Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia — Volume ISturt, Charles
History
Two Expeditions into the Interior of Southern Australia — Volume I
Sturt, Charles
New South Wales -- Discovery and exploration; Sturt, Charles, 1795-1869
The parties were two Irish runaways, who thought they could make their
way to Timor. They escaped from Wellington Valley with a fortnight's
provision each, and a couple of dogs, and proceeded down the Macquarie.
About the cataract, they fell in with the Mount Harris tribe, and
remained with them for some days, when they determined on pursuing
their journey. The blacks, however, wanted to get possession of their
dogs, and a resistance on the part of the Europeans brought on a
quarrel. It appears, that before the blacks proceeded to extremities,
they furnished the Irishmen, who were unarmed, with weapons, and then
told them to defend themselves, but whether against equal or inferior
numbers, I am uninformed. One of them soon fell, which the other
observing, he took his knife out, and cut the throats of both the dogs
before the blacks had time to put him to death. He was, however,
sacrificed; and both the men were eaten by the tribe generally. I
questioned several on the subject, but they preserved the most sullen
silence, neither acknowledging nor denying the fact.
ARBUTHNOT'S RANGE.
Mr. Hume had been one day on Mount Harris, and while there, had laid
his compass on a large rock, near to which Mr. Oxley's boat had been
burnt. To his surprise, he found the needle affected; and his bearings
were all wrong. I subsequently went up to ascertain the extent of the
error produced, and found it precisely the same as Mr. Hume noticed.
When I placed the compass on the rock, Mount Foster bore from me N. by
W., the true bearing of the one hill from the other being N.N.W. My
placing my notebook under the compass did not alter the effect, nor did
the card move until I raised the instrument a couple of feet above the
stone, when it first became violently agitated, and then settled
correctly; and my bearings of the highest parts of Arbuthnot's Range,
and of its centre, were as follows:
Mount Exmouth to the N ...... N. 86 E.
Centre....................... N. 85 E.
Vernon's Peak................ N. 89 E.
Distance 70 miles.
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