Who Are You Talking About?

Who are THEY I'd like to know?

When we boil this meat, if we put a piece of charcoal in the pot, it will come out as sweet as a nut." He merely replied, with a dubious expression of face, "Oh!" but he ate his share of it as readily as anybody else. The next day, Christmas eve, I sent Mr. Tietkens and Gibson on two of the horses we had lately brought back, to find the mob, which they brought home late, and said the tracks of the natives showed that they had driven the horses away for several miles, and they had found them near a small creek, along the south face of the range, where there was water. While they were away some ducks visited the camp, but the tea-tree was too thick to allow us to shoot any of them. The day was cool, although there is a great oppression in the atmosphere, and it is impossible to tell by one's feelings what might be the range of the thermometer, as I have often felt it hotter on some days with the thermometer at 96 or 98 degrees than when it ranged up to 108 or 110 degrees. The afternoons are excessively relaxing, for although the mercury falls a little after three o'clock, still the morning's heat appears to remain until the sun has actually set. It is more than probable that the horses having been hunted by the natives, and having found more water, will not come back here of their own accord to water any more; so I shall keep one tied up at the camp, to fetch the others up with every morning.

And now comes Thursday, 25th December, Christmas Day, 1873. Ah, how the time flies! Years following years, steal something every day; at last they steal us from ourselves away. What Horace says is, Eheu fugaces, anni labuntur postume, postume: - Years glide away, and are lost to me, lost to me.

While Jimmy Andrews was away after the others, upon the horse that was tied up all night, we were startled out of our propriety by the howls and yells of a pack of fiends in human form and aboriginal appearance, who had clambered up the rocks just above our camp. I could only see some ten or a dozen in the front, but scores more were dodging in and out among the rocks. The more prominent throng were led by an ancient individual, who, having fitted a spear, was just in the act of throwing it down amongst us, when Gibson seized a rifle, and presented him with a conical Christmas box, which smote the rocks with such force, and in such near proximity to his hinder parts, that in a great measure it checked his fiery ardour, and induced most of his more timorous following to climb with most perturbed activity over the rocks. The ancient more slowly followed, and then from behind the fastness of his rocky shield, he spoke spears and boomerangs to us, though he used none.

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