Stimulated, However, By A Desire Of Acquiring
A Further Knowledge Of The Country, On The 26th Instant, Accompanied By
Mr.
Arndell, assistant surgeon of the settlement, Mr. Lowes, surgeon's mate
of the 'Sirius', two marines, and a convict, I left
The redoubt at day-break,
pointing our march to a hill, distant five miles, in a westerly or inland
direction, which commands a view of the great chain of mountains,
called Carmarthen hills, extending from north to south farther than
the eye can reach. Here we paused, surveying "the wild abyss;
pondering our voyage." Before us lay the trackless immeasurable desert,
in awful silence. At length, after consultation, we determined to steer
west and by north, by compass, the make of the land in that quarter indicating
the existence of a river. We continued to march all day through a country
untrodden before by an European foot. Save that a melancholy crow now and then
flew croaking over head, or a kangaroo was seen to bound at a distance,
the picture of solitude was complete and undisturbed. At four o'clock
in the afternoon we halted near a small pond of water, where we took up
our residence for the night, lighted a fire, and prepared to cook our supper:
that was, to broil over a couple of ramrods a few slices of salt pork,
and a crow which we had shot.
At daylight we renewed our peregrination; and in an hour after we found
ourselves on the banks of a river, nearly as broad as the Thames at Putney,
and apparently of great depth, the current running very slowly in
a northerly direction. Vast flocks of wild ducks were swimming in the stream;
but after being once fired at, they grew so shy that we could not get near them
a second time. Nothing is more certain than that the sound of a gun
had never before been heard within many miles of this spot.
We proceeded upwards, by a slow pace, through reeds, thickets, and a thousand
other obstacles, which impeded our progress, over coarse sandy ground,
which had been recently inundated, though full forty feet above
the present level of the river. Traces of the natives appeared at every step,
sometimes in their hunting-huts, which consist of nothing more than
a large piece of bark, bent in the middle, and open at both ends, exactly
resembling two cards, set up to form an acute angle; sometimes in marks
on trees which they had climbed; or in squirrel-traps*; or, which surprised us
more, from being new, in decoys for the purpose of ensnaring birds.
These are formed of underwood and reeds, long and narrow, shaped like
a mound raised over a grave; with a small aperture at one end for admission
of the prey; and a grate made of sticks at the other: the bird enters
at the aperture, seeing before him the light of the grate, between the bars
of which, he vainly endeavours to thrust himself, until taken.
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