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 these were sand-hills with a thick, sheltering growth of casuarina and banksia, while here and there grew copses of mimosa and blackwood, the Australian hickory. Here, it seems, the police were plodding along, apparently on their usual persistent but unavailing search, when suddenly one of the men pulled up, dismounted, and, picking up something, gave a low, sibilant whistle. In an instant the whole troop gathered around him, while he held up a small piece of bark which had quite recently been ignited. Not a word was said as Yapton took the lead, at a sign from Buckup, and the rest of the black troopers followed in loose order, like questing hounds, examining with eager eyes every foot of the way. Shortly afterwards a tree was discovered where, with a few fresh cuts of a tomahawk, a grub had been taken out of the hollow wood. The trail had been struck. Patiently for several hours the man-hunters followed up the tracks, while fresh signs from time to time showed that a large body of blacks had quite recently passed that way. Suddenly, at a yell from Yapton, every man raised his head, and then rode at full speed towards a frantic company of savages as, startled and surprised, they made for a patch of scrub.

The horses fell and floundered from time to time in the deep, boggy soil, but their desperate riders managed to lift and hustle them up as the last black disappeared in the ti-tree. Unluckily for them, the scrub was not a large one, and the ground on either side comparatively clear.

Buckup sent a man to each corner, and himself with two troopers charged into the centre. Spears