This is one of the stories he told about the blacks, and from it you will see that white men can be quite as bloodthirsty in those wild parts:
“When we come up here, two er the chaps that the cove hired was brothers. I niver seen brothers so fond er each other as them two young fellers was. Strappin’ young fellers, though they was new to this kind er work. They’d been knockin’ about, an’ was glad to git anythin’ to do, I guess. Wal, one day Tom—that was the youngest—was down by the creek yonder, lookin’ arter a duck, or summat er that. Me an’ Fred—that was the eldest—was up on the rise beyont, lookin’ arter the bullocks. All of a suddent we heerd a _cooey_.
“‘That’s Tom,’ says Fred. I didn’t want him to tell me. It worn’t a bit like a black feller’s.
“‘He’s come to grief,’ says I, for it sounded like that, an’ down we galloped to the creek full pelt. Jist as we got into the scrub we heard another _cooey_, an’ presently another, fainter an’ fainter like. Wal, we hunted about, an’ onder a grass tree we found poor Tom with a spear stickin’ into him.
“‘Mother—poor old gal!’ he says, when we come up to him, an’ Fred was kneelin’ by his side. I guess he was the old gal’s pet, and Fred had promised to look arter him when they come out, or summut er that. Anyhow Fred looked like a very divil.
“‘Which way?’ says he, lookin’ about an’ cockin’ his gun. ‘Who was it, Tom?’ says he, with his face as white as ashes.
“Poor Tom had jist breath enough left to say ‘Black Swan,’ an’ then the blood bubbled out er his mouth, an’ he was dead, an’ his brother a-blubberin’ over him like a gal over her sweetheart. I let him blubber for a bit to ease hisself, but he was ser long about it that I gives him a nudge with my foot. ‘Come,’ says I, ‘Fred, git up—that ain’t no good,’ says I.
“‘No,’ says he, jumpin’ up, ‘that _ain’t_ no good—but you hear me, Tom!’ An’ then he clinched his fist like the playactors, an’ swore that, if he iver cotched Black Swan, he’d cut him in two with a cross-cut saw.
“‘Sarve him right,’ says I, ‘but there ain’t much chance er that.’
“Black Swan was a black divil we’d called so ’cos of his gallus long neck. Wal, we cotched Tom’s horse, and Fred took the corpse back on it to the station, and buried his brother close ahind our hut. I can’t say I relished that azactly, nor the way Fred ’ud go an’ sit by the grave arter sundown, mumblin’ to hisself as if he was silly. He’d been a jolly chap afore that—not half as jolly as Tom, though. The hut was like a dead place when _he_ was gone. All that Fred seemed to care about was to get a pop at the blacks. Wal, one day when we’d had a scrimmage with ’em, Fred hit Black Swan in the knee. He was a-hoppin’ off, boohooin’ like a babby, a one leg, but Fred was down on him in no time. I ’spected he’d blow his brains out right off, an’ have done wi’ him. But Fred knocked him down with the butt-end er his gun, an’ tied his hands an’ feet, an’ lugged him back to our hut, an’ kicked him into the skillion ahind.