Page:In bad company and other stories.djvu/87

the criminals of other colonies, who, fleeing from justice, were notoriously in the habit of crossing the Queensland border, and evading a too searching inquiry.

These were outlaws in the worst sense of the word; desperate and degraded, conversant with undetected crime, and always willing to join in the quasi-industrial revolts, unfortunately of everyday occurrence.

In these, bloodshed was barely avoided, while hand-to-hand fights, inflicting grievous bodily injury, were only too common.