The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-06-12
THE CATTLE DUFFER-

\
 The cattle duffer belongs to a now lfast-dwindling class. Happily so!
 In bygone days, when settlement was
 scanty, the country for the most part
 wild and untenanted, and when big
 squatters were the only pioneers of the vast interior pastoral regions. he | f1ourished exceedingly, and drove his | gay but nefarious trade with fine | dash and recklessness and con- | temptuous disregard of the police His ! number was then to be reckoned by the | hundred.
 His methods were as follows: He built himself hut in the heart of some | great forest, situated within measur- | able distance of two or more big cattle stations. Near the hut he constructed an enclosure--a paddock surrounded with log-leg fence Ga dog-leg fence is made by heaping the trunks of sap- ling trees about forked stakes driven into the ground) These paddlocks always embraced a stream of running
 water, and were often many acres in
 extent.
 Having so provided himself, he de- seconded on horseback at night upon the
 squatting runs. armed with stock
 whip and re vover and what cattle he
 could find he drove off to his fastness.
 When his stolen herd had accumulated
 to sufficiently brave proportions, assist
 ed by his servants and fellow-robbers.
 he proceeded to altar their brands
 Roping and throwing the cattle one by
 one, first the old brand was obliterated
 by applying a red-hot, broad, flat
 searing-iron to the spot, and then, after
 allowing time for the wounds to heal,
 his own brand was imprinted on the scar, So treated, the proper owners of the animals could never identify them. The cattle duffer therupon drove his prey to the nearest market and sold them at auction, often to the very men whom he had robbed.
 Sometimes he was caught red-hand- ed by his enemies the squatters, and was convicted and imprsoned: some times he was shot and perished miser- ably in the bush, the story of his end known only to the man who slew him, who wisely kept the secret to himself; but more often he escaped scotfree, made much money. retired from his lawless calling, and developed into squatter on his own account. Many great colonial fortunes have been so founded.
 It is an open secret that the late mil- James Tyson. Australia's rich- { est pastoralist, commenced life as a { cattle duffer. I knew one once inti- < mately myself, who died recently worth several hundred thousand pounds. He was clerk of petty sessions in town of the New England plains, a respect able Government servant-but only in the daytime: after dark he was a prince of cattle duffers, employing over twenty rascals at whose head he led many wild midnight raid in that rich squatting district.
 For almost twenty years he carried cn this double life, his villainy un- by the many, known only to 2 few, whose silence he purchased with his tainted gold He was appointed a justice of the peace, and in all the odors of sanctity. It may interest to learn that he was a Scot, Hielander, whose ancestors were famous covenanting chiefs who gave much trouble to Lowland farmers n their day. I have seen in his study ! rusted old broadsword. which he de dared had, in the hand of an ancient ,randsire, cut off lock of C1aver- louses wig. "A braw swipe," the old 'coundrel used to say, Out hardly can- 0rumclog would never have been ocht "-Australian Correspondence london Mail.