Page:Tracks of McKinlay and party across Australia.djvu/352

 with no light hand by the governor, had the slightest effect. Middleton then tried him, and after horse and man coming to the ground three times, he "gub" it up, and away they went across the plain, Middleton riding him as if there was a bush fire or a tornado behind him; he stuck to him like a brick, and fairly, by putting plenty of it in, took all the steel out of him. I hope they will be successful, it would throw a gloom over the party should he be lost, to say nothing of the sheep, and that would put us all in a queer state. We have nothing for dinner, and till Mr. McKinlay comes back we cannot get even a little flour. Should they not find him we shall have to kill a bullock, and then "two birds with one stone," viz., jerk him, and keep on looking out for Kirby. Mr. McKinlay adds in his journal: —

"'Middleton and Palmer got on his tracks, and followed them to about dark, when within a very short distance of our tracks here, and more than half the distance to this camp, and thought it not improbable, from the course he was then pursuing, that he had got to our camp, and came home, but the unfortunate had not. Had he been followed the day before by Hodgkinson with the same perseverance, all would have been well, and much anxiety spared to all. If the poor man has kept to the ranges, I'm afraid there is little hope of him — it will be a sad end for the poor fellow; a better man for his occupation could not be found. Just fancy an unfortunate man lost between two and three hundred miles from the coast, in a perfect wild, with twenty-three sheep (and I question if"