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But the rabbits seemed to have increased a thousand-fold. In despair, rabbit commissioners were appointed in each colony to enforce the building of high rabbit-proof wire fences, and now thousands of miles of wire fences have been built so as to enclose ranges and farms.
The Wolves and the Tasmanian Devils killed a number of his sheep; and it was stated among the neighbours that if Jacob Hall had lived he would eventually have imported Bengal tigers and African lions before trying the commonplace virtues of rabbit-proof fencing.
The town is right on the Queensland border, and an interprovincial rabbit-proof fence with rabbits on both sides of it runs across the main street. This fence is a standing joke with Australian rabbits about the only joke they have out there, except the memory of Pasteur and poison and inoculation.
There had been long years of drought and loss, and then came the rabbit pest the rabbits swarmed like flies over his run, and cropped the ground bare where even the poor grass might have saved thousands of sheep and the rabbits cost the squatter hundreds of pounds in "rabbit-proof" fences, trappers' wages, etc., just to keep them down. Then came arrangements with the bank.
As I descended the gravelly slope, my path led through the ferns into a tunnel of vines, to a rail over the water, and on up to the woods. By the middle of June the tangle, except by the half-broken path, was almost rabbit-proof. The rank ferns waved to my chin, and were so thick that they left little trace of my passing until late in the summer.
And so, for two years, they lived on at Castle Lashcairn; for long days sometimes Louis went off to Cook's Wall, and she despaired. Most of the time she hoped blindly. Much of the time they were incredibly happy in small things. Some slight measure of prosperity came to Loose End. The uncle who used to send the gramophone records retired from business and, buying himself an annuity, divided his money between his few relatives so that he could see what they did with it before he died. Quite a respectable flock of sheep came to take the place of those drowned in the flood and burnt in the fire; a horse and buggy went to and fro between Loose End and the station; Scottie the collie got busy and two shepherds came, building another hut at the other side of the run. A plague of rabbits showed Mr. Twist the folly of putting off the construction of rabbit-proof fencing any longer, now that he could afford it, and the gorse was once more left uncleared for months in the pressure of new things. Neighbours came, too the deposit of manganese at Cook's Wall was found cropping up on the extreme borders of Gaynor's run, and a tiny mining township called Klondyke settled itself round the excavations five miles from the Homestead. Marcella made friends with everyone, to Louis's amazement. To him friendliness was only possible when whisky had taken away his self-consciousness; the parties of miscellaneous folks who turned up on Sundays, bringing their own food, as is the way in the Bush where the nearest store is often fifty miles away, worried him at first. He stammered and was awkward and ungracious with them, but Marcella, dimly realizing that it must be bad for him to be drawn in so much upon their égoïsme
They built a bark hut, fenced in a garden with a rabbit-proof fence, and planted it with potatoes. Their base of supplies for groceries was at the Old Port. They were monarchs of all they surveyed, From the centre all round to the sea. They paid no rent and no taxes. Sometimes they fished, or went to the seal islands and brought back seal skins.
There was an idea once of trying to spread a disease among the rabbits, so as to kill them off quickly, but that was abandoned. Now the method is to enclose the pasture-lands within wire-netting, which is rabbit-proof, and within this enclosure to destroy all logs and the like which provide shelters for the rabbits, to dig up all their burrows, and to hunt down the rabbit with dogs.
They walked round the rabbit-proof fences and came back in time to welcome a "surprise party" from Klondyke drawn by the magnetism of the "gentleman from England" who had won them the night before. Marcella thought several times of Dr. Angus and wished that he could have been there to see Kraill "getting off the rostrum" as he had done in Edinburgh.
But in the alfalfa fields was a chance, for it must be remembered that such fields were surrounded by the rabbit-proof wire in which but a single opening was known to the jack in question. Therefore, with huge delight, the dogs gave chase. Mr. Rabbit bolted back for his opening, his enemies fairly at his heels. Now comes the curious part of the episode.
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