Shearing In The Riverina, New South Wales
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Rolf Boldrewood [Thomas Alexander Browne] (1826 1915) >> Shearing In The Riverina, New South Wales
SHEARING IN THE RIVERINA, NEW SOUTH WALES.
"Shearing commences to-morrow!" These apparently simple words were
spoken by Hugh Gordon, the manager of Anabanco station, in the district
of Riverina, in the colony of New South Wales, one Monday morning in
the month of August. The utterance had its importance to every member
of a rather extensive "CORPS DRAMATIQUE" awaiting the industrial drama
about to be performed.
A low sand-hill a few years since had looked out over a sea of grey
plains, covered partly with grass, partly with salsiferous bushes and
herbs. Two or three huts built of the trunks of the pine and roofed
with the bark of the box-tree, and a skeleton-looking cattle-yard with
its high "gallows" (a rude timber stage whereon to hang slaughtered
cattle) alone broke the monotony of the plain-ocean. A comparatively
small herd of cattle, 2000 or 3000, found more than sufficient
pasturage during the short winter and spring, but were always compelled
to migrate to mountain pastures when the swamps, which alone in those
days formed the water-stores of the run, were dried up. But two or
three, or at most half-a-dozen, stockmen were ever needed for the
purpose of managing the herd, so inadequate in number and profitable
occupation to this vast tract of grazing country.
But, a little later, one of the great chiefs of the wool-producing
interest--a shepherd-king, so to speak, of shrewdness, energy, and
capital--had seen, approved and purchased the lease of this waste
kingdom. Almost at once, as if by magic, the scene changed. Great gangs
of navvies appeared, wending their way across the silent plain. Dams
were made, wells were dug. Tons of fencing wire were dropped on the
sand by the long line of teams which seemed never tired of arriving.
Sheep by thousands, and tens of thousands, began to come, grazing and
cropping up to the lonely sandhill--now swarming with blacksmiths,
carpenters, engineers, fencers, shepherds, bullock-drivers--till the
place looked like a fair on the borders of Tartary.
Meanwhile everything was moving with calculated force and cost, under
the "reign of law". The seeming expense was merely the economic truth
of doing all the necessary work at once, rather than by instalments.
One hundred men for one day rather than one man for one hundred days.
Results soon began to demonstrate themselves. In twelve months the dams
were full, the wells sending up their far-fetched priceless water, the
wire fences erected, the shepherds gone, and 17,000 sheep cropping the
herbage of Anabanco. Tuesday was the day fixed for the actual
commencement of the momentous, almost solemn transaction--the pastoral
Hegira, so to speak, as the time of most station events is
calculated with reference to it, as happening before or after shearing.
But before the first shot is fired which tells of the battle begun,
what raids and skirmishes, what reconnoitring and vedette duty must
take place!
First arrives the cook-in-chief to the shearers, with two assistants to
lay in a few provisions for the week's consumption of 70 able-bodied
men. I must here explain that the cook of a large shearing-shed is a
highly paid and tolerably irresponsible official. He is paid and
provided by the shearers. Payment is generally arranged on the scale of
half-a-crown a head weekly from each shearer. For this sum he must
provide punctual and effective cooking, paying out of his own pocket as
many "marmitons" as may be needful for that end, and to satisfy his
tolerably exacting and fastidious employers.
In the present case he confers with the storekeeper, Mr de Vere, a
young gentleman of aristocratic connexions who is thus gaining an
excellent practical knowledge of the working of a large station and to
this end has the store-keeping department entrusted to him during
shearing.
He does not perhaps look quite fit for a croquet party as he stands
now, with a flour-scoop in one hand and a pound of tobacco in the
other. But he looks like a man at work, and also like a gentleman, as
he is. "Jack the Cook" thus addresses him:
"Now, Mr de Vere, I hope there's not going to be any humbugging about
my rations and things! The men are all up in their quarters, and as
hungry as free selectors. They've been a-payin' for their rations for
ever so long, and of course now shearing's on, they're good for a
little extra!"
"All right, Jack," returns de Vere, good-temperedly, "all your lot was
weighed out and sent away before breakfast. You must have missed the
cart. Here's the list. I'll read it out to you: three bags flour, half
a bullock, two bags sugar, a chest of tea, four dozen of pickles, four
dozen of jam, two gallons of vinegar, five pounds pepper, a bag of
salt, plates, knives, forks, ovens, frying-pans, saucepans, iron pots,
and about a hundred other things. Now, mind you, return all the cooking
things safe, or PAY FOR THEM--that's the order! You don't want
anything more, do you? You've got enough for a regiment of cavalry, I
should think."
"Well, I don't know. There won't be much left in a week if the weather
holds good," makes answer the chef, as one who thought nothing too
stupendous to be accomplished by shearers, "but I knew I'd forgot
something. As I'm here I'll take a few dozen boxes of sardines, and a
case of pickled salmon. The boys likes 'em, and, murder alive! haven't
we forgot the plums and currants? A hundredweight of each, Mr de Vere!
They'll be crying out for plum-duff and currant buns for the afternoon;
and bullying the life out of me, if I haven't a few trifles like. It's
a hard life, surely, a shearers' cook. Well, good-bye, sir, you have
'em all down in the book."
Lest the reader should imagine that the role of Mr Gordon at
Anabanco was a reign of luxury and that waste which tendeth to penury,
let him be aware that all shearers in Riverina are paid at a certain
rate, usually that of ONE pound per hundred sheep shorn. They agree, on
the other hand, to pay for all supplies consumed by them at certain
prices fixed before the shearing agreement is signed. Hence, it is
entirely their own affair whether their mess bills are extravagant or
economical. They can have anything within the rather wide range of the
station store. PATES DE FOIE GRAS, ortolans, roast ostrich, novels,
top-boots, double-barrelled guns, IF THEY LIKE TO PAY FOR THEM--with
one exception. No wine, no spirits! Neither are they permitted to bring
these stimulants "on to the grounds" for their private use. Grog at
shearing? Matches in a powder-mill! It's very sad and bad; but our
Anglo-Saxon industrial or defensive champion cannot be trusted with the
fire-water. Navvies, men-of-war's men, soldiers, AND shearers--fine
fellows all. But though the younger men might only drink in moderation,
the majority and the older men are utterly without self-control once in
the front of temptation. And wars, 'wounds without cause,' hot heads,
shaking hands, delay and bad shearing, would be the inevitable results
of spirits A LA DISCRETION. So much is this a matter of certainty from
experience that a clause is inserted, and cheerfully signed, in most
shearing agreements, "that any man getting drunk or bringing spirits on
to the station during shearing, LOSES THE WHOLE OF the money earned by
him." The men know that the restriction is for their benefit, as well
as for the interest of the master, and join in the prohibition
heartily.
Let us give a glance at the small army of working-men assembled at
Anabanco--one out of hundreds of stations in the colony of New South
Wales, ranging from 100,000 sheep downwards. There are seventy
shearers; about fifty washers, including the men connected with the
steam-engine, boilers, bricklayers and the like; ten or twelve
boundary-riders, whose duty it is to ride round the large paddocks,
seeing that the fences are all intact, and keeping a general look-out
over the condition of the sheep; three or four overseers; half-a-dozen
young gentlemen acquiring a practical knowledge of sheep-farming, or,
as it is generally phrased, "colonial experience"--a comprehensive
expression enough; a score or two of teamsters, with a couple of
hundred horses or bullocks, waiting for the high-piled wool bales,
which are loaded up and sent away almost as soon as shorn;
wool-sorters, pickers-up, pressers, yardsmen, extra shepherds. It may
easily be gathered from this outline what an 'army with banners' is
arrayed at Anabanco. While statistically inclined, it may be added that
the cash due for the shearing alone (less the mess bill) amounts to
1700 pounds; for the washing (roughly), 400 pounds, exclusive of
provisions consumed, hutting, wood, water, cooking. Carriage of wool
1500 pounds. Other hands from 30 pounds to 40 pounds per week. All of
which disbursements take place within from eight to twelve weeks after
the shears are in the first sheep.
Tuesday comes "big with fate." As the sun tinges the far
skyline, the shearers are taking a slight refection of coffee and
currant buns to enable them to withstand the exhausting interval
between six and eight o'clock, when the serious breakfast occurs.
Shearers always diet themselves on the principle that the more they eat
the stronger they must be. Digestion, as preliminary to muscular
development, is left to take its chance. They certainly do get through
a tremendous amount of work. The whole frame is at its utmost tension,
early and late. But the preservation of health is due to their natural
strength of constitution rather than to their profuse and unscientific
diet. Half-an-hour after sunrise Mr Gordon walks quietly into the vast
building which contains the sheep and their shearers--called "the
shed," par excellence. Everything is in perfect cleanliness and order--the
floor swept and smooth, with its carefully planed boards of pale
yellow aromatic pine. Small tramways, with baskets for the fleeces, run
the wool up to the wool tables, superseding the more general plan of
hand picking. At each side of the shed floor are certain small areas,
four or five feet square, such space being found by experience to be
sufficient for the postures and gymnastics practised during the
shearing of a sheep. Opposite to each square is an aperture,
communicating with a long narrow paled yard, outside of the shed.
Through this each man pops his sheep when shorn, where he remains in
company with the others shorn by the same hand, until counted out. This
being done by the overseer or manager supplies a check upon hasty or
unskilful work. The body of the woolshed, floored with battens placed
half an inch apart, is filled with the woolly victims. This enclosure
is subdivided into minor pens, of which each fronts the place of two
shearers, who catch from it until the pen is empty. When this takes
place, a man for the purpose refills its. As there are local
advantages, an equitable distribution of places for shearing has to be
made by lot.
On every subdivision stands a shearer, as Mr Gordon walks, with an air
of calm authority, down the long aisle. Seventy men, chiefly in their
prime, the flower of the working-men of the colony, they are variously
gathered. England, Ireland, and Scotland are represented in the
proportion of one half of the number; the other half is composed of
native-born Australians.
Among these last--of pure Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Celtic descent--are to
be seen some of the finest men, physically considered, the race is
capable of producing. Taller than their British-born brethren, with
softer voices and more regular features, they inherit the powerful
frames and unequalled muscular development of the breed. Leading lives
chiefly devoted to agricultural labour, they enjoy larger intervals of
leisure than is permissible to the labouring classes of Europe. The
climate is mild, and favourable to health. They have been accustomed
from childhood to abundance of the best food; opportunities of
intercolonial travel are frequent and common. Hence the
Anglo-Australian labourer without, on the one hand, the sharpened
eagerness which marks his Transatlantic cousin, has yet an air
of independence and intelligence, combined with a natural grace of
movement, unknown to the peasantry of Britain.
An idea is prevalent that the Australians are, as a race, physically
inferior to the British. It is asserted that they grow too fast, tend
to height and slenderness, and do not possess adequate stamina and
muscle. The idea is erroneous. The men reared in the cities on the
seaboard, living sedentary lives in shops, banks, or counting-houses,
are doubtless more or less pale and slight of form. So are they who
live under such conditions all over the world. But those youngsters who
have followed the plough on the upland farms, or lived a wilder life on
the stations of the far interior, who have had their fill of wheaten
bread and beefsteaks since they could walk, and snuffed up the free
bush breezes from infancy, they are MEN.--
Stout of heart and ready of hand,
As e'er drove prey from Cumberland;
--a business, I may remark, at which many of them would have
distinguished themselves.
Take Abraham Lawson as he stands there in a natural and unstudied
attitude, 6 feet 4 inches in his stockings, wide-chested, stalwart,
with a face like that of a Greek statue. Take Billy May, fair-haired,
mild, insouciant, almost languid, till you see him at work. Then,
again, Jack Windsor, handsome, saucy, and wiry as a bull-terrier and
like him with strong natural inclination for the combat; good for any
man of his weight, or a trifle over, with the gloves or without.
It is curious to note how the old English practice of settling disputes
with nature's weapons has taken root in Australia. It would 'gladden
the sullen souls' of the defunct gladiators to watch two lads, whose
fathers had never trodden England's soil, pull off their jackets and go
to work "hammer and tongs," with all the savage silence of the true
island type.
It is now about seven o'clock. Mr Gordon moves forward. As he does so,
every man leans towards the open door of the pen in front of which he
stands. The bell sounds! With the first stroke each one of the seventy
men has sprung upon a sheep--has drawn it out--placed its head across
his knee--and is working his shears as if the "last man out" was to be
flogged, or tarred and feathered at the least. Four minutes--James
Steadman, who learned last year, has shorn down one side of his sheep;
Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are well down the other sides of theirs;
when Billy May raises himself with a jerking sigh, and releases his
sheep, perfectly clean-shorn from the nose to the heels, through the
aperture of his separate enclosure. With the same effort apparently he
calls out 'Wool!' and darts upon another sheep. Drawing this second
victim across his knee, he buries his shear-points in the long wool of
its neck. A moment after a lithe and eager boy has gathered up fleece
number one, and tossed it into the train-basket, the shearer is halfway
down the sheep's side, the wool hanging in one fleece like a great
glossy mat, before you have done wondering whether he did really
shear the first sheep, or whether he had not a ready-shorn one in his
coat-sleeve--like a conjuror.
By this time Jack Holmes and Gundagai Bill are 'out,' or finished; and
the cry of "Wool!' Wool!" seems to run continuously up and down the
long aisles of the shed, like a single note upon some rude instrument.
Now and then the "refrain" is varied by "Tar!" being shouted instead,
when a piece of skin is snipped off as well as the wool. Great healing
properties are attributed to this extract in the shed. And if a shearer
slice off a piece of flesh from his own person, as occasionally
happens, he gravely anoints it with the universal remedy, and considers
that the onus then lies with Providence, there being no more that man
can do. Though little time is lost, the men are by no means up to the
speed which they will attain in a few days, when in full practice and
training. Their nerve, muscle, eye, endurance, will be all at, so to
speak, concert-pitch, and sheep after sheep will be shorn with a
precision and celerity even awful to the unprofessional observer.
The unpastoral reader may be informed that speed and completeness of
denudation are the grand desiderata in shearing; the employer thinks
principally of the latter, the shearer principally of the former. To
adjust equitably the proportion is one of those incomplete aspirations
which torment humanity. Hence the contest--old as human society--
between labour and capital.
This is the first day. According to old-established custom, a kind of
truce obtains. It is before the battle, the "salut," when no hasty word
or too demonstrative action can be suffered by the canons of good
taste. Red Bill, Flash Jack, Jem the Scooper, and other roaring blades,
more famous for expedition than faithful manipulation, are shearing
today with a painstaking precision, as of men to whom character is
everything.
Mr Gordon marches softly up and down, regarding the shearers with a
paternal and gratified expression, occasionally hinting at slight
improvements of style, or expressing unqualified approval as a sheep is
turned out shaven rather than shorn. All goes on well. Nothing is heard
but expressions of goodwill and enthusiasm for the general welfare. It
is a triumph of the dignity of labour.
One o'clock. Mr Gordon moved on to the bell and sounded it. At the
first stroke several men on their way to the pens stopped abruptly and
began to put on their coats. One fellow of an alert nature (Master Jack
Windsor) had just finished his sheep and was sharpening his shears,
when his eye caught Mr Gordon's form in proximity to the final bell.
With a bound like a wild cat, he reached the pen and drew out his sheep
a bare second before the first stroke, amidst the laughter and
congratulations of his comrades. Another man had his hand on the
pen-gate at the same instant, but by the Median law was compelled to
return sheepless. He was cheered, but ironically. Those whose sheep
were in an unfinished stage quietly completed them; the others moving
off to their huts, where their board literally smoked with
abundance.
An hour passed. The meal was concluded; the smoke was over; and the
more careful men were back in the shed sharpening their shears by two
o'clock. Punctually at that hour the bell repeated its summons DE CAPO.
The warm afternoon gradually lengthened its shadows; the shears clicked
in tireless monotone; the pens filled and became empty. The
wool-presses yawned for the mountain of fleeces which filled the bins
in front of them, divided into various grades of excellence, and
continuously disgorged them, neatly and cubically packed and branded.
At six o'clock the bell brought the day's work to a close. The sheep of
each man were counted in his presence, and noted down with scrupulous
care, the record being written out in full and hung up for public
inspection in the shed next day. This important ceremony over, master
and men, manager, labourers and supernumeraries, betook themselves to
their separate abodes, with such keen avoidance of delay that in five
minutes not a soul was left in or near the great building lately so
busy and populous, except the boys who were sweeping up the floor. The
silence of ages seems to fall and settle upon it.
Next morning at a rather earlier hour every man is at his post.
Business is meant decidedly. Now commences the delicate and difficult
part of the superintendence which keeps Mr Gordon at his post in the
shed, nearly from daylight till dark, for from eight to ten weeks.
During the first day he has formed a sort of gauge of each man's temper
and workmanship. For now, and henceforth, the natural bias of each
shearer will appear. Some try to shear too fast, and in their haste
shear badly. Some are rough and savage with the sheep, which do
occasionally kick and become unquiet at critical times; and it must be
confessed are provoking enough. Some shear very fairly and handsomely
to a superficial eye, but commit the unpardonable offence of "leaving
wool on." Some are deceitful, shearing carefully when overlooked, but
"racing" and otherwise misbehaving directly the eye of authority is
diverted. These and many other tricks and defects require to be noted
and abated, quietly but firmly, by the manager of the shed--firmly
because evil would develop and spread ruinously if not checked; quietly
because immense loss might be incurred by a strike. Shearing differs
from other work in this wise: it is work against time, more especially
in Riverina. If the wool be not off the backs of the sheep before
November, all sorts of draw-backs and destructions supervene. The
spear-shaped grass-seeds, specially formed as if in special collusion
with the Evil One, hasten to bury themselves in the wool, and even in
the flesh of the tender victims. Dust rises in red clouds from the
unmoistened, betrampled meadows so lately verdurous and
flower-spangled. From snowy white to an unlovely dark brown turn the
carefully washed fleeces, causing anathema from overseers and
depreciation from brokers. All these losses of temper, trouble, and
money become inevitable if shearing be protracted, it may be, beyond a
given week.
Hence, as in harvest with a short allowance of fair weather,
discipline must be tempered with diplomacy. Lose your temper, and be
over particular: off go Billy May, Abraham Lawson, and half-a-dozen of
your best men, making a weekly difference of perhaps two or three
thousand sheep for the remainder of the shearing. Can you not replace
them? Not so! Every shed in Riverina will be hard at work during this
present month of September and for every hour of October. Till that
time not a shearer will come to your gate, except, perhaps, one or two
useless, characterless men. Are you to tolerate bad workmanship? Not
that either. But try all other means with your men before you resort to
harshness; and be quite certain that your sentence is just, and that
you can afford the defection.
So our friend Mr Gordon, wise from many tens of thousands of shorn
sheep that have been counted out past his steady eye, criticises
temperately, but watchfully. He reproves sufficiently, and no more, any
glaring fault; makes his calculation as to who are really bad shearers,
and can be discharged without loss to the commonwealth, or who can
shear fairly and can be coached up to a decent average. One division,
slow, and good only when slow, have to be watched lest they emulate
"the talent," and so come to grief. Then "the talent" has to be mildly
admonished from time to time lest they force the pace, set a bad
example, and lure the other men on to "racing." This last leads to
slovenly shearing, ill-usage of the sheep, and general dissatisfaction.
Tact, temper, patience, and firmness are each and all necessary in that
Captain of Industry who has the very delicate and important task of
superintending a large woolshed. Hugh Gordon had shown all in such
proportion as would have made a distinguished man anywhere, had fortune
not adjusted for him this particular profession. Calm with the
consciousness of strength, he was kind and considerate in manner as in
nature, until provoked by glaring dishonesty or incivility. Then the
lion part of his nature woke up, so that it commonly went ill with the
aggressor. As this was matter of public report, he had little occasion
to spoil the repose of his bearing. Day succeeds day, and for a
fortnight the machinery goes on smoothly and successfully. The sheep
arrive at an appointed day and hour by detachments and regiments at the
washpen. They depart thence, like good boys on Saturday night, redolent
of soap and water, and clean to a fault. They enter the shed white and
flossy as newly combed poodles to emerge, on the way back to their
pasturage, slim, delicate, agile, with a bright black A legibly branded
with tar on their paper-white skins.
The Anabanco world--stiffish but undaunted--is turning out of bed one
morning. Ha! what sounds are these? And why does the room look so dark?
Rain, as I'm alive. "Hurrah!" says Master Jack Bowles, one of the young
gentlemen. He is learning (more or less) practical sheep-farming,
preparatory to having (one of these days) an Anabanco of his own.
"Well, this is a change, and I'm not sorry for one," quoth Mr.
Jack, "I'm stiff all over. No one can stand such work long. Won't the
shearers growl! No shearing to-day, and perhaps none tomorrow either."
Truth to tell, Mr Bowles' sentiments are not confined to his ingenuous
bosom. Some of the shearers grumble at being stopped "just as a man was
earning a few shillings." Those who are in top pace and condition don't
like it. But to many of the rank and file--working up to and a little
beyond their strength--with whom swelled wrists and other protests of
nature are becoming apparent, it is a relief, and they are glad of the
respite. So at dinner-time all the sheep in the sheds, put in overnight
in anticipation of such a contingency, are reported shorn. All hands
are then idle for the rest of the day. The shearers dress and avail
themselves of various resources. Some go to look at their horses, now
in clover, or its equivalent, in the Riverina graminetum. Some play
cards, others wash or mend their clothes. A large proportion of the
Australians having armed themselves with paper, envelopes, and a
shilling's worth of stamps from the store, bethink themselves of
neglected or desirable correspondents. Many a letter for Mrs Leftalone,
Wallaroo Creek, or Miss Jane Sweetapple, Honeysuckle Flat, as the case
may be, will find its way into the post-bag tomorrow. A pair of
youngsters are having a round or two with the gloves; while to complete
the variety of recreations compatible with life at a woolshed, a
selected troupe are busy in the comparative solitude of that building,
at a rehearsal of a tragedy and a farce, with which they intend, the
very next rainy day, to astonish the population of Anabanco.