An Outback Marriage · Chapter
The Wild Cattle explained
Carew, Charlie Gordon, and Considine spend days taking delivery of the Kuryong cattle, riding through blazing heat and scrub.
What happens
Carew, Charlie Gordon, and Considine spend days taking delivery of the Kuryong cattle, riding through blazing heat and scrub. Considine worries about his wife Peg and his inheritance. They camp out, and one night they go moonlighting for wild cattle using 'coachers' (quiet cattle). Carew is given a pistol and a horse named Smoked Beef. During the chase, a bull charges, and Carew shoots it repeatedly, but it keeps coming until a black boy knifes it. The fat gin mocks Carew's performance. They decide to return to civilisation: Charlie to manage Mr. Grant's stations, Carew as a 'colonial experiencer', and Considine to England for his inheritance.
Themes in this chapter
Colonial Identity and the Bush
The chapter vividly depicts bush life: mustering wild cattle, camping, and the use of black stockmen and gins.
Survival and Resilience
Carew's ineptitude and the dangerous wild cattle chase illustrate the harshness and resilience required in the bush.
Greed and Ambition
Considine's anxiety about his inheritance and his determination to avoid sharing with his wife reflect greed and self-interest.
Characters to notice
- Mr. Carew
Rides with Considine and Charlie, learns about wild cattle, participates in moonlighting, and is mocked by the gin.
- Charlie Gordon
Accompanies Considine and Carew, helps plan the moonlighting expedition, and decides to return to manage Mr. Grant's stations.
- Patrick Henry Considine
Takes delivery of the cattle, worries about his wife Peg and inheritance, leads the moonlighting expedition, and plans to go to England.
- Peggy Donohoe
Mentioned as Considine's wife (old Peg) whom he fears will follow him for his money.
Key passages
“If I go to England after this money, Mister, I suppose they won’t be handin’ me out ten years for perjury, same as they done for Roger Tichborne, eh?”
Considine worries that claiming his inheritance might lead to a perjury conviction like the Tichborne case.
Considine expresses fear of legal trouble over his inheritance.
“The way we get wild cattle hereabouts is to take out a mob of quiet cattle, what we call coachers, and let ’em feed in the moonlight alongside the scrub, while we wait back out o’ the road and watch ’em.”
Considine explains the technique of using tame cattle to lure wild ones out of the scrub at night.
Description of the moonlighting method for capturing wild cattle.
“Shoot him any place. In the earhole, or the shoulder, or the ribs, or the flank. Any place at all. Shoot him all over if you like. One or two bullets don’t hurt a beast. It takes a lead-mine to kill some of ’em.”
Considine tells Carew to shoot a breaking beast anywhere, as bullets rarely stop them quickly.
Considine's casual advice on shooting cattle during the chase.