A. J. Vogan

“ Dina’s childish face beams with fun as she watches the contest. She is not cruel,—few Australian natives delight in seeing pain in any form,—but she is, like many of her sex, white and black, indifferent, that is all; content to be amused, and forgetful of the suffering anything may feel so long as it pleasantly tickles her sense of the humorous. The mantis on the path by the verandah is invulnerable to the ants’ attack, save at two points,—its soft tail and long, facile neck. On the other hand, the mode of warfare employed by those tiny, insect bull-dogs, the emmets, is simplicity itself. ”

“ Round the grey embers of the camp-fire, upon which remains the impress of last night’s damper, the figures of the party lie motionless in their tossed coverings of red and blue blankets, and nearby stands the billy, containing sodden tea-leaves, where the last man on watch drained the cold tea ere turning in.
Each man’s saddle is his pillow, and beyond is a vague litter of pack-saddles, bags, and snaky-looking surcingles; amongst which Don’s retriever pup keeps guard against the prowling, cowardly dingoes, whose blinking eye-stars have circled the camp during the dark hours. ”

“ Both men hear a shout at this instant, and Billy, who has climbed up the cliff a little way, is seen waving excitedly to the white men, and calling to them to follow him to his elevated perch. Claude is not long in scrambling up, but he has to descend again to assist Williams, whose knees are getting a bit stiff with age, although the muscles of his arms and shoulders are as good as ever. Arrived at Billy’s post of vantage, the black proudly shows them a remarkable tunnel opening into the cliff: it has smooth, shiny walls, and is evidently not the result of human labour. ”

“ Then, as if mocking the horrified wretch’s agonizing fears, the fire flares up before the rising morning breeze, and upon the side of a leathern satchel suspended from a bough hard by he reads the name of Claude Angland.
A sickening odour, resembling roasting pork, is beginning to make the air heavy around, and a little pulseless black hand lies cooking on the ashes. But Giles sees nothing with his staring eyeballs but one small, pallid face, that even in the ruddy light of the fire lies white as marble upon the dead body of a ragged-coated dog. ”

“ T is an hour after sundown at Murdaro station. A few lights twinkle here and there about the dusky quadrangle of low-roofed buildings, ere shadow and silence bring to a close another workday.
The giant curlew screeches impatiently to his dilatory mate at intervals from the bush hard by; the dingoes wail mournful signals on the distant sandstone ridges; and at the other side of the star-reflecting water-hole, beneath the dark group of Deadfinish gum-trees, the native station-hands and fat house-gins, their labours over for the day, can be heard crooning out their evening chants. ”

“ On the ninth day out from Murdaro the expedition has reached the long blue line of gum-trees, towards which it has been toiling since daybreak across the desert plain. And here, at no great distance from the little water-hole, near which the horses are now being unsaddled by the rest of the party, Claude pays a first visit to the lonely mound where, beneath a protecting cairn of stones and tree-stems, his explorer-uncle has begun his long, well-earned rest. As the young man stands there in the scanty shade of she-oaks and box-trees, a thousand solemn thoughts gather around him. ”

“ In the muddy water-holes of the great, intermittently-flowing rivers of Northern Australia, we have seen aborigines successfully chase the finny denizens of the deep pools, and bring them otter-like to the shore in their white-toothed jaws. And many a hunted black has saved himself from the cruel rifle of squatter invaders of his native land by pretending to fall as if shot into a river or water-hole, and remaining, apparently, at the bottom. ”

“ Presently, with the instinct of a smoker, he feels for his pipe and matches, and solaces his lonely reflections by puffing peace-bringing, but unseen, clouds of fragrant smoke from his lips, and sits waiting for daylight to appear. A dead stillness is all around, broken only by the sound of a far-off steamboat’s droning whistle from time to time, the rumble of a distant vehicle, or the occasional silver chiming hour-bells from some clock-tower close at hand. Looking upward from where he sits, Claude can see the dark mass of the viaduct standing out against the sky ”

“ At two o’clock arrives the hottest time of the day,—it is really as warm as any living thing can stand with safety,—and as the expedition crawls along over the burnt-up, reddish soil of the plain, upon which withered tufts of various kinds of coarse grass appear at intervals, Claude feels certain that he has never been in such a thirsty-looking place before. Everything around, trees, grass, and all, looks as if fashioned out of brown paper and sprinkled with dust. ”

“ Billy trusts now implicitly to his torn clothes to serve as a flag of truce till he can get a hearing from the man whose life he is probably about to save; and careless of the fact that the old miner has a revolver hanging in the open pouch at his belt, and that a fowling-piece lies by the pick within a yard of the thin, hairy right arm, he girds up his tatters and commences to whistle loudly as he makes his way over the hot boulders towards the curious, propensic figure by the stream-side. ”

“ The sun blazed out, and the white, patchwork mantle on the blue-grey hills disappeared as if by magic. But the Fates were against us. First our horses did not turn up till late; then the cows we had with us kept on getting bogged in the muddy billabongs, and had to be hauled out. And what with one delay and another, I saw the sunset redden the cliffs before us as we crossed Chamber’s Creek and entered the pass, and knew that I must camp my cattle there for the night, and no help for it. ”

“ Regardless of the majestic fury of the roaring elements overhead, of the heavy, drenching rain, of dangerous snakes and poisonous thorns, and with the fierce, sweet love of slaughter warming each individual’s heart with its terrible excitement, the cruel cordon has shrunk its wreath of death nearer and nearer around its slumbering prey; and now some thirty pair of eyes are watching the small glimmer of the black camp-fire, and thirty fingers itch to pull the smooth, cold triggers against which they rest. ”

“ The ground sinks rapidly, as the increasing noisiness of the brawling streamlet indicates, as it leaps from rock to rock on its way, as if rejoicing upon its approach to freedom and the sea. Some way down the gorge, the steamy haze of a cataract climbs up the cliff sides and blots out further view in that direction, and the soft thunderings of falling waters come up the gully at intervals, as the evening breeze begins to stir the topmost branches of the stately trees. ”

“ And upon the last page Angland sees the sandstone rock before him with its fossil exuviæ, and its surface sheltering a few miserable euphorbias, where passing birds have dropped undigested seeds. The poor grass struggles here and there to clothe the barren, ugly rocks, during the few months in every two or three years when it has the opportunity of growing. Perhaps Nature will one day add another and a brighter chapter to this history of the wilds of central-northern Queensland—a chapter of forest life and copious rains. ”

“ But neither dress, envy, nor in fact any of those other common troubles that come to ruffle the soft feathers of ordinary maidens’ meditations, ever disturb the firm balanced mind of Miss Lileth Mundella.
“I will make myself honoured, obeyed, perhaps even loved, by means of that one talisman that has survived the ages, and can still work efficiently in this extremely practical world in which I find myself. Money alone will give me the social position which will make life worth living. I will strive to make myself rich.” ”

“ Black walls of basalt rise more or less perpendicularly around the dark, indigo water at their feet. Here and there the ancient lava has crystallized into prismatic columns, or weathered into picturesque battlements and projections, which stand up, like the ruins of some old abbey, above the feathery palms and undergrowth that struggles down the precipitous cliffs in places in avalanches of sunlit emerald or shady o’erhangings of brown and purple. ”

“ The cool-headed white man hears Deder-re-re’s yell, and can just see him as he bounds past the smouldering fire towards him. A snap-shot 106 rings through the air, and the black fellow, springing upwards, falls dead upon the red-hot embers, crushing and fanning them into a sudden blaze, that shows the dark, flying forms of the villagers rushing towards the water-hole. Now ring the short, sharp carbine shots through the still morning air! Now whistling swan-shot from fowling pieces buzz through the falling leaves! ”

“ And accustomed to the softer beauties of a New Zealand moonlight night, Claude cannot help exclaiming to his companion upon the strange, phantom-like appearance that all the 260 familiar objects around him appear to have put on beneath the argent rays. Even that most unpoetical object, the stockyard, where the imprisoned cattle are roaring impatient of restraint, seems, with its horrid carcase gallows, all dressed with a silvery, mystic robe of light, as if transformed into a spectre castle, filled with moaning, long-horned beings of another world. ”

“ On the low trees round about numbers of large crows—those scavengers of the wilds—are croaking their harsh cries of impatience: “Augh, augh, ah-h-h-h.” These sable rascals are never absent from an Australian traveller’s camp, and appear like magic when he lights his billy fire. Hardly has Claude mounted to 307 ride after his companions, when the crows swoop down by the cold ashes to fight and squabble over the odds and ends that lie about. ”

“ The young men have left the whirring, noisy, lamplit 29 crowds of Paddy’s Market during this conversation, and are making their way westward to George Street. The air is hot, and steamy with the butyric odours of a Saturday-night crowd. Crossing the wide rattling thoroughfare just mentioned, with its thousands of lights, and busy streams of thundering omnibuses and cabs, Claude and his companion push their way across the pavement,—crowded with purchasing humanity,—and find themselves suddenly in a new world. ”

“ So very early next morning Billy and the old miner set out; just about the time when that earliest of early birds, the crow, has begun to think it time to commence his matutinal robberies, and long ere the sun has risen to dry the fern and scrub sufficiently for any natives to be out hunting who might notice the two men’s departure. By midday our friends have followed for eight miles that only road possible through the dense jungle,—the rough, white bed of the merry little creek. ”

“ To my nephew, Claude Angland, of Auckland, New Zealand.
“I am dying before my work is completed. It rests with you to allow me to rest in peace after my death. I wish to make reparation to those I have neglected too long. I have tried to bury the past in science and in work. Your mother will explain all to you at the proper time. Come to where I now lie. You can trust Billy, whom you will remember with me in England. I believe he will get out of this. Come here alone with him, and at once. Good-bye to all. I hope you keep up your chemistry. Beware of squatters and police. ”

“ Save where a brawling brooklet has cut a rugged pathway for itself through the dense undergrowth, or a hoary monarch of the forest has succumbed to age and insect foes and fallen to the ground, no road through the matted growths around seems passable but for the smallest animals. Yet it is in these gloomy wilds that some of the tribes of Queensland aboriginals find their only safe sanctuary to-day, from the white settlers who have driven them from their old homes in the open country at the foot of the mountain chain. ”

“ It was through this latter kind of forcing growth that the humbly-useful, plain Geological Society (no Royal and Imperial then) of Sydney—which was originally composed of real lovers of science—suddenly burst into the green-leafed glory of public recognition, with a real live Governor of the Colony as patron.
Science is a tender plant in many respects, and requires plenty of room in which to expand and throw out its ever-increasing tendrils. ”

“ The earth grows darker suddenly, and the bosom of the piece of water in the foreground, is led and fringed with graceful lignum bushes, and backed by a picturesque outline of broken sandstone cliffs, becomes lighter by contrast as all else merges into purple shadows. Native companions (a large kind of crane) croak hoarsely high overhead, as they follow the sun westward, across the violet expanse of sky, to their feeding grounds by the salt lakes; large buzzards, called turkeys by the Australian settlers, come out to wrangle over grubs by the water’s side ”

“ Suddenly, however, remembering that “missie” has threatened her with a flogging if she appears before that lady without her stockings on, she sneaks off again, softly as a bat upon the wing, and presently reappears with her calfless lower limbs clothed in neat white cotton and shod with highly polished shoes.
The girl stands for some time with her arms akimbo, and her white-palmed hands resting open upon the waistband of her short gown, meekly waiting for her mistress to notice her. But Miss Mundella’s thoughts are far away. ”

“ UTSIDE on the verandah a happy couple are sitting enjoying the hay-scented night wind as it blows in gentle gusts up the valley. Dick and Mollie are in that delightfully idiotic frame of mind known to the vulgar as “being spooney.” A great silver moon is shining down, as only a New Zealand moon can shine, over the forest-clad Hunua ranges in the distance and the neighbouring dewy pastures, where white-backed cattle can be seen resting for the night. ”