Australia Twice Traversed - The Romance Of Exploration, Through Central South Australia, And Western Australia, From 1872 To 1876 By Ernest Giles
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Mount Gould
Is Almost Entirely Composed Of Huge Blocks Of Almost Pure Iron, Which
Rendered The Compass Useless.
The creek the camp is on appears to come
from some low hills to the north east-wards, and on leaving this place
I shall follow it up.
Some recent rains must have fallen in this
neighbourhood, for the whole country is beautifully green. The flies
at the camp to-day were, if possible, even more numerous than before.
They infest the whole air; they seem to be circumambient; we can't
help eating, drinking, and breathing flies; they go down our throats
in spite of our teeth, and we wear them all over our bodies; they
creep up one's clothes and die, and others go after them to see what
they died of. The instant I inhale a fly it acts as an emetic. And if
Nature abhors a vacuum, she, or at least my nature, abhors these
wretches more, for the moment I swallow one a vacuum is instantly
produced. Their bodies are full of poisonous matter, and they have a
most disgusting flavour, though they taste sweet. They also cause
great pains and discomfort to our eyes, which are always full of them.
Probably, if the flies were not here, we might think we were overrun
with ants; but the flies preponderate; the ants merely come as
undertakers and scavengers; they eat up or take away all we smash, and
being attracted by the smell of the dead victims, they crawl over
everything after their prey.
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