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Confessions of a Beachcomber

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records. It was a fierce and clamorous competition, and the enterprise flourished. A good beginning had been made, and the high-minded hens chuckled with pride and satisfaction. In the course of two or three months, however, a gradual deterioration in the size of the eggs took place. There was just the same amount of fuss and feathers, showing the artfulness of the hens, but the eggs soon dwindled down below plans and specifications, and then an investigation took place. Not a single nest egg was to be found. Vainly was search made. The hens sniggered. They had fulfilled their duty, and finding it tiresome and wearing to produce abnormal eggs, had secreted those set apart for them to measure by, and had thereupon levelled their enterprise and skill down. Such sinfulness and such burglarious conduct on the part of respectable hens that had the most discreet upbringing, that had never been allowed to play in anybody else's yard, and that had never been permitted to wander from the paths of virtue, was a sore affliction. But one day a nest egg was found far away in the bush, and then another a quarter of mile from the yard in the creek. Again another was discovered underneath a hollow log. Being restored to accustomed places with due ceremony, and in sight of all the hens in convention assembled, a gratifying change in the size of eggs produced resulted in a few days, but again a slump set in. The nest eggs had disappeared, and the hens were fulfilling their contract anyhow. Other nest eggs of prescribed dimensions were taken out of stock; and a yet more wonderful thing happened! One morning about fowl-feeding time a great cry arose. "Sen-ake!" "Sen-ake!" Yes, there was a snake. About half--the latter half--its length was visible outside the back of a nesting place (a box open at the front), and a blow from a shovel disabled it. Further examination showed that the snake had squeezed through a knot hole in the box. A lusty man hauled on the snake violently. The box was heavy, and from the front the snake could be seen. It looked troubled and uncomfortable, but not inclined to back out, although the inducement in that direction was considerable. Eventually the snake parted; and in the latter half there was a bulge. Dissection revealed--What--marvellous! a nest egg. But why did the snake show such reluctance to leave the box? The first or forward half was hooked out from among the straw, and there was another oval distention--another nest egg! The snake had discovered elsewhere a china egg, had swallowed it, and then crawled in at the knot hole, and got outside another. Escape was impossible. until the problem was solved by halving. There are no more accusations of dishonourable motives on the part of the hens in doing away with the porcelain patterns to escape the arduous duty of laying. It was all the fault of the serpent. Now the serpent is not wise, for any nest egg beguiles him. It takes a long while to digest such hardware. Traps are now laid for him. An egg of china is put in a box, the open part of which is covered with small mesh-wire netting. The snake submits to the temptation of the egg coyly resting on a bunch of grass, and having made it its own, cannot let go. Then comes abhorred fate in the shape of a gleeful man with a long-handled shovel, and the end of the snake is piece--s. ADVENTURE WITH A CROCODILE "Cooling of the air with sighs, In an odd angle of the Isle." Now to proceed with the deliberate intention of dragging by the ears into these pages a crocodile yarn. We have not a single "alligator" in Australia, our crocodiles being wrongly so called, but this perversity of nomenclature does not affect the anecdote. To tell of the coast of Queensland, and to omit reference to an adventure with one of those wary beasts would be to court criticism likely to cast a shadow upon the veracity of more than one of the incidents and occurrences herein to be chronicled. I approach the duty to the readers as well as to myself with diffidence, for has it not been stated that these pages were fated to be unsensational and unromantic, and can any one imagine an unsensational adventure with a crocodile? Therein lie the virtue of and the apology for this story. If the reader will take the trouble to scan the revised chart of the Island, he will notice on the eastern coast an indentation entitled "Panjoo," which, in the language of the blacks, seems to indicate "nice place." A steep grassy slope comes down to the sea, separated therefrom by a line of pandanus palms. To the north is a jungle-covered spur, along the foot of which is a palm-tree gully; to the south a ridge with low-growing, wind-bent acacias. The gully enters the boulder-strewn inlet under the shade of much leafage. The great Pacific gurgles at the base of giant rocks, among which a ragged palm (CARYOTA) bears immense bunches of yellow insipid fruit, each containing two coffee-like berries. Panjoo is a favourite objective, for it may be approached from various directions, each pleasant, but as a resort for a crocodile it is about as unpromising a locality as could be imagined. Thither one bright November morning we ("Paddy," the most silent and alert of black boys, and myself) went. The tide was out, and we found a comparatively easy track close to the margin of the sea, having occasionally to wade through shallow pools and to clamber over rocks thickly studded with limpets. Years gone by a huge log of pencil cedar had been cast among the boulders at Panjoo, and as I looked at the log "Paddy" with a start indicated the presence of a novelty--a crocodile apparently in repose, with its head in the shadow of a boulder. I was carrying a pea rifle more for company than for anything else; for "Paddy," though of a most cheerful disposition, never made remarks. His conversation for the most part was compounded of eloquent looks and expressive gestures. A monosyllable to him was a laborious sentence; four or five words a speech. Once upon a time, it is said, a youthful German inadvertently blundered into a railway carriage reserved for Moltke. The glare of the great man brought three words of respectful apology for the intrusion. The great man exclaimed with an air of exasperated boredom--"Insufferable talker!"--of course, all in German. "Paddy," like Moltke, was,

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