"
Again he kicked him. Still Farmer strained and hung back. Once more he
let him have it. Then--off flew the winkers, and over went Dad and
Anderson and old Brown, and down rolled Joe and Farmer on the other side
of the fence. The others leant against their horses and laughed the laugh
of their lives. "Worse 'n a lot of d--d jackasses," Dad was heard to say.
They caught Farmer and led him to the fence again. He jumped it, and rose
feet higher than he had any need to, and had not old Brown dodged him just
when he did he would be a dead man now.
A little further on the huntsmen sighted a mob of kangaroos. Joy and
excitement. A mob? It was a swarm! Away they hopped. Off scrambled the
dogs, and off flew Paddy Maloney and Dave--the rest followed anyhow, and
at varying speeds.
That all those dogs should have selected and followed the same kangaroo
was sad and humiliating. And such a waif of a thing, too! Still, they
stuck to it. For more than a mile, down a slope, the weedy marsupial
outpaced them, but when it came to the hill the daylight between rapidly
began to lessen. A few seconds more and all would have been over, but a
straggling, stupid old ewe, belonging to an unneighbourly squatter, darted
up from the shade of a tree right in the way of Maloney's Brindle, who was
leading.
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