was beginning to think that my only chance was to take to my legs—which indeed would have been almost certain death—when at this crisis I was, as you may imagine, agreeably surprised by the welcome “Halloo” of the stockman and hutkeeper, who, having heard the report of the gun and the yells of the savages, knew that something was up, and arrived at the nick of time to my rescue. After giving me some dry ammunition we made a rush after them, but could not overtake the black legs which were now plying at a particularly nimble rate, and which they especially do when getting out of the reach of a gun. This was the first attempt they had made on any of our lives, and their manœuvres showed that they were under the impression that, if they could “_do for_” the master, they might easily finish the men. But I made it a rule that never less than two were to go out on foot or in canoes, and with never less than twenty rounds of ball cartridge. We did not see anything of the Blacks for a fortnight after this, during which interval, as they afterwards told us, they were preparing for a grand attack on the Wirrai station. About two hours before sundown the following day the stockman went out, as usual, to see that the cattle were safe. The Wirrai hut, I should mention, was at this time on a kind of island about a mile and a half in diameter, formed by the Wirrai Lagoon and a deep creek,—so that the cattle were feeding almost within sight of the hut. All was quiet; the cattle did not seem to betray any symptoms of fear, which they generally will do when the Blacks are near. He had not returned more than half an hour, when we saw the poor beasts coming rushing towards the hut—as if for protection—as hard as they could lay legs to the ground. On going among them, we found many with spears sticking in their bodies. We immediately mounted horses—(I bareback, as I had left my saddle at Barratta)—and gallopped as hard as we could in the direction the cattle had come from for about a mile, when, not seeing anything, we stopped and listened. There was a small, dense shrub before us, and, as we approached it, the awful yell that greeted our ears I shall not forget in a hurry. You can have no idea of the effect it has on one unaccustomed to the sound, for it is like nothing earthly that I can compare it to, but more like what one might imagine a lot of fiends would set up while performing their jubilee over the soul of some defunct mortal lately arrived at the “prison-house.” We gallopped through the shrub. Before us was a space bounded by two creeks, forming at their junction an angle on the plain beyond. Arranged in a semicircle in this space were some two hundred warriors, painted and armed, and drawn up in battle array. Between us and them four or five bullocks were writhing in their death agony, while the other side of the creek, beyond the warriors, was black with old men, women, and children looking on, and yelling at a most fearful rate.