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The authorities had refused to allow the boss to come closer in, and so one side of his camping-place was walled by virgin bush; a dense tract of blue-gum and iron-bark stretching, almost as far as the eye could reach, to the foot-hills of a gaunt mountain range.
Then everyone seemed to think hard and look at the tea. I did n't want any more. Dan jumped off the sofa and went outside; and Dad looked after Mother. At last the four acres excepting the biggest of the iron-bark trees and about fifty stumps were pretty well cleared; and then came a problem that could n't be worked-out on a draught-board.
The clouds that old Bob said were gathering when he came in were now developing to a storm, for the wind began to rise, and the giant iron-bark tree that grew close behind the house swayed and creaked weirdly, and threw out those strange sobs and moans that on wild nights bring terror to the hearts of bush children. A glimmer of lightning appeared through the cracks in the slabs.
Several deep creeks were crossed, all running strongly with clear pelluced water to W. and N.W. The timber when it occured was bloodwood, stringy and iron-bark on the ridges, banksia, grevillia, and several kinds of tea-trees in the gullies, which were honey-combed and boggy. Two new kinds of palm were seen.
Two of them, Warrigal and another, watched with a good deal of interest the burial of the swag beneath a drought-seared solitary iron-bark. No sooner was the man out of sight he walked slowly and with a somewhat staggering gait now than the pack unearthed his swag with quick, vicious strokes of their feet, and laid it bare to the full blaze of the afternoon sunlight.
On passing through this gorge, which, from the name of a hill on the south side, may be named Ydire, I crossed a very extensive tract of flat country, on which the wood consisted of iron-bark and acacia pendula; this tract being part of a valley evidently declining to the north-west, which is bounded on the south by the Liverpool Range, and on the south-west by the extremities from the same.
It was plentifully watered, and remarkable for presenting the only iron-bark trees that were seen since leaving the Einasleih. At 8 and 12 miles, two small very boggy creeks were crossed, the first of which had to be bridged. Their banks were very unsound and swampy, covered with tea-tree, pandanus, ferns, and all kinds of valueless underwood.
Leichhardt's description at the point where they had supposed that they should strike it, made it stony and timbered with iron-bark and box. Now, since leaving the Einasleih they had not seen a single box or iron-bark tree, or a stone. Frank Jardine therefore determined to push out to thenorth-east, and again seek this seemingly apocryphal stream.
In the first place, his missile must be perfectly straight, and of the hardest wood; and no bough, however large, would fulfil these requirements, so it must be cut out bodily from the stem of an iron-bark tree, and the nearer the heart he can manage to get, the better will be his weapon.
Thick patches of a kind of tree, much resembling brigalow in its appearance and grain, were seen on the river banks; but the box, apple-gum, and iron-bark, mentioned by Leichhardt as growing in this latitude were altogether wanting. Large ant-hills, as much as 15 feet in height, which were frequent, gave a remarkable appearance to the country.
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