In the meantime, the blacks had come into Canobie at night, and attacked three men who were camped on the river, within sight of the station. They killed two, and the third was left for dead. He was found to be alive, and afterwards recovered from the severe battering he received. Palmer sent word asking me to send all the men I could spare to come over to assist in hunting the murderers. I did so, Carruthers taking charge of the armed party. A few days previous to this occurrence I had visited an out-station to count the sheep, taking a man with me to help in repairing the yard. On returning after dark we passed a billabong, from which a very strong stench, as if from decomposed vegetable matter, arose. The following morning we both felt unwell, and vomited a good deal. The man with me was much older than I, and succumbed to the sickness in nine days. After the party had left for Canobie, I was completely prostrated, and had no medicine on hand except Epsom salts. During the night we (the cook, a new-chum Cockney, and myself) heard voices down at the water-hole, which we took as from a party of travelling Chinamen. In the morning we found that, some of the blacks who were implicated in the murder had doubled back, and had taken away every article of iron they could find, our camp oven included, and my clothes, which had just been washed. This so preyed on my mind that when the party returned, they found me delirious. Mr. Carruthers, seeing the helpless state I was in, and the condition of affairs generally, engaged Mr. Reg. Uhr to take charge on my behalf, whilst he took me down to Burketown, distant 155 miles, in a cart, with two horses. The road was almost deserted, and the blacks were very bad. Carruthers would boil his billy at water-holes in the afternoon, and go out to the centre of the plains to camp, with no bells on the horses. As for myself, I was sick and weak. Not being able to eat damper or meat, I was almost starved, lost all vitality, and cared little whether I survived the trip or not. We had to cross the "Plains of Promise." These consisted of an uninterrupted run of about 30 miles of devil-devil country. It was a succession of small gutters and mounds, which, to a sick man in a cart without springs, was intolerable. We arrived at Burketown about November, 1866, and the public house was the only place in which I could get accommodation. There I suffered all the nightly noises incidental to a bush shanty. Burketown at this time was an almost new settlement, with a population of about 50 whites, but the number of graves of those who died within its short life from fever was more than twice as many, and increasing daily. The Burketown fever was more virulent than any other I had hitherto or since come in contact with, and was supposed to be a kind of yellow jack fever, introduced by some vessel from Eastern countries.