Page:Aurora Australis.djvu/99

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A PONY WATCH.

AFTER watching the man painting the lamp post with a brush fixed on a breast drill, for some time in silence, I say to the boy with green hair, ‘I believe I could do it better myself.’ The brush catches me a blow in the ribs, and the man rushes at me with a chopper in one hand and a hammer in the other, when realising that I can fly I take huge leaps without any effort, a most delightful sensation.

To my horror I find that though the leaps are high yet they do not carry me far; and on the fourth or fifth the man is waiting for me with the hammer. I give myself up for lost, and come down receiving a fearful blow on the head. A voice says, “Come on, this is your pony watch and it has gone two.”

By the dim light of the oil lamp, I see standing by the side of my bunk, a figure clothed in oilskins streaming water. Joyce is sitting on his bunk growling out in a voice hoarse with sleep, “Now then