"It"s a something shame the way things is carried on! Now, look here, a banker can rob hundreds of wimmin and children an" widders and orfuns, and nothin" is done to him; but if a poor man only embezzles a shilling _he gets transported to the colonies for life_." The italics are ours, but the words were his.
We explained to this new chum that transportation was done away with long ago, as far as Australia was concerned, that no more convicts were sent out here--only men who ought to be; and he seemed surprised. He did not call us a liar, but he looked as if he thought that we were prevaricating. We were glad that he didn"t say so, for he was a bigger man. New chums are generally more robust than Australians.
When we got through the Heads someone pointed to the wrong part of the cliff and said:
"That"s where the _Dunbar_ was wrecked."
Shortly afterwards another man pointed to another wrong part of the cliffs and observed incidentally:
"That"s where the _Dunbar_ was wrecked."
Pretty soon a third man came along and pointed to a third wrong part of the cliff, and remarked casually:
"That"s where the _Dunbar_ was wrecked."
We moved aft and met the fourth mate, who jerked his thumb over his shoulder at the cliffs in general, and muttered condescendingly:
"That"s where the _Dunbar_ was wrecked."
It was not long before a woman turned round and asked "Was that the place where the Dunbar was wrecked, please?"
We said "Yes," and she said "Lor," and beckoned to a friend.
We went for"ard and met an old sailor, who glared at us, jerked his thumb at the coast and growled:
"That"s where the _Dunbar_ went down."
Then we went below; but we felt a slight relief when he said "went down"
instead of "was wrecked."
It is doubtful whether a pa.s.senger boat ever cleared Sydney Heads since the wild night of that famous wreck without someone pointing to the wrong part of the cliffs, and remarking:
"That"s where the _Dunbar_ was wrecked."
The _Dunbar_ fiend is inseparable from Australian coasting steamers.
We travelled second-cla.s.s in the interests of journalism. You get more points for copy in the steerage. It was a sacrifice; but we hope to profit by it some day.
There were about fifty male pa.s.sengers, including half a dozen New Zealand shearers, two of whom came on board drunk--their remarks for the first night mainly consisted of "gory." "Gory" is part of the Australian language now--a big part.
The others were chiefly tradesmen, labourers, clerks and bagmen, driven out of Australia by the hard times there, and glad, no doubt, to get away. There was a jeweller on board, of course, and his name was Moses or Cohen. If it wasn"t it should have been--or Isaacs. His christian name was probably Benjamin. We called him Jacobs. He pa.s.sed away most of his time on board in swopping watch lies with the other pa.s.sengers and good-naturedly spoiling their Waterburys.
One commercial traveller shipped with a flower in his b.u.t.tonhole. His girl gave it to him on the wharf, and told him to keep it till it faded, and then press it. She was a barmaid. She thought he was "going saloon,"
but he came forward as soon as the wharf was out of sight. He gave the flower to the stewardess, and told us about these things one moonlight night during the voyage.
There was another--a well-known Sydney man--whose friends thought he was going saloon, and turned up in good force to see him off. He spent his last shilling "shouting," and kept up his end of the pathetic little farce out of consideration for the feelings of certain proud female relatives, and not because he was "proud"--at least in that way. He stood on a conspicuous part of the saloon deck and waved his white handkerchief until Miller"s Point came between. Then he came forward where he belonged. But he was proud--bitterly so. He had a flower too, but he did not give it to the stewardess. He had it pressed, we think (for we knew him), and perhaps he wears it now over the place where his heart used to be.
When Australia was fading from view we shed a tear, which was all we had to shed; at least, we tried to shed a tear, and could not. It is best to be exact when you are writing from experience.
Just as Australia was fading from view, someone looked through a gla.s.s, and said in a sad, tired kind of voice that he could just see the place where the _Dunbar_ was wrecked.
Several pa.s.sengers were leaning about and saying "Europe! E-u-rope!"
in agonized tones. None of them were going to Europe, and the new chums said nothing about it. This reminds us that some people say "Asia! Asia!
Ak-kak-Asia!" when somebody spills the pepper. There was a pepper-box without a stopper on the table in our cabin. The fact soon attracted attention.
A new chum came along and asked us whether the Maoris were very bad round Sydney. He"d heard that they were. We told him that we had never had any trouble with them to speak of, and gave him another show.
"Did you ever hear of the wreck of the _Dunbar_?" we asked. He said that he never "heerd tell" of it, but he had heerd of the wreck of the _Victoria_.
We gave him best.
The first evening pa.s.sed off quietly, except for the vinously-excited shearers. They had sworn eternal friendship with a convivial dude from the saloon, and he made a fine specimen fool of himself for an hour or so. He never showed his nose for"ard again.
Now and then a pa.s.senger would solemnly seek the steward and have a beer. The steward drew it out of a small keg which lay on its side on a shelf with a wooden tap sticking out of the end of it--out of the end of the keg, we mean. The beer tasted like warm but weak vinegar, and cost sixpence per small gla.s.s. The bagman told the steward that he could not compliment him on the quality of his liquor, but the steward said nothing. He did not even seem interested--only bored. He had heard the same remark often before, no doubt. He was a fat, solemn steward--not formal, but very reticent--unresponsive. He looked like a man who had conducted a religious conservative paper once and failed, and had then gone into the wholesale produce line, and failed again, and finally got his present billet through the influence of his creditors and two clergymen. He might have been a sociable fellow, a man about town, even a gay young dog, and a radical writer before he was driven to accept the editorship of the aforesaid periodical. He probably came of a "good English family." He was now, very likely, either a rigid Presbyterian or an extreme freethinker. He thought a lot, anyway, and looked as if he knew a lot too--too much for words, in fact.
We took a turn on deck before turning in, and heard two men arguing about the way in which the _Dunbar_ was wrecked.
The commercial travellers, the jeweller, and one or two new chums who were well provided with clothing undressed deliberately and retired ostentatiously in pyjamas, but there were others--men of better days--who turned in either very early or very late, when the cabin was quiet, and slipped hurriedly and furtively out of their clothes and between the blankets, as if they were ashamed of the poverty of their underwear. It is well that the Lord can see deep down into the hearts of men, for He has to judge them; it is well that the majority of mankind cannot, because, if they could, the world would be altogether too sorrowful to live in; and we do not think the angels can either, else they would not be happy--if they could and were they would not be angels any longer--they would be devils. Study it out on a slate.
We turned in feeling comfortably dismal, and almost wishing that we had gone down with the _Dunbar_.
The intoxicated shearers and the dude kept their concert up till a late hour that night--or, rather, a very early hour next morning; and at about midnight they were reinforced by the commercial traveller and Moses, the jeweller, who had been visiting acquaintances aft. This push was encouraged by voices from various bunks, and enthusiastically barracked for by a sandy-complexioned, red-headed comedian with twinkling grey eyes, who occupied the berth immediately above our own.
They stood with their backs to the bunks, and their feet braced against the deck, or lurched round, and took friendly pulls from whisky flasks, and chyacked each other, and laughed, and blowed, and lied like--like Australian bushmen; and occasionally they broke out into s.n.a.t.c.hes of song--and as often broke down. Few Englishmen know more than the first verse, or two lines, of even their most popular song, and, where elevated enough to think they can sing, they repeat the first verse over and over again, with the wrong words, and with a sort of "Ta-ra-ra-rum-ti-tooral, ta-ra-ra-ra-ra-rum-ti, ta-ra-ra-rum-tum-ti-rum-rum-tum-ti-dee-e-e," by way of variation.
Presently--suddenly, it seemed to our drowsy senses--two of the shearers and the bagman commenced arguing with drunken gravity and precision about politics, even while a third bushman was approaching the climax of an out-back yarn of many adjectives, of which he himself was the hero.
The sc.r.a.ps of conversation that we caught were somewhat as follow. We leave out most of the adjectives.
First Voice: "Now, look here. The women will vote for men, not principles. That"s why I"m against women voting. Now, just mark my---"
Third Voice (trying to finish yarn): "Hold on. Just wait till I tell yer. Well, this bloomin" bloke, he says---"
Second Voice (evidently in reply to first): "Principles you mean, not men. You"re getting a bit mixed, old man." (Smothered chuckle from comedian over our head.)
Third Voice (seeming to drift round in search of sympathy): ""You will!"
sez I. "Yes, I will," he sez. "Oh, you will, will yer?" I sez; and with that I---"
Second Voice (apparently wandering from both subjects) "Blanker has always stuck up for the workin" man, an" he"ll get in, you"ll see. Why, he"s a bloomin" workin" man himself. Me and Blanker---"
Disgusted voice from a bunk: "Oh, that"s d.a.m.n rot! We"ve had enough of lumpers in parliament! h.o.r.n.y hands are all right enough, but we don"t want any more blanky h.o.r.n.y heads!"
Third Voice (threateningly): "Who"s talkin" about "orny heads? That pitch is meant for us, ain"t it? Do you mean to say that I"ve got a "orny head?"
Here two men commenced snarling at each other, and there was some talk of punching the causes of the dispute; but the bagman interfered, a fresh flask was pa.s.sed round, and some more eternal friendship sworn to.
We dozed off again, and the next time we were aware of anything the commercial and Moses had disappeared, the rest were lying or sitting in their bunks, and the third shearer was telling a yarn about an alleged fight he had at a shed up-country; and perhaps he was telling it for the benefit of the dissatisfied individual who made the injudicious remark concerning h.o.r.n.y heads.
"So I said to the boss-over-the-board, "you"re a nice sort of a thing,"