At a town called Nobble, about three hundred miles west of Sydney, there lived a man, supposed to be knowing in gold, named Crinkett, with whom they had corresponded, and to whom they intended, in the first instance, to apply.

And about twenty miles beyond Nobble were the new and now much reputed Ahalala diggings, at which they purposed to make their first debut.

It had been decided that they would go direct from Melbourne to Nobble,not round by Sydney so as to see more of the world, and thus spend more money,but by the direct route, taking the railway to Albury and the coaches, which they were informed were running between Albury and Nobble.

It had been decided that they would go direct from Melbourne to Nobble,not round by Sydney so as to see more of the world, and thus spend more money,but by the direct route, taking the railway to Albury and the coaches, which they were informed were running between Albury and Nobble.

Chapter IX Nobble During the two days which Dick and Caldigate spent together in Melbourne Mrs. Smith's name was not mentioned between them.

Here they stayed but a few hours and then went on by coach on their journey to Nobble.

They went through Wagga-Wagga and Murrumburra, and other places with similar names, till at last they were told that they had reached Nobble.

Nobble they thought was the foulest place which they had ever seen.

And they had generally assumed most singular names for themselves: 'The Old Stick-in-the-Mud Soft Goods Store,' 'The Polyeuka Stout Depot,' 'Number Nine Flour Mills,' and so on,all of which were very unintelligible to our friends till they learned that these were the names belonging to certain gold-mining claims which had been opened in the neighbourhood of Nobble.

'They told us that Nobble was a fine town.' Henniker's hotel was a long, low wooden shanty, divided into various very small partitions by thin planks, in most of which two or more dirty-looking beds had been packed very closely.

'Chaps like you don't come much to Nobble for nothing else.

Was Mr. Crinkett known in Nobble?

It seemed that Crinkett was very well known in Nobble indeed.

If anybody had done well at Nobble, Mr. Crinkett had done well.

'Perhaps he's a pal of yourn?' Caldigate explained that he had never seen Mr. Crinkett, but that he had come to Nobble armed with a letter from a gentleman in England who had once been concerned in gold-digging.

It was called Polyeuka Hall, because while it was being built Mr. Crinkett was drawing large gains from the Polyeuka mine, about three miles distant on the other side of Nobble.

Dick told him that they had heard of that very successful mining enterprise since their arrival at Nobble.

Ahalala was twenty-three miles from Nobble, and a coach had been established through the bush for the benefit of miners going to the diggings;but Mick was of opinion that miners ought to walk, with their swag on their backs, when the distance was not more than forty miles.

They had hardly gone a mile out of Nobble before Maggott started a little difficulty,merely for the purpose of solving it with a master's hand.

Ahalala was a very different place from Nobble,made Nobble seem to be almost a compact and prosperous city.

Ahalala was a very different place from Nobble,made Nobble seem to be almost a compact and prosperous city.

At Nobble there was at any rate a street.

Ahalala was leafy, and therefore, though much less regular, also less hideous than Nobble.

I'm a-going back to Nobble.

That stamp, that effigy, that twopenny queen's-head, which by its presence on the corner of the envelope purported to have been the price of conveying the letter from Sydney to Nobble, on 10th May, 1873, had certainly been manufactured and sent out to the colony since that date!