while utilised his colonial experience to some purpose, as the sequel will show.
Possibly a strict provincial life at Lyne became monotonous after the "boilers" had realised some 30s. per head. The Ballarat diggers would have eaten them gaily at £7 or £8 each a year or two after, but we did not forecast that and a few other unimportant changes. After the calves were branded, after the German shepherd had with paternal care cured the Silesians of foot-rot—(how different from the demeanour of Australian Corydon purring at his foul pipe, and double-blanking the sheep, with everybody connected with the place, from the ration-carrier upwards, as he pares the offending hoof)—after these, and divers other engrossing duties, had helped to hurry along the stream of Time, the captain delegated such and the like, permanently, to Mr. J. R. Nowlan, a gentleman who dwelt hard by, constituting him his managing partner. He then betook himself with his Prince back to Europe, via Panama, a route then coming into fashion with Australian home-returning voyagers. The travellers—including, I think, Messrs. Lang and Winter—had nearly completed their foreign tour in an abrupt and melancholy fashion. While crossing the Chagres river (I will not certify as to the name, but, if doubtful on the point, communicate with Baron Lesseps, Captain Mayne Reid, and Mr. Frederick Boyle) their light bark sprang a leak. They were partly canoe-wrecked, and left by their boatman upon a sandbank in the mid-stream of a big, rapid river, swarming with alligators. The river was rising, which tended to limit their period of security. In this strait, a small
