will not serve less than a man. And, one and altogether, they will choose a beating in fair ding-dong fight before the easy handling a weak soul may give.
Tod blinked round the clearing where a full hundred men from the ends of earth struck the great bass chord of virulent life above the tender treble of the wind passing in the tree-tops.
“Wid the four of us—takin’ come-an-go-agin—I think we can manage to howld up to the week-indin’,” he said.
From Purdey’s Camp a twelve-mile tram-line ran up to the terminus. The rails were of wood, and warped by the frost. They were hog-backed over the creeks and gullies, and sinfully greasy in rain. But there, and in the clashing mills, Purdey’s men made few mistakes. For Purdey had the knack of rousing their pride, and pride carries weight with all men who are worthy the name.
Steve roused next morning to the scream of the mill-engines, and the snarl of waking saws. He fought in the man-choked rough-slabbed hut for sea-pie and mutton through the blank chill that goes before dawn, and took the first jigger that sat on the line while the sunrise was drowsy and faint on the tree-tops. For already the bush was calling with the witchery of shaken sunbeams on the laughing brown-eyed cheeks, and the trembling sweet
