"Passing the time of day with Jack," Dan called the scrimmage; as we left
the field of battle and looking back we found that already the Bromli
kites were closing in and sinking and settling earthwards towards the
crows who were impatiently waiting our departure--waiting to convert the
erst raging scrub bulls into white, bleaching bones.
Travelling quicker than the cattle, we were camped and at dinner at
"Abraham's"--another lily-strewn billabong--when the mob came in, the
thirsty brutes travelling with down-drooping heads and lowing deeply and
incessantly. Their direction showing that they would pass within a few
yards of our camp fire, on their way to the water, as a matter of course
I stood up, and Dan, with a chuckle, assured me that they had "something
else more important on than chivying the missus."
But the recollection of that raging mob was too vividly in mind, and the
cattle beginning to trot at the sight of the water, decided against them,
and the next moment I was three feet from the ground, among the
low-spreading branches of a giant Paper-bark.
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