The statement lasts
some ten minutes. Mr Isaacs listens patiently and politely and
remarks:
"Fourteen days."
Charley saw the humour of it afterwards, he says.
But what good does it all do?
I had no wish to treat drunkenness frivolously in beginning this
sketch; I have seen women in the horrors--that ought to be enough.
"ROLL UP AT TALBRAGAR"
Jack Denver died at Talbragar when Christmas Eve began,
And there was sorrow round the place, for Denver was a man;
Jack Denver's wife bowed down her head--her daughter's grief was wild,
And big Ben Duggan by the bed stood sobbing like a child.
But big Ben Duggan saddled up, and galloped fast and far,
To raise the longest funeral ever seen on Talbragar.
-_Ben Duggan_.
Both funerals belonged to Big Ben Duggan in a way, though Jack Denver
was indirectly the cause of both.
Jack Denver was reckoned the most popular man in the district (outside
the principal township)--a white man and a straight man--a white boss
and a straight sportsman. He was a squatter, though a small one; a
real squatter who lived on his run and worked with his men--no dummy,
super, manager for a bank, or swollen cockatoo about Jack Denver. He
was on the committees at agricultural shows and sports, great at
picnics and dances, beloved by school children at school feasts (I
wonder if they call them feasts still), giver of extra or special
prizes, mostly sovs.
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