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1. Progress of Exploration.—The coasts of Australia had all been examined before the
year 1815. From that date those who wished to make fresh discoveries were
obliged to penetrate into the interior; and we have already seen that, previous
to the year 1836, explorers were busy in opening up the south-east portion of
the continent. Oxley had made known the northern districts of New South Wales,
and Allan Cunningham the southern part of what is now the colony of Queensland.
Hume and Hovell, Sturt and Mitchell, had traversed the southern districts of New
South Wales and the territory now occupied by Victoria. Following closely in
the footsteps of these intrepid discoverers, the squatters had entered all
these districts, and, wherever the land was suitable, had settled down with
their flocks; so that, ere long, all that corner of Australia which would be
cut off by drawing a straight line from Brisbane to Adelaide was fully
surveyed. But there still remained to be explored about seven-eighths of the
continent; and from this date onward there was an unbroken succession of
adventurous travellers, who entered the vast central territory for the purpose
of making known its nature and capacities. But the manner of conducting an
expedition was now very different from what it had been. Previous explorers had
been provided with parties of convicts, and had traversed lands for the greater
part grassy and well watered. These expeditions had their dangers, arising
chiefly from the hostility of the blacks; and Allan Cunningham, his brother
Richard, with many others, sacrificed their lives in their ardour for
discovery. But subsequent travellers had to encounter, in addition, the pangs
of hunger and thirst in that dry and desolate country which occupies so great a
portion of Central Australia.
2. Eyre.—The first on this roll of gallant discoverers was Edward John Eyre, who, in
1840, offered to conduct an expedition to the interior. He himself provided
about half the money required, the South Australian Government—which was then
in difficulties—gave a hundred pounds, and a number of Eyre’s personal friends
made up the remainder. With five Europeans, three natives, and thirteen horses,
and with forty sheep to serve as food on the way, he set out from Adelaide and
travelled to the head of Spencer’s Gulf, where a small vessel lay waiting to
supply them with provisions sufficient for three months. Having traversed forty
or fifty miles of desert land, he turned to the west, and came in sight of what
he called Lake Torrens. It was now dried up, so that in place of a sheet of
water twenty miles broad, he saw only a dreary region covered with glittering
salt. When he entered upon it the thin crust of salt broke, and a thick black
mud oozed up. The party plunged onward for about six miles, the mud becoming
always deeper and deeper, till at length it half covered the saddles of their
horses. He was then forced to turn back, and to seek a
passage round this lake of mud; but, having followed its shores for many miles,
there seemed to be so little prospect of reaching the end of the obstacle, that
he turned his course again, from west to north. After travelling about two
hundred miles through a very desolate country, he was once more arrested by
coming upon a similar sheet of salt-encrusted mud, which he called Lake Eyre.
Again there appeared no hope of either crossing the lake or going round it; no
water was to be found, and his supplies were fast failing, so that he was
forced to hasten back a long distance to the nearest stream. Setting out once
more, he twice attempted to penetrate westward into the interior, but, on each
occasion, the salt lakes barred his progress, and as a last effort he urged his
failing party towards the north-east. Here the country was the most barren and
desolate that can be imagined. It was not always so, but after a period of
drought, when the grass is burnt to the roots and not a drop of fresh water to
be seen in a hundred miles, it has all the appearance of a desert. His supplies
of water ran short, and frequently the explorers were on the point of
perishing. When they approached the Frome River—a creek which flows northwards
into Lake Eyre—they were inexpressibly delighted to view from afar the winding
current; but its waters were found to be as salt as the ocean. After a long and
dreary journey, Eyre ascended a hill, in order to see if there was any hope of
finding better country; but the view was only a great and barren level,
stretching far away to the horizon on every side. He had now no water, and his
only course was to turn back; so, leaving this place—which he called Mount
Hopeless—he retraced his steps to the head of Spencer’s Gulf.
3. Australian Bight.—Here he changed the object of his journey, and made efforts to go along the
shores of the Great Australian Bight, in order to reach West Australia. Three
times he rounded Streaky Bay; but in that bare and desert land the want of
water was an insuperable obstacle, and each time he was forced to retreat to
less desolate country. Governor Gawler now sent word to him to return to
Adelaide, as it seemed madness to make further efforts; but Eyre replied that
to go back without having accomplished anything would be a disgrace he could
never endure. Seeing that his only chance of reaching West Australia was to
push rapidly forward with a simple and light equipment, he sent back the whole
of his party except Mr. Baxter, his black servant Wylie, and the other two
natives; and taking with him a few horses, carrying a supply of water and
provisions for several weeks, he set out to follow the coast along the Great
Australian Bight. His party had to scramble along the tops of rough cliffs
which everywhere frowned from three hundred to six hundred feet above the sea;
and if they left the coast to travel inland they had to traverse great
stretches of moving sands, which filled their eyes and ears, covered them when
asleep, and, when they sat at meals, made their food unpleasant. But they
suffered most from want of water; for often they were obliged to walk day after
day beneath a broiling sun when all their water was gone, and not a drop to be
seen on the burning soil beneath them. On one occasion, after they had thus
travelled 110 miles, the horses fell down from exhaustion, and could not be
induced to move. Eyre and a native hastened forward; but, though they wandered
for more than eighteen miles, they saw no sign of water, and when darkness came
on they lay down, with lips parched and burning, and tossed in feverish slumber
till morning. At early dawn they perceived a ridge of sand-hills not far away,
and making for them they found a number of little wells—places where the
natives had dug into the sand for six or eight feet, and so had reached fresh
water. Here Eyre and his black companion drank a delicious draught, and
hastened back with the precious beverage to revive the horses. The whole party
was then able to go forward; and there, around these little waterholes, Eyre
halted for a week to refresh his men and animals before attempting another
stretch of similar country. They saw some natives, who told them that there was
plenty of water farther on, and when Eyre set out again he carried very little
with him, so as not to overburden the horses. But after sixty miles of the
desert had been traversed without meeting any place in which water was to be
found, he became alarmed, and sent back Mr. Baxter with the horses to bring up
a better supply, whilst he himself remained to take charge of the baggage. When
Baxter returned they all set forward again, and reached a sandy beach, where
they had great difficulty in preventing the horses from drinking the sea-water,
which would certainly have made them mad. As it was, two of them lay down to
die, and part of the provisions had to be abandoned. Baxter now grew
despondent, and wished to return; but Eyre was determined not yet to give up.
Onward they toiled through the dreary wilderness, and two more horses fell
exhausted; 126 miles from the last halting-place, and still no signs of water.
Still onward, and the horses continued to drop by the
way, Baxter constantly entreating Eyre to return. It was only after a journey
of 160 miles that they came to a place where, by digging, they could obtain
fresh water in very small quantities. They were now forced to eke out their
failing provisions by eating horseflesh. Baxter was altogether disheartened; and,
if to return had not been as dangerous as to go forward, Eyre would himself
have abandoned the attempt. The three natives, however, were still as
light-hearted and merry as ever; whilst the food lasted they were always full
of frolic and laughter.
4. Death of Baxter.—Each evening Eyre
formed a little camp, loaded the muskets, and laid them down ready for use in
case of an attack by the blacks; the horses were hobbled, and set free to
gather the little vegetation they could find. But this forced Eyre and Baxter
to keep watch by turns, lest they should stray so far as to be lost. One
evening when Eyre had taken the first watch, the horses, in their search for
grass, had wandered about a quarter of a mile from the camp. He had followed
them, and was sitting on a stone beneath the moonlight, musing on his gloomy
prospects, when he was startled by a flash and a report. Hastening to the camp,
he was met by Wylie, who was speechless with terror, and could only wring his
hands and cry: “Oh, massa”. When he entered, he saw Baxter lying on his face,
whilst the baggage was broken open, and scattered in all directions. He raised
the wounded man in his arms, but only in time to support him as his head fell
back in death. Then placing the body on the ground, and looking around him, he
perceived that two of his natives had plundered the provisions, shot Mr. Baxter
as he rose to remonstrate with them, and had then escaped. The moon became
obscured, and in the deep gloom, beside the dead body of his friend, Eyre
passed a fearful night, peering into the darkness lest the miscreants might be
lurking near to shoot him also. He says, in his diary: “Ages can never efface
the horrors of that single night, nor would the wealth of the world ever tempt
me to go through a similar one”. The slowly-spreading dawn revealed the
bleeding corpse, the plundered bags, and the crouching form of Wylie, who was
still faithful. The ground at this place consisted of a great hard sheet of
rock, and there was no chance of digging a grave; so Eyre could only wrap the
body in a blanket, leave it lying on the surface, and thus take farewell of his
friend’s remains.
5. Arrival at King George’s Sound.—Then
he and Wylie set out together on their mournful journey. They had very little
water, and seven days elapsed before they reached a place where more was to be
obtained. At intervals they could see the murderers stealthily following their
footsteps, and Eyre was afraid to lie down lest his sleep should prove to have
no awaking; and thus, with parching thirst by day, and hours of watchfulness by
night, he slowly made his way towards King George’s Sound. After a time the
country became better; he saw and shot two kangaroos, and once more approached
the coast. His surprise was great on seeing two boats some distance out at sea.
He shouted and fired his rifle, without attracting the attention of the crews.
But, on rounding a small cape, he found the vessel to which these boats
belonged. It was a French whaling ship; and the two men, having been taken on
board, were hospitably entertained for eleven days. Captain Rossiter gave them new clothes and abundance of food; and when they were
thoroughly refreshed, they landed to pursue their journey. The country was not
now so inhospitable; and three weeks afterwards they stood on the brow of a
hill overlooking the little town of Albany, at King George’s Sound. Here they
sat down to rest; but the people, hearing who they were, came out to escort
them triumphantly into the town, where they were received with the utmost kindness.
They remained for eleven days, and then set sail for Adelaide, which they
reached after an absence of one year and twenty-six days.
This expedition was, unfortunately, through so barren a country that it
had but little practical effect beyond the additions it made to our geography;
but the perseverance and skill with which it was conducted are worthy of all
honour, and Eyre is to be remembered as the first explorer who braved the dangers
of the Australian desert.
6. Sturt.—Two years after the
return of Eyre, Captain Sturt, the famous discoverer of the Darling and Murray,
wrote to Lord Stanley offering to conduct an expedition into the heart of
Australia. His offer was accepted; and in May, 1844, a well-equipped party of
sixteen persons was ready to start from the banks of the Darling River. Places
which Sturt had explored sixteen years before, when they were a deep and
unknown solitude, were now covered with flocks and
cattle; and he could use, as the starting-place of this expedition, the
farthest point he had reached in that of 1828. Mr. Poole went with him as
surveyor, Mr. Browne as surgeon, and the draughtsman was Mr. J. MʻDouall Stuart, who, in
this expedition, received a splendid training for his own great discoveries of
subsequent years. Following the Darling, they reached Laidley’s Ponds, passed
near Lake Cawndilla, and then struck northward for the interior. The country
was very bare—one dead level of cheerless desert; and when they reached a few
hills which they called Stanley Range, now better known as Barrier Range,
Sturt, who ascended to one of the summits, could see nothing hopeful in the
prospect. How little did he dream that the hills beneath him were full of
silver, and that one day a populous city of miners should occupy the waterless
plain in front of him! In this region he had to be very careful how he
advanced, for he had with him eleven horses, thirty bullocks, and two hundred
sheep, and water for so great a multitude could with difficulty be procured. He
had always to ride forward and find a creek or pond of sufficient size, as the
next place of encampment, before allowing the expedition to move on; and, as water
was often very difficult to find, his progress was but slow. Fortunately for
the party, it was the winter season, and a few of the little creeks had a
moderate supply of water. But after they had reached a chain of hills, which
Sturt called the Grey Range, the warm season was already upon them. The summer
of 1844 was one of the most intense on record; and in these vast interior
plains of sand, under the fiery glare of the sun, the earth seemed to burn like
plates of metal: it split the hoofs of the horses; it scorched the shoes and
the feet of the men; it dried up the water from the creeks and pools, and left
all the country parched and full of cracks. Sturt spent a time of great
anxiety, for the streams around were rapidly disappearing; and, when all the
water had been dried up, the prospects of his party would, indeed, be gloomy.
His relief was therefore great when Mr. Poole found a creek in a rocky basin,
whose waters seemed to have a perennial flow. Sturt moved forward, and formed
his depôt beside the stream; and here he was forced to remain for six weeks.
For it appeared as though he had entered a trap; the country before him was
absolutely without water, so that he could not advance; while the creeks behind
him were now only dry courses, and it was hopeless to think of returning. He
made many attempts to escape, and struck out into the country in all
directions. In one of his efforts, if he had gone only thirty miles farther, he
would have found the fine stream of Cooper’s Creek, in which there was sufficient
water for the party; but hunger and thirst forced him to return to the depôt.
He followed down the creek on which they were encamped, but found that, after a
course of twenty-nine miles, it lost itself in the sand.
Meantime the travellers passed a summer such as few men have ever
experienced. The heat was sometimes as high as 130 deg. in the shade, and in
the sun it was altogether intolerable. They were unable to write, as the ink
dried at once on their pens; their combs split; their nails became brittle and
readily broke, and if they touched a piece of metal it blistered their fingers.
In their extremity they dug an underground room, deep enough to be beyond the
dreadful furnace-glow above. Here they spent many a long day, as month after
month passed without a shower of rain. Sometimes they watched the clouds
gather, and they could hear the distant roll of thunder, but there fell not a
drop to refresh the dry and dusty desert. The party began to grow thin and
weak; Mr. Poole became ill with scurvy, and from day to day he sank rapidly. At
length, when winter was again approaching, a gentle shower moistened the plain;
and, as the only chance of saving the life of Poole, half of the party was sent
to carry him quickly back to the Darling. They had been gone only a few hours
when a messenger rode back with the news that he was already dead. The mournful
cavalcade returned, bearing his remains, and a grave was dug in the wilderness.
A tree close by, on which his initials were cut, formed the only memorial of
the hapless explorer.
7. Journey to the Centre.—Shortly
afterwards there came a succession of wet days, and, as there was now an
abundance of water, the whole party once more set off; having travelled
north-west for sixty-one miles farther, they formed a new depôt, and made
excursions to explore the country in the neighbourhood. MʻDouall Stuart crossed
over to Lake Torrens; while Sturt, with Dr. Browne and three men, pushing to
the north, discovered the Strzelecki Creek, a stream which flows through very
agreeable country. But as they proceeded farther to the north their troubles
began again; they came upon a region covered with hill after hill of fiery red
sand, amid which lay lagoons of salt and bitter water. They toiled over this
weary country in hopes that a change for the better might soon appear; but when
they reached the last hill, they had the mortification to see a great plain,
barren, monotonous and dreary, stretching with a
purple glare as far as the eye could reach on every side. This plain was called
by Sturt the “Stony Desert,” for, on descending, he found it covered with
innumerable pieces of quartz and sandstone, among which the horses wearily
stumbled. Sturt wished to penetrate as far as the tropic of Capricorn; but
summer was again at hand, their water was failing, and they could find neither
stream nor pool. When the madness of any farther advance became apparent,
Sturt, with his head buried in his hands, sat for an hour in bitter
disappointment. After toiling so far, and reaching within 150 miles of his
destination, to be turned back for the want of a little water was a misfortune
very hard to bear, and, but for his companions, he would have still gone
forward and perished. As they hastened back their water was exhausted, and they
were often in danger of being buried by moving hills of sand; but at length
they reached the depôt, having traversed 800 miles during the eight weeks of
their absence.
It was not long before Sturt started again, taking
with him MʻDouall Stuart as his
companion. On this trip he suffered the same
hardships, but had the satisfaction of discovering a magnificent stream, which
he called Cooper’s Creek. On crossing this creek he again entered the Stony
Desert, and was once more compelled reluctantly to retrace his steps. When he
reached the depôt he was utterly worn out. He lay in bed for a long time,
tenderly nursed by his companions; and, when the whole party set out on its
return to the settled districts, he had to be lifted in and out of the dray in
which he was carried. As they neared their homes his sight began to fail. The
glare of the burning sands had destroyed his eyes, and he passed the remainder
of his days in darkness. His reports of the arid country gave rise to the
opinion that the whole interior of Australia was a desert; but this was
afterwards found to be far from correct.
8. Leichardt.—Allan Cunningham’s
discoveries extended over the northern parts of New South Wales and the
southern districts of Queensland. But all the north-eastern parts of the
continent were left unexplored until 1844, when an intrepid young German
botanist, named Ludwig Leichardt, made known this rich and fertile country.
With five men he started from Sydney, and, passing through splendid forests and
magnificent pasture lands, he made his way to the Gulf of Carpentaria,
discovering and following up many large rivers—the Fitzroy, with its
tributaries—the Dawson, the Isaacs and the Mackenzie; the Burdekin, with
several of its branches; then the Mitchell; and, lastly, the Gilbert. He also
crossed the Flinders and Albert, without knowing that, a short time previously,
these rivers had been discovered and named by Captain Stokes, who was exploring
the coasts in a British war-ship. Having rounded the gulf, he discovered the
Roper, and followed the Alligator River down to Van Diemen’s Gulf, where a
vessel was waiting to receive his party. On his return to Sydney the utmost
enthusiasm prevailed; for Leichardt had made known a wide stretch of most
valuable country. The people of Sydney raised a subscription of £1,500, and the
Government rewarded his services with £1,000. Leichardt was of too ardent a
nature to remain content with what he had already done; and, in 1847, he again
set out to make further explorations in the north of Queensland. On this
occasion, however, he was not so successful. He had taken with him great flocks
of sheep and goats, and they impeded his progress so much that, after wandering
over the Fitzroy Downs for about seven months, he was forced to return. In 1848
he organised a third expedition, to cross the whole country from east to west.
He proposed to start from Moreton Bay, and to take two years in traversing the
centre of the continent, so as to reach the Swan River settlement. He set out
with a large party, and soon reached the Cogoon River, a tributary of the
Condamine. From this point he sent to a friend in Sydney a letter, in which he
described himself as in good spirits, and full of hope that the expedition
would be a success. He then started into the wilderness, and was lost for ever
from men’s view. For many years parties were, from time to time, sent out to
rescue the missing explorers, if perchance they might still be wandering with
the blacks in the interior; but no traces of the lost company have ever been
brought to light.
9. Mitchell.—Whilst Leichardt was absent on his first journey, Sir Thomas Mitchell—the discoverer
of the Glenelg—had prepared an expedition for the exploration of Queensland.
Having waited till the return of Leichardt, in order not to go over the same
ground, he set out towards the north, and, after discovering the Culgoa and
Warrego—two important tributaries of the Darling—he turned to the west. He
travelled over a great extent of level country, and then came upon a river
which somewhat puzzled him. He followed the current for 150 miles, and it
seemed to flow steadily towards the heart of the continent. He thought that its
waters must eventually find their way to the sea, and would, therefore, after a
time, flow north to the Indian Ocean. If that were the case, the river—which
the natives called the Barcoo—must be the largest stream on the northern coast,
and he concluded that it was identical with the Victoria, whose mouth had been
discovered about nine years before by Captain Stokes. He, therefore,
provisionally gave it the name of the Victoria River.
10. Kennedy.—On the return of
Mitchell, the further prosecution of exploration in these districts was left to
his assistant-surveyor—Edmund Kennedy—who, having been sent to trace the course
of the supposed Victoria River, followed its banks for 150 miles below the
place where Mitchell had left it. He was then forced to return through want of
provisions; but he had gone far enough, however, to show that this stream was
only the higher part of Cooper’s Creek, discovered not long before by Captain
Sturt. This river has a course of about 1,200 miles; and it is, therefore, the
largest of Central Australia. But its waters spread out into the broad marshes
of Lake Eyre, and are there lost by evaporation.
In 1848 Kennedy was sent to explore Cape York Peninsula. He was landed
with a party of twelve men at Rockingham Bay, and, striking inland to the
north-west, travelled towards Cape York, where a small schooner was to wait for
him. The difficulties met by the explorers were immense; for, in these tropical
regions, dense jungles of prickly shrubs impeded their course and lacerated
their flesh, while vast swamps often made their journey tedious and
unexpectedly long. Thinking there was no necessity for all to endure these hardships, he left eight of his companions at Weymouth Bay,
intending to call for them on his way back in the schooner. He was courageously
pushing through the jungle towards the north with three men and his black
servant Jackey, when one of the party accidentally
received a severe gunshot wound, which made it impossible for him to proceed.
Kennedy was now only a few miles distant from Cape York; and, leaving the
wounded man under the care of the two remaining whites, he started—accompanied
by Jackey—to reach the cape and obtain assistance from the schooner. They had
not gone far, and were on the banks of the Escape River, when they perceived
that their steps were being closely followed by a tribe of natives, whose
swarthy bodies, from time to time, appeared among the trees. Kennedy now
proceeded warily, keeping watch all around; but a spear, urged by an unseen
hand from among the leaves, suddenly pierced his body from behind, and he fell.
The blacks rushed forward, but Jackey fired, and at the report they hastily
fled. Jackey held up his master’s head for a short time, weeping bitterly.
Kennedy knew he was dying, and he gave his faithful servant instructions as to
the papers he was to carry, and the course he must follow. Not long after this
he breathed his last, and Jackey, with his tomahawk, dug a shallow grave for
him in the forest. He spread his coat and shirt in the hollow, laid the body
tenderly upon them, and covered it with leaves and branches. Then, packing up
the journals, he plunged into the creek, along which he walked, with only his
head above the surface, until he neared the shore. Hastily making for the
north, he reached the cape, where he was taken on board the schooner. This
expedition was one of the most disastrous of the inland explorations. The
wounded man, and the two who had been left with him, were never afterwards
heard of—in all probability they were slaughtered by the natives; whilst the
party of eight, who had been left at Weymouth Bay, after constant struggles
with the natives, had been reduced, by starvation and disease, to only two ere
the expected relief arrived.
11. Gregory.—In 1856 A. C. Gregory
went in search of Leichardt, and, thinking he might possibly have reached the
north-west coast, took a small party to Cambridge Gulf. Travelling along the
banks of the Victoria River, he crossed a low range of hills and discovered a
stream, to which he gave the name of “Sturt Creek”. By following this, he was
led into a region covered with long ridges of glaring red sand, resembling
those which had baffled Captain Sturt, except that in this desert there grew
the scattered blades of the spinifex grass, which cut like daggers into the
hoofs of the horses. The creek was lost in marshes and salt lakes, and Gregory
was forced to retrace his steps till he reached the great bend in the Victoria
River; then, striking to the east, he skirted the Gulf of Carpentaria about
fifty miles from the shore; and, after a long journey, arrived at Moreton Bay,
but without any news regarding Leichardt and his party. His expedition,
however, had explored a great extent of country, and had mapped out the courses
of two large rivers—the Victoria and the Roper.
CHAPTER XVIII.
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