But no thought of the irony of fate fell darkly on the merry party issuing from The Chase to greet the Badajos and Benmohr contingents, as they came up from opposite directions. With Harry O’Desmond rode a tall man in a green hunting frock, whose length of limb and perfect seat showed off the points of an inestimable grey of grand size and power, whom all men saw at once to be The Caliph, well known on both sides of the Straits. It was in truth John Hampden’s famous hunter, a very Bayard among horses, at whom no horse-loving junior could look without tears in his eyes.
Of that party also were the Gambiers—Alick, Jimmy, and Jack—with their friend Willie Machell. A trio of cheerful hard-riding young squatters, having made names for themselves as leading dare-devils where anything dangerous was to be done with the aid of horse-flesh. Their ‘Romeo’ five-year-olds, with matchless shoulders, but imperfect tempers, carried them admirably. Will Machell was a tall, mild, gentlemanlike, musical personage, by no means so ‘hard’ as his more robust friends. He would be available as a chaperon for the feminine division, as he did not intend to do more than canter a mile or two after the throw-off.
Came from the broad river-flats and forest parks of the Murray, Claude Waring and his partner Rodder, the former tall, dark, jovial; the latter neat, prudent, and fresh-coloured.
Came from the volcanic cones and scoria-covered plateaus of Willaree the broad frame and leonine visage of Herman Bottrell. He was well carried by his square-built ambling cob, while beside him on a dark bay five-year-old, with the blood of Tramp in his veins, sat the well-known figure of ‘Dolly’ Goldkind, a man who in his day had shared the costliest pleasures of the _haute volée_ of European capitals. Commercial vicissitudes in his family had forced him to importune fortune afresh in the unwonted guise of an Australian squatter. She had, in this instance, not disdained to ‘favour the brave,’ and Dolly was now in a fair way to see the pavement of the Faubourg St. Germain once yet again, and to bask amid the transient splendour of the Tuileries. He had faced gallantly his share of uncongenial solitude, unadorned Nature, and rude surroundings, always awaiting, with the philosophy born of English steadfastness, and Parisian _insouciance_, the good time coming.