‘No, faith. He would need to be a smart fellow to stand before Charley if he kept him humbugging about when the bark was empty and the whaling gear in trim. But you are not shipped as an A.B. anywhere as yet. Make the most of your young life, Ernest, my boy―it won’t come twice.’ ‘There is a time for all things,’ rejoined Mr. Neuchamp, who had small reverence for play in the abstract; ‘I came to Australia principally for work, and I shall be uneasy until I am fairly in harness. But without beating about the bush, I am impatient to purchase a place of my own, and unless you are inexorably averse to the step, in which case I should give in, I feel the strongest desire to make a start on my own account.’ ‘Why won’t you be content to sail by my orders for a while?’ said Paul, much disturbed. ‘If you knew how many young fellows I have seen ruined all for the want of a little delay, for want of following the caution I have given you, you would not be in such a hurry to risk your fortune on a throw.’ ‘But consider,’ said Ernest, perceiving, as he thought, a slight sign of compromise in Paul’s candid face, ‘I am not exactly like other young fellows, with the same intentions. I have had in reality more experience in the time of my novitiate than they have had in double the period. I have had road work, station work, sheep and cattle management. I have had, from peculiar circumstances, more than ordinary advantages of practical teaching, and I do myself consider that unless I am duller than ordinary, I may be trusted to manage a moderate-sized cattle station, if you will help me with your advice in the purchase.’ ‘Well, I don’t know,’ said Paul, passing through into the verandah, and lighting the cigar of reflection, ‘I don’t know but that, as you say, you have had rather more luck than common in your apprenticeship. You have been before the mast, too, as we say on board ship, and that is a great help. You are as steady as a church. That’s all to the good, no doubt. But what I am afraid of is a sudden turn in prices―stock can hardly be lower, to be sure. Well, well―you can only risk it. But I don’t want to see you, as I have seen many a good fellow, lose his money and the best years of his life, and either die, go to the devil, or settle down to the banishment of an overseer’s berth.’ ‘Like poor old Geoffrey Hasbene,’ said Ernest; ‘I don’t think I could quite endure that, though the old fellow is resigned enough.’ ‘I remember him well enough,’ said Paul; ‘it’s a good while since I heard his name. I have seen him ruffling it with the best, and the owner of a good station. He was not very fast either.’ ‘And what ruined him?’ ‘Partly bad luck, partly a careless, easy-going disposition. He thought more of his house, his stables, and his garden than he did of his stock, and that was the end of it. Mind you take warning by him.’