Page:Rambles in Australia (IA ramblesinaustral00grewiala).pdf/371

 savvy," they replied vaguely. So we said good-*bye to our poor little dusky brothers, and turned back to the Botanical Gardens to recover the Government cart and horse. At parting, our driver took out of a native basket a little collar of coloured beads made by the natives up the Daly River, and gave it to us as a memento of our brief acquaintance.

There were only three cars in Darwin, and the snorting noise made by the one in which we returned awoke our horse to such terrified and mettlesome curvetting, that we could only remount the seat with considerable difficulty. We drove back through the gathering dusk with flying foxes soundlessly flitting across our path. By the time we reached the jetty darkness had come on. We had to make a hasty change, and after a hurried dinner, we started back again in the heavy, moist, scented darkness to find the hall in which the evening's lecture was to be delivered. It was very funny to find that early closing was compulsory in Darwin. Chinatown must hate it. The little shops were half lighted, and in the dusk seated figures like small Buddhas were dimly discernible outside. A strong, Oriental smell hung over it all.

We shall always remember the scene of the lecture in the Town Hall. The moist heat, the