THE NOVELIST.

Observer, Volume II, Issue 40, 18 June 1881, Page 436

THE NOVELIST.

HIS WIFE'S DREAM, A Story of the Victorian Diggings.

I AM not going to say that there is anything in dreams, or that they\arc more than the jumbled action of the imperfectly awakened senses. Still there are some curious coincidences constantly occurring which keep alive the faith which many people have in them. I have heard of several, though of none so remarkable as the following. I heard it from the mate of the man's wife who dreamt it, and who positively assured me it was true. For my part I know that the discovery was true, but cannot vouch for the previous dream. There were five of us who had accidentally met at a camping-place on the road to the Ovens. It was on the bank of a creek underneatlr a granite range. Huge boulders were scattered here and there, .and honeysuckle and sheoak trees, with their drooping foliage, dotted the grassy margin of the stream. We had formed one general camp iv order for protection, as we had heard that Gipsy Smith was around. After we had partaken of our evening meal, as we smoked our pipes, we entered into conversation, comparing notes, talking about mates and the prospects that lay before us. Something that was said led me to mention Blanket liush, when Jim, a broad-shouldered young fellow of about thirty years of age, said : — ' You know Blanket Rush, then, mate. D'ye know Lanky Bill ?' ' I know Lanky Bill's Hill, and a good rush it was, too.' • That it was, as I ought to know, for I was Lanky Bill's mate. But do yer know how it was found ? No ? Well, it was a ruin way, and was all owing to a dream, and if you've a mind to hear, I don't care if I tell it you. ' You must know that me and Lanky Bill ■were mates up the country when the diggings opened, and we kept on together there till we had a good cheque. In January, 1852, we came clown to Fryer's Creek and set in to work. Well, we were only new chums or we might have made a splendid pile. I believe we lost as much or more gold as we saved. Just fancy, the * wash-dirt was mostly stiff clay, and we -used to put it in the cradle and bash it through ■with lots of water and a stick. By Jo, I wish I had the same ground now. Why, yon could take the shovel and cut through the blue clay, and on every slice the gold shone like plums in a pudden. When we had worked out all the ground as we thought, and that was in a fortnight, we thought weed have a run to Melbourne, for neither had been there for two or three years. I needn't tell you how we got on. We shared nine hundred pounds apiece, and those worn't the saving days. To make a long story short, however, we were coining home from the theatre one night when we heard a shriek (it was in Flinders-street, I think), and running up we found two ugly fellows ill-using a young woman-: Of course we couldn't stand that, and so, after a blow or two, we drove them off. By this time the young woman was crying as if her heart would break, and Bill did all he could to comfort her. After a while lie got her to speak, when she told us that she was an immigrant, and had only arrived that day ; that she had been forced to leave the vessel, and, having no money, had determined to walk about the streets all night and try and get work in the morning. She was a tight-looking wench — bright eyes and everything- clean — and I could see Lanky Bill had taken a liking to her. You know how quickly things were done those days ; see a lass to-day and marry her to-morrow. So Lanky up and told her what he was, how much he had got, and asked whether she would have him. Well, what could the poor girl do ? She looked hard at my mate for a minute, put her hand in his, and burst out crying again. This made me feel quite spooney, too, and as for Bill — but I suppose it was nature, and I don't think the worse of him for it. Well, he took her to a lodging, and the next day they were fixed up. He wanted to buy her flash dresses, but no, she said, "Bill, we had better keep the money and not spend it," and so she chose good dresses for wear. She looked better in day than night, and I felt sure that Bill had struck a patch. Well, two or three days after, as we were altogether, says BUI, "Jim, I'm getting tired of town, and as I'm a married man I must go after more gold. Will yer go ?" " Yes, " I said, ' ' I'm willing. " 'With that Lanky empties all his cash, but a few pounds, into Nancy's (that was her name) lap, and says, "Take care of it till I come home, old woman." But what do you think ? She says, " You took me for bctter'and worse, and I'm your wife and I'm bound to look after you, and so I'll go to the diggings to." You'd better believe Bill was proud to hear her, for all the women we knew would take their husbands' gold fast enough, but liked better to live a lazy life in Melbourne than go help them on the diggings. Just before we were ready to start we happened to go into an auction room where they were selling allotments of land. They were down in Collingwood Flat, and Lanky bought six of them, saying they might turn up trumps some day, and right he was too. ' Well, we got away at last, and spent many weeks travelling from rush to rush, but without luck enough to make us stop anywhere. We had bought a horse and cart with a tilt over it, and so were able to get about comfortably. It was real jolly travelling, and Nance was a, splendid cook. We didn't have damper, we didn't, but good wholesome bread baked in a camp oven ; and instead of nothing but chops and steaks, Nance used to make pies and puddings and splendid stews. Ah ! she was a prime woman, and stuck to Bill well, and he was mighty fond of her. She didn't flirt round and laugh and talk Avith other men when Bill was away, as many of them did in those days. I believe she thought her man the finest in the world, and though she was kind and civil to all she was true to him. I ought to know, for I was with them constant for

going on for two years. Well, we kept on travelling round from one rush to another without doing more than kept us going, until we heard of Blanket Flat. By this time we were running mighty short, and we felt it was time that we set in in earnest. We got to Blanket Flat, but found the ground all taken up on the line, and most of the outside too. However, we got a piece of outside ground at last, but it turned out no good, though we kept on working, keeping our eyes about us so as to get a piece of spare in the centre of the gully. Now you may recollect Blanket Flat. They called it a flat, but it was more like a gully, though different from any other gully I have seen. It ran due east and west. The range on the north side was a steep rocky hill covered by strin^ybark, but on the south side the ridge which divided it from the next gully was quite different. It was a ridge of ground rises, with no timber on it to speak of. On the other side of it was another gully, and on the south side of it was another range, rocky and woody like the range north of Blanket Flat. I want you to see that this bare ridge had no business there at all, as the two gullies were really one with a hump running down the centre. Well, they traced the gold to the foot of one of these humps .and then lost the lead. When we came to the Flat they had rushed up the gully to try and recover the lead. We worked away, as I said, with no luck. One morning as we were afc breakfast (I used to sleep in my own little tent, this same one I've got with me), Nance told us a dream — she had dreamt it three times, she said. She dreamt that in the middle of the night a robber came to the tent, and before they could stop him had seized a big nugget that was on the table and had bolted with it ; that we all gave chase, and followed him over the gully and up the rise — that Lanky Bill was ahead with a pick and flung it. at the man as he crossed the rise and knocked him down. They then rushed up to the .place, but could not find the man, but to their joy found the nugget and pick close together. " Be sure," she said, "my dream's true, and there's gold there if I could find the spot." Just at that moment a goat that belonged to a digger down the gully stepped into the tent and seized hold of half a loaf and bolted over the gully. Bill and I jumped up and ran after the goat, and just as the animal got to the top of the hill Bill slung the pick and hit him. With a baa-baa the goat dropt the bread and skedaddled. Nance by this time had come up, and as the hill was covered by short, .stumpy bushes helped us to look for the pick. She found it first and at once sung out, "My dream, my dream." When we got to her she was all of tremble, and looked like one half asleep, "there's where the man dropped the nugget, I know by that sutmp and that stone, and it lay .alongside the pick just like the loaf of bread. Here's where the gold is, my man — .sink here, Bill.and you'll get lots of gold." Well, I looked at Lanky Bill, and he looked at me. We said nothing hut off with our coats and iixed up the pegs. Bill commenced a hole with the pick, and I went for a shovel. Well, my story's nearly told. We bottomed that night and washed three ounces out of the first dishful. The whole claim paid well and we made our piles. Lanky Bill is now a swell iv Melbourne with a lot of youngsters. With his money he built twelve houses on his allotments, and gets richer and richer every day. I go to see him every Christmas, and he always blesses the day when he married Nancy and listened to her dream. ' How is it I did not do as well ? Ah, there's a yarn about that that I may tell you sometime. I thought that as Bill had struck such a patch when he married Nancy I could easily do the same. But women are like the diggings ; you may fancy you know all about them and think you have marked out a really golden patch, or be dead on the gutter, and then she may turn out a thorough duffer with not a .solitary spec of gold to the blessed acre. Such was my luck. I wish I could find another Nancy and get her to dream dreams.'