Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia Volume II Part 10

(**Footnote. On leaving Sydney for this expedition I placed in charge of Mr. McLeay, colonial secretary, the first specimen of this plant produced by cultivation. It grew luxuriantly in a flower-pot from seeds brought from the Darling where it was discovered. Volume 1.)

In the bed of Waljeers we again found the Agristis virginica of Linnaeus,* and an Echinochloa allied to E. crusgalli, two kinds of very rich gra.s.s; but most of the verdure in the middle of the bed consisted of a dwarf species of Psoralea which grew but thinly.** Hibiscus was also springing very generally. The bed of this lake had been full of the freshwater mussel; and under a canoe (which I took away in the carts) were several large crayfish dead in their holes. Dry and parched as the bed of the lake then was, the natives found nevertheless live freshwater mussels by digging to a substratum of sand. I understood that they also find this sh.e.l.l alive in the same manner, in the dry bed of the Lachlan.

(*Footnote. See Volume 1.)

(**Footnote. The third species of Psoralea before referred to (March 19th). P. cinerea, Lindley ma.n.u.scripts; herbacea, incana, foliis pinnatim trifoliolatis, foliolis dentatis punctatis ovatis acutis intermedio basi cuneato, racemo pedunculato denso multifloro foliis triplo longiore, bracteis minimis ovatis ac.u.minatis, calycibus pellucide pauci-punctatis, caule ramisque strictis.)

This lake was surrounded by yarra trees similar to those on the banks of the river; and within them was a narrow belt of slender reeds but no bulrushes. On the western sh.o.r.e lay a small beach of sand. The banks were in height about eight feet above the ordinary water-line of the lake; and the greatest depth in the centre was about sixteen feet below that line.

The yarra trees distinguis.h.i.+ng the margin continued to form a dense belt extending westward from the northern sh.o.r.e; and the natives informed me that these trees surrounded a much smaller lake named Boyonga which lay, as they pointed, immediately to the northward of it.

On ascending the bank overlooking the western sh.o.r.e of Waljeers we found that it also consisted of firm red soil with high bushes of atriplex, etc., as on the opposite side. We next traversed a plain of the same elevation but of firmer texture than any we had seen nearer the Lachlan.

The gra.s.s upon it was also good and abundant; and we found ourselves upon the whole in a better sort of country than we had seen for weeks; but still water was, if possible, scarcer than ever. After travelling about seven miles beyond Waljeers we regained the banks of the Lachlan; but I pursued its channel about two miles without finding a drop, and we encamped finally without having any for the animals after travelling upwards of sixteen miles.

BARNEY IN DISGRACE.

May 7.

The gra.s.s was green and abundant and dew had fallen upon it during the night; our cattle therefore had not fared as badly as on other nights of privation; and were able to proceed. After we had left our former encampment and the envoy had deserted us it occurred to me that our friend Barney, who had accompanied us a long way, appeared rather too anxious to have a gin. He had been busy, as I subsequently learnt, in raising a hue and cry on the approach of the tribe we last met, in hopes that we might quarrel with them, and that he might get one, in consequence, on easy terms. I recollected that he reminded me of his wants in this respect at the very moment these people were approaching. I foresaw the mischief likely to arise from this readiness of Barney to insult native tribes while under the wing of our party; and the unfavourable impression he was likely to make on them respecting us if he were allowed to covet their gins. I therefore blamed him for causing the return of the guide who had been sent with us by that tribe, placed him in irons for the night and, much as I liked the poor fellow as an intelligent native, I thought it necessary to send him back this morning in company with a mute young savage, also from Cudjallagong, who seemed much inclined to become a follower of the camp. Our stock of provisions could not be too carefully preserved and such followers, when beyond their beat, might have had claims on it not to be resisted. There then remained with us, besides Piper and his gin, two intelligent native boys, each being named Tommy, together with The Widow and her child. The two Tommies obtained new chronometrical surnames, being known in the party as Tommy Came-first and Tommy Came-last. The former had been told plainly to go back, upon which he was heard to say he should follow the party, notwithstanding Majy's orders, as he could always find opossums in the trees. I was pleased with his independence on being told this, and allowed him to accompany the party as well as his friend Tommy Came-last, whom he had picked up somehow in the woods.

A FAMILY OF NATIVES FROM THE MURRUMBIDGEE.

Our female guide maintained that there was a waterhole some miles onward at Pomabil; and we accordingly proceeded in that direction, regaining first the firm plains outside the trees growing on the river margin. We reached the part to which she had pointed and she went forward to look for the water but, on her calling out soon after that natives were there, we advanced into the wood, when we observed smoke arising and natives running away, pursued by The Widow. At length, perceiving that she stood talking to them, we went up. The strangers consisted of a family just come from the Murrumbidgee, and presented such a picture of the wild and wonderful that I felt a strong desire to make a sketch of the whole group. One man who was rather old being in mourning, as I was told, for the death of a brother, had his face, head and breast so bedaubed with white that he resembled a living skeleton; the others had large sticks, snakes and other reptiles in their hands, but they were perfectly naked and, crowding around him, presented a strange a.s.semblage.

INCONVENIENT FORMALITY OF NATIVES MEETING.

I was anxious to learn from the princ.i.p.al personage the situation of the water; but on this first meeting it was necessary, as usual on all such occasions, to continue for some time patient and silent. This formality was maintained very remarkably by the old man and Piper. In vain did I desire the latter to ask him a question; each stood silent for a full quarter of an hour about eight yards apart, neither looking at the other.

The female however became the intermediate channel of communication, for both spoke alternately in a low tone to her. At length Piper addressed the old man, raising his voice a little but with his head averted; and the other answered him in the same way; until at length by slow degrees they got into conversation. We were then informed that water was to be found a mile or two on, and the old man agreed to guide overseer Burnett and Piper to the place. I conducted the wheel-carriages along the firm plain outside and, after proceeding more than 2 1/2 miles, I heard a shot from Burnett, announcing his arrival at the water. I accordingly proceeded with the party in that direction, and we encamped near the river, amid the finest verdure that we had yet seen and after a journey of nine miles. We were informed that the Lachlan contained water in more abundance one or two days' journey lower down, and that the Murrumbidgee was not far to the southward.

May 8.

This day being Sunday I gave the cattle rest; but Mr. Stapylton went down the river with two men to make sure of water at our next stage. They found a pond at the distance of about eleven miles; the way to it being over a fine hard plain covered with mesembryanthemum and salsolae. The party saw a large kangaroo, the first observed on the banks of the Lachlan during this journey. The old man and his family had proceeded across to Waljeers in order to procure mussels, the object, as I understood, of his journey from the Murrumbidgee.

May 9.

We moved to the pond above-mentioned, named Yambarenga, and found near it a number of large huts similar to those of the Darling. The water was very green and muddy but the taste was good. The plain we traversed this day exactly resembled the best of the ground on the Darling; and in some places I observed the Quandang bushes,* having their branches covered with a parasitical plant whose bright crimson flowers were very ornamental.**

(*Footnote. Fusa.n.u.s ac.u.minatus.)

(**Footnote. Loranthus quandang, Lindley ma.n.u.scripts; inca.n.u.s, foliis oppositis lineari-oblongis obsolete triplinerviis obtusis, pedunculis axillaribus folio multo bevioribus apice divaricato-bifidis 6-floris, floribus pentameris aequalibus, petalis linearibus, antheris linearibus basi insertis. Next L. gaudichaudi.)

THE MURRUMBIDGEE SEEN FROM THE LACHLAN.

South of the spot where we now encamped the ground, which consisted of firm red clay, gradually rose; and from a tree Burnett observed the tall yarras of the Murrumbidgee at a distance of about eight miles. The lat.i.tude observed was 34 degrees 14 minutes 37 seconds South, longitude 144 degrees 25 minutes East.

May 10.

A thick fog prevented the men from getting the cattle together as early as usual. In the meantime I made a drawing of the native female and the scenery around; and we finally left the encamping ground at a quarter before eleven. The first part of this day's journey was over a rising ground, on leaving which the country seemed as if it descended westward into a lower basin, so that I took the river Lachlan which lay below to be already the Murrumbidgee.

RICH TINTS ON THE SURFACE.

We next travelled over a fine hard plain covered very generally with small bushes of a beautiful orange-flowered, spreading under-shrub, with broad thin-winged fruit;* but the Mesembryanthemum aequilaterale grew almost everywhere and seemed to take the place of gra.s.s. It crept over the light red earth, ornamenting it with a rich variety of bright green, light red, purple, and scarlet tints which, when contrasted with the dead portions that were all of a pale grey colour, produced a fine harmonious foreground, fit for any landscape. The plains were intersected by a small wood of goborro (dwarf box) and after crossing this and keeping the lofty yarra trees in view we found these trees at length growing on ground which was intersected by hollows full of reeds, other parts of the surface bearing a green crop of gra.s.s.

(*Footnote. Ropera aurantiaca, Lindley ma.n.u.scripts; foliolis linearibus obtusis succulentis petiolo aequalibus, petalis obovatis obtusissimis, fructibus...o...b..culatis. November 1838: This Ropera has grown in the gardens of the Horticultural Society at Chiswick and proves a pretty new annual flower.)

IMPROVED APPEARANCE OF THE RIVER.

The banks of the river bore here a very different aspect from any parts which we had seen above; and I supposed that we were at length approaching its junction with the Murrumbidgee. The bed was broader but not so deep, and contained abundance of water at every turning. Ducks, pigeons, c.o.c.katoos and parrots were numerous; and we had certainly reached a better country than any we had yet traversed.

INHABITED TOMB.

On a corner of the plain, just as we approached the land of reedy hollows, I perceived at some distance a large, lonely hut of peculiar construction, and I accordingly rode to examine it. On approaching it I observed that it was closed on every side, the materials consisting of poles and large sheets of bark, and that it stood in the centre of a plot of bare earth of considerable extent, but enclosed by three small ridges, the surface within the area having been made very level and smooth. I had little doubt that this was a tomb but, on looking through a crevice, I perceived that the floor was covered with a bed of rushes which had been recently occupied. On removing a piece of bark and lifting the rushes, I ascertained, on thrusting my sabre into the hollow loose earth under them, that this bed covered a grave.

Tommy Came-first, who was with me, p.r.o.nounced this to be the work of a white man; but by the time I had finished a sketch of it The Widow had hailed him from the woods and told him that it was a grave, after which I could not prevail on him to approach the spot. I carefully replaced the bark, anxious that no disturbance of the repose of the dead should accompany the prints of the white man's feet. I afterwards learnt from The Widow that the rushes within that solitary tomb were actually the nightly bed of some near relative or friend of the deceased (probably a brother) and that the body was thus watched and attended in the grave through the process of corruption or, as Piper interpreted her account, until no flesh remains on the bones; "and then he yan (i.e. goes) away!"

No fire, the constant concomitant of places of shelter, had ever been made within this abode alike of the living and the dead, although remains of several recent fires appeared on the heath outside.

DEAD TREES AMONG THE REEDS.

In the afternoon we came upon the river where rich weeds and lofty reeds enveloped a soft luxuriant soil. The yarra, or bluegum, not only grew on its banks, but spread over the flats; but I remarked that where the reeds grew thickest most of the trees were dead; and that almost all bore on their trunks the marks of inundation. These dead trees among reeds suggest several questions: Were they killed by the frequent burning of the reeds in summer? If so, how came they to grow first to such a size among them? Or did excess of moisture or its long continuance kill them?

Are seasons now different from those which must have admitted of the growth of these trees for half a century? Or have changes in the levels of the deposits made by the larger rivers below, produced inundations above, to a greater extent than they had spread formerly?

I was returning with the overseer from examining the country some miles in advance of the carts, and with the intention of encamping where I had left them halted, when I found the men had followed my track into some bad ground. After extricating them from it I proceeded three miles further to Bidyengoga, which we did not reach until dark. Water was found in the bed of the Lachlan on our penetrating through a broad margin of reeds towards some lofty yarra trees. Lat.i.tude 34 degrees 12 minutes 17 seconds South; longitude 144 degrees 18 minutes East.

VISIT SOME RISING GROUND.

May 11.

Rising ground appeared on the horizon about four miles to the north-west, and an intervening plain of firm clay covered with atriplex and salsolae rose towards it from the very margin of the reedy basin of the river.

Although anxious to see the junction of the Lachlan and Murrumbidgee, curiosity irresistible led me to the rising ground, while Mr. Stapylton traced the supposed line of the Lachlan and the overseer conducted the carts and party westward. Unlike the hills I had seen on the limits of interior plains elsewhere, the ridge I now visited consisted of the same rich loam as the plains themselves.

VIEW NORTHWARD.

It was connected with other low ridges which extended in a north-western direction into a country finely diversified with hill, dale, and patches of wood, but in all probability at that time entirely without water. The dry bed of a lake lay in a valley immediately north of the hills on which I stood. A few trees of stunted appearance alone grew in the hollow. On the top of this ridge I ate a russet apple which had grown in my garden at Sydney, and I planted the seeds in a spot of rich earth likely to be saturated with water as often as it fell from the heavens.

DIFFICULTIES IN FINDING EITHER OF THE RIVERS OR ANY WATER.

Southward I could see no trace of the Lachlan, and I hastened towards the highest trees where I thought it turned in that direction. I thus met the track of the carts at rightangles and galloped after them as they were driving through scrubs and over heaths away to the westward. When I overtook them I found that Mr. Stapylton had crossed over to them and told Burnett to say to me that he had not seen the Lachlan.

SEARCH FOR THE MURRUMBIDGEE.

A row of lofty yarra trees appeared to the southward and, as I expected to find the Murrumbidgee among them, I directed my course thither, travelling to the westward of south as well as any appearance of water would allow. We pa.s.sed through a scrub which swarmed with kangaroos, bronze-wing pigeons, and c.o.c.katoos; also by a rather singular hollow resembling the bed of a dry lake, in which we found several gra.s.ses apparently new and very beautiful,* together with a low but wide-spreading bush which bore a fruit resembling a cherry in size and taste, but with a more elongated stone.

(*Footnote. A Poa near P. australis, R. Br. and Bromus australis of R.

Br.)

After descending into what I had thought was the bed of a river we found unequal ground and saw, at a distance, patches of reeds, also lofty yarra trees growing all about. On reaching the reeds we found they filled only very slight hollows in the surface and, after pa.s.sing through them, we crossed another firm plain with atriplex and salsolae. No river was to be seen, but another line of trees bounded this plain, exactly like those on the banks of streams, and on reaching it I felt confident of finding water; but on the contrary there was only an open forest of goodly trees without the least indication of it.

A NIGHT WITHOUT WATER.