Spinifex and Sand/Part V/Chapter III

Chapter III: The Journey Begins
The week's rain had made the roads in a terrible state, where dust had been there was now a foot or so of soft mud, and the ground, which had been hard and clayey, was now so sticky and slippery, that it was not easy travelling for the camels. We passed several camps of Afghans, squatting miserably under huge tarpaulins, waiting for the roads to dry before starting their caravans, loaded with stores for some distant district. There are one or two things that camels are quite unable to do, according to an Asiatic driver; one is to travel in wet weather. However, Europeans manage to work camels, wet or fine; the wily Afghan says, "Camel no do this," "Camel no do that," because it doesn't suit his book that camel should do so &mdash; and a great many people think that he must know and is indispensable in the driving of camels; which seems to me to be no more sensible than to say that a chow-dog can only be managed by a Chinaman.

There is, perhaps, a small amount of risk in travelling in wet weather, for when a camel does slip he does so with a vengeance; each foot seems to take a different direction and thus, spread-eagled under a heavy load, he might suffer a severe strain or even break a bone. Redleap fell once, but, happily, neither hurt himself nor the load.

The winter had caused a transformation in the appearance of the bush; everywhere little patches of green grass or saltbush could be seen, and wherever a teamster had stopped to bait his horses, a miniature field of oats had sprung into life. How we hoped that the rainfall had extended towards the interior!

If only we could have started sooner, we should have benefited by the cool weather for a great part of the journey. But though the days were warm enough, there was no doubt about the coldness of the nights. Our blankets were white with frost in the mornings, and our canvas water-bags frozen into a solid mass. My thermometer registered 17 degrees F. just before dawn on the coldest night. Unhobbling the camels and loading them was freezing work, during which our fingers were quite numbed. Shivering, we walked along until the sun was above the trees, then in a little its rays warmed to their work, and we would peal off now a coat, now a jersey or shirt, until in the middle of the day the heat was too great to be pleasant. Poor little Val hated the cold nights, and, as I always sleep away from a fire, she used to crawl into my blankets and lie up against my back, which was quite pleasant for both of us. Most men like to sleep alongside a roaring fire in the winter, but I have always found that after the fire burns out and the night becomes colder, the change of temperature becomes unbearable. If the fire burned all night it would be a different matter; but to do so it must be replenished, and this entails leaving warm blankets to carry wood. It is amusing to see two men camped by a fire which has burned low, both lying awake, and watching to see if the other will get up and attend to it.

The best recipe for avoiding cold is to sleep soundly; and to sleep soundly one must be tired. As a rule night found us in this state, for we all discovered walking rather trying at first, none of us having done any for some time. We were all pleased, I think, when our stage of seven or eight hours was finished &mdash; especially Breaden, who had given himself a nasty strain in loading the camels, and who had a deal more weight to carry than we thin people. Australian bushmen do not, as a rule, make good walkers &mdash; their home has been the saddle. It was the more necessary, therefore, that we should start on foot at once and carry out a system of training, in which I am a great believer; thus we never ate or drank between breakfast at daylight and tea at night &mdash; from nine to eleven hours afterwards. Stopping in the middle of the day wastes time, and entails the unloading of the camels or putting them down with their burdens on, a very bad plan; the time so spent at midday is far more valuable in the evening, when the camels can employ it by feeding. Then again, a meal, really unnecessary, during the day soon makes an appreciable difference in the amount of provisions used. Breaden and Godfrey consoled themselves with tobacco, but Charlie and I were not smokers. I used to be, but gave up the practice because it made me so dry &mdash; an effect that it does not have on every one, some finding that a smoke relieves not only hunger but thirst. I have only one objection to a smoker as a travelling companion, and that is, that if by some horrible mishap he runs out of tobacco, he becomes quite unbearable. The same holds with an excessive tea-drinker. I was specially careful, therefore, to have a sufficient supply of these articles. A large amount of tea was not required, since Godfrey was the only confirmed tea-drinker.

On July 15th we reached Menzies, having followed the telegraph line to that point. And a very badly constructed line this is, the poles being timber and not sunk sufficiently deep into the ground &mdash; a contract job. The iron poles which are now used in the Government-constructed lines are a vast improvement. Menzies was the last town we called at, and was not so specially inviting that we regretted leaving it. Niagara, the next city, we avoided, and turned up the old Lake Darlot road, some fifteen miles to the west of it. Between Menzies and Sandy Creek, close to where we turned, the open, saltbush plain which fringes the salt lake, Lake Prinsep, was looking quite charming, dotted all over with patches of splendid green and yellow herbage, plants like our clover and dandelion, and thousands of pink and white everlastings. There can be no doubt that with a better rainfall or with some means of irrigation, could artesian water be found, a great part of the goldfields would be excellent pastoral land. As it is, however, a few weeks suffice to again alter the face of the country to useless aridity. We camped a day on Sandy Creek, to allow our beasts to enjoy, while they could, the luscious green feed; I embraced the opportunity of taking theodolite observations for practice. The pool, some eighty yards long, and twenty wide, fringed with overhanging bushes and weeping willow with its orange-red berries, made a pretty picture; turkeys evidently came there to water, but we had not the luck to shoot any.

The northern track from Sandy Creek deviated so much on account of watering-places, thick scrub, and broken rocks, that we left it and cut through the bush to some clay-pans south of Cutmore's Well; and successfully negotiated on our way the lake that had given me so much trouble when I and the fever were travelling together. All through the scrub every open spot was covered with grass, that horrible spear-grass (Aristidi), the seeds of which are so troublesome to sheep and horses. I have seen sores in a horse's mouth into which one could put two fingers, the flesh eaten away by these vicious little seeds. When turned out on this kind of grass, horses' mouths should be cleaned every day. Camels do not suffer, as they seldom eat grass unless long, young, and specially succulent. We, however, were rather annoyed by the persistent way in which the seeds worked through our clothes and blankets; and before much walking, our trousers were fringed with a mass of yellow seeds, like those of a carter who has wound wisps of straw round his ankles. Truly rain is a marvellous transformer; not only vegetable but animal life is affected by it; the bush is enlivened by the twittering of small birds, which come from nobody knows where, build their nests, hatch out their young, and disappear! Almost every bush held a nest, usually occupied by a diamond-sparrow. Her nest is round, like a wren's, with one small entrance and is built roughly of grass, lined with soft, small feathers. The eggs, numbering four to five in the few nests we disturbed, are white and of the size and shape of our hedge-sparrow's. I am pretty sure that the nesting season depends entirely on the rain. After rain, the birds nest, however irregular the seasons.

As well as small birds, teal had found their way to the clay-pans, and gave us both sport and food. These water-holes are the tail-end of Wilson's Creek, on which is sunk Cutmore's Well, where splendid water was struck at a depth of about eighty feet. Flood-waters from the creek spread out over these flats, and eventually reach the lake already mentioned, to the South. The caretaker at the Well occupied his spare time by growing vegetables, and our last meal, with white men near us, for many months to come, was accompanied by pumpkins and turnips. Camped here, too, was a mob of cattle, about 130 head. The stockmen told us they had started from the head of the Gascoyne River with 2,000 sheep and 150 bullock's. Leaving the station, some four hundred miles to the N.N.W. of Cutmore's, they travelled by Lake Way, where a fair-sized mining community was then established, and Lawlers, where the advance of civilisation was marked by numerous "pubs." Their stock had not suffered from want of food or water &mdash; in fact, a very general rain seemed to have spread from Coolgardie to the Nor'-West. The cattle and our camels seemed quite friendly; the latter were settling down to work, and could now be allowed to go in their hobbles at night, in place of being tied down. Only an occasional fight disturbed our sleep; but at the the clay-pans two strangers, wild and savage, caused a deal of trouble, necessitating one or other of us being up all night. However, we would soon be beyond such annoyances. At this point our journey might be said to begin, for here we left the last outpost of civilisation, and saw the last white face for some time to come.