On the following morning they breakfasted together in much comfort, and then separated, as so many pleasant chance comrades are compelled to do in this life. The Government official drove off in his buggy to visit another line of road, while Mr. Neuchamp, full of hope and rich with the gathered spoils of his late adventure, paced cheerily along the high road to fortune and the mystical desert interior. Halting at mid-day by a watercourse favourably situated for temporary rest and refreshment, he heard the half-forgotten words of a favourite operatic air trolled forth by a rich voice with unusual effect and precision. Looking round for the performer, he descried, lying under a noble casuarina tree, the roots of which spread halfway across the little creek, a tall man, whose worn and somewhat shabby habiliments were strongly at variance with the distinction of his air and the aristocratic cast of his features. Beside him was a small black camp kettle, from which he had been preparing the usual traveller’s refreshment of ‘quartpot tea.’ He was smoking, of course, and as he half raised himself and saluted Ernest, that observer of human nature thought he had rarely seen a more striking countenance. ‘In which direction are you travelling?’ inquired Mr. Neuchamp. ‘Towards Nubba,’ said the unknown, ‘and a devilish dull track it is. Do you happen, by any chance, to be going there?’ ‘My route lies past that place, I believe. As we are both apparently on a walking tour we may as well be fellow-travellers, if you have no objection.’ ‘Most happy, I am sure,’ assented the stranger, with the ease of a man of the world; ‘one so rarely has the pleasure of having a gentleman for a comrade in this part of the creation. May I offer you some tea? Sorry to say my flask is empty.’ ‘Many thanks—I prefer the tea. Perhaps, on the other hand, you will make trial of part of my provender?’ Here Mr. Neuchamp exhibited an ample store of solids, which he had had the foresight to bring with him, and the stranger, after observing that the brisk air gave one a most surprising appetite, made so respectable a meal that he would almost have fancied that tea and tobacco had alone composed that repast which he had just finished. The mid-day halt over, the newly-made acquaintances took the road with great cheerfulness, and, on Ernest’s part, a considerable accession of spirits. ‘Here,’ thought he, ‘is one of those happy contretemps that so rarely occur—out of books—in an old country. There, if you did meet a man, under these circumstances, you would be afraid to speak to him until you had actually gauged his social position and standing. Here, now, is a gentleman evidently of culture, travel, refinement, who, like me, prefers from time to time to lead this half-gipsy, half-hunter life entirely for the pleasure of unconventional sensations.’