Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia Volume I Part 25

From that point he appeared to have intended to return and, by the zigzag course he took, that he had either been travelling in the dark, or looking for his own track, that he might retrace it. In this manner his steps actually approached within a mile of our route, but in such a manner that he appeared to have been going south while we were travelling north (on the 18th). Thus he had continued to travel southward, or south-south-west, full 14 miles, crossing his own track not far from where he first quitted our route. On his left he had the dry channel (Bullock creek) with the water-gumtrees (eucalypti) full in view, though without ever looking into it for water.* Had he observed this channel and followed it downwards he must have found our route; and had he traced it upwards he must have come upon the waterholes where I had an interview with the two natives, and thus, perhaps, have fallen in with me. From the marks of his horse having been tied to four different trees at the extreme southern point which he reached, it appeared that he had halted there some time, or pa.s.sed there the second night. That point was not much more than half a mile to the westward of my track out on the 21st.

From it he had returned, keeping still more to the westward, so that he actually fell in with my track of the 19th, and appeared to have followed it backwards for upwards of a mile, when he struck off at a rightangle to the north-west.

(*Footnote. These trees being remarkable from their white s.h.i.+ning trunks, resembling those of beech trees; a circ.u.mstance to which, as connected with the presence of water, I had just before drawn his attention.)

It was impossible to account for this fatal deviation, even had night, as most of the party supposed, overtaken him there. It seemed that he had found my paper directing him to trace my steps backwards, and that he had been doing this where the paper marked N.E. had been found, and which I therefore considered a sort of reply to my note. If we were right as to the nights, this must have taken place on the very day on which I had pa.s.sed that way, and when my eye eagerly caught at every dark-coloured distant object in hopes of finding him! After the deviation to the north-west it appears that Mr. Cunningham made some detours about a clear plain, at one side of which his horse had been tied for a considerable time, and where it is probable he had pa.s.sed his third night, as there were marks where he had lain down in the long dry gra.s.s. From this point only his horse's tracks had been traced, not his own steps which had hitherto accompanied them; and from the twisting and turning of the course to where it lay dead, we supposed he had not been with the horse after it left this place. The whip and straps seemed to have been trod off from the bridle-reins to which Mr. Cunningham was in the habit of tying his whip, and to which also the straps had been probably attached, to afford the animal more room to feed when fastened to trees.

To the place therefore where Mr. Cunningham's own steps had last been seen I hastened on the morning of the 29th April with the same men, Muirhead and Whiting, who had so ably and humanely traced all the tracks of the horse, through a distance of 70 miles.

The spot seemed well chosen as a halting-place, being at a few trees which advanced beyond the rest of the wood into a rather extensive plain: a horse tied there could have been seen from almost any part around, and it is not improbable that Mr. Cunningham left the animal there fastened, and that it had afterwards got loose, and had finally perished for want of water.

We soon found the print of Mr. Cunningham's footsteps in two places: in one, coming towards the trees where the horse had been tied, from a thick scrub east of them; in the other, leading from these trees in a direction straight northward. Pursuing the latter steps we found them continuous in that direction and, indeed, remarkably long and firm, the direction being preserved even through thick brushes.

This course was direct for the Bogan; and it was evident that, urged by intense thirst, he had at length set off with desperate speed for the river, having parted from his horse, where the party had supposed. That he had killed and eaten the dog in the scrub, whence his footsteps had been seen to emerge was probable, as no trace of the animal was visible beyond it; and as it was difficult otherwise to account for his own vigorous step, after an abstinence of three days and three nights. I then regretted that I had not at the time examined the scrub but, when we were at his last camp (the trees on the plain) we were most interested in Mr.

Cunningham's further course.

This we traced more than two miles, during which he had never stopped, even to look behind towards the spot where, had he left his horse, he might still have seen him. Having at length lost the track on some very hard ground we exhausted the day in a vain search for it.

MR. LARMER MEETS A TRIBE.

On returning to the camp I found that Mr. Larmer, whom I had sent with two armed men down the Bogan, had nearly been surrounded, at only three miles from our camp, by a tribe of natives carrying spears. Amongst these were two who had been with us on the previous day, and who called to the others to keep back. They told Mr. Larmer that they had seen Mr.

Cunningham's track in several parts of the bed of the Bogan; that he had not been killed but had gone to the westward (pointing down the Bogan) with the Myall (i.e. wild) Blackfellows. Thus we had reason to hope that our friend had at least escaped the fate of his unfortunate horse by reaching the Bogan. This was what we wished; but no one could have supposed that he would have followed the river downwards, into the jaws of the wild natives, rather than upwards. His movements show that he believed he had deviated to the eastward of our route rather than to the westward; and this mistake accounts for his having gone down the Bogan.

Had he not pursued that fatal course, or had he killed the horse rather than the dog, and remained stationary, his life would have been saved.

The result of our twelve days' delay and search was only the discovery that, had we pursued our journey down the Bogan, Mr. Cunningham would have fallen in with our track and rejoined us; and that, while we halted for him, he had gone ahead of us, and out of reach.

THE FOOTSTEPS TRACED INTO THE CHANNEL OF THE BOGAN.

April 30.

I put the party in movement along the left bank of the Bogan, its general course being north-west, and about five miles from our camp we crossed the same solitary line of shoe-marks, seen the day before, and still going due north! With sanguine hopes we traced it to a pond in the bed of the river, and the two steps by which Mr. Cunningham first reached water, and in which he must have stood while allaying his burning thirst, were very plain in the mud! The scales of some large fish lay upon them, and I could not but hope that even the most savage natives would have fed a white man circ.u.mstanced as Mr. Cunningham must then have been. Overseer Burnett, Whiting and The Doctor proceeded in search of him down the river while the party continued, as well as the dense scrubs of casuarinae permitted, in a direction parallel to its course. Just as we found Mr.

Cunningham's footsteps a column of smoke arose from the woods to the southward, and I went in search of the natives, Bulger accompanying me with his musket. After we had advanced in the direction of the smoke two miles it entirely disappeared, and we could neither hear nor see any other traces of human beings in these dismal solitudes. The density of the scrubs had obliged me to make some detours to the left, so that I did not reach the Bogan till long after it was quite dark. Those who had gone in search of Mr. Cunningham did not arrive at our camp that night although we sent up several skyrockets and fired some shots.

May 1.

The party came in from tracing Mr. Cunningham's steps along the dry bed of the Bogan, and we were glad to find that the impressions continued.

There appeared to be the print of a small naked foot of someone either accompanying or tracking Mr. Cunningham. At one place were the remains of a small fire, and the sh.e.l.ls of a few mussels, as if he had eaten them.

It was now most desirable to get ahead of this track, and I lost no time in proceeding, to the extent of another day's journey, parallel to the Bogan or, rather, so as to cut off a great bend of it.

DEATH OF THE KANGAROO.

We crossed some good undulating ground, open and gra.s.sy, the scenery being finer, from the picturesque grouping and character of the trees, than any we had hitherto seen. On one of these open tracts I wounded a female kangaroo at a far shot of my rifle, and the wretched animal was finally killed after a desperate fight with the dogs.

REFLECTIONS.

There is something so affecting in the silent and deadly struggle between the harmless kangaroo and its pursuers that I have sometimes found it difficult to reconcile the sympathy such a death excites with our possession of canine teeth, or our necessities, however urgent they might be.

The huntsman's pleasure is no more, indeed, when such an animal dies thus before him, persecuted alike by the civilised and the savage. In this instance a young one, warm from the pouch of its mother, frisked about at a distance, as if unwilling to leave her, although it finally escaped.

The nights were cold, and I confess that thoughts of the young kangaroo did obtrude at dinner, and were mingled with my kangaroo-steak.

As we turned to our right in the afternoon in search of the Bogan, we encountered some casuarina scrub, to avoid which we had to wind a little, so that we only made the river at dusk, and at a part of the bed which was dry. Water, as we afterwards found, was near enough upwards, but the two parties sent in the evening having by mistake both sought for it in the other direction, we had none till early in the morning.

FIVE NATIVES BROUGHT TO ME WITH A SILK HANDKERCHIEF IN THEIR POSSESSION.

May 2.

Five natives were brought to me by Whiting and Tom Jones, on suspicion; one of them having a silk pocket-handkerchief which they thought might have belonged to Mr. Cunningham.

The native wore it fastened over his shoulders, and seemed so careless about our scrutiny that I could not think he had obtained the handkerchief by any violence; and still less from Mr. Cunningham, as it was engrained with a smoky tinge, apparently derived from having been long in his possession. No mark was upon it, and the only information we could obtain as to where they got it, was the answer "old fellow," and pointing to the north-east. As these men had been at some out-station of ours and could speak a little English, and as they had a young kangaroo dog called by them olony (Maloney) I did not think at the time that the handkerchief had belonged to Mr. Cunningham; and the men appointed to attend him declared they had never seen that handkerchief in his hands.

THEIR NAMES.

These five natives were overtaken suddenly at a waterhole two miles lower down the Bogan. The name of him with the handkerchief was Werrajouit, those of the other four Yarree Buckenba and Tackijally Buckenba (brothers) Youimooba, and Werrayoy (youths). The most intelligent was Tackijally, and even he understood but little, not enough to comprehend anything I said about the white man lost in the bush.

To secure their goodwill and best services however I immediately gave them three tomahawks; and when Yarree Buckenba took a new handkerchief from my pocket I presented him with it. They accompanied us when we moved forward to encamp nearer water.

THE PARTY HALT AT CUDDULDURY.

We pa.s.sed a small pond, the name of which was Burdenda, and afterwards came to Cudduldury where we encamped with the intention of making what further search we could for Mr. Cunningham.

INTERVIEW WITH THE KING OF THE BOGAN.

While the men were pitching the tents at this place I rode with the natives, at their request, towards some ponds lower down. There, by their cooeys and their looks, they seemed to be very anxious about somebody in the bush beyond the Bogan. I expected to see their chief; at all events from these silent woods something was to emerge in which my guides were evidently much interested, as they kept me waiting nearly an hour for

The unseen genius of the wood.

At length a man of mild but pensive countenance, athletic form, and apparently about fifty years of age, came forth, leading a very fine boy, so dressed with green boughs that only his head and legs remained uncovered; a few emu-feathers being mixed with the wild locks of his hair. I received him in this appropriate costume, as a personification of the green bough, or emblem of peace.*

(*Footnote. The Grecians used to supplicate with green boughs in their hands, and crowns upon their heads, chiefly of olive or laurel, whence Statius says:

Mite nemus circa ---- Vittatae laurus, et supplicis arbor olivae.)

One large feather decked the brow of the chief; which with his nose, was tinged with yellow ochre. Having presented the boy to me, he next advanced with much formality towards the camp, having Tackijally on his right, the boy walking between, and rather in advance of both, each having a hand on his shoulder.

The boy's face had a holiday look of gladness, but the chief remained so silent and serious, without however any symptoms of alarm, that my recollections of him then, and as he appeared next day, when better acquainted, are as of two distinct persons.

To this personage all the others paid the greatest deference, and it is worthy of remark that they always refused to tell his name, or that of several others, while those of some of the tribe were familiar in our mouths as household words. The boy, who was called Talambe Nadoo, was not his son; but he took particular care of him. This tribe gloried in the name of Myall, which the natives nearer to the colony apply in terror and abhorrence to the wild blackfellows, to whom they usually attribute the most savage propensities.

Not a word could this chief of the Myalls speak besides his own language; and his slow and formal approach indicated that it was undoubtedly the first occasion on which he had seen white men. It was evident at once that he was not the man to wander to stock-stations; and that, whatever others of his race might do, he preferred an undisputed sway:

Far from the cheerful haunt of men and herds.

Numbers of the tribe came about us, but they retired at the chief's bidding. Not one however except those first met with in the Bogan, could speak any of the jargon by which the natives usually communicate with the stockmen.

MUIRHEAD AND WHITING SENT TO EXAMINE THE DRY CHANNEL OF THE RIVER.

We could not make them understand that we were in search of one of our party who was lost; neither could Muirhead and Whiting, who were returning to follow up Mr. Cunningham's track, prevail on any of these natives to accompany them.

May 3.