Edward Palmer

“ Leichhardt, intersected as it was by some very interesting rivers, such as the Suttor, Burdekin, Mitchell, and Lynd, warranted such a favourable conclusion.
The tablelands were high, and possessed of a cool and healthy climate; the soil on the banks of the rivers was of a rich nature, suitable for agriculture; the pasturage was unequalled for stock of all kinds; and the mineral prospects were favourable towards the settlement of a mining community. All this undeveloped natural wealth lay at the disposal of any who might enter and bring it under the magic influence of capital and enterprise. ”

“ In the three hundred years since the first contact between Europeans and the New Hollanders, no change has occurred; they were then spread over Australia, the same in habits and life as they are now, and the only result of the contact of the two races of men, the civilised and the savage, is that the native is fading away before the white man like mist before the morning sun. Nothing can avert the doom that is written as plainly as was the writing on the wall at Belshazzar’s feast. ”

“ The scent of the innumerable flowers on the plains, the tender herbage, the young grasses sending their seed stalks several feet high, and all the soil covered densely with vegetation and herbage suitable for stock present a picture to the eye, so utterly opposed to that which prevailed but a few weeks before the advent of the rains, that the spectator can scarcely believe it to be the same country. The seeds of some plants will remain dormant for years, and then suddenly spring up in profusion ”

“ Knowledge of a great pastoral country away to the shores of the Gulf and extending far up the Burdekin River was in the possession of many pioneer explorers whose names are unrecorded, and the tide of advancing settlement followed on as fast as was possible, stations being formed to the right and left of the main routes, while others moved forward with a restless energy that nothing would satisfy but the best country for their stock. ”

“ His bodily strength, great experience, and energy, came in to help in no small degree to keep settlement alive. The arrival of the bullock teams was quite an event, perhaps after being months on the road, and when all supplies had run short—not that the fact of supplies being short on the station would induce them to hasten their progress, for no bullock driver was ever known to hurry or go out of his slow, crawling pace for any inducement whatever. ”

“ The professional tramp is not a nice character, [Pg 196] there can be no mistaking him, with his swag done up in a long roll, and hung round his shoulder and down his side, a billycan and water-bag in his hand. He creeps along slowly with sore feet and shuffling steps, camping in the shade when he can to rest; he has no companions generally, and his life is a joyless and miserable one; but there he is, and there he will remain, for his tribe will not die out, because no one will refuse to give a little rations to a wayfarer because he is hard up, ragged, and penniless. ”

“ The soil in which this grass thrives best is in the sandy strips along the banks of creeks. After seeding, the heads bunch together, in tangled masses, and shower the seeds on to sheep passing through. It is of use as a fodder grass only when young and green, although cattle thrive fairly well upon it, and its presence in any quantity at once determines whether the pasturage is favourable to sheep or not. ”

“ The continuous discovery of natural wealth, the progress of settlement, the healthy growth of the great industries, the establishment of a system of oversea, coastal, and inland communications, the creation of great cities, the founding of social and educational institutions, in fact all that makes the colony of to-day, with its potentialities of industrial wealth and expansive settlement, have been covered by the span of a single life. ”

“ It is needless to dwell on the history of the dark days of bondage and weakly infancy, which has little to do with the early days of settlement in North Queensland, except to show the starting point. The North is free from the stain and drag of convictism. The real life of the colony began with the first days [Pg 6] of free settlers, then immigrants poured in rapidly, and the occupation of the interior advanced. With this strong growth of material progress, came also the desire for self-government, and separation from New South Wales. ”

“ Some drovers have a plant of their own, twenty or thirty good horses, [Pg 199] a dray or waggonette, and saddles, and make contracts to shift cattle or sheep at so much per head, paying their own men, and finding everything. The wages of drovers are always high, but not too high when the care and constant work are taken into consideration. Sundays and week days alike, rain or fine, grass or no grass, whatever turns up, it all means that the drover, or man in charge has to be on hand and see to things himself. The life is monotonous, wearying and fatiguing in the extreme. ”

“ The line between Croydon and Normanton passes through a perfectly level and very uninteresting country, a melancholy sandy waste of ti-tree flats, covered with the innumerable pinnacles and mounds made by white ants; the pasturage is as poor as the country looks.
From Normanton a number of carriers are employed to carry goods to Cloncurry and the many stations trading therewith. Many teams are found carrying loading by the side of the railway line to Georgetown and the Etheridge past Croydon, ignoring the services of the railway. ”

“ The foundations of trade, so modest at the start, have developed in one lifetime to a nation’s wealth. In 1844, in the territory then forming the colony, there were 650 horses, 13,000 cattle, 184,000 sheep, and scarcely more than 1,500 of a population, one half of whom were domiciled in North and South Brisbane. At the present day, the products of the live stock of the State furnishes employment for thousands, and forms a volume of trade that employs the finest lines of steamers sailing in the Southern Seas. ”

“ Then the explorer appears on the scene, and discovers its rivers and facilities for establishing the occupation of the country, and maps out its capabilities. Such were Leichhardt, Mitchell, Gregory, Landsborough, and many others. Thus the way is opened up for the pioneer squatter with his flocks and herds and the attendant business of forming roads and opening ports for his requirements, holding his own against many odds, droughts, floods, outrages by blacks, fevers that follow the opening up of all new countries, and losses peculiar to life in the wilderness. ”

“ The varieties of the indigenous grasses that cover the great western plains are innumerable; all are more or less eaten by stock, even the triodia or spinifex that is looked on as a desert grass, and of a formidable and forbidding nature. Spinifex is a very drought-resisting plant, and in times of great scarcity and extreme drought, when all other grasses have dried out and been blown away, the spinifex is there with its erect spiney leaves, possibly bitter to the taste, but still life sustaining to stock, as has been proved in many a severe drought. ”

“ The flow of this artesian water from the private and public bores is worth more to Queensland than a river of gold. They have completely changed the face of the country, and removed the anxiety of the stock owners towards the end of the season, when all surface water (except the most permanent lagoons) has dried up and formed mud traps to catch all weak stock that venture near them. These tiny perforations of the earth’s surface have helped to solve the difficulty of settlement on the western lands, where we find the rainfall diminishing as we go further west. ”

“ The pioneers cannot be condemned for taking the law into their own hands and defending themselves in the only way open to them, for the blacks own no law themselves but the law of might. The protection of outside districts by the Native Police, was the only course open, although the system cannot very well be defended any more than what was done under it can be. The white pioneers were harder on the blacks in the way of reprisals when they were forced to deal with them for spearing their men or their cattle or horses even than the Native Police. ”

“ The roads were lined with flocks and herds of those entering on the pioneering work of the North of Queensland, and business men were following in the wake of the early stock settlers to commence a trade wherever an opportunity offered. The settlement was bona fide and genuine; men with means, energy and experience were entering on it with great enthusiasm and high hopes of the future of the new country. The wave of occupation passed on to the Burdekin River, causing a great demand for sheep and cattle for the purpose of stocking new country in the north and west. ”

“ This is an annual of quick growth after rains, growing in a spherical form from a common root; when the stem dries, it breaks off close to the ground, and the ball of dried vegetation is driven by the winds over the plains at a furious rate, topping the fences, and piling up against them in masses. It causes the greatest consternation to horses as it is driven across the downs. It possesses no virtue as a fodder plant. ”

“ From Cape York to the Great Australian Bight, and from the Leeuwin to the Great Sandy Spit on Frazer’s Island, there is no difference in the type of the [Pg 210] native of Australia, although the quality and quantity of their food has caused some of the tribes to be more robust and better developed than others. In the north, where food is plentiful, there are many fine specimens of men over the average height of the European. Many of the northern aboriginals are tall, muscular men, of great activity and endurance, with keen sight and observation, and they often attain to a good old age. ”

“ But the tribe of “whalers,” as they were called in New South Wales, men who tramped up one side of the Darling River, and tramped down on the other side, never betraying any desire to find work, these can be found in the Queensland bush too, but not far out, where there are long dry stages between the stations, and a shortness of water which terrifies these old “bummers.” There are men who have tramped all over the colonies—every colony in Australia they have been through, and know all the tracks. ”

“ As a rule, the drovers in Queensland are a trustworthy and respectable class of men—of course there are exceptions, but these are soon found out. Cases have come to light where cattle sold on the road have been returned as knocked up lame, or dead from pleuro, and grog has been entered in the accounts as stores supplied. The owner is a good deal at the mercy of the drover after the latter has taken charge of the stock, as he has then very little control over them until they reach their destination. ”

“ No country was ever endowed by Nature with a more permanent, healthy, and beneficial pasturage than Australia, though heavy stocking and hot dry seasons have somewhat diminished the value of this natural wealth in some of the earlier settled districts. The chief source of employment in the Colony of Queensland, and the leading export, is still derived from the stock depastured on the native grasses that were found when the State was first explored. ”

“ The story of North Queensland’s childhood is simply one of gradual discovery and advancing settlement from the Southern districts, where the same severe course of wresting the land from uselessness [Pg 3] and sterility had been gone through. The source of this movement may be traced chiefly to a desire for pastoral extension by squatters, always on the move for new pastures, and to the ever roving prospector in search of fresh mineral discoveries.
First the navigator outlines the coast with its bays and islands and openings for ports; such were Cook, Flinders, Stokes, and others. ”

“ Scarcely on the earth is to be found a race similar to the aboriginals, whilst their antiquity is beyond doubt, and also the fact that they have a common origin. Their speech, habits, colour, customs, and superstitions, proclaim in the strongest terms that they all came from a common source; from the far north of Australia to the farthest south, a hundred proofs are forthcoming to show a common ancestry. Words that have a similar meaning are used on the Darling River and in places in the Gulf of Carpentaria; the weapons are similar all over the continent ”

“ A small firm of two men, Anderson and Trimble, successful diggers from the Snowy River, in New South Wales, joined the rest of the pushing crowd, and held a good run on the Saxby River with sheep.
Still the tide of occupation flowed on, and when all the available watered runs around the Gulf were occupied in 1865 and the following year, those remaining unsatisfied, marched on, restless as the surges that beat on the shore. Several of those in charge of stock travelled up the Gregory River southwards, and out far away on to Barkly Tableland, discovered by Mr. W. Landsborough. ”