‘Mary,’ said Charlie, addressing his wife, ‘allow me to introduce to you a sample of the distinguished strangers from the Leviathan now anchored in our bay.’
‘Gentlemen,’ said he turning to us, ‘allow me to have the pleasure of introducing you to my spouse.’ Mary gracefully inclined her head, and blushed a whitish-grey. We bowed.
‘Be seated, gentlemen, be seated. Make yourselves at home,’ said Charlie, pointing to the sand, and then, turning to his blushing wife, suggested that refreshments would be acceptable.
While Mary was engaged at a decayed stump searching for the delicate and creamy grub known to scientists as the Vermiculites filiformis on which to regale her guests, Charles told us the following touching story of her capture.
‘Well, it came about in this way,’ said Charlie, clearing his throat and expectorating on the sand. ‘Mary and I had been married a month or so when we thought we would take a run down to the seaside as a wind-up for our honeymoon. For a week or so it was a blaze of sunshine, which, gentlemen, is not unusual in these parts. All day long we wandered up and down the beach, chasing little crabs and gathering up shells. At night, tired with paddling in the water, we scratched a hole in the sand, and slumbered. One morning I awoke and I found I was alone. I didn’t think much of it at the time, for Mary had a habit of rising early to catch a particular kind of worm for which she knew I had a partiality. As time passed, I felt a little anxious, and looked about me to see if it was possible to discover the direction which Mary had followed. I tracked her to the beach, and then down to the edge of the water, but as the tide had risen beyond this, her footsteps had been obliterated. “Mary, Mary, my love, where are you?” I cried. But no response beyond the lapping of the waves. That day I must have travelled nigh on twenty miles to the Eastward, in the hopes of discovering some sign of Mary’s whereabouts. At one time I thought she had deceived me, and had fled with an unknown lover. I vowed vengeance. That night I had to sleep in a hole by myself. Next day I travelled well on forty miles to the Westward, when just as the sun was going down, I came on tracks as thick as if there had been a mob of cattle passing. The few minutes of daylight that remained, for you know, sir, in these parts when the sun goes down, the light disappears as quickly as when you blow out a lamp, I spent in examining the tracks to see if I could find one corresponding to the hoof of my Mary. Just before the light went out, I found the print of a toe which I thought might have been hers. Beyond this there was another little round hole, then a third one, and then a fourth one—one following the other in a crooked line. After I had seen the series there was no doubt in my mind but that I was on Mary’s track. But why was Mary travelling on one toe, and in crooked lines? Had she been waltzing? Was she intoxicated? Had some heathen lopped off her other toes? Who were her companions? While I was thinking over this and a hundred other questions, it became quite dark, and I sat down at the foot of a tree to wait for dawn. I had hardly been there a couple of hours, when a low wailing sound came on the breeze, which had just set in down a neighbouring gully. It was Mary’s voice, and I was off in an instant. In twenty minutes or so I had reached the side of my dusky bride, who, to my horror, I found lashed to a tree. I quickly untied the bonds, and we wept upon each other’s necks. Mary then told me how, when she had risen to capture the early worm, she had suddenly been captured herself by a party of “whites,” who, after putting a gag in her mouth, had carried her off to the place where I had found her. As she was borne alone, she kept putting her foot down to the sand, and thus the toe marks. Her captors were close in the neighbourhood, and had gone in search of me. We must get off at once. Our first move was to hurry towards the beach, where we should be able to travel quickly. Arriving on the shore we almost immediately ran upon a number of tracks similar to those I had seen yesterday. They came from the bush down to the edge of the water, and then appeared to branch off in both directions along the shore line. Now this is what I want you to mark,’ said Charlie, tapping the ashes out of his pipe on the toe of his boot: ‘the tracks came down from the bush. Not up to the bush. “It is impossible to travel on the shore,” said Mary to me; “we had better take the opposite direction, and enter the bush where the strangers came out.” Little thinking what was about to happen, hand in hand we entered the bush. We had hardly passed the first thicket, than there was a dreadful yell, and Mary and I found ourselves enveloped in a net. The rest of the story was short: we were bound, brought into Palmerston, exhibited for a week in a show, and finally tamed.’
‘But how was it,’ said Peter, ‘that you made such a blunder as to think you were going in the opposite direction to those who caught you?’
‘Well, it was just this way,’ replied Charlie: ‘those whites didn’t act square, knowing if I came along the beach looking for Mary I was not going to run into their arms; they just walked backwards from the shore up to where they had set their darned net. The blacks are up to this backward trick now, so the new dodge is to catch their wives first, and tie them up to a tree as bait to catch their husbands. That is why they call the black women “gins.”’
When we returned to the hotel, we asked the landlord if he had ever heard the story of Charlie’s capture. He looked at us for a minute, and then went off in roars. ‘Why,’ said he, ‘Charlie tells that same old lie to everyone as comes. How much did you give him for the entertainment?’
That night Peter and I accepted an invitation to dine at a house where there was a collection of pet animals very closely resembling a happy family. I can only describe those which made some impression on me. One animal was a great slate-coloured bird like a stork. Usually it contented itself with standing stock still, posing as a bronze image. When you advanced to admire the beautiful workmanship, it would give a little ‘sold again’ sort of wink, and walk away. Another remarkable creation was a parrot who was always edging along sideways towards you, as if desirous of seeing how near you would allow it to put its eye to yours. I suggested that it should be provided with a cage. The most remarkable animal of all was a male sheep. This had once been a little lamb skipping about with a blue ribbon round its neck. Since its early days it had grown to the size of a young ox, and therefore, instead of wandering about the house, it had been placed together with other sheep in a paddock inside. In going home that night we had to cross this paddock. As it was close on midnight my companions said that danger need not be apprehended, the sheep would certainly be sleeping. I once thought of turning my attention to sheep-farming, but after my experiences on that memorable evening I think that all sheep ought to be kept in cages, or at least wear muzzles. In was 12 p.m. on the 4th of July. When in future years Americans see me rejoicing on the glorious 4th, they need not embrace me as a faithful citizen. My thanksgivings will be to commemorate deliverance from the jaws of a ferocious sheep. The name of this sheep is Billy. I first saw Billy standing in the moonlight. The moment my companions saw him, there was a general stampede. I am thankful to state that I kept well in the van. As to what occurred during the next ten minutes I can only speak from memory. There was no time allowed for taking notes. For two or three minutes or so, I am told that I was seen passing very rapidly backwards and forwards over and through some wire fencing. During this time I can remember a snorting and rustling going on at the distance of about two feet from my coat-tails. Each time that I slipped between the wires I could feel the warm breath of my pursuer near my body. Once or twice I heard some vicious, blood-curdling snaps. At last there was a pause. I was on one side of the railings and Billy was on the other. About two feet away from us was an open gate, which at once explained the continued proximity of Billy’s nose to my coat-tails. After grinding his jaws, he snuffed defiantly, threw his head in the air, and marched away. Billy had certainly cleared the field. It took us fully ten minutes to collect together, and then ten minutes more to clear our pockets and shoes of dirt and gravel. The whole thing had been like a thunderstorm. So much for the innocence and docility of sheep. I shall say more about Australian sheep in another chapter.
Next day a nice-looking fellow, called Pater, invited us to join a shooting-party. This would give me an opportunity of seeing something of the bush, so I embraced the offer. As Billy occupied the paddock, it was necessary to make a detour, and we were in consequence rather late for breakfast. We started in a buggy. The euphonious word ‘buggy’ is applied to a vehicle not unlike a waggonette. The place we went to was called ‘The Lagoons.’ I believe they were the lagoons of some particular person, but I forget his name. It was a long drive of perhaps ten or twelve miles, through tolerably open woods, made up of gum trees and screw palms. The gum trees grew anywhere and anyhow, but the screw palms grew with a corkscrew-like arrangement of their leaves, and only in places where there is water. If everything could arrive at a helical condition by imbibing water, what a time the sailors would have! Our road lay along a proposed railway track, and near an existing telegraph line. The railway line will lead to the mining districts, about 150 miles away. The telegraph line leads to Adelaide, nearly 2,000 miles distant. In position it is something like a line of longitude. We thought of following the line of telegraph to Adelaide, but as we heard that the journey usually took two years, our friends persuaded us to give up the notion.