Page:The Emu volume 9.djvu/243

 contained was much discoloured, and, as there were from 500 to 600 cattle watering there, the fluid resulting became more and more unwholesome. This, combined with the great heat, the swarms of bush flies and other vermin, made my stay of six weeks at this centre the reverse of a picnic. However, compensation was to be found for all these discomforts in the presence close at hand of a party of Yellow-spotted Bower-Birds. Watching them with the ultimate hope of securing this rare nest and eggs comprised my most exciting and interesting occupation at Milly Pool. Success came at length, and on 6th November I said good-bye to Milly Pool, taking my last nest—a Nankeen Kestrel's—the previous day. This proved also to be the last nest taken on the trip. All the smaller birds had ceased to breed at this late date. The heat was becoming intense, a thermometer hanging in a bough shed at a neighbouring cattle-station having already touched 116° in the shade.

I must say a few words about the weather experienced during my four months' travelling on the East Murchison. Teamsters and others who had been on the roads since the goldfields "broke out" were unanimous in their opinion that there never had been such a season for regular rains. This part of the Murchison lies in the zone of the summer tropical rains, and the fall had been exceptionally good for the previous few months. During both my visits to Bore Well I encountered further heavy rain, accompanied by strong gales. However acceptable the rain, the accompanying winds proved to be a great hindrance in working the spinifex for nests of such secretive and feeble-flying birds as Amytornis and Stipiturus—the chief objects of my search for the time being—and my difficulties were much enhanced thereby. The mornings were usually bitterly cold, the frost often severe. I shall always remember with a shiver awaking on 30th July. We had arrived in camp at sundown the previous evening, too late to put up a tent, and I slept on the ground near our waggon. In the morning my rugs were white with hoar frost, a bucket of water had thick ice on it, and even the water in a billy-can with the lid on was coated with ice. Nannine, according to the railway survey, is 1,470 feet above sea-level. Lake Way, being further inland, averages perhaps a hundred or so feet higher. It is no doubt this elevation which produces such severe cold in a locality at no great distance south of the tropic of Capricorn.

Before giving a detailed account of the birds observed during my trip, I must add a few words relating to the aborigines. Around Wiluna, which is on the outer fringe of civilization, they are fairly numerous, and their numbers are frequently augmented by the visits of "wild blacks" from the little-known interior to the north and east. Taking an average, I found them inferior to the blacks of the north-west both in physique and intelligence,