Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete

C >> Charles Sturt >> Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia, Complete

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The two natives, whom the stockmen had named Peter and Jemmie, were of
infinite service to us, from their knowledge of all the passes, and the
general features of the country. Having, however, seen us thus far on the
journey from their usual haunts, they became anxious to return, and it was
with some difficulty we persuaded them to accompany us for a few days
longer, in hopes of reward. The weather had been cool and pleasant; the
thermometer averaging 78 of Fahrenheit at noon, in consequences of which
the animals kept in good condition, the men healthy and zealous. The sheep
Mr. O'Brien had presented to us, gave no additional trouble; they followed
in the rear of the party without attempting to wander, and were secured at
night in a small pen or fold. No waste attended their slaughter, nor did
they lose in condition, from being driven from ten to fifteen miles daily,
so much as I had been led to suppose they would have done.

CHAPTER III.

Character of the Morumbidgee where it issues from the hilly country--
Appearance of approach to swamps--Hamilton Plains--Intercourse with the
natives--Their appearance, customs, &c.--Change in the character of the
river--Mirage--Dreariness of the country--Ride towards the Lachlan river
--Two boats built and launched on the Morumbidgee; and the drays, with
part of the men sent back to Goulburn Plains.

NATIVES--WILD GAME,&c.; CHARACTER OF THE RIVER AND THE ADJOINING COUNTRY.

From our camp, the Morumbidgee held a direct westerly course for about
three miles. The hills under which we had encamped, rose so close upon our
right as to leave little space between them and the river. At the distance
of three miles, however, they suddenly terminated, and the river changed
its direction to the S.W., while a chain of ponds extended to the
westward, and separated the alluvial flats from a somewhat more elevated
plain before us. We kept these ponds upon our left for some time, but, as
they ultimately followed the bend of the river, we left them. The blacks
led us on a W. by S. course to the base of a small range two or three
miles distant, near which there was a deep lagoon. It was evident they
here expected to have found some other natives. Being disappointed,
however, they turned in towards the river again, but we stopped short of
it on the side of a serpentine sheet of water, an apparent continuation of
the chain of ponds we had left behind us, forming a kind of ditch round
the S.W. extremity of the range, parallel to which we had continued to
travel. This range, which had been gradually decreasing in height from the
lagoon, above which it rose perpendicularly, might almost be said to
terminate here. We fell in with two or three natives before we halted, but
the evident want of population in so fine a country, and on so noble a
river, surprised me extremely. We saw several red kangaroos in the course
of the day, and succeeded in killing one. It certainly is a beautiful
animal, ranging the wilds in native freedom. The female and the kid are of
a light mouse-colour. Wild turkeys abound on this part of the Morumbidgee,
but with the exception of a few terns, which are found hovering over the
lagoons, no new birds had as yet been procured; and the only plant that
enriched our collection, was an unknown metrosideros. In crossing the
extremity of the range, the wheels of the dray sunk deep into a yielding
and coarse sandy soil, of decomposed granite, on which forest-grass
prevailed in tufts, which, being far apart, made the ground uneven, and
caused the animals to trip. We rose at one time sufficiently high to
obtain an extensive view, and had our opinions confirmed as to the level
nature of the country we were so rapidly approaching. From the N. to
the W.S.W. the eye wandered over a wooded and unbroken interior, if I
except a solitary double hill that rose in the midst of it, bearing
S. 82 degrees W. distant 12 miles, and another singular elevation that
bore S. 32 degrees W. called by the natives, Kengal. The appearance to the
E.S.E. was still that of a mountainous country, while from the N.E., the
hills gradually decrease in height, until lost in the darkness of
surrounding objects to the northward. We did not travel this day more than
13 miles on a W. by N. course. The Morumbidgee, where we struck it, by its
increased size, kept alive our anticipations of its ultimately leading us
to some important point. The partial rains that had fallen while we were
on its upper branch, had swollen it considerably, and it now rolled along
a vast body of water at the rate of three miles an hour, preserving a
medium width of 150 feet; its banks retaining a height far above the usual
level of the stream. A traveller who had never before descended into the
interior of New Holland, would have spurned the idea of such a river
terminating in marshes; but with the experience of the former journey,
strong as hope was within my breast, I still feared it might lose itself
in the vast flat upon which we could scarcely be said to have yet entered.
The country was indeed taking up more and more every day the features of
the N.W. interior. Cypresses were observed upon the minor ridges, and the
soil near the river, although still rich, and certainly more extensive
than above, was occasionally mixed with sand, and scattered over with the
claws of crayfish and shells, indicating its greater liability to be
flooded; nor indeed could I entertain a doubt that the river had laid a
great part of the levels around us under water long after it found that
channel in which nature intended ultimately to confine it. We killed
another fine red kangaroo in the early part of the day, in galloping after
which I got a heavy fall.

The two blacks who had been with us so long, and who had not only exerted
themselves to assist us, but had contributed in no small degree to our
amusement, though they had from M'Leay's liberality, tasted all the
dainties with which we had provided ourselves, from sugar to concentrated
cayenne, intimated that they could no longer accompany the party. They had
probably got to the extremity of their beat, and dared not venture any
further. They left us with evident regret, receiving, on their departure,
several valuable presents, in the shape of tomahawks &c. The last thing
they did was to point out the way to us, and to promise to join us on our
return, although they evidently little anticipated ever seeing us again.

In pursuing our journey, we entered a forest, consisting of box-trees,
casuarinae, and cypresses, on a light sandy soil, in which both horses and
bullocks sunk so deep that their labour was greatly increased, more
especially as the weather had become much warmer. At noon I altered my
course from N.W. by W. to W.N.W., and reached the Morumbidgee at 3 in the
afternoon. The flats bordering it were extensive and rich, and, being
partially mixed with sand, were more fitted for agricultural purposes than
the stiffer and purer soil amidst the mountains; but the interior beyond
them was far from being of corresponding quality. We crossed several
plains on which vegetation was scanty, probably owing to the hardness of
the soil, which was a stiff loamy clay, and which must check the growth of
plants, by preventing the roots from striking freely into it. The river
where we stopped for the night appeared to have risen considerably, and
the fish were rolling about on the surface of the water with a noise like
porpoises. No elevations were visible, so that I had not an opportunity of
continuing the chain of survey with the points I had previously taken.

TRAVELLING DOWN THE RIVER.

As we proceeded down the river on the 8th, the flats became still more
extensive than they had ever been, and might almost be denominated plains.
Vegetation was scanty upon them, although the soil was of the first
quality. About nine miles from our camp, we struck on a small isolated
hill, that could scarcely have been of 200 feet elevation; yet, depressed
as it was, the view from its summit was very extensive, and I was
surprised to find that we were still in some measure surrounded by high
lands, of which I took the following bearings, connected with the present
ones.

A High Peak.....N. 66 E. distance 40 miles.
Kengal ........ N. 110 E. distant.
Double Hill ... S. 10 W. distant.

To the north, there were several fires burning, which appeared rather the
fires of natives, than conflagrations, and as the river had made a bend to
the N.N.W., I doubted not that they were upon its banks. From this hill,
which was of compact granite, we struck away to the W.N.W., and shortly
afterwards crossed some remarkable sand-hills. Figuratively speaking, they
appeared like islands amidst the alluvial deposits, and were as pure in
their composition as the sand on the sea-shore. They were generally
covered with forest grass, in tufts, and a coarse kind of rushes, under
banksias and cypresses. We found a small fire on the banks of the river,
and close to it the couch and hut of a solitary native, who had probably
seen us approach, and had fled. There cannot be many inhabitants
hereabouts, since there are no paths to indicate that they frequent this
part of the Morumbidgee more at one season than another.

On the 9th, the river fell off again to the westward, and we lost a good
deal of the northing we had made the day before. We journeyed pretty
nearly equidistant from the stream, and kept altogether on the alluvial
flats. As we were wandering along the banks of the river, a black started
up before us, and swam across to the opposite side, where he immediately
hid himself. We could by no means induce him to show himself; he was
probably the lonely being whom we had scared away from the fire the day
before. In the afternoon, however we surprised a family of six natives,
and persuaded them to follow us to our halting place. My boy understood
them well; but the young savage had the cunning to hide the information
they gave him, or, for aught I know, to ask questions that best suited his
own purposes, and therefore we gained little intelligence from them.

Every day now produced some change in the face of the country, by which it
became more and more assimilated to that I had traversed during the first
expedition. Acacia pendula now made its appearance on several plains
beyond the river deposits, as well as that salsolaceous class of plants,
among which the schlerolina and rhagodia are so remarkable. The natives
left us at sunset, but returned early in the morning with an extremely
facetious and good-humoured old man, who volunteered to act as our guide
without the least hesitation. There was a cheerfulness in his manner,
that gained our confidence at once, and rendered him a general favourite.
He went in front with the dogs, and led us a little away from the river
to kill kangaroos, as he said. At about two miles we struck on an
inconsiderable elevation, which the party crossed at the S.W. extremity.
I ascended it at the opposite end, but although the view was extensive, I
could not make out the little hill of granite from which I had taken my
former bearings, and the only elevation I could recognise as connected
with them, was one about ten miles distant, bearing S. 168 W. I could
observe very distant ranges to the E.N.E. and immediately below me in that
direction, there was a large clear plain, skirted by acacia pendula,
stretching from S.S.E. to N.N.W. The crown and ridges of the hill on which
I stood, were barren, stony, and covered with beef-wood,
the rock-formation being a coarse granite. The drays had got so far ahead
of me that I did not overtake them before they had halted on the river at
a distance of ten miles.

INFORMATION FROM A NATIVE.

The Morumbidgee appeared, on examination, to have increased in breadth,
and continued to rise gradually. It is certainly a noble stream, very
different from those I had already traced to their termination. The old
black informed me that there was another large river flowing to the
southward of west, to which the Morumbidgee was as a creek, and that we
could gain it in four days. He stated that its waters were good, but that
its banks were not peopled. That such a feature existed where he laid it
down, I thought extremely probable, because it was only natural to expect
that other streams descended from the mountains in the S.E. of the island,
as well as that on which we were travelling. The question was, whether
either of them held on an uninterrupted course to some reservoir, or
whether they fell short of the coast and exhausted themselves in marshes.
Considering the concave direction of the mountains to the S.E., I even
at this time hoped that the rivers falling into the interior would unite
sooner or later, and contribute to the formation of an important and
navigable stream. Of the fate of the Morumbidgee, the old black could give
no account. It seemed probable, therefore, that we were far from its
termination.

I had hitherto been rather severe upon the animals, for although our
journey had not exceeded from twelve to fifteen miles a day, it had been
without intermission. I determined, therefore, to give both men and
animals a day of rest, as soon as I should find a convenient place. We
started on the 11th with this intention, but we managed to creep over
eight or ten miles of ground before we halted. The country was slightly
undulated, and much intersected by creeks, few of which had water in them.
The whole tract was, however, well adapted either for agriculture, or
for grazing, and, in spite of the drought that had evidently long hung
over it, was well covered with vegetation. We had passed all high lands,
and the interior to the westward presented an unbroken level to the eye.
The Morumbidgee appeared to hold a more northerly course than I had
anticipated. Still low ranges continued upon our right, and the cypress
ridges became more frequent and denser; but the timber on the more open
grounds generally consisted of box and flooded-gum. Of minor trees, the
acacia pendula was the most prevalent, with a shrub bearing a round nut,
enclosed in a scarlet capsule, and an interesting species of stenochylus.
I had observed as yet, few of the plants of the more northern interior.

NATIVES--THEIR UGLINESS.

In this neighbourhood, the dogs killed an emu and a kangaroo, which came
in very conveniently for some natives whom we fell in with on one of the
river flats. They were, without exception, the worst featured of any I had
ever seen. It is scarcely possible to conceive that human beings could
be so hideous and loathsome. The old black, who was rather good-looking,
told me they were the last we should see for some time, and I felt that if
these were samples of the natives on the lowlands, I cared very little how
few of I them we should meet.

EXTENSIVE PLAINS.

The country on the opposite side of the river had all the features of that
to the north of it, but a plain of such extent suddenly opened upon us to
the southward, that I halted at once in order to examine it, and by
availing myself of a day of rest, to fix our position more truly than we
could otherwise have done. We accordingly pitched our tents under some
lofty gum-trees, opposite to the plain, and close upon the edge of the
sandy beach of the river. Before they were turned out, the animals were
carefully examined, and the pack-saddles overhauled, that they might
undergo any necessary repairs. The river fell considerably during the
night, but it poured along a vast body of water, possessing a strong
current. The only change I remarked in it was that it now had a bed of
sand, and was generally deeper on one side than on the other. It kept a
very uniform breadth of from 150 to 170 feet--and a depth of from 4 to 20.
Its channel, though occasionally much encumbered with fallen timber, was
large enough to contain twice the volume of water then in it, but it had
outer and more distant banks, the boundaries of the alluvial flats, to
confine it within certain limits, during the most violent floods, and to
prevent its inundating the country.

HAMILTON'S PLAINS.

With a view to examine the plain opposite to us, I directed our horses to
be taken across the river early in the morning, and after breakfast,
M'Leay and I swam across after them. We found the current strong, and
could not keep a direct line over the channel, but were carried below the
place at which we plunged in. We proceeded afterwards in a direction
W.S.W. across the plain for five or six miles, before we saw trees on the
opposite extremity, at a still greater distance. We thus found ourselves
in the centre of an area of from 26 to 30 miles. It appeared to be
perfectly level, though not really so. The soil upon it was good,
excepting in isolated spots, where it was sandy. Vegetation was scanty
upon it, but, on the whole, I should conclude that it was fitter for
agriculture than for grazing. For I think it very probable, that those
lands which lie hardening and bare in a state of nature, would produce
abundantly if broken up by the plough. I called this Hamilton's plains,
in remembrance of the surgeon of my regiment. The Morumbidgee forms its
N.E. boundary, and a creek rising on it, cuts off a third part on the
western side, and runs away from the river in a southerly direction. This
creek, even before it gets to the outskirts of the plains, assumes a
considerable size. Such a fact would argue that heavy rains fall in this
part of the interior, to cut out such a watercourse, or that the soil is
extremely loose; but I should think the former the most probable, since
the soil of this plain had a substratum of clay. I place our encampment on
the river in latitude 34 degrees 41 minutes 45 seconds S., and in East
longitude 146 degrees 50 minutes, the variation of the compass being
6 degrees 10 minutes E.

INTERCOURSE WITH THE NATIVES; SCANTINESS OF THE POPULATION.

On our return to the camp we found several natives with our people, and
among them one of the tallest I had ever seen. Their women were with them,
and they appeared to have lost all apprehension of any danger occurring
from us. The animals were benefited greatly by this day of rest. We left
the plain, therefore, on the 13th with renewed spirits, and passed over a
country very similar to that by which we had approached it, one well
adapted for grazing, but intersected by numerous creeks, at two of which
we found natives, some of whom joined our party. Our old friend left us in
quest of some blacks, who, as he informed Hopkinson, had seen the tracks
of our horses on the Darling. I was truly puzzled at such a statement,
which was, however, further corroborated by the circumstance of one of the
natives having a tire-nail affixed to a spear, which he said was picked
up, by the man who gave it to him, on one of our encampments. I could not
think it likely that this story was true, and rather imagined they must
have picked up the nail near the located districts, and I was anxious to
have the point cleared up. When we halted we had a large assemblage of
natives with us, amounting in all to twenty-seven, but I awaited in vain
the return of the old man. The night passed away without our seeing him,
nor did he again join us.

We started in the morning with our new acquaintances, and kept on a
south-westerly course during the day, over an excellent grazing, and, in
many places, an agricultural country, still intersected by creeks, that
were too deep for the water to have dried in them. The country more
remote from the river, however, began to assume more and more the
character and appearance of the northern interior. I rode into several
plains, the soil of which was either a red sandy loam, bare of vegetation,
or a rotten and blistered earth, producing nothing but rhagodiae,
salsolae, and misembrianthemum.

We fell in with another tribe of blacks during the journey, to whom we
were literally consigned by those who had been previously with us, and who
now turned back, while our new friends took the lead of the drays. They
were two fine young men, but had very ugly wives, and were for a long time
extremely diffident. I found that I could obtain but little information
through my black boy,--whether from his not understanding me, or because
he was too cunning, is uncertain. One of these young men, however,
clearly stated that he had seen the tracks of bullocks and horses, a long
time ago, to the N.N.W. in the direction of some detached hills, that were
visible from 20 to 25 miles distant. He remembered them, he said, as a
boy, and added that the white men were without water. It was, therefore,
clear that he alluded to Mr. Oxley's excursion, northerly from the
Lachlan, and I had no doubt on my mind, that he had been on one of that
officer's encampments, and that the hills to the north of us were those
to the opposite base of which he had penetrated. I was determined,
therefore, if practicable, to reach these hills, deeming it a matter of
great importance to connect the surveys, but I deferred my journey for a
day or two, in hopes, from the continued northerly course of the river,
that we should have approached them nearer.

In the evening we fell in with some more blacks, among whom were two
brothers, of those who were acting as our guides. One had a very pretty
girl as a wife, and all the four brothers were very good-looking young
men. There cannot, I should think, be a numerous population on the banks
of the Morumbidgee, from the fact of our having seen not more than fifty
in an extent of more than 180 miles. They are apparently scattered along
it in families. I was rather surprised that my boy understood their
language well, since it certainly differed from that of the Macquarie
tribes, but nevertheless as these people do not wander far, our
information as to what was before us was very gradually arrived at, and
only as we fell in with the successive families. Moreover, as my boy
was very young, it may be that he was more eager in communicating to those
who had no idea of them, the wonders he had seen, than in making inquiries
on points that were indifferent to him.

CHARACTER OF THE COUNTRY.

We passed a very large plain in the course of the day, which was bounded
by forests of box, cypress, and the acacia pendula, of red sandy soil and
parched appearance. The Morumbidgee evidently overflows a part of the
lands we crossed, to a greater extent than heretofore, though the alluvial
deposits beyond its influence were still both rich and extensive. The
crested pigeon made its appearance on the acacias, which I took to be a
sure sign of our approach to a country more than ordinarily subject to
overflow; since on the Macquarie and the Darling, those birds were found
only to inhabit the regions of marshes, or spaces covered by the acacia
pendula, or the polygonum. We had not, however, yet seen any of the latter
plant, although we were shortly destined to be almost lost amidst fields
of it.

CHANGE IN THE COUNTRY.

We were now approaching that parallel of longitude in which the other
known rivers of New Holland had been found to exhaust themselves; the
least change therefore, for the worse was sufficient to raise my
apprehensions; yet, although the Morumbidgee had received no tributary
from the Dumot downwards, and was leading us into an apparently endless
level, I saw no indication of its decreasing in size, or in the rapidity
of its current. Certainly, however, I had, from the character of the
country around us, an anticipation that a change was about to take place
in it, and this anticipation was verified in the course of the following
day. The alluvial flats gradually decreased in breadth, and we journeyed
mostly over extensive and barren plains, which in many places approached
so near the river as to form a part of its bank. They were covered with
the salsolaceous class of plants, so common in the interior, in a red
sandy soil, and were as even as a bowling green. The alluvial spaces near
the river became covered with reeds, and, though subject to overflow at
every partial rise of it, were so extremely small as scarcely to afford
food for our cattle. Flooded-gum trees of lofty size grew on these reedy
spaces, and marked the line of the river, but the timber of the interior
appeared stunted and useless.

DESCRIPTION OF THE NATIVES; MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE NATIVES.

We found this part of the Morumbidgee much more populous than its upper
branches. When we halted, we had no fewer than forty-one natives with us,
of whom the young men were the least numerous. They allowed us to choose
a place for ourselves before they formed their own camp, and studiously
avoided encroaching on our ground so as to appear troublesome. Their
manners were those of a quiet and inoffensive people, and their appearance
in some measure prepossessing. The old men had lofty foreheads, and stood
exceedingly erect. The young men were cleaner is their persons and were
better featured than any we had seen, some of them having smooth hair and
an almost Asiatic cast of countenance. On the other hand, the women and
children were disgusting objects. The latter were much subject to
diseases, and were dreadfully emaciated. It is evident that numbers of
them die in their infancy for want of care and nourishment. We remarked
none at the age of incipient puberty, but the most of them under six. In
stating that the men were more prepossessing than any we had seen, I would
not be understood to mean that they differed in any material point either
from the natives of the coast, or of the most distant interior to which I
had been, for they were decidedly the same race, and had the same leading
features and customs, as far as the latter could be observed. The sunken
eye and overhanging eyebrow, the high cheek-bone and thick lip, distended
nostrils, the nose either short or acquiline, together with a stout bust
and slender extremities, and both curled and smooth hair, marked the
natives of the Morumbidgee as well as those of the Darling. They were
evidently sprung from one common stock, the savage and scattered
inhabitants of a rude and inhospitable land. In customs they differed in
no material point from the coast natives, and still less from the tribes
on the Darling and the Castlereagh. They extract the front tooth,
lacerate their bodies, to raise the flesh, cicatrices being their chief
ornament; procure food by the same means, paint in the same manner, and
use the same weapons, as far as the productions of the country will allow
them. But as the grass-tree is not found westward of the mountains, they
make a light spear of a reed, similar to that of which the natives of the
southern islands form their arrows. These they use for distant combat, and
not only carry in numbers, but throw with the boomerang to a great
distance and with unerring precision, making them to all intents and
purposes as efficient as the bow and arrow. They have a ponderous spear
for close fight, and others of different sizes for the chase. With regard
to their laws, I believe they are universally the same all over the known
parts of New South Wales. The old men have alone the privilege of eating
the emu; and so submissive are the young men to this regulation, that if,
from absolute hunger or under other pressing circumstances, one of them
breaks through it, either during a hunting excursion, or whilst absent
from his tribe, he returns under a feeling of conscious guilt, and by his
manner betrays his guilt, sitting apart from the men, and confessing his
misdemeanour to the chief at the first interrogation, upon which he is
obliged to undergo a slight punishment. This evidently is a law of policy
and necessity, for if the emus were allowed to be indiscriminately
slaughtered, they would soon become extinct. Civilised nations may learn a
wholesome lesson even from savages, as in this instance of their
forebearance. For somewhat similar reasons, perhaps, married people alone
are here permitted to eat ducks. They hold their corrobories,
(midnight ceremonies), and sing the same melancholy ditty that breaks the
stillness of night on the shores of Jervis' Bay, or on the banks of the
Macquarie; and during the ceremony imitate the several birds and beasts
with which they are acquainted. If these inland tribes differ in anything
from those on the coast, it is in the mode of burying their dead, and,
partially, in their language. Like all savages, they consider their women
as secondary objects, oblige them to procure their own food, or throw to
them over their shoulders the bones they have already picked, with a
nonchalance that is extremely amusing; and, on the march, make them beasts
of burden to carry their very weapons. The population of the Morumbidgee,
as far as we had descended it at this time, did not exceed from ninety to
a hundred souls. I am persuaded that disease and accidents consign many of
them to a premature grave.

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