Chapter III (1)

The story of that day of bloodshed and horror, when Charlik and his white allies sought to exterminate the whole community, cannot here be told in _all_ its dreadful details. Seventy years have come and gone since then, and there are but two or three men now living on the island who can speak of it with knowledge as a tale of "the olden days when we were heathens." Let the rest of the tale be told in the words of one of those natives of Leassé, who, then a boy, fought side by side with Ledyard, North, and Macy.

* * * * *

"The sun was going westward in the sky when the two ships rounded the point and anchored in what you white men now call Coquille Harbour. We of Leassé, who watched from the shore, saw six boats put off, filled with men. There pulled inside the reef, and went to the right towards Môut; three went to the left. Letya (Ledyard), with the two white strangers who had come to him in the night, and two hundred of our men, had long before gone into the mountains to await Charlik and his fighting men, and their white friends. They--Letya and the Leassé people--made a trap for Charlik's men in the forest. Charlik himself was in the boats with the other white men. He wanted to see the people of Leassé and Môut driven into the water, so that he might shoot at them with a new rifle which Késa or the other ship captain--I forget which--had given to him. But he wanted most of all to get Cerita, the wife of Letya, the white man. Only Cerita was to live. These were Charlik's words. He did not know that her husband had returned from the sea. Had he known that, he would not have given all his money and all his oil to the two white captains to help him to make Leassé and Môut desolate and give our bones to his dogs to eat.

"It was a great trap--the trap prepared by Letya; and Charlik's men and the white men with them fell in it. They fell as a stone falls in a deep well, and sinks and is no more seen of men.

"This was the manner of the trap: The path down the cliff was between two high walls of rock; at the foot of the cliff was a thick clump of high pandanus trees growing closely together. In between these trees Letya built a high barrier of logs, encompassing the outlet of the path to Leassé. This barrier was a half circle; the two ends touched the edge of the cliff, and the centre was hidden among the pandanus trees. On the top of this barrier the men of Leassé waited with loaded muskets; lower down on the ground were others, they too had loaded muskets. On the top of the cliff where the path led down, fifty men were hidden. They were hidden in the thick scrub which we call _oap. Oap_ is a good thing in which to hide from an enemy, and then spring from and slay him suddenly.

"I, who was then a boy, saw all this. I heard Letya, our white man, tell the head of our village that Charlik's men would enter into the trap and perish. Then kava was made, and Letya and the head men drank. Kava is good, but rum is better to make men fight. We had no rum, but we had great love for Letya and his wife, and his two children, and great hate for Charlik. So we said, 'If this is death, it is death,' and every man went to his post--some to the barrier at the foot of the cliff, and some to the thicket of _oap_ on the summit. Cerita, the wife of Letya the Englishman, was weeping. She was weeping because Nená, the chief of Môut, was waiting in the house to kill her if her husband should be slain. But she did not weep because of the fear of death; it was for her children she wept. That is the way of women. What is the life of a child to the life of a man?

"Nená was my father's brother. He was a brave man, but was too old to fight, for his eyes were dimmed by many years. So he sat beside Cerita and her two children, with a long knife in his hand and waited. He covered his face with a mat and waited. It was right for him to do this, for Letya was a great man; and his wife, although she was a foreigner, was an honoured woman. Therefore though Nená might not look upon her face at other times, he could kill her if Letya said she must die. This was quite right and correct. A wife must be guided by her husband and do what is right and correct, and avoid scandal.

"For many hours the women in the houses waited in silence. Then suddenly they heard the thunder of two hundred guns, and the roaring of voices, then more muskets. They ran out of the houses and looked up to the cliff, and lo! the sky was bright as day, for when Charlik's people and the white men walked into the trap in the darkness, Letya and our people set alight great heaps of dry leaves and scrub, which were placed all along the barrier of logs. This was done so that they could see better to shoot. There were thirty or forty of Charlik's men killed by that volley. The white man who was leading them was very brave; he tried to climb over the barrier, but fell back dead, for a man named Sru thrust a whale-lance into his heart. All this time the other white men and the rest of Charlik's people were firing their muskets, but their bullets only hit the heavy logs of the barrier, and Letya and our people killed them very easily by putting their muskets through the spaces. When the sailors saw their captain fall, they tried to run away, and the Lele warriors ran with them. But when they reached the path which led up between the cliff, it too was blocked, and many of them became jammed together between the walls, and these were all killed very easily--some with bullets, and some with big stones. Then those that were left ran round and found inside the trap, trying to get out. They were like rats in a cask, and our people kept killing them as they ran. Some of them--about thirty--did climb over, but all were killed, for when they jumped down on the other side our people were there waiting. At last four of the sailors made a big hole by tearing out two posts, and rushed out, followed by the Lele men. Letya was the first man to meet the sailors, and he told them to surrender. Two of them threw down their arms, but the other two ran at Letya, and one of them ran his cutlass into him. It went in at the stomach, and Letya fell. We killed all these white sailors, but some of the Lele men escaped. That was a great pity, but then how can these things be helped?" The two strange white men who were fighting beside Le|tya, picked him up, and they carried him into his house. He was not dead, but he said, 'I shall soon die, take me to my wife.' I did not go with them to the house. I went into the barrier with the other youths to kill the wounded. It is a foolish thing not to kill wounded men; they may get better and kill you. So we killed them. There were fourteen white men slain in that fight beside their captain.

"Before it was daylight some of our men set out along the beach to look for the boats. They did not want to kill any more white men, but they did want to kill Charlik. They were very fortunate, for before they had gone far on their way they saw three of the boats coming along close in to the beach. So they hid behind some rocks. Charlik was in the first boat; he was standing in the bow pointing out the way. When he came very close they all fired together, and Charlik's life was gone. He fell dead into the sea. Then the boats all turned seaward, and pulled hard for the ships. Then before long, we saw the other three boats going back to the ships; in these last were four of Charlik's men who had escaped. The boats were quickly pulled up, and the ships sailed away, for those on board were terrified when they heard that all the white men they had sent to fight were dead.

"Letya did not die at once--not for two days. Cerita his wife and two white men watched beside him all this time. Before he died he called the head men to him, and said that he gave his small ship to the two white men, together with many other things. All his money he gave to his wife, and told her she must go away with the white men, who would take her back to her own people. To the head men he gave many valuable things, such as tierces of tobacco and barrels of powder. This was quite right and proper, and showed he knew what was correct to do before he died. We buried him on the little islet over there called Bèsi.

"The two white men and Cerita and her two children went away in the little ship. But they did not go to Cerita's country: they remained at Ponapé, and there the tall man of the two--the officer--married Cerita. All this we learnt a year afterwards from the captain of a whaling ship. It was quite right and proper for Letya's widow to marry so quickly, and to marry the man who had been a friend to her husband."

_A Hundred Fathoms Deep_

There is still a world or discovery open to the ichthyologist who, in addition to scientific knowledge, is a lover of deep-sea fishing, has some nerve, and is content to undergo some occasional rough experiences, if he elects to begin his researches among the many island groups of the North and South Pacific. I possessed, to some extent, the two latter qualifications; the former, much to my present and lasting regret, I did not. Nearly twenty-six years ago the vessel in which I sailed as supercargo was wrecked on Strong's Island, the eastern outlier of the fertile Caroline Archipelago, and for more than twelve months I devoted the greater part of my time to traversing the mountainous island from end to end, or, accompanied by a hardy and intelligent native, in fishing, either in the peculiarly-formed lagoon at the south end, or two miles or so outside the barrier reef.

The master of the vessel, I may mention, was the notorious, over maligned, and genial Captain Bully Hayes, and from him I had learnt a little about some of the generally unknown deep-sea fish of Polynesia and Melanesia. He had told me that when once sailing between Aneityum and Tanna, in the New Hebrides, shortly after a severe volcanic eruption on the former island had been followed by a submarine convulsion, his brig passed through many hundreds of dead and dying fish of great size, some of which were of a character utterly unknown to any of his native crew--men who came from all parts of the North and South Pacific. More remarkable still, some of these fish had never before been seen by the inhabitants of the islands near which they were found. There were, he said, some five or six kinds, but they were all of the groper family. One of three which was brought on board was discovered floating on the surface when the ship was five miles off Tanna. A boat was lowered, but on getting up to it, the crew found they were unable to lift it from the water; it was, however, towed to the ship, hoisted on board, and cut into three parts, the whole of which were weighed, and reached over 300 lbs. In colour it was a dull grey, with large, closely-adhering scales about the size of a florin; the fins, tail, and lips were blue. Another one, weighing less, had a differently-shaped head, with a curious, pipe-like mouth; this was a uniform dull blue. A similar upturning from the ocean's dark depths of strange fish occurred during a submarine earthquake near Rose Island, a barren spot to the south-west of Samoa. The disturbance threw up vast numbers of fish upon the reefs of Manua, the nearest island of the group, and the natives looked upon their great size and peculiar appearance with unbounded astonishment.

Without desiring to bore the reader with unnecessary details of my own experiences in the South Seas, but because the statement bears on the subject of this article--a subject which has been my delight since I was a boy of ten years of age--I may say that, nine years after the loss of Captain Hayes's vessel on Strong's Island, I was again shipwrecked on Peru, one of the Gilbert, or, as we traders call them, the "Line" Islands. Here I was so fortunate as to take up my residence with one of the local traders, a Swiss named Frank Voliero, who was an ardent deep-sea fisherman, and whose catches were the envy and wonder of the wild and intractable natives among whom he lived; for he had excellent tackle, which enabled him to fish at depths seldom tried by the natives, who have no reason to go beyond sixty or eighty fathoms. In the long interval that had elapsed since my fishing days in the Carolines and my arrival at Peru Island, I had gained such experience in my hobby in many other parts of the Pacific as falls to few men, and the desire to fish in deep water, and get something that astonished the natives of the various islands, had become a passion with me. Voliero and myself went out together frequently, and, did space permit, I should like to describe the fortune that attended us at Peru, as well as my fishing adventures at Strong's Island.

In a former work I have endeavoured to describe that extraordinary nocturnal-feeding fish, the _palu_, and the manner of its capture by the Malayo-Polynesian islanders of the Equatorial Pacific, and in the present article I shall try to convey to my readers an idea of deep-sea fishing in the South Seas generally. When I was living on the little island of Nanomaga (one of the Ellice Group, situated about 600 miles to the north-west of Samoa), as the one resident trader, I found myself in--if I may use the term--a marine paradise, as far as fishing went. The natives were one and all expert fishermen, extremely jealous of their reputation of being not only the best and most skilful men in Polynesia in the handling of their frail canoes in a heavy surf, but also of being deep-learned in the lore of deep-sea fishing.

My arrival at the island caused no little commotion among the young bloods, each of whose chances of gaining the girl of his heart, and being united to her by the local Samoan missionary teacher, depended in a great measure upon his ability to provide sustenance for her from the sea; for Nanomaga, like the rest of the Ellice Group, is but little more than a richly-verdured sandbank, based upon a foundation of coral, and yielding nothing to its people but coconuts and a coarse species of taro, called puraka. The inhabitants, in their low-lying atolls, possess no running streams, no fertile soil, in which, as in the mountainous isles of Polynesia, the breadfruit, the yam, and the sweet potato grow and flourish side by side with such rich and luscious fruits as the orange and banana, and pineapple--they have but the beneficent coconut and the evergiving sea to supply their needs. And the sea is kind to them, as Nature meant it to be to her own children.

The native missionary at Nanomaga was a Samoan. He was intended by nature to be a warrior, a leader of men; or--and no higher praise can I give to his dauntless courage--a boat-header on a sperm whaler. Strong of arm and quick of eye, he was the very man to either throw the harpoon or deal the death-giving thrust or the lance to the monarch of the ocean world; but fate or circumstance had made him a missionary instead. He was a fairly good missionary, but a better fisherman.

Three miles from Nanomaga is a submerged reef, marked on the chart as the Grand Coral Reef, but known to the natives as Tia Kau, "the reef." It is in reality a vast mountain of coral, whose bases lie two hundred fathoms deep, with a flattened summit of about fifty acres in extent, rising to within five fathoms of the surface of the sea. This spot is the resort of incredible numbers of fish, both deep-sea haunting and surface swimming. Some of the latter, such as the _pala_ (not the _palu_)--a long, scaleless, beautifully-formed fish, with a head of bony plates and teeth like a rip-saw--are of great size, and afford splendid sport, as they are game fighters and almost as powerful as a porpoise. They run to over 100 lbs., and yet are by no means a coarse fish. In the shallow water on the top of this mountain reef there are some eight or nine varieties of rock cod, none of which were of any great size; but far below, at a depth of from fifty to seventy fathoms, there were some truly monstrous fish of this species, and I and my missionary friend had the luck to catch the four largest ever taken--221 lbs., 208 lbs., 118 lbs., and 111 lbs. I had caught when fishing for schnapper, in thirty fathoms off Camden Haven, on the coast of New South Wales, a mottled black and grey rock cod, which weighed 83 lbs., and was assured by the Sydney Museum authorities that such a weight for a rock cod was rare in that part of the Pacific, but that _bêche-de-mer_ fishermen on the Great Barrier Reef had occasionally captured fish of the same variety of double that size and weight.

Not possessing a boat, we fished from a canoe--a light, but strong and beautifully constructed craft, with "whalebacks" fore and aft to keep it from being swamped by seas when facing or running from a surf. The outrigger was formed of a very light wood, called _pua_, about fourteen inches in circumference. With the teacher and myself there usually went with us a third man, whose duty it was to keep the canoe head to wind, for anchoring in deep water in such a tiny craft was out of the question, as well as dangerous, should a heavy fish or a shark get foul of the outrigger. Capsizes in the daytime we did not mind, but at night numbers of grey sharks were always cruising around, and they were then especially savage and daring.

Leaving the pretty little village, which was embowered in a palm grove on the lee side of the island, we would, if intending to fish on the Tia Kau, make a start before dawn, remain there till the canoe was loaded to her raised gunwale pieces with the weight of fish, and then return. Night fishing on the Tia Kau by a single canoe was forbidden by the _kaupule_ (head men) as being too dangerous on account of the sharks, and so usually from ten to twenty canoes set out together. If one did come to grief through being swamped, or capsized by having the outrigger fouled by a shark, there was always assistance near at hand, and it rarely happened that any of the crew were bitten. In 1872, however, a fearful tragedy occurred on the Tia Kau, when a party of seventy natives--men, women, and children--who were crossing to the neighbouring Island of Nanomea, were attacked by sharks when overtaken on the reef by a squall at night. Only two escaped to tell the tale.[14]

If, however, we meant to try for _takuo_, a huge variety of the mackerel-tribe, or _lahe'u_, a magnificent bream-shaped fish, we had no need to go so far as the dangerous Tia Kau; three or four cable-lengths from the beach, and right in front of the village, we could lie in water as smooth as glass, and seventy fathoms in depth. Our bait was invariably flying-fish, freshly caught, or the tentacles of an octopus. My lines were of white American cotton, and I generally used two hooks, one below and one above the sinker, both baited with a whole flying-fish, while my companions preferred wooden or iron hooks, of their own manufacture, and lines made from hibiscus bark or coconut fibre.

I shall always remember with pleasure my first _lahe'u_. I was accompanied by the native teacher alone, and we paddled off from the village just after evening service, and brought to about a quarter of a mile outside the reef. The rest of the islanders had gone round in their canoes to the weather side of the little island to fish for _takuo_, for we were expecting a _malaga_, or party of visitors from the Island of Nukufetau in a day or two, and unusual supplies of fish had to be obtained, to sustain, not only the island's record as the fishing centre of the universe, but the people's reputation for hospitality. It had been my suggestion to the teacher that he and I, who were unable to accompany the others, should try what we could do nearer home. The night was brilliantly starlight, and the sea as smooth as glass--so smooth that there was not even the faintest swell upon the reef. The trade wind was at rest, and not the faintest breath of air moved the foliage of the coco palms lining the white strip of beach. Now and then a splash or a sudden commotion in the water around us would denote that some hapless flying-fish had taken an aerial flight from a pursuing _pala_, or that a shark had seized a turtle in his cruel jaws. Lighting our pipes, we lowered our lines together according to island etiquette, and touched bottom at thirty fathoms; then hauled in a fathom or two of line to avoid fouling the coral. In a few minutes my companion hooked an _utu_, a sluggish fish, somewhat like a salmon in appearance, with shining silvery scales and a broad flat head. As he was hauling in, and I was looking over the side of the canoe to watch it coming up, I felt a sharp, heavy tug at my own line, and, before I could check it, thirty or forty yards of line whizzed through my fingers with lightning speed.

"_Lahe'u!_" shouted the teacher, hurriedly making his own line fast, and whipping up his paddle. "Don't give out any more line or he will run under the reef, and we shall lose him."

I knew by the vibration and hum of the line as soon as I had it well in hand that there was a heavy and powerful fish at the end. Ioane, disregarding the _utu_ as being of no importance in comparison to a _lahe'u_, was plunging his paddle rapidly into the water, and endeavouring to back the canoe seaward into deeper water, but, in spite of his efforts and my own, we were being taken quickly inshore. For some two or three minutes the canoe was dragged steadily landward, and I knew that once the _lahe'u_ succeeded in getting underneath the overhanging ledge of reef, there would be but little chance of our taking him except by diving, and diving on a moonless night under a reef, and freeing a fish from jagged branches of coral, is not a pleasant task, although an Ellice Islander does not much mind it. Finding that I could not possibly turn the fish, I asked Ioane what I should do. He told me to let go a few fathoms of line, brace my knee against the thwart, and then trust to the sudden jerk to cant the fish's head one way or the other. I did as I was told. Out flew the line, and then came a shock that made the canoe fairly jump, lifted the outrigger clear out of the water, and all but capsized her. But the ruse was successful, for, with a furious shake, _lahe'u_ changed his course, and started off at a tremendous rate, parallel with the reef, and then gradually headed seaward.

"Let him go," said Ioane, who was carefully watching the tautened-out line, and steering at the same time. "'Tis a strong fish, but he is _man tonu_ (truly hooked), and will now tire. But give him no more line, and haul up to him."

For fully five minutes the canoe went flying over the water, and I continued to haul in line fathom by fathom, until I caught sight of, deep down in the water right ahead, a great phosphorescent boil and bubble. Then the pace began to slacken, as the gallant fighter began to turn from side to side, shaking his head and making futile breaks from port to starboard. Bidding me come amidships with the line, Ioane took in his paddle, and picked up the harpoon which we always carried on the outrigger platform in case of meeting a turtle. Nearer and nearer came the great fish, till, with a splash of phosphorescent light and spray, he came to the surface, beating the water with his forked and bony tail, and still trying to get a chance for another downward run. Then Ioane, waiting his opportunity, sent the iron clean through him from side to side, and I sat down and watched, with a thrill of satisfaction and a sigh of relief, his final flurry. In a few minutes we hauled him alongside, drew the harpoon, and with some difficulty managed to get him over the side and lower him into the bottom of the canoe amidships, where he lay fore and aft, his curved back standing up nearly a foot and a half above the raised gunwale. Although not above four feet in length, he was nearly three in depth, and about sixteen inches thick at the shoulder--a truly noble fish.

"We have done well," said the teacher, with a pleased laugh, as he hauled in his own line and dropped a 6-lb. _utu_ into the canoe. "There will be much talk over this to-morrow, for these people here are very conceited, and think that no one but themselves can catch _lahe'u_ and _pala_. They will know better now, when they see this one."

We returned to the shore within two hours from the time we left, with my _lahe'u_, an _utu_, and five or six salmon-like fish called _tau-tau_, all nocturnal feeders, and all highly thought of by the natives, especially the latter. The _lahe'u_ we hung up under the missionary's verandah, and at daylight I had the intense satisfaction of seeing a crowd of natives surrounding it, and of hearing their flattering allusions to myself as a _papalagi masani tonu futi íka_--a white man who really could fish like a native.

_On a Tidal River_

The English visitor to the Eastern Colonies of Australia who is in search of sport with either rod or hand line can always obtain excellent fishing in the summer months even in such traffic-disturbed harbours as Sydney, Newcastle, and other ports; but on the tidal rivers of the eastern and southern seaboard he can, every day, catch more fish than he can carry during seven months of the year. In the true winter months deep sea fishing is not much favoured, except during the prevalence of westerly winds, when, for days at a time, the Pacific is as smooth as a lake; but in the rivers, from Mallacoota Inlet, which is a few miles over the Victorian boundary, to the Tweed River on the north of New South Wales, the stranger may fairly revel not only in the delights of splendid fishing but in the charms of beautiful scenery. He needs no guide, will be put to but little expense, for the country hotel accommodation is good and cheap; and, should he visit some of the northern rivers where the towns, or rather small settlements, are few and far between, he will find the settlers the embodiment of British hospitality.

Some three years ago the writer formed one of the crew of a little steamer of fifty tons named the _Jenny Lind_, which was sent out along the coast in the endeavour to revive the coast whaling industry. Through stress of weather we had frequently to make a dash for shelter, towing our sole whaleboat, to one of the many tidal rivers on the coast between Sydney and Gabo Island. Here we would remain until the weather broke, and our crew would literally cover the deck with an extraordinary variety of fish in the course of a few hours. Then, at low tide, we could always fill a couple of cornsacks with excellent oysters, and get bucketfuls of large prawns by means of a scoop net improvised from a piece of mosquito netting; game, too, was very plentiful on the lagoons. The settlers were generally glad to see us, and gave us so freely of milk, butter, pumpkins, &c., that, despite the rough handling we always got at sea from the weather, we grew quite fat. But as the greater part of my fishing experience was gained on the northern rivers of the colony of N.S. Wales it is of them I shall write.

Eighteen hours' run by steamer from Sydney is the Hastings River, on the southern bank of which, a mile from the bar, is the old-time town of Port Macquarie, a quaint, sleepy little place of six hundred inhabitants, who spend their days in fishing and sleeping and waiting for better times. There are two or three fairly good hotels, very pretty scenery along the coast and up the river, and a stranger can pass a month without suffering from ennui--that is, of course, if he be fond of fishing and shooting; if he is not he should avoid going there, for it is the dullest coast town in New South Wales. The southern shore, from the steamer wharf to opposite the bar, is lined with a hard beach, on which at high tide, or slack water at low tide, one may sit down in comfort and have great sport with bream, whiting, and flathead. As soon as the tide turns, however, and is well on the ebb or flow, further fishing is impossible, for the river rushes out to sea with great velocity, and the incoming tide is almost as swift. On the other side of the harbour is a long, sandy point, called the North Shore, about a mile in length. This, at the north end, is met by a somewhat dense scrub, which lines the right bank of the river for a couple of miles, and affords a splendid shade to any one fishing on the river bank. The outer or ocean beach is but a few minutes' walk from the river, and a magnificent beach it is, trending in one great unbroken curve to Point Plomer, seven miles from the township.

Before ascending the river on a fishing trip one has to provide one's self with a plentiful supply of cockles, or "pippies," as they are called locally. These can only be obtained on the northern ocean beach, and not the least enjoyable part of a day's sport consists in getting them. They are triangular in shape, with smooth shells of every imaginable colour, though a rich purple is commonest. As the back wash leaves the sands bare these bivalves may be seen in thick but irregular patches protruding from the sand. Sometimes, if the tide is not low enough, one may get rolled over by the surf if he happen to have his back turned seaward. Generally I was accompanied by two boys, known as "Condon's Twins." They were my landlord's sons, and certainly two of the smartest young sportsmen--although only twelve years old--ever met with. Both were very small for their age, and I was always in doubt as to which was which. They were always delighted to come with me, and did not mind being soused by a roller now and then when filling my "pippy" bag. Pippies are the best bait one can have for whiting (except prawns) in Australia, for, unlike the English whiting, it will not touch fish bait of any sort, although, when very hungry, it will sometimes take to octopus flesh. Bream (whether black or silvery), flathead, trevally, jew-fish, and, indeed, all other fish obtained in Australia, are not so dainty, for, although they like "pippies" and prawns best, they will take raw meat, fish, or octopus bait with readiness. Certain species of sea and river mullet are like them in this respect, and good sport may be had from them with a rod in the hot months, as Dick and Fred, the twins aforesaid, well knew, for often would their irate father wrathfully ask them why they wasted their time catching "them worthless mullet."

But let me give an idea of one of many days' fishing on the Hastings, spent with the "Twins." Having filled a sugar bag with "pippies" on the ocean beach, we put on our boots and make our way through the belt of scrub to where our boat is lying, tied to the protruding roots of a tree. Each of us is armed with a green stick, and we pick our way pretty carefully, for black snakes are plentiful, and to tread on one may mean death. The density of the foliage overhead is such that but little sunlight can pierce through it, and the ground is soft to our feet with the thick carpet of fallen leaves beneath. No sound but the murmuring of the sea and the hoarse notes of countless gulls breaks the silence, for this side of the river is uninhabited, and its solitude disturbed only by some settler who has ridden down the coast to look for straying cattle, or by a fishing party from the town. Our boat, which we had hauled up and then tied to the tree, is now afloat, for the tide has risen, and the long stretches of yellow sandbanks which line the channel on the farther side are covered now with a foot of water. As we drift up the river, eating our lunch, and letting the boat take care of herself, a huge, misshapen thing comes round a low point, emitting horrid groanings and wheezings. It is a steam stern-wheel punt, loaded with mighty logs of black-butt and tallow wood, from fifty feet to seventy feet in length, cut far up the Hastings and the Maria and Wilson Rivers, and destined for the sawmill at Port Macquarie.

In another hour we are at our landing-place, a selector's abandoned homestead, built of rough slabs, and standing about fifty yards back from the river and the narrow line of brown, winding beach. The roof had long since fallen in, and the fences and outbuildings lay low, covered with vines and creepers. The intense solitude of the place, the motionless forest of lofty grey-boled swamp gums that encompassed it on all sides but one, and the wide stretch of river before it were calculated to inspire melancholy in any one but an ardent fisherman. Scarcely have we hauled our boat up on the sand, and deposited our provisions and water in the roofless house, when we hear a commotion in the river--a swarm of fish called "tailer" are making havoc among a "school" of small mullet, many of which fling themselves out upon the sand. Presently all is quiet again, and we get our lines ready.

For whiting and silvery bream rather fine lines are used, but we each have a heavy line for flathead, for these fish are caught in the tidal rivers on a sandy bottom up to three feet and four feet in length. They are in colour, both on back and belly, much like a sole, of great width across the shoulders, and then taper away to a very fine tail. The head is perfectly flat, very thin, and armed on each side with very sharp bones pointing tailward; a wound from one of these causes intense inflammation. The fins are small--so small as to appear almost rudimentary--yet the fish swims, or rather darts, along the bottom with amazing rapidity. They love to lie along the banks a few feet from the shore, where, concealed in the sand, they can dart out upon and seize their prey in their enormous "gripsack" mouths. The approach of a boat or a person walking along the sand will cause them to at once speed like lightning into deep water, leaving behind them a wake of sand and mud which is washed off their backs in their flight. Still, although not a pleasing fish to look at, the flathead is of a delicious and delicate flavour. There are some variations in their shades of colour, from a pale, delicate grey to a very dark brown, according to their habitat, and, although most frequent in very shallow water, they are often caught in great quantities off the coast in from ten to fifteen fathoms of water. Gut or wire snoodings are indispensable when fishing for flathead, else the fish invariably severs the line with his fine needle-pointed teeth, which are set very closely together. Nothing comes amiss to them as food, but they have a great love for small mullet or whiting, or a piece of octopus tentacle.

Baiting our heavy lines with mullet--two hooks with brass-wire snoods to each line--we throw out about thirty yards, then, leaving two or three fathoms loose upon the shore, we each thrust a stick firmly into the sand, and take a turn of the line round it. As the largest flathead invariably dart upon the bait, and then make a bolt with it, this plan is a good one to follow, unless, of course, they are biting freely; in that case the smaller lines for bream and whiting, &c., are hauled in, for there is more real sport in landing an 8-lb. flathead than there is in catching smaller fish, for he is very game, and fights fiercely for his life.

Having disposed our big lines, we bait the smaller ones with "pippies," and not two minutes at the outside elapse after the sinkers have touched bottom when we know we are to have a good time, for each of us has hooked a fish, and three whiting are kicking on the sand before five minutes have expired. Then for another hour we throw out and haul in again as quickly as possible, landing whiting from 6 oz. to nearly 2 lbs. in weight. One of the "Twins" has three hooks on his line, and occasionally lands three fish together, and now and again we get small bream and an occasional "tailer" of 2 lbs. or 3 lbs. As the sun mounts higher the breeze dies away, the heat becomes very great, and we have frequent recourse to our water jar--in one case mixing it with whisky. Then the whiting cease to bite as suddenly as they have begun, and move off into deeper water. Just as we are debating as to whether we shall take the boat out into mid-stream, Twin Dick gives a yell as his stick is suddenly whipped out of the sand, and the loose line lying beside it rushes away into the water. But Dick is an old hand, and lets his fish have his first bolt, and then turns him. "By Jingo! sir, he's a big fellow," he cries, as he hauls in, the line now as taut as a telegraph wire, and then the other twin comes to his aid, and in a few minutes the outline of the fish is seen, coming in straight ahead as quick as they can pull him. When he is within ten feet of the beach the boys run up the bank and land him safely, as he turns his body into a circle in his attempts to shake out the hook. Being called upon to estimate his weight, I give it as 11 lbs., much to the twins' sorrow--they think it 15 lbs.

Half an hour passes, and we catch but half a dozen silvery bream and some small baby whiting, for now the sun is beating down upon our heads, and our naked feet begin to burn and sting, so we adjourn to the old house and rest awhile, leaving our big lines securely tied. But, though the breeze for which we wait comes along by two o'clock, the fish do not, and so, after disinterring our takes from the wet sand wherein we had buried them as caught to prevent them being spoilt by the sun, we get aboard again and pull across to the opposite bank of the river. Here, in much deeper water, about fifteen feet right under the clayey bank, we can see hundreds of fine bream, and now and then some small jew-fish. Taking off our sinkers, we have as good and more exciting sport among the bream than we had with the whiting, catching between four and five dozen by six o'clock. Then, after boiling the billy and eating some fearfully tough corned meat, we get into the boat again, hoist our sail, and land at the little township just after dark.

Such was one of many similar day's sport on the Hastings, which, with the Bellinger, the Nambucca, the Macleay, and the Clarence, affords good fishing practically all the year round. Then, besides these tidal rivers, there are at frequent intervals along the coast tidal lagoons and "blind" creeks where fish congregate in really incredible quantities. Such places as Lake Illawarra and Lake Macquarie are fishing resorts well known to the tourist; but along the northern coast, where the population is scantier, and access by rail or steamer more difficult, there is an absolutely new field open to the sportsman--in fact, these places are seldom visited for either fishing or shooting by people from Sydney. During November and December the bars of these rivers are literally black with incredible numbers of coarse sea-salmon--a fish much like the English sea-bass--which, making their way over the bars, swim up the rivers and remain there for about a week. Although these fish, which weigh from 6 lbs. to 10 lbs., do not take a bait and are rather too coarse to eat, their roes are very good, especially when smoked. They are captured with the greatest of ease, either by spearing or by the hand; for sometimes they are in such dense masses that they are unable to manoeuvre in small bays; and the urchins of coastal towns hail their yearly advent with delight. They usually make their first appearance about the second week in November, and are always followed by a great number of very large sharks and saw-fish, which commit dreadful havoc in their serried and helpless ranks. Following the sea-salmon, the rivers are next visited in January by shoals of very large sea-mullet--blue-black backs, silvery bellies and sides, and yellow fins and tails. These, too, will not take a bait, but are caught in nets, and, if a steamer happens to be on the eve of leaving for Sydney, many hundreds of baskets are sent away; but they barely pay the cost of freight and commission, I believe. There are several varieties of sea-mullet, one or two of which will take the hook freely, and I have often caught them off the rocky coast of New South Wales with a rod when the sea has been smooth. The arrival of the big sea-mullet denotes that the season for jew-fish is at its height; and if the stranger to Australian waters wants exciting sport let him try jew-fishing at night. In deep water off the coast these great fish are occasionally caught during daylight, but a dull, cloudy night is best, when they may be caught from the beach or river bank in shallow water. Very stout lines and heavy hooks are used, for a 90-lb. or l00-lb. jew-fish is very common. Baiting with a whole mullet or whiting, or one of the tentacles of an octopus, the most amateurish fisherman cannot fail to hook two or three jew-fish in a night. (Even in Sydney harbour I have seen some very large ones caught by people fishing from ferry wharves.) They are very powerful, and also very game, and when they rise to the surface make a terrific splashing. At one place on the Hastings River, called Blackman's Point, a party of four of us took thirteen fish, the heaviest of which was 42 lbs. and the lightest 9 lbs. Next morning, however, the Blackman's Point ferryman, who always set a line from his punt when he turned in, showed us one of over 70 lbs. When they grow to such a size as this they are not eaten locally, as the flesh is very often full of thin, thread-like worms. The young fish, however, are very palatable.

The saw-fish, to which I have before alluded as harrying the swarms of sea-salmon, also make havoc with the jew-fish, and very often are caught on jew-fish lines. They are terrible customers to get foul of (I do not confound them with the sword-fish) when fishing from a small boat. Their huge bone bill, set on both sides with its terrible sharp spikes, their great length, and enormous strength, render it impossible to even get them alongside, and there is no help for it but either to cut the line or pull up anchor and land the creature on the shore. Even then the task of despatching one of these fish is no child's play on a dark night, for they lash their long tails about with such fury that a broken leg might be the result of coming too close. In the rivers of Northern Queensland the saw-fish attain an enormous size, and the Chinese fishermen about Cooktown and Townsville often have their nets destroyed by a saw-fish enfolding himself in them. Alligators, by the way, do the same thing there, and are sometimes captured, perfectly helpless, in the folds of the nets, in which they have rolled themselves over and over again, tearing it beyond repair with their feet, but eventually yielding to their fate.

The schnapper, the best of all Australian fish, is too well known to English visitors to describe in detail. Most town-bred Australians generally regard it as a purely ocean-loving fish, or at least only frequenting very deep waters in deep harbours, such as Sydney, Jervis Bay, and Twofold Bay. This is quite a mistake, for in many of the rivers, twenty or more miles up from the sea, the writer and many other people have not only caught these beautiful fish, but seen fishermen haul in their nets filled with them. But they seldom remain long, preferring the blue depths of ocean to the muddy bottoms of tidal rivers, for they are rock-haunting and surf-loving.

Of late years the northern bar harbours and rivers of New South Wales have been visited by a fish that in my boyhood's days was unknown even to the oldest fisherman--the bonito. Although in shape and size they exactly resemble the ocean bonito of tropic seas, these new arrivals are lighter in colour, with bands of marbled grey along the sides and belly. They bite freely at a running bait--_i.e.,_ when a line is towed astern, and are very good when eaten quite fresh, but, like all of the mackerel tribe, rapidly deteriorate in a few hours after being caught. The majority of the coast settlers will not eat them, being under the idea that, as they are all but scaleless, they are "poisonous." This silly impression also prevails with regard to many other scaleless fish on the Australian coast, some of which, such as the trevally, are among the best and most delicate in flavour. The black and white rock cod is also regarded with aversion by the untutored settlers of the small coast settlements, yet these fish are sold in Sydney, like the schnapper, at prohibitive prices.

In conclusion, let me advise any one who is contemplating a visit to Australia, and means to devote any of his time to either river or sea fishing, to take his rods with him; all the rest of his tackle he can buy as cheap in the colonies as he can in England. Rods are but little used in salt-water fishing in Australia, and are rather expensive. Those who do use a rod are usually satisfied with a bamboo--a very good rod it makes, too, although inconvenient to carry when travelling--but the generality of people use hand lines. And the visitor must not be persuaded that he can always get good fishing without going some distance from Sydney or Melbourne. That there is some excellent sport to be obtained in Port Jackson in summer is true, but it is lacking in a very essential thing--the quietude that is dear to the heart of every true fisherman.

_Denison Gets Another Ship_

Owing to reduced circumstances, and a growing hatred of the hardships of the sea, young Tom Denison (ex-supercargo of the South Sea Island trading schooner _Palestine_) had sailed from Sydney to undertake the management of an alleged duck-farm in North Queensland. The ducks, and the vast area of desolation in which they suffered a brief existence, were the property of a Cooktown bank, the manager of which was Denison's brother. He was a kind-hearted man, who wanted to help Tom along in the world, and, therefore, was grieved when at the end of three weeks the latter came into Cooktown humping his swag, smoking a clay pipe, and looking exceedingly tired, dirty, and disreputable generally. However, all might have gone well even then had not Mrs. Aubrey Denison, the brother's wife, unduly interfered and lectured Tom on his "idle and dissolute life," as she called it, and made withering remarks about the low tastes of sailors other than captains of mail steamers or officers in the Navy. Tom, who intended to borrow £10 from his brother to pay his passage back to Sydney to look for a ship, bore it all in silence, and then said that he should like to give up the sea and become a missionary in the South Seas, where he was "well acquainted with the natives."

Mrs. Aubrey (who was a very refined young lady) smiled contemptuously, and turned down the corners of her pretty little mouth in a manner that made the unsuccessful duck-farmer boil with suppressed fury, as she remarked that _she_ had heard of some of the shocking stories he had been telling the accountant and cashier of the _characters_ of the people in the South Seas, and _she_ quite understood _why_ he wished to return there and re-associate with his vulgar and wicked companions. Now, she added, had he stuck bravely to work with the ducks, the Bank (she uttered the word "Bank" in the tone of reverence as one would say "The Almighty") would have watched his career with interest, and in time his brother would have used his influence with the General Manager to obtain a position for him, Tom Denison, in the Bank itself! But, judging from _her_ knowledge of his (Tom's) habits and disposition, she would be doing wrong to hold out the slightest hope for him now, and------

"Look here, Maud, you're only twenty-two--two years older than me, and you talk like an old grandmother;" and then his wrath overpowered his judgment--"and you'll look like one before you're twenty-five. Don't you lecture _me_. I'm not your husband, _thank Heaven above_! And damn the bank and its carmine ducks." (He did not say "carmine," but I study the proprieties, and this is not a sanguinary story.)

From the weatherboard portals of the bank Tom strode out in undisguised anger, and obtained employment on a collier, discharging coals. Then, by an extraordinary piece of good luck, he got a billet as proof-reader on the North Queensland _Trumpet Call_, from which, after an exciting three weeks, he was dismissed for "general incompetency and wilful neglect of his duties." So with sorrow in his heart he had turned to the ever-resourceful sea again for a living. He worked his passage down to Sydney in an old, heart-broken, wheezing steamer named the _You Yangs_, and stepped jauntily ashore with sixteen shillings in his pocket, some little personal luggage rolled up in his blanket, and an unlimited confidence in his own luck.

Two vessels were due from the South Sea Islands in about a month, and as the skippers were both well known to and were on friendly terms with him, he felt pretty certain of getting a berth as second mate or supercargo on one of them. Then he went to look for a quiet lodging.