Day after day the schooner drifted to and fro upon this sand-bank, sometimes moving a length or two, and sometimes only a few feet during a tide; the sand scoured out from beneath her bow and stern, leaving holes with 6ft. or more of water there, while hillocks accumulated under her in midship; and the sand seemed to travel so evenly with her, that the usual criterion—a hand lead, allowed to trail upon the ground—was of no service in enabling us to estimate the distance she had moved.
On the 10th of October the decks had rifted, the combings of the main hatch had started up, the starboard side between the masts was hogged up 18in., and at the turn of the bilge, where the floor timbers join the ribs, one of the planks had split for 15ft. or more, leaving spaces into which the flat hand might easily be passed.
We laid broad strips of blanket and sheepskin well tarred on the principal rents, and nailed thin planks over them (Fig. 8, p. 170), but in another day or two she was just as bad on the other side; her stern was peaked into the air, while her bows dipped about 7ft. into a hole, the water pouring out of the fresh rifted planking as the tide fell. The mainmast rose up through the partners, so that we were obliged to slack off the rigging, and it became a question whether the stanchion under the main hatch should be knocked away to prevent its bursting up the deck, or whether it should remain so that the strength of the deck might keep the bottom a little longer from breaking.
On the 25th we again floated, after nearly a month of straining to and fro upon the sand-banks, and drifted rather than navigated the vessel up to the camp we had established below Steep-head.
Captain Gourlay with his crew, and some of the expedition men, found suitable trees some little distance up the river at Timber Creek, which, however, after a rather exciting adventure with some wandering natives, acquired the name of Cut-Stick Creek instead. Two long heavy gum trees as straight as possible were selected, brought to the vessel, and laid as sister keelsons (Fig. 2) alongside the real one, which, as well as all the original framework, is marked Fig. 1 in our illustration. Three or four pair of heavy crooks, each representing the half of a floor timber (Fig. 3), were then laid on the inner skin, with the inner ends abutting on the sister keelson, and the outer reaching up above the junction of the ribs with the floor heads. Heavy riders (Fig. 4) were placed upon them crossing the three keelsons, and were secured by clamps (Fig. 5) made of the tires of our dray wheels, which we had no hope of being able to put to their proper use. Being now above the rise and fall of the tide we could not beach the vessel, and, therefore, the frame could only be bolted to the true sides above the water line (Fig. 6), but it was pressed down upon the bottom not only by its own weight but by stanchions (Fig. 7) between it and the deck beams.
The schooner being detained for repairs, it was decided to undertake an expedition to the Albert River in the long boat; and thus, by reaching Mr. Gregory in time to assure him that a vessel was coming, prevent his starting for the colony with insufficient supplies; Mr. George Phibbs, the overseer of the expedition, and Mr. Graham, the mate of the “Messenger,” volunteering for the trip, we commenced our preparations. The boat was cleaned, repainted, the leaks stopped; and two inflatable tubes were made, each of them of one piece of canvas, 14ft. long, lined with waterproofed calico, folded so that the two sides should come together, a rope along the seam, with eyes turned in at the corners, to make it fast by, and, with one of the screw valves from our worn-out boat (p. 48), let into the after end, to receive the nozzle of the bellows. These we at first intended to stretch beneath the thwarts, inside, but eventually laced them outside each gunwale, where they were less in the way, and, when kept in a state of semi-inflation, projected sufficiently to prevent a great deal of the ripple of the sea washing into the boat, and this advantage we made the most of when we were fairly at sea, by fitting light bamboo stanchions forward, and securing the tubes to them, so as to make a kind of raised wash streak round the bows.
