Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia and Overland from Adelaide to King George's Sound in the Years 1840-1: Sent By the Colonists of South Australia, with the Sanction and Support of the Government: Including an Account of the Manners and Customs of the Aborigines and the State of Their Relations with Europeans — Volume 01Eyre, Edward John
History
Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia and Overland from Adelaide to King George's Sound in the Years 1840-1: Sent By the Colonists of South Australia, with the Sanction and Support of the Government: Including an Account of the Manners and Customs of the Aborigines and the State of Their Relations with Europeans — Volume 01
Eyre, Edward John
Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Ethnology -- Australia
For ten miles we continued along the beach until we came to a bluff rocky
ridge, running close into the sea; here we rested until the tide fell,
and to give the native boy an opportunity of rejoining us, which he did
soon after, but without the horse; the poor animal had travelled about
eight miles with him from the place where we had left him, but had then
been unable to come any further, and he abandoned him.
Whilst the party were in camp, I sent the overseer to a distant point of
land to try and get a view of the coast beyond; but upon his return,
after a long walk, he told me his view to the west was obstructed by a
point similar to the one I had sent him to. During the day, we had passed
a rather recent native encampment, where were left some vessels of bark
for holding water, or for collecting it from the roots of trees, or the
grass. Near where we halted in the middle of the day, the foot-prints of
the natives were quite fresh, and shewed that they were travelling the
same way as ourselves.
For the last two or three days, we had passed many pieces of wreck upon
the beach, oars, thwarts of boats, fragments of masts, spars, etc. strewed
about in every direction; none of them, however, appeared to have been
recently deposited there, and many of the oars, and lighter spars, were
stuck up on their ends in the sand above high water mark, probably so
placed by the natives, but with what object I know not. One oar was stuck
up upon a high sand ridge, some distance from the shore, and I spent some
time in examining the place, in the vain hope that it might be an
indication of our vicinity to water.
In the afternoon we all had a little tea; and after a bathe in the sea,
again moved onwards; fortunately the beach was firm and hard, and the
evening cool; the horses advanced slowly and steadily, and in a way that
quite surprised me. After travelling for thirteen miles, we encamped
under the coast ridge late in the evening, all very much exhausted,
having made several ineffectual searches for water, among the sandy
ridges, as we passed along.
In our route along the shore, we had seen immense numbers of fish in the
shallow waters, and among the reefs lying off the coast; several dead
ones had been picked up, and of these the boys made a feast at night. Our
last drop of water was consumed this evening, and we then all lay down to
rest, after turning the horses behind the first ridge of the coast, as we
could find no grass; and neither the overseer nor I were able to watch
them, being both too much worn out with the labours of the day, and our
exertions, in searching for water.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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