Page:Australia, from Port Macquarie to Moreton Bay.djvu/74

 1st day.— We walked to Gurrasembi creek, the south ann of the Nambucca. I stopped for the night at a cedar dealer's store; and as the Yarra-Hapinni blacks were encamped m the neighbourhood, I paid them a visit after dark, to ascertain whether I could persuade some of them to accompany me to the other side of the Bellengen. As a grand corroberree was in the act of being performed, I had to wait patiently until its conclusion, before I could sound the natives on the object of my visit. At length, when a cessation took place in the obstreperous singing, and frantic gesticulations, which create such intense excitement in the Australian savage during this dance, and the performers had cast themselves down exhausted before their fires, I explained to them what I wanted. After some trouble, I persuaded three of the blacks to accompany me, by the promise of a tomahawk to each of them on my return, and plenty of tobacco whilst travelling with me. These three natives gloried in the following names, which had recently been conferred on them by the sawyers, viz. Wongarini Paddy, Billy, and the Bullock.

2nd day.—We started after dinner, and reached the mouth of the Nambucca at nightfall. We stopped for the night on some sandy ground, where I was severely bitten by the stinging-ants, called Jumpers, which leap like grasshoppers, and inflict a sharp pain. Being, moreover, pestered by sand-flies, our sleep was not very refreshing.