1902 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER. 
471 
An Australian Christmas 
The sun was rising red and lurid over 
the plain; it had been a hot night, and 
there was all the promise of a fierce, hot 
day. Even on the veranda it was not 
cool, and the creepers that had once 
twined round the posts, and made a 
leafy bower, were but dead sticks. There 
was not a single living thing left in the 
garden that a couple of years ago had 
been the pride of Allie Kemp’s heart, 
and the ground, where it was not dust, 
was iron-bound. Beyond the garden 
was no sign of green, hardly a trace 
even of vegetation. At the bottom of 
the garden enclosure was the creek, or, 
rather, what had once been the creek, a 
winding course, 30 feet below the plain. 
“One thing,” said Allie, with a sigh, 
“we needn’t be afraid of fire, because 
there is really nothing to burn. And, 
you know, baby is wonderfully well, 
considering.” 
“Allie, dear,” her husband put his 
hand on her shoulder; “it’s not a nice 
Christmas box for you, but unless we 
get rain within the next three days we’ll 
have to go.” 
“But the water In the tank.” 
“May last a week with great care, but 
we can’t stop here till we haven’t a drop 
left Garoona is 60 miles away, and the 
chances are they’re not much better off 
than we are. We must take a little wa¬ 
ter along with us, and even if they have 
enough, you can’t drive that distance 
even at night without a drink for your¬ 
self and the beasts.” 
“What about the accommodation- 
house on Dinglet’s Dam?” 
“The dam has vanished, and so have 
the people. Do you know that out of 
100,000 sheep I doubt if we have a thou¬ 
sand left. Merry Christmas, isn’t it?” 
Allie’s eyes filled with tears. She had 
been fighting back the thought for the 
last three months, but it had come home 
to her at last The drought had spelled 
ruin for them; and when they left the 
station, as leave it they must, if the rain 
did not come, £50 in the bank and the 
starving sheep would be all their prop¬ 
erty. But she kept the tears back brave¬ 
ly. She did not mean to burden Tom 
with a fretting wife, and, after all, baby 
was standing the heat well. 
“And will those thousand pull 
through? Couldn’t we do something for 
them?” 
“My girl, what can we do? Morton 
and I are cutting the scrub for them, but 
water we have not to give, and I don’t 
believe there’s a drop of fresh water 
within a hundred miles of us except 
what’s in the underground tank there. 
The sheep couldn’t travel 10 miles, let 
alone a hundred.” 
“It would be kinder to cut their 
throats.” 
“Oh, we’ll give them a chance,” and, 
kissing her and the baby, he mounted 
the lean horse, and rode away towards 
the sky-line. 
And this was Christmas. A hot wind 
was beginning to stir the dust in the 
garden, and Allie drew down the blinds 
and shut the doors and windows. The 
only servant she had was Ah Goon, the 
Chinaman, and he was in the kitchen 
making preparations for the Christmas 
dinner as imperturbably as if he had all 
the resources of Australia at his back. 
It was no good fretting. All she could 
do was to imitate his coolness, and pack 
up what things she could take away 
with her, if go they must 
Tom Kemp rode after Morton deject¬ 
edly enough. Even the crows were go¬ 
ing; he only saw one or two, where a 
week ago there had been hundreds. The 
water-hole he passed was simply a mass 
of corruption, the mud was not quite 
hard yet, and the sheep had struggled 
towards the moisture, and stuck in the 
heavy mud and died. And not only the 
sheep, but there was a kangaroo, and 
parrots, and cockatoos innumerable. The 
country must be in a nice state when 
even the native birds died. There could 
be no water for many a long mile. All 
this carrion, and not a kite or a crow to 
fatten on it. 
There were a few weary-looking sheep 
under the shade of the dead finish, and 
Morton, who had cut an armful for his 
horse, was standing contemplating them 
hopelessly. 
“Boss, I think we’d better chuck up 
the sponge. You and I have about seen 
it through. Those poor beasts can’t eat 
without a drink.” 
“Come along back, Morton. You’ve 
stuck to me like a Briton. We’ll have a 
quiet Christmas, and we’ll clear to¬ 
night” 
Allie knew how it was when she heard 
their footsteps on the veranda; and 
she went out to meet them with a smile 
on her washed-out face. The sky had 
clouded, and the wind was blowing 
clouds of dust before it. 
“It looks—it looks like rain," she hesi¬ 
tated. 
“My girl, it has looked like rain every 
second day on an average for the last 
six months. The very worst sign of a 
drought.” 
“Come in and rest, and have a lemon 
drink. It’s nice and cool on the side¬ 
board there, and here is baby smiling at 
his daddy.” 
Brave little woman. She was making 
the best of it, but the man who flung 
himself down in the armchair had hard¬ 
ly the heart to respond to her efforts. 
He was ruined, and he must begin over 
again; yet half an hour’s rain would 
save him. 
Ah Goon elected they should have din¬ 
ner in the middle of the day, but they 
could hardly enjoy the chicken and 
plum pudding. It was getting darker 
and darker outside, and the hot wind 
whistled weirdly round the roof. 
“It ought to be cold,” said Alice, “it 
ought to be cold,” and she drew the 
blind and looked out. The dust was so 
thick she could hardly see to the end 
of the garden. It was coming in through 
all the crannies and cracks. The air 
was full of it. Then right through it 
cut the steel blue lightning, and a crash 
of thunder burst over their heads. 
“If it would only bring rain,” gasped 
Allie, as she soothed her baby’s fright¬ 
ened crying. 
“It won’t, it won’t It has been like 
this 20 times, and there is no rain. Don’t 
buoy yourself up with false hopes, dear. 
It will be cooler and quieter after the 
storm, and then we will start Eh, 
Morton?” 
“Right you are, Boss.” 
So Allie would not look out again, and 
when the wind dropped and she heard 
a sound of big drops on the iron roof 
she said nothing, and closed her ears. 
She had fancied rain before, and it had 
only been the dust beating against the 
roof. It was only the dust again, or per¬ 
haps some twigs torn from a withered 
tree. But Tom sat up and young Mor¬ 
ton sat up. 
"Surely—surely-” 
“Only heat drops.” 
Morton threw open the door, and 
there came in the fresh smell of the rain 
on the parched-up earth, a scent that 
had not come to their nostrils for two 
long weary years. 
. Faster and faster and faster, the hea¬ 
vens seemed to have opened, and it was 
a deluge that was coming down. It shut 
in everything. Kemp caught his wife 
and whirled her out into it, and Morton 
was throwing up his hat and yelling like 
a maniac. 
“A merry Christmas, wifie! A 
merry Christmas indeed! In a week the 
country will be a garden. A merry 
Christmas to you, Allie, my wife. Run 
in now and change your things, and see 
you don’t get cold. Morton, I think 
we’ll have that Christmas dinner over 
again, eh, my boy!”—The Australasian. 
MOTHERS.—Be sure to use “Mrs.Wins- 
low’s Soothing Syrup” for your children 
while Teething. It is the Best.— Adv. 
A Housekeeper’s Invention 
The housekeeper with practical Ideas 
said: 
“Have you ever seen my ash-box? 
Well, it is the very nicest thing of the 
kind I ever saw, if I did have it made; 
this sounds rather egotistical, but it is 
so frequently necessary for me to make 
my ingenuity assist in doing the work, 
that I feel the pride in those small in¬ 
ventions of mine is pardonable. You 
probably know what emptying an ash- 
pan on a windy day means, to those not 
blessed with a furnace, for the wind 
always blows more or less during the 
ash-pan season. One is simply covered 
from head to foot with that odious white 
dust, which ruins clothing as no other 
dust can; also, when economically in¬ 
clined to pick over the cinders, there is 
more dust, and if you prefer your cin¬ 
ders sifted before picking over, words 
are powerless to describe this dust. But 
in my box cinders may be emptied, sift¬ 
ed, and picked over without the dust 
causing any discomfort whatever. Do 
you wonder that I am proud of it? 
“First I purchased a large empty dry 
goods box, for 50 cents, and it took a 
carpenter about two hours to put the 
box in shape for use; no other material 
was required excepting two sets of small 
hinges, and four bed slats, which I 
found stored in the attic, where they 
had been placed for cases of emergency 
like this. The slats were nailed securely 
to each side of the box, through the 
center about 12 Inches from the top, two 
of them arranged so as to form a rest to 
work the ash sifter over, and the other 
two forming sides to hold the sifter in 
place. The slats were all placed with 
the narrow edges, which are beveled, 
up. Before nailing the slats in, it would 
bo well to take the exact measurements 
of the sifter to assure its working easily 
in the frame constructed for it. Next a 
cover is fitted to the top with hinges, 
which may be raised or lowered to suit 
your convenience; and a second smaller 
door is cut in the side of the box near 
the bottom for removing the ashes. The 
last requirement is a coarse wire sieve 
or screen in the shape of a pan with a 
lcng handle attached. This is placed in 
the box on the railway, a notch having 
been previously cut in the box which 
will allow the handle to protrude 
through to the outside, where it can be 
shaken easily. The box is now ready 
to empty the ash pan in; after empty¬ 
ing close the lid, shake the cinders free 
from the ashes, and no dust can possi¬ 
bly escape to annoy the operator while 
doing so. The cinders may be picked 
over and thrown into the box, or may 
be lifted out and taken to some other 
place. Usually, unless the day is too 
severely cold, I pick over my cinders 
standing; it takes so very little time, 
and I also will admit the pride in my 
box is so profound that it really glorifies 
to me, what used to be an irksome task.” 
SARAH RODNEY. 
“Well begun is half done, but three- 
quarters done is not the other half by 
any means. It takes the last one nine¬ 
ty-ninth to finish the job. It takes en¬ 
ergy to begin, but threefold energy to 
see things through.—Sunday School 
Times. 
TRY GRAIN-0! TRY GRAIN-0! 
Ask your Grocer to-day to show you a package of 
GRAIN-O, the new food drink that takes the place 
of coffee. The child ten may drink It without Injury 
as well as tho adult. All who try It, like It. URAIN-O 
has that rich seal brown of Mocha or Java, but It is 
made from pure grains, and tho most delicate stomuch 
receives It without distress. \i tho price of coffee 
16o. and 26o. per package. Sold by aU grocers 
CauaDainI Dill* Listead of using Metal 
wav e I allll DIIIS Roofing.which requires 
painting every 
two years, use 
Arrow Brand 
Asphalt 
Ready Roofing, 
a 1 r e a d y sur¬ 
faced with gravel, and which needs no painting. 
AShHALTREADY ROOFING CO. Send lor free 
130 Water St.. New York. samples. 
mat 
ruuai 
Rheumatic 
Sctatie, Sharp and Shooting Palo*, 
Strains, Waaknass and all bodily ache* 
and palna rallarad almost instantly. 
Backache, Haadache, Faceacha, 
Chast Palna, and all Nervous Palna 
sad MuacuW Weakness cured by 
StJacobsOil 
After al other remedies fait. 
ArU Ilka magic I 
Conquers Pain 
Prlc*, ajc and 50c. 
•ou *y ata. dialer* ih xiDionm 
Corns Cured Free. 
Allen's Antiseptic Corn Plaster 
cures corns. To prove it i will mail free 
plaster to any one. Send name and ad¬ 
dress—no money. 
Geo. M. Dorrance, 210 Fulton St., Oept.L, N. Y. 
STEM-WIND WATCH.CHAIN AND CHARM 
'oucan geta Stem-Wind, Nickel-Platod 
Vatch, warranted,alsoa ChalnandCharin 
or selling 19 paekagesof BlulneatlOccach 
lend name and address at once and we will 
orward you the liluino and our largo Pro- 
,.1,.™ Tint- nmtndrt Nomnnevrennlrod. 
MADE $105 THE FIRST MONTH 
writes FRED. BLODGETT, of N. Y. J. L. 
BAKRIOK, of La., writeB: “Am mnking 
$3.00 to $3.00 every duy I work.” MRS. L. 
M. ANDERSON, of Iowa, writes: “I 
made $3.H0 to $0.(50 a day.” Hundreds 
doing likewise. So can you. 
$6.00 to $10.00 dally mude pla¬ 
ting jewelry, tablewuro, bicy¬ 
cles, metal goods with gold, sil¬ 
ver, nickel, etc. Enormous de¬ 
mand. We teach you CDCC 
Write—offer free. IIiLm 
(1. OKAY A GO., l’latlmr Work.. A n him I Bldir.. Claelnnatl. O. 
THE 
ADIRONDACK 
MOUNTAINS 
The lakes and streams in the 
Adirondack Mountains are full of 
fish ; the woods are inviting, the 
air is filled witli health, and the 
nights are cool and restful. If 
you visit Litis region once, you 
will go there again. An answer 
to almost any question in regard 
to Lite Adirondack's will be found 
in No. 20 of the “ Four-Track 
Series,” “ The Adirondaeks and 
I low to Reach Them sent free 
on receipt of a two-ceut stamp, by 
George II. Daniels, General Pas¬ 
senger Agent New York Central 
& Hudson River Railroad, Grand 
Central Station, New York. 
RfinFINR ^ Will Pay You to write us for sam- 
ilUU I I ll U'ples A prices before ordering elsewhere 
Agents Wanted. Stowell Mfg. Co., Jersey City, N. Y. 
For the Roofs and 
Sides of your Barns 
and Poultry-Houses 
RUBEROID 
(TRADE-MARK REGISTERED) 
ROOFING 
Lasts Indefinely. Booklet “K ” 
THE STANDARD PAINT CO 
102 William St., New York. 
