I Find It
Difficult To Bring Before The Reader The Thousand Curious Objects That Met
Us On Our Way.
The sullen crocodile basking in the sun, sank noiselessly;
a splash would be heard, and a four feet albicore would fling himself madly
into the air, striving vainly to elude the ominous black triangle that cut
the water like a knife close in his rear.
Small chance for the poor
fugitive, with the ravenous shark following silent and inexorable. We lay
on our oars and watched the result. The hunted fish doubles, springs
aloft, and dives down, but all in vain; the black fin is not to be thrown
off, double as he may. Anon the springs become more feeble, the pursuer's
tail partly appears as he pushes forward with redoubled vigour, a faint
splash is heard, the waters curl into an eddy, and the monster sinks
noiselessly to enjoy his breakfast in the cooler depths beneath. And now
we come to a sand bank running out some miles or so into the bay, and on
which the water is less than three fathoms. Here the surface is broken by
huge black objects, coming clumsily to the top, shooting out a jet of
spray, and again disappearing. We let the boat glide gently along until
she rests motionless above the bank, and stooping over the side with our
faces close to the water, and sheltered by our hands, we can peer down into
the placid depths, and see the huge animals grazing on the submarine
vegetation with which their favourite feeding-place is thickly overgrown.
But what animal is he talking about? the reader will ask. It is the dugong
('Halicore Australis'), or sea-cow, from whence is extracted an oil equal
to the cod-liver as regards its medicinal qualities, and far superior to it
in one great essential, for instead of a nauseous disagreeable flavour, it
tastes quite pleasantly. It frequents the whole of the north-eastern coast
of Australia, and when the qualities of the oil first became known, it was
eagerly sought after by invalids who could not overcome their repugnance to
the cod-liver nastiness. The fishermen, however, spoilt their own market,
for greed induced them to adulterate the new medicine with shark oil, and
all kinds of other abominations, so that the faculty were never quite
certain what they were pouring down the throats of their unhappy patients.
Thus the oil lost its good name, though I am convinced from personal
observation that fresh, pure dugong is quite equal, if not superior, in
nourishing qualities to cod-liver oil, and do not doubt that a time will
come when it will enter largely into the Pharmacopoeia. The animal itself
is so peculiar, that a brief description of it may not be here amiss. Its
favourite haunts are bays into which streams empty themselves, and where
the water is from two to five fathoms in depth, feeding on the 'Algae' of
the submerged banks, for which purpose the upper lip is very large, thick,
and as it turns down suddenly at right angles with the head, it much
resembles an elephant's trunk shorn off at the mouth. Its length averages
from eight to fourteen feet; there is no dorsal fin, and the tail is
horizontal; colour blue, and white beneath. Its means of propulsion are
two paddles, with which it also crawls along the bottom, and beneath which
are situated the udders, with teats exactly like a cow's. Its flesh is far
from bad, resembling lean beef in appearance, though hardly so good to the
taste, and the skin can be manufactured into gelatine. I have often
wondered that this most useful animal was not oftener captured. A fishing
establishment with a good boat, a trained crew, and proper appliances for
extracting the oil, could not fail to return a large profit to the
proprietors, and every now and then they could kill a whale, one or more of
which could be frequently seen disporting themselves in the waters of the
bay.
[Illustration - BAY ON HINCHINBROOK ISLAND, WITH NATIVES.]
By ten o'clock we had reached Garden Island, and beached the boat on a long
sandy spit that stretched into the sea. Leaving one man as boat-keeper, we
spread ourselves into line, and regularly beat the little island from end
to end, but without finding a single black; we could, however, see their
smoke-signals arising from Gould Island, and observed several heavily-laden
canoes making the best of their way towards Hinchinbrook. Our search
having been unsuccessful, we hurried down to the boat, with the intention
of cutting the fugitives off, but found to our disgust that the tide had
fallen so low during our absence that our united strength was insufficient
to move the boat, so we were perforce compelled to remain until the return
of the water. This did not in reality so much signify, indeed, some of the
party were rather averse to our plan of intercepting the canoes, arguing
that if closely pressed, the blacks might make an end of their captives.
However this might be, there was no help for it, we were stuck fast until
the afternoon, so had to summon such philosophy as we possessed, and while
away the time as best we could. The boat's sail, spread under the shade of
a tree, kept the intense heat a little at bay until after dinner, and this
most essential part of the day's programme have been done ample justice to,
and the pipes lighted and smoked out, we wandered about the long space left
bare by the tide, amusing ourselves by collecting oysters, cowrie shells,
and periwinkles.
The way we captured the two latter was by turning over the rocks, to the
under sides of which we found them adhering in great numbers, sticking on
like snails to a garden wall. Some of the cowries were very beautiful,
particularly those of a deep brown colour approaching to black.
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