[ILLUSTRATION 32]
WYNBRING ROCK.
On the 26th of June we departed from the pretty little oasis of Wynbring, leaving its isolated and water-giving rock, in the silence and solitude of its enveloping scrubs, abandoning it once again, to the occupation of primeval man, a fertile little gem in a desolate waste, where the footsteps of the white man had never been seen until I came, where the wild emu, and the wilder black man, continually return to its life-sustaining rock, where the aboriginal inhabitants will again and again indulge in the wild revelries of the midnight corroborree dance, and where, in an existence totally distinct from ours of civilisation, men and women live and love, and eat and drink, and sleep and die. But the passions are the same in all phases of the life of the human family, the two great master motives, of love and hunger, being the mainspring of all the actions of mankind.
Wynbring was now behind us, and Jimmy once more our guide, philosopher, and friend. He seemed much gratified at again becoming an important member of the expedition, and he and Tommy, both upon the same riding-camel, led the way for us, through the scrubs, in the direction of about west-north-west. In seven or eight miles we came to a little opening in the scrub, where Jimmy showed us some bare flat rocks, wherein was a nearly circular hole brimful of water. It was, however, nearly full also of the debris of ages, as a stick could be poked into mud or dirt for several feet below the water, and it was impossible to say what depth it really was; but at the best it could not contain more than 200 or 300 gallons. This was Taloreh. Proceeding towards the next watering-place, which old Jimmy said was close up, in a rather more northerly direction, we found it was getting late, as we had not left Wynbring until after midday; we therefore had to encamp in the scrubs, having come about fifteen miles. It is next to impossible to make an old fool of a black fellow understand the value of the economy of time. I wanted to come on to Edoldeh, and so did old Jimmy; but he made out that Edoldeh was close to Taloreh, and every mile we went it was still close up, until it got so late I ordered the party to camp, where there was little or nothing that the camels could eat. Of course it was useless to try and make Jimmy understand that, having thousands of miles to travel with the camels, it was a great object to me to endeavour to get them bushes or other food that they could eat, so as to keep them in condition to stand the long journey that was before them. Camels, although exceedingly ravenous animals, will only eat what they like, and if they can't get that, will lie down all night and starve, if they are too short-hobbled to allow them to wander, otherwise they will ramble for miles. It was therefore annoying the next morning to find plenty of good bushes at Edoldeh, two miles and a half from our wretched camp, and whither we might have come so easily the night before. To-day, however, I determined to keep on until we actually did reach the next oasis; this Jimmy said was Cudyeh, and was of course still close up. We travelled two and a half miles to Edoldeh, continued eighteen miles beyond it, and reached Cudyeh early in the afternoon. This place was like most of the little oases in the desert; it was a very good place for a camp, one singular feature about it being that it consisted of a flat bare rock of some area, upon which were several circular and elliptical holes in various places. The rock lay in the lowest part of the open hollow, and whenever rain fell in the neighbourhood, the water all ran down to it. In consequence of the recent rains, the whole area of rock was two feet under water, and the extraordinary holes or wells that existed there looked like antediluvian cisterns. Getting a long stick, and wading through the water to the mouths of these cisterns, we found that, like most other reservoirs in a neglected native state, they were almost full of soil and debris, and the deepest had only about three feet of water below the surface of the rock. Some of these holes might be very deep, or they might be found to be permanent wells if cleaned out.
Next day we passed another little spot called Yanderby, with rock water, at ten miles; thence in three more we came to Mobing, a much better place than any of the others: indeed I thought it superior to Wynbring. It lies about north 62° west from Wynbring and is fifty miles from it; the latitude of Mobing is 30° 10´ 30´´. At this place there was a large, bare, rounded rock, very similar to Wynbring, except that no rock-holes to hold any surface water existed; what was obtainable being in large native wells sunk at the foot of the rock, and brimful of water. I believe a good supply might be obtained here. There were plenty of good bushes in the neighbourhood for the camels, and we had an excellent camp at Mobing. As usual, this oasis consisted merely of an open space, lightly timbered with the mulga acacia amongst the sandhills and the scrubs.
The day after, we were led by old Jimmy to a small salt lake-bed called Bring, which was dry; it lay about south-west from Mobing. Round at the southern shore of this lake Jimmy showed us a small rock-hole, with a few dozen gallons of water in it. In consequence of Mr. Young not being well, we encamped, the distance from Mobing being nine miles. This also was a rather pretty camp, and excellent for the camels. Towards evening some light showers of rain fell, and we had to erect our tarpaulins and tents, which we only do in times of rain. More showers fell the next day, and we did not shift our quarters. A very shallow sheet of water now appeared upon the surface of the lake bed, but it was quite salt. We made some little dams with clay, where the water ran into the lake, and saved enough water to indulge in a sort of bath with the aid of buckets and waterproof sheeting. This was the last day of June. Unfortunately, though Chairman of the Company, I was unable to declare a dividend for the half-year.
The 1st of July broke with a fine and beautiful morning, and we left Lake Bring none the worse for our compulsory delay. I was anxious to reach Youldeh so soon as possible, as I had a great deal of work to do when I arrived there. To-day we travelled nearly west seventeen or eighteen miles, and encamped without an oasis. On the 2nd we passed two rocky hills, named respectively Pondoothy and Poothraba, Pondoothy was an indented rock-crowned hill in the scrubs. Standing on its summit I descried an extraordinary line cut through the scrubs, which ran east by north, and was probably intended by the natives for a true east line. The scrub timber was all cut away, and it looked like a survey line. Upon asking old Jimmy what it was done for, and what it meant, he gave the usual reply, that Cockata black fellow make 'em. It was somewhat similar to the path I had seen cleared at Pylebung in March last, and no doubt it is used for a similar purpose. Leaving this hill and passing Poothraba, which is in sight of it, we continued our nearly west course, and camped once more in the scrubs. The country was very difficult for the loaded camels, it rose into such high ridges or hills of sand that we could only traverse it at a snail's pace. It was of course still covered with scrubs, which consisted here, as all over this region, mostly of the Eucalyptus dumosa, or mallee-trees, of a very stunted habit; occasionally some patches of black oaks as we call them, properly casuarinas, with clumps of mulga in the hollows, here and there a stunted cypress pine, callitris, some prickly hakea bushes, and an occasional so called native poplar, Codonocarpus cotinifolius, a brother or sister tree to the poisonous Gyrostemon. The native poplar is a favourite and harmless food for camels, and as it is of the same family as the Gyrostemon, my friend Baron von Mueller argues that I must be mistaken in the poison plant which affected the camels. He thinks it must be a plant of the poisonous family of the Euphorbiaceae, and which certainly grows in these regions, and which I have collected specimens of, but I cannot detect it.
We were now nearly in the latitude of Youldeh, and had only to push west to reach it; but the cow camel that Jimmy and Tommy rode, being very near calving, had not travelled well for some days, and gave a good deal of trouble to find her of a morning. I wished to get her to Youldeh before she calved, as I intended to form a depot there for a few weeks, during which time I hoped the calf would become strong enough to travel. On the morning of the 5th, only about half the mob were brought up to the camp, and, as Mr. Tietkens' and my riding camels were amongst them, we rode off to Youldeh, seven or eight miles away, telling the others to come on as soon as they could. Mr. Young, Saleh, and Tommy were away after the absent animals. On arriving I found Youldeh much the same as when I left it, only now the weather was cool, and the red sandhills, that had formerly almost burnt the feet of men and animals, were slightly encrusted with a light glittering mantle of hoar-frost in the shaded places, under the big leguminous bushes, for that morning Herr Gabriel Daniel Fahrenheit had fallen to 28°. My old slabbed well had got filled up with sand, and it was evident that many natives had visited the place since I left on the 24th of March, 103 days ago. We managed to water our camels, as they lay down on the top of the well, and stretched their long necks down into it. We then quietly waited till long past midday for the caravan to come up. We had nothing to do, and nothing to eat; we could not dig out the well, for we had no shovel. At last Mr. Tietkens got alarmed at the non-arrival of the party, and he went back to the camp, taking my riding-camel with him, as she would not remain quiet by herself. I remained there mighty hungry, and made some black smoke to endeavour to attract any natives that might be in the neighbourhood. I have before remarked that the natives can make different coloured smokes, of different form, and make them ascend in different ways, each having a separate meaning: hurried alarm, and signal fires are made to throw up black and white smokes. No signals were returned, and I sat upon a sandhill, like Patience on a monument, and thought of the line, “That sitting alone with my conscience, is judgment sufficient for me.” I could not perceive any dust or sand of the approaching caravan; darkness began to creep over this solitary place and its more solitary occupant. I thought I had better sleep, though I had no bedding, to pass the time away till morning. I coiled myself up under a bush and fell into one of those extraordinary waking dreams which occasionally descend upon imaginative mortals, when we know that we are alive, and yet we think we are dead; when a confused jumble of ideas sets the mind “peering back into the vistas of the memories of yore,” and yet also foreshadowing the images of future things upon the quivering curtains of the mental eye. At such a time the imagination can revel only in the marvellous, the mysterious, and the mythical. The forms of those we love are idealised and spiritualised into angelic shapes. The faces of those we have forgotten long, or else perchance have lost, once more return, seraphic from the realms of light. The lovely forms and winning graces of children gone, the witching eyes and alluring smiles of women we have loved, the beautiful countenances of beloved and admired youth, once more we seem to see; the youthful hands we have clasped so often in love and friendship in our own, once more we seem to press, unchanged by time, unchanged by fate, beckoning to us lovingly to follow them, still trying with loving caress and youthful smiles to lead us to their shadowy world beyond. O youth, beautiful and undying, the sage's dream, the poet's song, all that is loving and lovely, is centred still in thee! O lovely youth, with thine arrowy form, and slender hands, thy pearly teeth, and saintly smile, thy pleading eyes and radiant hair; all, all must worship thee. And if in waking hours and daily toil we cannot always greet thee, yet in our dreams you are our own. As the poet says:—
“In dreams you come as things of light and lightness!
We hear your voice in still small accents tell,
Of realms of bliss and never-fading brightness,
Where those who loved on earth together dwell.”