Chapter V: Front Matter (5)

Communication in these days was limited. Cantleville news arrived _via_ Sydney, and the newspapers were a week old when delivered. So that the team brought its own tidings home. They had not had a good time. They had also been heavily fined, and they proposed to go afield no more. The Blacksmith and the Saddler, who had ‘taken it out,’ were the last to appear.

‘I suppose you play Rugby rules?’ had asked blandly the Secretary of the C.F.C., as he curiously surveyed the ‘Bushies’ on their arrival.

‘No, we don’t,’ said the Blacksmith. ‘We plays Crupperton,’ and no more questions were asked. But when it was seen what Crupperton rules meant, backs, half-backs, forwards, and all the rest of it, struck and refused to continue. Instead, they took to chaffing the ‘black and white magpies.’

Whereupon, Crupperton, putting the question of football on one side, went at its opponents _à la_ Saddlestrap. Their places, however, they presently found taken by policemen. These latter every man handled to the best of his ability, and had to pay for accordingly.

‘Shoo!’ said the Blacksmith, as he finished. ‘They’re nothin’ but a lot o’ tiddleywinkers up there. Let’s have another match with Saddlestrap.’

ON THE GRAND STAND.

A Pioneer Sketch.

There was a lot of men from up-country staying at the Kamilaroi. One could easily tell them by their bronzed hands and faces, and creased or brand-new clothes, from the city members of the well-known Pastoralists’ Club.

‘Hello,’ suddenly exclaimed a fine-looking man, whose thick moustache lay snow-white against the deep tan of his cheek, ‘here’s Boorookoorora in the market! H’m, one hundred and sixty thousand sheep (so they’ve got the jumbucks on it at last).... Capital homestead ... stone-built house ... splendid garden and orchard. How things must have changed out there since Wal Neville and Jimmy Carstairs and myself took that country up, and lived for months at a time on damper, bullock and pigweed in a bark humpy. Stone house and orchard! Well, well,’ he concluded, laying down the newspaper with a sigh, ‘I hope they haven’t disturbed the boys. I left them there sleeping quietly enough side by side over five-and-twenty years ago.’

‘Shouldn’t have gone home and stayed away so long, Standish,’ here remarked a friend. ’You’re out of touch altogether with our side now. That’s the worst of being rich. D’rectly a fellow gets a pot of money left him, off he must go “home.” But here’s Hatton.—Hatton, let me introduce Mr Hugh Standish to you. He’s interested in your place. First man to take it up; early pioneer, and all that sort of thing.’

‘Yes,’ said Mr Hatton presently, ‘I was the first to put sheep on Boorookoorora, and they do well. Yes, the two graves are untouched at the old homestead still. Carstairs and Neville! I’ve heard the story, or a version of it. Poor fellows! I had their graves freshly fenced in a couple of years ago. And so you were the third partner. Will you tell us the story of your escape? I should much like to hear it at first hand.’

‘Do you know the Grand Stand?’ asked Standish, without replying directly.

The other shook his head.

‘What is it?’ he asked.

‘Why, the big rock, close to the Black Waterhole, on your own run,’ replied Standish.

‘Oh,’ said his new acquaintance, ‘you mean Mount Lookout. That’s just at the bottom of the orchard now. You see, we’ve shifted the head station from where you and Warner and Adams and the rest had it.’

‘Well, well,’ replied the other, ‘Grand Stand, or Mount Lookout, or whatever you like to call it, I had a very rough time on its top.’

‘Ah,’ remarked the owner of Boorookoorora, ‘I’ve had the top levelled and an anemometer erected on it; also a flight of steps cut. In fact, it is a sort of observatory on a small scale.’

‘The devil it is!’ exclaimed Standish. ‘Well, if you’ll listen, I’ll tell you what I observed once from its top.’

* * * * *

‘There were three of us. We were all young and healthy, and each had a little money. Foregathering (the first time was in this very room), we determined to become partners, and take up country. We would go out in person—far out, beyond even, as poor Neville put it, the “furthest paling of civilisation.”

‘There we would acquire a territory, expressible not in poor, miserable acres, but in square miles—thousands of ’em.

‘There we would breed sheep and cattle, increasing yearly in multitude, so that the sands upon the sea-shore shouldn’t be a circumstance to them. We would plant in that far country our own vines and our own fig-trees, and sit under their shade in the good days to come—we and our children, and our children’s children after us—in that wide and pleasant heritage of our founding. Alas, the glamour of youth and confidence, and health and strength over a bottle or two of good wine! Five-and-twenty years ago, gentlemen, in this same old room!

‘So we went. And the days grew into weeks, and the weeks into months, as we rode, searching hither and thither, to the right hand or to the left, but always with our faces to the falling sun. Over stony ridges and over rolling downs; over deserts of cruel spinifex and barren sand; through great scrubs, thick and gloomy; along rivers, tortuous and muddy. At times drenched with rain, at others suffering from heat and hunger and thirst, but ever westward. At length, after many disappointments, emerging from a broad stretch of sterile country and ascending a range of low hills, our eyes beheld something resembling the Canaan of our dreams. Track of horse or beast we had not seen for weeks; therefore we knew that the land was, if we so willed it, ours.

‘For a long time we gazed over the timber-clumped, wide expanse, emerald-swarded after some recent fire, and through which ran a creek whose waterholes shone like polished steel under the mid-day sun.

‘“Here we rest?” said one; and another,—“The Plains of Hope lie before us!”

‘So we rested from our wanderings; and one, journeying backwards, secured the country, defining its boundaries, not by marked trees, but by parallels of latitude.

‘Shortly a homestead arose, rude but sufficient. Mob after mob of cattle came up from stations to the south and east, and Boorookoorora became itself a station.

‘We got the name from a black fellow. We understood him to signify that the word meant “_No place beyond_.” This pleased us, for we were, so far, proud of being the “farthest out”—the _Ultima Thule_ of settlement. We may have been altogether mistaken, for the fellow was wild as a hawk, and, at the first chance, gave us the slip. But I’m glad, all the same, that the old name still holds.

‘Of the blacks we had seen very little. They appeared to decline all communication with us. Now and again the stockmen would bring one in; but he came evidently under strong protest, and refused both food and gifts of any description. However, we cared nothing for that, so long as our cattle remained unmolested. They were doing splendidly; and we soon began to talk about sending a mob to the southern markets, with which, in those days, there was little or no communication. We intended to pioneer that trade. There was plenty of room as yet. Our nearest neighbour was a hundred miles away; the nearest township, five hundred. One Sunday morning I went for a ride, leaving Walter and Jimmy alone. The two white stockmen and a couple of black boys, who made up the head station staff, were away on a round of the out-stations.

‘I had intended to be back for the dinner, which I had left the pair busily preparing. Unfortunately, when about five miles from the homestead on my return, my horse put his foot in a hole, stumbled badly, and directly afterwards went dead lame.

‘The day was a roaster for a tramp; but there seemed no help for it. So, planting the saddle and bridle, also, in a most unlucky moment, my heavy Enfield rifle, I set out through the long, dry grass, which reached at times over my head, and made walking hard and disagreeable work.

‘As often as I paused to rest and wipe my dripping face did I curse our remissness in not having “burnt off” before this, and vow to soon have a right royal blaze amongst the thick reed-like grass-stalks that hampered my progress towards shade and dinner.

‘I had got about two miles along, and was just thinking of having a good drink at the Black Waterhole, which I knew to be close to me, when I suddenly came upon the dead body of a fine young heifer.

‘A couple of broken spears stuck out of the carcase—so freshly killed that even the crows had not yet found it. It was, indeed, still warm. By the tracks I could see that the niggers were in force. They had evidently run the beast up from the water, and slain it merely for sport, as it was untouched. My first impulse was to return for the rifle. Second thoughts determined me to make for home as quickly as possible.

‘I had kept my shoulder-belt, to which was attached a heavy metal powder-flask. Thinking that I should travel lighter without these things, I started to unbuckle, when a tomahawk hurtled past one side of my head, whilst a spear went sailing by the other. The grass was full of blacks coming at me sideways—that is, between me and the station.

‘Turning, I ran for the water, the whole pack, now in full cry, after me.

‘Close to the banks of the Black Waterhole stood a tall rock we had named (I don’t know why, for it was as much like one as this tumbler is) the Grand Stand. I daresay it must have been quite one hundred and fifty feet high, if not more—’

‘One hundred and seventy-five six,’ put in Mr Hatton, who, in common with, by this time, a small crowd, was listening interestedly.

‘Thanks. You’ve evidently had more leisure than we could manage. Anyhow, it was sheer on three sides, only accessible, in one part, on the fourth.’ (‘Just where I had the stairway cut,’ murmured Mr Hatton. But no one took any notice).

‘Many a time I had climbed it to look for cattle across the plains on which it formed such a landmark. If I could do so now, very quickly, there might still be a chance.

‘I could tell by the sound of the spears that I was gaining. They didn’t come slipping quietly past, but whizzed and sung angrily, a sure sign that the throwing sticks were being used; at least I found it so. It was wonderful how they missed me. If the grass had been burnt I was a dead man fifty times over. Presently, I struck a cattle pad, and, at the same moment, caught sight of the Grand Stand. Now they saw what I was after, and put on a spurt, yelling harder than ever. As they arrived at the foot of the rock I was half-way up the narrow, almost perpendicular, track, going like a goat, whilst spears, tomahawks and nullahs hit all around me. One spear grazed my leg, sticking in the breeches, and a stone tomahawk knocked my hat off. I afterwards made use of that spear. It was hot work while it lasted, which, luckily, wasn’t long. The top of the Grand Stand measured about twenty feet each way, and sloped gently inwards, saucer-shape, to a depth of four. There had been rain lately, and a good pool of water was collected in the basin, which was strewn with stones and big boulders, remains of a former top, which had broken off and lay around the base. Being in a hurry, I hadn’t time to pull myself up, so tumbled headlong into the water. However, the bath refreshed me much, and, everything below having all at once become silent as the grave, I peeped over.

‘Well it was I did so!

‘Four big fellows were climbing up, one behind the other.

‘Lifting a stone, just as much as I could manage, I rolled it to the edge, and, forgetting to sing out “Stand from under,” let go.

‘It caught the first fellow fair on the chest, and the lot went down like skittles.

‘Three picked themselves up and limped off howling. The fourth man—he who led—lay quite still, and had to be dragged away. I did not care about expending my ammunition or I could have scattered them also.

‘It was terribly hot up there under the sun, but, ripping out the lining of my coat, I covered my head with it. If there had been no water, though, I should have been done—roasted alive.

‘Now I had a spell, and took a good look at the niggers.

‘They were a wild lot—five-and-twenty of ’em—naked as the day they were born, tall and wiry, with woolly hair and long, black beards. One side of their faces was painted white, t’other red, ribs and legs to match. Half-a-dozen of ’em had some shining stone like a lump of crystal either around their necks or tied upon their foreheads. These I took to be chiefs.

‘I had never seen any niggers quite like these, and, consequently, was rather impressed, not to say scared. They squatted under a shady tree, the only one for miles around, evidently holding a council of war, whilst I crouched and watched them, and slowly baked on top of my rock.

‘Suddenly, all springing to their feet, they ran backwards, then, wheeling together, threw their spears. But the height beat ’em. There was a strong breeze blowing, too, hot as from a furnace, right against them. Quite plainly that game wouldn’t answer, so they squatted again and started another consultation.

‘Meanwhile the day grew hotter. The rock was actually blistering my skin through the light clothes I wore.

‘Bathing my head and face brought relief.

‘Being quite a new chum with respect to blacks and their ways, I half expected that, now, seeing they couldn’t get me down, they would raise the siege and be off.

‘Nothing, it appeared, could be further from their intentions. The confab over, some lit a fire on a small, clear space close to the water, whilst others went off towards the dead heifer, shortly returning with great lumps of meat, which they roasted and devoured.

‘After this, they all got up, and coming quite close, one went a little apart from the rest and pointed at my head, which was all he could see, with outstretched arm.

‘Then his fellows formed a circle and danced and yelled, patting their bellies, and going through the motions of eating and drinking. Presently the gaunt, black semaphore was altered, pointing towards the sun. The dancing and shouting ceased, and, sitting down, the party began to display symptoms of the utmost distress.

‘Once more the arm shifted, this time towards the water, whereupon the whole crowd stiffened themselves out as if dead.

‘Another dance round and a song, and the semaphore put himself in position again and pointed in the direction of the homestead.

‘Instantly all but two sneaked off into the tall grass. The pair left behind lay down beside each other, feigning sleep. Suddenly, with terrific yells, the rest sprung upon them and went very realistically through the motions of beating the sleepers’ brains out and thrusting spears into their bodies.

‘The first portion of the pantomime I took to mean that they were determined to stay and see how long I could withstand the combined effects of heat, hunger, and want of water.

‘The second was only too intelligible, and for the first time made me feel a sharp pang of anxiety for those at home, totally unwarned, and off their guard.

‘How, as I watched the brutes, did I wish and long for that rifle, hidden away back there, or—best of all—that newly-imported breech-loader hanging over my stretcher at the station.

‘It was getting late in the afternoon. The rock was casting a long shadow, and my dripping body beginning to feel a little cooler as the sun lowered. Slight though the scratch upon my leg was, it smarted terribly. I was also very hungry, and altogether in anything but a happy frame of mind.

‘Foreseeing a night of it, I carried and rolled big stones to the edge, placing them so that at a touch they would go crashing down.

‘Darkness fell at last, and with it came the moon, nearly at her full.

‘Lying along the incline, I watched the niggers, and tried to work out some plan of giving them the slip.

‘Gorged to repletion, they were stretched about their fire: but two upright black forms, motionless as if cut from marble, watched steadfastly the pathway, on which the moonbeams fell full of light.

‘Although I had promised to return for dinner, I had no expectation, on account of my failure, that the others would come and look for me. We were all nothing if not irregular in our habits. Of the blacks we had almost ceased to think, so little had we seen of them. Indeed, though generally going armed, we carried rifles more for the purpose of shooting an odd bull or so than from any other motive. The place, you should remember, had been formed now over a couple of years, during all which time nothing suspicious had occurred.

‘The two at home would merely think that I had extended my ride as far as one of the out-stations, and feel no surprise if I did not turn up till the next day.

‘As for them, I knew not what to think. That the blacks were nearly all inveterate liars I was aware; but this sudden, strange raid, together with their expressive pantomimes and determined attitude towards myself, made me fear the worst.

‘If there had been no moon I should certainly have made an effort to get away. But it was as bright as day—so bright that I fancied I could at times see the glitter in the eyes of the sentinels.

‘I must have been cat-napping, for I awoke with a start to the sound of an awful chorus of yells.

‘The moon was low, but still gave enough light to enable me to make out that more niggers had arrived.

‘After what appeared to be an enthusiastic greeting of the new-comers, the whole mob—about fifty—came up and began to dance at the foot of the rock. Presently, to my horror, I caught sight of objects that I recognised only too well.

‘One fellow had on a broad-brimmed straw hat belonging to Carstairs; another flourished a hunting-knife of my own; yet another waved a gaily-striped rug that I had last seen covering poor Neville’s stretcher.

‘Evidently the station had been sacked.

‘Neither hearing nor seeing anything, they perhaps imagined me asleep, and, just as the dawn was breaking redly, some of them began to ascend.

‘A leaping, rattling, boulder, however, soon undeceived and sent them to the right-about.

‘Knowing that another day would probably see the end, they were in no particular hurry now.

‘The sun rose hot and angry-looking. By its better light I made out a whole heap of our traps under the tree, jumbled up anyhow.

‘But, lest I should, by any means, fail to comprehend what had happened, they had recourse once more to dumb show.

‘A nigger came forward and arranged three spears, tripod fashion. To their apex he hung a nullah-nullah. All the weapons were red with blood. Then, pointing alternately to the homestead, myself, and the heap of plunder, he made a long speech, beginning quietly enough, but working himself into such a rage at the finish that his big black beard was speckled with foam.

‘Of course, I didn’t understand a word. There was little need that I should—everything was plain enough.

‘But worse was to come!

‘Seeing that I made no sign, and thinking, perhaps, that I was difficult to convince, the orator went off to the pile of stuff, and, in a minute, returned with some object in a net, which, amidst triumphant yells, he fastened to the trophy already erected.

‘For a moment I couldn’t make it out at all. Then, as the sun shone fuller on the thing, I saw that it was Neville’s head.

‘All gashed and disfigured though it was, I recognised it by the long golden beard which the poor old chap had been so proud of.

‘The sight turned me quite faint and sick. Then I got vicious. Slipping to the water, of which there was now very little left, to get one good, long, last drink, my eyes fell upon the powder-flask lying where I had thrown it off.

‘It was one of the old-fashioned kind, of solid copper, very large, and holding nearly a couple of pounds. It was quite full.

‘“Well,” I said to myself, taking the flask up as the idea struck me, “you’ve cornered me and killed my mates, but I’ll be hanged if I don’t try and scorch some of you before giving in.”

‘Now, sitting down, I tore a strip off my handkerchief, and, with moistened gunpowder, made a rough sort of fuse. Then unscrewing the measuring cylinder, and taking out the spring-valve, I inserted the fuse deeply into the powder, brought the twisted end well up, and replaced the long cylinder. Then, binding the flask firmly about five feet from the head of the spear that had come up with me, I shouted to the niggers, who were busily overhauling their booty.

‘They stared with surprise, and I waved my coat and beckoned to them to come nearer.

‘Chattering like anything, a couple of ’em advanced a few steps very doubtfully.

‘Stooping down and striking a match I fired the fuse, which caught at once and began to burn quietly away inside the cylinder.

‘At this moment I hove the spear well out towards them. To my delight it stuck fairly upright in the ground almost at their feet, the shock, so far as I could see, shifting nothing.

‘Starting back, they gazed inquisitively at the shining polished object it had brought with it.

‘For a minute or two they hesitated, and I despaired. But, seeing the rest moving up, curiosity or cupidity prevailed, and one running to it, seized the spear and made off back to the mob.

‘At once he was surrounded with an eager, excited, jabbering crowd, each man with his chin over his neighbour’s shoulder.

‘The seconds went by like ages. I had reckoned the fuse would last, perhaps, seven or eight minutes. They had untied the flask, and it was being passed from hand to hand.

‘Still no sound!

‘With a deep sigh of regret I gave the affair up as a failure—had even turned away—when an explosion like that of an eighteen pounder made me jump.

‘From out of a cloud of dense white smoke came shrieks and screams of agony. I could dimly see bodies—some quite still, and others rolling over and over.

‘By God! gentlemen,’ exclaimed the speaker, interrupting himself emphatically, and with a cruel gleam in his eyes, ‘although afterwards I shot the wretches down in dozens, and always with joy in my heart, yet never with such a complete sense of satisfaction and pleasure as I felt at that moment.

‘As I looked a sharp blaze curled up, spreading broadly, and almost instantly, into a curtain of flame and smoke.

‘The grass was on fire!

‘Never a thought had I given to that. For miles and miles the country was covered with herbage, tall, and dry as tinder.

‘The top of the Grand Stand was about the only safe place now, bar the water, in all that neighbourhood. For a long time I couldn’t see a foot for smoke; but, as with the fire, it rolled away before the wind. I looked towards the Black Waterhole, thinking, of course, that the niggers would have taken to it. To my surprise not one was to be seen. There was the blackened ground, smoking yet, bare, and affording not the slightest cover.

‘The erstwhile shady and graceful tree was a gnarled and withered skeleton.

‘Underneath it, as the haze cleared, I made out four motionless bodies, blacker than the burnt black ashes on which they lay.

‘I waited a bit longer before coming down. But at last, pretty certain that the niggers had cleared out, or better still, been caught in the fire, I crept down the pathway, stiff, sore, and hungry, but with that feeling of vengeful joy in my heart trebly intensified as I passed by the poor, scorched, singed head lying on the ground.

‘Poking about the heap of blankets, clothing, etc., still smouldering, I dropped across a tin of preserved meat—a four pounder.

‘This was luck, if you like. Taking it to the water I finished it to the last scrap, and made the most appreciated meal of a life.

‘I hadn’t gone near the bodies. They were charred, and I was certain they were dead.

‘But, as I finished eating, to my astonishment one fellow got up and staggered straight for me. Snatching up a heavy stick, which happened to be handy, I stood ready to receive him.

‘As he came nearer his face frightened me.

‘It wasn’t a face at all, properly speaking; nor, for the matter of that, a head even. It was simply a mass of grass-ashes and blood—every scrap of hair had been burnt off. From his open mouth protruded a blackened tongue. I dropped my stick, for I saw he was stone-blind—in fact, he was eyeless altogether.

‘Groping along, in a minute or two he felt the water at his feet, when, instead of splashing into it, as you’d naturally think a fellow in such an awful predicament would do, he gave a sort of screech, very bad to hear, and made out again at a great pace, tripped over a stone, and fell headlong.

‘When I got up to him he was as dead as Julius Cæsar, and a great lump of jagged copper was sticking out of the back of his skull.

‘Presently I started off towards the homestead, but hadn’t got more than half-way before I met our two white stockmen—the black boys had cleared on the back track.

‘The buildings, such as they were, and all our things were gone. But we didn’t trouble much about that just then.

‘Taking Neville’s head to him, we buried him and Carstairs, who had been literally chopped to pieces, and then, getting the outside men together, we followed the niggers.

‘They had made for a patch of red ground six miles away. There we found ’em—fifty of ’em; and there we left ’em. How they must have travelled to have beaten the fire! Must have been touch and go, for some of ’em were pretty badly scorched.

‘Well, gentlemen, that’s the story of the Grand Stand, and the first settling of Boorookoorora. “Stone house and garden, and splendid orchard,” eh? Well, well, I suppose it’s only natural. Yet it sounds curiously to me. No; I won’t invest. Shouldn’t care about going back to live there now. That’s the dinner gong, isn’t it? Good old Kamilaroi! Come along.’

TOO FAR SOUTH.

The captain of the _Boadicea_—regular London and Australian trader—had long been the owner of a crotchet, or perhaps it would be nearer the mark to call it a theory. He was a comparatively young man, and after a few trips of eighty-nine, ninety, and ninety-six days respectively, he grew impatient; and at last, seeing an opportunity of putting his idea to the test, he determined to make the attempt.

It was by no means a new theory; simply an expansion of an old one. Years ago the masters of the _Lightning_, _Red Jacket_, and other clipper ships of renown, had successfully demonstrated that, instead of turning round the Cape of Good Hope as if it were a corner, in the old style, vessels bound to the Australian colonies would, if they kept on southward, be very likely to pick up a current of strong westerly winds which, although twice the distance might have to be sailed over, yet would take them to their destination far more quickly than by the usual route.

But the master of the _Boadicea_ contended that none of these early exponents of ‘Great Circular sailing’ had as yet gone far enough south, and that, at a still more distant point, a regular westerly wind-current, strong as a good-sized gale and as steady as a trade, without its fickleness, was to be met with which would shorten the average passage by at least ten days.

Older shipmasters laughed, and, saying that they found the Roaring Forties quite strong enough for them, stuck to the regular merchantman track, not so old yet, they thought, nor so worn by the marks of their keels, as to require a fresh one. However, Captain Stewart had, by dint of long persuasion and perseverance, obtained permission from his owners to test practically his pet idea; and this was the reason that, on the thirty-fifth day out, the _Boadicea_, in place of running her easting down amongst the Forties like a Christian ship, with half a gale singing in the bellies of her topsails, and mountains of dark-blue water roaring rhythmically astern, found herself poking about close hauled, with, on every hand as far as vision extended, icebergs, varying in size and shape, from a respectable many-peaked island to a spireless dissenting chapel.

We were very far indeed to the southward.

And now there came both mist and snow,
And it grew wondrous cold;
And ice, mast high, came floating by,
As green as emerald.

Still our commander’s faith in his strong wind-streak was unshaken; albeit, for a week or more, light baffling airs, scarce sufficing to fill the stiffened canvas, had been our portion. It was, too, indeed, ‘wondrous cold,’ and the necessity for keeping a close and unwearied look-out became every hour more apparent. Already we had had narrow escapes of coming into collision with bergs wandering aimlessly about, which, although wonderfully beautiful objects in the daytime, and at a distance, with the bright sunlight reflecting a thousand prismatic hues from their glistening surfaces, yet of a dark night were liable, with a touch almost, to send us in a twinkling to Davy Jones.

The crew growled and shivered, and shivered and growled, making the while sarcastic inquiries as to the near vicinity of the South Pole, wishing in undertones that their skipper had been perched on the top of it before leading them into such cold quarters. As for myself, although rated as third mate, I was little more than a lad at the time, and thought the whole thing simply magnificent, hoping that we might penetrate still further into the unknown ‘regions of thick-ribbed ice’ ahead of us, whilst visions of a Southern Continent, bears, seals and walruses, floated through my imagination. To be sure I was well clothed and comfortably housed, which, perhaps, made all the difference. We are very apt to look at things one-sidedly, and with regard only to the character of our own particular surroundings. Man born of a woman is a more or less selfish animal. Every day the ‘wandering pearls of the sea,’ as someone has called them, seemed to become more plentiful, whilst, to add to our dilemma, a thick Antarctic fog, through which the _Boadicea_, with look-outs alow and aloft, crept like some great blind monster feeling its way across the ocean, arose and hid everything from view.

The only one on board with any experience of such latitudes was our chief officer, a rough New Englander, who had taken a couple of voyages to the Northern fisheries in a Nantucket whaler. Far, however, from giving himself airs on that account, he was probably the most anxious man in the ship’s company. He had not a particle of faith in the great theory; moreover, he had seen a vessel ‘ripped’ in Davis Sound, which none of his companions had.

One evening, as if drawn up by some mighty hand, the fog lifted, disclosing the sun, cold, red, and angry-looking, glaring at us out of a sombre sky, and flushing the water and the bergs round about with a flood of purple light, on which our masts and rigging cast tremulous, long, black shadows, crossing and recrossing in a quivering maze, with big, shapeless blotches here and there for the sails. Suddenly a deeper, darker shadow fell athwart us; and there, not two oars’ lengths away, between ship and sun, rose an island.

Men rubbed their eyes, and rubbed and looked again, but there it was, every stern outline standing in bold relief, a rough, ragged mass of barren, desolate rock, its summit covered with snow—still, indisputably land. Even as we gazed eagerly, wonderingly, the _mirage_ faded away in a moment, as it had appeared, and the mist descended like a grey, heavy curtain, enveloping all things in its damp folds.

Presently it came on to snow. The standing rigging and running gear alike were coated with ice, whilst the canvas took the consistency of sheet-iron, and rang like glass when touched.

Roaring fires were lit in oil drums, fore and aft, in forecastle and cuddy. Soon the smoke in both places was as thick as the fog on deck; a kind of damp, unwholesome warmth was engendered as the impromptu stoves grew red-hot; great half-frozen cockroaches, thinking that the tropics were at hand, crawled out of nooks and crannies; and it seemed at times a toss up whether our end should come by ice or fire.

Most of our crew were Danes or Swedes, hardy and obedient men. If they had been British they would probably have attempted to compel the captain to alter his course. As it was, they simply put on all their available clothing and growled quietly. No matter what their nationality, all seamen growl; only some growl and work also.

Now, all the watches and clocks on board stopped, and, refusing to start again, they were placed in the cook’s oven with a view to warming the works. But, in the excitement consequent upon fending off a huge berg, which threatened to crush us, they were done brown, and completely ruined. About this time the captain, thinking, perhaps, that his experiment had gone far enough, gave the order to square the yards. On going to the braces we found that the sheaves of the blocks were frozen to their pins and would not travel. Taking them to the winch, with much heaving, the yards at last swung, creaking and groaning, round, whilst showers of icy fragments fell rattling on deck.

It was almost a calm, the ship having barely steerage way upon her; but the barometer was falling, and it was judged prudent to shorten sail by putting the _Boadicea_ under a couple of lower top-sails and fore and mizzen stay-sails.

To stow each of the upper top-sails it took twenty-four men and two boys—nearly, in fact, the ship’s company; and, if the courses had not already been furled, I do not think we could ever have managed them. The foot-ropes were like glass, the reef-points as rigid as bar iron, and one’s hands, after a minute aloft, had no more feeling in them than the icy canvas they tried to grasp. Through the fog, as we slowly descended the slippery ratlines, we imagined we could see great bergs looming indistinctly; and in our strained ears echoed the ever-impending crash as the wind gradually freshened.

It was a trying experience, even for the best prepared amongst us, this comparatively sudden transit from the tropics to twenty degrees below freezing point; and I firmly believe that, but for the unlimited supply of hot cocoa available day and night, at all hours, some of us would have given in. Spirits could be had for the asking, but no one seemed to care about them, even those known to be inveterate topers declining rum with something akin to disgust; perhaps the reason was that it became quite thick, and, when taken into the mouth, burned and excoriated both tongue and palate.

The night of the day on which we had snugged the _Boadicea_ down was dark as pitch, and you could feel the fog as it hung low and clingingly to everything. Some time in the middle watch the breeze died away, giving place to light, unsteady airs—catspaws almost—and occasional falls of snow.

Imagine, if you can, the big ship creeping timorously and uncertainly through the thick Polar darkness and mist, a shapeless mass of yet thicker darkness, emitting here and there ruddy flashes of light, reflected momentarily back from snow-covered deck or coil of frozen rope. No sound breaks the silence except a gentle lap-lapping of water under her fore-foot as the canvas just fills enough to draw. Now snow falls, not deliberately, but with a soft, fleecy, rushing motion, which speedily fills up any inequalities about the decks, and would fill them from rail to rail if it lasted long. Presently a dozen bulky spectres move noiselessly around the galley door, which, being withdrawn, a warm glow streams out upon the watch come for hot cocoa.

Imagine, too, just as the tired men are about to drag their half-frozen limbs below, a sudden deeper silence, and a strange feeling of warmth and calm pervading the ship; the sails giving one mighty creaking flap up there in the gloom; the crash and rattle of ice falling from their frozen folds, and a cluster of awe-struck, up-turned faces, shining pallidly in the glow of the galley fire, as the _Boadicea_, but for a slight roll, lies idle and at rest.

Everyone knows and feels that something unusual has taken place, but no man there can say what it is. A muttered order is heard, and in a minute a flood of vivid blue fire pours out into the darkness from the ship’s quarter, and a great subdued ‘Ah!’ runs fore and aft her, as, by its glare, we see tall, jagged cliffs, weird and ghastly in the strange light, towering far on high above our mast-heads, which appear to touch them.

‘Get the deep-sea lead overboard!’ shouts the captain.

‘Watch, there, watch!’ needlessly cry the men, as the line slips from their hands; and no bottom at one hundred fathoms.

‘’Taint land at all,’ says the mate quietly. ‘I kin smell ice; an’ ef we don’t mind we may calculate to winter ’mongst it ’stead o’ makin’ tracks for the Antipodes. Lower the quarter-boat,’ he goes on, ‘an’ tie the ship up for the night, as, ef I ain’t mistook, we’re pooty nigh surrounded.’

More bluelights are burned, and by their help and those of lanterns, the _Boadicea_, in a somewhat unnatural plight, is warped alongside a kind of ice jetty which stretches out from the main mass, and which, as if to save us the trouble of carrying out anchors, also to complete the resemblance to a pier, is furnished here and there with great knobs, to which we make fast our lines.

If you will try and picture to yourself the scene I have described, you will, I think, be willing to admit that ship seldom entered stranger harbour in a stranger manner, or that the ‘sweet little cherub, sitting up aloft,’ who is supposed to keep a special look-out for ‘poor Jack,’ and who on the present occasion—all the more honour to him—must have felt colder even than the proverbial upper hank of a Greenlandman’s gib, seldom performed his duty better.

Perhaps the all-pervading stillness was the thing that struck us most. The fenders, even, between the ship’s side and her novel pier scarcely gave a creak. And yet we were conscious that, somewhere, not very far away, it was beginning to blow freshly, although the sound fell on our ears but as a subdued, faint murmur, serving only to intensify the surrounding silence and hush.

‘There’s a fire up there!’ exclaimed one of the men, presently. And, sure enough, a tiny, sickly flame appeared far away above us. It grew gradually larger and larger, till at length a long, broad streak of silver shot down the ice-mountains and fell athwart our decks, as a three-quarters-full moon, pale, washed-out and sickly-looking, shone for a minute through the low, black clouds hurrying swiftly across her face.

A dull, grey dawn, at last, giving us just enough light to see what had happened. Ice everywhere!

The ice was here, the ice was there,
The ice was all around;

and on every side rose huge bergs from one hundred feet to two hundred feet in height, and enclosing a space of barely a mile in circumference; an ice-bound lake, in fact; and, what struck a chill of terror to our hearts as we gazed, a lake without any exit. Look as we might, there was not the least sign of an opening. Unwittingly we had sailed or drifted into a girdle of conjoined bergs. During the night the passage through which we entered had closed, and a cruel and stupendous barrier, hard as granite, slippery as glass, lay betwixt us and the outer ocean.

Within, the water was as smooth as a mill-pond, the air was quite warm, and after breakfast all hands went ‘ashore’ to stretch their legs, look wonderingly up at our prison walls, and speculate on the chances of getting out.

As I gazed around me at the strange scene—the snow-clad, towering peaks, glittering coldly in the yet feeble sun rays, the deep, shadow-laden valleys at their bases, and the perpendicular curtains of naked, steely-blue ice connecting one berg with the other—there came to my mind some long-forgotten lines of Montgomery’s, in which he depicts the awful fate of an ice-bound vessel:—

There lies a vessel in that realm of frost,
Not wrecked, not stranded, but for ever lost;
Its keel embedded in the solid mass;
Its glistening sails appear expanded glass;
The transverse ropes with pearls enormous strung.

* * * * *

Morn shall return, and noon, and eve, and night
Meet here with interchanging shade and light;
But from that barque no timber shall decay;
Of these cold forms no feature pass away.

I had rather enjoyed the first days of our Antarctic experiences, but the pleasure began decidedly to pall with such a horrible contingency in view, and I was now fully as anxious as anyone for clear water and a straight course.

After a while, the gig was manned, and, with the captain and chief mate, we pulled round our harbour to a spot where, from the ship, a part of the ice-curtain seemed low and pretty accessible. So it had appeared; but when we reached it we found fifty feet of perpendicular slippery wall between our boat’s gunwale and the summit of the ridge we had hoped to mount.

‘We’re in a pooty nice kind o’ a fix,’ said our mate, as we returned. ‘An’,’ glancing at the lowering sky, ‘I reckon it’s going to blow some, presently. Mebbe it’ll blow us out o’ these chunks of ice.’

The captain made no reply, but he was evidently not in a very cheerful state of mind.

That evening it did begin to blow very hard. Not that we felt it much, but we could hear the storm howling and roaring outside, and the thunderous breakers which dashed themselves against our sheltering bergs, causing them to tremble and pitch now and again as the mighty seas struck their bases. We had shifted the _Boadicea_ out to the extreme end of the jetty, double-banked our fenders, and taken every other precaution we could think of, in addition to standing-by through the night to cast off and sheet home at a minute’s notice.

There was no more silence now; for, although we were all drifting away together about E. half S. before the wind, the bergs forming our enclosure ground against each other with an incessant rending, tearing sound, which now, although seeming to foretell an early dissolution of partnership, filled us with terror lest some of them should topple over on the ship.

The ship herself, no longer steady, was hove violently up and down with every motion of the bergs; whilst the great wooden fenders, cut from spare spars, were torn to splinters, and the hawsers surged round their icy mooring posts with a curious, screaming, intermittent noise, making us think that every moment they were about to part.

Four bells in the morning watch had just struck when we heard a terrific crash rising high above the surrounding din, and the next instant a great wave came rushing over the _Boadicea_, filling her decks, nearly lifting her on to the ice, and then slamming her down with such force as to snap the hawsers like threads and smash the bulwarks to matchwood the whole length of the port side. Drifting away from our friendly jetty, we at once felt that our prison was broken up; for, now, the gale from which we had been so long sheltered howled and tore through the rigging, whilst cataracts of bitter cold water rushed in quick succession over the decks, and lumps of ice bumped up against the _Boadicea’s_ bows and sides.

‘Set the lower fore-top-sail and mizzen-stay-sail!’

And now the slatting and banging of canvas, the rattle of iron sheets and hanks, the hoarse cries of the men as they staggered about the wet, slippery planking, together with the rending and smashing of ice all around, made up a scene that defies description; whilst to lend it an additional weirdness, a ‘flare-up’ of oakum and tar, which had been run up to a lower-stuns’l boom-end, blazed wildly overhead like a great fierce eye looking down upon us out of the thick darkness. So closely were we beset, however, that, spite of the canvas, we soon found that we were simply drifting aimlessly about amidst immense fragments of capsized bergs, which threatened every moment to crush us. Indeed, we did get one squeeze that made the ship crack again, and whose after effect was seen by the fact that the cabin doors for the rest of the passage refused to close by a good six inches. Presently, grinding and scraping up alongside a small berg—or portion of a larger one, we cannot tell which—we make fast to it as well as we are able, and direct all our efforts to fending off its companions. As daylight approaches, we notice that the ice becomes rarer, and sails by at longer intervals; and as it breaks more fully out of a lowering yellowish sky a wild sight meets our eyes.

The sea is dotted with bergs—small ones nodding and bobbing along, big ones gliding majestically before the wind, till, a pair of these latter colliding, down crumble spires and minarets, towers and pinnacles, suddenly as a child’s card-built house, sending up tall columns of water as they fall.

It is not this spectacle, however, that brings forth a simultaneous shout from everyone on board, but the appearance, as one berg gives a half-turn, of an object, hardly two hundred yards from our jibboom end, standing there, amidst all the wild commotion, steadfast, rugged and grim, with tall breakers curling up against its ice-surrounded, dark red cliffs, and falling back in showers of foam, showing milky-white in the morning gloom.

It is land, surely! And, surely, we have seen those forbidding, snow-capped precipices before. It is the island of the _mirage_, substantial enough this time, and in another ten minutes we shall be dashed to atoms against its surf-encircled base.

The sight had a wondrous effect, and men who seemed incapable a minute before of stirring their stiffened limbs now hopped up the rigging like goats, and scampered along the deck with the top-sail halliards as if racing for a wager, in obedience to the order to cast off and make sail.

‘Hard a port!’ and the _Boadicea’s_ poop is splashed with spray from rocks and ice as she turns slowly from a jagged, honeycombed promontory, whilst her late consort goes headlong to destruction on its iron teeth.

It is still blowing hard; but our captain is more than satisfied; and, under everything she can carry, the _Boadicea_ rushes, like a frightened stag, fast away, northwards and eastwards, out of those dismal seas of ice and fog, snow, and unknown islands, a very nightmare of navigation, into which one merchant skipper, at least, will never willingly venture again.

However, we, after all, perhaps, set our course on a higher parallel than anyone had done since Ross in ’41, followed the outline of a southern continent, whose volcanoes flamed to heaven from a lifeless, desolate land of ice and snow. And, as some compensation for our trouble and dangers, till we sighted the south end of Tasmania, we never had occasion to touch a rope, so steadily and strongly blew the fair wind.

‘Seventy-five days—a rattlin’ good passage!’ exclaimed our Port Jackson pilot; and when he asked what had become of our bulwarks, and why the cuddy doors wouldn’t shut, we simply told him we had been ‘Too far south.’

THE MISSION TO DINGO CREEK.

An Apostolical Sketch.

‘Bad work, this!’ exclaimed the Bishop of B—— to one of a recent consignment of curates. ‘Bad work this, in the North! That part of the diocese evidently wants looking to again. Nice trip for you, Greenwell. Give you some idea of the country, too,’ continued the Bishop. ‘Yes, decidedly; the very man! Let me see; steamer to R——, then overland. Of course, you may have to rough it a little; but that will only add a zest to the change.’

The ‘bad work’ that his lordship alluded to was the substance of some reports that had just arrived from one of the new gold rushes, situated in the extreme north of his immense diocese, reports of a terrible state of immorality, drunkenness, and general godlessness existing there amongst far-off members of his flock—to wit, rough diggers and bushmen, together with a sprinkling of nondescripts, characterless vagrants, defaulters, horse-thieves, and worse, who had flocked there from the neighbouring colonies as to an Alsatia, where they could remain, at least, for the time being, secure from even the far-reaching arm of the law.

On such material as this had the good Bishop, shortly after his arrival in his new see, from his snug English vicarage, essayed the power of his eloquence on his only visit to that part of his charge: a visit, be it whispered, he was not in the least anxious to repeat.

The Reverend Spicer Greenwell fairly shuddered at the thought of trusting his precious person amongst such a set of savages as his imagination at once conjured up. But all his excuses and demurrings were without avail, his superior having, by some curious mischance, got it into his head that his senior curate was the very man qualified for such a mission to the heathen.

Though getting well on towards middle age, Mr Greenwell was a failure. He had completely mistaken his vocation; but he did not think so, and nobody had, as yet, been rude enough to tell him so.

Mrs Jellyby’s mission was, if we remember aright, to cultivate coffee and the natives of Borioboola-Gha. Mr Greenwell’s was to cultivate teas—afternoon ones—and at the same time to, if possible, capture a fair ‘Native,’ rich in those goods of this world, in which he himself was so unhappily deficient.

For the rest, he was a gaunt, waxen-visaged man, who always wore the highest waistcoats, longest coats, and whitest neckties obtainable; was never seen without a large diamond ring on his little finger; and seldom deigned to consort or even converse with the other clergymen of the district, unless brought into direct communication with them by his position—into which he had partly thrust himself, partly had conferred upon him through home influence—of the Bishop’s _chargé d’affaires_. He had, he flattered himself, before this untoward affair happened, been making rapid progress with the damsels of the Banana city; and, indeed, amongst some of the more elderly spinsters of the congregation of St Jude’s, he was voted as ‘quite too nice.’

Imagine then, if you can, the horror and disgust of such a man at being chosen for such an errand. But the Bishop was adamant; and I have many a time thought since that he purposely hardened his heart, and that, whilst dilating on his curate’s especial fitness for the work, his energy and push—as already illustrated in parish matters—his suave and polished manners, alone a vast handicap in his favour amongst the rude and illiterate people he was about to visit, the good prelate privately hoped within himself that if the shepherd he was sending forth did little benefit to the flock, yet, that the latter might possibly succeed in some unforeseen way in toning down the self-sufficiency, egoism and vanity of the pastor.

Seeing, at length, that there was no help for it, and that go he must, the luckless curate, taking a mournful and solemn farewell of his lady friends, went forth to preach the Gospel to the heathen of the Dingo Creek diggings.