Page:Outlawandlawmak00praegoog.djvu/30

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18
OUTLAW AND LAWMAKER.

"I am determined that somehow or other I will see Baròlin," said Elsie, with the wilfulness of a spoilt child. "Perhaps you don't know why the scrub and the waterfall are called Baròlin?"

"Did King Tommy tell you?"

"King Tommy told me that the white-haired old man was once a great chief who lived in Mount Luya and was a mighty man of war, against whom none of the other chiefs could stand. He got so powerful that he offended the great spirit Yoolatanah, and Yoolatanah turned him into a rock and shut him up behind the waterfall, which was called after him Baròlin. The Blacks say that he sleeps, and only wakes when someone goes near the fall. Then he seizes them, and they are never seen or heard of again. So the Blacks will not go near Baròlin or enter the scrub even at bunya time."

"I thought it was the Bunyip," said Hallett laughing. "I know none of the Blacks will go near Baròlin. They always say 'Debil debil sit down there,' and as there are any amount of bunyas in the scrub and none to speak of anywhere else, this superstition must be a pretty powerful one."

At that moment an Alpine call sounded from the other side of the creek. Elsie got up. "That's Horace. Now we shall hear something more about Moonlight."

"Why are you so interested in Moonlight?" asked Hallett jealously.

"I have told you. Because he is a hero. Horace—Horace; have they caught Moonlight?"