But as he thought of all this he worked away with his bush and his matches, extinguishing the flames here and lighting them there, striving to make a cordon of black bare ground between Boolabong and Gangoil.

Surely Abraham had never been called on to work like this! He and his men were in a line covering something above a quarter of a mile of ground, of which line he was himself the nearest to the river, and Medlicot and his foreman the farthest from it.

The German and O'Dowd were in the middle, and Jacko was working with his master.
If Harry had just cause for anger and sorrow in regard to Nokes and Boscobel, he certainly had equal cause to be proud of the stanchness of his remaining satellites.

The men worked with a will, as though the whole run had been the personal property of each of them.

Nokes and Boscobel would probably have done the same had the fires come before they had quarreled with their master.