I sang and cracked my stock-whip as I cantered along, quite forgetting to be reserved and proper.  Presently I came upon the sheep just setting out for their day’s tramp, with a black boy ahead of them, of whom I inquired which was the boss.  He pointed towards a man at the rear wearing a donkey-supper hat.  I made my way through the sheep in his direction, and asked if he were in charge of them.  On being answered in the affirmative, I informed him that I was Mr Bossier’s niece, and, as the men were otherwise engaged, I would see the sheep through.

“That’s all right, miss.  I will look out that you don’t have much trouble,” he replied, politely raising his hat, while a look of amusement played on his face.

He rode away, and shouted to his men to keep the flock strictly within bounds and make good travelling.

“Right you are, boss,” they answered; and returning to my side he told me his name was George Ledwood, and made some remarks about the great drought and so on, while we rode in the best places to keep out of the dust and in the shade.  I asked questions such as whence came the sheep? whither were they bound? and how long had they been on the road?  And having exhausted these orthodox remarks, we fell a-talking in dead earnest without the least restraint.  I listened with interest to stories of weeks and weeks spent beneath the sun and stars while crossing widths of saltbush country, mulga and myall scrubs, of encounters with blacks in Queensland, and was favoured with a graphic description of a big strike among the shearers when the narrator had been boss-of-the-board out beyond Bourke.  He spoke as though well educated, and a gentleman—­as drovers often are.  Why, then, was he on the road?  I put him down as a scapegrace, for he had all the winning pleasant manner of a ne’er-do-well.

At noon—­a nice, blazing, dusty noon—­we halted within a mile of Caddagat for lunch.  I could have easily ridden home for mine, but preferred to have it with the drovers for fun.  The men boiled the billy and made the tea, which we drank out of tin pots, with tinned fish and damper off tin plates as the completion of the menu, Mr Ledwood and I at a little distance from the men.  Tea boiled in a billy at a bush fire has a deliciously aromatic flavour, and I enjoyed my birthday lunch immensely.  Leaving the cook to collect the things and put them in the spring-cart, we continued on our way, lazily lolling on our horses and chewing gum-leaves as we went.

When the last of the sheep got off the Caddagat run it was nearing two o’clock.

Mr Ledwood and I shook hands at parting, each expressing a wish that we might meet again some day.

I turned and rode homewards.  I looked back and saw the drover gazing after me.  I waved my hand; he raised his hat and smiled, displaying his teeth, a gleam of white in his sun-browned face.  I kissed my hand to him; he bowed low; I whistled to my dog; he resumed his way behind the crawling sheep; I cantered home quickly and dismounted at the front gate at 2.30 p.m., a dusty, heated, tired girl.