A few days later I retraced my steps to Coolgardie, and thence to Perth. On the homeward journey I had experiences of much discomfort. On the coach between Coolgardie and Bullabulling, I managed, as on the previous occasion, by a private arrangement with the driver, to secure the box-seat, in order to be at an elevation from the dust. But the wind was behind us, and we were soon enveloped in such a cloud of dust that it was often impossible to see the leaders, and, as there is no rule of the road, we had narrow escapes of colliding with teams travelling in the opposite direction. Upon our arrival at Bullabulling, we found that the contractor's train contained only one passenger carriage, which was already crowded; so several of us climbed on an open luggage truck and made ourselves tolerably {313} comfortable, though we suffered from the blazing heat of the mid-day sun. My neighbour was a man who had had a most varied career. In his youth he had managed a small hosiery shop in an English Midland town; then, as his health was bad, he had emigrated to Victoria, where he had unsuccessfully carried on grazing operations. He had been attracted to Western Australia by the discoveries of gold, and had bought a waggon and team of horses, with which he had carried goods between Southern Cross and Coolgardie before the construction of the railway. He told me that the life had been very hard, and pointed out to me portions of the road which were so heavy that a progress of ten miles was regarded as a satisfactory day's work. He was then on his way to revisit the "old country," after an absence of five years. At Southern Cross we changed into the Government train, and I travelled through the night in a compartment with four others, two of whom were ill, one of them suffering from some form of ophthalmia which caused him excruciating pain and kept him the whole time awake. None of us obtained much sleep, and we were glad to reach Perth early next morning.