FIRST MEETING WITH ROBERT SIEVIER 



One night, just before I was leaving, Captain D., 

 who had been in the " Blues," and belonged to a very 

 old Scottish family, asked me if I would lend him the 

 key, which I did. I happened to come in very early the 

 next morning and there were two of the giants shaving 

 themselves with water they had in an old kerosene tin. 

 They had slept on some wooden shutters — it kept the 

 cold off their backs at all events. Each had a tooth- 

 brush and had kept sixpence out of the money I had 

 given the previous evening for clean collars. Yet one 

 of these men who had slept on that hard bed in the 

 cellar when he got his money would blossom out into 

 one of the smartest of new chums. He had real good 

 clothes, yet in the middle of the month everything 

 would get pawned and there was no credit on occasions, 

 even at the most moderate boarding houses. They 

 got hold of a pair of boxing gloves and used to hit 

 pretty hard. I don't know why I was the capitalist 

 of the party, but I suppose it was the capacity for keep- 

 ing up my corner, although the youngest of them all. 

 The slightest sign of a bit of money in one of them 

 would get all the others round him and I would miss 

 the bunch for some days, but occasionally hear of their 

 exploits in various directions after they had been 

 " round the town." 



When one or two dropped out others seemed to step 

 in their places. Some would get a passage home and 

 others make up their mind that they should " really 

 get a job." One got a place as a marker at the Coffee 

 Palace in Melbourne, and another went up somewhere 

 in the New England district, also as a marker. It 

 seemed a congenial occupation to them ; they could 

 smoke their pipes, keep themselves neat, have plenty 

 to eat, a comfortable bed, use the hotel bathroom, and 

 the players would ask them to have a drink. I put one 



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