In broken dreams the image rose

Of varied perils, pains, and woes.

They come, in dim procession led,

The cold, the faithless, and the dead;

As warm each hand, each brow as gay,

As if they parted yesterday.

The condition of the fugitives in their rude fortress was sufficiently dispiriting, after the first joy that they felt for their victory had passed away. Three of their number lay dead; and all the rest, save Rashleigh, were more or less wounded, as before related. Besides these causes for regret, they knew that the blacks, though repulsed for a time, would most certainly renew their attack with the first convenient opportunity and never cease to harass them until they had either revenged the fall of their fellows or shared their bloody graves. The spot in which they were also afforded no water, and it would have been perfectly impossible for some of the white men, who had suffered most in their late conflict, to remove to any more promising place, even if they had not feared danger by the way from the assaults of their insidious enemies.

McClashin, who was almost uninjured, and Hennessy, who was only slightly so, were now violent in their clamours against our adventurer, accusing him of being the origin of all their mishaps, since they had adopted his advice of continuing the route along the beach. It was in vain that Rashleigh alleged the fact that they would have been equally liable to the attacks of the aborigines in whatever direction they had proceeded. The others only became more clamorous; and Hennessy at length got so much enraged that, taking an opportunity while Ralph was looking another way, he presented his musket at the former. Roberts, whose wounds had by this time become so stiff that he could not rise, was only able to warn the intended victim of the other’s murderous design in a hurried manner.

On turning his head, Rashleigh saw the rascal taking aim at himself and rushed upon him. Fortunately the gun missed fire; and our adventurer, whose passions were fully aroused at the treachery of the attempt, wrested the musket out of Hennessy’s hand, then, throwing it away, seized upon his foe and lifting him up by main strength, dashed him to the ground, the craven ruffian roaring out all the while for mercy; which Ralph, thinking the fall might be a sufficient lesson to him, now granted and resumed his seat beside Roberts, who was rapidly sinking from loss of blood, he having received four spear wounds in different parts, besides many contusions.

It was Rashleigh’s care in the first place to withdraw the weapons, portions of which still remained in the wounds of his suffering companion. He then bandaged them up as well as he could and laid the wounded man in a nook where he might take some undisturbed repose. After this he cautiously crept out of their fastness, with his musket loaded, to reconnoitre the neighbourhood for water and to observe whether any of their late opponents were visible. Not one of the latter was to be seen, nor could our adventurer for a long period discover any of the former object of his search. At length, in a spot at the foot of a clef, in the precipice, he found some aquatic-looking plants, around which the soil seemed moist. Here he scratched a hole with a stick, and in a few moments had the happiness to observe the orifice filling with a fluid that examination soon assured him was good fresh water, a small supply of which he took in a quart pot to the cave, having first enlarged the little well to the capacity of a bucket.

The water was eagerly welcomed by Roberts; and the other wounded men were equally clamorous for a drink. But as a few minutes must elapse before any quantity could be collected, they were forced to wait, and in the mean time Ralph employed himself in dragging away the dead bodies that cumbered the floor of their retreat. These he put in a hole beside a huge rock at some distance, covering them with sand as well as his imperfect means would allow. The next operation he engaged in was the construction of a sort of hedge, or chevaux de frise, with the ropes they had brought, which he tied across a narrow part of their retreat, securing the ends to stakes wedged into fissures of the rock and interlacing the whole with thorny boughs, so that it might serve to prevent any sudden hostile attack and keep off their foes while they reloaded their muskets, which, as Ralph had discovered, was very essential from the circumstances attending the last onslaught of their sable enemies.

Our adventurer next procured a sufficient supply of fresh water and prepared some food, of which, however, neither Roberts nor Owens was able to partake. They were the principal objects of his solicitude, as the conduct of neither McClashin nor Hennessy had been such as much to endear them to him. But nevertheless, though they had not assisted him in any of his exertions, he invited them to share the meal, which they did very willingly, appearing to be quite friendly and reconciled, though once or twice our adventurer detected sinister glances passing from one to another of them, which he neither understood nor approved of, and therefore, after having attended to the wants of the wounded, he left the cavern in search of some secret nook to which he might repair after it became dark.

At some short distance from their place of retreat was an upright fissure in a rock, which had been filled with seaweed by the action of repeated storms. The upper part of this was now dry, and Rashleigh resolved on making it his lair for the night that was now fast approaching. Intending, however, to give one more look at his companion Roberts and to smoke a pipe beside him as he lay, he turned back for this purpose, taking with him a large armful of seaweed to form an addition to the couch of the wounded man.

Just before he reached their place of refuge he heard voices conversing together in a subdued, almost whispering manner. A little attention to the tones satisfied him they were those of McClashin and Hennessy, and willing to hear what the subject might be they were discussing in this stealthy manner, our adventurer noiselessly put down his burden and crept very cautiously behind a rock they were seated in front of, talking so earnestly that they had not observed his approach.

Ralph heard Hennessy say, “I tell you he’s as strong as a bullock and might be more than a match for the pair of us.”

McClashin rephed, “Well thin, we must do the other thing, that’s all.” And they rose from their seats, going away towards their companions.

The few words he had thus heard set Rashleigh thinking what might be their import; but he could not satisfy himself upon this score, though, coupling the glances he had seen exchanged between these men with this circumstance, he feared they intended treachery to himself. Thus put in some degree upon his guard, he entered the cavern very warily and looked round for the two conspirators, whom he saw sitting by the fireside, chatting together in a very unconcerned manner.

McClashin observed, “I see you’ve got something to make a bed. Is there any more of it anywhere handy?”

“Plenty on the beach,” briefly replied Rashleigh. And the other two rose and went out, as Hennessy said, “to gather something to lay upon.”

While they were gone, our adventurer’s first act was to take out the flints from their muskets, after which he made up a bed for Roberts and then concealed all the other fire-arms but the piece he carried himself. When this was done he prepared his pipe and lay down to smoke in silence beside his wounded companions, who went to sleep almost directly he had replaced them on their rude couches. McClashin and Hennessy soon returned, and the former observed they had now a good way of passing the night.

Our adventurer did not make any reply, and the other went on addressing him, “What’s the rason you don’t speak to a body? Sure you an’t crabbed at us because you had them few words wid us to-day, are you? You shouldn’t mind me or Hennessy, for we are only a couple of foolish wild Irishmin, you must know.”

Hennessy here laughed and swore, “By Jakus, thin, I’m foolish enough, anyway, for I’d quarrel wid my best frind sometimes; but id’s all over wid me in a minnit.”

Rashleigh did not put much confidence in the pretended friendship of either, but still thought it best to suppress the answer that was rising to his lips. So he only said that he wasn’t at all angry, but only tired and sleepy, on which McClashin remarked, “Faix, thin, and no wondher, afther the hullaballoo we’ve all been in to-day. By my sowl thin, I seen you shtick that big black divil that was hauling you off like a horse’s head to a bonfire. That was nately done . . . And thin, how you rattled the others about the shkulls that was pegging away at poor Roberts. I will say if you hadn’t come back to help us, he’d a bin dead now, anyway. And musha, God knows, the whole of us, maybe.”

There was a catlike, treacherous, whining way about this man that he ever assumed towards those whom he most deeply hated, and Rashleigh had observed it often before, so that all his specious talk made no further impression upon the mind of our exile than warning him against some meditated deed of stealthy violence. So, finding himself really about to sleep, he got up and stole out of the place, taking the greatest precaution against being either followed or observed. In this way he reached his proposed lair and nestling in among the seaweed, slept unmolested until morning.

Soon after daylight he re-entered the rude shelter, where he found all things undisturbed and the inmates fast asleep behind the defence he had erected. While he was preparing their morning meal, McClashin awoke, and observing Rashleigh to be busied in his occupation, he arose and proffered to assist him. Hennessy also got up and our adventurer thought there was an air of hesitation about this bold-faced ruffian that did not become the assumed heartiness of his manner as he bade Ralph a good morrow. In the course of their meal McClashin asked the latter how he had slept and being answered very well, he added that he also slept wen, “only the muskatees were very throublesome”.

This day passed over quietly, and towards nightfall McClashin and Rashleigh went out to fish while Hennessy promised to keep a strict look-out for the blacks.

The two anglers met with very good success and brought home as much finny spoil as promised to afford them all two abundant meals. After supper Rashleigh lay down beside Roberts as before, until it was dark, when he repaired to his separate sleeping-place, where he again disposed himself for slumber, but in vain for a very long period, and he imagined that he was not sufficiently tired to sleep quickly. At length the drowsy god shed his poppies over the eye-lids of our exile, who sank into a state of troubled repose.

His rest was broken by a series of singular dreams. First his vagrant fancy strayed to the home of his youth. He was playing with his only sister, when a little childish quarrel arose and she was suddenly transformed into a hideous spectre, whose demoniac features still bore a faint resemblance to those of the departed bushranger Philip Foxley, who, grinning horribly, appeared about to strangle the solitary sleeper. Then again, he fancied himself to be an inmate of Marshall’s cottage, paying courtship to his quondam fellow-traveller Jane Bates; and she was smiling at his suit as the door suddenly opened, when McClashin, with Hennessy for his compartion, rushed in, who shot the poor girl dead and were dragging him out when he awoke to feel a sensation of some undefinable dread overhanging his mind, which he could by no means dispel so as to sleep again.

At last the fear of some unknown and horrible impending calamity became so poignant that Rashleigh could endure it no longer, and hastily getting up, he went towards the place of his comrades’ repose. On arriving within sight of the opening, the first thing that attracted his attention was the ruddy glow of some hasty fire that emanated from it, which, casting its glare around, illumined every object for many yards. His instant idea was that the blacks had surprised his sleeping companions, and having set fire to the hedge he had put up, were perhaps waiting until the white men came out in confusion to spear them at their leisure.

Full of this dreadful thought, he cocked his piece and stepped stealthily towards the spot, where he saw McClashin stooping down, adding some light wood to the fire, while Hennessy was apparently looking for someone in the corner where Rashleigh had at first lain down.

Who was the object of this search quickly became apparent, for the ruffian making it uttered a loud oath, and said, “That beggar Ralph is not any place here!”

“Well, never mind him now!” replied McClashin. “We can give it to him as he comes back. Settle the other two at once.”

By this ............