which was likely to interfere with our march. I left the cattle to come on, and resolved to ride to Melbourne to find them or get others. I knew they were likely to "make" in that direction, about the Upper Plenty.
At Kinlochewe I encountered the late Mr. Dalmahoy Campbell. He condoled with me. How pleasant is a sympathetic manner from an older man to a youngster! I have never forgotten those who, in my youth, were kindly and tolerant. He gave me the advice of an experienced overlander, and promised to write to a friend in the neighbourhood to look out for the runaways.
At the next stage I encountered my old friend Fred Burchett, late of "The Gums," another Port Fairy man, luckily also bound that way with a herd of cows and calves—the latter given in—which he had purchased from Mr. Shelley, at Tumut. His cattle were just ahead, and he proposed that we should join forces at Keilor, and journey together the rest of the way. Nothing could be nicer. I forgot my griefs. "Lost horses," like "lost sheep," produce acute suffering while they last; but the agony abates, as Macaulay said. I spent the evening with him, and next day went on to Melbourne.
Poor dear Fred! The kindest, the best-tempered, the most humorous of men! How many a laugh we had together! It has always been a grief to me that he died before the advent of Bret Harte or Mark Twain! How he would have revelled in their inimitable touches, their daring drolleries, their purest pathos. A well-read man and a fair scholar,
