The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1906-04-06

AAOSAhA5y
bottom to upset there with crash.
Buster shook his shaggy head slow
ly. Then he pitched forward with a
grunt, making the pace unweariedly.
Tony's mouth grinned, though his eyes
were anxious. He knew that Buster
thought he was doing unlawful deeds
by trotting where the rule was a care
full walk
On the neg. siding the windward
bush fell away, and Tony saw some
thing that made him giddy. All the
country that spreads from Tregellan's
Gap far north to the Ironstone Noun
tains was under fire, deep in the ferny
gullies, livid in the sunlight on the
faces, blood-crimson where it ran
along the half-naked ranges. Fire!
The cruelest, grandest thing on earth;
bush fire in heavy timber. 1t was
glorious, and powerful, and terrible
beyond words.
Tony's face was white under the
healthy red that painted everything,
and the corner of his lip bled where
his teeth had met III it. He trotted
beside his team, sweating and breath
less, and with heartache of pity for
the frightened wild things that passed
him. And still the team slung heav-
lily forward, with the logged Buster
to force them.
The road and the volleys of smoke
filed earth and sky. A spark from
somewhere hit Tony's hand, and the
breath of flames fluttered in the leaves
close beside. Tony prayed only that
the fire might strike behind first. With
that goad to drive them the team
might get through. A honey suckle
ahead flushed, quivered, and broke in
to fame Tony felt the pull-back Of
the great body nearest, and his heart
thumped until it shook him.
"Buster!" he yelled, and swung up
the bar again.
team along by his impetus. The
honeysuckle linked hands with a tree
across the line, and dropped sparks
on them as they passed under. Tony
beat the sparks out. But others came;
fiercer, nearer; more often. Tony's
hands blistered; the heated chains
scared the flesh as the bullocks sway
ed and staggered; the hurry of the
fire grew more insistent, and the lick
Of the flames strengthened. Tony had
neither speech nor power Left. Only
he knew that he must drive his team
fSrward-forward-u the river
should make the right flank of the
track and told the fire off by its width
Five times the beasts would have
stopped. Five times the unbroken
strength of Buster bore them on. Tony
saw by the madness in his eyes that
there would be danger to the man who
tried to stop him, and he grinned with
stiff lips.
Good for me 1 took you, you old
savage" he said.
That evening Jake, his eyes sore
with watching the fury Of the fire that
had passed two miles off, said to the
group about him:
Seems like Moffat1l hev ter git an
other bullocky an another team" he
said. There amt must as ud be like
ly to come alive outer that"
The slow clank of chains came up
the one street, and the dry clack Of
split hoofs. The whole crowd came
out to see eighteen bullocks crawl up
to the door and stand, leaning each on
the other. Jake gasped.
s'Tony's lot" he said. my sakes!
Tony's lot! But where is the kid?"
Something stumbled out Of the dark
that smelt of burnt flesh and singed
hair.
ST lost the leading couple" said
Tony, in voice that no man knew.
THE smoke smothered them, l think.
Buster pulled the others through.
Don't unyoke him. you chaps. He's
got enough left in him to poke
hole through you yet l told you he
was a 'dinny-aiser.'
Then he pitched forward at Jake's
feet in a dead faint. They picked him
gently up.
81 reckon Buster amt the only
dinny -aiser in this lot" he said
Young England.