Davy put the money in his pocket, went to the Queen's Head, and, as it was already dark, he hired a man for ten shillings to show him the road through the wet wilderness of Caulfield and round No-good-damper Swamp. It was half-past eleven when he arrived at Hook's Hotel, and, as his pony was still too lame to travel, he bought the horse he had hired, and set out with the Sale mailman. At the Moe he found Angus McMillan, William Montgomery, and their stockmen, afraid to cross the creek on account of the flood, and they had eaten all their provisions. Before dark a black gin came over in a canoe from the accommodation hut on the other side of the creek, having heard the travellers cooeying. They told her they wanted something to eat, but it was too dangerous for her to cross the water again that night. A good fire was kept burning but it was a wretched time. It rained heavily, a gale of wind was blowing, and trees kept falling down in all directions. Scott, the hut-keeper, sent the gin over in the canoe next morning with a big damper, tea, sugar, and meat, which made a very welcome breakfast for the hungry travellers.
They stayed there two days and two nights, and as the flood was still rising, they resolved to try to cross the creek at all risks, preferring to face the danger of death by drowning rather than to die slowly of starvation. Each man took off his clothes, all but his flannel shirt and drawers, strapped them to the pommel of his saddle, threw the stirrup irons over the saddle, and stopped them with a string under the horse's belly to keep them from getting foul in the trees and scrub. In some places the horses had to climb over logs under water, sometimes they had to swim, but in the end they all arrived safely at the hut. They were very cold, and ravenously hungry; and while their clothes were drying before a blazing fire, they drank hot tea and ate up every scrap of food, so that Scott was obliged to accompany them to the next station for rations. He left the gin behind, having no anxiety about her. While he was away she could feed sumptuously on grubs, crabs, and opossums.
In March, 1852, when everybody was seized with the gold fever, Davy took it in the natural way. He again left Port Albert without a pilot and went to Melbourne to resign his office. But Mr. Latrobe promised to give him a salary of 500 pounds a year and a boat's crew of five men and a coxswain. The men were to have twelve-and-six a day and the coxswain fifteen shillings.
By this time the gold fever had penetrated to the remotest parts of Gippsland, and from every squatting station and every lonely hut on the plains and mountains men gathered in troops. They were leaving plenty of gold behind them at Walhalla and other places. The first party Davy met had a dray and bullocks. They were slowly cutting a road through the scrub, and their team was the first that made its way over the mountains from Gippsland to Melbourne. Their captain was a lady of unbounded bravery and great strength--a model pioneeress, with a talent for governing the opposite sex.* When at home on her station she did the work of a man and a woman too. She was the one in a thousand so seldom found. She not only did the cooking and housework, but she also rode after stock, drove a team, killed fat beasts, chopped wood, stripped bark, and fenced. She did not hanker after woman's rights, nor rail against the male sex. She was not cultured, nor scientific, nor artistic, nor aesthetic. She despised all the ologies. All great men respected her, and if the little ones were insolent she boxed their ears and twisted their necks. She conquered all the blackfellows around her land with her own right arm. At first she had been kind to them, but they soon became troublesome, wanted too much flour, sugar, and beef, and refused to go away when she ordered them to do so. Without another word she took down her stockwhip, went to the stable, and saddled her horse. Then she rounded up the blackfellows like a mob of cattle and started them. If they tried to break away, or to hide themselves among the scrub, or behind tussocks, she cut pieces out of their hides with her whip. Then she headed them for the Ninety-mile Beach, and landed them in the Pacific without the loss of a man. In that way she settled the native difficulty. The Neills, with a bullock team, the Buckleys and Moores, with horse teams, followed the track of the leading lady. The station-owners stayed at home and watched their fat stock, which soon became valuable, and was no longer boiled.
[*Footnote: Mrs. Buntine; died 1896.]
On December 31st, 1851, there were in Tasmania twenty thousand and sixty-nine convicts. Six months afterwards more than ten thousand had left the island, and in three years forty-five thousand eight hundred and eighty-four persons, principally men, had left for the diggings. It was evident that Sir Wm. Denison would soon have nobody to govern but old women and children, a circumstance derogatory to his dignity, so he wrote to England for more convicts and immigrants, and he pathetically exclaimed, "To whom but convicts could colonists look to cultivate their lands, to tend their flocks, to reap their harvests?" In the month of May, 1853, Sir William wrote that "the discovery of gold had turned him topsy-turvy altogether," and he rejoiced that no gold had been discovered in his island. Then the Legislature perversely offered a reward of five thousand pounds to any man who would discover a gold field in Tasmania, but, as a high-toned historian observes, "for many years they were so fortunate as not to find it."
The convicts stole boats at Launceston, and landed at various places about Corner Inlet. Some were arrested by the police and sent back to Tasmania. Many called at Yanakie Station for free rations. Mr. Bennison applied for police protection, and Old Joe, armed with a carbine, was sent from Alberton as a garrison. Soon afterwards a cutter of about fifteen tons burden arrived at Corner Inlet manned by four convicts, who took the mainsail ashore and used it as a tent. They then allowed the cutter to drift on the rocks under Mount Singapore, and she went to pieces directly. While trying to find a road to Melbourne, they came to Yanakie Station, and they found nobody at the house except Joe, Mrs. Bennison, and an old hand. It was now Joe's duty to overawe and arrest the men, but they, although unarmed, overawed and arrested Joe. He became exceedingly civil, and after Mrs. Bennison had supplied them with provisions he showed them the road to Melbourne. They were arrested a few days afterwards at Dandenong and sent back to the island prison.
A NEW RUSH.
"And there was gathering in hot haste."