Before this business was finished, the doctor felt his patient's back below the shoulder, and seemed to apply his fingers as if he twitched something out; after which, he sat down by the patient, and put his right arm round his back; the old man, at the same time, sat down on the other side the patient, with his face the contrary way, and clasped him round the breast with his right arm; each of them had hold of one of the patient's hands, in which situation they remained a few minutes.
Thus ended the ceremony, and Colebe said he was well. He gave his worsted night cap and the best part of his supper to the doctor as a fee; and being asked, if both the men were doctors, he said, yes, and the child was a doctor also, so that it may be presumed the power of healing wounds descends from father to son.
This affair being finished, most of the party fell asleep, whilst the two doctors were amused by Colebe and Ballederry, with an account of the buildings at Sydney and Rose-Hill, and in what manner the colonists lived: in this history, names were as particularly attended to as if their hearers had been intimately acquainted with every person who was mentioned.
Though the tribe of Buruberongal, to which these men belonged, live chiefly by hunting, the women are employed in fishing, and our party were told, that they caught large mullet in the river. Neither of these men had lost their front tooth, and the names they gave to several parts of the body were such as the natives about Sydney had never been heard to make use of. Ga-dia (the penis), they called Cud-da; Go-rey (the ear), they called Ben-ne; in the word mi (the eye), they pronounced the letter I as an E; and in many other instances their pronunciation varied, so that there is good reason to believe several different languages are spoken by the natives of this country, and this accounts for only one or two of those words given in Captain Cook's vocabulary having ever been heard amongst the natives who visited the settlement.
Having taken leave of their new friends the Car-ra-dy-gans (doctors), our party set off at a quarter past seven o'clock in the morning of the 15th of April, and followed the natives path along the banks of the river, walking at a good pace till a quarter past eight o'clock, when they came to a creek which was too wide to be crossed by cutting down a tree, and was too deep to be forded; they were, therefore, obliged to follow its windings till they supposed themselves at the head of it, and then they endeavoured to regain the banks of the river; but they presently found that they had only rounded a small arm of this creek, the principal branch of which they continued to trace with infinite fatigue for the remainder of the day.
It was high water in this creek at forty minutes past twelve o'clock, and at half past three, they found it divide into two branches, either of which might have been crossed on a tree; but by this time the party were tired, and threatened with heavy rain, which would make their night very uncomfortable, as they had no tent; they therefore took up their residence at a spot where a quantity of timber, from trees, which had already been burnt down by the natives, promised them good fires with little labour.
The rain went off after a few light showers, but our two natives now began to grow quite impatient to return home. Colebe talked about his wife, and said his child would cry; and Ballederry lost all patience when the rain began, telling the governor, that there were good houses at Sydney and Rose-Hill, but that they had no house now, no fish, no melon (of which fruit all the natives are very fond); and there is no doubt but they would have left the party, had they been acquainted with the country through which they had to return. It was most likely that the greatest part of the next day would be spent in getting to that part of the river which the creek had obliged them to quit, so that two days would be taken up in getting to the opposite side of a creek, not one hundred feet wide; it was, therefore, determined to return to Rose-Hill, which bore from the sleeping place south-east, sixteen miles distant.
The river which Governor Phillip had named the Nepean in a former excursion, was then traced for some miles, and he expected to have fallen in with it this journey, and to have traced it down to where it empties itself into the Hawkesbury, which it is supposed to do above Richmond-Hill: indeed, during the first day of this excursion, he supposed it possible that the river they were then tracing might be the Nepean, but what they saw of it afterwards, left no doubt but that they had fallen in with the Hawkesbury some miles below Richmond-Hill.
In the morning of the 16th of April, at half past seven o'clock, Governor Phillip and his party set off on their return to Rose-Hill; and, as soon as they were clear of the creek, they went south 40° east, which, they supposed, would carry them into the path leading from Rose-Hill to Prospect-Hill.--The face of the country where they slept, and for several miles in their road, was a poor soil, but finely formed, and covered with the stately white gum-tree. At noon, they came to a hollow, in which they found some very good water; here they stopped near an hour: after passing this gully, and a rocky piece of ground, the soil grew better, and they soon came to a brook of good water, which they had occasion to cross twice; the soil was good, and covered with long grass: they were now drawing near to Rose-Hill, where they arrived a little before four o'clock.
The dry weather still continued, and though they had a few showers, the quantity of rain which fell in the month of April, was not sufficient to bring the dry ground into proper order for sowing the grain; a few acres, however, of what was in the best condition, were sown with wheat the last week in the month. This long continuance of dry weather, not only hurt their crops of corn very much, but the gardens likewise suffered greatly; many being sown a second and a third time, as the seed never vegetated, from the want of moisture in the soil; this was a double misfortune, for vegetables were not only growing scarce, but seed also.