CHAPTER IV.
Social Life in the Backblocks.
Table of Contents If you are nobody in the social world, and want to rise from obscurity now and again for a change, live in the backblocks-live at Milparinka, the place that has become a synonym in New South Wales for the outermost limit.
In big towns only people of distinction, people in high positions, and those who have gained renown by accident, influence or merit, are deemed worthy of mention in the social columns of the big newspapers. The doings of our leading society women, of the butterflies of fashion, are chronicled, however insignificant; and mostly they pertain to weddings, engagements, receptions, dog parties, and flitting from place to place. When Mr. Smith-Jones retires from duty, or departs for a new field of activity, he receives a eulogistic notice; and particulars of his send-off and the select circle who took part in it, or were among those present, are duly published; also Mrs. Smith-Jones' dress is described to the minutest detail when she graces the ballroom or the lawn at Randwick. Her housemaid may be more attractive; but that obscure young person is only noticed when she falls down stairs with extra violence, or narrowly escapes drowning while surf bathing. Neither is the engagement of Bill, the boundary rider, to the cook at Wild Dog Hotel referred to in print. He receives no flattering publicity, even when he marries the girl, though a bush wedding is often a highly interesting function. Bill is only mentioned when he breaks his neck, or does something equally disastrous to himself or to somebody else. If, however, Bill came into a fortune, eloped with an heiress, or discovered a gold mine, the amount of advertisement he would receive all at once would make him blush.
In the country town distinctions are less rigidly drawn. An outbreak of snobbery only brings humiliation on the snob. Everybody's weddings are noticed in the local paper, and every bride, whatever her station in life, looks charming. The only difference is that the squatter's daughter gets more space than is allotted to pretty little Mary whose father helps to keep the roads in repair. An old resident of any decree is worthy of half a column or more when he dies. If he dies in an uncommon or sensational fashion, the editor rejoices, and spreads himself on the lamented demise. Even the dairyman gets a sympathetic paragraph when he loses Strawberry, though Strawberry may not have been any thing like a prize cow. There also Constable X. is a highly-esteemed citizen, whose movements are recorded with a laudatory pen. If, further, it becomes necessary to refer frequently to the lapses of the town drunk, it is done more in sorrow than in anger. The lives of the people are closely intermingled, and as the population to the square mile grows less the inhabitants merge more on a plane of equality.
The social life in these primeval parts is not a joy to those who have been used to the mad whirl and gaiety of cities. At first some aspects of it are amusing and entertaining; there is a freshness, novelty and picturesqueness about it all that pleases and thrills; but that soon wears off, and leaves behind it an atmosphere of deadly dullness. The bushman and the bush maid are not conscious of any dullness; they haven't time, and their lives are too busy to know the meaning of ennui. In their natural element there is much to exercise the mind that is meaningless to the visitor.
The main events in the way of public entertainments are the grass-fed races, the hospital ball, and the cricket match. Some times there is a blackfellows' corroboree. For the rest, home resourcefulness and neighbourly cooperation keep the ball rolling in a spasmodic fashion. In a widely scattered community, afternoon tea parties are hardly possible. When one family visits another they set out early in the morning, and return late in the evening. At squattages visitors arrive at any time between midday and midnight, and stay till next morning; sometimes they stay a week. Among humbler folk, horses and vehicles are the means of locomotion, though many walk. They walk five or six miles for a few hours' gossip, or to attend a dance; they often walk miles after a horse before they start on their day's trip. Almost every gathering or function that eventuates demands a long walk.
What great walkers were the old bush mothers-the mothers we knew on the rivers where the big scrubs grew, when settlers were hewing daylight into the tangled vegetation and making initial clearances in the dense forests! What few horses the settlements boasted of were generally in the use of the men, and there was seldom a vehicle in their possession other than a heavy dray, which was mostly wanted for more necessary purposes than pleasure driving. Many farmers at the beginning had to be content with a slide. This at times was used as the family carriage, on which they glided over the landscape to town or to a neighbour's place; but, as a rule, when paying calls the women walked.
When, one decided to go visiting, she started away after breakfast, with all the children in tow. There was an odd one who got lost, and another who tramped for hours up and down hills and gullies in search of the friend's house. Here and there they had to take their boots off to get over a wet patch and to ford a running stream. By-and-bye those streams were spanned by a log. The visitors made themselves presentable when near the friend's house, and arrived in time for lunch. Soon after lunch it was time to start back. A strenuous visiting day like that was not a weekly event.
The bush dance is one of the most frequent socials in far-out parts. It is a cheerful factor in the introduction of young couples, in the development of acquaintances, and the ripening of friendships. Nearly all the dances are distant outback, except to one or two families. If the girl doesn't possess a horse and saddle, it is the young man's duty to bring the necessary outfit with him when he calls for her. She will ride 20 miles to a dance after doing a hard day's work; and after dancing all night ride home in the shivering dawn and go straight to work again. She will also walk a good many miles under similar conditions when a horse is not available, over gullies and ridges, here and there through mud and water, carrying her precious ball dress and her dancing shoes in her hands.
The occasions for such communal gatherings are many and varied. It may be somebody's birthday, somebody's golden wedding, or an old resident may be leaving the district; there is a dance when a young couple gets married, and a house-warming when their home is built. The housewarming is a custom that introduces newcomers at once to everybody in the neighbourhood. Sometimes a christening is seized upon as an excuse for a dance; and always when a long-absent member of a family returns, when a school is erected, and when someone comes in for a modest fortune, there is a gathering of the clans. Then there is the "harvest home;" and when nothing at all is happening in the locality a dance is held to relieve the monotony.
Where houses are far apart, and a young man, who has been casually attracted by a pair of bright eyes, hasn't excuses for calling at her place frequently, the bush dance is a happy medium. Not that excuses are scarce. He calls on all sorts of pretences by way of cultivating a desirable acquaintance. One day he has lost his dog which he has taken the precaution to tie up in the scrub; another day he reports that some of her father's cattle are out (he probably let the sliprails down the night before); but his favourite trick is borrowing things he doesn't want, the returning of which provides with a legitimate excuse for calling again.
A good example of the intrepid swain who would see his girl at any cost was Captain John Slyney, one of the old coastal identities, who knew the north-eastern rivers in the romantic days of the fifties. In his youth he was a farmer, and farmers' hours were from daylight till dark. On Sundays he had to mind cockatoos and hunt wallabies. For all that, he got some recreation. "Girls were very scarce then," he would remark reminiscently, "and it was nothing for a young fellow to walk 25 or 30 miles to see one of them." There were no bicycles or motor launches for rapid transit then; so he and a youthful neighbour took turn about with the wallabies and cockatoos so that they would have time alternately to go courting.
Another strenuous courtship was that of a young boatbuilder on the Richmond River . He built a little boat for himself, and in this he used to pull 10 miles after he knocked off work on Saturday to see his girl. Then he had to take her for a row. The return journey commenced on Sunday night, and, bar accidents, he got back in time to begin work on Monday morning. This continued for two years; then a rival, who settled within easy reach of the girl, carried off the prize.
The backblocker has at least an advantage in the cost of his courting. In the cities courting is expensive. In the backblocks it can be carried on to any length of time without overtaxing the means of the poorest. Bill's sweetheart expects to be taken to sports and entertainments; but these don't make much of a gap in the year's income. He can buy her a saddle, which will be a useful asset after marriage, for the same amount as the cityite expends on a couple of motor rides, and that sums up all his travelling expenses. He doesn't travel anyway extensively; most times he is quite content to sit on a log with his arms round her lissome waist, both sharing the mutual feeling that their life is as one blissful Eden.
A lady visitor to a backblock squattage is apt to get a slight shock at first. No strict formalities are observed; there is an unconventional air...
