The Explorers (32 page)

Having returned to Wylie, I made him lead one of the horses in advance, and I followed behind, driving the rest after him, according to the system of march I had adopted in the morning. As soon as the two natives saw us moving on, and found Wylie did not join them, they set up a wild and plaintive cry, still following along the brush parallel to our line of route, and never ceasing in their importunities to Wylie, until the denseness of the scrub and the closing in of night concealed us from each other.

I was now resolved to make the most of the opportunity afforded me, and by travelling steadily onwards to gain so much distance in advance of the two natives as to preclude the possibility of their again overtaking us until we had reached the water, if indeed we were ever destined to reach water again. I knew that they would never travel more than a few miles before lying down, especially if carrying all the bread they had taken, the keg of water, guns, and other articles. We had, however, seen none of these things with them, except the firearms.

Our road was over scrubby and stony undulations, with patches of dry grass here and there; in other parts we passed over a very sandy soil of a red colour, and overrun by immense tufts of prickly grass (spinifex), many of which were three and four yards in diameter. After pushing on for eighteen miles, I felt satisfied we had left the natives far behind and, finding a patch of grass for the horses, halted for the remainder of the night. It was quite impossible, after all we had gone through, to think of watching the horses, and my only means of preventing them from straying was to close the chains of their hobbles so tight that they could not go far; having thus secured them, we lay down, and for a few hours enjoyed uninterrupted and refreshing sleep.

Moving on again on the 1st of May, as the sun was above the horizon, we passed through a continuation of the same kind of country for sixteen miles, and then halted for a few hours during the heat of the day. We had passed many recent traces of natives both yesterday and today, who appeared to be travelling to the westward. After dividing a pot of tea between us, we again pushed on for twelve miles, completing a stage of twenty-eight miles, and halting, with a little dry grass for the horses. It was impossible they could endure this much longer; they had already been five days without water, and I did not expect to meet with any for two days more, a period which I did not think they could survive.

As yet no very great change had taken place in the country; it was still scrubby and rocky, but the surface stone now consisted of a cream-coloured limestone of a fine compact character, and full of shells. The cliffs, parallel with which we were travelling, were still of about the same height, appearance and formation as before, whilst the inland country increased in elevation, forming scrubby ridges to the back, with a few open grassy patches here and there.

One circumstance in our route today cheered me greatly, and led me shortly to expect some important and decisive change in the character and formation of the country. It was the appearance for the first time of the banksia, a shrub which I had never before found to the westward of Spencer's Gulf, but which I knew to abound in the vicinity of King George's Sound, and that description of country generally. Those only who have looked out with the eagerness and anxiety of a person in my situation, to note any change in the vegetation or physical appearance of a country, can appreciate the degree of satisfaction with which I recognised and welcomed the first appearance of the banksia. Isolated as it was amidst the scrub, and insignificant as the stunted specimens were that I first met with, they led to an inference that I could not be mistaken in, and added, in a tenfold degree, to the interest and expectation with which every mile of our route had now become invested.

During the day the weather had been again cloudy with the appearance of rain; but the night turned out cold and frosty, and both I and the native suffered extremely. We had little to protect us from the severity of the season, never being able to procure firewood of a description that would keep burning long at once, so that between cold and fatigue we were rarely able to get more than a few moments rest at a time; and were always glad when daylight dawned to cheer us, although it only aroused us to the renewal of our unceasing toil.

May 2—We again moved away at dawn, through a country which gradually became more scrubby, hilly and sandy. The horses crawled on for twenty-one miles, when I halted for an hour to rest, and to have a little tea from our now scanty stock of water. The change which I had noticed yesterday in the vegetation of the country was greater and more cheering every mile we went, although as yet the country itself was as desolate and inhospitable as ever. The smaller banksias now abounded, whilst the
Banksia grandis
, and many other shrubs common at King George's Sound, were frequently met with.

The natives whose tracks we had so frequently met with, taking the same course as ourselves to the westward, seemed now to be behind us; during the morning we had passed many freshly lit fires, but the people themselves remained concealed; we had now lost all traces of them and the country seemed untrodden and untenanted. In the course of our journey this morning, we met with many holes in the sheets of limestone which occasionally coated the surface of the ground; in these holes the natives appeared to procure an abundance of water after rains, but it was so long since any had fallen that all were dry and empty now. In one deep hole only did we find the least trace of moisture; this had at the bottom of it perhaps a couple of wine glasses full of mud and water, and was most carefully blocked up from the birds with huge stones; it had evidently been visited by natives not an hour before we arrived at it, but I suspect they were as much disappointed as we were, upon rolling away all the stones, to find nothing in it.

After our scanty meal, we again moved onwards, but the road became so scrubby and rocky, or so sandy and hilly, that we could make no progress at all by night, and at eight miles from where we dined we were compelled to halt after a day's journey of twenty-nine miles; but without a blade even of withered grass for our horses, which was the more grievous because for the first time since we left the last water a very heavy dew fell, and would have enabled them to feed a little, had there been grass. We had now traversed 138 miles of country from the last water and, according to my estimate of the distance we had to go, ought to be within a few miles of the termination of the cliffs of the Great Bight.

May 3—The seventh day's dawn found us early commencing our journey. The poor horses still crawled on, though slowly. I was surprised that they were still alive, after the continued sufferings and privations they had been subject to. As for ourselves, we were both getting very weak and worn out, as well as lame, and it was with the greatest difficulty I could get Wylie to move, if he once sat down. I had myself the same kind of apathetic feeling, and would gladly have laid down and slept forever. Nothing but a strong sense of duty prevented me from giving way to this pleasing but fatal indulgence.

The road today became worse than ever, being one continued succession of sandy, scrubby and rocky ridges, and hollows formed on the top of the cliffs along which our course lay. After travelling two and a half miles, however, we were cheered and encouraged by the sight of sandy hills, and a low coast stretching beyond the cliffs to the south-west, though they were still some distance from us. At ten miles from where we had slept, a native road led us down a very steep part of the cliffs, and we descended to the beach. The wretched horses could scarcely move. It was with the greatest difficulty we got them down the hill; and now, although within sight of our goal, I feared two of them would never reach it. By perseverance we still got them slowly along for two miles from the base of the cliffs and then, turning in among the sand-drifts, to our great joy and relief, found a place where the natives had dug for water. Thus at twelve o'clock on the seventh day since leaving the last depot we were again encamped at water, after having crossed 150 miles of a rocky, barren and scrubby tableland…

July 7—…Having turned our horses loose, and piled up our baggage, now again greatly reduced, I took my journals and charts, and with Wylie forded the river about breast high. We were soon on the other side, and rapidly advancing towards the termination of our journey. The rain was falling in torrents, and we had not a dry shred about us, whilst the whole country through which we passed had, from the long-continued and excessive rains, become almost an uninterrupted chain of puddles. For a great part of the way we walked up to our ankles in water. This made our progress slow, and rendered our last day's march a very cold and disagreeable one.

Before reaching the Sound, we met a native who at once recognised Wylie, and greeted him most cordially. From him we learnt that we had been expected at the Sound some months ago but had long been given up for lost, whilst Wylie had been mourned for and lamented as dead by his friends and his tribe. The rain still continued falling heavily as we ascended to the brow of the hill immediately overlooking the town of Albany—not a soul was to be seen—not an animal of any kind—the place looked deserted and uninhabited, so completely had the inclemency of the weather driven both man and beast to seek shelter from the storm.

For a moment I stood gazing at the town below me—that goal I had so long looked forward to, had so laboriously toiled to attain, was at last before me. A thousand confused images and reflections crowded through my mind, and the events of the past year were recalled in rapid succession. The contrast between the circumstances under which I had commenced and terminated my labours stood in strong relief before me. The gay and gallant cavalcade that accompanied me on my way at starting, the small but enterprising band that I then commanded, the goodly array of horses and drays, with all their well-ordered appointments and equipment, were conjured up in all their circumstances of pride and pleasure; and I could not restrain a tear as I called to mind the embarrassing difficulties and sad disasters that had broken up my party, and left myself and Wylie the two sole wanderers remaining at the close of an undertaking entered upon under such hopeful auspices.

Whilst standing thus upon the brow overlooking the town, and buried in reflection, I was startled by the loud shrill cry of the native we had met on the road and who still kept with us: clearly and powerfully that voice rang through the recesses of the settlement beneath, whilst the blended name of Wylie told me of the information it conveyed. For an instant there was a silence still almost as death—then a single repetition of that wild joyous cry, a confused hum of many voices, a hurrying to and fro of human feet, and the streets which had appeared so shortly before gloomy and untenanted were now alive with natives—men, women, and children, old and young, rushing rapidly up the hill to welcome the wanderer on his return and to receive their lost one almost from the grave.

It was an interesting and touching sight to witness the meeting between Wylie and his friends. Affection's strongest ties could not have produced a more affecting and melting scene—the wordless, weeping pleasure, too deep for utterance, with which he was embraced by his relatives, the cordial and hearty reception given him by his friends, and the joyous greeting bestowed upon him by all, might well have put to the blush those heartless calumniators who, branding the savage as the creature only of unbridled passions, deny to him any of those better feelings and affections which are implanted in the breast of all mankind, and which nature has not denied to any colour or to any race.

† Mr H. was of course William Hovell.

* This is one of the names by which the transported convicts are distinguished in the colony.

† The very large loads the women are carrying suggest a more sedentary lifestyle for these Aborigines.

† The strange beast was probably a seal.

† Batman was on the Yarra River near where Queen Street now terminates.

† It wasn't taro she was digging, but the root of the yam daisy.

† Wándo River: now the Wannon River.

* My native name.

W
ILLIAM
W
ALL

Bad Is the Bush, 1844

William Wall, Irish ‘Collector and Preserver' at the Australian Museum, lacked the stiff upper lip so often encountered in explorers' writings. In 1844 he was sent on a collecting expedition with a bullock team from Sydney to the Murrumbidgee River. Reading Wall's account gives the idea that he was pushing into the deepest wilds, but in fact he was journeying down what was to become the Hume Highway—and even then a weekly coach ran the route.

Wall had a unique way with words. I have left his spelling and punctuation entirely as I found them, not least because I found it difficult to divine the state of Mr Clark, who was, Wall tells us, ‘compleatly punalised when he saw us'!

Friday Septr. 13th.—The Morning very gloomy likely to rain left Hurley's at 6 oclock for Camden. Had a wreatched night no sleep full of anxiety. Paid 5/- for bed and Tea also 3/- coach hire to Camden—arrived at Camden at 8 ock. had breakfast payed 1/ 6—left for Brownlow Hill accompanied by Mr Lakeman the propicitor of the Camden Inn in a Spring Cart got lost in the Bush about 11 ock. after driving about for 4 hours we came in sight of a farm which he believed to be Mr M. McLeay…It rained on us all day so that we arrived in a dreadfull mess wet through.