Dad was in the lead, and poor Joe, bare-shinned and bootless, in the rear.

Now and again he tramped on a Bathurst-burr, and, in sitting down to extract the prickle, would receive a cluster of them elsewhere.

When he escaped the burr it was only to knock his shin against a log or leave a toe-nail or two clinging to a stone.

Joe howled, but the wind howled louder, and blew and blew.
Dave, in pausing to wait on Joe, would mutter: "To HELL with everything! Whatever he wants bringing us out a night like this, I'm DAMNED if I know!" Dad could n't see very well in the dark, and on this night could n't see at all, so he walked up against one of the old draught horses that had fallen asleep gazing at the lucerne.

And what a fright they both got! The old horse took it worse than Dad--who only tumbled down--for he plunged as though the devil had grabbed him, and fell over the fence, twisting every leg he had in the wires.