Kangaroo Island

“ On rounding this cape, Kingscote Harbour and Nepean Bay appear on the opposite shores of Kangaroo Island—excellent harbours, and one of them well supplied with water. Unfortunately they lead to nothing. The buildings erected by the South Australian Company in 1837 were permitted to fall into decay. Recently a few stock stations have been taken up on the island, and about one hundred persons are resident there. ”

“ The sealers have given this spot the name of American Harbour. In it, I am informed, vessels are completely land-locked, and secure from every wind. Kangaroo Island is not, however, fertile by any means. It abounds in shallow lakes filled with salt water during high tides, and which, by evaporation, yield a vast quantity of salt. ”

“ On Kangaroo Island they found a countless number of kangaroos, of which they killed thirty-one, knocking them down with sticks. On 8 April, off Encounter Bay, they met the French exploring ship Géographe, under the command of Captain Nicolas Baudin, of his conversation with whom Flinders has left an amusing account. ”

“ With the exception of Tasmania there are no important islands belonging geographically to Australia, for New Guinea, Timor and other islands of the East Indian archipelago, though not removed any great distance from the continent, do not belong to its system. On the east coast there are a few small and unimportant islands. In Bass Strait are Flinders Island, about 800 sq. m. in area, Clarke Island, and a few other small islands. Kangaroo Island, at the entrance of St Vincent Gulf, is one of the largest islands on the Australian coast, measuring 80 m. ”

“ Flinders,—the scarcity of water,—but the presence of so many animals shows that there is an abundance somewhere, though he could find but a scanty supply in one single spot. In Kangaroo Island only one accident occurred which showed any disposition or power on the part of its old inhabitants to wage war with the intruders. One of the sailors having attacked a large seal without proper caution, was so severely bitten in the leg, that he was not merely laid up in consequence of this hurt, but was obliged to be discharged, three months afterwards, when the ship was refitted at Sydney. ”

“ The track of some animal was very discernible and Nelson agreed with me that it was the kangaroo; but whether these animals swim over from the mainland, or are brought here by the natives to breed, it is impossible to determine. The latter is not improbable as they may be taken with less difficulty in a confined spot like this than on the continent.
The island is about a league in circuit: it is a high lump of rocks and stones covered with wood; but the trees are small, the soil, which is very indifferent and sandy, being barely sufficient to produce them. ”

“ The bay is perfectly sheltered from all southern winds; and as there were several spots clear of wood near the beach, it is probable that the kangaroos, and perhaps cassowaries, might be numerous. We did not stop to land, but got under way so soon as the bearings were taken, to beat out of the strait against the south-east wind; so little was gained, however, after working all the day, that at eight in the evening the ship was still off the east end of Kangaroo Island. ”

“ His voyage can easily be traced on our maps to-day. Voyaging westward through the Recherches group of islands, Flinders passed the low, sandy shore to a cape he named Cape Pasley, after his late Admiral; high, bleak cliffs now rose to the height or some five hundred feet for a distance of four hundred and fifty miles—the great Australian Bight. Young Franklin's name was given to one island, Investigator to another, Cape Catastrophe commemorated a melancholy accident and the drowning of several of the crew. Kangaroo Island speaks for itself. Here they killed thirty-one dark-brown kangaroos. ”

“ Windsor Earle declares that he was "murdered on the south coast of Australia, by a party of runaway convicts from Van Diemen's Land, who resided on an island near the coast, and who were in the habit of visiting the mainland for the purpose of carrying off the native women, and of shooting the men who endeavoured to defend them." This refers to the iniquitous band of Kangaroo Island. There was a settlement of forty persons, of both colours and sexes, indulging in vices to an extent only limited by their passions and means. ”

“ We kept close to the Neptune Isles, a low rocky group, the southernmost of which we give the position of; Captain Flinders, who passed too far to the northward, having not exactly determined it: it lies in latitude 35 degrees 22 minutes 15 seconds South and longitude 20 degrees 22 minutes 15 seconds East of Swan River. These islands appear well adapted for a light-house.
There was a strong indraught of a knot an hour into Spencer's Gulf. Kangaroo Island has no remarkable features; whilst Althorpe and Quoin islands are sufficiently striking to be recognized by anyone who has once seen them. ”

“ Wind and tide made against a rapid passage, and the east end of Kangaroo Island had not been cleared by eight o'clock on the following evening.
At four o'clock on the afternoon of April 8th the sloop was making slow progress eastward, when the man aloft reported that a white rock was to be seen ahead. ”

“ Gales between North-West and South-West detained us here until the 19th. We found water by digging on the North-East extreme of Grant Island, which at high tide is a low sandy islet. On first landing there, we found in a clump of bushes a kangaroo, very dark-coloured, indeed almost black. His retreat being cut off he took to the water, and before a boat could reach him, sank. This not only disappointed but surprised us; for in Tasmania a kangaroo has been known to swim nearly two miles. Black swans were very numerous, and it being the moulting season, were easily run down by the boats. ”

“ But, to find any other member of the kangaroo's order (besides the Didelphidæ) , in a state of nature, we must go much farther than merely across the Atlantic; namely, to Australia or the islands adjacent to it, including that enormous and unexplored island, New Guinea, which has recently attracted public attention through the published travels of a modern Baron Munchausen.
To return, however, to our subject. To find marsupials at all, we have, as we have seen, to go to the New World. To find nearer allies of the kangaroo, we must go to the newest world, Australia ”

“ The typical and most familiar member of the Marsupial Order is the Kangaroo—the heraldic mammal of that vast island-continent in the South Seas, whose phenomenal advance by leaps and bounds, from what scarcely a century since was represented by but a few isolated settlements, has been aptly likened to the characteristic progression of this animal. Of kangaroos proper there are some twenty-four known species distributed throughout the length and breadth of Australia, extending southwards to Tasmania, and to the north as far as New Guinea and a few other adjacent islands. ”

“ The Kangaroo is showing her heels, isn’t she, Miss Smithers? That’s the beauty of her, she can sail as well as steam; and when she has a strong wind like this abaft, it would have to be something very quick that would catch her. I believe that we have been running over seventeen knots an hour ever since midnight. I hope to make Kerguelen Island by seven o’clock to correct my chronometers.”
“What is Kerguelen Island?” asked Augusta.
“Oh! it is a desert place where nobody goes, except now and then a whaler to fill up with water. ”

“ We soon found that they had been made acquainted by the seamen of the Kangaroo of our being on the island, and had only waited for leisure to go and bring us to the settlement. Another party had already been dispatched to bring in the emigrants, and from the rough unmannerly way in which these treated our new friends, we could not but feel the gravest apprehensions as to the indignities to which they might be subjected. Our own existence in the hands of lawless ruffians would be very different from what it had hitherto been. ”

“ No fresh water has ever been discovered upon this island: indeed the loose filtering nature of the soil is not tenacious enough to retain that element at the surface. The woods are abundantly stocked with a small species of kangaroo of which we saw only the traces; nor did we see the animal, on account of whose numbers and resemblance to a rat the island received its name from Vlaming in 1619. M. Peron says that it forms a new genus, and of a very remarkable character.* Rottnest Island does not appear ever to have been inhabited or even visited by the natives from the main ”

“ A kangaroo. 71. Appears to be a bird of prey, having seized upon a kangaroo-rat. 32. Shark and pilot-fish.
During our stay we did not see any of the natives on the island; but on the main several of them were observed, though they would not allow us to communicate, moving off as soon as any attempt was made to get near them in the boats. On one occasion, when Mr. Fitzmaurice, in a whaleboat, was examining a part of the coast to the eastward of Depuch Island, he entered a creek, which soon, however, became too confined by the mud-banks for them to use the oars. ”

“ No other quadrupeds than the kanguroo, womat, and duck-billed aculeated ant-eater were found upon the islands. The kanguroo is of a reddish brown, and resembles the smaller species which frequents the brush woods at Port Jackson: when full grown, it weighs from forty to fifty pounds. There were no traces of it upon the Passage Isles; but, upon Cape-Barren and Clarke's Islands, the kanguroo was tolerably abundant, though difficult to be procured, owing to the thickness of its retreats. There were also numbers on Preservation Island, when the Sydney Cove was first run on shore ”

“ But two huts were found in our track, and not a native was seen; indeed the kangaroo seems to reign undisturbed lord of the soil, a dominion which, by the evacuation of Port Philip, he is likely to retain for ages. ”

“ They roamed very peacefully about the Australian prairies before the new continent was opened up to European enterprise; having no other enemies to fear than the natives, who were scattered in small tribes over a few points of an immense territory. Their chase is now one of the favourite amusements of the colonists, who destroy them in great numbers. They are easily domesticated, and may be regarded as already acclimatized in Europe, where, it is hoped, they may prove of great utility. The flesh of the tame Kangaroo is very good, but that of the wild animal is still better. ”

“ This fine tract of country, in connection with the lands already seen almost adjoining on the eastern bank of the Sherlock, would in itself support a larger population than is at present contained in the whole of the colony of Western Australia. We had seen more kangaroos on these plains than on any other portion of our route; one that was shot resembled the Osphranter, and was in very good order, the fur much thicker and softer than the common kangaroo of the western coast, and of a pale mouse colour. It weighed about forty-five pounds. Camp 50.
Latitude 21 degrees 54 minutes 18 seconds. ”

“ Tasmania once swarmed with kangaroos, but the hunters here, as upon the mainland, have nearly obliterated the species. Full-grown males sometimes measure six feet when standing upright, and weigh about one hundred and fifty pounds. The sharp claws of the short fore-feet are powerful weapons, and if brought to bay by the dogs when hunted, the male kangaroo will sometimes turn upon his pursuers and with his claws disembowel the largest dog. ”

“ There are a few species, however, in which the body is in better proportion. In the Tree Kangaroos of New Guinea, for instance, the tail is very bushy, and the fore-legs almost as long as the hind ones.
The Great Kangaroo inhabits New South Wales, and Southern and Western Australia. It lives on low grassy hills and plains in the open parts of the country, feeding upon the low bushes and herbage, and sheltering itself in the high grass during the heat of the day. ”

“ Windsor Earl makes much of this theory, but, unfortunately for it, the tree-kangaroos are chiefly found in the northern peninsula of New Guinea, which is entirely composed of hills and mountains with very little flat land, while the kangaroo of the low flat Aru Islands (Dorcopsis asiaticus) is a ground species. A more probable supposition seems to lie, that the tree-kangaroo has been modified to enable it to feed on foliage in the vast forests of New Guinea, as these form the great natural feature which distinguishes that country from Australia. ”

“ PREFACE. The Natives of a certain district of Port Lincoln, when questioned as to the cause of the non-existence of that species of Kangaroo known to the Colonists as the great Red Kangaroo, have the following legend in reference to its extinction:—
“In former times, one of the species, inhabited Port Lincoln, his name was Kupirri, he was of stupendous size, and devoured all those who attempted to spear him. ”

“ After observing the sun's altitude at noon, I returned on board with the intention of getting the ship under way, to examine more closely a bight in the coast near Point Bell; and then of returning to Petrel Bay in the Isle St. Francis, in order to obtain better observations for a base to my chart of this archipelago. At two o'clock, Mr. Brown and his party returned from the eastern island, bringing four kangaroos, of a different species to any before seen. Their size was not superior to that of a hare, and they were miserably thin, and infested with insects. ”