Hornung Ernest William - A Bride from the Bush стр 13.

No doubt you order these things better in Australia; eh?

What things? asked the Bride, with some eagerness; for of Australia she had been thinking, but not of Mr Travers or his election.

Why, said the Member, with dignity, your elections. I was speaking of the difficulty of getting some of the lower orders to the poll; you have almost to drive them there. What I say is, that very probably,

in Australia, you manage these things on a superior system.

We do, said the Bride laconically.

The new Member looked astonished; he had expected a more modest answer.

Indeed! he said stiffly, and addressed himself to his tea-cup.

For, explained the Bride, exhibiting dangerous symptoms, we do drive em to the poll out there, and make no bones about it either!

Indeed? said Mr Travers again; but this time there was some curiosity in his tone. This is interesting. I always thought Australia was such a superlatively free country!

The Bride scented a sarcasm.

So it is, she cried warmly, beginning to speak at a perilous pace, and with her worst twang; my word it is! But you dont understand me. Its like this: we do drive em to the poll, up the Bush; Ive driven em lots o times myself. Theyre camped out the voters, like all over the runs, for all the hands have a vote; and to get em to the police-barracks (the poll, dye see?) on election day, each squatters got to muster his own men and drive em in. I used to take one trap with four horses, and father another. Gracious, what a bit of fun it was! But the difficulty was

She hesitated, for Lady Bligh was staring at her; and, though her ladyships face was in shadow, the Bride was disturbed, for a moment, by the rigid pose of the old ladys head. A queer expression was come over the face of the new Member, moreover; but this Gladys could not see, for he was a tall man, standing, while she was seated.

What was the difficulty? asked Granville from a corner, in an encouraging tone.

Gladys instantly forgot Lady Bligh. To keep em from going to the shanty first , she answered, with a merry laugh.

The shanty? repeated Mr Travers, with a vague idea of sailors songs.

The pub., then. Of course they all went afterwards, and but we were obliged to keep them sober till theyd voted; and thats where the difficulty came in.

The assembly shuddered; but, before new ground could be broken, Mr Travers, for the first time interested in somebody elses electioneering experiences, said inquiringly:

These squatters I presume, represent the landed interest; my party, in fact?

Oh, I dont know nothing about that, replied the Bride.

At this juncture Alfred announced, in an uncommonly loud and aggressive tone, that what do you think? the glass was going down!

Is it? cried Sir James, with a lively concern quite foreign to his habit. Dear, dear! And Mr Travers just now assured me that the weather was quite settled. I fear that this will disappoint er Mr Travers!

But it failed even to attract that gentlemans attention; and Granville, in the background, chuckled satanically over the ingenuousness of the device. Mr Travers, in fact, was sufficiently interested elsewhere. Yet, of course, he was saying, there are two parties?

My word, there are! returned the Bride.

And do you call them Whig and Tory?

I dont think it doubtfully.

Conservative and Liberal, perhaps?

Not that I know of.

Yet you say you have two parties

Of course we have, same as you, broke in the Bride, who would brook anything rather than the implied inferiority of Australia in the most trivial respect. But all ever I heard em called was the squatters candidate and the selectors man !

And your men, I suppose, voted for the squatters candidate?

I should rather hope so! said Mrs Alfred, with severe emphasis. Even Daft Larry whos both deaf and mad had sense enough to give us his vote!

Mr Travers, though astonished at her tone, said nothing at the moment; but Granville asked from his corner:

What if they didnt, Gladys?

The Bride was seized with a sudden fit of uncontrollable mirth. Some reminiscence evidently tickled her.

There was one man that we knew of that voted wrong, she said, and he got it pretty hot, I can tell you!

Advanced Australia! murmured Granville.

I am sorry to hear that, Mrs Bligh, said Mr Travers (who had ceased to deal with those local tradesmen, at his place in the Midlands, who were suspected of having voted wrong the previous week). I am sorry indeed to hear that. May I ask who punished him?

Certainly I did.

It was a startling reply. The Judge quietly quitted the room. Alfred, with his back to every one, surveyed his red face in the mantel-mirror, and ground his teeth; only Lady Bligh sat stoically still.

He came back

to the trap very drunk blind, speechless, paralytic, the Bride explained rapidly, and owned up what hed done as bold as brass. So I let him have it with the whip, pretty sudden, I can tell you. It was chiefly for his drunken insolence but not altogether, said Gladys, candidly.

Mr Travers had been glad to pick up a thing or two concerning Australian politics, but he seemed now to consider himself sufficiently enlightened.