"GET him! To-morrow first thing go for him! I'LL make something of him!" "Don't know"-- Dave chuckled--"he's a----" "Tut, tut; you fetch him." "Oh, I'll FETCH 'im." And Dave, on the strength of having made a valuable suggestion, dragged Joe off the sofa and stretched himself upon it.
Dad went on thinking awhile.

"How much," he at last asked, "did Johnson get for those skins ?" "Which ?" Dave answered.

"Bears or kangaroos ?" "Bears." "Five bob, was n't it?
Six for some." "What, A-PIECE ?" "Yairs." "Why, God bless my soul, what have we been thinking about?
FIVE SHILLINGS?
Are you sure ?" "Yairs, rather." "What, bear-skins worth that and the paddock here and the lanes and the country over-run with them--FULL of the damn things--HUNDREDS of them--and we, all this time--all these years--working and slaving and scraping and-and" (he almost shouted), "DAMN me! What asses we HAVE been, to be sure." (Dave stared at him.) "Bear-skins FIVE SHILLINGS each, and----" "That's all right enough," Dave interrupted, "but----" "Of COURSE it's all right enough NOW," Dad yelled, "now when we see it." "But look!" and Dave sat up and assumed an arbitrary attitude.

He was growing suspicious of Dad's ideas.

"To begin with, how many bears do you reckon on getting in a day ?" "In a day"-- reflectively--"twenty at the least." "Twenty.