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Updated: May 20, 2025
Certainly there was plenty of tin at Kurnalpi, and plenty of alluvial gold as well for the lucky ones amongst which we were not numbered.
This method is only suitable when the soil is wet and sticky, or where the nuggets are fairly large and not too rare. On the first rush to Kurnalpi, where more alluvial gold was found in a short time than on any other field, sieves were almost the only implements used. A sieve is very useful for prospecting the surface soil, being more portable and more rapidly worked than the dishes.
Bayley's is one and a half miles from their boundary, Kalgoorlie twelve miles, Kurnalpi seven miles, and a number of other places lie just on the wrong side of the survey line to please the shareholders, though had all these rich districts been found on their land, I fancy there would have been a pretty outcry from the general public.
Queen Victoria Spring, reported permanent by Giles, lay some seventy miles to the eastward, and attracted our attention; for Lindsay had reported quartz country near the Ponton, not far from the Spring, and the country directly between the Spring and Kurnalpi was unknown.
Soon after sunset on the 27th, from the branches of a high gum tree we sighted the Pinnacles almost dead on our course; and late that night we reached the lake, and found to our joy a condenser already established, by means of which two men earned a precarious livelihood by selling water to travellers for these lakes were on the direct track from Kurnalpi to the Mount Margaret district.
Very rough, stony hills covered with dense scrub surround Kurnalpi on the south; once across these, flat, open country of saltbush and samphire, rapidly changing into salt-swamp, made travelling easy; passing over another low range of diorite, from which we got an extensive view of Lake Lapage to the west and Lake Roe to the east, we reached Beri, hitting off the rock with so much accuracy that even Paddy Egan was surprised into praise of the compass.
The general verdict was notice to quit within so many hours an order that few would dare to neglect. A case in which this did happen occurred at Kurnalpi when a man was caught passing bad notes in the "Sunday School." He refused to budge, and, seeing that he was a great giant with the reputation of being the roughest and hardest fighter in the country, the question arose who should "bell the cat."
On November 10th we made a start from Coolgardie, and, travelling along the Twenty-five Mile road for some fifteen miles, we branched off in an easterly direction, to try some country where I had previously found "colours" of gold, when journeying from Kurnalpi to the Twenty-five Mile.
Kurnalpi was known at first as "Billy-Billy," or as "The Tinker's Rush" the first name was supposed by some to be of native origin, by others to indicate the amount of tin used in the condensing plants "Billy," translated for those to whom the bush is unfamiliar, meaning a tin pot for boiling tea in, and other such uses.
Failing to find any gold, and being in need of flour, we made south to Kurnalpi, through country flat and uninteresting, and arrived at that camp just in time to secure the last two bags of flour. The town was almost deserted, and had none of the lively and busy appearance that it presented when I had last seen it. All who saw us praised our equipment and forethought in having portable condensers.
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