A Yorkshire Childhood in Australia
Growing up at Glen Lorne
by
Eileen Thomson (nee Coles)
My grandmother, Grace Tindale, and her three daughters, Sarah, Grace and Rosemary, moved out of Sydney to 200 acres four and a half miles out of
Campbelltown along the Appin Road at the end of the First World War. The property was named Glen Lorne.
All thought of their intended return to England was abandoned in favour of life in Australia. For my grandmother here was a dream. A lovely old house on 100 acres of land, a large garden and fine farm buildings. There was another 100 acres across the road and a further 100 acres a few miles up the road towards Appin. At first the idea was to live in the house and employ a farm manager. This did not work out so my grandmother took on the farm with the vision of adapting it to the model of a Yorkshire mixed farm such as the Tindale family had had in Elvington near York in England. Men were employed for the day to day work. There was a room across the back yard for one man. I don’t remember where the second one slept or whether he came from elsewhere each day, I know that later sometimes an employee arrived on a bicycle each day.
There was a certain amount of amusement around the ridges when Mrs Tindale began putting up fences to make smaller paddocks or fields as she called them. In actual practice the plan proved a good one for that property until with the Second World War labour became unavailable and the care such a property needed was not possible..
My mother, Grace and her sister Sarah, were walking along the street in Campbelltown about 1922 when two young men in army uniform walking in front of them caught their attention. These two had just been discharged from the Army after being kept in England on army business after the War. One became my father, Victor Coles. The other was his friend, Ralph Naylor. My Coles grandfather and his family lived at Wedderburn. Many years later Grandmother Coles was buried at St.Peter’s Church in Campbelltown.
It was inevitable that the young people should meet. Those were the days of the tennis court as the social centre for young people. There was a good grass court at Glen Lorne, and Vic. and his brothers built a chip (ant bed) court at their home, Pine Grove, in Wedderburn. The two families soon started meeting for tennis parties. The Coles’ boys could take a short cut across the Georges River to get to Glen Lorne. In due course Grace and Vic fell in love and became engaged. Vic became a regular visitor staying in the evenings until he was encouraged to go home. In the winter they sat in the little sitting room in front of a well stacked fire with a big chunky back log. It was too hot to hold a toasting fork to make toast for a supper snack so Vic made a long wire toasting fork which reached right across the room.
Grace and Vic were married in January 23, 1924 in the Anglican Church at Appin. Grace’s brother George, gave the bride away and Ralph Naylor was best man. Sarah, Rosemary and Vera (Vic’s sister), were bridesmaids. The Reception was at Glen Lorne in the Dining Room with Joseph Coates MLA (Grace Tindale’s cousin) as Master of Ceremonies. As my parents drove through Campbelltown on the way to or from their honeymoon the lights came on for the first time.
I was born on November 6 that year. My parents were living in the little white cottage on the edge of the bush at Glen Lorne. They made the cottage attractive and comfortable. There was a climbing rosebush over the front which I remember years later. There was a fuel stove but my mother also had a three burner kerosene stove with an oven which went over two of the burners, One day my mother returned to the cottage and discovered someone had been in it so checked to see if anything had been taken. The only two things missing were the top tier of her wedding cake which was being kept for my Christening, and some bandages she had torn from old sheets. She thought someone had been injured in the bush while running away and they were injured and hungry.
My father used to have a motor bike and side car so he probably drove my mother to Camden in it. I was born in Dr.West’s cottage house hospital and went home to Glen Lorne for my mother to be coddled as mothers and babies were in those days. Then we went back to the cottage. My father was working at Boydell’s Garage in Campbelltown, and driving the mail car at times. He was having considerable success selling cars. There was to be a red Model T Ford coupee on display at the Show. He agreed to buy it and take it home after the Show. Aunty Sarah had all the gates at Glen Lorne open so he was able to drive in great style down to the cottage. He had asked how to start the car when he left but realized as he drove into Glen Lorne he did not know how to stop it, so he slowed right down and drove it under the verandah and into the wall. Just as well the walls were so solid! After driving for some time Dad drove over to Camden to get a driver’s licence. The policeman there said he need not do a test as driving across from Campbelltown was test enough.
It was about this time that a group of artists were painting at and around Glen Lorne. Sydney Ure Smith was one who painted the cottage and stables, both pictures I understand are in the NSW National gallery.
In due course my family moved into a soldier’s Settlement House in Campbelltown. My brother, Bob, was born at Dr.West’s hospital in 1926 with another six weeks coddling at Glen Lorne. Dad continued to sell cars driving all over the country, sometimes in a very relaxed manner with his feet out the far window. He then got a job as a salesman for AEC selling truck and bus chasses. Finally he and Mr.Hastings Deering built up AEC (Australia). Dad succeeded Mr. Deering as Chairman of the Hastings Deering group of companies.
This meant we had to live in Sydney but to us children Glen Lorne continued to be home. My parents did not like children growing up in the suburbs so took every opportunity to go or send us back to Glen Lorne. My grandmother had bought a big dark blue Buick and her daughters Sarah and Rosemary became her drivers. She insisted on having a second rear mirror so she could control the handbrake! I don’t know how my aunts tolerated that. If one of us was ill she would employ someone from the garage to drive her to Rose Bay to bring the sick child back. The biggest occasion was when I had Rheumatic Fever, I was taken and put in front of fire in my grandmother’s bedroom and then into her big double bed and Dr. West was sent for from Camden. Soon after this my second brother, Ken, was born in Camden. I remember going in the Buick to visit Mum and the baby. Mr. brother Bob and I each had a little blue sock for the baby. Again Mum came back to Glen Lorne for several weeks.
There was no electricity at Glen Lorne so lamps and lanterns were very important. The glass covers were washed and polished dry every day and kerosene checked. A pressure lamp in the little sitting room provided a good light for reading and sewing at night.
Life at Glen Lorne centered around the kitchen in the mornings. Nan had a solid wooden rocking chair in one corner where she sat to read the newspaper after the cooking was done. Before that Bob and I vied with each other to rock in it, sometimes rather wildly so we would then be sent outside. There was a black fuel stove in the centre of the back wall and the men kept the woodbox full of small logs. We children used to collect chips from the woodheap after the chopping was finished. There was a big table in the centre of the room. There Nan used to preside in the mornings, in a long white apron, making bread or pastry. She made bread for the family. Loaves for the men came from the baker in the mailbag. First there was an excursion out to the storeroom. This was next to the Kitchen but the way in was via a small wired in verandah. This was a favourite spot for Bob and me when it rained and the path outside became a river because we could poke sticks as boats through the wire and watch them washed down stream.
On baking days Nan would get ingredients from the Storeroom, beside the kitchen and reached though a small verandah, flour from a big can with a dipper (like a jug without a handle, sugar and eggs etc. Eggs for the off season were stored in isinglass in kerosene tins. Bob and I were allowed to participate in baking by shaping some dough into little tins for our own bread, or cut out some pastry tarts. After a while Bob would lose interest but I was expected to stay around watching and learning because bread and pastry making were important for Yorkshire girls. Some days biscuits were made, often Ormskirks (ginger) from a traditional family recipe. Near Christmas Yule cakes with currants were made. Both were big solid biscuits. Both of us children shaped a few to our own designs. Nan also made most of the puddings, maybe a treacle roly-poly, steamed pudding or a milk pudding (rice or sago). Having done her work Nan retired to her rocker with a cup of tea or coffee while someone washed the dishes in the Washing up pantry, a narrow room with a sink and cupboards off the kitchen. The mailbag arrived about this time so she was able to read the paper and quote interesting news. That was how I learnt about Haile Selassie and the war in Ethiopia. Sometimes it would be royal news or the latest fashion.
The rest of the mornings the aunts took over. Some days the big wooden butter churn would be set on the table and we all took turns at churning the cream to butter, listening for its plop plop sound. We usually had a drink of butter-milk.
When the butter was ready it was shaped into slabs with wooden pats, and some shaped like shells for individual serves.
Aunty Sarah did most of the rest of the cooking because she had trained at a cookery school in England. There was meat to be cooked in the oven or stew or corned beef in big pots on top. Most of the saucepans were black with blue enamel lining and long handles. Cabbage and pumpkin and potato were cooked most days. Sometimes family had peas, carrots or sliced French beans instead of cabbage and pumpkin.. Some days a steam pudding bubbled away. The men’s meals were served in a little dining room off the back kitchen behind the main kitchen. The family generally ate in the Breakfast Room which was beyond the Washing up Room. While we children were young we had a separate table from the grownups. For a few years at one time there was a young farm manager from Scotland who ate with the family. There was one notable occasion when he sat at table with a tiny puppy on his shoulder – not repeated!
Chicken was a favourite food only served for special occasions like Christmas, Easter and birthdays. There was much drama about plucking, singeing and gutting before filling with seasoning and covering with slices of bacon and sausages. Always there was breadsauce with gravy as well as baked vegetables
Aunty Sarah was my special aunt. I specially enjoyed being in the kitchen with her some afternoons when she cooked cakes and biscuits to keep up the afternoon supply. When we children were there she often made rich biscuits which we cut with the animal shapes. Preparing the oven was quite an art for cake cooking. Cakes might be sponges or madiera cake. If my father was coming she would make Rock Buns. Another favourite was Anzac biscuits to the recipe she had learnt in Sydney when cooking for soldiers during the war. One very special one was Brandenburg Cake which came out in brown and white check squares.
Afternoon tea was an important time for the family to gather with any visitors who called. Like most country people the hot meal of the day was in the middle of the day. Supper was a lighter meal. Afternoon Tea might be served in the Drawing Room if there were very special guests, but more often in the little sitting room or the verandah off it.
Occasionally there was a lady employee but they rarely lasted long because of isolation. Aunty Rosemary was in charge of cleaning. I remember being recruited to dust chairs.
From the Breakfast Room there was a passage which went through the rest of the house from the back verandah to a small bedroom near the far door outside. I knew this door well because running down the path I put my hand out to the door on to a wasp’s nest. Aunty Sarah’s bedroom was next after the breakfast room then May’s with a door to the outside. Each of these rooms had open fireplaces which were used regularly in winter. Nan’s bedroom with the bay window was larger with a bigger fireplace. She had a double bed with a thick down mattress which needed two people to shake it each morning. Her eiderdown was also like a continental one – very thick down. I was very happy in this big bed in my long spell with rheumatic fever and the lovely outlook from the windows. Each bedroom had a washstand with a basin and water jug. In winter everyone also had a jug of hot water for washing. One day for fun I was given a bath in an old hip bath in front of the fire in Nan’s room. In winter everyone had a hot water bottle. Sometimes the bedwarmer was lifted from the wall and filled with hot coals and wiped through the sheets. There was much emphasis by this north of England family on making sure bedding was dry.
The little sitting room next to Nan’s bedroom was the coziest room in the house. It opened out to a wire screened verandah which covered about half the length of the front verandah. The next room along round the bend was the formal Dining Room used for Christmas and special occasions like birthdays. As well as the dining table it had a couple of comfortable big chairs near the fireplace. I remember the carved mount around this and the carved heads which we called Gog and Magog. These rooms had wall paper. The grandfather clock was in the dining room and a glass cupboard of treasures and a gold clock. A welsh dresser on the end opposite the fire place held an original set of willow pattern dishes.
Then there was the Drawing Room, which always seemed cool and quiet except at Christmas when there was a big Christmas tree. I used to enjoy a rest time in there on hot afternoons. Outside the French doors was a verandah with white columns and another flower garden. I remember walking there with an alphabet picture book with A is for applepie etc. when I was four years old.
Through the Drawing Room was another bedroom where my parents slept when they were staying at Glen Lorne. Along the hall was a wider area where a bath tub had been put in. The telephone was also there on the wall. One rang a bell to call the exchange who then called the requested number. A little ear piece hung on one side so a second person could listen in. Emergency warnings were rung through as when there were bush fires. The most terrifying was when the Wedderburn hills across the river were blazing. We had been trained to always put our clothes ready to put on in the night if fires came close. One year my father sent a car up from Sydney and left it pointing down the drive in case we had to leave suddenly. Most fires were easily controlled with wet bags from the barrels which collected water from drainpipes on the farm buildings, or with a wet mop around wood slab fences .
A favourite place for sitting was on a bench on the back verandah facing a flower garden. This garden was enclosed with a white picket fence and paths in it were lined with sloping bricks. This garden always seemed full of colour with cosmos, pin cushions, daisies etc. Beside a covered way across the centre there was a tank on a stand and a pump. The water was drawn from a well from which we children were told to stay away from its cover but that only drew us the more to perch on a pile of stones in the centre. November lilies grew by the path which invariably flowered on my birthday in November.
Beyond this yard was the Big yard with sheds all around. This was the centre of work, harnessing horses, branding cows and dipping sheep. There was a gate out to the big yard and a path across to the cow bails. When I was small coming out of this gate was an ordeal as there were two dogs chained there with their kennels under a big pepper tree. One was Nipper a cream dog and the other a typical blue cattle dog. They were working dogs who barked as I went past and seemed huge and terrifying. Often Bob and I would be sent across to the cow bails with mugs to get frothy milk to drink. I did not like this and still do not enjoy milk. We usually sat on the fence and watched the cows meander in to be milked and then stroll out the other side. They were milked by hand with the men sitting on wooden logs. Swishing tails were hooked on to a nail on a post. Each time a bucket was full the milkman brought it out to go into a ten gallon can. Any cats around were given milk in a herrings and tomato sauce tin. Cats seemed to come from nowhere. Some were dumped by city people looking for a good home for their pussies. The result was there were always kittens being born. We thought nothing of watching them being drowned in a bucket of water. My mother would have been horrified if she knew what her children were watching. The herd of cows was usually mixed short horns with one or two jerseys and geurnseys to enrich the milk. For a while there were Ayrshires. A row of feeding troughs was built behind the bails and when the Ayrshire cows with great big horns were in the stalls each side Bob enjoyed the challenge of walking along the top among the horns.
The cows had to be brought in from across the road up a lane parallel to the drive. Some men used horses others just the dogs. The bails and dairy was kept spotless and kalsomined white every year because the Inspectors required this. All buckets, cans and the separator were thoroughly washed with boiling water from an outside copper on one side of the Dairy,
When cows were dry they were driven up to the top paddock up the road towards Appin. There were always two or three riding horses for this. A pampered horse was Jimmy, Aunty Rosemary’s pony which I was allowed to ride under supervision. From about 8 years Bob was allowed to ride an ex-polo pony with the men and follow the cows to the top paddock.
After milking, the milk was taken up to the dairy and tipped into a cooler, where the milk poured down over a sheet of metal like corrugated iron. Some days, Stop Days, the milk was separated to cream and skim milk. Milk went into 10 gallon cans and cream into 5 gallon cans. Skim milk was used for the pigs. Milk and cream cans were put on a trolley and pulled down to the front gate, and lifted on to a stand for the milk lorry to slide them on to his level. One of our joys was to sit on this stand and wait for the milk lorry and watch the cars coming along the road, guessing the colour of the next one. There were not many cars on the road in the 20s and 30s. Occasionally horse riders passed and called a cherry greeting. If we happened to be there in the morning waiting for the mail car we saw a large saloon car, wider than most and with an extra row of seats. Very few people had cars and used the mail car to go into Campbelltown or to the railway for Sydney.
Back in the house for morning tea on the back verandah we might be sent to wash in a bathroom through the Washing up area. Beyond this outside was the toilet emptied by a man each week. The back verandah was a place for much talk, hair cutting, nail trimming, and sometimes removal of splinters. Needles used for this were then put through the floor boards. Another room across the little yard was used as an office and store of excess furniture. Nan had her desk in here for writing letters and cheques and for paying the men.
Wash Days were full of action. A windy day meant washing sheets and towels. There was a deep circular tub on the porch outside the back kitchen near the Vegetable Garden. Water was boiled in a copper and transferred to the tub with grated soap. A brass Postick was pushed up and down to agitate the soapy water. Sheets and towels were rinsed by hand in tubs in the back kitchen and put through a big mangle. Big baskets of washing were carried out to a paddock behind the wood heap and everything hung to catch the wind. Once they were dry towels were folded and put to air, sometimes the next fine day. Sheets, table clothes and serviettes etc. were folded and before ironing they would be damped. Ironing was done on the table in the main kitchen. Two irons were heated on the stove and one used then the other, a slow process but efficient. Clothes were washed in small quantities on different days.
Water was never a problem. There were five underground wells and river water was pumped up from the river via the little pump house down by the river. There were a number of water barrels to catch water from the various buildings. These grew green scum and provide a source of interest when we were tall enough to see the wrigglies in them.
The big yard was lined with sheds, stables, sheds for sulkies, covered areas for farm machinery, the car garage and a loft for storing bags of food. Rats and mice were a problem so the cats were encouraged to live up there.
I think one of the qualifications for employment must have been patience with children. The only names I can remember were Clem and a young man waiting for his call up at the beginning of the War, Cec Fairburn. For us there was plenty of action and things to learn. We knew every bit of harness and the order it was put on the cart horses when they were being prepared for a day’s work. We trailed along watching the plough or stood on the back of the seed drill, and knew the uses of the other equipment, when to harrow and what was used for harvesting. A few acres were fenced across the road and sackleen? or corn were grown there. We enjoyed the fun of reaping with closing in circles and watching rabbits making dashes to escape. When Bob’s hyperactivity needed an outlet he was given a small fenced area near the end of the drive in the Big Yard, which he dug and then planted potatoes. When we were old enough we roamed the bush and built cubby houses.
Sachleen seemed to be the main cow food. It was stacked in a big high barn down near the bottom of the paddock on the way to the cottage near the old chook yards. The feed was chopped in a mechanical chaff cutter while Bob and I scrambled to the top of the pile and slid down trying to catch little mice as we slid. Up from there was a one acre paddock with a row of pine trees as a wind break. Another paddock was fenced one year somewhere closer to the bush to grow passionfruit. Closer to the house there was an orchard with old neglected trees. The plums bore well enough for us to have plum pies and plum jam. There was also a quince and apples.
In our early years there were large chook yards and regular visits by foxes leaving trails of white feathers as they dragged their spoil down to the bush. Eventually a new modern yard was built up along the cow drive towards the pig sties. This had lids over the laying pens which could be lifted to collect the eggs without going into the yard. Some years there were ducks and turkeys around the place. Even the chooks were let roam around during the day.
The pigs gave me a lot of pleasure, watching them rooting and fussing around. There was a big rock in the middle of one yard. This to me covered a secret passage like my favourite family story. Nan would tell us The Pigsty Story. (Summarised at end)
Feeding the pigs at Glen Lorne involved boiling the mash in an outside copper. Bran and pollard were mixed with skim milk. Everyday there was also a kerosene bucket of household scraps. They enjoyed these and snorted their way through the cabbage leaves and other tit bits. These jobs, like milking had to be done regardless of the weather. On wet days the men wore opened hessian bags as rain coats.
There were gardens in the front and on the drive side of the house. Right across the road frontage there were big spiky succulent bushes and a strip of paddock and I remember sheep there for a few years. Just inside the gates to the main drive there was a large plumbago bush. There were fir trees and shrubs on the way up the drive and two big bunya pines at the top. There was a side track off the main drive to a circular drive around green grass. Otherwise there were shrubs such as May bushes dotted around. The tennis court was on the side near the orchard. Outside the Drawing room there were rose bushes and other flowering shrubs.
In the late afternoons Nan always sat on the little verandah at the front looking out to the distant mountains as the sun was sinking. She had been educated as a Quaker so a time of silence was important to her. Other members of the household often joined her. I enjoyed the silence. My brothers were too restless so were banned and sent right out the back. Some summer evenings the croquet set was taken from the long box on the other open end of the front verandah and set up in the circle. The other sporting activity which my Father organised was cricket in the big back yard. Aunty Sarah was the real sportswoman. She played golf in Campbelltown and used to practice on the Golf Course my grandmother had laid out in the hundred acres across the road. This did not take off as a business, but we all enjoyed hitting around and Dad and Sarah especially took it seriously. The two hazards were the dam in the middle and swooping magpies.
Another enterprise Nan took on was the White Café on the corner in Campbelltown where the road went off to Camden. This was just being discovered when the new road south branching off at Crossroads took the traffic away. In the White Café era when we arrived by train one of the aunts would meet us and take us to the White Café. It had small tables with white clothes and narrow oak chairs. Tea and coffee cups were different sizes, some all white and some with a line of roses. Little loaves of bread and cakes were displayed in a glass cabinet. A big three door refrigerator stored milk, cream and butter and provided home made ice cream which was then scooped into large and small cones. I enjoyed the icecream but Bob wouldn’t eat it because he said it was too hot! I remember a row of glass jars with coloured lollies which were sold to children in little white paper bags. One jar contained musk flavoured sweets with messages on them. Some were heart shapes with ‘I love you’ written on them.
Some of the film ‘The Flying Doctor’ was shot at Glen Lorne in 1933. We children were banned for the time but returned to see the equipment of big square silver reflectors and wires. A temporary shed was erected as the property office. The film is available from Screensound Australia. Our greatest grief was the disappearance of Ken’s magpie. This was a tame magpie that responded to Ken’s attention and which sang so beautifully that the sound was used in the film.
Also by this time Glen Lorne had a radio with a long aerial across the front garden which had to be detached from the machine during thunderstorms. It had a big horn in the Dining Room and despite crackles we listened to the Children’s Hour in the late afternoons with Ginger the ventriloquist doll joking with the presenter.
When Dad was there for weekends we went for walks on Sunday afternoons. One was across the road and up to the Mount Gilead windmill. Another walk took us through the clothes line paddock towards the passionfruit paddock past a small stone smoke house overgrown with prickly bushes. It had been used for smoking bacon and ham. It was shaped like an igloo with a smouldering fire lit in the entrance tunnel. I believe there had been another smoke house across the road once.
Quite the favourite walk was down to the river. Each side of the track was dense bush with rocks which we were told had fox holes. The track seemed steep to us children. A small dam part way down on the right hand side had a mossy wall from which we were banned. Bob certainly walked across it one day to my horror. After rain the river was full of water with plenty of crayfish and a good swimming area and sandy beach. Even when not flowing so much there was plenty of water for us to be warned to be careful. Our delight was to play on the rocks. One time we had a sandstone factory and little slabs of sand were shipped down stream on wooden boats.
On the way back we might diverge and collect fir cones for the fires. Apart from the kitchen and Back Kitchen stoves there were fire places in Nan, Sarah’s and Rosemary’s bedrooms and in the little Sitting room and the Dining and Drawing rooms. They were all back to back fireplaces so there were five big chimneys. As well as the usual pokers and tongs there was an old sword in the little sitting room which made lovely sparks. We had a lot of fun describing what we could see in the fires.
When I was old enough I was often put on the four pm train at Strathfield railway station with a penny chocolate. I liked the clickety clack and watching the stations we sped through and the places where men were working and calling out for papers which people threw out of the train windows to them. It was always comforting to see the buick in the station yard as we approached Campbelltown, and I knew there would be an aunt to meet me. The first stop might be just up the road to buy an icy pole. I did not like waiting on the platform to go home for fear of the shriek of the whistle as the train pulled in.
I was thoroughly spoilt by Nan and the aunts when I was on my own, going everywhere with them and helping in the house. There were limits as when I needed a hat and a whole pile of pretty children’s straw hats was sent out fro Solomon’s store. They were considered not suitable and I had to wait till Sydney for a plain white panama with a narrow coloured ribbon. It was in those times I enjoyed reading the aunt’s books and the set of Dickens stored in one of the big hall cupboards. I pored over May’s Arthur Mee’s Children’s Encyclopaedia. I am sure I learnt more this way than at school.
One year I was allowed to make mauve streamers to decorate the Town Hall as a wisteria garden for a Fete.
Every now and again there would be a calf to be taken to the sale in Camden. It would be put in a hessian bag behind my seat in the car. Its wriggling worried me so I was always glad when it was handed over to the agent. We were sure to see the little train puffing along beside the road on the way there or back. If Aunty Sarah was driving we had fun trying to race it.
Other excursions I enjoyed were driving into Campbelltown mostly to Solomon’s store. Sometimes a man had brought a horse from Glen Lorne earlier in the day for new shoes so we would go to the Blacksmith’s and watch. From time to time the Blacksmith made or repaired tools for my grandmother. He also made cooking pans to her specification. When she came to town it was a full dress hats and gloves excursion. Mostly she preferred services and goods going to her at Glen Lorne. Now and again a dressmaker would come to make her new dresses or repair linen.
For me Glen Lorne was an idyllic childhood and I was heartbroken when Nan and the aunts decided they could not manage it any longer and moved away leasing it to a man with sons who could work with him. Eventually the property was sold.
THE PIGSTY STORY
This was about a little girl who was sent to a farm run by an old lady while her parents went to England. All went well for a while and the little girl was happy, then the old lady started shouting at her and making her work in the house and didn’t feed her very well. Apparently the money for the girl’s care had stopped coming so it was thought that the parents must have been shipwrecked and drowned at sea. In her unhappiness the girl went up to the pig sties in the afternoons when the old lady rested. One day she was crying so much a mother pig came to the fence and listened sympathetically, and then went and scratched away some of the straw in the middle of the yard and started getting her snout into a ring fastened there. Finally she managed to lift the ring and pull aside a trap door. She nudged the little girl over to see the steps down. There was a light at the bottom so the little girl was so curious she went down. There was a door at the bottom which she pushed open to show a bright little room with pink walls and a party table set in the middle. The girl sat down and had some bread sprinkled with hundreds and thousands, a couple of little cakes iced with pink icing and a glass of sweet pink milk. There was a box of toys she played with and then tidied up. When she heard the pig up the stairs she shut the doors and climbed up the stairs and forced herself back to the old ladies’ house. From then on each afternoon she went back to the play house until one morning a car drove up. It was her parents. Yes they had been ship-wrecked but survived and got back to Sydney and came straight up to the farm for their daughter. She was so happy and just went up to say goodbye and thank you to the pigs before leaving with her parents.
