safe hiding in days gone by. Whether they could not bear to surrender to the white man these cherished solitudes, or whether it was the short-sighted, childish anxiety to possess our goods and chattels, can hardly ever be told. Whatever the motive, it was sufficient, as on all sides at once came tales of wrong-doing and violence, of maimed and slaughtered stock, of homicide or murder.
Next day we saw the greater part of the cattle, but those particular ones that Old Tom had missed were not to be found anywhere. We were turning our horses' heads homewards when I noticed the eaglehawks circling around and above a circular clump of ti-tree scrub in a marsh. While we looked a crow flew straight up from the midst of the clump, and we heard the harsh cry of others. The same thought evidently was in all our minds, as we rode straight for the place, and forced our horses between the thick-growing, slender, feathery points. In the centre, amid the tall tussac grass, lay the yellow heifer with the white flank, stone dead. A spear-hole was visible beneath the back ribs. Exactly on the corresponding portion of the other side was another, proving that, strange as it may seem, a spear had been driven right through her body. After Old Tom had concluded his exclamations and imprecations, which were of a most comprehensive nature, we agreed that the campaign had been opened in earnest, and that we knew what we had to expect. "We'll find more to-morrow," said the old man. "Onest they'll begin like this, they'll never lave off till thim villains, Jupiter and Cocknose, is shot, anyway."
