Were it not for that, a good many of these fellows would go all lengths, relying on taking to the bush when they had made the colony too hot to hold them.

But there are only a few of them that have ever got on well with the blacks, and many a man who has gone out into the bush has found his end there.
You see, there's no explaining to a dozen natives, who jump up and begin to throw spears and boomerangs at you, that you are a bad white fellow, and not a colonist on the search for fresh runs.
"No, the bush rangers on the whole are not such a bad lot of fellows.

I suppose there is not one of us, here, who hasn't had men ride up and ask for food; who were, he knew pretty well, bush rangers.

Of course they got their food, as anyone else would who rode up to a station and asked for it.
"Once, only, I was told to hand over any money I had in the house.
As, fortunately, I had only a few pounds I gave it up without making a fight for it.

It's no use risking one's life, unless for something worth fighting for.