Page:Tracks of McKinlay and party across Australia.djvu/449

 danger, he called out in English, although speaking with difficulty, that he was their countryman. He then informed them that he had lived for seventeen years with the Aborigines in the neighbourhood,, being the sole survivor of the crew and passengers of a ship that had been wrecked, so far back as the year 1846, upon a reef off the adjacent coast. He had been wandering over the country about Mount Elliott, a lofty hill, above 4000 feet in height, near the mouth of the Burdekin, and he must have been but a short way to the east of McKinlay's party, as they passed down the river. His name was James Morrill, and he was born near Maldon, in Essex, England, and had been a seaman of the wrecked vessel the "Peruvian." He was supplied with clothes by his new friends, and after a short interval taken to Port Denison, where a subscription was made on his behalf, and where both himself and his narrative were the subject of very general interest.

The captain of the "Peruvian" had warned the watch against "broken water," that dangerous symptom of this coral reef coast. The vessel was wrecked during the night, after the watch had indeed detected the fatal symptom ahead, but too late to be of any avail. There was a considerable gale blowing; the two boats were lost, and with them the first and second officers. The