Not a sign of life around them - no
bird or beast to tell them that life existed for any - no sound to break
the stillness of that ghastly wilderness - no green grass or trees to
relieve the monotony of the sand - nothing but the eternal spinifex and a
few shrunken stems of trees that have been - no shade from the burning
sun - above them the clear sky only clouded by death! slow, cruel death,
and yet in their stout hearts love and courage! Poor fellows! they died
like men, with a message written by dying fingers for those they left to
mourn them - a message full of affection, expressing no fear of death, but
perfect faith in God. So might all mothers be content to see their sons
die - when their time comes.
They had died, it appears, too soon for any aid to have reached them.
Even had Mr. Wells been able to turn back on his tracks at once on
arrival at the Fitzroy, it is doubtful if he could have been in time to
give any help to his suffering comrades.
The bodies were taken to Adelaide, where the whole country joined in
doing honour to the dead.
CHAPTER XVI
KIMBERLEY
Since we were not to retackle the sand forthwith, we laid ourselves out
to rest and do nothing to the very best of our ability. This resolve was
made easy of execution, for no sooner had the Warden, Mr. Cummins, heard
of our arrival, than he invited us to his house, where we remained during
our stay in Hall's Creek, and met with so much kindness and hospitality
that we felt more than ever pleased that we had arrived at this
out-of-the-way spot by a rather novel route.
Since Kimberley (excepting the South African district) must be an unknown
name to the majority of English readers, and since it is one of the most
valuable portions of West Australia, it deserves more than passing
mention.
Hall's Creek, named after the first prospector who found payable gold in
the district, is the official centre of the once populous Kimberley
goldfields, and the seat of justice, law, and order for the East
Kimberley division.
Attention was first drawn to this part of the Colony by the report of
Alexander Forrest, who discovered the Fitzroy, Margaret, and other
rivers; but it was not the pastoral land described by him that caused any
influx of population. Gold was the lure. The existence of gold was
discovered by Mr. Hardman, geologist, attached to a Government
survey-party under Mr. Johnston (now Surveyor-General), and, though he
found no more than colours, it is a remarkable fact that gold has since
been discovered in few places that were not mentioned by him. Numerous
"overlanders" and prospectors soon followed; indeed some preceded this
expedition, for Mr. Johnston has told me that he found marked trees in
more than one place. Who marked them was never ascertained, but it was
supposed that a party of overlanders from Queensland, who were known to
have perished, were responsible for them.
In 1886 payable gold was found, and during that and the following year
one of the largest and most unprofitable "rushes" known in Australia set
in for the newly discovered alluvial field. The sinking being shallow,
what ground there was, was soon worked out, and before long the rush set
back again as rapidly as it had come, the goldfield was condemned as a
duffer, and left to the few faithful fossickers who have made a living
there to this day. The alluvial gold was the great bait; of this but
little was found, and to reefing no attention to speak of was given, so
that at the present time miles upon miles of quartz reefs, blows,
leaders, and veins are untouched and untested as they were before the
rush of 1886. No one can say what systematic prospecting might disclose
in this neglected corner of the Colony. There are many countries less
favoured for cheap mining; Kimberley is blessed with an abundant
rainfall, and the district contains some of the finest pasture-lands in
Australia.
A scarcity of good mining timber, the remoteness of the district from
settled parts, and the bad name that has been bestowed upon it, are the
disadvantages under which the goldfield labours. Nevertheless two
batteries are working at the present day, and a good find by some old
fossicker is not so rare.
Setting aside the question of gold-discoveries, which may or may not be
made, this district has a great future before it to be derived from the
raising of stock, cattle, sheep, and horses. So far only a limited area
of country has been taken up - that is to say, the country in the valleys
of the Ord, Margaret, and Fitzroy Rivers and their tributaries. There
still remains, however, a large tract lying between those rivers and the
most Northerly point of the Colony as yet unoccupied, and some of it even
unexplored. One or two prospectors have passed through a portion of it,
and they speak well of its pastoral and, possibly, auriferous value.
Cut off, as it is, by the desert, the district has the disadvantage of
none but sea communication with the rest of the Colony. This necessitates
the double shipment of live stock, once at either port, Derby or Wyndham,
after they have been driven so far from the stations, and once again at
Fremantle. A coastal stock route is debarred by the poverty of the
country between Derby and the De Grey River, and a direct stock route
through the desert is manifestly impracticable. It seems to me that too
little attention has been given to horse-breeding, and that a
remunerative trade might be carried on between Kimberley and India, to
which this district is nearer than any other part of Australia.
