Preoccupied with these minute but necessary details, he did not observe that another man had, like him, selected the spot as appropriate to rest, if not to refreshment. The personage whom he so suddenly descried was not pedestrianising, like him, as two serviceable roadsters grazed within a few yards, their fore legs confined by the short chain attached to two leather straps, which had more than once attracted his attention in his travels. In one respect the new traveller differed from any other wayfarer whom Mr. Neuchamp had as yet encountered; for, in spite of the inconveniences to which his late incautious acceptance of companionship had subjected him, he could not refrain from a close examination of the stranger. The unknown was apparently not about to make or to drink a pot of tea. Neither was he smoking, preparing to smoke, nor obviously having just finished smoking. ‘Good-morning,’ said this person, bending a pair of exceedingly keen gray eyes upon Ernest. ‘Travelling early, like myself. Bound for Nubba?’ ‘Yes!’ answered Ernest. ‘Going any farther?’ ‘As far as Garrandilla,’ he replied. ‘Humph!’ said the new acquaintance. ‘I suppose you were at Boonamarran last night. I left Boree station early, and am going on as soon as my horses have had another half-hour’s picking at this patch of good feed.’ ‘Have you breakfasted yet?’ inquired Ernest. ‘Well, I’m not particular about a meal or two,’ cheerfully replied the stranger. ‘I can always find a salad, and with a crust of bread I can manage to get along.’ ‘Salad in the bush?’ asked Ernest, with astonishment. ‘I never heard of any before.’ ‘There’s always plenty, if you know where to look for it,’ gravely answered the stranger; ‘only men in this country are a deal more fond of making for the nearest public-house than of studying the book of nature, and learning what it teaches them. No man need fast in this country if he knows anything about the herbage and the plants he’s always riding and trampling over.’ ‘You amaze me!’ said Ernest; ‘I always thought people ate nothing but meat in this country.’ ‘When you’ve been longer in Australia’ (Ernest groaned) ‘you’ll find out, by degrees, that there’s a deal of difference in people here, much as, I suppose, there is in other countries. See here,’ he continued, taking up and cropping with great relish a succulent-looking bunch of greens, ‘here’s a real good wholesome cabbage—warrigal cabbage, the shepherds call it. Here’s another,’ uprooting a long dark-green fibrous-looking wild endive. ‘As long as you’ve these two and marshmallow sprout, you can’t starve. Many a pound it’s saved me, and you may take my word for it there’s more money made in this country by saving than by profits. I suppose you’re going to learn colonial experience at Garrandilla.’ ‘How can he know that?’ thought Mr. Neuchamp. ‘These people seem to guess correctly about everything concerning _me_, while I am continually deceived about them.’