’My profound objection to democracy as a principle arises from the fact that the levelling process destroys our perfect valets,’ he told Mrs. Macdougal.

‘Oh yes, it does, does it not?’ she answered brightly.  Possibly it was to provide for his deficiency in this respect that after a few days’ residence on Boobyalla Mr. Ryder was at no little expense and trouble to win the good graces of Yarra, the half-caste.  Yarra was a remarkably clever tracker, and uncommonly cute for his years; but within a fortnight the new comer had secured so powerful an influence over him that the boy had confided to one of the gins: 

‘That plurry pfeller good man him.  Mine die alonga that pfeller!’ meaning that he would cheer fully have given his life for Ryder, which was a great deal, coming from the child of an undemonstrative race.

Yarra had been ordered by Mrs. Macdougal to consider himself Mr. Ryder’s servant during the latter’s stay at Boobyalla, and as there was always a danger of a man of the Honourable Walter’s inexperience being bushed if he rode alone, Yarra followed him on many of his long rides into the ranges, and helped him to explore the gorges and secret recesses of the heavily-timbered hills; but as a rule Mrs. Macdougal accompanied the Englishman, and then Yarra’s services were not required.  On occasions Miss Lucy Woodrow made a third, riding a hardy little chestnut mare her mistress had placed at her disposal.

These parties were usually very merry, for Lucy had been transformed into quite a daring Bush-rider, and Mrs. Macdougal, accustomed to the use of many horses since her babyhood, could sit anything in reason with the ease with which she reclined in her invalid chair when her languishing mood was upon her; while Ryder, to repeat Monkey Mack’s compliment, rode ‘like a cattle thief.’

Ryder’s horsemanship and his interest in horses formed something like a bond of sympathy between him and his host, too.  Macdougal never walked a hundred yards from his own door; he rode every where, and rode hard always.  Mike Burton’s description of him was quite accurate in this respect.  He no sooner got across a good horse, or behind one, than he seemed to become possessed with a sort of frenzy of speed, and rode and drove like a madman.  He had killed many horses, and once a fine animal died under him, leaving him about fifty miles from home, with one pint in his water-bag and he was nearly dead himself when at length he succeeded in dragging his misshapen limbs to one of the huts on the run.  When Ryder first saw Mack on a galloping horse he was reminded of a goat-riding monkey he had seen at a fair in his youth, and had a convulsive disposition to laughter; but he learned to respect the horseman who pushed a spirited animal through timber at a speed that an ordinary rider rarely indulged in on an open road.