I had not gone far from the hotel before I saw a man coming after me. He called me to stop, which I did, and when he came closer I perceived that it was the man who had been sitting on his swag in the verandah at the hotel. He said he had come after me because he had neither rations nor money, and did not know how to get along the road unless I would be good enough to let him travel with me. He wanted to go to ---- station, and try to get some shearing to do. It happened that I intended to turn off the road about half a mile further on, and that according to the place to which he said he was going we should travel in almost opposite directions, and I told him so. I said also that if he was pushed I would help him with a few rations, but that I had not time to accommodate the pace of the horses to his walk, as I had already been travelling for a much longer time than I liked. Of course he said he would be glad of anything, and so I got off the horse and had a fire lighted, by which we made some tea, and he had his dinner out of my provisions. After the meal he suddenly made up his mind that he might as well go the same road as I, and try to get a job at a station which we should pass some forty miles from where we then stood. I did not like this much, because he seemed to me a man whose company I should not appreciate, but, as the loneliness of the bush always appeared to me to engender a sort of fellowship towards whoever is there, I did not find it easy nor did I deem it right to say I would have nothing to do with him. On the contrary, I said that we would push on together then for the day, and that I would walk while he put his swag on my saddle-horse. In this way we now went several miles, and my travelling companion had very little to say. He seemed to know the road to perfection, and about four o'clock in the afternoon he suggested that we should camp at a certain spot at which we had arrived, but about a hundred yards off the road. I objected. I said he was free himself to camp or not as he chose, but if he wanted to travel with me he would have to walk a good deal further, as I had by no means come as far yet as I considered a day's journey required. After that we started again, but my new friend seemed frightfully morose, and had not a word to say. As the horse he held was a better leader than mine he gradually forged ahead of me, and try as I would I could not keep up with him. I was just wishing myself well rid of him when I saw him suddenly turn off the road, leading the horse after him, and although I called again and again, he neither turned round nor answered me until he came to a deep water-hole about a mile off the road. Here he took the load off the horse, and hobbled it out. I was not only angry, but I was also to a certain extent afraid. I had already agreed with myself that I could not lie down to sleep alongside of him; but what, of all things, did he mean by leading me to this