Mrs Gildea, who understood the personal application, broke in across the table with an apposite remark about her own early experiences of the Blacks.

Lady Bridget impatiently addressed McKeith.
'Go on.

What do the Blacks do now to you people to make you treat them unkindly ?' 'What do they do now--to us squatters you mean ?' Colin had recovered himself.

'Why they begin by spearing our cattle and then they take to spearing ourselves.' 'Did they ever spear you ?' she asked.
Colin smiled at her grimly.
'Well, you wouldn't have noticed, of course, that I've got just a touch of a limp--it's only if I'm not in my best form that it shows.

I owe that to a spear through my thigh one night that the Blacks rushed my camp when I was asleep.