In Mountainous Country Where Landmarks Are Numerous The Traveller May
Manage It; But No Man Could Travel For Any Length
Of time without keeping
some sort of reckoning, in a flat country like the interior of Western
Australia, where for
Days together one sees no hill or rise, without
before long becoming hopelessly lost.
Paddy Egan had been content to travel in this haphazard way, and it was
long before he would acknowledge the benefits of a compass and map. That
he could travel straight there was no gainsaying, for if, as I sometimes
did, I pointed out our line and sent him ahead, he would go as straight as
a die, with now and then a glance at the sun, and a slight alteration in
his course to allow for its altered position, and require but little
correction. Indeed, even when using a compass, one instinctively pays as
much and more attention to the sun or the stars, as the case may be.
The rock-hole at Beri was dry, so we pushed on for Lake Roe, and, though
we worked sinking holes until past midnight, and nearly the whole of the
next day, we were unable to find water. It was only salt water we
expected, but a stiff pipeclay, continuing to a depth too great for our
limited means of sinking, baffled all our efforts. I followed the lake
some six miles to the eastward, carrying a shovel and digging trial holes
at intervals, but this pipeclay foiled me everywhere.
I do not know how far this lake runs east, and fancy its limits have never
been laid down on the map; not that there is anything sufficiently
inviting in its appearance - the usual flat expanse of mud, with banks of
sand fringed with low straggling mallee and spinifex - to warrant further
investigation.
Lake Roe having failed us, we turned on our tracks for the nearest point
of Lake Lapage, some nine miles distant. Here we were more fortunate, and
obtained a splendid supply of salt water at a depth of only three feet.
Timber was not easily got - that would have been too much joy! It had to
be carried nearly half a mile on our shoulders, for the camels, having
travelled all day, deserved a rest. The condensers worked well, now that
we had had some experience, and produced water at the rate of four gallons
an hour. With our casks replenished and our camels filled, leaving the
condenser standing, we turned south to some hills that were visible; we
intended to be absent for four days, at the end of which the camels would
again require water, as the weather was exceedingly hot.
Nothing of interest was met with until we came upon a huge wall-like reef,
standing some fifteen or twenty feet above the ground, from ten to twenty
feet wide, and running almost due north and south for nearly five miles,
without a break of appreciable extent, as we subsequently found. Breaking
the quartz at intervals, hoping at each blow of the pick to see the
longed-for colours, we followed this curious natural wall, and finally
camped, sheltered by it from the wind. A violent storm of dust, wind,
thunder, and lightning swept over us that night, tearing the "fly" we had
pitched, in the vain expectation of rain, into ribbons.
Leaving the others to continue prospecting, I turned my steps, or rather
those of Satan, whom I was riding, towards Cowarna, a large granite rock,
some fourteen miles distant, and due south from our camp, if I had
reckoned our position on the map correctly. Twelve miles of open forest,
alternating with scrubby thickets, brought me to the edge of a fine little
plain of saltbush and grass, from the centre of which a bare rock of
granite stood out. Arrived at the rock, I hunted long and diligently for
water. Numerous rock-holes were to be seen, but all were dry, and my hopes
of making this our base from which to prospect in various directions were
at first short-lived; but before long I was overjoyed to hear the
twittering of a little flock of Diamond sparrows - a nearly certain sign
that water must be handy; and sure enough I found their supply at the
bottom of a narrow, round hole, down which I could just stretch my arm.
CHAPTER II
GRANITE ROCKS, "NAMMA HOLES," AND "SOAKS"
At this point it may not be amiss to give a short description of these
peculiar outcrops of granite, without which the track from York to
Coolgardie could never have been kept open, nor the place discovered, nor
could its early inhabitants have supported life before the condensing
plant came into general use.
The interior of the Colony, between the coast and a point some hundred
miles east of Coolgardie, is traversed by parallel belts of granite,
running in a general direction of north-north-west and south-south-east.
This granite crops out above the surface, at intervals of from ten to
twenty or thirty miles, sometimes in the form of an isolated barren rock,
and sometimes as low ranges and hills several miles in extent. From them
small creeks, and sometimes larger watercourses, run down, to find their
way into the stony and gravelly debris which usually surrounds the rocks.
Much of what little rain does fall is absorbed by the trees and scrub,
and much is taken by the sun's heat, so that a very small proportion can
sink below the surface soil, and only when there is some underground basin
in the rock beneath will water be found by sinking, except immediately
after rain.
Round the granite base a belt of grass of no great extent may be found,
for the most part dry and yellow, but in places green and fresh. It is in
such spots as these that one may hope to tap an underground reservoir in
the rock. To these shallow wells has been given the name of "Soaks."
They seldom exceed fifteen feet in depth, though similar subterranean
basins have been tapped by a well perhaps a hundred feet deep, sunk some
distance from the foot of the outcrop.
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