I will venture here to allude to a matter very far removed indeed from the general scope of this book. Before leaving England a friend of mine had put into my hand a volume of ballads, which had been sent home to him from Australia, called “Bush Ballads, or Galloping Rhymes.” He told me that the author had been a young Scotch gentleman who had gone out young, but had not done well. He had taken to a sporting life, and had then fallen into a sad melancholy, and had--died. I read the ballads, and was greatly struck by their energy. It was evident that the writer of them had lived out of the literary world, and that he had lacked that care and spared himself that labour which criticism and study will produce, and which are necessary to finish work;--but of the man’s genius there could be no doubt. There was one called “Britomarte,” which alone entitled him to be called a poet. I found that he had lived in this neighbourhood, near to Mount Gambier, and that he had been well loved by many friends. For a while he was in the South Australian parliament, but parliamentary work had not suited him. He was given to the riding of racers,--and was prone to write about horses and the race-course. In the literary traces which I found of him in the neighbourhood, there was but scanty allusion to other matters, except to racing, and to the melancholy, thoughtful, solitary, heart-eating life which a bushman lives. His horse had been his companion when he was alone,--and when he got back to the world horses were his delight. They are seldom safe companions for a man prone to excitement. I heard wondrous tales of the courage of his riding. As a steeple-chase rider he was well known in Melbourne; but few seemed to have heard of him as a poet. It is as a poet that I speak of him now. His name was A. L. Gordon. CHAPTER V. MINERALS.