Fourth expedition. The members. Departure. Squabbles. Port Augusta. Coogee Mahomet. Mr. Roberts and Tommy. Westward ho!. The equipment. Dinner and a sheep. The country. A cattle ranch. Stony plateau. The Elizabeth. Mr. Moseley. Salt lakes. Coondambo. Curdling tea. An indented hill. A black boy's argument. Pale-green-foliaged tree. A lost officer. Camels poisoned. Mount Finke in the winter. Wynbring. A new route. A good Mussulman. Depart from Wynbring. New places. Antediluvian cisterns. Still westwards. Lake Bring. Rain and a bath. A line cut in the scrubs. High sandhills. Return to Youldeh. Waking dreams. In depot. Fowler's Bay once more. The officers explore to the north. Jimmy and Tommy. Jimmy's bereavement. At the bay. Richard Dorey. Return to Youldeh. Tommy's father. The officer's report Northwards. Remarks.
Sir Thomas Elder was desirous that the new expedition for Perth, for which camels were to be the only animals taken, should start from Beltana by the 1st of May. I was detained a few days beyond that time, but was enabled to leave on Thursday, May the 6th. The members of the party were six in number, namely myself, Mr. William Henry Tietkens, who had been with me as second on my last expedition with horses—he had been secured from Melbourne by Sir Thomas Elder, and was again going as second; Mr. Jess Young, a young friend of Sir Thomas's lately arrived from England; Alexander Ross, mentioned previously; Peter Nicholls, who had just come with me from Fowler's Bay, and who now came as cook; and Saleh, the Afghan camel-driver as they like to be called. I also took for a short distance, until Alec Ross overtook me, another Afghan called Coogee Mahomet, and the old guide Jimmy, who was to return to the bosom of his family so soon as we arrived anywhere sufficiently near the neighbourhood of his country. Poor old Jimmy had been ill at Beltana, and suffered greatly from colds and influenza. The Beltana blacks did not treat him so well as he expected, and some of them threatened to kill him for poking his nose into their country, consequently he did not like the place at all, and was mighty glad to be taken away. Thus, as I have said, on the 6th of May, 1875, the caravan departed from Beltana, but we did not immediately leave civilisation or the settled districts, as I had to travel 150 miles down the country nearly south, to Port Augusta at the head of Spencer's Gulf, where I intended to take in my stores, and loading for the inland voyage, as most of my equipment was forwarded by Sir Thomas from Adelaide to that port.
Nothing very particular occurred on the road down, except some continual squabbles between myself, and Saleh and Coogee, on account of the extraordinary and absurd manner in which these two men wanted to load and work the camels. In the first place, we had several young camels or colts in the mob, some of these were bulls and others bullocks. The Afghans have a way when travelling of bringing the camels up to the camp and making them lie down by their loads all night, whether they have had time to fill themselves or not. This system was so revolting to my notions of fair play that I determined to alter it at once.
Another thing that annoyed me was their absurd and stupid custom of hobbling, and unhobbling, while the camels were lying down. This may be necessary for the first few days after the creatures are handled, but if they are never accustomed to have their legs and feet touched while they are standing up, of course they may paw, or strike and kick like a young horse; and if a camel is a striker, he is rather an awkward kind of a brute, but that is only the case with one in a thousand. The Afghans not only persist in hobbling and unhobbling while the camels are lying down, but never think of taking the hobbles entirely off at all, as they unfasten the hobble from one leg and put both on the other, so that the poor brutes always have to carry them on one leg when they are travelling. I quickly put a stop to this, but Coogee Mahomet exclaimed, “Oh, master! you mustn't take off a hobble, camel he keek, he keek, you mustn't.” To which I replied, “Let him kick, and I hope he will kick you to death first, so that there will be one Afghan less in the world, but every hobble shall come off every camel every day.” This Coogee was a most amusing though lazy, indolent beggar. He never ceased to brag of what he could make camels do; he wished to ingratiate himself with me in the hope I would take him with me, but I had already determined to have only one of his countrymen. He said if he came with me he could make the camels go 200, 300, 400 or 500 miles with heavy loads without water, by just talking to them in his language. He used to say, “You know, master, camel he know me, and my countrymen; camel he un'stand my language, he no like Englishman, Englishman, he no un'stand riding camel, he no un'stand loading camel, only my countryman he un'stand camel,” etc., etc.; but with all his bragging about the camels going so long without water, when we had been only four days gone from Beltana, Saleh and Coogee had held a council and decided that I must be remonstrated with, in consequence of my utter ignorance, stupidity, and reckless treatment of the camels. Accordingly on the fourth morning, the weather having been delightfully cool and the camels not requiring any water, Coogee came to me and said, “Master, when you water camel?” “What?” I said with unfeigned astonishment, “Water the camels? I never heard of such a thing, they will get no water until they reach Port Augusta.” This completely upset Mr. Coogee, and he replied, “What! no water till Port Gusta? camel he can't go, camel he always get water three, four time from Beltana to Port Gusta.” “Well,” I said, “Coogee, they will get none now with me till they walk to Port Augusta for it.” Then Coogee said, “Ah! Mr. Gile, you very smart master, you very clever man, only you don't know camel, you'll see you'll kill all Sir Thomas Elder camel; you'll no get Perth, you and all you party, and all you camel die; you'll see, you'll see; you no give poor camel water, camel he die, then where you be?” I was rather annoyed and said, “You stupid ass, it was only yesterday you said you could take camels, 300, 400, 500 miles without water, with heavy loads, and now they have no loads and we have only come about seventy miles, you say they will die if I don't give them water. How is it that all your countrymen continually brag of what camels can do, and yet, when they have been only three days without water, you begin to cry out that they want it?”
To this he only condescended to reply, “Ah! ah! you very clever, you'll see.” Of course the camels went to the port just as well without water as with it. Alec Ross overtook us on the road, and brought a special little riding-camel (Reechy) for me. I got rid of Mr. Coogee before we arrived at the port. We remained a little over a week, as all the loads had to be arranged and all the camels' pack-saddles required re-arranging. Saleh and another of his countryman who happened to be there, worked hard at this, while the rest of the party arranged the loads.
While at Port Augusta, Mr. Charles Roberts, who had been with me, and with whom I left all the horses at Youldeh, arrived, by the usual road and brought me a young black boy, Master Tommy Oldham, with whom I had travelled to Eucla from Fowler's Bay with the three horses that had died on my journey to Beltana. He was very sorry to hear of the loss of Chester and Formby, the latter having been his riding-horse. Old Jimmy was immensely delighted to meet one of his own people in a strange place. Tommy was a great acquisition to the party, he was a very nice little chap, and soon became a general favourite.
Everything being at length ready, the equipment of the expedition was most excellent and capable. Sir Thomas had sent me from Adelaide several large pairs of leather bags, one to be slung on each side of a camel; all our minor, breakable, and perishable articles were thus secure from wet or damp. In several of these large bags I had wooden boxes at the bottom, so that all books, papers, instruments, glass, etc., were safe. At starting the loads were rather heavy, the lightest-weighted camels carrying two bags of flour, cased in raw-hide covers, the two bags weighing about 450 pounds, and a large tarpaulin about 60 pounds on top, or a couple of empty casks or other gear, which did not require to be placed inside the leather bags. The way the camels' loads are placed by the Afghan camel-men is different from, and at first surprising to persons accustomed to, pack-horse loads. For instance, the two bags of flour are carried as perpendicularly as possible. As a general rule, it struck me the way they arranged the loads was absurd, as the whole weight comes down on the unfortunate animal's loins; they use neither bags nor trunks, but tie up almost every article with pieces of rope.
My Afghan, Saleh, was horrified at the fearful innovations I made upon his method. I furnished the leather bags with broad straps to sustain them, having large rings and buckles to pass them through and fasten in the ordinary way of buckle and strap; this had the effect of making the loads in the bags and trunks lie as horizontally as possible along the sides of the pads of the pack-saddles. Saleh still wanted to encumber them with ropes, so that they could not be opened without untying about a thousand knots. I would not permit such a violation of my ideas, and told him the loads should be carried as they stood upon the ground; his argument always was, a la Coogee Mahomet, “Camel he can't carry them that way,” to which I invariably replied, “Camel he must and camel he shall,” and the consequence was that camel he did.
When we left Port Augusta, I had fifteen pack- or baggage-camels and seven riding ones. The two blacks, Jimmy and Tommy, rode on one animal, while the others had a riding-camel each. The weight of the loads of the baggage-camels on leaving, averaged 550 pounds all round. All the equipment and loads being in a proper state, and all the men and camels belonging to the new expedition for Perth being ready, we left Port Augusta on the 23rd of May, 1875, but only travelled about six miles, nearly west-north-west, to a place called Bowman's or the Chinaman's Dam, where there was plenty of surface water, and good bushes for the camels; here we encamped for the night. A few ducks which incautiously floated too near fell victims to our sportsmen. The following day we passed Mr. Bowman's station, had some dinner with him, and got a fat sheep from one of his paddocks. On the 25th we encamped close to a station in the neighbourhood of Euro Bluff, a hill that exists near the south-western extremity of Lake Torrens; we now travelled about north-north-west up Lake Torrens, upon the opposite or western side to that on which we had lately travelled down, to Port Augusta, as I wished to reach a watercourse (the Elizabeth), where I heard there was water. On the 28th of May we encamped on the banks of Pernatty Creek, where we obtained a few wild ducks; the country here was very good, being open salt-bush country. The next morning we met and passed a Government Survey party, under the command of Mr. Brooks, who was engaged in a very extensive trigonometrical survey. In an hour or two after, we passed Mr. Bowman's Pernatty cattle-station; there was no one at home but a dog, and the appearance of the camels seemed to strike him dumb. There were some nice little sheets of water in the creek-bed, but scarcely large enough to be permanent. The country was now a sort of stony plateau, having low, flat-topped, tent-shaped table-lands occurring at intervals all over it; it was quite open, and no timber existed except upon the banks of the watercourses.
On the 30th of May we reached the Elizabeth; there was an old hut or two, but no people were now living there. The water was at a very low ebb. We got a few ducks the first day we arrived. As some work had to be done to the water-casks to enable us to carry them better, we remained here until the 2nd of June. The Elizabeth comes from the table-lands near the shores of Lake Torrens to the north-eastward and falls into the northern end of Pernatty Lagoon. Here we were almost as far north as when at Beltana, our latitude being 31° 10´ 30´´. The weather was now, and had been for several weeks—indeed ever since the thunderstorm which occurred the day we came upon the clay-channel water—very agreeable; the nights cold but dewless. When at Port Augusta, I heard that a Mr. Moseley was out somewhere to the west of the Elizabeth, well-sinking, on a piece of country he had lately taken up, and that he was camped at or near some rain-water. I was anxious to find out where he was; on the 31st of May I sent Alec Ross on the only track that went west, to find if any water existed at a place I had heard of about twenty-five miles to the west, and towards which the only road from here led. Alec had not been gone long, when he returned with Mr. Moseley, who happened to be coming to the Elizabeth en route for Port Augusta. He camped with us that night. He informed me his men obtained water at some clay-pans, called Coondambo, near the edge of Lake Gairdner, another large salt depression similar to Lake Torrens, and that by following his horses' tracks they would lead, first to a well where he had just succeeded in obtaining water at a depth of eighty-five feet, and thence, in seven miles farther, to the Coondambo clay-pans. I was very glad to get this information, as even from Coondambo the only water to the west beyond it, that I knew of, was Wynbring, at a distance of 160 or 170 miles.