At The
Head Of A Gully Running From This We Were Fortunate In Finding Water,
Sufficient To Fill Our Casks, And Give Each Camel A Drink.
This was on the
morning of January 25th, and until the 31st about noon we saw no further
signs of water.
Every likely place was dry. Where Luck and I had found
water before, not a drop of moisture could be seen; the holes contained
nothing but the feathers and skeletons of disappointed birds. Unable to
stop at Mount Ida without packing water twenty-five miles, which the
prospects of the country did not warrant, we turned northwards across much
broken granite country, which we vainly searched for Namma-holes or soaks.
Far ahead of us we could see sharp pinnacles, standing up high and
solitary above the scrub. These turned out to be huge blows of white
quartz, and were no doubt connected underground, for we traced them a
distance of nearly thirty miles. Interesting as these were, our thoughts
were turned to water-hunting, for the weather - the season being
midsummer - was scorching; the poor camels, sore-footed from the stony
granite, parched with thirst, and forced to carry their loads, eight to
twelve hours a day, showed signs of distress. Weary and footsore
ourselves, tramping at full speed all day over the burning rocks, one with
the camels, the others on either hand, scouting, our casks all but empty,
our position was not enviable.
The night of the 30th our water was finished. The nearest known to us was
thirty-five miles off, and a a salt lake was between - a sufficient bar to
our hopes in that direction. Matters were by no means desperate, however,
for thirty miles north we were bound to cut the Cue-Mount Margaret road,
and having done so it would be merely a question of time, with a certainty
of arriving at a watering place eventually, if we and our camels could
hold out. A dry stage, however long, with the certainty of relief at the
end of it, gives little cause for anxiety when compared with one on which
neither the position nor even the existence of water can be known.
Next morning we followed up a small creek, and on crossing saw the tracks
of several kangaroos and emus making towards two peaks of quartz. Here was
our chance. It was my place of course to go, but I yielded to the
persuasion of Paddy and Jim, who insisted that I had denied myself water
to eke out our scanty supply (though I doubt if I had done so more than
they), and must rest. So, putting the camels down in the welcome shade of
a kurrajong, I lay down beside them and was presently relieved by the
sound of a revolver-shot, our signal that water was found.
What a beautiful sight it was! Nestling in the hollow between two great
white blows of quartz, this little pool of crystal-clear water, filled
evidently by a little gully falling over a steep ledge of quartz beyond,
presented no doubt a pretty picture after the rains. A soakage it must be,
for no open rock-hole could hold water in such terrible heat; and its
clearness would suggest the possibility of an underlying spring. A popular
drinking-place this, frequented by birds of all kinds, crows, hawks,
pigeons, galahs, wee-jugglers, and the ubiquitous diamond-sparrows. During
the night we could hear wallabies hopping along, but were too worn out to
sit up to shoot them. Though our sufferings had not been great, we had had
a "bit of a doing."
One day's rest, occupied in various mendings of clothes, boots, and
saddles, and we were off again to the north, cutting the track as
expected, and presently found ourselves at the newly established mining
camp of Lawlers, prettily situated on the banks of a gum-creek, with a
copious supply of water in wells sunk in its bed. A great advantage that
the northern fields have over those further south is the occurrence of
numerous creeks, sometimes traceable for over thirty miles, in all of
which an abundance of fresh water can be obtained by sinking at depths
varying from fifteen to fifty feet.
Towards the end of their course the well-defined channels, with banks
sometimes ten feet high, disappear, giving place to a grassy avenue
through the scrub, lightly timbered with cork-bark, and other small trees.
It is on such flats as these that the wells are sunk. All creeks find
their way into the lakes, though seldom by a discernible channel, breaking
and making, as the expression is, until a narrow arm of the lake stretches
to meet them. At the most these creeks run "a banker" three times during
the year, the water flowing for perhaps three days; after which pools of
various sizes remain, to be in their turn dried up by evaporation and
soakage. In the dry weather the creeks afford a weird spectacle. Stately
white gums (the only timber of any size in these districts), with their
silvery bark hanging in dishevelled shreds around the branchless stems,
bend ghost-like over an undulating bed of gravel; gravel made up of
ironstone pebbles, quartz fragments, and other water-worn debris washed
down from the hills at the head of the creeks.
What a marvellous transformation the winter rains cause! It is then that
the expert, or journalist, takes his walks abroad; it is then that we read
such glowing accounts of rich grass lands, watered by countless creeks,
only awaiting the coming of an agriculturist to be turned into smiling
farms and fertile fields.
Numerous parties were camped at Lawlers, with some two hundred horses
turned out in the bush, waiting until rain should fall. Though with no
better feed than grass, dry and withered, the freedom from work had made
them skittish. What a pretty sight it is to see a mob of horses trooping
in for water at night; the young colts kicking up their heels with
delight; the solemn old packhorse looking with scorn on the gambols of his
juvenile brethren, with a shake of his hardy old head, as much as to say,
"Ah!
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