The emu also lent itself to the excitement of the chase during the tour. The big brown wingless bird much the size and shape of the ostrich, is quite unable even to jump, but runs as fast as a horse can gallop, and when pursued will charge a barbed wire fence so hard as to break its way through, its feathers protecting it from being seriously torn. It is on this account not beloved by the squatter, but it is seldom shot. The Prince brought away with him two newly hatched emu chickens, creatures the size of ducks and prettily marked in shades of black and fawn. Their quarters on the _Renown_ were in a roomy cage on the superstructure, where they soon established a reputation as quiet, sober and well-behaved members of the ship's company. On several of his expeditions the Prince was given a meal in the bush camp fashion. One of these was on the shady banks of a stream twenty-five miles from a station, from which he had ridden out in the morning accompanied by sons of his hosts. Here quantities of dead gum-tree trunks were quietly burning, and were made use of for grilling chops and making billy tea. The latter is quite unlike and, to the hungry rider, infinitely preferable to the teapot variety. A tin-can is filled at the nearest water-hole and is carried to a burning tree trunk, on which it is gingerly balanced, usually with the aid of a stick, the tree trunk being as a rule too hot to reach without one. The water boils with extraordinary rapidity and the pot is quickly hooked off the fire. A generous handful of tea is thrown into the water before it ceases to boil and the resultant brew is drunk from any utensil that happens to be handy. Nobody inquires what becomes of the tea leaves. One of the sights on the Canoubar run was sixty thousand sheep recently returned from stations in well-watered districts, in one case five hundred miles distant by rail, whither they had been sent to stay over the years of drought. These sheep had all been carried by the state railways of New South Wales, at extraordinarily low rates, and with surprisingly few casualties. They offered a concrete example of what had been done on a very large scale throughout the State, where the railways were able to save for the squatters hundreds of thousands of valuable sheep, which must otherwise have perished when the fodder supply gave out. The Prince was so interested in what he saw that there was no getting him away before dark. By the time he was back in the station he had ridden over sixty miles without leaving the run. XXII AMONGST THE SHEEP