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Every scrap of loose timber on the ground would be picked up and added to the flames. Some stumps were very obstinate and resisted all blandishments to burn; but careful handling generally ensured the fate of the majority. There are few sights more weird, or more typically Australian, than a paddock at night with burning-off in process.
Her father was poking round some logs where they had been "burning-off". A pungent odour came through a broken pane and turned her sick. He was burning the hide. Wylie did not go to bed that night; he got his breakfast before daylight, and rode up through the frosty gap while the stars were still out, carrying a bag of beef in front of him on the grey horse.
He had been sent to 'burn off' some old paint of the woodwork of a window. He was not very skilful in the use of the burning-off lamp, because on the firm when he had been working in London it was a job that the ordinary hands were seldom or never called upon to do. There were one or two men who did it all. For that matter, not many of Rushton's men were very skilful at it either.
Wall didn't mind this fire much; most of his sheep were on their way out back, to a back run where there was young grass; and the dry ridges along the creek would be better for a burning-off only he had to watch his fences. But, about dusk, Mary came galloping home in her usual breakneck fashion. "Father," she cried, "turn out the men and send them at once.
Summer was very late that year, and "burning-off" operations on the rougher parts of the run had been carried on much longer than was generally possible. Norah always regarded "burning-off" as an immense picnic, and used to beg her father to take her out. Night after night found them down on the flats, getting rid of old dead trees, which up to the present had refused obstinately to burn.
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