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Frank Melton's Luck, Or, Off to New Zealand

Chapter XI. Cattle Muster—The Ladies Assist

Chapter XI. Cattle Muster—The Ladies Assist.

As we rode up the valley we espied a mob of cattle near the bush. Our object was to get quietly up before we should attract their attention, and intercept their certain endeavours to make for cover on being startled by our appearance. We therefore struck off to the right, instead of riding straight up to them, and, gaining the bush, akirted it without making a sound until we had the advantage of the required position. The wind was fortunately in our favour. When they at last caught sight of us, having been roused by the noise made by my horse stepping on a dead branch and cracking it, the fun began. With heads and tails erect they made for the friendly shelter with a mighty rush at a pace which I feared would leave us no chance of heading them. Uncle, however, was off at full gallop to turn the leaders, cracking his formidable stockwhip, and shouting to me to follow up and prevent the stragglers from breaking in behind him.

I was intending to take it easy, thinking that swiftness would not be required for my part of the performance, but Playboy evidently knew better, for he went off at his utmost speed, regardless of his rider's wishes. By tearing along some distance behind uncle, we managed to achieve our object, of keeping the cattle going parallel to the bush without allowing them to enter. Still, the danger was not over, and if they once beat us the chance of securing them was lost for that time, as horses cannot penetrate the tangled under-scrub, though cattle crash through it at a great rate. If uncle could but turn the leaders out more on to the open, there might be some hope, but his utmost efforts could not achieve more than he was now effecting. His gallant bay would have headed the smartest amongst these wild bush cattle, but his rider had to restrain him, as he noted an inclination amongst some headstrong brutes a little behind him in the fiercely rushing straggling mob, to break off and take a lead of their own. A moment's slackening of his speed prevented this, then on again for dear life. While watching for a moment his splendid horsemanship and clever tactics, and thereby relaxing my own vigilance, a big calf rushed by my horse's nose and made for solitude. The old stock horse, without a motion from me, swerved round and started after it, again swinging round, though at full gallop, as he headed it, and this time so very abruptly that, not being aware of his intentions, I had not time to swing with him, but shot straight over his head, and found myself seated on the ground unhurt. I jumped up. Playboy very obligingly, and page 44 contrary to the usual custom of horses in the state of excitement that he was, allowed me to catch him. I quickly remounted, and as uncle was out of sight round a corner of bush, determined to say nothing about my spill, but learn by it experience for the future. The calf, seeing my discomfiture, had again rushed into the bush, so knowing it was useless trying to get him out, I tore after the rest of the mob, and by dint of good luck rather than good management, as far as I was concerned, we got them beyond the point of bush, which it appeared uncle most dreaded, and into the open country, where we considered them comparatively safe.

‘Where is old Rough? I left him with you,’ asked uncle, as I rode up to him.

The old dog answered the question himself by scampering out of the bush in full pursuit of the lost calf, catching hold of him by the heels now and then with no gentle nip, and making him roar for mercy, or his mother. The old lady rushed back from the mob go defend her offspring, and Playboy galloped after her against my will, but had to retire just as swiftly, as she lowered her horns and rushed at him, the pursuer thus becoming the pursued. I was in a great fright. I fancied the old horse could not escape the infuriated beast who, rendered mad by the danger which threatened her calf, and evidently considering him the cause of it, followed with head down only a few feet behind his tail. If he fell what would be my fate? My uncle I could hear convulsed with laughter, which I thought most cruel. The pace continued hot, but we did not gain on our ruthless adversary. I tried ineffectually to make it hotter by kicking my horse and giving him the whip. I had no spurs. ‘Could he be done up? If so, I am lost,’ I thought to myself. We had been going in a circle, and were now approaching the spot where my uncle was standing, when suddenly he made a noise like a calf in distress. The effect was electrical. The old cow stopped short and gazed round to see where the noise came from, when old Rough had time to get hold of her heels, and made her rush back to the mob which her son had long since regained. I rode up and thanked uncle for his well-timed interference, as I said the horse could not have held out much longer, and the furious beast would have almost certainly gored me to death.

‘Saved your life—rot!’ replied he. ‘Horse was no more knocked up than I am. No beast alive could catch Playboy. He was caught once half asleep. Look at that old scar along his ribs; that's a lesson he never forgets. He doesn't trouble much as long as he knows they can't reach him. Likes to play with them.’

So all my terrors were needless. In the moment of danger I had thought of the sweet sympathy I should obtain from my cousin if I escaped with life, but this anticipation proved also a fraud.

‘Ah, Frank,’ she exclaimed, with a ringing laugh, ‘so you had to turn tail to an old cow, had you? We saw you as we cantered down the range.’

‘Had to turn tail? why, what else could I do?’

‘Why, Charlie would have given her a crack or two with his whip and beaten her off. She's very easily frightened, for I see it's old Polly, one that I used to milk a few years ago, though certainly she has got pretty wild since that.’

Here was sweet sympathy with a vengeance, to be laughed at for running away from an old milking cow. However, I bore it as well as I could.

page 45
Charlie and Tim soon joined us with another mob they had found, and we started off for the stockyard with the lot. The scene was one of wild excitement. About one hundred head of cattle of various colours rushing madly about, wild as hares, for it must be remembered that, save at mustering time, they rarely set eyes on a human
Exit pursued by a cow

Chased By a Cow.

being. Many of the calves born in the bush had never been out in open country till that day; rival bulls were fiercely attacking one another; cows bellowing for lost calves; calves roaring for their mothers, whom they had missed in the crowd; horsemen—eh, and horsewomen, too, for the girls rendered valuable assistance—frantically page 46 galloping round them with snake-like stockwhips cracking like pistol shots, as they descended on the back of some extra unruly animal, leaving a streak of red as a warning to behave better in future; dogs barking and helping all they could. After one more most desperate struggle to get back to their dearly-loved bush had been defeated, and ground gained inch by inch by our united efforts, for their blood was now thoroughly up, and they were ready for anything, we had comparatively little trouble. A few of the oldest cows amongst the mob took the lead, well-knowing that the stockyard was to be their destination, and that we would stand no humbugging. Every now and then, however, two or three would break the ranks, especially cows with calves at foot, evidently ready to try one last desperate chance for freedom, only to be headed and brought back by whichever of us was nearest at hand at the time.

This job had not as yet fallen to my turn, but just as I was congratulating myself on only obtaining one spill, of which the others, fortunately, knew nothing, a shout from uncle arrested my thoughts, and called my attention to a beast which had just shot out of the mob. Playboy saw him as soon as I did, and was off in pursuit, going through the high fern with a succession of bounds to prevent its entangling his legs, a most difficult gait to sit. However, as they were all watching, I determined to stick to my pigskin at all hazards when the horse should ‘turn on a threepenny bit,’ the term employed to denote the movement of a good stock horse on heading a beast. I succeeded only very moderately, for I lost both my stirrups, and only saved a fall by vigorously embracing the animal's neck. ‘Would that it were Fanny's. What a different sensation it would cause,’ was my thought as I scrambled back into my saddle, only to be slung clean out of it by another sharp turn which the horse took to counteract a similar one on the part of the steer. I found the ground hard enough to irretrievably damage my new pants, to say nothing of my devoted self, and my uncle, galloping past in pursuit of the beast, added insult to injury by giving me a sounding crack with his stockwhip for being such a muff as to fall off.

‘I told you how it would be, you young fool, if you didn't hold well with your kness!’ was all the satisfaction I could get out of him for the ill-usage I had received.

After this mishap I managed to concentrate all my energies in going with my horse, as he seemed to know most about the business, and we soon had the cattle all safely yarded. Then those fit for the butcher were draughted out, and any calves which were judged old enough were taken from their mothers, branded with a hot iron, and put into the weaning paddock, the remainder of the mob being turned out again on the run.

At tea that evening my riding became the subject of conversation, and I must say of some very adverse and unkind criticism. I had, of course, to own to the last cropper, and also to having been frightened half out of my life by an old cow, which I did meekly, but as a savinng clause I affirmed that I had at least learnt to sit a buck-jumper.

‘No, Frank,’ said Miss Fanny, ‘you mustn't lay that flattering unction to your soul till you can ride Bucking Billy. Playboy's mild attempts were but childplay to his when his monkey's up, which it certainly would be when you mounted.’

They all seemed to see some stupid joke in this, and were highly a used, till Fanny explained that she meant nothing rude, only that page 47 he always showed temper when a stranger tried to ride him, although, as I had seen to-day, he went quietly enough with Tim, who, it appeared, owned him.

‘Billy certainly is the most inveterate buck-jumper. Never saw his equal when he begins,’ said uncle. ‘The day Charlie mounted him I saw directly it was a case. Bucked saddle and rider clean over his head without even smashing the girth.’

‘But I stuck to the saddle, dad. No man could do more.’

‘Yes, boy, you did, and I was proud of you. I hadn't to hide you as I did Frank to-day.’

‘Yes, uncle, you did, and not lightly either, and I thought it remarkably unkind of you.’

‘Couldn't stand seeing a nephew of mine chucked off by a horse spinning round.’

I went to bed that night considerably mortified by the various humiliations of the day. To be thrown twice, chased and mortally frightened by an old cow, stockwhipped, and, worse than all, well laughed at by my friends, including the lady on whom I had hoped to make an impression by my brilliant achievements—this was too trying. But I slept.

The next morning was the Sabbath, and I was not sorry, for to tell the truth I felt that the rest would be very pleasant to my limbs, which were stiffened by my falls and the severe exercise to which I had of late been little accustomed. Sunday is, I may say, a day well kept in those parts of the country where churches are accessible, and even where they are not a clergyman, should he visit a station, will get an attentive congregation, which will be none the less so because the woolshed or parlour may have to do duty for the sacred edifice of more civilized districts. Where neither clergymen or lay readers are heard among the back country stations, bushmen's huts, or prospectors' camps, Sunday is the general washing day. You see the roughly clad, bearded men washing and mending their clothes, and doing extra baking and cooking for the week to come, and such of their neighbours as are near enough visit them and exchange news. My uncle, although rough, and to a great extent unpolished, yet never let a Sunday pass without giving his hands a chance of hearing the word of God. If there was no service by a clergyman near enough for them to attend, he would himself hold a short but impressive one in the parlour, so that although I missed the chimes of the old country Sabbath bells, yet there was no need of missing divine worship.

The next week or so we continued the mustering. We were generally not nearly so successful as on the first day. Sometimes, indeed, we returned without a single head after a hard day's hunt.

The young ladies only occasionally accompanied us. I several times tried to make excuses to stay at home with them, but uncle would not hear of it.

‘Work while you're young, boy,’ he said. ‘You're beginning to learn to ride now; it would be a pity to miss a lesson.’

I was rather huffed at the idea that I was only just beginning to learn to ride, yet it must be confessed that from one reason or another I certainly rarely missed a day without having a spill for the first week. The style of riding was so totally different to that to which I had been accustomed.