Part 5 (2/2)

Day after day, day after day, I gazed wistfully over the sea for hours at a tirow sohed for the companionshi+p ofin her endeavours to make life pleasant for me and keep me well supplied with the best of food; but I could see that she, too, did not like living on this exposed and desolate spot So, after a feeeks' experience of life there, I decided to return to my bay home, and later on make preparations for a journey overland to a point on the Australian coast, where I learned shi+ps quite frequently passed The point in question was Somerset Point, at the extreme north of the Cape York peninsula; and I had learnt of its existence frohted to see me on my return, and I re my next journey They were keenly anxious that I should join the expeditions, but I always declined, on the ground that I was not a fighting man The fact of the matter was, that I could never hope to throw a spear with anything like the dexterity they themselves possessed; and as spears were the principal weapons used in warfare, I was afraid I would not shoell at a critical moment Moreover, the warriors defended themselves so dexterously with shi+elds as to be all but invulnerable, whereas I had not the slightest idea of how to handle a shi+eld And for the sake of e, I could not afford to ood care to let the blacks seeonly those feats which I felt morally certain I could accomplish, and accomplish to their ah withspears,” as the natives considered the inabout my position was that I dared not even atte, for fear the blacks should come upon me suddenly, when I would most certainly lose caste I had several narrow escapes from this serious calamity, but h, that the blacks, when drinking at a river or water-hole, invariably scoop up the water with their hands, and never put their ht down close to the surface of the water Well, one day I was guilty of this solecis expedition, and reached the water-hole with an intense burning thirst My mentor was not with iving fluid Suddenly I heard murmurs behindaroo But Yamba soon came to the rescue, and explained away the dreadful breach of etiquette, by telling the my face; ere alone she soleain

Thethe sa the in their sports, andperiodical trips inland with Yareat journey I proposed to make overland to Cape York When I spoke to my devoted companion about my plans, she told me she was ready to accompany me wherever I went--to leave her people and to be for ever by ly do these things Her dog-like fidelity to me never wavered, and I know she would have laid down her life for me at any time

Often I told her of my own home beyond the seas, and when I asked her whether she would come with me, she would reply, ”Your people are o with you wherever you takewas ready, and I paid a final farewell, as I thought, to hteenon a long journey overland to another part of the country et into touch with h they realised they should never seeThe night before we left, a great _corroboree_ was held in , and a body of the natives escorted us for the first 100 miles or so of our trip At last, however, Ya were left to continue our wanderings alone The reliance I placed upon this wo I knew that alone I could not live a day in the ailderness through which ere to pass; nor could any solitary white man By this time, however, I had had innumerable demonstrations of Ya food and water when, to the ordinary eye, neither was forthco my black people I had provided myself hat I may term a native passport--a kind of Masonic mystic stick, inscribed with certain cabalistic characters Every chief carried one of these sticks I carried , luxuriant hair, which I wore ”bun” fashi+on, held in a net of opossum hair This passport stick proved invaluable as a ood terms with the different tribes we encountered The chiefs of the blacks never ventured out of their own country without one of these e-bearers I am sure I should not have been able to travel far without e tribe I always asked to be taken before the chief, and when in his presence I presented reatest friendliness, and offer us food and drink

Then, before I took e stick, handing it back tome on to another tribe with an escort It often happened, however, that I was personally introduced to another tribe whose ”frontier” joined that of my late hosts, and in such cases my passport was unnecessary

At first the country through which our wanderings led us was hilly and ooded, the trees being particularly fine, ht of 150 feet or 200 feet Our principal food consisted of roots, rats, snakes, opossuaroo The physical conditions of the country were constantly changing as we enuity was often sorely taxed to detect the whereabouts of the various roots necessary for food It was obviously unfair to expect her to be fareat Australian Continent Sometimes she was absolutely nonplused, and had to stay a few days with a tribe until the wo the roots of the country And often we could not understand the language In such cases, though, when spoken words were unlike those uttered in Yae which appears to be general a the Australian blacks All that Ya over her shoulder, and containing a variety of useful things, including some needles rinding-stones for crushi+ng out of its shell a very sustaining kind of nut found on the palm trees, &c Day after day alked steadily on in an easterly direction, guiding ourselves in the dayti by opossum scratches on trees and the positions of the ant-hills, which are always built facing the east We crossedand at others ti

Gradually we left the hilly country behind, and after about five or six weeks' traave off a dust from our very tracks that nearly suffocated us Each water- hole we caan to contain less and less of the precious liquid, and our daily _th ere co but a few roots and stray rats Still we plodded on, finally striking a terrible spinifex country, which was inconceivably worse than anything we had hitherto encountered In order to rass” of the Australian interior), ere bound to follow the tracks aroos or natives, othere should have ress whatever These tracks at ti fashi+on, and led us considerable distances out of our course, but, all the same, we dare not leave them Not only ater all but unobtainable here, but our skin was torn with thorns at almost every step Yaer provide for ht, and a sufficient quantity would collect on the foliage to refresh erly would I lick the precious drops froh, Yamba herself up to this ti about this marvellous woh the awful spinifex desert, and for at least eight days of that period ere virtually without water, trarass, and undulating sand-hills of a reddish colour Often and often I blahtful country at all Had I known beforehand that it was totally uninhabited I certainly should not have ventured into it We were still going due east, but in consequence of the lack of water-holes, ht it advisable to strike a little onies of thirst--A ghastly drink--I ask Yaht opossue--The plunge into the Rapids--A waste of waters--A fearful situation--Barking alligators--English-speaking natives--A shi+p at last--I abandon hope--The deserted settlean to feel quite delirious; I fear I was like a baby in Yamba's hands She knew that all I wanted ater, and became almost distracted when she could not find any for ht And yet she was full of strange resources and devices When I ive h this possessed no real htly relieved reorse and worse, however, and the deliriuhts would that devoted creature sit byrass On the fifth day without water I suffered the ave myself up for lost I could neither stand nor walk, speak nor s My throat seemed to be al appeared to be going round and round in theviolence, andmad My bloodshot eyes (so Yamba subsequently toldpossessed me to kill my faithful Bruno, in order to drink his blood My poor Bruno! As I write these hurace, I fancy I can see hi, illi out, and his piteous brown eyes fixed upon ony The only thing that kept hiether was the blood of so

Gradually I greeaker and weaker, and at last feeling the end was near, I crawled under the first tree I caht as to its species,--and prepared to iven up, these lines would never have been written A to relate, she kept coh without water; and in my most violent paroxysive me its warm blood to drink, while yet it lived Then she would ive it to reatly to her disappoint, for at last she stooped down and whispered earnestly in o off in search of water Like a dream it comes back tooverhead, and that if she followed in the same direction she was almost certain to reach water sooner or later

I could not reply; but I felt it was a truly hopeless enterprise on her part And as I did not want her to leave me, I rened to her to come and strike onies The heroic creature only smiled and shook her head emphatically She took the proffered weapon, however, and after putting so marks on my tree with it, she hurled it soainst the trunk of the tree; and then leavingto keepstrides of aour

It was late in the afternoon when she took her departure; and I lay there hour after hour, sometimes frantically delirious, and at others in a state of se she was byover with delicious water I would rouse myself with a start fro the long and deathly stillness of the night, the dew came down heavily, and as it enveloped my bed, I fell into a sound sleep, from which I akened so voice that had addressed ht on my island sand-spit Out upon the i the earnest words: ”_Coupe l'arbre_! _Coupe l'arbre_!”

I was quite conscious, and reat deal At first I thought it must have been Yamba's voice, but I remembered that she did not knoord of French; and when I looked round there was no one to be seen Thein my ears, but I was far too weak to attempt to cut the tree myself, I lay there in a state of inert drowsiness until, rousing myself a little before dawn, I heard the fa the spot where I lay Her face expressed anxiety, earnestness, and joy

In her tre two or three ounces of life-giving water This I drank with gasping eagerness, as you h I was still unable to speak I signed to her to cut the tree, as the voice in my dream had directed me Without a word of question Yamba picked up the toorously into the trunk,a hole three or four inches deep Itto you, but it surprised me in no hen out from the hole there _trickled a clear_, _uncertain stream of water_, under which Yamba promptly heldeffect upon me, and in a short tireatly to the delight of my faithful coed in another and far sounder sleep I do not know the scientific name of that wonderful Australian tree which saved my life, but believe it is well known to naturalists I have heard it called the ”bottle tree,” froht, while Ya for water, Bruno had never leftintoue Whilst I was asleep the second ti in search of food, and returned with a young opossu way on a tripod of sticks over a blazing fire I was able to eat a little of the flesh, and we obtained all the water anted from our wonderful tree Of course, Yamba was unacquainted with the fact that water was stored in its interior As a rule, her instinct ht be depended upon implicitly; and even after years of her companionshi+p I used to be filled onder at the way in which she would track down galance at a tree casually, and discern on the bark certain minute scratches, which were quite invisible to me, even when pointed out She would then cliood-sized opossum, which would be roasted in its skin, with many different varieties of delicious roots

When I had quite recovered, Yaht, and had finally discovered a water-hole in a new country, for which she said weFortunately this did not take very long, and on reaching the brink of the water-hole we camped beside it for several days, in order to recuperate I must say that the water we found here did not look very inviting--it was, in fact, very slireen in colour; but by the time we took our departure there was not a drop left Yamba had aanother hole alongside the one containing the water, leaving a few inches of earth between theh which the water would percolate, and collect in hole perfectly filtered

At other ti could detect the presence of water, she would point out to round in an old dried-up water-hole This, she told , and she would at once thrust down a reed about eighteen inches long, and invite me to suck the upper end, with the result that I ihts of delicious water

At the water-hole just described birds were rather plentiful, and when they came down to drink, Yamba knocked them over without difficulty They made a very welco the birds was sirass that completely enveloped her, and, shrouded in this, waited at the edge of the water-hole for the birds to come and drink

Then she knocked over with a stick as many as she required In this e had a very pleasant spell of rest for four or five days Continuing our journey once more, we pushed on till in about three weeks we came to a ooded country, where the eucalyptus flourished e to say, there was very little garew a little anxious, and she explained that as we had not coaroos lately, nor any blacks, it was evident that the wet season was coround, and accordingly went almost due north for the next few days, until we reached the banks of a big river--the Roper River, as I afterwards found out--where we thought it advisable to camp This would probably be sometime in the month of Dece round the foot of a tree, and was just about to knock some of them over with my stick, when Yamba called out to an to climb the tree, and she explained that this clearly indicated the advent of the wet season ”I did not wish you to kill the snakes,” she said, ”because I wanted to see if they would take refuge in the trees fro floods”

Up to this tihtest indication of any great change in the weather Many ions, for the river was extreh banks, and the country all round was dry and parched; but even as alked, a rees I was oppressed with a sense of co evil

I listened intently when Yamba requested me to do so, but at first all I could hear was a curious ruradually increased in volume, and came nearer and nearer, but still I was utterly unable to account for it I also noticed that the river was beco at ever- increasing speed Suddenly an enorhtful roar, in one solid wave, and then it dawned uponin the hills, and the tributaries of the river were now sending down their floods into therapidity In the course of a couple of hours it had risen between thirty and forty feet Yaested that we had better build a hut on soround and re to continue our march while the rains lasted; and it was evident they were now upon us

We therefore set to work to construct a comfortable little shelter of bark, fastened to a fra plants Thus, by the tily ensconced We did not, however, rehout the whole of the day, but went in and out, hunting for food and catching game just as usual; the torrential rain which beat down upon our naked bodies being rather a pleasant experience than otherwise At this tie-pal a cataate the river when the floods had subsided Yaht ti pins of hardwood, and then bound thearoo hide

We also collected a stock of provisions to take with us--kangaroo and opossue-palm, and roots of various kinds These preparations took us several days, and by the ti for our journey the weather had become settled once more Yamba remarked to me that if we simply drifted down the Roper River we should be carried to the open sea; nor would we be very long, since the swollen current was now running like a mill-race