Page:Narrative of a survey of the intertropical and western coasts of Australia, Volume 1.djvu/128

 SURVEY OF THE INTERTROPICAL' shallow well contstning fresh'water, which they had evidently taken the opportunity of our ab- sence to drink at. Upon further search we found their encampment; it consisted 'of three or four dwel!Ln of a very different description from any that we'had before,' or have since seen: they were of a conical shape, not more than three feet high, and not larger than would conveniently contain one person; they were 'built of sticks, stuck in the grinrod, and being united at the top, supported a roof of bark, which'was again covered with sand, so that the hut looked more like a sand-hillock' than the' abodo. of a human creature: the opening was at one side,-and about eighteen inches in diameter; but. even' this could be reduced when thoy were inside, by'heap- ing tho sand up before it.. In'one of the huts wero found several strips of bamboo, and some fishing.nets, rudely made of the fibres' of the bark of trees. - Mr. Cunningham took the advantage of a good spo t of soil in the vicinity of our wooding-place, to sow every sort of seed that we 'possessed, peach, apricot, loquat, (a Chinese fruit), lemon, seventeen sorts of culinary seeds', tobacco, roses, and a variety of other European plants; and in addition to these, the cocoa-nut' was planted, which we had found upon the beach of South-

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