We Made Camp One Mile From The Foot Of The Hills, And Charlie And I
Walked Over To See What Was To Be Seen.
This range is of sandstone, and
made up of a series of flat-topped hills of peculiar shapes, standing on
the usual rough, stony slopes.
The hills are traceable in a broken line
for a considerable distance, perhaps twenty miles, in a North-Easterly
direction. No doubt some good water-hole exists amongst these hills,
judging from the tracks of kangaroos, turkeys, and dingoes. I fancy that
animals and birds follow up rain-storms from place to place to take
advantage of the good feed which springs into life, and it is most
probable that for ten months in the year these hills are undisturbed by
animal or bird life. Certainly Giles found that to be the case when he
crossed them in 1876; so disgusted was he with their appearance that he
did not trouble to investigate them at all. Indeed, he could have no
other than sad remembrances of this range, for he first sighted it from
the East, when attempting to cross the interior from East to West - an
attempt that failed, owing to the impossibility of traversing this desert
of rolling sand and gravel with horses only as a means of transport.
Baffled, he was forced to return, leaving behind him, lost for ever,
his companion Gibson. After him this desert is named, and how he lost his
life is related in Giles's journals.
In 1874 Giles, Tietkens, Gibson, and Andrews, with twenty-four horses,
left the overland Central Australian telegraph line, to push out to the
West as far as possible. Keeping to the South of the already discovered
Lake Amadeus, they found the Rawlinson and neighbouring ranges just
within the Colony of West Australia. Water was plentiful, and a depot camp
was formed, Giles and Gibson making a flying trip ahead to the westward.
The furthest point was reached on April 23, 1874, from which the Alfred
and Marie was visible some twenty-five miles distant. At this point
Gibson's horse "knocked up," and shortly afterwards died. Giles thereupon
gave up his own horse, the Fair Maid of Perth, and sent his companion
back to the depot for relief; for it was clear that only one could ride
the horse, and he who did so, by hurrying on, could return and save his
companion. With a wave of his hat, he shouted goodbye to his generous
leader and rode off. "This was the last ever seen of Gibson." It appears
that the poor fellow failed to follow back the outgoing tracks, got lost
in the night, became hopelessly "bushed," and perished, alone in the
desert. Giles meanwhile struggled on and on, every hour expecting relief,
which of course never came. At last he staggered into camp, nearly dead.
No time was lost in saddling fresh horses, and Tietkens and his exhausted
companion set out in search of the missing man.
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