LABOUR IN LANDING STORES.

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the beach, and tried to follow their tracks up into the country, but could see nothing more of them.

This night, at 8 P.M., we had another sudden squall from off the land, accompanied with thunder, lightning, and heavy rain; it blew so hard that we were obliged to let go the best bower anchor, but, as usual, it only lasted twenty minutes.

As Mr. Lushington was to accompany the schooner to Timor, and I was anxious to ascertain which would be the best direction for us to move off in on his return, I determined to commence my exploring trips as soon as possible. All hands still continued busily engaged in landing the stores, and conveying them to the tents; but, though the men worked hard, our progress was slow. Every thing had to be carried on the men's shoulders,—for the path, after the great trouble and labour we had bestowed on it, was still so intricate and rocky that it was impossible to use even a handbarrow. The intense heat of the sun, too, incommoded the men very much at first; but, by the 16th of December, all the stores were landed, and a considerable supply of water was taken off to the vessel. I determined, therefore, now to start in my first exploring excursion, leaving to Mr. Lushington the task of seeing the watering of the schooner completed before he left for Timor.

CHAPTER VI.

HANOVER BAY AND ITS VICINITY.

NATIVES

SEEN-FIRST

OF THE

EXCURSION-CHARACTER SCENERY-GEOLOGICAL PHENOMENA-CUCKOO PHEASANT -SPORTING-NATIVE HAUNTS-ATTACK OF NATIVES-RETURN TO HANOVER BAY-PROCEEDINGS THERE DURING MY ABSENCE-CHRISTMAS DINNER-PLANTING USEFUL SEEDS -WALK TO MUNSTER WATER-ISTHMUS NEAR HANOVER BAY-HILL OF SHELLS-COUNTRY ABOUT PRINCE REGENT'S RIVER-GOUTY STEMMED TREES-SINGULAR PIECES OF SANDSTONE.

Sunday, December 17.-THIS morning, directly after breakfast, I read prayers to the men, and then commenced my preparations for the excursion on which I intended to start in the evening. Whilst I was occupied in arranging my papers, Mr. Lushington observed two natives sitting on the rocks, on the top of the cliffs which overlooked the valley, and gazing down intently on us. The instant that he made friendly signs to them, they rose from their seats, and began to retreat. Some of the party then called to them, and one of the natives answered; but they still moved rapidly away. I would not allow them to be followed, for fear of increasing their alarm, and in the hope that they would return,——

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93

but was disappointed. It must have awakened strange feelings in the breast of these two savages, who could never before have seen civilized man, thus to have sat spectators and overlookers of the every action of such incomprehensible beings as we must have appeared; and the relation to their comrades, of the wonders they had witnessed, could not have been, to them, a whit less marvellous than the tales of the grey-headed Irish peasant, when he recounts the freaks of the fairies, "whose midnight revels by the forest side or fountain" he has watched intently from some shrub-clad hill.

I started in the evening, accompanied by Corporal John Coles, and Private R. Mustard, both of the corps of Royal Sappers and Miners, and, for a short distance, by two or three others of the party from the camp. We moved up the ravine in which we were encamped in a nearly due south direction, and, after following this course about a mile, turned up a branch ravine to the left, bearing 87° from the north.

The romantic scenery of this narrow glen could not be surpassed. Its width, at bottom, was not more than forty or fifty feet, on each side rose cliffs of sandstone, between three and four hundred feet high, and nearly perpendicular; lofty paper-bark trees grew here and there, and down the middle ran a beautiful stream of clear, cool water, which now gushed along, a murmuring mountain torrent, and anon formed a series of small cascades. As we ascended higher the width contracted; the paper

94

ASCENT OF A GLEN.

bark trees disappeared; and the bottom of the valley became thickly wooded with wild nutmeg and other fragrant trees. Cockatoos soared, with hoarse screams, above us, many-coloured parrakeets darted away, filling the woods with their playful cries, and the large white pigeons, which feed on the wild nutmegs, cooed loudly to their mates, and battered the boughs with their wings as they flew away.

The spot I chose to halt at for the night, was at the foot of a lofty precipice of rocks, from which a spring gushed forth. Those who had accompanied us from the camp now returned, leaving me and the two soldiers alone, and about to penetrate some distance into an utterly unknown country. We were each provided with ten days' provisions, and, confident in the steadiness and courage of my men, I had not the slightest anxiety,-feeling that as long as we maintained a cool and determined bearing, the natives would make no attacks upon us that we could not repel.

We soon erected a little hut of bark, then kindled a fire and cooked our supper, consisting of tea and two white pigeons, which we had shot; and by the time our repast was finished it was nearly dark. My companions laid down to sleep: I remained up for a short time, to think alone in the wilderness, and then followed their example.

December 18.-At break of day we were again upon our route, which lay up the valley we had slept in; but, as each of us carried ten days' provisions, and a day's water, besides our arms, the

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95

progress we made in a tropical climate, when thus laden, was necessarily slow and laborious; but the beauty of the landscape, and the solicitude we all felt to see more of this unexplored land, cheered

us on.

Having at length reached the table-land which this valley drained, we found ourselves in the midst of a forest, differing widely from any thing we had before seen. The soil beneath our feet was sandy, and thickly clothed with spinifex, (a prickly grass,) which in spite of our thick trousers slightly but continually wounded our legs. The trees were lofty, and some of them of considerable circumference; but the trunks of all were charred and blackened by constant fires: this circumstance, and their slight and thin, yet strikingly graceful foliage, gave them a most picturesque appearance.

Every here and there in the wood rose lofty and isolated pinnacles of sandstone rock, fantastic in form, and frequently overgrown with graceful creeping and climbing plants, which imparted to them a somewhat of mystery and elegance. In other parts rose the gigantic ant-hills,—so much spoken of by former visitors of these shores ;-and in the distance we saw occasionally the forms of the timid kangaroos, who stole fearfully away from the unknown disturbers of their solitude.

But when we arrived at the extremity of the table land, I felt somewhat disappointed at beholding a deep narrow ravine at my feet, precisely resembling in character the one we had left, and