The "Roll Up" Slowly Dispersed, Every Man Muttering That It Was Not His
Business, And That, After All, Passing A "Stiff 'un" On To A New Chum Was
No Great Crime As Compared To Stealing Gold Or Robbing A Camp.
In this I
think they showed sound judgment.
The prize-fighting gent, however, became
too bumptious, and was eventually hustled out of the place.
Our camp at Lake Darlot was rather pleasantly situated on rising ground by
the side of the blow; behind us, sheer cliffs of conglomerate, worn and
weathered into queer little caves, the floors of which were covered inches
deep by the droppings of bats and small wallabies; and, stretching away
to the South, an open plain enclosed in an endless sea of scrub. Every
morning we witnessed the strange phenomenon of a lake appearing in the sky
to the South, miles away, above the scrub, a lake surrounded by steep
white cliffs. This mirage would last perhaps half an hour, and was, I
suppose, a reflection of Lake Darlot, which lay at the back of us, some
five miles distant to the North.
Our camp consisted of the usual tents and bough-shades and for the first,
and probably the only, time in our lives we cooked our pots on a golden
fireplace. To protect the fire from the wind, so that a good pile of ashes
should collect for baking purposes, we had made a semicircular wall of
stones. The nearest available stones, quartz boulders from the blow, were
used, and so it came about that we had a gold-studded fireplace! We used
to have a curious visitor from the caves - a small black cat, which was
tame enough to wander between our legs as we sat round the fire, but too
wary to be caught. I can hardly imagine a prospector carrying a cat as
companion, and yet how else did it get there? Its shyness inclined us to
think it had strayed from civilisation. Jim tried to catch it one evening,
and not only got scratched and bitten for his trouble, but so startled the
beast that it never returned. Our party was now increased to five; for an
extra hand, Alfred Morris, had been engaged. Between us the duties of the
day's work were divided.
Our daily labours included hunting up the camels, lest they strayed or
were stolen, cutting timber for mining or firewood, packing water from the
rocks five miles away, and working on the mine.
I had occasion to make a journey to Lawlers, where a Warden, Mr. Clifton,
had lately been established, and I mention here an illustration of one of
the many intelligent traits in the character of camels.
Not wishing to follow the road in its many turns from water to water, I
cut through the bush for some fifty miles. The first part was over hard,
stony ground, then came sand, then more stones, and then I struck the road
again about two miles from Lawlers.
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