The Explorers (21 page)
On this I got angry and told Mr Hovell that I would prefer being rid of him altogether rather than have one in his position setting such a bad example. I gave him to understand very plainly that for me, or all I cared, he might just remain on the side of the river he was standing on, but I was determined to pursue the journey as originally intended.
I also threatened to put Claude
in
the river if he did not cross it with me, at the same time seizing him by the throat, as if to make good my threat; in fact, I frightened the fellow into crossing along with me.
I then rigged out my tarpaulin boat* and crossed with my men and my cattle. Mr Hovell, with his men, remained on the near side of the river, with the asserted purpose of recrossing the Hume and following down its northern bank.
After I had crossed the Mitta Mitta, taken my wattle-boat to pieces, and made a start onwards, Mr Hovell called after me, pressing me to stop and assist him over, and that he would accompany me. I did so. To his horror, on the very same afternoon, we made the Kiewa River (Little River), bank high; but were saved the trouble of using the boat, as a fallen tree assisted our crossing. We then passed over the present Ovens goldfieldsâ¦
Had I, at this time, become in any way discouraged, or had I yielded in the least to the reluctance of Mr Hovell at crossing the Hume, and his refusal to cross the Mitta Mitta with me, our expedition must have ended on the north bank of the Hume. I can here safely affirm that, only for my own fixed determination to go on at this point, Bass's Straits would never have been reached by any of our party.
Faculties Peculiar to Man, 1826
Dumont d'Urville sailed into Australian waters in search of safe anchorages for French ships and a suitable location for a possible penal settlement. His first port of call was King George Sound near present-day Albany.
Dumont d'Urville led an extraordinary life. In 1810 he purchased the
Venus de Milo
from a Greek peasantâit had arms then, but these were broken off in a tussle for the priceless object between the French and Turkish soldiers. He later explored in Australia, the subantarctic and elsewhere. He died in a train crash in Versailles in 1842.
In King George Sound in October 1826, the expedition scientists Jean René Quoy and Joseph Paul Gaimard wrote detailed notes on the Aborigines they encountered there which formed part of Dumont d'Urville's original expedition report.
The natives of King George Sound are generally below average height; however, there were some quite tall ones among the twenty-five to thirty of them that we were able to see. At first sight one is struck by their thinness and the diminutiveness of their lower limbs, but this tendency does not appear to be peculiar to these people; it is due to the miserable state in which they live and lack of sufficient nourishment to develop those parts. What we have seen in these regions seems to bear this out. Some women from a New Holland tribe that lives on the mainland opposite Kangaroo Island, and others from Port Dalrymple in Van Diemen's Land and abducted by English sealers in this emaciated condition, after living with them and eating meat in abundance, had very well developed, even obese, extremities. The same condition applied to several tribes in New South Wales. Whatever the cause, this characteristic emaciation is so marked among the men we are concerned with here, that it seems peculiar and quite extraordinary at first sight and the drawing that M. Sainson made of a child looks like a real caricature; one would say that his lower limbs are nothing but a femur and tibia covered with skin.
If the torso seems more developed and compact, one can only attribute this to the spindliness of their legs, because it is usually thin. The arms too are the same but slightly less so. However, the stomach is rounded with a tendency to enlarge; which can easily be explained by the habit these savages have; as they are exposed to long periods of abstinence, they overeat when they get the opportunity.
The head is quite large, the face broad, the brow ridges very prominent, the more so perhaps because their eyes, the whites of which are a yellowish white, are very deepset. They have fairly wide and flat nostrils, their lips are moderately thick, the gums are pale, a big wide mouth is filled with beautiful regular teeth, the whole set resembling those artificial jaws that one sees in Paris in the Palais-Royal. They have quite ordinary ears; their hair is wavy without being frizzy, but it is hard to recognise the colour because it is always covered with a layer of ochre, except in the children, who have brown or black hair. Their beards are sparse as are their moustaches.
Their usual colour varies between a light black and a reddish black. Their emaciation is so pronounced that some of them look like spectres. This is not surprising when you consider that the earth provides practically no food for these people whose only weapon is a primitive spear, and who have to cover large areas in search of small prey like snakes, lizards, skinks and sometimes phalangers and bandicoots, which they eat without cooking after merely scorching them in the fire. We have occasionally seen them devour with the same relish the fish intestines that our sailors threw awayâ¦
The wretched state in which these tribes seem to live has not destroyed, as one might think likely, certain of the faculties peculiar to man. Thus, for example, one cannot say that the inhabitants of King George Sound are stupid, although their existence is spent almost entirely in sleeping or searching for food. Our presence put them in high spirits, and they tried to communicate their feelings to us with a loquacity to which we could not respond because we did not know their language. On meeting, they approached us first, talking and gesticulating a great deal; they would give loud shouts, and if we responded in the same tone, their delight knew no bounds. Soon there would be an exchange of names, and it was not long before they would ask for food by patting their stomachs. During a night spent among them on shore, we quite easily picked up their words for everyday things, and they were unfailingly very kindly disposed towards us. They sometimes followed us as we went about our work; however, it must be said that they continually displayed a lack of industry and a laziness which never moved them to offer to help with certain work that other men would have been eager to lighten for us, such as, for example, carrying our collection of specimens, looking for shells and so on.
If the need for food or some other reason obliges them to leave the settlements where they have their huts, they can be seen wandering about in small groups of two, three or four, rarely seven or eight, and they are not afraid to camp out in the open without any shelter. They merely light a fire beside which they never stop shivering with cold. And this was in spring in the southern hemisphere. What must it be like in winter?â¦These children of nature, of whom such a brilliant picture has been painted, sometimes seem to us very much to be pitied. If they intend spending a night somewhere, they promptly build a small hut hardly adequate to protect them from the rain.
When they are distressed they cry easily; this happened to an old man who was involuntarily kept on board a little longer than he wanted to be. They sometimes sing, or rather they chant. Paternal love seems fairly well developed among them, as we saw from our friend Patêt; this good Australian took great care of his son Yalepouol, who accompanied him everywhere and came aboard
Astrolabe
with him.
On the Importance of a Good Introduction, 1830
Charles Sturt was as gifted with the pen as he was with the compass. We join him here in a boat on the Murray in January 1830, between the Murrumbidgee and the Darling. In contrast with most other explorers, he encountered vast numbers of Aborigines in this heavily populated region. Clearly, tribal boundaries were fiercely defended, and the use of emissaries to provide an introduction for travelling groups was essential if conflict was to be avoided. All goes well for Sturtâuntil his boat outsails his Aboriginal heralds.
Of all expeditionary turning points, I like this one best. Sturt's progress is stopped by a vast fishing net strung across the Darling. Out of consideration for the Aborigines who depend upon it for survival, Sturt decides not to breach the net. Instead he raises the Union Jack, gives three cheers and returns whence he came.
We had not seen any natives since falling in with the last tribe on the Murrumbidgee. A cessation had, therefore, taken place in our communication with them, in re-establishing which I anticipated considerable difficulty. It appeared singular that we should not have fallen in with any for several successive days, more especially at the junction of the two rivers, as in similar situations they generally have an establishment. In examining the country back from the stream, I did not observe any large paths, but it was evident that fires had made extensive ravages in the neighbourhood, so that the country was, perhaps, only temporarily deserted. Macnamee, who had wandered a little from the tents, declared that he had seen about a dozen natives round a fire, from whom (if he really did see them) he very precipitately fled, but I was inclined to discredit his story, because in our journey on the following day we did not see even a casual wanderer.â
The river maintained its character, and raised our hopes to the highest pitch. Its breadth varied from 150 to 200 yards; and only in one place, where a reef of ironstone stretched nearly across from the left bank, so as to contract the channel near the right and to form a considerable rapid, was there any apparent obstruction to our navigation. I was sorry, however, to remark that the breadth of alluvial soil between its outer and inner banks was very inconsiderable, and that the upper levels were poor and sandy. Blue gum generally occupied the former, while the usual productions of the plains still predominated upon the latter, and showed that the distant interior had not yet undergone any favourable change. We experienced strong breezes from the north, but the range of the thermometer was high, and the weather rather oppressive than otherwise. On the night of the 16th, we had a strong wind from the
NW
, but it moderated with daylight, and shifted to the
ENE
, and the day was favourable and coolâ¦
About 4 p.m. some natives were observed running by the river side behind us, but on our turning the boat's head towards the shore they ran away. It was evident that they had no idea what we were and, from their timidity, feeling assured that it would be impossible to bring them to a parley, we continued onwards till our usual hour of stopping, when we pitched our tents on the left bank for the night, it being the one opposite to that on which the natives had appeared. We conjectured that their curiosity would lead them to follow us, which they very shortly did; for we had scarcely made ourselves comfortable when we heard their wild notes through the woods as they advanced towards the river; and their breaking into view with their spears and shields, and painted and prepared as they were for battle, was extremely fine. They stood threatening us and making a great noise for a considerable time but, finding that we took no notice of them, they, at length, became quiet.
I then walked to some little distance from the party and, taking a branch in my hand as a sign of peace, beckoned them to swim to our side of the river, which, after some time, two or three of them did. But they approached me with great caution, hesitating at every step. They soon, however, gained confidence, and were ultimately joined by all the males of their tribe. I gave the first who swam the river a tomahawk (making this a rule in order to encourage them) with which he was highly delighted. I shortly afterwards placed them all in a row and fired a gun before them: they were quite unprepared for such an explosion, and after standing stupified and motionless for a moment or two they simultaneously took to their heels, to our great amusement. I succeeded, however, in calling them back, and they regained their confidence so much that sixteen of them remained with us all night, but the greater number retired at sunset.