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'So we unstrapped our swags and hid them in the mulga scrub by the side of the road; then we rode on to the shanty, got down, and hung our horses to the verandah posts. "Poisonous" came out at once, with a smile on him that would have made anybody home-sick.
Nicholls had previously got strangely excited in fact the poor fellow was light-headed from thirst, and at one place where there was no water he threw up his hat and yelled out "Water, water!" he walking a little in advance; we had really passed the spot where the water was, but when Nicholls gave the false information I jumped down off my camel and ran up to him, only to be grievously disappointed; but as I went along I caught sight of a whitish light through the mulga trees partially behind me, and without saying a word for fear of fresh disappointment, I walked towards what I had seen; Nicholls and Jimmy, who both seemed dazed, went on with the camels.
Such is the irony of the desert. Pat Dorrity's horse had been abandoned ten miles back, and the tottering man had walked on, till, when he had managed to stagger to the top of the last sandhill, and had seen two clumps of timber, one of box and one of mulga, his senses had played him false and he had gone to the mulgas. Stobart did not stop to wonder how his old friend had come to such a pass.
Wood excessively hard, dark-brown; used, preferentially, by the natives for boomerangs, sticks with which to lift edible roots, and shafts of phragmites, spears, wommerahs, nulla-nullas, and jagged spear ends. Mr. J.H. Maiden determined the percentage of mimosa tannic acid in the perfectly dry bark as 8.62." The mulga bears a small woody fruit called the mulga apple.
We followed the creek for some distance, at length it became very undefined, and the gum timber disappeared. Only a few acacia bushes now indicated the flow of the water over the grassy mulga flats, which wound about so much around sandhills in the scrub, that I left the creek, and pushed on now for the South Australian Telegraph Line.
"There's ticklish work ahead. You watch me." And they settled down again to give all their attention to the work in hand. About five miles west of the town is a narrow but close belt of timber, mostly gnarled mulga and gidgee, with here and there a sprawling stunted creek gum. The cattle were making for this shelter. But already the tremendous pace was beginning to tell.
On the top of the ridge are three conspicuously tall dead mulga trees. From the mulga trees the bluff bears 144 degrees. One and a half miles N.E. by N. from the cave is a valley of open spinifex, breaking through the ridges in a West and Southerly direction, on which are clumps of cork-bark trees; these would incline one to think that water cannot be far below the surface in this spot.
We have not seen a drop of water on the surface; the ground evidently absorbs all that falls; the scrub is principally the mulga and hakea bushes and acacia, with a few other small bushes, but very little salt bush. Camped to-night without water.
In due course we reached the burnt country for which we had steered, and, after hours of tracking, singled out some footsteps going straight away as if to camp. Warri and I were leading, riding Highlander in turn; on cresting a high ridge we saw before us a little clump of mulga and grass, amongst it a camp of some dozen or more natives.
Travelling on through 200 or 300 yards of mulga, we came out on the open ground, which was really a sight that would delight the eyes of a traveller, even in the Province of Cashmere or any other region of the earth.
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