Burdekin River

“ One of the pioneers was Mr. Robert Stewart, of Southwick station, on Fletcher’s Creek, a stream of pure, clear water, flowing from the great basaltic wall into the Burdekin. Reedy Lake station was stocked with sheep by O’Reilly and Reeve, near Dalrymple, where the main route from Bowen to the Gulf crossed the Burdekin River. Many other runs were taken up on the Burdekin and towards the coast, and many soon changed hands, the first settlers passing on to [Pg 129] occupy country in the interior. ”

“ The flat along the Burdekin was about two miles and a half broad, and was skirted by silver-leaved Ironbark ridges. In approaching the Clarke, we came to a low basaltic range, which bounded its fine broad openly timbered valley to the northward. The bed of the river was formed by talc-schiste, in strata, the strike of which was from north by west to south by east, standing almost perpendicular, with a slight dip to the eastward. The stream was perpendicular on the line of striking. The pebbles in its bed were mostly basaltic, baked sandstone, conglomerate, quartz, sienite, and porphyry. ”

“ Just as the river takes a south-east course the Scott joins the Burdekin as it comes from south-south-west, flowing to north-north-east. In its whole width a perfect mass of slippery rocks and deep water, and where we struck it no apparent current; although when it contracts more and runs through more narrow rocks there is a strong and rapid stream. After getting about one and a quarter miles along its bank in a north-north-west direction was compelled to halt; perfectly impracticable and will be a most intricate crossing. Mount McConnell bears from this crossing-place about 241 1/2 degrees. ”

“ April 25.--We travelled almost due west, about nine miles along the river, our latitude being 19 degrees 1 minutes 3 seconds. Our route lay through a fine well grassed country; the grass being very dense: at a distance from the river, I observed box flats, and poplar-gum flats; the latter are probably swampy during the rainy season. A good sized creek joined the Burdekin; a range of high hills extended along its left side, and its right became equally hilly as we approached our camping place. ”

“ It is a river willfully wasted by nature. The inundation raises it to about six feet throughout: this freshet, however, is of short duration, and the great breadth of the river causes a want of depth which renders it unfit for the navigation of a craft more civilized than the Indian's birch or the Canadian fur-boat. Colonel Frémont failed to descend it in September with a boat drawing only four inches. The water, like that of the Missouri, and for the same reason, is surcharged with mud drained from the prairies; carried from afar, it has usually a dark tinge ”

“ For nine long hours we toiled down that interminable valley without rest or food, crossing the river back and forth innumerable times, scrambling up banks so steep that we had to go on hands and knees with our faithful little nags struggling up after us, and then finding in disgust that we had to slide down again to the rocky bed of the river, worrying through miles of fallen timber, miles of muskeg, miles of wiry bushes that slapped us viciously in the face as we forced a way through, and ripped our clothing until we looked more like stage tramps than fairly respectable travellers. ”

“ We had scarcely lighted our fires, when the camp was crowded with nearly naked Indians. There were two who appeared particularly intelligent—one, [223] a somewhat old man. He told me that, before the snows fell, it was six sleeps to the place where the whites lived, but that now it was impossible to cross the mountain on account of the deep snow; and showing us, as the others had done, that it was over our heads, he urged us strongly to follow the course of the river, which he said would conduct us to a lake in which there were many large fish. There, he said, were many people ”

“ The particular ambition of Burton and Speke was to trace the river Nile back to its source in the mysterious heart of the Mountains of the Moon.
Has it ever occurred to you that every river has a source—that every river begins somewhere, in a tiny spring? Few forms of exploration are more interesting than to trace a stream back to its first drop. The Thames, for example, begins in the Cotswold Hills—the merest little trickle. All running water, you know, sooner or later reaches the sea. ”

“ Beyond the stream we ascended Yellow-Creek Hill, a steep chain which divides the versant of the Bear River eastward from that of Weber River to the west. The ascent might be avoided, but the view from the summit is a fine panorama. The horizon behind us is girt by a mob of hills, Bridger's Range, silver-veined upon a dark blue ground; nearer, mountains and rocks, cones and hog-backs, are scattered about in admirable confusion, divided by shaggy rollers and dark ravines, each with its own little water-course. ”

“ The dirty boches are shellin' the fort. Come on!" And he grasped his rifle and started on a run toward the lake. It was over two miles, but we did not pause until the harbor was in view, and still we could not see the lake because of the sandstone cliffs which intervened. We ran as fast as we could around the lower end of the harbor, scrambled up the cliffs and at last stood upon their summit in full view of the lake. Far away down the coast, toward the river through which we had come to reach the lake, we saw upon the surface the outline of the U-33, black smoke vomiting from her funnel. ”

“ Emerging from the river plain we entered upon another mauvaise terre, with knobs and elevations of clay and green gault, striped and banded with lines of stone and pebbles: it was a barren, desolate spot, the divide between the Green River and its western influent, the shallow and somewhat sluggish Black's Fork. The name is derived from an old trader: it is called by the Snakes Ongo Ogwe Pa, or "Pine-tree Stream;" it rises in the Bear-River Mountains, drains the swamps and lakelets on the way, and bifurcates in its upper bed, forming two principal branches, Ham’s Fork and Muddy Fork. ”

“ I stopped at a trout brook, which came down out of the mountains on the right, and took a few trout for my supper; but its current was too roily from the shower for fly-fishing. Another farmhouse attracted me, but there was no one at home; so I picked a quart of strawberries in the meadow in front, not minding the wet grass, and about six o'clock, thinking another storm that had been threatening on my right had miscarried, I pushed off, and went floating down into the deepening gloom of the river valley. The mountains, densely wooded from base to summit, shut in the view on every hand. ”

“ A large stony holm about mid-stream is called Eduásim, meaning 'thief in river.' I need not repeat from my map the names of the unimportant settlements. At the mouth of the Abonsá the bed widens to nearly double, and the north-easterly direction shifts to due north. This great drain, falling into the left bank, lies between five and six miles above the Fura Creek. I shall have more to say about it when describing my descent. Two miles further north brought us to the beginning of the rapids, which apparently end the boat-navigation. The only canoes are used for ferrying ”

“ A high range of hills exist to the north of this creek, and the watercourses all trend to the north-west; and, as our latitude is the same as the Reedy Brook of Leichhardt on the south-west side of the Valley of Lagoons, it is evident that these streams do not join the Burdekin, but are tributary to the Lynd, joining it probably at the southern bend. ”

“ With great labor the baggage was transported across the crest to the head springs of a little stream leading to the main river. A few days were sufficient to destroy our fine band of mules. They generally kept huddled together, and as they froze, one would be seen to tumble [334] down, and the snow would cover him; sometimes they would break off and rush down towards the timber until they were stopped by the deep snow, where they were soon hidden by the pouderié.
"The courage of the men failed fast; in fact, I have never seen men so soon discouraged by misfortune as we were on this occasion ”

“ The enormous weathering of its side walls is to me the more wonderful, probably because the forces that have achieved this task are silent and invisible, and, so far as our experience goes, so infinitely slow in their action. The river is a tremendous machine for grinding and sawing and transporting, but the rains and the frost and the air and the sunbeams smite the rocks as with weapons of down, and one is naturally incredulous as to their destructive effects. ”

“ The talus, pitted with the shallow pans called 'women's washings,' shows signs of hard work, probably dating from the days when every headman had his gang of 'pawns' and slaves. Rising at the head of the creek, itself a natural gold-sluice, its bed and banks can carry any number of flumes, which would deposit their precious burden in cisterns near the river. I need hardly say they must be made movable, so as to raise their level above the inundation. Here the one thing wanted would be a miner accustomed to 'hydraulicking' in California or British Columbia, Australia or South Africa. ”

“ The “Big Muddy,” as it is now called—the Yellow River of old writers—venerable sire of snag and sawyer, displays at this point the source whence it has drawn for ages the dirty brown silt which pollutes below their junction the pellucid waters of the “Big Drink.” [14] It runs, like the lower Indus, through deep walls of stiff clayey earth, and, like that river, its supplies, when filtered (they have been calculated to contain one eighth of solid matter) , are sweet and wholesome as its brother streams. ”

“ Mudjatik river is a swift, winding stream about eighty miles in length, generally flowing in a shallow channel through a sandy plain, in the bottom of a wide depression between ridges of granite. It is obstructed by comparatively few rapids, and these are for the most part over ridges of boulders. ”

“ I have been up the Victoria Nile—viz. Lake Mesanga. It is a vast lake, but of still shallow water. The river seems to lose itself entirely in it. A narrow passage, scarcely nine feet wide, joins the north end of the Victoria Nile near Mrooli; and judging from the Murchison Falls— which are rapids, not falls—I should say Victoria Lake and Victoria Nile contribute very little to the true Nile. The branch Piaggia saw is very doubtful. I could not find it, and the boatmen seem very hazy as to its existence. As for Gessi's branch north of Albert Lake, I could not find that either. ”

“ Here in a distance of 12 m. the river drops 760 ft., culminating in a final vertical fall of 316 ft. Below the falls are violent rapids, and the river sweeps through a deep and narrow canyon. The country through which it passes is for the most part a wilderness of barren rock, full of lakes and lacustrine rivers, many of which are its tributaries. In certain portions of the valley spruce and poplars grow to a moderate size. From the head of Lake Attikonak a steep and rocky portage of less than a mile leads to Burnt Lake, which is drained into the St Lawrence by the Romaine river. ”

“ A march to this place was our next undertaking. The road for two or three miles kept up from the river and led us by three or four rough, stumpy farms. It then approached the lake and kept along its shores. It was here a dilapidated corduroy structure that compelled the traveler to keep an eye on his feet. Blue jays, two or three small hawks, a solitary wild [103] pigeon, and ruffed grouse were seen along the route. Now and then the lake gleamed through the trees, or we crossed on a shaky bridge some of its arms or inlets. After a while we began to pass dilapidated houses by the roadside. ”

“ As far as the writer knows, the first mention of Burnt River is in the Peter Skene Ogden journals for Saturday, February 4, 1826, on page 352 of the Oregon Historical Society Quarterly, volume X. T. C . Elliott, the authority on Ogden, is of the opinion that the name came from the burned woods, because the fur-traders reached the upper parts of the stream first where the burned looking rocks are not so much in evidence. During the times in question the stream was frequently mentioned as the Rivier Brule, by the French Canadians. ”

“ During the wet season, the water of the lake overflows its banks, and the banks of the river are also overflowed, while the water standing upon the surface of the ground is strongly impregnated with potash, not only near the sink, but far up the stream, nearly to its source, the same cause existing, though only in occasional spots is it exhibited to the same degree as about the lake. ”

“ McInnes reports that, ascending Burntwood river a few miles above Odei or Hart river, there is much land “apparently well adapted for cultivation. The clay is entirely free from boulders, and mixed near the surface with enough vegetable humus to produce a friable and seemingly productive soil. The gentle slopes give good natural drainage, and the open character of the forests makes it a country easily cleared. For the next nineteen miles the river valley and neighboring country present the same general aspect. ”

“ The slope up which the trail now ascends with gradual rise is covered with variegated chaparral, making a beautiful mountain carpet and cushion for the eye. To the foot and body it is entangling and annoying, placing an effectual barrier before any but the most strenuous, athletic and determined of men.
Now the white firs, with their white bark, and the red-barked yellow pines begin to appear. They accompany us all the rest of the way to the peak and lake.
Soon we cross Burton Creek, a mere creek except during the snow-melting or rain-falling time. It empties into Carnelian Bay. ”