The squatters at Peak Downs took great interest in my work, and my first experience of Australian “bush-life” was particularly agreeable. They placed their men at my disposal, so that I had a splendid opportunity of adding to my collections. At the station where I was a guest, even one of the ladies of the house offered me her assistance, and once or twice she accompanied me when I went after emus and kangaroos, which are easily approached when you are driving in a buggy. My fair companion held the reins while I did the shooting.
Emus are very inquisitive, and can therefore easily be enticed within shooting range. Thus a man at Peak Downs told me that he frequently had attracted their attention by lying on his back and kicking his feet in the air. When the animals came near enough he shot them.
In the winter I made an excursion to Calliungal, where the inhabitants were surprised that I suffered so much from the cold. As a joke they invited their nearest neighbours to come and look at “a Norseman who felt cold in Australia.” It was so cold in the nights that the pools were frozen over, while the day was comparatively hot. On account of the cold nights I, who was unaccustomed to this climate, found it difficult to get woollen blankets enough for my bed.
In the Dee river, which flows by Calliungal, I observed several times the remarkable Platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) swimming rapidly about after the small water insects and vegetable particles which constitute its food. It shows only a part of its back above water, and is so quick in its movements that it frequently dives under water before the shot can reach it.
CHAPTER III
Journey to Western Queensland—Camping out—Damper (Australian bread)—The song of the magpie—Australian scrubs—Hunting the kangaroo—Devotion of parrots—Station life—Lonely shepherds—Migration of rats—Native justice—Australian fleas—Native mounted police—A remarkable flint instrument—The boomerang.
A WOOL-WAGGON.
In the beginning of July I prepared myself for a long journey to the west. I first despatched several cases of things collected to Christiania, and then proceeded on my journey in company with a man who was to bring provisions to Minnie Downs, Messrs. Archer’s sheep station, about 350 miles west from Rockhampton.
I had long contemplated this journey, as Western Queensland was in my imagination a veritable Eldorado for the naturalist. So far as I knew, no zoologist had yet studied the fauna of the far west. With my limited acquaintance with Australian bush-life I was happy to get a companion; he had a waggon drawn by three horses, so that our day’s journey was comparatively short, which was a great advantage to me. I thus had the opportunity of making many digressions on the way, and of procuring many animals, while my companion preceded me. The greater part of the day I was occupied on my own account in hunting and in preparing my game. In the course of the afternoon I overtook the waggon, the track of which I was always able to follow.