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Updated: May 4, 2025
Like Dan, we saw little sense in "heaving rocks round," and went back to the camp and the business of packing up for the homestead. About next midday we rode into the homestead thoroughfare, where Cheon and Tiddle'ums welcomed us with enthusiasm, but Cheon's enthusiasm turned to indignation when he found we were only in for a day or two. "What's 'er matter?" he ejaculated.
With the breaking of her leg little Tiddle'ums had ended her bush days, but as she lost in bush craft she gained in excellency as a fence personifier. By three o'clock we struck water in the Punch Bowl a deep, volcanic hole, bottomless, the blacks say, but apparently fed beneath by the river; but long before then Dan's chuckle had died out, and soliloquies had ceased to amuse him.
The Maluka, knew this well, but before he could speak, Mac had seized a little half-grown dog the most persistent of all the leaping dogs by her tightly curled-up tail, and, setting her down at my feet, said: "And this is Tiddle'ums," adding, with another flourishing bow, "A present from a Brither Scot," while Tiddle'ums in no way resented the dignity.
For four days the Maluka argued with Chinese slimness before he felt satisfied that his cash was in safe keeping while the Wag and others did as they wished with our spare time. Then, four days later, again Cheon and Tiddle'ums were hailing us in welcome at the homestead.
Of course, Sool'em and Brown were with us, Little Tiddle'ums being in at the homestead on the sick list with a broken leg; and in addition to Sool'em and Brown an innumerable band of nigger dogs, Billy Muck being the adoring possessor of fourteen, including pups, which fanned out behind him as he moved hither and thither like the tail of a comet.
We were altogether at the Springs: Dan, the Dandy, the Quiet Stockman, ourselves, every horse-"boy" that could be mustered, a numerous staff of camp "boys" for the Dandy's work, and an almost complete complement of dogs, Little Tiddle'ums only being absent, detained at the homestead this time with the cares of a nursery.
Tiddle'ums having for some time given the whole of her heart to the Maluka, nestled closer to him and Dan gave an appreciative chuckle, and pulled Sool'em's ears. The conversation promised to suit him exactly. "Never got farther than the dog myself," he said. "Did I Sool'em, old girl?"
"You're right, Dan," he said, after a short silence, "when I come to think of it; I don't exactly see myself where the homelessness comes in. A bite and a sup and a faithful dog, and a guidwife by a glowing hearth, and what more is needed to make a home. Eh, Tiddle'ums?"
For hours we pitched near the restful green of the melon-beds, and as we pitched the Maluka ran fencing wires through two sides of the garden fence, while Tiddle'ums and Bett-Bett, hovering about him, adapted themselves to the new order of things, finding the line the goats had to stop at no longer imaginary.
So far Tiddle'ums had acted as fence, when we were in, at the homestead, scattering fowls, goats, and dairy cows in all directions if they dared come over a line she had drawn in her mind's eye. When Tiddle'ums was out-bush with us, Bett-Bett acted as fence. Johnny, generally repairing the homestead now, admired the garden and declared everything would be "A1 in no time."
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