pound of tobacco in the +other. But he looks like a man at work, and also like a gentleman, as +he is. "Jack the Cook" thus addresses him: + +"Now, Mr de Vere, I hope there's not going to be any humbugging about +my rations and things! The men are all up in their quarters, and as +hungry as free selectors. They've been a-payin' for their rations for +ever so long, and of course now shearing's on, they're good for a +little extra!" + +"All right, Jack," returns de Vere, good-temperedly, "all your lot was +weighed out and sent away before breakfast. You must have missed the +cart. Here's the list. I'll read it out to you: three bags flour, half +a bullock, two bags sugar, a chest of tea, four dozen of pickles, four +dozen of jam, two gallons of vinegar, five pounds pepper, a bag of +salt, plates, knives, forks, ovens, frying-pans, saucepans, iron pots, +and about a hundred other things. Now, mind you, return all the cooking +things safe, or PAY FOR THEM--that's the order! You don't want +anything more, do you? You've got enough for a regiment of cavalry, I +should think." + +"Well, I don't know. There won't be much left in a week if the weather +holds good," makes answer the chef, as one who thought nothing too +stupendous to be accomplished by shearers, "but I knew I'd forgot +something. As I'm here I'll take a few dozen boxes of sardines, and a +case of pickled salmon. The boys likes 'em, and, murder alive! haven't +we forgot the plums and currants? A hundredweight of each, Mr de Vere! +They'll be crying out for plum-duff and currant buns for the afternoon; +and bullying the life out of me, if I haven't a few trifles like. It's +a hard life, surely, a shearers' cook. Well, good-bye, sir, you have +'em all down in the book." + +Lest the reader should imagine that the role of Mr Gordon at +Anabanco was a reign of luxury and that waste which tendeth to penury, +let him be aware that all shearers in Riverina are paid at a certain +rate, usually that of ONE pound per hundred sheep shorn. They agree, on +the other hand, to pay for all supplies consumed by them at certain +prices fixed before the shearing agreement is signed. Hence, it is +entirely their own affair whether their mess bills are extravagant or +economical. They can have anything within the rather wide range of the +station store. PATES DE FOIE GRAS, ortolans, roast ostrich, novels, +top-boots, double-barrelled guns, IF THEY LIKE TO PAY FOR THEM--with +one exception. No wine, no spirits! Neither are they permitted to bring +these stimulants "on to the grounds" for their private use. Grog at +shearing? Matches in a powder-mill! It's very sad and bad; but our +Anglo-Saxon industrial or defensive champion cannot be trusted with the +fire-water. Navvies, men-of-war's men, soldiers, AND shearers--fine +fellows all. But though the younger men might only drink in moderation, +the majority and the older men are utterly without self-control once in +the front of temptation. And wars, 'wounds without cause,' hot heads, +shaking hands, delay and bad shearing, would be the inevitable results +of spirits A LA DISCRETION. So much is this a matter of certainty from +experience that a clause is inserted, and cheerfully signed, in most +shearing agreements, "that any man getting drunk or bringing spirits on +to the station during shearing, LOSES THE WHOLE OF the money earned by +him." The men know that the restriction is for their benefit, as well +as for the interest of the master, and join in the prohibition +heartily. + +Let us give a glance at the small army of working-men assembled at +Anabanco--one out of hundreds of stations in the colony of New South +Wales, ranging from 100,000 sheep downwards. There are seventy +shearers; about fifty washers, including the men connected with the +steam-engine, boilers, bricklayers and the like; ten or twelve +boundary-riders, whose duty it is to ride round the large paddocks, +seeing that the fences are all intact, and keeping a general look-out +over the condition of the sheep; three or four overseers; half-a-dozen +young gentlemen acquiring a practical knowledge of sheep-farming, or, +as it is generally phrased, "colonial experience"--a comprehensive +expression enough; a score or two of teamsters, with a couple of +hundred horses or bullocks, waiting for the high-piled wool bales, +which are loaded up and sent away almost as soon as shorn; +wool-sorters, pickers-up, pressers, yardsmen, extra shepherds. It may +easily be gathered from this outline what an 'army with banners' is +arrayed at Anabanco. While statistically inclined, it may be added that +the cash due for the shearing alone (less the mess bill) amounts to +1700 pounds; for the washing (roughly), 400 pounds, exclusive of +provisions consumed, hutting, wood, water, cooking. Carriage of wool +1500 pounds. Other hands from 30 pounds to 40 pounds per week. All of +which disbursements take place within from eight to twelve weeks after +the shears are in the first sheep. + +Tuesday comes "big with fate." As the sun tinges the far +skyline, the shearers are taking a slight refection of coffee and +currant buns to enable them to withstand the exhausting interval +between six and eight o'clock, when the serious breakfast occurs. +Shearers always diet themselves on the principle that the more they eat +the stronger they must be. Digestion, as preliminary to muscular +development, is left to take its chance. They certainly do get through +a tremendous amount of work. The whole frame is at its utmost tension, +early and late. But the preservation of health is due to their natural +strength of constitution rather than to their profuse and unscientific +diet. Half-an-hour after sunrise Mr Gordon walks quietly into the vast +building which contains the sheep and their shearers--called "the +shed," par excellence. Everything is in perfect cleanliness and order--the +floor swept and smooth, with its carefully planed boards of pale +yellow aromatic pine. Small tramways, with baskets for the fleeces, run +the wool up to the wool tables, superseding the more general plan of +hand picking. At each side of the shed floor are certain small areas, +four or five feet square, such space being found by experience to be +sufficient for the postures and gymnastics practised during the +shearing of a sheep. Opposite to each square is an aperture, +communicating with a long narrow paled yard, outside of the shed. +Through this each man pops his sheep when shorn, where he remains in +company with the others shorn by the same hand, until counted out. This +being done by the overseer or manager supplies a check upon hasty or +unskilful work. The body of the woolshed, floored with battens placed +half an inch apart, is filled with the woolly victims. This enclosure +is subdivided into minor pens, of which each fronts the place of two +shearers, who catch from it until the pen is empty. When this takes +place, a man for the purpose refills its. As there are local +advantages, an equitable distribution of places for shearing has to be +made by lot. + +On every subdivision stands a shearer, as Mr Gordon walks, with an air +of calm authority, down the long aisle. Seventy men, chiefly in their +prime, the flower of the working-men of the colony, they are variously +gathered. England, Ireland, and Scotland are represented in the +proportion of one half of the number; the other half is composed of +native-born Australians. + +Among these last--of pure Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Celtic descent--are to +be seen some of the finest men, physically considered, the race is +capable of producing. Taller than their British-born brethren, with +softer voices and more regular features, they inherit the powerful +frames and unequalled muscular development of the breed. Leading lives +chiefly devoted to agricultural labour, they enjoy larger intervals of +leisure than is permissible to the labouring classes of Europe. The +climate is mild, and favourable to health. They have been accustomed +from childhood to abundance of the best food; opportunities of +intercolonial travel are frequent and common. Hence the +Anglo-Australian labourer without, on the one hand, the sharpened +eagerness which marks his Transatlantic cousin, has yet an air +of independence and intelligence, combined with a natural grace of +movement, unknown to the peasantry of Britain. + +An idea is prevalent that the Australians are, as a race, physically +inferior to the British. It is asserted that they grow too fast, tend +to height and slenderness, and do not possess adequate stamina and +muscle. The idea is erroneous. The men reared in the cities on the +seaboard, living sedentary lives in shops, banks, or counting-houses, +are doubtless more or less pale and slight of form. So are they who +live under such conditions all over the world. But those youngsters who +have followed the plough on the upland farms, or lived a wilder life on +the stations of the far interior, who have had their fill of wheaten +bread and beefsteaks since they could walk, and snuffed up the free +bush breezes from infancy, they are MEN.-- + + +Stout of heart and ready of hand, +As e'er drove prey from Cumberland; + + +--a business, I may remark, at which many of them would have +distinguished themselves. + +Take Abraham Lawson as he stands there in a natural and unstudied +attitude, 6 feet 4 inches in his stockings, wide-chested, stalwart, +with a face like that of a Greek statue. Take Billy May, fair-haired, +mild, insouciant, almost languid, till you see him at work. Then, +again, Jack Windsor, handsome, saucy, and wiry as a bull-terrier and +like him with strong natural inclination for the combat; good for any +man of his weight, or a trifle over, with the gloves or without. + +It is curious to note how the old English practice of settling disputes +with nature's weapons has taken root in Australia. It would 'gladden +the sullen souls' of the defunct gladiators to watch two lads, whose +fathers had never trodden England's soil, pull off their jackets and go +to work "hammer and tongs," with all the savage silence of the true +island type. + +It is now about seven o'clock. Mr Gordon moves forward. As he does so, +every man leans towards the open door of the pen in front of which he +stands. The bell sounds! With the first stroke each one of the seventy +men has sprung upon a sheep--has drawn it out--placed its head across +his knee--and is working his shears as if the "last man out" was to be +flogged, or tarred and feathered at the least. Four minutes--James +Steadman, who learned last year, has shorn down one side of his sheep; +Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are well down the other sides of theirs; +when Billy May raises himself with a jerking sigh, and releases his +sheep, perfectly clean-shorn from the nose to the heels, through the +aperture of his separate enclosure. With the same effort apparently he +calls out 'Wool!' and darts upon another sheep. Drawing this second +victim across his knee, he buries his shear-points in the long wool of +its neck. A moment after a lithe and eager boy has gathered up fleece +number one, and tossed it into the train-basket, the shearer is halfway +down the sheep's side, the wool hanging in one fleece like a great +glossy mat, before you have done wondering whether he did really +shear the first sheep, or whether he had not a ready-shorn one in his +coat-sleeve--like a conjuror. + +By this time Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are 'out,' or finished; and +the cry of "Wool!' Wool!" seems to run continuously up and down the +long aisles of the shed, like a single note upon some rude instrument. +Now and then the "refrain" is varied by "Tar!" being shouted instead, +when a piece of skin is snipped off as well as the wool. Great healing +properties are attributed to this extract in the shed. And if a shearer +slice off a piece of flesh from his own person, as occasionally +happens, he gravely anoints it with the universal remedy, and considers +that the onus then lies with Providence, there being no more that man +can do. Though little time is lost, the men are by no means up to the +speed which they will attain in a few days, when in full practice and +training. Their nerve, muscle, eye, endurance, will be all at, so to +speak, concert-pitch, and sheep after sheep will be shorn with a +precision and celerity even awful to the unprofessional observer. + +The unpastoral reader may be informed that speed and completeness of +denudation are the grand desiderata in shearing; the employer thinks +principally of the latter, the shearer principally of the former. To +adjust equitably the proportion is one of those incomplete aspirations +which torment humanity. Hence the contest--old as human society-- +between labour and capital. + +This is the first day. According to old-established custom, a kind of +truce obtains. It is before the battle, the "salut," when no hasty word +or too demonstrative action can be suffered by the canons of good +taste. Red Bill, Flash Jack, Jem the Scooper, and other roaring blades, +more famous for expedition than faithful manipulation, are shearing +today with a painstaking precision, as of men to whom character is +everything. + +Mr Gordon marches softly up and down, regarding the shearers with a +paternal and gratified expression, occasionally hinting at slight +improvements of style, or expressing unqualified approval as a sheep is +turned out shaven rather than shorn. All goes on well. Nothing is heard +but expressions of goodwill and enthusiasm for the general welfare. It +is a triumph of the dignity of labour. + +One o'clock. Mr Gordon moved on to the bell and sounded it. At the +first stroke several men on their way to the pens stopped abruptly and +began to put on their coats. One fellow of an alert nature (Master Jack +Windsor) had just finished his sheep and was sharpening his shears, +when his eye caught Mr Gordon's form in proximity to the final bell. +With a bound like a wild cat, he reached the pen and drew out his sheep +a bare second before the first stroke, amidst the laughter and +congratulations of his comrades. Another man had his hand on the +pen-gate at the same instant, but by the Median law was compelled to +return sheepless. He was cheered, but ironically. Those whose sheep +were in an unfinished stage quietly completed them; the others moving +off to their huts, where their board literally smoked with +abundance. + +An hour passed. The meal was concluded; the smoke was over; and the +more careful men were back in the shed sharpening their shears by two +o'clock. Punctually at that hour the bell repeated its summons DE CAPO. +The warm afternoon gradually lengthened its shadows; the shears clicked +in tireless monotone; the pens filled and became empty. The +wool-presses yawned for the mountain of fleeces which filled the bins +in front of them, divided into various grades of excellence, and +continuously disgorged them, neatly and cubically packed and branded. + +At six o'clock the bell brought the day's work to a close. The sheep of +each man were counted in his presence, and noted down with scrupulous +care, the record being written out in full and hung up for public +inspection in the shed next day. This important ceremony over, master +and men, manager, labourers and supernumeraries, betook themselves to +their separate abodes, with such keen avoidance of delay that in five +minutes not a soul was left in or near the great building lately so +busy and populous, except the boys who were sweeping up the floor. The +silence of ages seems to fall and settle upon it. + +Next morning at a rather earlier hour every man is at his post. +Business is meant decidedly. Now commences the delicate and difficult +part of the superintendence which keeps Mr Gordon at his post in the +shed, nearly from daylight till dark, for from eight to ten weeks. +During the first day he has formed a sort of gauge of each man's temper +and workmanship. For now, and henceforth, the natural bias of each +shearer will appear. Some try to shear too fast, and in their haste +shear badly. Some are rough and savage with the sheep, which do +occasionally kick and become unquiet at critical times; and it must be +confessed are provoking enough. Some shear very fairly and handsomely +to a superficial eye, but commit the unpardonable offence of "leaving +wool on." Some are deceitful, shearing carefully when overlooked, but +"racing" and otherwise misbehaving directly the eye of authority is +diverted. These and many other tricks and defects require to be noted +and abated, quietly but firmly, by the manager of the shed--firmly +because evil would develop and spread ruinously if not checked; quietly +because immense loss might be incurred by a strike. Shearing differs +from other work in this wise: it is work against time, more especially +in Riverina. If the wool be not off the backs of the sheep before +November, all sorts of draw-backs and destructions supervene. The +spear-shaped grass-seeds, specially formed as if in special collusion +with the Evil One, hasten to bury themselves in the wool, and even in +the flesh of the tender victims. Dust rises in red clouds from the +unmoistened, betrampled meadows so lately verdurous and +flower-spangled. From snowy white to an unlovely dark brown turn the +carefully washed fleeces, causing anathema from overseers and +depreciation from brokers. All these losses of temper, trouble, and +money become inevitable if shearing be protracted, it may be, beyond a +given week. + +Hence, as in harvest with a short allowance of fair weather, +discipline must be tempered with diplomacy. Lose your temper, and be +over particular: off go Billy May, Abraham Lawson, and half-a-dozen of +your best men, making a weekly difference of perhaps two or three +thousand sheep for the remainder of the shearing. Can you not replace +them? Not so! Every shed in Riverina will be hard at work during this +present month of September and for every hour of October. Till that +time not a shearer will come to your gate, except, perhaps, one or two +useless, characterless men. Are you to tolerate bad workmanship? Not +that either. But try all other means with your men before you resort to +harshness; and be quite certain that your sentence is just, and that +you can afford the defection. + +So our friend Mr Gordon, wise from many tens of thousands of shorn +sheep that have been counted out past his steady eye, criticises +temperately, but watchfully. He reproves sufficiently, and no more, any +glaring fault; makes his calculation as to who are really bad shearers, +and can be discharged without loss to the commonwealth, or who can +shear fairly and can be coached up to a decent average. One division, +slow, and good only when slow, have to be watched lest they emulate +"the talent," and so come to grief. Then "the talent" has to be mildly +admonished from time to time lest they force the pace, set a bad +example, and lure the other men on to "racing." This last leads to +slovenly shearing, ill-usage of the sheep, and general dissatisfaction. + +Tact, temper, patience, and firmness are each and all necessary in that +Captain of Industry who has the very delicate and important task of +superintending a large woolshed. Hugh Gordon had shown all in such +proportion as would have made a distinguished man anywhere, had fortune +not adjusted for him this particular profession. Calm with the +consciousness of strength, he was kind and considerate in manner as in +nature, until provoked by glaring dishonesty or incivility. Then the +lion part of his nature woke up, so that it commonly went ill with the +aggressor. As this was matter of public report, he had little occasion +to spoil the repose of his bearing. Day succeeds day, and for a +fortnight the machinery goes on smoothly and successfully. The sheep +arrive at an appointed day and hour by detachments and regiments at the +washpen. They depart thence, like good boys on Saturday night, redolent +of soap and water, and clean to a fault. They enter the shed white and +flossy as newly combed poodles to emerge, on the way back to their +pasturage, slim, delicate, agile, with a bright black A legibly branded +with tar on their paper-white skins. + +The Anabanco world--stiffish but undaunted--is turning out of bed one +morning. Ha! what sounds are these? And why does the room look so dark? +Rain, as I'm alive. "Hurrah!" says Master Jack Bowles, one of the young +gentlemen. He is learning (more or less) practical sheep-farming, +preparatory to having (one of these days) an Anabanco of his own. +"Well, this is a change, and I'm not sorry for one," quoth Mr. +Jack, "I'm stiff all over. No one can stand such work long. Won't the +shearers growl! No shearing to-day, and perhaps none tomorrow either." +Truth to tell, Mr Bowles' sentiments are not confined to his ingenuous +bosom. Some of the shearers grumble at being stopped "just as a man was +earning a few shillings." Those who are in top pace and condition don't +like it. But to many of the rank and file--working up to and a little +beyond their strength--with whom swelled wrists and other protests of +nature are becoming apparent, it is a relief, and they are glad of the +respite. So at dinner-time all the sheep in the sheds, put in overnight +in anticipation of such a contingency, are reported shorn. All hands +are then idle for the rest of the day. The shearers dress and avail +themselves of various resources. Some go to look at their horses, now +in clover, or its equivalent, in the Riverina graminetum. Some play +cards, others wash or mend their clothes. A large proportion of the +Australians having armed themselves with paper, envelopes, and a +shilling's worth of stamps from the store, bethink themselves of +neglected or desirable correspondents. Many a letter for Mrs Leftalone, +Wallaroo Creek, or Miss Jane Sweetapple, Honeysuckle Flat, as the case +may be, will find its way into the post-bag tomorrow. A pair of +youngsters are having a round or two with the gloves; while to complete +the variety of recreations compatible with life at a woolshed, a +selected troupe are busy in the comparative solitude of that building, +at a rehearsal of a tragedy and a farce, with which they intend, the +very next rainy day, to astonish the population of Anabanco. + +At the home-station a truce to labour's "alarms" is proclaimed except +in the case and person of Mr de Vere. So far is he from participation +in the general holiday that he finds the store thronged with shearers, +washers, and "knock-about men," who being let loose, think it would be +nice to go and buy something "pour passer le temps." He therefore +grumbles slightly at having no rest like other people. + +"That's all very fine," says Mr Jack Bowles, who, seated on a case, is +smoking a large meerschaum and mildly regarding all things, "but what +have you got to do when we're all HARD AT WORK at the shed?" He speaks +with an air of great importance and responsibility. + +"That's right, Mr Bowles," chimes in one of the shearers, "stand up for +the shed. I never see a young gentleman work as hard as you do." + +"Bosh!" growls de Vere, "as if anybody couldn't gallop about from the +shed to the washpen, and carry messages, and give half of them wrong! +Why, Mr Gordon said the other day, he should have to take you off and +put on a Chinaman--that he couldn't make more mistakes." + +"All envy and malice, and t'other thing, de Vere, because you think I'm +rising in the profession," returns the good-natured Bowles, "Mr +Gordon's going to send 20,000 sheep, after shearing, to the Lik Lak +paddock, and he said I should go in charge." + +"Charge be hanged!" laughs de Vere, with two very bright-patterned +Crimean shirts, one in each hand, which he offers to a tall young +shearer for inspection. "There's a well there, and whenever +either of the two men, of whom you'll have CHARGE, gets sick or runs +away, you'll have to work the whim in his place, till another man's +sent out, if it's a month." + +This appalling view of station promotion rather startles Mr Jack, who +applies himself to his meerschaum, amid the ironical comments of the +shearers. However, not easily daunted or "shut up," according to the +more familiar station phrase, he rejoins, after a brief interval of +contemplation, "that accidents will happen, you know, de Vere, my boy-- +apropos of which moral sentiment, I'll come and help you in your +dry-goods business; and then, look here, if YOU get ill or run away, +I'll have a profession to fall back upon." + +This is held to be a Roland of sufficient pungency for de Vere's +Oliver. Everyone laughed. And then the two youngsters betook themselves +to a humorous puffing of the miscellaneous contents of the store: +tulip-beds of gorgeous Crimean shirts, boots, books, tobacco, canvas +slippers, pocket-knives, Epsom salts, pipes, pickles, painkillers, +pocket handkerchiefs, pills, sardines, saddles, shears and sauces: in +fact everything which every kind of man might want, and which +apparently every man did want, for large and various were the +purchases, and great the flow of conversation. Finally, everything was +severely and accurately debited to the purchasers, and the store was +cleared and locked up. A large store is a necessity of a large station; +not by any means because of the profit upon goods sold, but it +obviously would be bad economy for old Bill, the shepherd, or Barney, +the bullock-driver, to visit the next township, from ten to thirty +miles distant, as the case may be, every time the former wanted a pound +of tobacco, or the latter a pair of boots. They might possibly obtain +these necessary articles as good in quality, as cheap in price. But +there are wolves in that wood, oh, my weak brothers! In all towns +dwells one of the 'sons of the Giant'--the Giant Grog--red-eyed, with +steel muscles and iron claws; once in these, which have held many and +better men to the death, neither Barney nor Bill emerges, save pale, +fevered, nerveless, and impecunious. So arose the station store. Barney +befits himself with boots without losing his feet; Bill fills his +pocket with match-boxes and smokes the pipe of sobriety, virtuous +perforce till his carnival, after shearing. + +The next day was wet, and threatened further broken weather. Matters +were not too placid with the shearers. A day or two for rest is very +well, but continuous wet weather means compulsory idleness, and gloom +succeeds repose; for not only are all hands losing time and earning no +money, but they are, to use the language of the stable "eating their +heads off" the while. The rather profuse mess and general expenditure, +which caused little reflection when they were earning at the rate of +two or three hundred pounds a year, became unpleasantly suggestive, now +that all is going out and nothing coming in. Hence loud and deep were +the anathemas as the discontented men gazed sadly or wrathfully at the +misty sky. + +A few days showery weather having, therefore, wellnigh driven +our shearers to desperation, out comes the sun in all his glory. He is +never far away or very faint in Riverina. All the pens are filled for +the morrow; very soon after the earliest sunbeams the bell sounds its +welcome summons, and the whole force tackles to the work with an ardour +proportioned to the delay, every man working as if for the ransom of +his whole family from slavery. How men work spurred on by the double +excitement of acquiring social reputation and making money rapidly! Not +an instant is lost; not a nerve, limb, or muscle doing less than the +hardest task-master could flog out of a slave. Occasionally you see a +shearer, after finishing his sheep, walk quickly out and not appear for +a couple of hours, or perhaps not again during the day. Do not put him +down as a sluggard; be assured that he has tasked nature dangerously +hard, and has only given in just before she does. Look at that silent +slight youngster, with a bandage round his swollen wrist. Every "blow" +of the shears is agony to him, yet he disdains to give in, and has been +working "in distress" for hours. The pain is great, as you can see by +the flush which occasionally surges across his brown face, yet he goes +on manfully to the last sheep, and endures to the very verge of +fainting. + +There was now a change in the manner and tone of the shed, especially +towards the end of the day. It was now the ding of the desperate fray, +when the blood of the fierce animal man is up, when mortal blows are +exchanged, and curses float upward with the smoke and dust. The +ceaseless clicking of the shears--the stern earnestness of the men, +toiling with a feverish and tireless energy--the constant succession +of sheep shorn and let go, caught and commenced--the occasional savage +oath or passionate gesture, as a sheep kicked and struggled with +perverse delaying obstinacy--the cuts and stabs, with brief decided +tones of Mr Gordon, in repression or command--all told the spectator +that tragic action was introduced into the performance. Indeed, one of +the minor excitements of shearing was then and there transacted. Mr +Gordon had more than once warned a dark sullen-looking man that he did +not approve of his style of shearing. He was temporarily absent, and on +his return found the same man about to let go a sheep whose appearance, +as a shorn wool-bearing quadruped, was painful and discreditable in the +extreme. + +"Let your sheep go, my man," said Gordon, in a tone which somehow +arrested the attention of nearly all the shearers, "but don't trouble +yourself to catch another!" + +"Why not?" said the delinquent, sulkily. + +"You know very well why not!" replied Gordon, walking closely up to +him, and looking straight at him with eyes that began to glitter, +"you've had fair warning. You've not chosen to take it. Now you can +go!" + +"I suppose you'll pay a man for the sheep he's shorn?" growled +out the ruffian. + +"Not one shilling until after shearing. You can come then if you like," +answered Gordon, with perfect distinctness. + +The cowed bully looked savagely at him; but the tall powerful frame and +steady eye were not inviting for personal arbitration of the matter in +hand. He put up his two pairs of shears, put on his coat, and walked +out of the shed. The time was passed when Red Bill or Terrible Dick +(ruffians whom a sparse labour-market rendered necessary evils) would +have flung down his shears upon the floor and told the manager that if +he didn't like that shearing he could shear his------sheep himself and +be hanged to him; or, on refusal of instant payment, would have +proposed to bury his shears in the intestines of his employer by way of +adjusting the balance between Capital and Labour. Many wild tales are +told of woolshed rows. I knew of one squatter stabbed mortally with +that fatal and convenient weapon, a shear-blade. + +The man thus summarily dealt with could, like most of his companions, +shear very well if he took pains. Keeping to a moderate number of +sheep, his workmanship could be good. But he must needs try and keep up +with Billy May or Abraham Lawson, who can shear from 100 to 130 sheep +per day, and do them beautifully. So in "racing" he works hastily and +badly, cuts the skin of his luckless sheep nearly as often as the wool, +and leaves wool here and there on them, grievous and exasperating to +behold. So sentence of expulsion goes forth fully against him. Having +arrayed himself for the road he makes one more effort for a settlement +and some money wherewith to pay for board and lodging on the road. Only +to have a mad carouse at the nearest township, however; after which he +will tell a plausible story of his leaving the shed on account of Mr +Gordon's temper, and avail himself of the usual free hospitality of the +bush to reach another shed. He addresses Mr Gordon with an attempt at +conciliation and deference. + +"It seems very 'ard, sir, as a man can't get the trifle of money coming +to him, which I've worked 'ard for." + +"It's very hard you won't try and shear decently," retorts Mr Gordon, +by no means conciliated. "Leave the shed!" + +Ill-conditioned rascal as the shearer is, he has a mate or +travelling-companion in whose breast exists some rough idea of +fidelity. He now takes up the dialogue. + +"I suppose if Jim's shearing don't suit, mine won't either." + +"I did not speak to you," answered Mr Gordon, as calmly as if he had +expected the speech, "but of course you can go." + +He said this with an air of studied unconcern, as if he would rather +like a dozen more men to knock off work. The two men walk out, but the +epidemic does not spread, and several take the lesson home and mend +their ways accordingly. + +The weather now was splendid; not a cloud specked the bright blue +sky. The shearers continue to work at the same express-train +pace; fifty bales of wool roll every day from the wool-presses; as fast +as they reach that number they are loaded upon the numerous drays and +wagons which have been waiting for weeks. Tall brown men have been +recklessly cutting up hides for the last fortnight, wherewith to lash +the bales securely. It is considered safer practice to load wool as +soon as may be; fifty bales represent about a thousand pounds sterling. +In a building, however secure, should a fire break out, a few hundred +bales are easily burned; but once on the dray, this much-dreaded "edax +rerum" in a dry country has little chance. The driver, responsible to +the extent of his freight, generally sleeps under his dray; hence both +watchman and insulation are provided. + +The unrelaxing energy with which the work was pushed at this stage was +exciting and contagious; at or before daylight every soul in the great +establishment was up. The boundary-riders were always starting off for +a twenty or thirty mile ride, and bringing tens of thousands of sheep +to the wash-pen. At that huge lavatory there was splashing and soaking +all day with an army of washers; not a moment is lost from daylight +till dark, or used for any purpose save the all-engrossing work and +needful food. At nine o'clock p.m. luxurious dreamless sleep, given +only to those whose physical powers have been taxed to the utmost and +who can bear without injury the daily tension. + +Everything and everybody were in splendid working order, nothing out of +gear. Rapid and regular as a steam-engine the great host of toilers +moved onward daily with a march which promised an unusually early +completion. Mr Gordon was not in high spirits, for so cautious and +far-seeing a captain rarely felt himself so independent of +circumstances as to indulge in that reckless mood--but much satisfied +with the prospect. Whew! The afternoon darkens, and the night is +delivered over to water-spouts and hurricanes, as it appears. Next day +was raw, gusty, with chill heavy showers; drains had to be cut, roofs +to be seen to; shorn sheep were shivering, washers all playing +pitch-and-toss, shearers sulky; everybody but the young gentlemen +wearing a most injured expression of countenance. "Looks as if it would +rain for a month," says Long Jack. "If we hadn't been delayed might +have had the shearing over by this." Reminded that there are 50,000 +sheep yet remaining to be shorn, and that by no possibility could they +have been finished, he answers, "Suppose so, always the same, +everything sure to go agin the poor man." The weather did not clear up. +Winter seemed to have taken thought, and determined to show even this +land of eternal summer that he had his rights. The shed would be +filled, and before the sheep so kept dry were shorn, down would come +the rain again. Not a full day's shearing for ten days. Then the clouds +disappeared as if the curtain of a stage had been rolled up, and lo! +the golden sun, fervid and impatient to obliterate the track of winter. + +The first day after the recommencement, matters went much as usual. +Steady work and little talk, as if everyone was anxious to make +up for the lost time. But on the second morning after breakfast, when +the bell sounded, instead of the usual cheerful dash at the sheep, +every man stood silent and motionless in his place. Someone uttered the +words "roll up!". Then the seventy men converged, and slowly, but with +one impulse, walked up to the end of the shed where stood Mr Gordon. + +The concerted action of any body of men bears with it an element of +power which commands respect. The weapon of force is theirs; it is at +their option to wield it with or without mercy. At one period of +Australian colonisation a superintendent in Mr Gordon's position might +have had good ground for uneasiness. Mr Jack Bowles saw in it an EMEUTE +of a democratic and sanguinary nature, regretted deeply his absent +revolver, but drew up to his leader prepared to die by his side. That +calm centurion felt no such serious misgivings. He knew that there had +been dire grumbling among the shearers in consequence of the weather. +He knew that there were malcontents among them. He was prepared for +some sort of demand on their part, and had concluded to make certain +concessions of a moderate degree. So looking cheerfully at the men, he +quietly awaited the deputation. As they neared him there was a little +hesitation, and then three delegates came to the front. These were Old +Ben, Abraham Lawson, and Billy May. Ben Thornton had been selected for +his age and long experience of the rights and laws of the craft. He was +a weather-beaten, wiry old Englishman, whose face and accent, darkened +as the former was by the Australian summers of half a century, still +retained the trace of his native Devonshire. It was his boast that he +had shorn for forty years, and as regularly "knocked-down" (or spent in +a single debauch) his shearing money. Lawson represented the small +free-holders, being a steady, shrewd fellow, and one of the fastest +shearers. Billy May stood for the fashion and "talent," being the +"Ringer," or fastest shearer of the whole assembly, and as such truly +admirable and distinguished. + +"Well now, men," quoth Mr Gordon, cheerily meeting matters half-way, +"what's it all about?" The younger delegate looked at Old Ben, who, now +that it "was demanded of him to speak the truth," or such dilution +thereof as might seem most favourable to the interests of the shed, +found a difficulty like many wiser men about his exordium. + +"Well, Muster Gordon," at length he broke forth, "look'ee here, sir. +The weather's been awful bad, and clean agin shearing. We've not been +earning our grub, and--" + +"So it has," answered the manager, "so it has. But can I help the +weather? I'm as anxious as you are to have the shearing over quickly. +We're both of one mind about that, eh?" + +"That's all right enough, sir," struck in Abraham Lawson, who felt that +Ben was getting the worst of the argument, and was moreover far less +fluent than usual, probably from being deprived of the aid of the +customary expletives, "but we're come to say this, sir, that the +season's turned out very wet indeed. We've had a deal of broken +time, and the men feel it very hard to be paying for a lot of rations, +and hardly earning anything. We're shearing the sheep very close and +clean. You won't have 'em done no otherways. Not like some sheds where +a man can 'run' a bit and make up for lost time. Now we've all come to +think this, sir, that if we're to go on shearing the sheep well, and to +stick to them, and get them done before the dust and grass-seed come +in, that you ought to make us some allowance. We know we've agreed for +so much a hundred, and all that. Still as the season's turned so +out-and-out bad, we hope you'll consider it and make it up to us +somehow." + +"Never knew a worse year," corroborated Billy May, who thought it +indispensable to say something. "Haven't made enough, myself, to pay +the cook." + +This was not strictly true, at any rate, as to Master Billy's own +earnings; he being such a remarkably fast shearer (and good withal), +that he had always a respectable sum credited to him for his days' +work, even when many of the slower men came off short enough. + +However, enough had been said to make Mr Gordon fully comprehend the +case. The men were dissatisfied. They had come in a roundabout way to +the conclusion that some pecuniary concession, not mentioned in their +bond, should come from the side of capital to that of labour. Whether +wages, interest of capital, share of profits, reserve fund, they knew +not nor cared. This was their stand. And being Englishmen they intended +to abide by it. + +The manager had considered the situation before it actually arose. He +now rapidly took in the remaining points of debate. The shearers had +signed a specific agreement for a stipulated rate of payment, +irrespective of the weather. By the letter of the law, they had no +case. Whether they made little or much profit was not his affair. But +he was a just and kindly man, as well as reasonably politic. They had +shorn well, and the weather had been discouraging. He knew too that an +abrupt denial might cause a passive mutiny, if not a strike. If they +set themselves to thwart him, it was in their power to shear badly, to +shear slowly, and to force him to discharge many of them. He might have +them fined, perhaps imprisoned by the police-court. Meanwhile, how +could shearing go on? Dust and grass-seeds would soon be upon them. He +resolved on a compromise, and spoke out at once in a firm and decided +tone as the men gathered up yet more closely around him. + +"Look here, all of you! You know very well that I'm not bound to find +you in fine weather. Still I am aware that the season has been against +you. You have shorn pretty well, so far, though I've had to make +examples, and am quite ready to make more. What I am willing to do is +this: to every man who works on till the finish and shears to my +satisfaction, I will make a fair allowance in the ration account. That +is, I will make no charge for the beef. Does that suit you?" There +was a chorus of "All right sir, we're satisfied. Mr Gordon +always does the fair thing." &c. And work was immediately resumed with +alacrity. + +The clerk of the weather, too gracious even in these regions as far as +the absence of rain is concerned, was steadily propitious. Cloudless +skies and a gradually ascending thermometer alone were the signs that +spring was changing into summer. The splendid herbage ripened and +dried; patches of bare earth began to be discernible amid the late +thick-swarded pastures, dust to rise and cloud-pillars of sand to float +and eddy--the desert genii of the Arab. But the work went on at a high +rate of speed, outpacing the fast-coming summer; and before any serious +disasters arose, the last flock was "on the battens," and, amid +ironical congratulations, the "cobbler," or last sheep was seized, and +stripped of his rather dense and difficult fleece. In ten minutes the +vast woolshed, lately echoing with the ceaseless click of the shears, +the jests, the songs, the oaths of the rude congregation, was silent +and deserted. The floors were swept, the pens closed, the sheep on +their way to a distant paddock. Not a soul remains about the building +but the pressers, who stay to work at the rapidly lessening piles of +fleeces in the bins, or a meditative teamster who sits musing on a +wool-bale, absorbed in a calculation as to when his load will be made +up. + +It is sundown, a rather later time of closing than usual, but rendered +necessary by the possibility of the "grand finale." The younger men +troop over to the hut, larking like schoolboys. Abraham Lawson throws a +poncho over his broad shoulders, lights his pipe, and strides along, +towering above the rest, erect and stately as a guardsman. Considerably +more so than you or I, reader, would have been, had we shorn 130 sheep, +as he has done to-day. Billy May has shorn 142, and he puts his hand on +the five-foot paling fence of the yard and vaults over it like a deer, +preparatory to a swim in the creek. At dinner you will see them all +with fresh Crimeans and Jerseys, clean, comfortable, and in grand +spirits. Next morning is settling-day. The book-keeping departments at +Anabanco being severely correct, all is in readiness. Each man's tally +or number of sheep shorn has been entered daily to his credit. His +private and personal investments at the store have been as duly +debited. The shearers, as a corporation, have been charged with the +multifarious items of their rather copious mess-bill. This sum total is +divided by the number of the shearers, the extract being the amount for +which each man is liable. This sum varies in its weekly proportion at +different sheds. With an extravagant cook, or cooks, the weekly bill is +often alarming. When the men and their functionary study economy it may +be kept very reasonably low. + +The men have been sitting or standing about the office for half-an-hour +when Mr Jack Bowles rushes out, and shouts "William May!" That young +person, excessively clean, attired in a quiet tweed suit, with his hair +cut very correctly short, advances with an air of calm intrepidity, and +faces Mr Gordon. Gordon, now seated at a long table, wearing a +judicial expression of countenance. + +"Well, May, here's your account":-- + +So many sheep, at 1 pound per 100... xxxx pounds +Cook, so many weeks................. xxxx pounds +Shearing store account.............. xxxx pounds +Private store account............... xxxx pounds + ---- +Total............................... xxxx pounds + ---- + + +"Is the tally of your sheep right?" "Oh! I daresay it's all right, Mr +Gordon, I made it so and so; about ten less." + +"Well, well! Ours is correct, no doubt. Now I want to make up a good +subscription for the hospital this year. How much will you give? You've +done pretty well, I think." + +"Put me down a pound, sir." + +"Very well, that's fair enough. If every one gives what they can +afford, you men will always have a place to go to when you're hurt or +laid up. So I put your name down, and you'll see it in the published +list. Now about the shearing, May. I consider that you've done your +work very well, and behaved very well all through. You're a fast +shearer, but you shear closely, and don't knock your sheep about. I +therefore do not charge you for any part of your meat bill, and I pay +you at the rate of half-a-crown a hundred for all your sheep, over and +above your agreement. Will that do?" + +"Very well, indeed, and I'm much obliged to you, Mr Gordon." + +"Well, good-bye May! Always call when you're passing, and if any work +is going on you'll get your share. Here's your cheque. Send in Lawson!" +Exit May, in high spirits, having cleared about three pounds per week, +during the whole term of shearing, and having lived a far from +unpleasant life, indeed akin to that of a fighting cock, from the +commencement to the end of that period. + +Lawson's interview may be described as having very similar results. He, +also, was a first-class shearer, though not so artistic as the gifted +Billy. Jack Windsor's saucy blue eyes twinkled merrily as he returned +to his companions, and incontinently leaped on the back of his +wild-eyed colt. After these three worthies came a shearer named +Jackson; he belonged to quite a different class; he could shear very +well if he pleased, but had a rooted disbelief that honesty was the +best policy, and a fixed determination to shear as many sheep as he +could get the manager to pass. By dint of close watching, constant +reprimand, and occasional "raddling" (marking badly-shorn sheep and +refusing to count them) Mr Gordon had managed to tone him down to +average respectability of execution. Still he was always uneasily aware +that whenever his eye was not upon him, Jackson was doing what he ought +not to do with might and main. Gordon had, indeed, kept him on from +sheer necessity, but he intended none the less to mark his opinion of +him. + +"Come in, Jackson! Your tally is so-and-so. Is that right?" + +Jackson.--"I suppose so." + +"Cook and store account, so much; shearing account so much." + +Jackson.--"And a good deal too." + +"That is your affair," said Mr Gordon, sternly enough. "Now look here! +You're in my opinion a bad shearer and a bad man. You have given me a +great deal of trouble, and I should have kicked you out of the shed +weeks ago if I had not been short of men. I shall make a difference +between you and men who have tried to do their best. I make you no +allowance of any sort, I pay you by the strict agreement. There's your +cheque. Go!" + +Jackson goes out with a very black countenance. He mutters with a surly +oath that if "he'd known how he was going to be served he'd ha' +'blocked' 'em a little more." He is pretty well believed to have been +served right, and he secures no sympathy whatever. Working-men of all +classes are shrewd and fair judges generally. If an employer does his +best to mete out justice he is always appreciated and supported by the +majority. These few instances will serve as a description of the whole +process of settling with the shearers. The horses have all been got in. +Great catching and saddling-up has taken place all the morning. By the +afternoon the whole party are dispersed to the four winds; some, like +Abraham Lawson and his friends, to sheds "higher up," in a colder +climate, where shearing necessarily commences later. From these they +will pass to others, until the last sheep in the mountain runs are +shorn. Then those who have not farms of their own betake themselves to +reaping. Billy May and Jack Windsor are quite as ready to back +themselves against time in the wheat-field as on the shearing-floor. +Harvest over, they find their pockets inconveniently full, so they +commence to visit their friends and repay themselves for their toils by +a tolerably liberal allowance of rest and recreation. + +Old Ben and a few choice specimens of the olden time get no further +than the nearest public house. Their cheques are handed to the landlord +and a "stupendous and terrible spree" sets in. At the end of a week he +informs them that they have received liquor to the amount of their +cheques--something over a hundred pounds--save the mark! They meekly +acquiesce, as is their custom. The landlord generously presents them +with a glass of grog each, and they take the road for the next +woolshed. + +The shearers being despatched, the sheep-washers, a smaller and less +regarded force, file up. They number some forty men. Nothing more than +fair bodily strength, willingness and obedience being required in their +case, they are more easy to get and to replace than shearers. They are +a varied and motley lot. That powerful and rather handsome man is a New +Yorker, of Irish parentage. Next to him is a slight, neat, quiet +individual. He was a lieutenant in a line regiment. The lad in the rear +was a Sandhurst cadet. Then came two navvies and a New Zealander, +five Chinamen, a Frenchman, two Germans, Tin Pot, Jerry, and +Wallaby--three aboriginal blacks. There are no invidious distinctions +as to caste, colour, or nationality. Every one is a man and a brother +at sheep-washing. Wage, one pound per week; wood, water, tents and food +"A LA DISCRETION." Their accounts are simple: so many weeks, so many +pounds; store account, so much; hospital? well, five shillings; cheque, +good-morning. + +The wool-pressers, the fleece-rollers, the fleece-pickers, the +yardsmen, the washers' cooks, the hut cooks, the spare shepherds; all +these and a few other supernumeraries inevitable at shearing-time, +having been paid off, the snowstorm of cheques which has been +fluttering all day comes to an end. Mr Gordon and the remaining +"sous-officiers" go to rest that night with much of the mental strain +removed which has been telling on every waking moment for the last two +months. + +The long train of drays and wagons, with loads varying from twenty to +forty-five bales, has been moving off in detachments since the +commencement. In a day or two the last of them will have rolled heavily +away. The 1400 bales, averaging three and a half hundredweight, are +distributed, slow journeying, along the road, which they mark from +afar, standing huge and columnar like guide tumuli, from Anabanco to +the waters of the Murray. Between the two points there is neither a +hill nor a stone. All is the vast monotonous sea of plain--at this +season a prairie-meadow exuberant with vegetation; in the late summer, +or in the occasional and dreaded phenomenon of a DRY WINTER, dusty, and +herbless as a brickfield, for hundreds of miles. + +Silence falls on the plains and waters of Anabanco for the next six +months. The woolshed, the washpen, and all the huts connected with them +are lone and voiceless as caravanserais in a city of the plague. + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg Etext of Shearing In The Riverina, New South Wales +by Rolf Boldrewood [Thomas Alexander Browne] (1826-1915) + diff --git a/old/shrrv10.zip b/old/shrrv10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..bde3a67 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/shrrv10.zip |