Narrative of an Expedition into Central Australia. Charles Sturt

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СКАЧАТЬ discharge of his fusee whilst loading. He had incautiously put on the cap and was galloping at the time, but kept his seat. Mr. Browne informed me they had seen a great many cattle, but that they were exceedingly wild, and started off the moment the horsemen appeared, insomuch that they could not turn them, and it was with a view to drive them towards the river that Flood fired at them. However none approached the camp. Mr. Poole returned late in the afternoon equally unsuccessful. Mr. Browne dressed Flood's hand, who bore it exceedingly well, and only expressed his regret that he should be of no use on the Darling in the event of any rupture with the natives. I remained stationary, as Mr. Browne thought it would be necessary to keep Flood quiet for a day or two. On the following day we resumed our journey, and reached the junction of the ancient channel of the Darling with the Murray about 11. The floods were running into it with great velocity, and the water had risen to a considerable height, so that many trees were standing in it. I remained here until noon, when a meridian altitude placed us in lat. 34 degrees 4 minutes 34 seconds. We then bade adieu to the Murray, and turned northwards to overtake the party, which under Nadbuck's guidance had cut off the angle into which we had gone. With the Murray we lost its fine trees and grassy flats. The Ana-branch had a broad channel and long reaches of water; but was wholly wanting in pasture or timber of any size. The plains of the interior formed the banks, and nothing but salsolae grew on them. We encamped at eight miles from the junction, where there happened to be a little grass, but were obliged to keep the cattle in yoke and the horses tethered to prevent their wandering. As we advanced up the Ana-branch on the following day, its channel sensibly diminished in breadth, and at eleven miles we reached a hollow, beyond which the floods had not worked their way. Here we found a tribe of natives, thirty-seven in number, by whom the account we had heard of the massacre of the over-landers at the lagoons of the Darling was confirmed. Nadbuck now informed me that we should have to cross the Ana-branch and go to the eastward, and that it would be necessary to start by dawn, as we should not reach the Darling before sunset. Nadbuck had now become a great favourite, and there was a dry kind of humour about him that was exceedingly amusing, at the same time that his services were really valuable.

      Toonda, on the other hand, was a man of singular temperament. He was good-looking and more intelligent than any native I had ever before seen. His habit was spare, but his muscles were firm, and his sinews like whipcord He must indeed have had great confidence in his own powers to have undertaken a journey of more than 200 miles from his own home. He was very taciturn, and would rather remain at the officers' fire than join his fellows.

      The country we had passed through during the day had been miserable. Plains of great extent flanked the Ana-branch on either side, on which there were sandy undulations covered with stunted cypress trees or low brush.

      Flood had from the time of his accident suffered great pain; but as he did not otherwise complain, Mr. Browne did not entertain any apprehension as to his having any attack of fever.

      On the morning of the 24th, the natives paid us an early visit with their boys, and remained at the camp until we started. At the head of the water they had made a weir, through the boughs of which the current was running like a sluice; but the further progress of the floods was stopped by a bank that had been gradually thrown up athwart the channel. Crossing the Ana-branch at this point, we struck across barren sandy plains, on a N.N.E. course. From them we entered a low brush, in which there were more dead than living trees. At four miles this brush terminated, and we had again to traverse open barren plains. At their termination we had to force our way through a second brush, consisting for the most part of fusani, acaciae, hakeae, and other low shrubs, but there were no cypresses here as in the first brush. On gaining more open ground, the country gradually rose before us, and a ferruginous conglomerate cropped out in places. We at length began our descent towards the valley of the Darling. The country became better wooded: the box-tree was growing on partially flooded land, and there was no deficiency of grass. Mr. Browne went on a-head with Toonda and Flood, whilst I and Mr. Poole remained with the party. From the appearance of the country, however, I momentarily expected to come on the river; but the approach to it from the westward is extremely deceptive, and we had several miles of box-tree flats to traverse before the gum-trees shewed their white bark in the distance. We reached the Darling at half-past five, as the sun's almost level beams were illuminating the flats, and every blade of grass and every reed appeared of that light and brilliant green which they assume when held up to the light. The change from barrenness and sterility to richness and verdure was sudden and striking, and nothing certainly could have been more cheering or cheerful than our first camp on the Darling River. The scene itself was very pretty. Beautiful and drooping trees shaded its banks, and the grass in its channel was green to the water's edge. Evening's mildest radiance seemed to linger on a scene so fair, and there was a mellow haze in the distance that softened every object. The cattle and horses were up to their flanks in grass and young reeds, and plants indicative of a better soil, such as the sowthistle, the mallow, peppermint, and indigofera were growing in profusion around us. Close to our tents there was a large and hollow gum-tree, in which a new fishing net had been deposited, but where the owner intended to use it was a puzzle to us, for it was impossible that any fish could remain in the shallow and muddy waters of the Darling; which was at its lowest ebb, and the current was so feeble that I doubted if it really flowed at all. Whether the natives anticipated the flood which shortly afterwards swelled it I cannot say, although I am led to believe they did, either from habit or experience.

      So abundant had been the feed that none of the cattle stirred out of sight of the camp, and we should have started at an early hour, but for the visit of an old native, the owner of the net we had discovered. It was with some hesitation that he crossed the river to us, but he did so; and as soon as he saw me he recognised me as having been in the boat on the Murray in 1830, though fourteen years had passed since that time, and he could only have seen me for an hour or two. He was not, however, singular in his recollection of me, since one of the natives of the Ana-branch also recollected me; and Tenbury, the native constable at Moorundi, not only knew me the moment he saw me, but observed that a little white man sat by my side in the stern of the boat, and that I had something before me, which was a compass. There was a suspicious manner about our visitor, for which we could not very well account; but it arose from doubts he entertained as to the safety of his net, for after he had seen that it had not been taken away, his demeanour changed, and he expressed great satisfaction that we had not touched it.

      We commenced our journey up the Darling at nine o'clock, on a course somewhat to the westward {EASTWARD in published text} of north. We passed flat after flat of the most vivid green, ornamented by clumps of trees, sufficiently apart to give a most picturesque finish to the landscape. Trees of denser foliage and deeper shade dropped over the river, forming long dark avenues, and the banks of the river, grassed to the water, had the appearance of having been made so by art.

      We halted, after a journey of fourteen miles, on a flat little inferior to that we had left, and again turned the cattle out to feed on the luxuriant herbage around them.

      The Darling must have been in the state in which we found it for a great length of time, and I am led to infer, from the very grassy nature of its bed, that it seldoms contains water to any depth, or length of time, since in such case the grass would be killed. Its flats, like those of the Murray, are backed by lagoons, but they had long been dry, and the trees growing round them were either dead or dying.

      With the exception of the tribe at the Ana-branch, and the old man, we had seen no natives since leaving the Murray; but, from the reports we had heard of the recent massacre of the overland party at Williorara, and the character of the Darling blacks, I was induced to take double precautions as I journeyed up the river, and had the camp so formed that it could not be surprised. Two drays were ranged close to each other on either side, the boat carriage formed a face to the rear, and the tents occupied the front; thus leaving sufficient room in the centre to fold the sheep in netting. The guard, augmented to six men, occupied a tent at one angle. My own tent was in the centre of the front, and another tent at the angle opposite the guard tent. So that it would have been difficult for the natives to have got at the sheep (which they most coveted), without alarming us. Still, although СКАЧАТЬ