SHEEP-SHEAERS IN QUEENS LAND AND THEIR COOK.

Dunstan Times, Issue 954, 30 July 1880, Page 3

SHEEP-SHEAERS IN QUEENS LAND AND THEIR COOK.

The shearers' cook had a very bad time. He had many mashers, each of uhom had a peculiar taste, which imperatively required satisfying. There were so many faults found with the cooking (the true shearer being quite a gourmet in the matter of doughboys and duff), there were so many demands for food and drink at irregular hours, that, notwithstanding the good pay which this functionary gels, (lie receiving generally a certain sum from each man besides a subsidy from the owner of the station), two or three Lied the oiiice, and either resigned nr were dismissed. No one would take the job. This shearers were getting alarmed. They would have to cook their own food. This was a prospect none of them realised. It was time lost, waste of material, had prospect for puddings, and no servant to order or complain about. A negotiation was opened with the washers, some of whom, no doubt, tempted by the high wages would be glad to take the office. The shearers wore right. A washer—a dogged determined-looking man—accepted and commenced operations. That night on their return from the shed, each pannikin and knife was laid on the long bark table, the buckets with the tea placed handy, and a huge duff and pieces of boiled beef graced the board. As usual, no sooner had the men taken their places than cries arose of “I say, cook, do you call this duff?”

“ This tea isn’t sweet enough.” “ Tea’s too sweet.” “ Cook.” “Doctor.” The doctor quietly made his appearance. Boiling up his sleeves, ho marched up to the strongest and biggest of the bullies, and pointing with his strong stump of a forefinger at the pudding on the man's plate, he said., “Now then, mate, is that ere dulf the right thing?” The battered prize-fighting look of his bullet head- and flattened nose was quite enough. “ I scs it’s filsi rate,” was the reply. “All right,” said the cook, walking slowly along the table, Ids eye glancing fiercely around to find a victim. “Any one of you gents as ain’t satisfied can gi’ mo a lesson outside, yon know.” It

was sufficient. A stillness almost supernatural followed. The cook afterwards said he couldn’t imagine how any one could disagree with such .’a.ypuci lot of men.— Lllackwood’s Magazine, i