Thither, mother oh, I return again, Thither oh, I return again.

The other had been sung by the mother of Miago, a native who had accompanied Captain Wickham in the Beagle from the Swan River, and it had made a great impression on the natives.

Whither does that lone ship wander, My young son I shall never see again.

Whither does that lone ship wander.

EXTREME FEEBLENESS OF THE PARTY.

The night wore heavily on; sleepless sufferers were around me, and I myself began to feel very anxious as to what the next day might bring.

The men had now been already one night and two days without tasting a single drop of water or food of any kind whatever, for as the only provisions they had left was a spoonful or two of flour each it was impossible for them to cook this without water; indeed only two of them had even this small supply of flour left, and the rest were wholly dest.i.tute.

I personally suffered far less than any of the others with the exception of the native, and this for several reasons. In the first place I had been long accustomed to subsist on a very small quant.i.ty of water, and secondly I had always kept my mind occupied and amused instead of giving way to desponding or gloomy thoughts. When we halted and the others laid wearily down, brooding over their melancholy situation, I employed myself in writing up my journal, which was most scrupulously kept; and this duty being concluded I had recourse to a small New Testament, my companion throughout all my wanderings, and from this latter I drank in such deep draughts of comfort that my spirits were always good.

DANGER OF PERISHING FOR WANT OF WATER.

April 17.

About an hour and a half before dawn we started in a south by east direction, the native leading the way, for it was yet too dark for me to select points to march upon. As we moved along we moistened our mouths by sucking a few drops of dew from the shrubs and reeds, but even this miserable resource failed us almost immediately after sunrise. The men were so worn out from fatigue and want of food and water that I could get them but a few hundred yards at a time, then some one of them would sit down and beg me so earnestly to stop for a few minutes that I could not refuse acceding to the request; when however I thus halted the native in every instance expressed his indignation, telling me that it was sacrificing his safety as well as those of the others who were able to move, for that if we did not find water ere night the whole party would die. He was indeed as weak from want of food as any of us, for we had made such rapid and lengthy marches in the hope of speedily forwarding a.s.sistance to those left behind that when we came at night to the conclusion of our day's journey Kaiber was too much exhausted to think of looking for food.

About two o'clock in the afternoon the men were so completely exhausted that it was impossible to induce them to move, and at this period I found that we had only made about eight miles in a south by east direction, over plains studded with small sandy hills and the beds of dried up tea-tree swamps.

When I halted the sun was intensely powerful; the groans and exclamations of some of the men were painful in the extreme; but my feelings were still more agonized when I saw the poor creatures driven, by the want of water, to drink their own ----, the last sad and revolting resource of thirst!

UNSUCCESSFUL SEARCH FOR WATER WITH KAIBER.

Unable to bear these distressing scenes any longer I ordered Kaiber to accompany me, and notwithstanding the heat and my own weariness I left the others lying down in such slight shade as the stunted banksias afforded, and throwing aside all my ammunition, papers, etc., started with him in search of water, carrying nothing but my double-barrelled gun. We proceeded towards the sea. As the natives have the faculty, even in the trackless woods which they have never before been in, of returning direct to any spot they have left by however circuitous a course they may have travelled after quitting it, I paid no attention to the direction we were moving in but followed Kaiber, who roamed from spot to spot in the vain search of water; but we found not a drop. The same arid barren country seemed spread on every side; and when at length I began occasionally to stumble and fall from weakness hope abandoned me, and I determined to return direct to my comrades and get them to make one more effort to proceed and search for it in a southerly direction.

TREACHEROUS INTENTIONS OF KAIBER, THE NATIVE.

I therefore told Kaiber that such was my intention, and directed him to guide me to the party. With apparent alacrity he obeyed my orders; but after leading me about some time in an extraordinary manner he told me that he had lost his way and could not find them. His look was so very plausible when he said this, and he seemed so grieved at the circ.u.mstance, that for a moment I believed his tale; but I felt convinced that we could not be at any very great distance from them and therefore fired one barrel of my gun; the echo of this sound, never heard in these solitudes before, rang loudly through the woods, remoter distances caught it up, and at length it gradually died away: anxiously did I now listen for a repet.i.tion of the report, for I knew, were they within hearing, the men would instantly fire again to acknowledge the signal I had made; but minute after minute pa.s.sed on and no answering signal struck my ear. I sat down and applied my ear to the ground; every sense became absorbed in the single one of hearing, but not the remotest sound that I could distinguish broke the frightful solitude of these vast woods. I remained seated on the ground for a few minutes, still hearing no answer to my shot, till the conviction gradually forced itself on my mind that the native had been leading me astray. Only two cases could have occurred: either he had done so purposely, for he could not, by any accidental mistake, have taken me to such a distance as to prevent the party in these silent woods hearing the report of my gun, or otherwise the men had of themselves moved away from the place where I had left them. But I felt a.s.sured that this latter supposition was not correct, for ever since I quitted the other portion of the party I had maintained so strict a discipline that no man ever separated from the rest without my permission; indeed I had increased my strictness in these respects exactly in proportion to our increasing difficulties; and I moreover felt sure that some of the men were by far too much attached to me ever to abandon me in such a manner.

My situation however was undoubtedly very critical, not as far as regarded my own safety, for I was not now more than eighty miles from the nearest settler's hut; but was it possible for me to return alone to my countrymen and to say that I had lost all my comrades? that I had saved myself and left the others to perish? Yet I knew that unless I sent a.s.sistance to the first party I had left the majority of them could not survive; and from the state I had, about an hour and a half ago, left the others in, it appeared more than probable that they might wait and wait anxiously, expecting my return, until too weak to move, and thus die miserably in the woods.

These thoughts thronged rapidly through my mind. Indeed I was obliged to do all things quickly now for I felt that my existence depended upon my finding water within the next three or four hours. The native sat opposite to me on the ground, his keen savage eye watching the expression of my countenance, as each thought flitted across it. I saw that he was trying to read my feelings; and he at length thus broke the silence:

"Mr. Grey, today we can walk and may yet not die but drink water; tomorrow you and I will be two dead men, if we walk not now, for we shall then be weak and unable. The others sit down too much; they are weak and cannot walk: if we remain with them we shall all die; but we two are still strong; let us walk. There lies the sea; to that the streams run; it is long since we have crossed a river: go quickly, and before the next sun gets up we shall cross another running water." He paused for a minute, looking steadfastly at me, and then added, "You must leave the others, for I know not where they are, and we shall die in trying to find them."

HIS DESIGNS FRUSTRATED.

I now knew that he was playing me false and that he had purposely led me astray. He was too great a coward to move on alone for fear of other natives and, dreading to lose his life by thirst, he had hit upon this expedient of inducing me to abandon the others and to proceed with him.

"Do you see the sun, Kaiber, and where it now stands?" I replied to him.

"Yes," was his answer. "Then if you have not led me to the party before that sun falls behind the hills I will shoot you; as it begins to sink you die." I said these words, looking at him steadily in the face, and with the full intention of putting my threat into execution. He saw this, and yet strove to appear unconcerned, and with a forced laugh said, "You play. From daylight until now you and I have walked; we have wasted our strength now in looking for water for the others. But a short time, and we shall be dead; and you say, search for men whom I cannot find; you tell me, look; and I know not where to look." I now lost all patience with him and replied: "Kaiber, deceive as you will, you cannot deceive me; follow back our tracks instantly to the point from whence we started: if you do not find them, as the sun falls you die." "I am wearied,"

answered he; "for three days I have not either eaten or drunk, far have we wandered since we left them, and very distant from us are they now sitting." I could bear this no longer, and, starting up, said, "You deceive: the sun falls! just now I spoke: Koolyum, nganga dabbut--garrum w.a.n.gaga." Again he forced a laugh and said, "Surely, you play." I answered shortly, "Did I ever tell you a lie, Kaiber? I now speak the truth."

RETURN TO THE PARTY WITHOUT WATER.

He seemed, when he saw that I was so determined, to feel a little uncomfortable, and shifting his position moved rather further from me; this motion on his part induced me to conceive that he intended to run away; in which case I could never again have hoped to rejoin the party; I therefore instantly c.o.c.ked the remaining barrel of my gun and presented it at him, telling him that if he ever moved from me further than a certain tree which I pointed out I would forthwith shoot him, instead of waiting until sunset as I had originally intended. The decided manner in which I announced this to my friend Kaiber had the desired effect. He made a few protestations as to the folly of my conduct; lamented most loudly that his mother, and the Dandalup (a river of his own land) were so far removed from him; a.s.serted vehemently that the natives of these parts were bandy-legged, rough-tongued beings; that they eat earth and drank no water; and, winding-up with a fervent wish that he might catch one of them wandering anywhere between Pinjarup and Mandurup, in which case he would spear his heart, his kidney, and his liver, he sulkily resumed his route and led me straight back to the party in about an hour.

DISTRESSING SYMPTOMS OF EXTREME THIRST.

The men, who had been much surprised at the length of my absence, were at first buoyed up with the hope that I had found water; but this hope had at last died away, and they knew not what to conjecture. They were all reduced to the last degree of weakness and want; indeed I myself was at this period suffering from the most distressing symptoms of thirst; not only was my mouth parched, burning, and devoid of moisture, but the senses of sight and hearing became much affected; I could scarcely recognise the voices of the rest; and when uncouth unnatural tones struck upon my ear it took me some time to collect my thoughts in order to understand what was said, somewhat in the way in which one is obliged to act when roused suddenly from a deep sleep. In the same manner my sight had become feeble and indistinct; but by far the most distressing sensation was that experienced upon rising up after having rested for a few moments. I then felt the blood rush violently to the head, and the feeling produced was as if it were driven by a forcing-pump through all my veins.

LAST EFFORTS.

Previously to starting again I gave the men orders, which I believed at the time would be, to some at least, the last. I did not attempt to hide from them the dangers which surrounded us; but stating these I represented that matters had now arrived at such a crisis that, in the event of any of them being unable to proceed, it would be wrong to expect the others to halt on their account; and I therefore called upon all to exert their utmost energies and boldly to make a last struggle for their lives. My intention, I told them, was to proceed slowly but steadily to the southward, and never once to halt until I dropped or reached water; even in the event of any being unable to keep up I warned them that I should not wait for them but still pursue a steady and undeviating course until water was found; but as soon as I had slaked my own thirst I would return and bring a.s.sistance to those who might have been unable to come on with me.

PAINFUL MARCH.

Having thus imparted my intentions I ordered them to throw away every superfluous article; and a very valuable s.e.xtant, which had hitherto been carried turn about by Corporals Auger and Coles, was here abandoned.

These our preparations having been made we moved slowly on in sad procession, and never shall I forget the wild and haggard looks of those that followed me; reason had begun to hold but a very slight influence over some, and I feel a.s.sured that had it not been for the force of that discipline which I rigidly maintained some of the party must now have lost their lives. As it was, not a word of complaint was heard as to the plan I pursued or the route I took; but they all reeled and staggered after me, the silence being only broken by groans and exclamations. I preserved a slow uniform pace, proceeding still in a south by east direction, that is, in a straight line for Perth. The same sandy sterile country was around, thinly clothed with Banksia trees.

We had marched for about an hour and a quarter and in this time had only made two miles, when we suddenly arrived upon the edge of a dried-up bed of a sedgy swamp, which lay in the centre of a small plain, where we saw the foot-mark of a native imprinted on the sand, and again our hearts beat with hope, for this sign appeared to announce that we were once more entering the regions of animal life. We soon found that another part of the swamp was thickly marked with the footsteps of women and children; and as no water-baskets were scattered about no doubt could exist but that we were in the vicinity of water. We soon discovered several native wells dug in the bed of the swamp; but these were all dry, and I began again to fear that I was disappointed, when Kaiber suddenly started up from a thick bed of reeds and made me a sign which was un.o.bserved by the others, as was evidently his intention.

FORTUNATE DISCOVERY OF A MOIST MUD-HOLE. PROVIDENTIAL SUPPLY.

I hurried up and found him with his head buried in a small hole of moist mud, for I can call it nothing else. I very deliberately raised Kaiber by the hair, as all expostulations to him were useless, and then called up the others.

Kaiber had completely swelled himself out with this thick muddy liquid, and from the mark upon the sides of the hole had evidently consumed more than half of the total supply. I first of all took some of this moist mud in my mouth, but finding a difficulty in swallowing it, as it was so thick, I strained a portion through a handkerchief. We had thirsted with an intense and burning thirst for three days and two nights, during the greater portion of which time we had been taking violent exercise under a fierce sun. To conceive the delight of the men when they arrived at this little hole of mud would be difficult. Each, as he came up and cast his wearied limbs on the ground beside the hole, uttered these words: "Thank G.o.d;" and then greedily swallowed a few mouthfuls of the liquid mud, protesting that it was the most delicious water and had a peculiar flavour which rendered it far superior to any other he had ever tasted.

DANGER OF PERISHING FROM HUNGER.

But it required some time before their faculties were sufficiently recovered to allow them duly to estimate the magnitude of the danger they had escaped. The small portion of muddy water in the hole was soon finished, and then by sc.r.a.ping it out clean we found that water began slowly to trickle into it again. The men now laid themselves down almost in a state of stupefaction, and rested by their treasured pool. I felt however that great calls upon my energies might still arise, and therefore, retiring a little apart with the native, I first of all returned hearty thanks to my Maker for the dangers and sufferings he had thus brought me through, and then tottered on with my gun in search of food. As might have been expected, game was here plentiful: numerous pigeons and other birds came down at nightfall (which was now the hour) for the purpose of drinking at this lone pool, and the numbers of birds of different kinds that congregated here was a most convincing proof of the general aridity of this part of the country. Indeed the natives subsequently reported that the tract we had just traversed was at this season of the year totally devoid of water. It was in vain now that I raised the gun, for my tremulous hand shook so that I could not for a moment cover the bird I aimed at, and after one or two ineffectual attempts to kill something I was obliged to desist in despair.

PANGS OF HUNGER.

I now dreaded that I had only escaped the pains of death by thirst in order to perish of hunger, and for a moment regretted that I had not died ere I found water, for I firmly believed, from the state of weakness I was then reduced to, that the bitterness of death had pa.s.sed. But a short period sufficed to smother these unmanly and unchristian feelings in my breast, and, seeing a flight of black c.o.c.katoos soaring about in the air, I determined to watch them to their roosting-place, and then favoured by the darkness of night to steal upon them. On my return to the party I found the men sitting by the hole of water, anxiously watching until they again saw a little black mud in it, which they then eagerly swallowed.

I found some difficulty in inducing them to light their fire and to choose a situation where they could repose for the night, but, having accomplished this, I sat down by my own, hand-rubbing my limbs until it should grow rather darker. At length I had the pleasure of seeing that the black c.o.c.katoos, who found we were not likely to leave them in possession of the water, had taken up their position for the night in a large clump of trees distant not more than half a mile, and I hereupon started with Kaiber to try and get a shot at them.

SHOOT AND COOK A c.o.c.kATOO.

After about an hour's wandering and excitement such only as the desperate gambler can know whose life depends upon the stake for which he plays, I succeeded in getting a shot into a whole flight of roosting and snoring black c.o.c.katoos, and one fell. I pounced in triumph on it and received a bite which, famishing as I was, somewhat damped my ardour; Kaiber however hit it upon the head with a stick, and we then bore it off to our fire.

The men had cooked one spoonful of flour each in the liquid mud which the pool afforded, and a.s.sured me that they found this thick water very nourishing; whence I concluded that the large portion of mud it contained in some degree gratified the cravings of the stomach. Kaiber soon plucked the c.o.c.katoo and roasted it: I gave him the entrails, the feet, and the first joint of the legs, eating the head and thighs myself and reserving the other portions as a store against future emergencies. I now felt a.s.sured that my life was saved and, rendering thanks to G.o.d for his many mercies, I laid down by the fire to watch for the first appearance of dawn.

April 18.

The men slept but little during the night: every now and then one of them visited the hole of mud and water to see if a little of this fluid had drained into it, and about an hour before daylight I roused them up to proceed upon their journey. They were dreadfully feeble though upon the whole stronger than they had been for the last three days. We now entered upon a more hilly country than we had traversed yesterday; the hills were steep, being composed of sand and recent limestone, whilst the valleys were thickly wooded with gra.s.s-trees and stunted Banksias. The general line of route I followed was south by east, and we had not travelled more than nine miles when we came suddenly upon a valley with a river running rapidly through it. The sight of this cheered us up; and when on tasting the water we found it excellent, and saw adhering to the banks a species of freshwater mussel (Unio) called by the natives Maraylya, our joy was complete.

SUPERSt.i.tIOUS FEELINGS OF KAIBER REGARDING MUSSELS.

I proceeded therefore to collect wood for my fire and ordered Kaiber to make haste and gather some of these mussels, an order which, considering the hungry state he was in, I imagined he would gladly have obeyed; but to my astonishment he refused positively to touch one of them, and evidently regarded them with a superst.i.tious dread and abhorrence. My arguments to induce him to move were all thrown away; he constantly affirmed that if he touched these sh.e.l.lfish through their agency the Boyl-yas* would acquire some mysterious influence over him, which would end in his death. He could not state a recent instance of any ill effects having happened from handling or catching the mussel; but when I taunted him with this he very shrewdly replied that his inability to do so only arose from the fact of n.o.body being "wooden-headed enough" to meddle with them, and that he intended to have nothing whatever to do with them. This much he a.s.sured me was certain: that a very very long time ago some natives had eaten them, and that bad spirits had immediately killed them for so doing.

(*Footnote. The Boyl-ya is the native sorcerer.)

Kaiber was a great deal too sensible a fellow to be allowed to remain a prey to so ridiculous a superst.i.tion as this was; I therefore ordered him instantly to go and bring some of these mussels to me; that I intended to eat them, but that he could in this respect please himself. He hereupon, after thinking for a moment or two, got up to obey me, and walked away for this purpose; but I heard him, whilst occupied in the task, lamenting his fate most bitterly. It was true, he said, that he had not died either of hunger or thirst, but this was all owing to his courage and strong sinews, yet what would these avail against the supernatural powers of the boyl-yas. "They will eat me at night, whilst, worn out by fatigue, I must sleep." Amidst these and sundry other similar exclamations he brought the mussels to me: by this time my fire was prepared, and in a few minutes I was making such a meal as the weak state of my stomach would admit of. No inducement of mine could however prevail upon Kaiber to share with me, and I therefore handed him the remains of the c.o.c.katoo.

As soon as my repast was concluded I walked about three miles up the river in the hopes of getting a duck, Kaiber accompanying me. We saw several but killed none. There were some fine reaches in the river, as well as some good flats along its banks.