第7章 A Vision of Sandy Blight(2)

They'd fill all the boxes, and then build in between and under the bark, and board, and tin covers. They never seemed to get the idea out of their heads that this wasn't an evergreen country, and it wasn't going to snow all winter. My younger brother Joe used to put pieces of meat on the tables near the boxes, and in front of the holes where the bees went in and out, for the dogs to grab at. But one old dog, `Black Bill', was a match for him; if it was worth Bill's while, he'd camp there, and keep Joe and the other dogs from touching the meat -- once it was put down -- till the bees turned in for the night. And Joe would get the other kids round there, and when they weren't looking or thinking, he'd brush the bees with a stick and run.

I'd lam him when I caught him at it. He was an awful young devil, was Joe, and he grew up steady, and respectable, and respected -- and I went to the bad. I never trust a good boy now. . . . Ah, well!

"I remember the first swarm we got. We'd been talking of getting a few swarms for a long time. That was what was the matter with us English and Irish and English-Irish Australian farmers: we used to talk so much about doing things while the Germans and Scotch did them. And we even talked in a lazy, easy-going sort of way.

"Well, one blazing hot day I saw father coming along the road, home to dinner (we had it in the middle of the day), with his axe over his shoulder.

I noticed the axe particularly because father was bringing it home to grind, and Joe and I had to turn the stone; but, when I noticed Joe dragging along home in the dust about fifty yards behind father, I felt easier in my mind. Suddenly father dropped the axe and started to run back along the road towards Joe, who, as soon as he saw father coming, shied for the fence and got through. He thought he was going to catch it for something he'd done -- or hadn't done. Joe used to do so many things and leave so many things not done that he could never be sure of father.

Besides, father had a way of starting to hammer us unexpectedly -- when the idea struck him. But father pulled himself up in about thirty yards and started to grab up handfuls of dust and sand and throw them into the air.

My idea, in the first flash, was to get hold of the axe, for I thought it was sun-stroke, and father might take it into his head to start chopping up the family before I could persuade him to put it (his head, I mean) in a bucket of water. But Joe came running like mad, yelling:

"`Swarmer -- bees! Swawmmer -- bee--ee--es! Bring -- a -- tin -- dish -- and -- a -- dippera -- wa-a-ter!'

"I ran with a bucket of water and an old frying-pan, and pretty soon the rest of the family were on the spot, throwing dust and water, and banging everything, tin or iron, they could get hold of.

The only bullock bell in the district (if it was in the district) was on the old poley cow, and she'd been lost for a fortnight.

Mother brought up the rear -- but soon worked to the front -- with a baking-dish and a big spoon. The old lady -- she wasn't old then -- had a deep-rooted prejudice that she could do everything better than anybody else, and that the selection and all on it would go to the dogs if she wasn't there to look after it.

There was no jolting that idea out of her. She not only believed that she could do anything better than anybody, and hers was the only right or possible way, and that we'd do everything upside down if she wasn't there to do it or show us how -- but she'd try to do things herself or insist on making us do them her way, and that led to messes and rows. She was excited now, and took command at once. She wasn't tongue-tied, and had no impediment in her speech.

"`Don't throw up dust! -- Stop throwing up dust! -- Do you want to smother 'em? -- Don't throw up so much water! -- Only throw up a pannikin at a time! -- D'yer want to drown 'em?

Bang! Keep on banging, Joe! -- Look at that child! Run, someone! -- run! you, Jack! -- D'yer want the child to be stung to death? -- Take her inside! . . . Dy' hear me? . . . Stop throwing up dust, Tom!

(To father.) You're scaring 'em away! Can't you see they want to settle?'

[Father was getting mad and yelping: `For Godsake shettup and go inside.']

`Throw up water, Jack! Throw up -- Tom! Take that bucket from him and don't make such a fool of yourself before the children!

Throw up water! Throw -- keep on banging, children! Keep on banging!'

[Mother put her faith in banging.] `There! -- they're off! You've lost 'em!

I knew you would! I told yer -- keep on bang--!'

"A bee struck her in the eye, and she grabbed at it!

"Mother went home -- and inside.

"Father was good at bees -- could manage them like sheep when he got to know their ideas. When the swarm settled, he sent us for the old washing stool, boxes, bags, and so on; and the whole time he was fixing the bees I noticed that whenever his back was turned to us his shoulders would jerk up as if he was cold, and he seemed to shudder from inside, and now and then I'd hear a grunting sort of whimper like a boy that was just starting to blubber. But father wasn't weeping, and bees weren't stinging him; it was the bee that stung mother that was tickling father. When he went into the house, mother's other eye had bunged for sympathy. Father was always gentle and kind in sickness, and he bathed mother's eyes and rubbed mud on, but every now and then he'd catch inside, and jerk and shudder, and grunt and cough. Mother got wild, but presently the humour of it struck her, and she had to laugh, and a rum laugh it was, with both eyes bunged up. Then she got hysterical, and started to cry, and father put his arm round her shoulder and ordered us out of the house.

"They were very fond of each other, the old people were, under it all -- right up to the end. . . . Ah, well!"

Mitchell pulled the swags out of a bunk, and started to fasten the nose-bags on.