The smoke issued from the chimney of the hut occupied by Big Mat.  He was away looking after his cattle, but his wife Norah was inside, busy with her household duties, while the baby was asleep in the corner.  There was a small garden planted with vegetables in front of the hut, and Norah, happening to look out of the window during the afternoon, saw a strange man pulling off the pea pods and devouring them.  The strange man was Mr. Tyers.  Some other men were also coming near.

“They are bushrangers,” she said running to the door and bolting it, “and they’ll rob the hut and maybe they’ll murder me and the baby.”

That last thought made her fierce.  She seized an old Tower musket, which was always kept loaded ready for use, and watched the men through the window.  They came into the garden one after another, and at once began snatching the peas and eating them.  There was something fearfully wild and strange in the demeanour of the men, but Norah observed that they appeared to have no firearms and very little clothing.  They never spoke, and seemed to take no notice of anything but the peas.

“The Lord preserve us,” said Norah, “I wish Mat would come.”

Her prayer was heard, for Mat came riding up to the garden fence with two cattle dogs, which began barking at the strangers.  Mat said: 

“Hello, you coves, is it robbing my garden ye are?”

Mr. Tyers looked towards Mat and spoke, but his voice was weak, his mouth full of peas, and Mat could not tell what he was saying.  He dismounted, hung the bridle on to a post, and came into the garden.  He looked at the men, and soon guessed what was the matter with them; he had often seen their complaint in Ireland.

“Poor craythurs,” he said, “it’s hungry ye are, and hunger’s a killing disorder.  Stop ating they pays to wonst, or they’ll kill ye, and come into the house, and we’ll give ye something better.”

The men muttered, but kept snatching off the peas.  Norah had unbolted the door, and was standing with the musket in her hand.

“Take away the gun, Norah, and put the big billy on the fire, and we’ll give ’em something warm.  The craythurs are starving.  I suppose they are runaway prisoners, and small blame to ’em for that same, but we can’t let ’em die of hunger.”

The strangers had become quite idiotic, and wou’d not leave the peas, until Mat lost all patience, bundled them one by one by main force into his hut, and shut the door.

He had taken the pledge from Father Mathew before he left Ireland, and had kept it faithfully; but he was not strait-laced.  He had a gallon of rum in the hut, to be used in case of snake-bite and in other emergencies, and he now gave each man a little rum and water, and a small piece of damper.

Rum was a curse to the convicts, immigrants, and natives.  Its average price was then about 4s. 3d. per gallon.  The daily ration of a soldier consisted of one pound of bread, one pound of fresh meat, and one-seventh of a quart of rum.  But on this day, to Mr. Tyers and his men, the liquor was a perfect blessing.  He was sitting on the floor with his back to the slabs.