I’ve Seen a Lot of Country

Book 5, 'The Basher Gang Stoush', begins with just that. A brawl between rattler jumping swaggies and a basher gang of railway detectives. The Swaggies escape but, with one of them badly injured they must deal with the repercussions of the stoush for some time afterwards.As things cool down after the stoush, the four swaggies return to the business of trying to earn a quid. Stumpy and Longtack find work repairing a house roof only to have Colin crash through the ceiling and onto a kitchen table.In Gunnedah, the swaggies pick up a stray dog who attaches herself to the group and stays with them. The dog erns her keep by stealing a leg of lamb from a local butcher.Camped at the junction of the Barwon and Namoi rivers they meet a family of swaggies travelling with all their possessions tied to a bicycle.The group then take on work dagging sheep before they move on in their trek along the Barwon River. While on the river Tomcat rescues a drowning parson who they saw fall out of a rowboat.After picking up their dole chits in Brewarrina Longtack sends his earnings home, they pack up and head out of Bourke along the Bourke to Wilcannia road following the course of the Darling River all the way to Wilcannia.As they continue along the Darling River, Longtack and their dog Cadger are ambushed by dingoes and barely escape.Their river camp is destroyed in a fierce wind and rainstorm, in the midst of which they find and capture a stray horse. Their mate Davo decides to keep the horse and head back down river to where they had found an old Indian hawker wagon.Travelling on through Cobar and Goondawindi Longtack and Stumpy encounter a man who spins them a tall story about being Dan Kelly, despite the fact that Dan is dead, but in typical Aussie fashion that bloke doesn’t let the truth get in the way of a good story.They travel to Queensland for cane cutting work, then coming back engage in a long series of pointless train jumping and later feel that they went collectively crazy for a while. They eventually come to their senses somewhere near Menindee and head back to Victoria.In Mildura they need to make a hasty getaway after Chooka punches a policeman in the face, and they end up headed for Chooka’s home in Adelaide.When Chooka receives bad news at home about his sister, he has murder on his mind and is determined to kill the man who hurt her.Longtack and the others do their best to talk him out of it.