Читать книгу The Boy in the Bush онлайн

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Jack looked, and saw a funny little animal half leaping, half running along.

"We call them baby 'roos, joeys, you understand, and they make the cutest little pets you ever did imagine."

They were still in sandy country, on a good road not far from the river, and Jack saw the little chap jump to cover. The tall gum trees with their brownish pale smooth stems and loose strips of bark stood tall and straight and still, scattered like a thin forest that spread unending, rising from a low, heath-like undergrowth. It seemed open, and yet weird, enclosing you in its vast emptiness. This bush, that he had heard so much of! The sun had climbed out of the mist, and was becoming gold and powerful in a limpid sky. The leaves of the gum trees hung like heavy narrow blades, inert and colourless, in a weight of silence. Save when they came to a more open place, and a flock of green parrots flew shrieking, "Twenty-eight! Twenty-eight!" At least that was what the driver said they cried.—The lower air was still somewhat chilly from the mist. A number of black-and-white handsome birds, that they call magpies, flew alongside in the bush, keeping pace for a time with the buggy. And once a wallaby ran alongside for a while on the path, a bigger 'roo than the joey, and very funny, leaping persistently alongside with his little hands dangling.