Spinifex and Sand<br />A Narrative of Five Years' Pioneering and Exploration in Western Ausralia, David Wynford Carnegie [best novels in english .txt] 📗

Our hopes that the two lakes were separate were soon shattered, for before us lay a narrow neck connecting the two. There was nothing for it but to go straight ahead. The lightest-packed camel crossed without mischance, but not so the other two; down they went, too weak to struggle, and again the toil of digging them out, and driving and hauling them foot by foot, had to be gone through. Then the packs had to be carried piece by piece, for we sank too deep in the sticky mud with a heavy load, and our weary legs had to be dragged step after step from the bog. Hungry and thirsty, blistered by the glare of the salt in the pitiless sun, we struggled on, with a wondering thought of what the end would be.

Think of us, picture us, ye city magnates, toiling and struggling that your capacious pockets may be filled by the fruits of our labour: think of us, I say, and remember that our experiences are but as those of many more, and that hardly a mine, out of which you have made all the profit, has been found without similar hardships and battles for life! Not a penny would you have made from the wealth of West Australia but for us prospectors—and what do we get for our pains? A share in the bare sale of the mine if lucky; if not, God help us! for nothing but curses and complaints will be our portion. The natural rejoinder to this is, “Why, then, do you go?” To which I can only answer that one must make a living somehow, and that some like to make money hard, and some to make it easily. Perhaps I belong to the former class.

Whatever the reason, the fact remains that in the heat of the summer we were ploughing our way through salt-bogs, without water or any immediate prospect of getting any, and realised, not for the first time, that the prospector's life in West Australia is not “all beer and skittles.”

The lake negotiated, we decided to rest under the scanty shade of a mulga tree, and regaled ourselves on oatmeal washed down with a mouthful of water, the last, hot from the iron casks. At a time when water is plentiful it can be carried and kept cool in canvas bags; but it owes this coolness to evaporation, and consequent waste of water. During the hot weather, when water is scarce, I never allowed canvas bags to be used, and so saved water, not only by avoiding evaporation, but from the fact that water carried in galvanised-iron casks becomes so hot and unpalatable that one is not tempted to take a big draught, and thus the supply is eked out.

That night we camped in the thick mulga, and from one of the larger trees I could see the hills, dead on our course, and not more than two miles off. But we were too tired to go further that night, and in any case could have done but little good in the dark. The poor camels were too dry to eat the mulga we cut for them, too dry even to chew the cud; and lay silent, tied down beside us—the stillness of the night being unbroken by the rhythmical “crunch” of their jaws.

Before sunrise we were packed and away, and shortly reached the hills which we found to be, as we had hoped, bare granite rocks. Leaving the camels, we spread out, and searched every hole and corner without success. Every rock-hole was dry. One native soak we found, from which we scraped about half gallon of water none too clear, and the less tempting from the close proximity of the dead body of a gin, a young native woman, fortunately not long dead. The ashes of a native camp but lately deserted, could be seen close by; no doubt they had moved off as the supply of water was so nearly done. Whether they had left the body to become a skeleton, before making a bundle of the bones (a practice common to some Australian tribes), or whether it is their usual custom to leave the dead where they die, I do not know. I know, however, that this body was subsequently moved, not by the blacks, but by those snarling scavengers, the dingoes.

This finding of a corpse at the mouth of the only soak we had seen was hardly encouraging; but still there was a large extent of rocks that we had not yet visited. Shortly before sunset, as I stood on the summit of the highest rock, I was astonished by the sight of some horses grazing in a little valley beneath. I could hardly believe that I saw aright; it seemed incredible that horsemen should have reached this drought-begirt spot. Little time was wasted in idle speculation, and the appearance of our camels soon proved the horses to be flesh and blood, and not mere phantoms of the brain, unless indeed phantoms can snort and plunge!

The owner of the horses soon made his appearance, and, with reluctant resignation, showed us the soak from which his horses were watered. He and his mates, he said, were sinking for water in a likely spot some half-mile away; in the meantime they used the soak, though it was evident it would not last much longer. We must have water for our camels, and must use the soak, I said, until their thirst was somewhat relieved, then in our turn we would dig for soaks round the rocks. In the hottest time of the year our poor patient beasts had been eight days without food, except of the driest description, and eight days without water, struggling and kicking in the salt-bogs. It was indeed a delight to quench their thirst at last. All that night we worked without a minute's rest, digging, scraping, and bailing, and secured enough to keep the camels going. For the next two days we were engaged in sinking trial holes for soakages; no water, however, rewarded our labours until the night of the second day, when we struck a splendid supply, and for the time being our troubles were over. Pitching a “fly” to keep off the sun's rays in the daytime, we were content to do nothing but rest for the whole of the next day. Here again I was fortunate in shooting an emu, a welcome addition to our provisions.

McIlwraith and his mates (the owners of the horses) had also struck a good supply. From them we got the news which we already suspected that a new find of gold had been made not five miles from the rocks. An apparently rich find too! How strangely things turn out. Our ill-fortune in failing to find the Erlistoun had forced us into a most unpleasant experience, and yet that ill-fortune was turning into good. For here we were on the scene of newly-discovered reefs and nuggets, at the new rush, the existence of which we had gravely doubted. We were the third party on the field, and from Messrs. Rogers and friends I heard the history of its discovery.

About the month of October, 1894, Rogers and party, with their camels, were camped at Cutmore's (or Doyle's) Well, and, on studying the map of the Elder Exploring Expedition, they saw that Mr. Wells had marked the country north of Lake Darlot as “probably auriferous.” This they determined to visit, and, more fortunate than ourselves, were not caught in the intricacies of the salt lake.

Returning in disgust, having found no signs of gold, they passed the granites, where they got water, and camped on a promising piece of country, where they soon found gold in the the reefs. Here they worked for some time with but little encouragement, until after Christmas, when alluvial gold was found on the surface by a member of another party who came upon the original discoverers in a somewhat startling manner.

Cable, Janet, and Pickering had pushed out also from Cutmore's Well, and by finding water on a granite between the two, had reached the rocks near Lake Darlot. Here they found camped a tribe of aboriginals, to whom they showed kindness—too much kindness it appears, for the treacherous thieves, having tasted the white man's food, conceived the bold idea of raiding the camp, killing its occupants, and annexing their provisions. At midnight the prospectors were attacked, Cable and Janet being speared as they lay in their blankets, Cable through the stomach and Janet in the arm, Pickering escaping, for he had laid down his blanket under a tree, away from the packs, to get shade from the moon. He is, too, a man of exceptionally small stature, and so eluded the quick sight of the black-fellow.

In spite of the disadvantage under which they were placed by the sudden attack and wounds, the white men overpowered and dispersed their treacherous foes. In what a terrible position they were now placed, fifty-five miles from Cutmore's Well, the nearest certain water, for the chances that the water found between would be dried up, were great! Only one man unwounded and one suffering the most awful tortures of pain; and nobody with the smallest medical skill, within God knows how many miles! Death seemed certain, but while life remained they were not the men to give in, and they thought of a plan whereby the life of their mate might be saved if only their horses held out. They travelled five miles, then camped, and the available man returned to the rocks to water the horses at the risk of being again attacked by the niggers. And thus dot and go one, they hoped to reach Cutmore's.

So much endurance could not remain unrewarded and the two wounded men were overjoyed by the report of a shot (a dynamite shot as it afterwards transpired, fired by Rogers, Parks, and Lockhart as they worked on their reef), and as soon as the horses returned, the little band set forth in the direction from which the welcome sound had come, and before long saw the camp of the lucky prospectors.

Fortunately Mr. Parks had some knowledge of surgery, picked up in the African bush, where he had been a trader, and so could doctor the wounded men. Here they camped until one morning, Janet, recovered of his hurt, picked up a nugget of gold, strangely enough, close to the track from Roger's camp to the reef he was working. This nugget was the first-fruit of a plentiful harvest, and presently they went down to the coast where poor Cable could be properly attended to in hospital. Pickering and Janet returned as soon as possible, but not before some inkling of their find had leaked out; consequently when they returned, just at the time of our arrival on the scene, their tracks were followed, and a “rush” set in.

We were not long in making our camp at the new diggings, or in getting to work to hunt for gold. Being out for a syndicate, who naturally wanted something big in the way of a reef, we were precluded from the alluring search for alluvial, “specking,” as it is termed.

It seems the simplest thing in the world to find a good mine—that is, as I said before, after you have found it! On Sunday, February 17th, Paddy and I took a walk, and stepped right on to an outcrop of quartz showing beautiful gold. Quite simple! Any fool can prospect; all he wants is a little luck, and the strange inner urgings that make him examine a certain quartz reef or blow that others have passed, perhaps dozens of times, without happening to look in the right place! Roughly marking out an area, to establish our prior claim to the ground amongst those already on the field, we returned to camp and gave Jim, who had been packing water from the granites, the joyful news.

On Monday before daylight we were out, and soon had eighteen acres marked off by a post at each corner, and our notices posted on a conspicuous tree, which we had been unable to do the day before, Sunday-pegging being illegal.

Fresh parties were now arriving daily, and the consequent demand for water made it necessary for Jim to camp at the rocks, and bring us a supply whenever he was able.

This was not accomplished without some trouble, for not only were the soaks we had dug with so much labour, made use of by the new-comers, which we did not object to, but our right to the water was often disputed by some who, with small regard for the truth, said that it was they who had sunk the wells! Jim, however, was not the man to be bluffed, and,