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We passed the location of another tribe during the day, and recovered our letter-bag, which had been left by our messengers with a native belonging to it. Here the old Boocolo left us and returned to Williorara. The last days of 1845 and the few first of 1846 were exceedingly oppressive, and the heat was almost as great as in the interior itself.
There were, at the fire near the tents, a number of the young men of the Williorara tribe; and it would appear, from what occurred, that they were talking about us in no friendly strain.
I began, therefore, to suspect that it was one of those reports which the natives are, unaccountably, so fond of spreading without any apparent object in view. As we approached Williorara the course of the river upwards was somewhat to the westward of north. The country had an improved appearance as we ascended it, and grass seemed to be more generally distributed over the flats.
I am quite sure, that so long as he remained with the party, he would have sacrificed his life rather than an individual should have been injured. I shall frequently have to speak of this our old friend Nadbuck, and will not therefore disturb the thread of my narrative by relating any anecdote of him here. It may be enough to state that he accompanied us to Williorara, even as he had attended Mr.
The brush however was too thick, and in galloping through it after a bull, Flood's carbine exploded, and blew off three of the fingers of his right hand. This accident obliged me to remain stationary for two days, notwithstanding my anxiety to get up to the lagoon at Williorara, to ascertain the truth or otherwise of the report I had heard of the massacre of a party of overlanders there.
I had assumed Sir Thomas Mitchell's position at Williorara as correct, and had taken the most careful bearings from that point to the Depot, and the position in which they fixed it differed but little from the result of the many lunars I took during my stay there.
On the 21st December, they arrived at the camp of the relief party, under Piesse, at Williorara, and Sturt's last expedition came to an end. As he has often been termed the father of Australian exploration, it may be as well to look back on the result of his life-long labours.
In my communication to the Governor of South Australia, I expressed a desire that a supply of provisions might be forwarded to Williorara by the end of December, about which period I hoped I should be on my return from the interior. I regretted exceedingly putting her Majesty's Government to this additional cost, but I trust a sufficient excuse will have been found for me in the foregoing pages.
With the exception of the tribe at the Ana-branch, and the old man, we had seen no natives since leaving the Murray; but, from the reports we had heard of the recent massacre of the overland party at Williorara, and the character of the Darling blacks, I was induced to take double precautions as I journeyed up the river, and had the camp so formed that it could not be surprised.
In their physical condition they are inferior to the natives of the Murray in size and strength, but we have seen many very handsome men, and, although diminutive in stature, exceedingly well proportioned. The tribe at Williorara, Laidley's Ponds, numbers about eighty souls; the greater proportion women and children.
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