There were a number of opossums here which often damaged the garden
produce in the night. There were various dull-plumaged small birds,
with hawks, crows, and occasionally ducks, and one abominable croaking
creature at night used to annoy me exceedingly, and though I often
walked up the glen I could never discover what sort of bird it was. It
might have been a raven; yes, a raven never flitting may be sitting,
may be sitting, on those shattered rocks of wretchedness - on that
Troglodytes' shore, where in spirit I may wander, o'er those arid
regions yonder; but where I wish to squander, time and energies no
more. Though a most romantic region, its toils and dangers legion, my
memory oft besieging, what time cannot restore; again I hear the
shocks of the shattering of the rocks, see the wallabies in flocks,
all trembling at the roar, of the volcanic reverberations, or
seismatic detonations, which peculiar sensations I wish to know no
more. The horses were mustered at last, and at length we were about to
depart, not certainly in the direction I should have wished to go, but
still to something new.
Fort Mueller, of course, was named after my kind friend the Baron*,
who was a personal contributor to the fund for this expedition. It was
really the most astonishing place it has ever been my fortune to
visit. Occasionally one would hear the metallic sounding clang, of
some falling rock, smashing into the glen below, toppled from its
eminence by some subterranean tremour or earthquake shock, and the
vibrations of the seismatic waves would precipitate the rocks into
different groups and shapes than they formerly possessed. I had many
strange, almost superstitious feelings with regard to this singular
spot, for there was always a strange depression upon my spirits whilst
here, arising partly perhaps from the constant dread of attacks from
the hostile natives, and partly from the physical peculiarities of the
region itself.
"On all there hung a shadow and a fear,
A sense of mystery, the spirit daunted,
And said, as plain as whisper in the ear,
This region's haunted."
On the 16th we departed, leaving to the native owners of the soil,
this singular glen, where the water flowed only in the night, where
the earthquake and the dry thunderstorm occurred every day, and turned
our backs for the last time upon
"Their home by horror haunted,
Their desert land enchanted,"
and plunged again into the northern wilderness.
CHAPTER 2.7. FROM 16TH JANUARY TO 19TH FEBRUARY, 1874.
The Kangaroo Tanks.
Horses stampede.
Water by digging.
Staggering horses.
Deep rock-reservoir.
Glen Cumming.
Mount Russell.
Glen Gerald.
Glen Fielder.
The Alice Falls.
Separated hills.
Splendid-looking creek.
Excellent country.
The Pass of the Abencerrages.
Sladen Water.
An alarm.
Jimmy's anxiety for a date.
Mount Barlee.
Mount Buttfield.
"Stagning" water.
Ranges continue to the west.
A notch.
Dry rocky basins.
Horses impounded.
Desolation Glen.
Wretched night.
Terrible Billy.
A thick clump of gums.
A strong and rapid stream.
The Stemodia viscosa.
Head-first in a bog.
Leuhman's Spring.
Groener's and Tyndall's Springs.
The Great Gorge.
Fort McKellar.
The Gorge of Tarns.
Ants again.
Swim in the tarn.
View from summit of range.
Altitude.
Tatterdemalions.
An explorer's accomplishments.
Cool and shady caves.
Large rocky tarn.
The Circus.
High red sandhills to the west.
Ancient lake bed.
Burrowing wallabies.
The North-west Mountain.
Jimmy and the grog bottle.
The Rawlinson Range.
Moth- and fly-catching plant.
An inviting mountain.
Inviting valley.
Fruitless search for water.
Ascend the mountain.
Mount Robert.
Dead and dying horses.
Description of the mob.
Mount Destruction.
Reflections.
Life for water.
Hot winds.
Retreat to Sladen Water.
Wild ducks.
An ornithological lecture.
Shift the camp.
Cockatoo parrots.
Clouds of pigeons.
Dragged by Diaway.
Attacked by the natives.
