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The Good Old Days of Yore Mr. S. M. Howie Albury Banner
and Wodonga Express 5 September 1902 |
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Reminiscenees of Mr. S. M. Howie,
Usher of the Black Rod in the Legislative Council, written for the Gundagai
Times. In
the autumn of 1845 I determined to leave the Qaeanbeyan
district and take up my residence at Mannas,
whither my sheep bad preceded me, so I travelled thither with my youthful
wife, whom I had just married, driving 'unicorn'
in a lumbering, old fashioned carriage, only fit to be dragged by bullocks. After
making stopping places of Yass and Reedy Creak, we got to Jugiong
(Sheahan's) as another stage. Looking,
in the morning, at Cooney's Hill, I felt that I could not face it with my
horses, so I engaged a yoke of bullocks and a man to drive them, to pull us
to the top. All
went well after this, considering the difficulties of the road, and we
arrived at Mannaa and took possession of our slab
and bark hut. Misfortune happened to us by the upsetting of our dray upon a
sideling near Bago, breaking our crockery and other
articles of domestic use, with which we hoped to furnish our hut and render
it habitable. As
the dray pulled up at the door the pole bullocks got loose, the dray tilted
up, and the work of destruction in this direction was consummated. Further,
the roof of the hub was leaky, and the rain, stained with the bark, spoiled
the cherished portions of my wife's wardrobe. As
time wore on I could not get shepherds and so I had to 'take out' some of my sheep, and then my boots, which could not
be replaced, wore out, and so shepherding on horseback fell to my lot. I
had to thresh my wheat, wash it dry it, and 'bung' the mill in the evening,
and when the shearing time arrived, to pack my wool with a spade. All
these things were borne with becoming equanimity,
and, I may say, contentedly, for life was young and its ship had 'youth on the prow and pleasure at the
helm’, but when 'fluke' seized
upon my sheep I thought it time to seek for 'fresh woods and pastures new', and so returned to the Queanbeyan district. This
was a change from the 'frying pan into
the fire', for catarrh, which was then very prevalent, attacked my sheep,
and carried off 40 per night in each flock. Despite
these drawbacks, I have often sighed during my long official life for the
return of those ever-to-be-remembered days, with 'each maid a heroine and
each man a friend’. When
at Mannas my neighbour
was Mr. John Stewart, the celebrated veterinary surgeon, and eventually,
M.L.C. He
sold out to a Mr. Gale. The Robinsons were at Coppabella Creek,
whither we went once a week for our mails. Mr.
Sydney Grandison Watson was on the 'Edward', I think; Mr. John (Swampy)
Hay on the Upper Hume, below the Harveys. They
married two of the Robinson girls. Mr. H. A. Thompson was at Meragle, Mr. James Garland at Tooma,
and Mr. (afterwards Sit John) Hay, of the firm of Hay and Ohalmera,
at Wallaregang, whence one had a view of Kosolusko and its snowclad
peak. Mr.
Love, the father of the well known family of that name, who also married a
Miss Robinson, lived on the road from Mannas to Djhindjelloc. Retracing
our steps, we find Mr. Jonathan Goldspink at Bago, Mr. Rutherford at Billapalap
(a station of Mr. Hugh Gordon's, of Manar), Mr.
John M 'Arthur at Oberon, Mr. Charles M 'Arthur at Nackie
Nackie, Mr. Peter Stuckey at Willie Ploma, Mr. Fred Vyner (who also
married a Miss Robinson of the family aforesaid), Mr. Rose, and Mr. Rowland
Shelley, at the 'Doomut-th', and Mr. Rusden
(afterwards Clerk of the Parliaments, Melbourne) at Mingay.
Mr.
Rowland Shelley married a Miss Peters, one of two sisters, the highly
educated, daughters of a Lieutenant Peters, who in May, 1836, came in the
same ship with me and other passengers. There was also a son - Frederic - and
he settled somewhere in the district now known as Riverina.
We
had in those days fairly rough times of it, but
there was an enjoyable sense of freedom about it, and a desire to dispense
our rough hospitality, not understood or appreciated by town-bred persons. 'What delight to back the flying steed' and make 'the welkin tremble' with a crack of one's stock-whip! This
reminds me that most singularly I found the address of 'Packer's Ned', the famous stock-whip maker, who lived at
Gundaroo in 1836. He promised to send me a whip of the
old-time shape. to show the Royal personages who
lately visited our shores, but to my disappointment, although of an orthodox
length, of an enlarged four-in-hand pattern. Is
there a stock-whip of an early date to be had? Jerry Leary, your townsman,
mentioned by Mr. Gormly, is always interesting to me as having been
associated with me in my early history. The
whole of the family - father, mother, sons, and daughter of daughters, came
to Yarrowlumla - Sir Terence Murray's - in the
early forties. Arthur
is a well-to-do man near Gunning, where I had the pleasure of seeing him some
months ago. I
have lost sight of Johnny and Katherine. In 1891 I was with a Parliamentary
party at the Tumut (Doomut-th), and we called at
the aboriginal camp at Brungle. I
asked one of the elder of the men if he knew the songs - a copy of which I
enclose. He
said yes, and to the astonishment of my fellow travellers,
and to the blacks also, I sang them with him. I
have often wondered how they came back to my memory. I have written them down
as orthographically as I could, but no white man could pronounce the words
with- out so hearing them by a black-fellow. I
was in the Coolalomin caves in the early forties
with Sir Terence Murray, but not in those of Yarrangobilly.
He
was in the caves, as he says in a letter to me of November, 1839, from Bongongo, where he had cattle: - 'I examined some of the caves of Arrangarran,
and found a number of human bones in one of them, and I brought back a skull.
This may have found its way into the Museum. It was for years at Yarrowlumla'. He
further says: - 'I never saw any
portion of the colony covered with grass so luxuriantly as this; it is a
pleasure to see and ride through it'. This
was after the great drought ending in or about July, 1839. It
is to be hoped that this drought will terminate in like manner. One
night we camped at the foot of the Boogong
Mountain, famed for the congregation of the moth of
that name. The
blacks at a particular time of the year used to make for this place, scoop
the insects into a sheet of bark, knead them into a dough,
bake, fatten upon them, and come down from the mountain obese and shiny. A
visitation of this insect took place in Sydney about 34 or 35 years ago, and
filled the late Rev. Mr. Clarke's church at St. Leonard's. The
swarm could be distinctly heard overhead making its way there. |