Title:      Last Leaves from Dunk Island (1925)
Author:     E J Banfield
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eBook No.:  0300451.txt
Language:   English
Date first posted:          March 2003
Date most recently updated: March 2003

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A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook

Title:      Last Leaves from Dunk Island (1925)
Author:     E J Banfield





CONTENTS


PART I

THE TEMPEST
SHORE-LINES
SOUNDS AND SWEET AIRS
THE WONDERFUL SEASON
THUNDER SEASON
A HOMELY GARDEN
IN RESERVE
THE SERENE SEA
TROPIC GLORY


PART II

THE PIGLING AND THE PICCANINNY
PETER: A FISHER OF MEN
BILLY TOO-GAL'S GHOST
THE PASSING OF SAM
SAMBO'S STRATEGY
A BUSH OCULIST
FRANK EDWARD'S FALL
BILLY, THE GUIDE
CAUSE AND EFFECT
RESOURCEFULNESS


PART III

A SPINNER OF SAND
METALLIC STARLINGS
THE SUNBIRD
THE SWAMP PHEASANT
SWIFTS AND SWIFTLETS
CHARACTER IN BIRDS
A SANCTUARY PROBLEM
A JUNGLE FLOWER
THE REEF MANTIS
REEF JEWELLERY
AN ISLE AND A REEF
DOGS THAT HAVE BEEN
FACTS AND MUSINGS


ILLUSTRATIONS
(Not included in this ebook)
THE BEACHCOMBER
"LEAFLESS WILDERNESS"
IN THE TRACK OF THE CYCLONE
"BEHOLD, HOW IT BLOSSOMS!"
THE VIGOROUS UMBRELLA-TREE
THE AISLE OF COCO-PALMS
BEACHCOMBERS AND BANANAS
THE FAMILY ISLANDS
A TROPIC VISTA
THE BANFIELD BUNGALOW
THE BEACHCOMBER'S WORKSHOP
E. J. BANFIELD, 1901
BERTHA BANFIELD, 1901
THE GATE OF HOSPITALITY
AN ISLAND CORNER
OLD NESTING-MOUND OF SCRUB FOWL
THE BEACH, BRAMMO BAY
METALLIC STARLING, ABOUT TO FEED ON CHILLIES
NEST AND YOUNG OF NUTMEG PIGEON, PURTABOI ISLET
SUNBIRD BROODING
SUNBIRD SILHOUETTE
SWAMP PHEASANT ON THE ALERT
SHINING
FLYCATCHER (MALE)
SHINING FLYCATCHER (FEMALE)
BLACK BUTCHER-BIRD BROODING
SPANGLED DRONGO AT HOME
NUTMEG PIGEON
BABY TERN CAMOUFLAGING
TERNS' EGGS AMONG CORAL
THE BEACH, BRAMMO BAY
MR. AND MRS. BANFIELD AND BARRY
"THE BEACHCOMBER'S" RESTING-PLACE
THE CAIRN


DUNK ISLAND-PLACE NAMES

Goor-tchur   Trumpet shell
Mood-goo-gar   Fish resembling trevalley
Tchu-goo-berri-me   Swarm of bees
Cum-mat-nubble-nubble   Creek in which a sucker fish was tethered
Barcoo   Blue pike
Evboola   The looking-glass tree (HERITIERA LITORALIS)
Tiering   Round, smooth, hard nut, spur on one end
Pallon    Name of a gin
Woor-amboo   Favourite camp of an old man so named
Toorgey-toorgey   Pinna shell
Oom-balla   Fish (yellow tall)
Bee-ran   Tree (Barringtonia speciosa)
Gin-gee   Sunflower tree (DIPLANTHERA TETRAPHYLTA)
Tak-al   Block of dead coral
Wallon-boo   Half-tide rocks
Kum-moo-arra   The Alexandrian laurel (COLOPHYLLUM INAPHYLLUM)
Tool-guy-ah   Eel
Moo-jee   Terminalia melanocarpa
Bul-loo-go   Stone fish
Kee-woo   Yellow plum (XIMENIA AMERICANA); also known as Bedyewrie
Karra-man   Red snapper
Tee-ree   White stone (quartz)
Ambah-ambah   Big wind
Coo-nana   A bulky rock, isolated
Boo-garoo   Native banana
Tapp-ana   Resort of turtle
Toora-coorang   Small fish frequenting rock crevices
Inno-noo-bah   Black palm
Koo-lal-bee   Black cockatoo
Wolngarin   Palm with coconut-like fronds
Poie-koo-kee   Booby (brown gannet)
Meera   Stone knife quarry
Karra-malla   Sea urchin
Panjoo   Nice place
Wambyan   Burial place of a boy so named
Tambal-tambal   Mainsail fish
Moor-in-jin   Spangled drongo
Pool-bee-ee   Thunderstone
Kit-ah  Fish spear tree
Tar-koo-kee   Name of a man who died on the spot a long time ago,
              and who is believed to haunt it
Bidgeroo   "Debil debil" who kills fish with a stone-pointed spear
Neyring   Native taro (COLOCASIA ANTIQUORUM)
Pall-koo-loo   Group of Isolated rocks perpetuating a legend of men
               who came across from the mainland to fight
Ika-ika    Round-headed, half-tide rock, supposed to have been rolled
           down the mountain by a "debil debil"
Pil-cal   Favourite camp of an old man so named
Mar-tel-kee   Fish like catfish seen in fine weather in clear water
Har-ran   Coral patch awash at low water
Murgon   Quandong (ELAEOCARPUS GRANDIS)
Toogan-toogan   Macaranga tanara. Shrub providing fish spears, twine
                for lines, and a cement
Coobin-ootan-you   Falling-star cave
Kar-tee   Coral rock
Muggy-muggy   Coral mushroom where crayfish lurk





PART I




THE TEMPEST


I

Early in the year 1918 two great storms visited the coast of North
Queensland. One centred off the port of Mackay, four hundred miles to the
south of Dunk Island, on 21st January, and the other about twenty-five
miles to the north, on 10th March.

Forty-eight hours prior to the Mackay storm premonitory effects were
observed here, succeeding a memorable tidal jumble. During a breathless
calm a mysterious northerly swell set in. To ears accustomed to the
silence and the musical whisperings of a sheltered bay, the roar and
burst of the breakers of a wind-forgotten sea suggested a confused mental
picture--a blending of black and grey without form.

Heaving, as with deep-drawn breaths, out from the beach the sea seemed to
be both restless and angry, as glistening rollers heaved themselves on to
the strand, to be shattered into spray. They rifled the Barrier Reef,
threw on the sand lumps of coral to which brown seaweed hung, like the
scalps of mermaids, and swept them to and fro with savage persistency.
They brought driftwood from afar, and claimed all sorts of sun-dried
relics from previous depositary moods.

After a time the sea became silent again, with a sparkling, wavering
ripple, while the noise of its assault on the mainland beach had the tone
of distant, unceasing thunder.

Ten days before the second storm, while the sky was cloudless and the air
serene, a change in the quality of the heat was felt. During the first
three months of the year--the period of heavy rainfall--the temperature is
generally humid., Suddenly it became dry and burning, with a tingling
intensity, as rare as uncomfortable. For the time the moist vapours of a
mild steam-bath were dispersed by scorching breath as from a furnace, to
the discomfort of animal life and the injury of vegetation.

Early on the morning of Sunday, 10th March, the sky became overcast. A
fresh southerly breeze had sprung up during the night. A short, confused
sea tumbled in the channel, and the usually placid bay mimicked its
sport. With fearsome steadiness of purpose, the wind developed as it
veered to the east. At 5 p.m. it was travelling at furious speed,
twisting branches from trees and thickening the now gloomy skies with
leaves. Consistently with the strength of the wind the barometer fell
until between 9 and 10 p.m., when, with a conglomeration of terrifying
sounds varying from falsetto shrieks to thunderous roars, the centre of
the cyclone seemed to bore down on the very vitals of the island.

The devastating assault lasted about half an hour; it was followed by a
lull, succeeded by another attack of violence from the north and
north-west; then, as orderly as the storm had developed so it subsided.

With the barometer at 29.90 at 9 a.m., who would have prognosticated a
dangerous cyclone within twelve hours? Mark the regularity of the
derisive finger that, having failed to herald the storm, acted as a
servile registrar of its various phases at the moment of occurrence:--

9 a.m. 29.90     5 p.m. 29.50
Noon   29.40     6 p.m. 29.60
3 p.m. 29.70     7 p.m. 29.30
4 p.m. 29.60     8 p.m. 29.18

As the 8 p.m. observation was taken, the unassisted finger dropped
2-100ths with a jerk, and within a few minutes the demons of the air were
crazy with fury. That was the final reading for the night, for the crisis
came with such ferocity that the wreckage of parts of the house made the
site of the instrument inaccessible; nor was it possible to consult it
again until shortly before nine o'clock the following morning, when it
stood exactly at the point from which it had begun to move twenty-four
hours before.

Only while the core of the storm was passing was lightning seen or
thunder heard. Then the whole mass of tumultuously-racing clouds and
vapour was luminous at frequent intervals, and the rumble of the thunder
almost continuous--but the glow was weak and tremulous, and the thunder
timorous, as if the electricity was a cowed captive at the chariot-wheels
of triumphing Wind.

Throughout the night rain was incessant; but its torrential tramplings on
the resonant, ceilingless roof were not to be detached from the
discordancies of wind and wave, save only while breath was held in
expectation of whatsoever might happen after the terrifying lull. The
gauge overflowed at 10.50 in., so that the exact quantity for the
twenty-four hours during which all ordinary concerns and interests were
wafted aside cannot be stated; but, by comparison with results of
previously recorded deluges, the fall must have exceeded 14 in., the
greater volume of which should be ascribed to about five hours.

Being in perfect sympathy with each other's fury, wind, rain and sea, in
a common tongue, spoke threats of ruin and devastation, and fulfilled
them all in more or less degree. And it has to be confessed that the
crash and confusion of the awe-inspiring night, after three years of
healing, still ring in the ears.

While the rage lasted, a slight degree of comfort was attained from
considering the suddenness of the storm and its very violence. At its
lowest the barometer indicated nothing out of the normal; but its
marvellous activity as the wind gathered in force, the sensational drop
immediately prior to the crisis, the recovery as the depression passed
over, and the subsequently revealed fact that the course of the storm
was brief--little over a hundred miles--show that it was home-brewed.
Subsequent information proved that the dangerous phase was not experienced
for more than twenty miles to the south and twenty-four miles to the
south-west.


II

Having thus disposed of the formalities of a great occasion, the pages to
follow will be devoted to a review of its consequences, not to human
beings--and they were sad and disastrous enough--but to the natural
features of the island, as they came to be revealed.

At sunrise on Sunday a leafy wilderness; at sunrise on Monday a leafless
wilderness, wanting only grey skies, snow on the hills, and ice on the
pools to suggest an English winter scene. Along the beach, on the flat,
on the spurs of the range, astonishing transfiguration. The
shrub-embroidered strand is now forlorn, its vegetation, uprooted and
down-beaten, naked roots exposed to critical view. Not a shrub has
escaped, and broken and shattered limbs of tough trees appeal for
sympathy. The country is foul with wreckage.

Rain ceased two days after the storm, giving way to dry air under a
cloudless sky, and the effects of the visitation were revealed in harsh
crudeness and nakedness. Not a single tree escaped more or less serious
injury. Those not uprooted or broken at the trunk, are almost limbless and
entirely leafless. Instead of a compact mantle in various shades of
green, hills and spurs--and even valleys and the rims of ravines--have
assumed a tattered and frayed raiment of brown, as if a mighty flame had
singed the verdure.

All the minor secrets of the land are bare; the "verdurous glooms" of
yesterday are open to the inquisitive sun; the streams, fair-running but
foul-tasting now, are blocked with decaying vegetation, and the flat
lands are strewn with fallen timber.

Ravished by the profligate wind, once tender and lovable scenes flaunt
their wretchedness and woe, and seem to appeal for consolation. The islet
in the bay-hitherto a garden to the water's edge, offering to the
admiration of the sun and sea masses of golden-brown orchids and red
clumps of umbrella-trees, of incomparable luxuriance and beauty--is but a
bare rock with a forlorn crest of seared shrubs.

Let the dreary picture be blotted for the time by recollection of the
endearing past.

Huge coco-nut palms, that a few hours ago might have vaunted their
stately straightness, lie uprooted or broken at the base, or lean at
pitiable angles. Some lie fifty yards from the spot where their fronds
saluted Sunday morning's sun, yet still carry fragments of their burden
of nuts. What significant illustration of the demonism of the wind does a
fallen palm present! During ordinary gales the fronds stream before the
wind like the loosened hair of a woman, offering to it coy resistance;
but, subject itself to the tormenting cyclone as the palm-tree may, lean
in obedience to its will, bow before its strength, sway to its caprices,
there comes a time when graceful acts are of no avail. The wind will have
its savage way. The wailing palm is prostrated, torn and dishevelled,
carried along as if it were a straw, and piled with other trophies of
victory and violation in calamitous heaps.

The veering of the wind to the north-west, since it took place about the
hour of high water, occasioned a tidal wave, evidences of which strew the
green places of yesterday a hundred yards beyond the strand. Shrubs four
feet high are buried in white coral sand. Here, amidst the desolation, an
artificial flower-garden, acres in extent, has been created by the
successive action of wave and rain. Thousands of small shells from the
bleached hordes of the reef are stranded with the concavity uppermost.
Then the nor'-wester swept the surface of the new sand, leaving each
shell resting on the summit of a sturdy little pinnacle. At first glance
the scene is that of a magically-planted field of strange, white flowers,
the single atonement for the ravages of the dark hours. Here, too, every
exposed rootlet, every twig and fragment of drift-wood, is the crest of
a sand-ridge in miniature, telling the direction whence came the wind's
final onrush.

Forlorn birds, made tamer by one irresistible touch of Nature, flit
mournfully among the battered branches. They are silent. None of the
cheerful jeers and chuckles of the scrub-fowl comes from the trampled
jungle; the great flight of terns, which settled on the sand-spit on
Sunday and sat in a dense crowd, head to sea, has been dispersed. A
solitary, wind-wearied gannet sleeps, head under wing, in the sun.

Thousands of maritime birds were killed, and those of the land suffered
in like degree. Here the only species which seems to be in pre-storm
numbers is the swiftlet, the home of which, in secret places among huge
granite rocks, was safe against the shake of anything less than an
earthquake.

Some shy birds have been made confiding by the stress of hunger. This is
specially noticeable among the fruit-eating pigeons, which frequent the
jungles. For several days these beautiful birds swarmed about the ruins
of the aboriginal settlement on the mainland opposite, perching in
protected spots at dark after a great deal of preliminary fluttering.
This voluntary faith in the goodwill of man on the part of a timorous
bird shows that the storm had destroyed its supplies and shelter.
Although many species have been seen since the perfidious date, they have
not made free with the dwelling, possibly because a few acres of jungle
still stand, fresh as ever, at the head of a deep ravine.

The roof being off the store at the settlement, bags of sugar were soon
converted into syrup, which soon attracted swarms of bees of Italian
descent, and for days overindulgence in heady nectar seemed to be borne
without disorderly effect. As time passed, however, many became bloated,
and, being tipsy, passed from the stage of excited good-humour to almost
helpless pugnacity. Unable to fly, they crawled and staggered and rolled
on the ground, and savagely attacked bare-footed trespassers,
illustrating the ease with which industrious and provident bees fall from
grace under the temptation of a superabundance of stimulating sustenance.

Conversely, there is a change of outlook, equally quaint, among certain
birds. Cockatoos had acquired a taste for the seeds of citrus fruits, to
the dismay of owners of groves, but in consequence of the loss of the
entire crop these birds have not been able to indulge the habit.
Moreover, the figs and the wattle-seeds generously supplied during normal
times being non-existent, the noisy birds have fared ill. For many weeks
after the disturbing event few cockatoos visited the island. In the past
many reared broods in the security of this sanctuary, making morning
trips to the mainland for food and recreation among the more numerous
communities there, and returning shortly before dusk. Recently fairly
large flocks have resumed their accustomed journeys to and fro,
proclaiming the hour of departure and arrival with discordant cries.

Many scrub-fowls on the Isle were killed by whirling missiles from the
groaning trees. In two or three instances incubating mounds of renown, in
which chicks had been hatched from periods traditional to the blacks,
were destroyed; and at least one of recent origin, and under frequent
observation, was swept away by the tidal wave. But after an interlude the
industrious birds began to chuckle and crow in the bedraggled jungle, and
to rake over the thick carpet of fallen leaves in the forest. Now
attempts are being made to gather the material, of which there are
superabundant supplies, for new mounds. All through the forest where the
soil is light and friable the indefatigable birds work with energy, and
with much noise during the evening; for the white ants, having come to
their kingdom, must be kept down, and the capacity of the scrub-fowl for
such food represents a prodigious natural check.

It will be seen, then, that what Shakespeare might have termed "this
great perturbation of nature" had its effects on things small as well as
great, some of which operate generally to man's disadvantage. It
destroyed thousands of molluscs, tore up acres of what we are satisfied
to call seaweed, displaced coral by the ton, and made in the shallow
waters a maze of snags. On land, in common with distressed birds,
millions of insects cast themselves on the hospitality of human brings,
to our dismay and discomfort. Among the many species came thousands of
fruit-moths from the desolated banana-grove, invading the house after
dark and settling on maturing bunches, until each fruit was covered with
living mosaic. Dusky, greedy, gross of habit, they feasted the whole
night, and with quivering wings deposited their ova, retiring to obscure
places for the day. Their enemies--bats and nightjars--having been
decimated, their numbers were almost overpowering, so that for decency's
sake the fruit that attracted them had to be destroyed. And yet the
pomelo and the lemon and lime trees, broken and crippled, are already
displaying flower-buds, and with the tender green of new leafage
emblematize the most alluring of the cardinal virtues--Hope.


III

The loveliness of the Isle is of the past; but do I love it the less
while it bears the stripes of its chastisement? Shall I not rather
attempt to comfort and soothe it and heal its scars? Behold, how it
blossoms in its distress!

Did I not, years ago, banish certain garden creepers to the jungle, in
the hope that sooner or later they might wrestle successfully with
coarser-fibred natives, that seldom displayed aught but foliage? Have
they not now come to their own, taking advantage of the downfall of the
crude and intolerant rioters which flourished rampantly when all was calm
and well? And are they not offering tribute of blooms in half-forgotten
and unexpected places? Even a great, bullying, maniacal wind has its
compensations. Here they are presented in masses and garlands of pale
lavender.

Much is to be learned from such phenomena. Certain features of the Isle,
often conned but never understood, are invested with fresh interest, and
have become amenable to inquiry. For instance, cannot it now be
anticipated that the effects of the storm, instead of being inimical to
plant-life on a large scale, may prove to be beneficial in the most
sumptuous style?

Many forest trees were uprooted, or broken down, or reduced to a
branchless, leafless, almost limbless state--forlorn relics, so that in
the despondent phase dismal pictures were evolved. Would it not take a
score of consolatory years to restore the beautiful foliage and hide the
disfigured trees? How soon did Nature begin her soothing duties!

In the shattered forest the sun searched out spots sheltered from its
rays for many a generation, and germinated seeds of jungle plants which
had been dropped by careless birds or carried by idle winds. A thick
undergrowth is springing up, which from present appearances may
permanently transform the country. Instead of forest, there will be
forest in the process of conversion into jungle, and in years to come
there will be specific jungle vegetation.

Instead of permanently destroying vegetation, the big wind will have to
its credit denser and more beautiful growths; instead of grassy glades,
an almost impenetrable entanglement; palms will sprawl over lofty trees;
huge vines, with stems as thick as a man's thigh and bearing pods a yard
long, will spread a network over all; and instead of the forest's
comparatively dry surface will be maintained a moist, sweet-smelling
soil, and steamy conditions and half-lights. In time, too, the gradual
accumulation of vegetable mould must tend inevitably to the enrichment of
the land. We mortals are apt to fly in the face of Providence, to rail
against decrees that cannot be resisted, and bemoan their effects;
whereas, if we were able to look a month or two ahead, and were wise
enough to interpret Nature's laws, we might conclude that the results
would be to our ultimate pleasure and profit.

Occasionally, a single victim presents in its fall a more striking
picture of disaster than a number of others piled up in hopeless
confusion. One such--a soft-wooded tree which some call the "sunflower,"
and the natives "gin-gee"--lies not far away. It stood in a hollow some
yards from a low gully, so protected that the insurance of holding-roots
seemed, perhaps, superfluous. Taken at a disadvantage, its collapse is
pathetically complete. Trunk, limbs and branches lie smashed and
shattered as if the tree had been broken on the wheel under the rigour of
the Inquisition, its seemly proportions, huge leaves, and crown of golden
flowers utterly and completely desolated. Yet in other localities other
specimens, tried and toughened by the experience of many a storm,
stand but slightly affected, to the wonder of those who know of the
tenderness of the white wood.

Even in so imperfect and slight a reference to the stability or otherwise
of the trees of the afflicted coast we cannot omit the hibiscus. In the
van of beach vegetation on such occasions, it must bear the brunt of the
attack of the surges. In very few instances was the tough and pliant wood
broken, although twisted into strange shapes; but the shrubs met the fate
of the frontal line, being uprooted and overturned so that hardly a
single specimen escaped. However, the fact that seeds are produced in
great quantity gives hope that the beach may soon be redecorated with the
familiar soft foliage and the great yellow bells.

After such a visitation, probably the most conspicuous trees of the coast
are the tea-trees, for the lustful wind tore off their weather-stained
layers of bark, revealing naked limbs and branches of a pale-red tint.
The tea-tree's bark is composed of an infinite number of layers, thin as
tissue paper; within a few weeks of its ravishment, the exterior became
white, and, contrasted with the seared and stricken forest, each looked
like an emblem of purity and an example of strength. How few of these
magnificent trees were overthrown whose roots had obtained secure hold!
Few were snapped below the spring of the branches, or otherwise mutilated.
Most were stripped of foliage, but slender branches and twigs stand out as
an elaborate fretwork against the sombre hue of the battered and slowly
recovering background. Over a fair extent of country not a single
instance of an uprooted tea-tree is to be seen, save where the tidal
surges had attacked its base; and hundreds exultingly display clean
trunks and limbs and all the elaborate and beautiful complexity of
branches and twigs, now glistening with silvery leaf-buds. Wrong as it
would be, on such evidence, to ascribe to this particular species
supremacy on the score of durability, yet as far as visible signs may
give assurance, it makes excellent claim thereto.

Different, but scarcely less sturdy, stand the bloodwoods. Few are
uprooted, fewer broken at the trunk; but how horribly are most maimed and
disfigured! Limbs lopped off, they stand gaunt and grotesque, with few
evidences of life save a profuse crop of leaf-buds, soon to develop into
what at first glance seem artificial rosettes of leaves along the stumps
of branches. But for these superabundant buds, the woeful and distorted
forest through which Dante passed in the infernal regions could scarce
have provoked more dismal reflections.

Less at ease under extraordinary conditions, the Moreton Bay ash-trees
suffered greatly. In the thick of the sheltered forest they lie, scores
uprooted, scores severed at the trunk, and most of them more or less
seriously mutilated by loss of limb. This tree is more susceptible to
decay than bloodwood, and offers more inviting food to white ants, though
when seasoned it becomes almost imperishable. In the general disaster
huge trees involve the ruin of lesser trees of other species; but when
the cleansing fire breaks out Moreton Bay ash will burn, root and branch,
to a white ash.

Forest mahogany, or mess-mate, another eucalypt plentifully represented,
shows contemptible subservience to the will of the wind in all phases of
disastrous ruin; and in its perversity it will not burn unless logged
into masses and heaps. Thousands of prone trunks will litter the forest
until the white ants complete their office.

Of the wattles, that which is known locally as the black--the toughest and
the densest--behaved with the greatest staunchness, though many were
destroyed by the uprooting and severing force of the wind. It would seem
that the weak spot of many a specimen was about ten or twelve feet from
the ground; at least, thereabouts the trunk was often broken. Another
species, lacking a familiar name, but often more conspicuous because of
its size and the richness and fragrance of its bloom, fell like
ninepins, few being broken. The favourite habitat of this species is
sandy flats, where the foothold is insecure. The storm there cried
"Havoc," and let slip all its dogs of war. The scrub wattle went
down placidly, for in its home the soil is soft of surface.

Figs, soft-wooded, but willing to bend before the wind, do not show very
serious effects, though many in exposed parts were cast down. Slim shrubs
of upright habit and pithy texture escaped almost scot-free, being
pliable and submissive, and pandanus palms stood the test bravely in
comparison with many trees which vaunt a tougher nature.

Most of the jungle being in sheltered aspects, it is difficult to apply
the gauge which might serve for forest country; but elsewhere it is said
that the tallest and hardiest trees succumbed. For the most part the fate
would be a common one, since few of the denizens of the jungle are
independent. An entanglement of serpent-like vines of gigantic strength
is over all, binding tree to tree, and when a single giant falls it may
bring ruin to an acre.

The records of experienced and competent observers preserve proof that
birds and other creatures are endowed with sensibilities so much more
acute than those of human beings as to seem by their actions to forecast
changes of the weather. Gilbert White, of Selborne, mentions that before
the end of an exceptionally severe frost roosters which had been silent
"began to sound their clarions, and the crows to clamour as prognostic of
milder weather." It may, therefore, be reasonable to attribute to snakes,
as well as to birds, the faculty of prevision of so great a storm before
indications of its approach were given by the barometer or were
perceptible to human beings. Such a theory, indeed, has the support of
facts. Lesser frigate-birds rarely visit this part of the coast save in
advance of foul weather. Ten days prior to the event a large flock
appeared, wheeling high up in the sky. These, or others of the species,
were seen each day until the morning of the outbreak, and reappeared in
diminished numbers the day after. It may be that, as the storm became
localized, the birds fled before it; they came back when the wind
changed to the north, so battered and dishevelled that the fresh breeze
thrummed on taut but ragged wings, and the confident flight of the past
was reduced to evident efforts to keep on the wing. Several worn-out
bodies were found on the beach.

Unaccustomed silence on the part of swamp pheasants for more than a week
following the black-letter day, led to the conclusion that many
representatives had been exterminated; but it was soon discovered that,
although quiet, the birds were with us, having been, apparently,
frightened and saddened by the storm. Even now (1918) they seldom tell of
their presence; but the time will come when forest and flat will resound
again to their mellow voices.

One, at least, of these birds affords proof of the dispersing effects of
the big wind. So far as years of patient observation are to be trusted,
no swamp pheasants existed on any of the isles of the Family Group other
than this, the largest and best watered. A few weeks ago, when passing
the isle of Timana, three miles to the south, the happy sound of a
contented bird came from it, leaving no doubt that the bird, slow, weak
and clumsy of wing, had been driven from Dunk Island when the change to
the north occurred.

Before the event which brought ruin and dismay to many, no bird was more
frequently seen, more admired, and more welcomed than the frail little
thing which takes its familiar name from the sun. For many weeks
afterwards no sign of it had been seen, nor had its thin, squeaky note
been heard; and it had been regretfully included in the list of permanent
and regretted losses. Then, in the quiet of a lustrous and lazy
afternoon, one of the living jewels came to feast among the red hibiscus
blossoms. It received a joyful though suppressed greeting. Without its
sunbirds the Isle would have lost no little of its glitter.

This imperfect review of the effects of the storm on bird-life ought to
include brief reference to an element which may have good results
indirectly. Immediately after the storm it was evident that many land
snakes had been killed, bodies being seen among the long ridges of
rubbish on the beaches. For two weeks prior to the event quite a number
of reptiles known to the blacks as "Wat-tam" congregated about the
poultry yard, and it is safe to say that few escaped the alarmed vigilance
of a black boy, who believes in the legend of the extraordinary
viciousness and the venomous qualities of a snake which men of science
hesitate to pronounce dangerous. About a dozen were shot. Subsequently,
reflection on the invasion provoked the theory that possibly the snakes
had an instinctive premonition of the disturbance. Lesser frigate-birds
did give warning. Is the most subtle of the beasts of the field to be
denied so beneficial a faculty? Not a single specimen has been seen since,
and it is likely that snakes of such habit would be serious sufferers
during a whirl of limbs and branches, and that birds generally would
ultimately benefit by the destruction of many enemies.




SHORE-LINES



If in these writings the subject of the March cyclone crops up with
irritating persistency; if, indeed, it becomes as intrusive as King
Charles the First did in the memorials of the famous Mr. Dick,
peradventure pardon may be granted; for, after all the event was real,
and has stamped itself so deeply on the face of the land that no glance
is free from impressive reminders of its hasty coming, brief term, and
boisterous disrespect towards the concerns and sentiments of human
beings.

Yet it may be quite possible to say certain pleasant things about the
event, and to speculate whether it may not have beneficial results as
time passes. Indeed, already incontrovertible evidence exists on the
latter point. Within a few weeks after the storm two strange grasses
appeared in three different localities--within a few feet of high-water
limit in two places, and about fifty yards therefrom in another area over
which the tidal wave had romped. Soon the cows showed that the grasses
were good, substantiating the welcome of man. It is safe to say that
these grasses had not previously been included in the island flora, nor
had any of those to whom they were pointed out ever seen them either.
One of the visitors who shrewdly examined both is a man of wide experience
as a grazier in North Queensland, a cattle-owner, and one who takes more
than ordinary interest in the dietary of his herd. He was unable to
identify either, and was astonished when proof of the cows avidity for
them was pointed out.

My well-informed friend is apt in the opinion of abnormal developments in
various directions traceable to that fateful whirl. Do they crop up not
only in connection with plant and bird life, but also with the actual
life of the island itself? Did not the storm cut deep furrows here, raise
ridges there, amend the shore-line beyond belief, and subject the mental
processes of its inhabitants to a vigorous but not to be despised
treatment which has brought about subtle changes of temperament--something
beyond "the immediate material compulsion of life?" Can it be
other than a pleasant and proper duty to register from time to time, as
they become obvious, some of the physical changes due to such an
exhibition of magnificent and supreme force?

Much might be written of the more simple problems which affect the
shore-line. Let it be said that the tidal wave swept over an isolated
rock mass known geographically as "the Forty-foot Rock" and locally by
the less significant but better-sounding title of "Wolngarin," and it
will be the more readily understood how the shore-line in more
impressionable material was cut up and transfigured. The work of
repair began almost with the next high tide, and has been slowly
maintained since; but between the ordinary tidal range and the limit of
the advance of the tidal wave over the flat shore, raw sand still lies,
with here and there shoots of buried shrubs peering through the repugnant
covering. In this inhospitable element, and just beyond high tide,
several species of plants have shown themselves, inclusive of
watermelons, tomatoes, (not of that degenerate variety which sometimes
crops up in unexpected places, but good, rotund, sweet-flavoured sorts),
the beach hibiscus, the native cabbage, that lovely silvery-leafed shrub
known as SOPHORA TOMENTOSA, the poona oil tree, with its coppery new
foliage, many small and vigorous plants of the umbrella-tree, and several
varieties of grass.

There is, therefore, actual promise, within seven months from its
desolation, of the restoration of the admirable and lovely features of
the strand-line; but on the weather aspect, where for the greater extent
compact vegetation overhung the sea, the band of bare, hot rock, forty
feet wide, will probably remain until many wet seasons have encouraged the
successive encroachment of adventurous vegetation.

The "vagrant wheat" which came wellnigh to maturity on the coarse sand
of the spit may be satisfactorily accounted for; but these plants
were not the only ones to sprout. Others sprang up in other situations,
mystifying the observer as to the origin of the seed, and seeming to
establish their right to occupy the barren margin of the Isle, and to
proffer, as did Herrick's, twice ten to one for each bushel sown.

The most prodigious, if not the most remarkable of the vagrant plants of
the beach was a single specimen of the castor-oil plant, which on being
transplanted into garden soil developed hugely. Whence did the single
seed come? True it is that some years ago seeds were sown half a mile
from the spot where the plant established itself; but since none came to
maturity it would be vain to look for a local origin for the wanderer.

So far only two of the plants that have undertaken the care of the
shore-line are to be credited with special qualities for the work, one
being the more wiry of the running grasses previously mentioned. This has
already highly commendable results to its credit; and it is to be noted
that, though the seeds must have been wave-borne, and that all the plants
are growing in sand, those which lie close to high-tide mark show
indifferent resistance to the scalding of sun and sea. What a recent
writer on the entertaining subject of tidal lands terms "vegetable
groynes" are necessary influences in the restoration and maintenance of
shore frontages. It will be interesting to note the part taken by the
self-sown plants in a great natural process, the beginning of which
occurred, as has been said, within a few days after the destruction of
the first and second lines of defence against such assaults of the sea.

Readers of Rudyard Kipling's SECOND JUNGLE BOOK will remember with joy
and thankfulness how with elephantine vigour the jungle was let in upon a
village, the inhabitants of which had earned the displeasure of the "man
cub." Let the great wind of half a year ago represent the wild creatures
that acted on the suggestion of Mowgli, and see how true to nature are
the writings of men of genius. Over a considerable extent of this Isle
the wind did uproot and trample down the great crop of trees, so that
the scene was distorted and rumpled; but what is the result? Vitalizing
sunlight was let into many a shadowy spot; seeds from the jungle which
had lain dormant for many a year germinated under its influence and that
of warm rain; and now, instead of a shady forest, there stands a
mutilated one, with an undergrowth of jungle vegetation which promises to
become dominant in the fight for supremacy. This thick undergrowth
excludes grasses and low shrubs, and is too succulent to burn, so that
the promise of the immediate future is a change from forest to damp
jungle with its cooling airs and earthy scents.

Truly, there are infinite problems to be watched and waited for.




SOUNDS AND SWEET AIRS



I


During the first month of the present year of grace (1922) rain occurred
on this Isle on seventeen days, mostly between sunset and sunrise, the
heaviest for twenty-four hours being 3.48 in., and the total 19 inches.
Compared with January last year there is an excess of 7.79 in.; and,
since the opening of the wet season, according to local records, is
significant of its character, it may be judicious to anticipate an
average amount of rain during the next three months.

A friend, whose observations of the weather of the coastal strip between
Hinchinbrook Island and the Johnstone River extend over the third of a
century, asserts that the rains have been unusually late. With a trifle
of mental exertion, a December that gave over 27 in. is recalled. In the
succeeding year (1907) the wet season lasted until the end of May, over
63 in. having been registered by that date.

My neighbour is of opinion that Providence is too profuse of watery
blessings during the cool season, such as has been our lot for a season
or two, and regards as ideal the good old thumping downpour, beginning
about seven in the evening and ending with a jerk about eight the next
morning, from December to April, and just occasional and genial showers
for the rest of the year. Yes; there is something to be said in favour of
such a season. With a sound roof over one's head, all neat and secure
outside., the boats housed, the lamp alight, an absorbing book, and what
matters the sound of the rain?

An inch of rain per hour for the best part of the night contrives changes
of the daylight scheme, and sets the miniature fall half a mile up the
ravine, among the palms and tree-ferns, roaring more truculently than
thousands of sucking doves. Having found its melodious voice, it will
continue its refrain for weeks--a musical competition with the fluent
tones of the sea. Then there will be shallow swamps on the flat, alive
and musical with frogs--gruff bass and shrieking treble, and all tones
between, and every frog panting to be heard. All the lagoons will be full
to the brim, and the brown crayfish, with dandy claws of blue tipped with
red, will become busy in a gliding, stealthy way among the submerged logs
where the eels grow fat.

During such a season, too, the rivers of the mainland send out to sea the
makings of many rafts. Unattached, independent, aloof, the logs lurch and
roll in the swell as the current takes them always, with rare exception,
north, and on them journey white, full-breasted terns, to which one is
inclined to say, "Whither goest? Your home is here."

Every beach of the Isle is transformed. The big rain makes short cuts to
the great sea, and the sea chokes the sluices with weeds and spoil, from
which the sun distils a scent compounded of flotsam and drift that seems
invigorating. At any rate, it may be enjoyed unrestrictedly, and, with a
trifle added by imagination, may inspire many a romantic theme. As a
tickler of the more subtle qualities of the mind, what is more effective
than a pungency--agreeable or disagreeable? And can there be anything to
excite unpleasant reminiscences in fresh incense from unpolluted
gatherings of sea and shore? On such grounds is the revel in a hearty wet
season founded.

Sodden to bedrock, the Isle flourishes. Every plant gushes with excess,
and consequently suffers. Long, soft, sapful shoots hang limp and faint,
and seemingly sorrowful, as tipplers from over-indulgence, when the sun
disperses the low-hanging clouds. Good to behold is the magic of growth.
It tells a heartening story. Untamed, unrestrained, untended--see what a
crop of crudeness and waste!

The cool breeze blows in through the window. Likely it will be a night of
reading to thunderous rhythm.


II

It came after unexampled drought. Far-off thunder had heralded it the day
before; but heavy clouds had so often gathered and had dispersed without
affording the parched soil any refreshment, that signs which under
ordinary conditions would have betokened the break of the season were
frankly discredited.

Filmy, heated vapour tinged the hills. The still, hot air, saturated with
the essence of smoke from many "burnings off" on the mainland, quivered
in response to the swiftly approaching disturbance. Clouds gathered
suddenly. A startling clap of thunder sounded near by, and big,
widely-dispersed drops began to splutter on the dust and to stutter on
the roof. Other sounds were deadened.

Rain was so eagerly desired that, merely to enhance the pleasure of
anticipation, we preferred to assert that it would not come. Most of the
tall, blady grass had become as yellow as hay, and there were actually
bare patches, revealing bluish-grey soil whereon the little blue doves
squatted and pecked, almost invisible until sheer nervousness made them
rise. Of other grasses and of herbs many had become crisp underfoot, and
brown; but with the first gentle sprinkling dry soil and faded leafage
sent up an incense as from flowers blossoming in the dust.

Another loud peal from a fast-gathering, ominous cloud--the base of
which rested on the nearest hill, and began to descend, fixed and
determined of purpose--and the welcome din began. All surroundings
were blotted out by a grey mantle of warm but invigorating rain,
while lightning played and thunder rattled and our spirits began
to jubilate. The time of doubt was over.

In half an hour the smaller watercourses, where they were not banked up
with leaves, ran headlong races to the flat, spread out into pools, and
gave the soil more than it could gulp. Like a man rescued at the last
moment in a dry and thirsty land, it could not absorb liberal helpings,
but had to be content with trivial doles until it became accustomed to
the effects of long-denied moisture. Soon the storm travelled across the
sea, vapour gathered on the hills against an inky background, and all the
birds began to call--the swamp pheasant the loudest and most mellow, the
scrub-fowl the merriest, with its coarse hilarity and contented chuckles.

To the south the blue-black bank of thunderous cloud rested on the sea,
with never so slight a blur where rain beat on the lustreless surface.
Most of the Isles were hidden; some were mere misty blots, while those
near at hand stood out preternaturally green and bold, with the slaty sea
enveloping their fringe of mangroves. All this dull shade and breathless
calm seemed to exist for a single purpose--to intensify the vividness of
the nutmeg pigeons, that trailed in irregular procession from the
mainland to the restful Isles. Snow-white and swift, they flew low over
the sea in companies of ever-changing formation, and the islet near at
hand suddenly seemed transformed--its almost leafless trees and shrubs
burst in white bloom, and the blending of wing-beats and coos came as one
of the pleasant sounds of early evening.

But sights and sounds do not sum up all the refreshing and invigorating
elements which visit a scene blessed with a soaking and noisy shower
after a period of silent, nerve-agitating drought. Walk along one of the
many cattle-tracks through the forest, where all the trees are respiring.

Flowers are few, but the freshly-fallen and decaying leaves underfoot
give forth an odour rich and varied; one must stop occasionally to fill
the lungs with so potent and pleasant a balsam, and to give thanks for
enjoying it on such a generous scale. All the air is saturated with its
invigorating principles. Gums and wattles, the huge-leaved "gin-gee,"
tea-trees, the ripe, orange-tinted fruit of the pandanus along the
gullies, the big spreading figs on the edge of the jungle, the pungent
native ginger, the full-fruited nutmeg, the few last flowers of the
milkwood, the resiniferous gum of the "tangebah," the patchouli-like
ixora, and the sodden grass--all contribute to the medley of perfumes,
and create a longing for some magic art by which the combination could be
fixed, materialized, and sent to those who may still believe that
Australia is a scentless land.

A mile away, the little pool of the jungle-entangled creek, which was
opened up for the sake of our dainty jerseys, is all thick and brown with
the scouring of many a loop and bend, and gives out a virile smell as of
brewery waste; for is it not a solution of fermenting leaves of scores of
different species of plants? Better so than to be tainted, as it was,
with the remains of an inconsiderate eel, which died therein just when
pure water was greatly to be desired.

But why think of the immediate past and its trivial anxieties and
discomforts and apprehensions? Are not the little creeks flushed by over
two inches of rain descending wilfully in one riotous half-hour? Is not
fresh and juicy herbage springing from the warm, moist soil? Are not aged
and sedate cows behaving like frisky calves, and calves, full to the lips
with mother's milk, gallivanting with that giddy irresponsibility which
nothing but a calf may assume, and maintain the least pretensions to
sanity? The air is cool and balmy; smoke-stains have been washed out of
it, and the yellow beaches of the mainland and distant hills are as a new
and glistening painting, with slaty clouds as a background.

Compare this mild evening, and all its pleasant pungencies and its vivid
revelations of scenes that were blurred for weeks with haziness and
smoke, with the past drought that is already almost incredible; and, if
you are not harmonic and cannot sing a gladsome note, leave such gloating
to the shrike-thrush, as he makes the gloomy dome of the mango resound
with fluty whistling.




THE WONDERFUL SEASON



If Gilbert White of Selborne were living to-day, and among us, he would
deem it a duty to record every characteristic and incident of this
wonderful season--its winds and calms, its rains and mists and drizzles,
its temperatures; the growth of its vegetation; the condition and conduct
of domestic animals; the moods of its birds, the activities of its
insects, baleful as well as beautiful--and draw just conclusions
therefrom for the edification of his day and for generations to come.
Possibly he would have referred to it as ANNUS MIRABILIS, not because of
bewildering disasters, such as plagues and fires and floods, and falling
stars, but because of its genialities, its uniform and, so far,
persistent beneficences, and its charms.

Bold in the assurance that no cruel comparisons can be made between the
records of a man of genius who delights hosts of readers all over the
world and the crude, thin observations of a loving disciple, an attempt
herein is made to register, as Gilbert White would have wished, some of
the everyday facts which have been noted since the beginning of the year.
It is understood, of course, that merely local conditions are to be
mentioned, though it is apparent that similar experiences have been the
fortunate lot of the North, whether along the coastal strip or in the
big, open spaces where conditions are generally quite dissimilar.

What could be more agreeable to the needs, or more in consonance with the
hopes, of those of us who live in direct touch with the goodwill of
Mother Earth than the lasting, artistically modulated wet season, with
naught of excess and but one attempt on the part of unruly winds to fly
in the face of a serene barometer? The sum of the first three months
being much below the average did, it has to be confessed, seem to signify
a shortage of rain throughout the year; but, just when one was inclined
to give way to doubt, came a series of genial showers, followed by nearly
two months of mist and drizzle, with warm, clear, radiantly blue days.
These restored confidence and that good-humour which is never far below
the surface in the mind of a man who loves land and expects it to respond
to his trivial ticklings. And so the season progresses, without a single
note of disapprobation, save on the part of the confirmed pessimist who
declares it to be too good to last, while the little creeks babble with
assurance, and most of the trees and plants revel and indicate well-being
by the exhibition of glossy leafage and abundant flower.

There are singular exceptions, however, to the general appearance of
vegetation impudent with fat living, and certain birds have been wholly
misled. The umbrella-trees quite forgot to flower, and the big tea-trees
made but a poor attempt. Both produce nectar in excess, and expectant
birds must have been driven to less prolific and less tasteful fountains.
Two species of birds seem to regulate their migratory flights in
accordance with food-supplies--nutmeg pigeons and metallic starlings,
and, as has been recorded, (CONFESSIONS OF A BEACHCOMBER") the blacks
were wont to foretell their coming by three trees in particular, one of
the palms, the coral-tree, and the nutmeg. The latter was always
specially associated with the pigeons, but since it and the coral-tree
manifest (the one with fruit, the other with flowers) the advance of the
season, the blacks accepted them as calendars. When the leaves fell, and
red flowers began to decorate the leafless branches of the coral-tree,
the blacks knew of the coming of the pigeons.

This year (1920) the coral-tree has been unusually dilatory, and it would
seem that the theory of the blacks in respect of its association with the
pigeons is established. Records of nigh upon a quarter of a century show
that the pigeons arrive about the 7th of August, the starlings having
preceded them by two or three days. This season the starlings arrived on
the 10th, announcing themselves, as they invariably do, with the whir of
rapid wings, and acidulous exclamations. Not until the 20th were the
first pigeons seen--a small flock that seemed to be weary and spent with
travel. When it is said that the local coral-trees have still to bloom,
and that the nutmegs are scarcely edible, from the pigeons point of
appreciation, it will be admitted that the season has its contradictions,
and the birds were in the right in delaying their arrival.

It has been noted, too, that some of the orchids are later than usual,
and that certain culinary vegetables have been exasperatingly slow in
development. Reports from the immediate neighbourhood tell of the
tardiness of the orange bloom, while the mango-trees have flowered off
and on during the last three months without establishing hope of fruit,
and without that excess of foliage which often registers a mild and
encouraging season. It is said that sugar-cane is making the heart of the
farmer rejoice over the next year's prospects, that new lands are being
cleared and planted, and that the cultivation of the banana in the North
is about to be revived on a scale worthy of the fruit and the clime.

See, therefore, the elasticity of the mind of man under the pull of the
weather. Not that in ordinary seasons there is much to complain about as
far as the coastal tract is concerned; but when all conditions are
favourable the stimulus becomes irresistible. Timely rains, naught of
excess in temperature, bright and cloudy days ideally alternated,
wholesome mists which have swathed mountains and hills in a dripping
blanket of grey--under such influences hope springs eternal in the breast
of that portion of humanity which gaily gambles with the weather for
livelihood.

And that brawny breast, does it not expand with this vitalizing, tepid
air that folk from the chill South hasten to share with the fortunate
North Queenslander? And is he not proud of his country? And does he not
chuckle over the juvenile inconsistencies of those who cry, tremulously,
for a White Australia, while declaring out of their ignorance or
prejudice that the most richly endowed part of it is fit only for blacks?

Ah! we know-do we not?--the riddling and the quibbling of theorists on
what they term "climatology," and how they apply their theories. We know.
too, that we have the only part of Australia in which certain articles of
food can be produced to the best advantage in quality, quantity, and in
the shortest space of time, and that we enjoy a monopoly--bestowed by
climate, and therefore permanent and superior to the manipulations of the
envious--over other products essential to the well-being of the
Commonwealth. When we do trouble ourselves to ponder affectionately over
the catalogue of our industries, present, prospective and possible, we
ought to be the most contented of Australians.




THUNDER SEASON



Thunder every other day and revivifying showers have characterized
November (1917). Plant-life becomes almost obnoxious under the stimulus
of the heat which precedes the thunder and the rains which maintain in
the soil the dampness of a forcing-house. Between successive flashes of
heat cool and calm days intervene, deluding the exasperated tiller of the
soil with promise of easier times--less rain, less heat, and,
consequently, less impertinence on the part of the vegetation he finds it
necessary to repress. When the cycle of change is completed in a single
day the changes are, of course, sudden, and mayhap sensational under
given circumstances.

If the morning promised fair--agreeable temperature, cloudless sky,
gentle easterly breeze and swell-less sea--was it not an invitation to
abandon ordinary occupations and start off to the mainland, with,
primarily, the benevolent purpose of visiting a neighbour six miles away,
in a remote nook on the slope of the blue range across the blue water,
and incidentally of absorbing some of the delicate sensations derivable
from perfect weather and changeful scenes?

Almost insensibly the breeze veered to the north, creating that gently
frolicsome sea in which a little boat seems to be sprightly with
eagerness and vanity and endearing swan-like buoyancy. With the wind from
that quarter there is a cosy cove for her, into which her betters in size
must not intrude; and there was she left, bowing to each admiring swell
that peered over the basaltic boulders, which form a rude sort of
protection even when the weather comes from open sea.

From the landing a track through jungle leads to a lonesome hut. No gleam
of sunshine penetrates to the red soil; the lofty, thickly-leaved trees
are for the most part the hosts of creepers, some parasitic, some with
huge, independent stems, strangely twisted and festooned, springing from
the ever-damp earth. Their own leaves, and those of the great burdens
imposed on the trees, create an agreeable shade; but to-day the soft
light has a singular quality, not worth emphasizing but yet perceptible,
and the cassowary after which the dog raced seems to be grumbling and
mumbling in the distance at strangely regular intervals, as if its hasty
flight had carried it a mile ahead.

Emerging from the jungle into the forest, we felt that the wind had
ceased. Few, indeed, of the everyday sort of breezes visit this sheltered
nook; the stillness, therefore, was more of a mental than a physical
sensation, and the mutterings of the nervous, long-winded cassowary
suddenly became transformed to distant thunder, grumbling behind
intervening hills.

Having chatted with the lonesome man, and having eaten abundantly of the
varied and kindly fruits of his well-kept clearings, it was time to
return to the beach through the leafy tunnel, now gloomy, but richer than
before with the scents of flowers and profuse leaves and wholesome earth.
Certain effects--an agreeable warmth, a delicate stillness, an echoless
silence--gave our voices unaccustomed tone; at least, the listener
fancied so. Perhaps the atmosphere was denser than during the morning,
and voices did not carry so far, and appeared to be abrupt, yet clear.
Though scores of nutmeg pigeons were feeding among the tree-tops, and an
occasional displaced fruit fell with a thud or pattered through the
foliage to the ground, no voice of bird sweetened the air. Nature seemed
to be holding herself in check for some authoritative effect in the way
of sound.

From the beach how changed the aspect! Blue-black clouds overhung distant
islands, and draped mainland hills in unbecoming sombreness. The storm
which the morning had heralded with cassowary-like plaints was gathering
fast. Its centre seemed to rest on the customary pivot--the always-dark
mountain north-westwards--and it was wheeling to impose itself between
the anchorage and home. The question of the moment was, Is it possible to
cross the leaden-hued water before thunder-charged clouds make mischief?
Let the risk be taken; at least we shall feel in half an hour the
influence of the Isles, breaking down the angry seas if the wind veers to
that quarter from which it makes the present spot uncomfortable if not
dangerous. So, up and away with all possible speed!

No sooner was the hurrying boat so far on the way that she would have
been caught as surely in retreat as in advance, than the thunder spoke in
menacing tones; skirmishing drifts flew down the ridges to the west, and
an enveloping movement on a grand scale began to operate with
irresistible vigour and haste. The glassy sea was ruffled here and there
with spear-heads of wind, which subsided almost as suddenly as they
appeared, but became broader every second; and the sounds of the eager
engine, coaxed to emit every atom of power, were heightened by the
quietude. With dramatic rapidity the black wall to the south changed to
grey, the mainland was smeared out with a similar hue; a vertical flash
of lightning descended, or seemed so to do, on the highest peak of our
homeland; a deafening roar shook the boat, and the wind and rain raced
towards her with a line of foam in straight and unbroken array, as if
both wind and rain stamped to the music of the thunder. In a few seconds
the boat was the centre of a grey blotch a few yards in diameter., in
which furious though not great seas seemed intent upon tearing her to
pieces, while the wind rushed past like a fiend, angry and searching.

In the brief opening phase of the fight both steersman and engineer were
soaked to the skin. As in a cyclone, the wind brushed off the crests of
the waves, so that the circle in which the boat was central was a blur of
most indefinite outline. For a time the steersman felt the way by the
sting of the mixture of rain and spray on his right cheek, but presently
these uncertain aids to direction became confusing; however he turned his
face, they smote him on both cheeks at once, and, though it might be safe
to assert from the location of the lightning and thunder-peals that for a
time at least the boat headed across the track of the storm, a very few
minutes elapsed before sense of the course was lost, and all that could
be done was to attempt to dodge the seas that flew at the bows, three at
a time, and sent jagged pieces from stem to stern, sharp as teeth and
cold yet savage.

Faced with an exciting problem which exacted immediate solution, we drew
the waterproof cover over the boat and up to the knees of the steersman,
who had to handle the tiller and keep the pump going. At all hazards the
engine must be kept dry, for who could guess at the duration of the
storm, and how far the boat might be carried out of her course before a
sight of land verified her whereabouts?

Now the tumult increased, after never so slight a rift directly overhead.
A flash of lightning seemed to hit the sea just ahead; with but the
briefest interval, the thunder crashed and the rain fell in torrents,
so benumbing the anxious crew that it was barely possible to attend to
urgent and essential duties.

An hour earlier the sultry jungle had teemed with pleasantness, and was
pervaded with silence!

In the midst of universal greyness, 'mid lightning and thunder, the rush
of rain and the snap of fierce little seas on bows that always mounted
them, the chill which made teeth chatter and benumbered fingers, there
was time to recollect the calmness, the stillness, and the warmth of the
leafy tunnel through which we had wandered with light-hearted,
time-ignoring carelessness. Not that the present moments were entirely
destitute of pleasure--for does it not brace the nerves to be in a sound
and worthy boat when she battles with forces that you are convinced she
may overcome, given some sort of co-operation and guidance? You have seen
her behaviour in all sorts of weathers, and have never known her cause
the slightest apprehension. She accepts the seas, and is still mistress
of her fate; but at the moment there are other circumstances to be
considered. Will the supply of petrol hold out? What freakish spirit in
the engine makes the mixture of petrol and kerosene, which usually gives
pure satisfaction, distasteful? Charge the repugnance to the
thunder-impregnated air, and yet no practical solution to the doubts of
the moment is forthcoming.

Is it not best to conserve the pure spirit and let the boat drift before
the storm? She will do so in safety, but when the storm ceases where
shall we be? Where is the despised compass now? With the stopping of the
engine, strife with the encircling waves ceases. The boat, an
irresponsible chip centralizing the blur, drives easily, with lightning
and thunder and torrents of rain as startling, loud, uncomfortable, but
harmless attendants. Vain are speculations as to the direction of the
drift and its speed. Will it take the boat on to the rocky point--or past
it--or to the neighbourhood of the anchorage left ever so long ago? There
is nothing to be done save to shiver with cold, find comfort in the heat
of the silencer, and watch the edges of the blur for hope-giving light.
The rift overhead was but momentary; but now along one edge appears a
straightened halo, dim at first but rapidly gleaming through the
crest-broken waves and the rain. In five minutes the sky is clear, with
the thunder retiring to the mountain, which seems its lair, the seas just
lively, and the deck already drying. The boat has drifted in the
direction of the cosy corner wherein she spent the day; but the engine
responds to the first impulse, and she runs home with, as the crew is
happy to reflect, a certain saucy jauntiness, a conscious exultation of
having fought a good fight without the least show of submission, and now
with real joy in the victory.

The sun shines brightly, the air is sprightly, the distances radiant. The
cycle from freshness to sultriness, storm, and obscurity, and again to
freshness and clear sky has been completed for the edification of two
holiday-makers in a single wayward day.




A HOMELY GARDEN



If one wanted proof of the significance of Kipling's saying that last
year's nuts are this year's black earth, it lies at hand. just before the
cyclone a diminutive garden, solely for utilitarian purposes, was made in
sand fronting the beach, and with a short, narrow, spongy depression,
tributary to a little creek, as a background. Tall tea-trees and many
pandanus palms flourished there in the peaty soil which was never dry,
and where the frontal ridge rose from swampy levels the sand was black
with the mouldering vegetation of centuries.

Adjacent to the crude fence once stood a huge coral-tree which had had
its day and ceased to be, and the soft wood as it decayed formed heaps of
tindery stuff that mingled with the sand, helped to this end by the
industry of scrub-fowls.

For generations before the coming of white men the great coral-tree, as
has been told elsewhere ("CONFESSIONS OF A BEACHCOMBER") was the centre
of activities of the aboriginal proprietors of the Isle. Some of their
dead were buried beneath its shade. The living feasted there, for have
not their stone ovens been unearthed? Birds lodged in the big tree. Being
deciduous and of succulent foliage, it contributed largely to the
enrichment of the absorbent sand which its roots explored far and near.

When it died it fell silently--so silently that the few resident blacks
were scared, and began to cast about for some unlucky chance that ought
to follow so unaccountable a fact. Other forms of vegetation sprang up
like magic, to the further sustenance of the sand, and the spot became a
circle of decayed vegetation with a scrub-fowl's mound about the base of
the rotting trunk.

Taking a hint from Nature, it was decided to form a vegetable garden
where water and sandy humus, enriched by the deposition of the refuse of
ages, were available. Tons of vegetable mould were transferred a few
yards; tons of decayed manure from the milking shed were added as a
special stimulant, and to give it body; and the work was wellnigh
completed when the storm and its attendant tidal wave desolated the
scene. The buoyant elements of the soil were carried off like froth, and
deposited in the peaty hollow where the pandanus palms stood, ever
refreshed; little but salt sand, raw from the beach, remained on the
scene which had absorbed so much enthusiastic labour. The fencing had to
be restored, the beds reformed, and some of the disarray of the spiteful
breeze smoothed with hasty hands, for the season was advancing. The cows
became curious, discovering fencing insecurities, and making havoc among
the irregular plots that were ready for seed.

How speedily, notwithstanding the ruffianly check, did the site justify
itself! It might have been thought that the very heart had been taken out
of the soil, but elements inappreciable to the eye remained in the
seemingly intractable sand, and soon gave positive evidence of their
existence. Seeds germinated with almost magical spontaneity, and plants
of varied character made extraordinary growth.

In one case another lesson direct from Nature was accepted in thankful
spirit and put into practice. It was seen that vagrant tomato plants grew
among the beach rubbish, until the cows developed a taste for foliage and
fruit alike. Several bags of decaying leaves, seaweed, sponges, the cases
of dead crustaceans and mummified little fish were dumped beside a huge
log, and in this light stuff young tomato plants were set. The results
have been excellent as to quantity and flavour, though in size the fruit
has much to its discredit. Cabbages, beans, green peas, carrots, parsnips
and radishes, with neglected sunflowers, are giving good returns, though
for several weeks the weather has been by no means propitious for
succulent greens, and oft-times serious affairs have interfered with
regularity in watering the beds.

Let it be remembered that most of the crops in the primitive garden
belong to cool, if not cold, climates, and that here--well within the
tropics--in almost pure sand, in some spots hot enough at noon to blister
the feet, no check has been sustained by plants usually associated with
cloudy skies and dripping mists. On the untended sand-ridge beyond the
highest limit of the tidal wave pumpkins and vegetable marrows have gone
on doing more than justice to themselves, some plants having lived
through two seasons productively. But the particular area occupied by the
rampageous vines was previously covered with wattles and a great variety
of more or less densely-foliaged shrubs, each of which would add its
quota to the accumulation of fallen leaves and discarded fruit or shelly
seed-husks, slow but certain of decay.

"Alas for human culture!" exclaims Thoreau. "Little is to be expected of
a nation when the vegetable mould is exhausted and it is compelled to
make manure of the bones of its fathers." Was this thought in the minds
of the authorities when the regulations against the careless use of fire
were issued subsequent to the cyclone? Was it recognized that in the
jungle country fire would destroy not so much fallen timber as the very
life of the soil, the result of ages of vegetable decay? Here in the
North lies the biggest deposit of "last year's nuts." No other area
within our borders possesses such an accumulation of the spoils of the
past; and it is the duty of the individual, if not of the State, to
safeguard the elements of the soil which are liable to destruction by
fire.

Of course, it is true that all jungle lands prior to cultivation have to
undergo the chastisement of fire; but it would be a calamity if during
the dry season now prevailing fires were started in jungle country which
had been subject to the will of the cyclone. We do not yet make use of
the bones of our own ancestors to enrich our garden plots, but in the
primitive spot referred to the bones of the forefathers of the vanished
blacks may have had their part in its fertilization.

What must not be permitted is the destruction of the soil; therein lies
life not only for the transient individual. but for the ever-improving
race of mankind. If the labour of trivial hands may produce results such
as this ribbon of sand displays, what might be the result of proper
cultivation of the soil in areas where Time and Nature have performed
their offices, unrestrained, time out of mind?




IN RESERVE



Though flocks of light-hearted tourists flee from. the searching cold of
the South to bask for a brief season in the genial warmth of the North,
there are scenes of fascination denied them. They may wander with unquiet
haste far and wide to accredited beauty-spots, but sequestered ones of
infinite charm are in reserve for the permanent dweller, who abhors the
misuse of God's good time, and disdains unholy zeal for quantity rather
than quality in his scenery.

It may be but a proof of conceited simplicity on the part of an
individual to proclaim such a spot or such another as the most
satisfying, since a bare half-dozen people may be capable of confirming
his opinions or confounding them. Yet, if these little-known charms were
to remain uncommended, mischief might be wrought. Chivalry, too, should
compel the fortunate individual who may have joy, special and peculiar,
in a particular scene to give others pleasure by telling of the
combination of blue sea and green islets and glowing sky which appeals
more strongly than other land and sea scapes.

Among the islets of the Family group, sprinkled between Hinchinbrook
and Dunk islands, not one is denied distinction. All are, for the
most part, rugged on the Pacific slope, though some decorate even
that exposed aspect with vegetation of a sumptuousness that conceals
the crude, confused masses of granite. Each has a truncated sand-spit
jutting out to the north-west, while two have masses of snow-white coral
spoil, which clinks and chinks underfoot, and upon which shrill-voiced
terns scatter, with careless profusion, daubed and spotted eggs. The
waves that break on it with measured stride, scarcely whiter than the
coral, wallow among its finger-shaped fragments, combing and rustling
them, until all point obediently to the reef whence old Ocean tore them.

But not always does the sea burst roughly on those banks to overhaul and
re-arrange its treasures in severe lines. More often it sleeps, and
smiles in its sleep; and then the lighter and unconsidered coinage
tinkles as it rolls under the impulse of playfully indifferent touches.
Then, too, the hot rocks glisten with micaceous spangles, and, where the
sand is, our toughened and unworthy feet are dusted with glittering
specks. It is all wealth of a kind--not material in the accepted sense,
but real enough if you are in the state of mind which is superior to the
"toil of fools."

When one wanders among such scenes, where there is no sign of traffic
save that of his own footprints, no sound save the confidential
whispering of the sea, the thin screams of terns and the whimsical
cackling of scrub-fowl in the jungle, he becomes a part of the realm
of Nature, a trivial and insignificant item soon to disappear, but
for a brief space supreme--the only part of teeming Nature capable of
disinterested joy in all the other parts. The sea will quickly smooth
away the last trace of his trespassing feet, and will moan and gurgle in
cool crevices whither bottle-green crabs scurry when the red-backed
sea-eagle soars vigilantly overhead. Yet for a time he has been absorbed
into the scene. He possesses it and is possessed by it, and will bring
away with him a loving remembrance of it which entices beyond power of
abstinence.

There is, of course, one scene which combines more of excellences than
the others, however admirable individually. A little bay lies open to the
turbulent south-easters, yet lacks not a sheltering cove wherein a small
boat may nestle. The cove is formed by a bold and rounded mass of
granite, on which pandanus palms and straggling shrubs find foothold. The
boat glides round the sturdy rock, revealing a white beach, the sand of
which has been ground to such singular fineness that it feels as silk
underfoot. Where the anchor rests, it is rippled in correspondence with
the gentle heaving of the sea, while patches of golden-brown weed sway to
the same poetic motion. Coarse grass marks time at high-water limit.

From a low pinnacle of rock, on which an osprey is fond of perching, the
virtues of the wider scene are best revealed. Five islets, wildernesses
of leafage, trip out to the east. A mass of fantastic rocks, round which
confusing currents swill, intercepts the fairway, and beyond the islets
are the Brooke group, with Goold Island and Hinchinbrook to the right to
complete the picture. The bay beneath is shallow close inshore, for coral
is industriously building substantial domes and fragile lacework in
limestone. The reef gleams dull-red through the blue water, and white and
pale green patches show where sand has occupation of the unallotted
places.

On a very still and clear day you may see turtles browsing on the weed
below, and at any time they may burst upwards through the surface with
splash and bubble for gulps of scented air.

On the rocks, piled high, is a long pencil-cedar log, weathered almost to
the tone of the granite. It has reposed there, with but slight changes of
position, for fifteen years and more, and the salt spray and the tepid
rains have done it but small harm; but the rocks have fretted its sides
as it has rolled uneasily when the seas have sought to claim it again.
The old log is the one relic of the coarse effects of the hands of man.
Few visit the spot. All its charms are held in reserve.




THE SERENE SEA



No sort of tedium dulled the too brief trip over the serene sea. No
device for killing time by eating inordinately, or quarrelling, or
flirting, was needed, though we had one custom in common with life on an
East Indiaman before the age of steam--ceremony was banished.

Porpoises, snow-white terns sitting on drifting wood, sea-eagles,
ospreys, sea-snakes, sails, the smudge of steamer-smoke and its ten-mile
plume, sunlit isles and speckless sky, with no sound save the purring of
the engine and the prattle of the water against the bows--a catalogue of
the commonplace, and yet stimulative of entertainment and content. Not
one of the three would have exchanged places with far more favoured
mortals. Here was, indeed, the freedom of the sea--the sea in its
happiest and most alluring and loveliest of moods. No restrictions
existed. The little boat sought out ways of her own, nosing shoal-showing
buoys and beacons, and hugging the land whensoever and wheresoever she
chose.

New aspects of familiar scenes thus become revealed. Seen from such a low
level, the heights of Hinchinbrook and all the shoulders and spurs and
ridges of the mountain demand uninterrupted attention, for are they not
transformed? Bold and clean-cut, the skyline with its abrupt declivities,
its peaks and contours--here the profile of a giant with beetling brows,
long, slim nose and babyish lips, there a succession of irregular notches
and knolls--are projected against a perfectly limpid atmosphere, while in
vale and gorge


   Just a faint cloud of rose shall appear,
   As if in pure water you dropped and let die
   A bruised, black-blooded mulberry.


And this tinted haze seems to magnify trees and obtruding rocks,
revealing hitherto well-guarded secrets. The sources of torrents which in
the wet season seam the brown rocks with silver, now cushioned with moss
and islanded with yellowing sedges, are shown by an occasional flash and
glitter as the sun plays upon them at a reflective angle.

Each time the channel is explored from the deck of a steamer some new
feature stands to the credit of the gaunt hills, and those who know them
best make free to assert that it is beyond the capabilities of man to
carry in mind all their individualities. A few miles back Leafe Peak was
a perfect cone of delicate blue. More than once it has seemed to change
its position, and now it might stand for a model of Castle Hill,
Townsville, as that was wont to be ere nakedness shamed its base. There
is legend extant that the name is derived from the ribbon of leaves which
almost invariably stretches from the mangroves and jungle at the foot to
the mangroves of the flats of the mainland; and it is further said that
hereabouts the northern and the southern current meet, creating the
watery ridge defined by leafy flotsam. But there exists a
counter-statement to the effect that the name commemorates that of one of
the surveyors of the channel. It is a good name, whatever its origin; and
perhaps the wavering line of yellow leaves, as permanent in its perpetual
renewal as the impassive rocks, will retain its hold on the imagination
as an emblem of unity between the mountain and the mangroves, when good
folks in holiday humour have ceased to concern themselves about the name
of a mere man.

In days that are gone an adventurous black "boy" told of a short cut from
Ramsay Bay, skirting the mangroves of Missionary Bay, to the channel. No
one credited him, though he gave dramatic evidence in support of his
account, describing the manner in which the spurs and slopes of certain
mountains interlocked. Viewing the landscape from the deck of the hasty
little boat, the route taken by the "boy" was easily discerned, and since
the chart shows that the distance from the mangroves in Missionary Bay to
those of the channel is not more than four miles, the pass ought to be
better known.

In popular imagination the mountains of Hinchinbrook, however picturesque
and grand, are too severe, rugged and precipitous to tempt any but the
boldest and toughest of athletes; but a resident of the Herbert district
undertook many years ago to demonstrate that from a mountaineering point
of view the difficulties of ascent were not so great as appearances
suggested. For the love of the thing he rowed across the channel from
Lucinda Point, fought his way through the jungle, scaled the shoulders of
Mount Diamantina, and signalled his presence at the great rock on the
summit by smoke in such a short space of time that the Mount might well
have felt humbled. A singular feature of the boulder surmounting the
rugged height is that it seems to be a pivot round which other elevations
swing--at least, such is the illusion as the boat runs down the channel
and out to sea to the south-east, and from whatsoever aspect the stern
boulders of the mount are viewed, they seem to express aloofness and
disdain. Not so the nooks and coves in the sheltered parts of the
channel, which coax little boats to spend quiet hours within rocky arms,
and promise gurgling lullabies the livelong night.

Within such a cove the boat lay in silence and serenity. In the deep
shadow of the morning a fast steamer, blurred with mist, came rushing
down the channel--a white blotch with a backward-curling smudge of smoke,
calling to mind one of Turner's masterpieces; but that famous picture
lacks the foreground of bold declivities and the distances of hills aglow
with the beams of the rising sun. Thence the course was to the northern
extremity of Pelorus Island, avoiding the shallow shoals opposite
Lucinda, and, when a clearance was made, direct to Pioneer Bay in Orpheus
Island.

Here is good shelter for small boats in all weathers, save the uncommon
and brief winds from the west which seldom raise a sea. The entrance
needs to be known, for it is interlocked by boulders and blocks of coral.
Thence the course lay almost due south, miles to the westward of the
steamer track, close past Dido Rock, with its outlying sandbank,
snow-white in the distance--not much larger than, and somewhat of the
shape of, an upturned boat. Most of these islands, rocks and shoals bear
the names of men-of-war, derived in the first instance from the classics.
Is it not possible, then, that the steep-faced, weather-scored rock which
bears the name of Dido caught the fancy of surveyors who had in mind the
citadel that valiant woman built on the African coast, when a storm drove
her fleet there, and she bought of the inhabitants as much land as could
be encompassed by a bull's hide cut into thongs?

Swarms of welcome swallows issued from the crevices of the red rock,
circled round the boat, twittering greetings, and flew back to their
nests when their invitations to stay were disregarded. At Herald Island,
where anchor was dropped at 4 o'clock in the afternoon close inshore,
flocks of swallows again paid the boat respect, perching on the rigging
and spars, and making themselves easy and familiar.

Two or three spent the night on board, and the rest of the colony seemed
to have homes among the low granite boulders and blocks that fringed the
shore just above high-water mark. Here, as elsewhere, the sea was
sparklingly clear, so that isolated rocks crowned with brown, wavy
seaweed, rounded masses of coral and dead shells, gleaming white, were
revealed, and the merging tints, pale-green to deep-blue as the water
deepened off-shore where the sand was soft and pure white, made the heart
glad. It was invigorating, too, to wallow in such stainless water before
sunrise, the air being crisp and the only sound that of the cheeping of
the welcome swallows.

Suddenly clouds gathered in the south-west, and before a moaning wind the
serenity of the sea fled, chased by white horses. The boat lay snug under
the spit until the early snack of coffee and biscuit was disposed
of--then, rejoicing as a strong man to run a race, she swept disdainfully
round its apex and with frolic and saucy capers flew homewards.




TROPIC GLORY



Last evening (March 6, 1921) we saw the very gates of heaven. Those who
live under sullen skies seldom have a chance of seeing the majestic
paintings of the sun; but here, where hills and sea and sky are the
mediums in which a tropical sun plays fantastic tricks of bewildering
variety, you become accustomed to, though never satiated by, the glories
of The Beyond.

All day it had been scorching hot--that kind of hotness that tingles the
small of the back and adds two shades of brown to the shoulders during
the sun-bath following the noontide wallow in the sea. I had spent an
unclad hour clearing away loose coral from one of the favourite runs of
the little fishing-net, and had cooled down in the sparkling, noisy
streamlet that the wet season stimulates and freshens. That loll in the
fragrant water--it comes down the palm- and fern-tree-embowered
ravine--created an appetite for lunch, and afterwards influenced a dreamy
while of reading.

When I really woke and began to stroll among the mango-trees, the western
half of the sky, or rather a big area of it, was sullen--thickly,
diabolically blue, as if reeking with fumes from hell. Beneath was a zone
of curry-coloured sky, outlining ranges almost black in the intensity of
blue.

Away aloft, so high that a backward tilt of the head was necessary, the
cloud-bank was edged with light as ineffably variable as the shadows over
a wheat-field on a breezy day. Soon rainbow tints, appearing, disappearing
and reappearing magically in detached flakes and patches, and severed by
purple rays, hovered and flitted over and along the cloud. Occasionally
lightning zig-zagged horizontally across the densest part, and you could
just catch the mutterings of thunder.

A great patch of yellow light sprang from the middle of the upper edge of
the dusky cloud, like the half of an enormous nimbus, glowing and
glittering. Then, with the gentlest of gradations, its yellow gave way to
other primary colours, delicately displayed and quivering with fairy-like
agitations. A huge ravine opened up, a valley through rainbow-land,
leading to a wall as ruddy as imagination may paint, and embossed with a
pearl as great as a house.

Twice appeared a strange shape. Picture a bird soaring in a huge,
circling flight from north to south, hidden by the cloud-screen save for
one fully-extended wing, and that wing displaying bands of blending tints
of gold and green and silvery rose, with feather-tips of sepia, fluffy
and breathlessly soft. Picture the wing wavering and slowly vanishing,
until the final feather seemed the shadow of a golden plume and as slowly
reappearing in all its magnificence--inspiring the hope that the glorious
bird of Paradise would emerge and be seen soaring in its proper sphere at
the gate of heaven.

All the ships, the ragged remnants, the fragments and frayings of all the
rainbows of the most decorative of wet seasons, skirted the cloud or were
tossed about in luminous heaps; and then the scene burnt itself out in
extravagant redness, leaving the Isle in a lurid gloom, and its
inhabitants stiff-necked, but with a rare joy at heart.





PART II




THE PIGLING AND THE PICCANINNY



Though the piccaninny's arrival had preceded it, the pigling vanished
first, and since this is a record of departures it deserves prominence in
the title.

Both were island bred.

George the Greek, who seldom leaves the vicinity nowadays, brought the
pigling from Goold Island, where there was wont to be such a superfluity
that parents abandoned them on the merest sniff of danger. Possibly
George had murdered one of its able-bodied relatives, for he had with him
a joint of something that bore a distant resemblance to pork and was so
tough and tasteless that Debil-debil (the authoritative dog now of "that
equal sky") and his consort got it, after apologies to George. Impossible
pork, it looked like a junk out of a newly-felled bloodwood log, but had
naught of the wholesome odour of the fresh red wood.

So much for the pigling's uncle.

George was upbraided because he had inflicted the Isle with a
rest-disturbing orphan, helpless and squeakful. Inspired by hope, and
permitting his imagination to dwell on the attractiveness of a six weeks'
suckling, fat and tender, with a crisp exterior, browned and glistening,
and an interior gushing with gravy and  fragrant with herbs, he proceeded
to pet the helpless, lean little creature. Imprisoned in an improvised
hutch, well padded and bedded with blady grass, the pigling forgot its
brief experience of freedom, finding consolation in a diet of coco-nut
milk.

Intent upon giving its flesh a nutty flavour, over which his eyes
twinkled, George, after three or four unsuccessful attempts, made a huge
grater out of a foot square of galvanized iron, and spent an hour or so
every day stuffing his pet with porridge of shredded coco-nut and milk.
As its fat increased the squeaks of the pigling mellowed into throaty
grunts. Was it not living an ideal life? A luxurious nest, a plethora of
squashy food, a foster-parent who watched over it with stern vigilance.
If it had been in the habit of reflecting, it might have thanked its
lucky stars that fate had brought it to a scene where there was no
vociferous competition for mother's milk, no trapesing through blady
grass as one of a hustling brood, no sort of care or anxiety regarding
the next meal.

About a month before the advent of the pigling, Lucy had made Ned gloomy
and thoughtful by becoming the mother of a piccaninny, about a
span-and-a-half long, the colour of a tan shoe, with whitish soles to its
feet, and hands and fingers so crumpled and soft, and of such tender hue,
that they might have been the unfolding frond of a tree-fern. About the
same age as the pigling that protested shrilly if George's other duties
belated meal-time, the piccaninny so seldom made a sound that its devoted
mother began to imagine that it never would. Within its tiny hutch it
kicked feebly, grasped at empty nothings with fern-like fingers, grimaced
and writhed in an agonized attempt to cry, and emitted a squeak so puny
and faint that it was hardly worth an effort so painful. But in its
mother's ears that beetle-power sound was as charming as the din of a
corroboree.

George ignored the piccaninny, but took the pigling to his heart, ever
and anon assuring the community that very soon it would be fat and
tender. He hung about its hutch, contemplating its proportions in the
exulting, gruesome mood of that midshipmite who seasoned the steamy
cauldron, and, no doubt, hummed to himself in Greek, "How very very nice
you'll be!"

Both youngsters prospered. The piccaninny began to make her voice heard.
Her fingers unfolded. Her complexion became that of a new penny and her
mother foresaw all sorts of charms in her face. The pigling squeaked when
hungry (which was seldom), grunted when satisfied, snored when asleep
(which was often) and spent all the time putting on fat; and its
foster-parent saw more of beauty in its rapidly rotunding figure than did
Lucy in her wrinkled and crumpled offspring.

As far as interested observers could judge, both parties were happy, each
tolerant of the other's pet, each anxious to demonstrate the peculiar
fascinations of pigling and piccaninny, respectively. Interested
observers, moreover, came to the inevitable conclusion that, at this
stage, for intelligence and appreciation of the appropriate benefits of
life the pigling had the advantage. George liked it and in a sense
bullied it. It knew George and liked him and bullied him, and, true to
his cast of mind, George liked the bullying, responding by scratching the
bully's pink-and-white back until it squirmed and wriggled in ecstasies
of delight.

The dogs watched the petting from a distance; for George scowled
fearsomely when they approached the hutch, and promised exquisite
tortures if they dared to sniff. They also pricked their ears when the
piccaninny began to wail above a whisper. It was a foreign sound to them,
impossible, for all their restraint, to ignore. The conduct of both,
however, was admirably discreet. They were interested. No affectation in
that respect could avail. They were curious, but their curiosity was
tempered by wisdom. They were obviously jealous, but suppressed that
emotion under a pose of austere superiority. How could high-spirited dogs
be sincere in their indifference to two strange animals, one vocal with
assertiveness, the other a mere whimperer? They glared out of the corner
of their eyes while their tails waggled the assurance that both were
quite safe so far as they were concerned. If Debil-debil's state of mind
was interpreted aright, all his sentiments were humanized by that great
gift of his--humour. He would direct sudden gleams of actual savagery
towards the grunter's hutch, and then, turning towards his master would,
like a popular actress grinning with her teeth, demonstrate love and
affection and universal peace and goodwill!

Brooking no contrary opinion on the point, George decided the date of the
execution of the pigling, foretelling a rare feast, and, of course, Ned
and Lucy did their share of anticipatory gloating.

Two days before the fatal date, while the sun was below the sheltering
hill, Ned discovered that during the night the half-expected had
happened. Unable longer to resist temptation, the dogs had overturned the
pigling's hutch, scratched and torn at the door until it flew open, and
the rest was--!

There sat the upturned hutch, minus its petted occupant, while the dogs
stood by, sniffing and tail-wagging with what appeared to be a blending
of self-accusation and plea for mercy in their faces. Who could blame
dogs for the inability to resist so pleasant a sin? When George came on
the scene, anger and grief made the hills vocal.

On the assumption that the dogs might have merely chased the pigling into
the jungle and that it might be tracked by them, they were encouraged to
sniff the hutch, which they did joyfully, and with Ned, experienced
tracker, in the lead, all the able-bodied of the Isle joined in the hunt.
The dogs, leading across the paddock to the ravine, ran, nose to ground,
down its steepness and up through the orange plantation, followed
enthusiastically by Ned and the others, just as the character of country
permitted. Early in the hunt the dogs put up a scrub-fowl, which noisily
fluttered and spluttered through the jungle, and, ending its flight on a
lofty branch, jeered and chuckled as it peered down at the intruders.

Then Debil-debil scented a big brown lizard, cosy in a hollow log and
loudly appealed for help, which Ned gave with a stick; but Cricket had
the best of the luck and made a good catch. Debil-debil scored with a fat
rat which, nosed out of its nest of leaves, had scampered up a slender
sapling. Leaping high, he jostled the rat to the ground and snapped it up
with the alertness of a conjurer.

Being now hot for the chase both dogs ran wild, quartering the shady
places industriously, and soon struck off up the steep slope on a good
scent. In a few minutes they gave tongue, yapping and yelping with
uncontrollable eagerness. Through the undergrowth, Ned in advance, we
struggled as fast as lawyer vines, the prickly raspberry (almost as
obstructive as barbed wire), saplings and shrubs interwoven with creepers
permitted; for did not humanity and love for delicately-fed pigling
demand that the fugitive should not be altogether wasted on the dogs?

Hot and puffing, with scratched and bleeding hands and arms, and George
anything but poetic in his terms of denunciation, we got up to the
dogs--to find them frantically trying to unearth a spiny ant-eater, which
was just as frantically but mutely digging itself in among a mat of
roots!

George poked up the animal with a stick as Debil-debil took a spell, his
bleeding muzzle showing that the "porc" had drawn first blood. Without a
pick and shovel, extrication was impossible; besides, we were after a
distressed and homeless pigling, not a porc disturbed while at home in
ease. George wanted to put in operation tactics he had once applied at
Hinchinbrook when his pup had scented out a porc and fought it for three
hours, with claws and teeth and voice. Night had come on and then George
took the part of the pup. A jamtinful of kerosene was poured on to the
creature's back and touched with a match.

"That pup he work for t'ree hour; he dig out t'ree barrow-load ground. In
t'ree seconds that porc he run feefty yard like star, that pup biting
fire all the time!"

Forbidden to experiment with fire on the pet porcs of this Isle, George
became sulky, and said awful things about Debil-debil, which the good dog
accepted as compliments, no doubt concluding that George's blistering
terms were meant for the porc.

Calling off the dogs, the hunt went farther afield, Ned exhorting both;
but naught was seen save ordinary vermin. In the afternoon we took a
different direction, under the leadership of Ned, whose theory it was
that the pigling was still alive, but too frightened to respond to
affectionate and soothing calls. The dogs enjoyed themselves, and so,
apparently, did the blacks and George. Alas, results were negative,
though Ned skilfully pointed out fresh tracks and once said that he heard
the lost pigling's squeal.

A season of regrets, tempered by philosophy, followed.

George's incessant proclamation of the richness of a roast sucking-pig
crammed with herbs had created imaginary bilious attacks. Besides, there
was far too much of garlic in his scheme of flavouring for the tastes of
those denied more than a strictly poetic sight of the Levant. He was
excitedly, deeply affected by the loss not only of a pet, but of a
prospective feast that would have smothered the subtle scents of the
Isle. Others beheld the silent hutch without the tribute of a sigh.

Lucy continued to smile as the piccaninny passed from the squealing to
the squalling phase. Even Ned's responsibilities seemed less tragic.

Just as George had become reconciled to the loss of the pigling the
piccaninny vanished--not alone either. Both father and mother accompanied
her. The hut on the beach was silent--and smellful. On a shelf was half a
loaf of bread and half a tin of jam. Sticking in the roof was an
unfinished boomerang. On the walls were pictures from illustrated papers,
and on the floor oddments of raiment and a mattress of bags. There had
also vanished from its anchorage a big flattie belonging to a fisherman,
a countryman of George's. Two days later the owner came to recover the
boat, and after a week's search found it on the mainland, high and dry.

Three months passed, then George, having occasion to visit the mainland,
discovered something for which he was not looking and has never been able
to see--a popular joke. It was rife and blithe in every blacks' camp
between the mouth of the Tully and the Tully Falls up among the ranges,
and from the Hull River to Wreck Creek down by Cardwell. And when the
blacks take hold of a joke the birds of the air hear of it. Cockatoos
scream it; scrub-fowls chuckle over it; honey-eaters make a song about it;
the listening lilies overhear the lotus-birds whispering it, and,
nodding, smile.

Every black grinned like "Debil-debil," for there was not one but knew
that the perfidious Ned, and Lucy and the giddy piccaninny had eaten the
pigling.




PETER: A FISHER OF MEN



Weakly, sedately, yet not lacking mincing precision, Peter slowly
followed the margin of the rippleless sea.

The boys, at the moment busy cleaning and painting the boat resting on
her cradle, knew him and smiled at his pensive progress. Further, they
made jerky remarks about him in their own tongue, one word of
which--"Ba-bah"--gave clue to his character.

Approaching the busy scene he slowed down, hesitated, and, glancing
ahead, saw that it was not possible to pass along to the corner of the
Bay, into which the babbling creek flows, without incurring the
derogatory asides of his contemptuous countrymen. His glance back towards
the sand-spit, where the water is deep, was momentary; with an assumption
of friskiness--too energetic a term for so mild and transient a mood--he
ventured nearer and politely greeted me, holding his battered hat abaft
his shoulder. There was such humiliation in his attitude and tones, such
obsequious deference, that a cheery response was necessary to set him at
ease.

Hunger and illness were plainly written in his face; but he smiled wanly
as I intercepted him and gave him the formal freedom of the Isle,

"Ba-bah" described him.

In his left hand he carried an aggressively sacerdotal book, and from
his arm, in the approved style, hung the crooked handle of an umbrella of
the past, its ferrule shining with the polish of the sand. His right
hand balanced with unstudied ease a long and slender fish-spear. In the
meekest of tones he said that he had fever--too many of his fellow exiles
were at the moment making like complaint, but in different terms. His was
the voice of the patient martyr intent upon the edification of the
unelect.

"I have had nothing to eat this morning, Mister. I was just going out to
spear some fish. Will you let me go round to the other little bay? I
won't do any harm. I am a very releegious boy, Mister. I like going by
meeself,  away from the other boys. I can read a little of this good
book; but not much, Mister. It is the Bible."

He spoke slowly and with novel inflection, as if understudying some
mouthing pulpiteer, and turning over the leaves of the book, glanced at
the print. It was the BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER--held upside down.

"I am very seeek this morning, Mister; but I must not grumble, for I am
a Christian. I am a very releegious boy, Mister. I am Church of England
boy, Mister. This book tells me true. I must be a good boy."

Tremulously weak and quite beyond the spearing of fish, he brisked up
when told to go to the house for physic and food, returning in about an
hour quite translated, to announce to the ribald boys that the mistress
of the house was also a Christian. Fish spearing no longer an urgency, he
sat in the sun, ignored the other boys and told of his conversion, of his
hatred of bad language, of playing cards, and prayerless companions. He
tried to do good.

Like others with a mission. he earned jeers. The boys said he was cranky.
Was a man cranky when he tried to stop boys from using bad language and
playing cards? The good book told him he ought to make Christians.

The paint-besmeared boys giggled.

Peter had his dinner apart at the house, and disappeared. Referring to
him afterwards, the boys said, "Ba-bah!"--and giggled.

The natives' camp was on the sand-spit under the shade of the
ever-sighing beach oaks. Most of its occupants were would-be escapees
from the settlement over the water. Some were not quite virtuous. Indeed,
they were rowdy as well, deceitful, and as lazy as overfed pups. The camp
boasted of cards--a grubby, frowsy, and incomplete pack; and the boys
spent most of the nights playing, or rather imitating the playing of,
euchre, with language of the strongest type as the chief part of the
game.

At daylight next morning one of the truly respectable members of the camp
was at the house, wild-eyed and fear-stricken. He told of certain
nocturnal happenings, and on the strength of his story I went to the
beach. The boat-shed was half full of scared gins and big-eyed
piccaninnies, and thence towards the sand-spit sleepers were distributed
at odd intervals, just above the limit of high tide. The only occupants of
the camp were Peter, his wife and little boy. They were peacefully asleep.

Dick--truthful, gentlemanly Dick--told of the happenings of the night.
The card-players had indulged in imaginary gambling and real language to
the tormenting of the soul of the righteous Peter, who had exhorted
them to give up their bad habits and become Christians, until, driven to
desperation by the jeers and the taunts of "Ba-bah!" he had let loose all
his zeal and endeavoured to convert the heathen with the fish-spear
unused yesterday, and with the might of a much-refreshed arm.

In the blackness of the night the camp had vanished. Better the whole
scene to his Christian self and family than the presence of gamblers
given to unwholesome phrases. In his exalted mood he had not
discriminated, for unoffending Dick and his family and all the other
quiet folks had been driven into darkness with the triple-pronged spear,
and not one of the crowd, orderly or disorderly, dared to whisper
"Ba-bah!" lest Peter., in his repose, might hearken and be saucy.

When the Christian family awoke, Peter, without the slightest taint of
exultation, corroborated all that Dick had told, merely adding that,
being a very "releegious" boy, he could not stand the bad language and
bad habits of the gamblers, and had taken the course of stopping both by
hostile demonstrations with his spear and the repetition of some texts
from the Bible.

As he glorified his actions, his wife, Maude, sauntered up and was
presented. She, too, was civil, not to say choice, of speech, and quickly
made proclamation of her Christianity and abhorrence of evil-speaking and
cards.

If there exist social and other grades of society among the descendants
of the original occupants of this favoured land, and if the hint of such
an idea may be carried to finality, then does Peter stand apart as the
representative and exponent of the Oxford style and air towards his
degenerate fellows. In his attitude to them the grace of humility is
abandoned. In demeanour and utterance he is a class by himself--superior,
convinced of his superiority, rather disdainful of those who are not such
as he.

The last of the family to crawl out of a scanty blue blanket was a
neatly-dressed boy of about eight, who came forward with assurance. Maude
indicated him as "My little boy." Peter referred to him not as Bill or
Billy, or even Will or Willy, but as "Will-yam," with lofty and dogmatic
stress on the "yam." Neither approved of the society at the settlement.
It was rude. Besides, there was no school, and it was the purpose of his
parents that Will-yam should have the advantages of a superior education.
Maude emphasized the point. Willyam must be sent to a good school. Peter
declared that Will-yam must learn to read the good book and be a
Christian like himself, a very "releegious" boy, and a Church of England
boy. He must never gamble or use bad language. To these terms Will-yam
meekly assented. And there stood on the beach an elated, happy,
self-satisfied family, though it possessed naught but two thin blankets, a
fish-spear, the handle of a discarded umbrella. and a prayer book, soiled
with grease and smoke!

Peter was no longer humble. He had been victorious; he was proud. Had he
not rebuked the scornful, piously burnt the broken pack, and with a frail
weapon scattered a hostile and hideous crowd?

Exhorted to refrain from violence, however earnest in the spread of
Christian knowledge, and in the suppression of gambling, in concern for
the purity of speech, Peter's eyes flashed with the inflammable fervour
of the fanatic. The coarse-tongued boys were right. He was in fact
"Ba-bah;" but until he was under proper supervision the derisive word
lapsed; the boys kept at a safe distance and there was not a giggle left
in them!




BILLY TOO-GAL'S GHOST



This story had the chance of being quite true. It would have been so, but
for the denial of certain surly facts. So much the worse for the story.

As half-forgotten incidents became fixed in mind and were associated with
happenings of the recent past, righteous endeavours were made to discover
corroborative evidence of doubtful points; but fact and fable had become
so blended that little could be done in the way of sorting out.

Would it not have been satisfactory to all concerned if it could have
been proved that the rusty rifle-barrel lying among odds and ends in the
barn was ever in the possession of Billy Too-gal (otherwise "Billy of the
Leg") and that it had been a serviceable weapon with carefully polished
stock and rather more of brave brass in its mountings than is the style
of the day? History is silent on this important point, while tradition
shouts confidently in the affirmative. Trust rather to the affirmative of
tradition than to the cheerless negative!

Tradition said that Billy Too-gal had been directly acquainted with the
rifle; that he had treasured it during his day, and that when he had
passed into the land of shades one of the mystery-men of the time had
flung it into the sea because he deemed it uncanny, dangerous, and
like to transcend in direct effect the magic in which he himself dealt.
Years afterwards, "Jack Walk About" found it--a shapeless mass of
rust--protruding from the sand at low water, and having chipped away
some of the corrosion, had taken it to a certain Isle, as evidence,
perhaps, of a forgotten tragedy!

There be some who declare that Billy Too-gal's affection for the weapon
was a grim sort of sentiment, which had germinated in the idea that he
had suffered strange martyrdom through it. They assert that the bullet
fired by the hasty and aggravated white man struck him on the left knee,
giving to his gait that singular lurch or strut--almost rollicking in
style--that his phantom perpetuated. Others, with equal force, and on,
perhaps, slightly sounder evidence, maintained that the bullet shattered
his lower jaw, so that the vestiges thereof hung loose; that he was
thereby deprived of the ability to masticate his food; that he presented
a repulsive, yet affecting, sight when he strove to appease his hunger;
for was he not driven to throw scraps and fragments into his cavernous
mouth and gulp them?

Poor Billy Too-gal may have been cheeky to the nervous and suspicious
white man who had invaded his country; but his punishment did not fit his
fault. It was excessive. It was cruel. Not only did it inflict lifelong
anguish, sentence him to insatiable hunger, but it also ruined his temper.
Behold him, thenceforward, a fierce-eyed man, tall and very lean, with a
strut that would have been ludicrous on the stage, a wide-open, slobbering
mouth, with portions of a frayed and dangling jaw.

His ghost retained, as ghosts should, the disfigurements of life--so the
wise old men proclaimed with voices of authority that brooked no
question. Those who were coeval with him had good cause to recollect his
singularities, his eccentricities, his passionate and explosive moments.
Not an infant in many a camp who did not recognize his phantom when the
sages gathered together to discuss affairs of moment, for prying
piccaninnies were kept in check by threats of the return to life of Billy
Too-gal, with his fearsome, mobile head and the strut that swung his body
to the right at every step. Billy was a "bidg-eroo" (malignant
"debil-debil"), that would still the squeakiest piccaninny, and make her
hide her eyes against her mother's side or on the mangy coat of the pup
she happened to be cuddling.

Boys might assume a tremulous air of bravado; but did ever one of them
venture out on to the beach after dark, where, their elders declared,
Billy of the Leg was wont to spend impatient nights spearing Too-gan? No;
the boys, defiant in a crowd in daylight, cowered in camp after dark, for
Billy's strut as he slid along the beach gave him the faculty of glaring
sideways with paralysing potency. They knew, too, that from the bark band
across his forehead was slung a dilly-bag big enough to hold a captured
piccaninny for breakfast, if the sleepy Too-gan failed to waver within
range of his spear. For these reasons, the bold-at-daylight boys kept in
the background after dark, glad of the muffling blankets teeming with
fleas.

Old, old men had often told of Billy's pitiful destiny. It was his to
strut tracklessly along the beach every dark night, from the lonesome
camp on the edge of the mangroves at Wongaling Creek to the intrusive
rocks, there to stand, in a furious temper, waiting the
never-to-be-granted chance of spearing a sleepy fish, his body the while
swinging to and fro, and the big dilly-bag swaying uneasily from shoulder
to shoulder.

If, said they, he was ever lucky enough to snap up a plump
piccaninny--girl preferred--he would cut her to pieces with a shell-knife
and use her for bait. Then he would be certain to catch a sleepy fish,
and when he had eaten it his hunger would be appeased, and he would walk
the beach no more.

Never was any piccaninny bold enough to think of Billy Too-gal as other
than a terrifying phantom with a yearning for bait of most distressing
kind, until You-an-linga--a dreamy little girl--dreamt a strange dream.

All the kiddies of all the camps knew that even the long-legged,
light-footed little birds that ran trippingly over the sand at the edge of
the blue sea made distinct tracks. You-an-linga dreamt that she saw Billy
Too-gal lurching along the beach, with swinging head and gaping mouth.
So vivid was the dream that she did not regard it as one. She firmly
believed that she had seen the piccaninny-scaring man in the very flesh,
and being, as some dreamers are, quite practical, she thought of following
his tracks under the assurance and protection of the morning's sun.

Being intuitive by nature, she concluded that Billy Too-gal would be
certain to make a distinctive track, though no one had ever seen the
records in the sand of his passing to and fro. She knew the track of
every one of the denizens of the camps, and read into each never-failing
characteristics. Though she might not have seen a group straggle off
aimlessly along the beach, she could tell by a glance at the tracks the
individuals of the party, where they had gone, why, and make good guess
at what they were doing at the fleeting moment.

You-an-linga was able so to do because she had a gift. All enjoyed it in
varying degrees; but in her case it was developed so remarkably and
applied so vividly--recollect that intuition was also hers--that some of
the crude folks believed her to be "ba-bah" (cranky). Could she not track
the big "Oo-boo-boo"--the long-legged wolf-spider--and tell where it would
be found next day hugging its dilly-bag?

Being thus quite out of the ordinary, You-an-linga was looked upon
despitefully by others of her age, so that she was often lonely and
occupied herself with affairs that had but slight interest to the swarms
of piccaninnies. She likened the dilly-bag (egg-capsule) of "Oo-boo-boo"
to a "chillen," and got one from an interested white man as a reward for
the aptness of the similitude. It was then that she told the visitor of
the passing the previous night along the beach of Billy Toogal, whose
head was loose "all asame Yam-boo" (praying mantis). She had not seen
Billy Too-gal after the sun came up, but last night she saw him, and he
was no good:

"Me no lik'm that fella. Might be that fella kill'm piccaninny. Me look
out proper. What for that fella no mak'm track?"

You-an-linga's father and mother stood by and smiled. Their smiles were
not quite honest. Did they not implicitly believe that Billy Too-gal was
a snapper-up of such trifles as piccaninnies at large on the beach after
dark? And since, in their way, they loved You-an-linga, they sought to
terrify her with stories of the nocturnal savage with huge mouth, and
were afraid when she did not betray the slightest apprehension, but
rather was eager for investigation.

The wise-heads in the camps looked upon Billy Too-gal's phantom as the
best item of an excellent stock-in-trade of mysteries, and would not,
without harsh forms of protest, submit to it being set at naught by a
piccaninny. You-an-linga was beginning to talk about their pet ghost in
a familiar strain, and they plotted to get rid of her, so that their
reputation as sorcerers and their rights as custodians of the mysteries
might be strengthened.

Secretly they debated a situation boding little good, and decided that
for three nights in succession Billy Too-gal's ghost should parade the
beach, and that all the camps should have the chance of witnessing the
coming and the passing of the apparition. On the third night You-an-linga
would be picked up and disappear from the camp forever. Then in a quiet
spot they would eat the piccaninny's vital parts and so assimilate some
of the rare qualities which she had displayed. They would thus confirm
their renown, rid the camp of a disturbing element, and secure for
themselves the singular powers which had been hers.

Too-bee (The Maggot), played the part of the restless phantom on the
first night. More than one quaking individual saw the lop-sided head, the
appalling mouth, the huge dilly-bag dancing from shoulder to shoulder.
You-an-linga heard early of the nerve-shocking apparition, and sat and
shivered, wrapped in her father's blanket. When the sun rose, she
scrambled out and raced with others to the beach. Never before had Billy
Toogal made tracks. His footprints were plain to be seen, and the
children huddled up and scampered back.

You-an-linga had seen enough. She knew Toobee's tracks as surely as she
knew her own father's. and her gift of intuition caused her to conclude
that he was making a fool. of them all; nor was she wise enough to keep
her own counsel.

Naturally, the old men were vexed, and Too-bee indulged in demonstrations
towards You-an-linga with a weighty waddy. Innocent enough of any thought
of defiance, she boldly said that Too-bee had been "Play about, all asame
gammon; me no 'frait."

Billy Too-gal was next represented by Oon-narra (The Cloud), and with such
realistic effects that the camp buzzed for the rest of the night. None
could now deny the existence of the ghost. Brave would be the man or
woman or piccaninny who would trust to the beach when it had been
announced by the mystery-men that it was reserved for the ghost. The
envious crowd flattered the old men., renewed their demonstrations of
deference, and contributed all sorts of fat things, from oysters to
scrub-turkey eggs, to their fires.

Again You-an-linga satisfied herself from the best of all evidence that,
light-footed as The Cloud might be, he had merely mimicked Billy Too-gal;
but she kept her opinion to herself until the evening when she took her
diffident father and mother into her confidence. She proposed that they
should wait on the beach for Billy Too-gal, and that when he appeared her
father should spear him, and then kill him alonga head with a
tomahawk--"dead finis"--and take his dilly-bag and long fishing-line for
his own. The proposal was decidedly obnoxious to Mur-juri (The Cicada),
You-an-linga's father, who being quite commonplace, had never questioned
the authenticity of any ghost; but having only the fag-end of a
fishing-line, and entirely lacking a dilly-bag, he was tempted. The
mother's repugnance was also overcome by the thought of the huge
dilly-bag her husband had actually seen and described.

* * * * *

The trio stole quietly out and snuggled into depressions in the still
warm sand.

Nor had they to wait long. The night was cloudy, with a fresh south-east
breeze bearing in from the sea a mist that seemed to be luminous. The
crests of the rustling breakers, blown ashore, mingled with the mist,
making a thin margin of vapour, which blurred, yet exaggerated, the form
of Kurran-doola (the Millepede), the wiliest and most resourceful of the
mystery-men who imitated Billy Too-gal's lurching gait on the third night.

You-an-linga's mother screeched when the substantial phantom came abreast
of the lair, but at the same moment Murjuri hurled his dugong spear.
The range was short; the aim true. Down went the phantom with a grunt,
and one blow of the tomahawk silenced him for ever.

Morning revealed naught. The undertow had taken charge of the bleeding
body and the current conducted it out to sea--a feast for sharks.

But what had become of Kurran-doola, the oldest of the old men. the most
mysterious of the mystics? No questions were asked. The other mystery-men
knew that they had been trapped by a piccaninny, and were sage enough to
keep silent.

Years afterwards, You-an-linga was wont to smile capaciously as she told
that she really had seen Billy Too-gal, and that he made tracks "all
asame" Too-bee, Oon-narra, and Kurran-doola!

In time the old men, taking up the cue, laid it down authoritatively that
You-an-linga was quite right; and that her discovery proved that Billy
Too-gal still walked the beach on cloudy nights. Mystery-men, of whatever
complexion, are ever artful in explaining awkward complications by added
mystification.

But what became of the hasty white man whose deed had provoked Billy
Too-gal's ghost hungrily to strut the wholesome beach? Billy Too-gal
never actually said; but the old men had so vividly interpreted his
gestures that the younger, in their love of movement and display, in time
embodied them as one of the most frequent themes of their corroborees.
What did this crudest of dramas, with its beggarly array of sticks and
slips of barks as stage properties, reveal?

A solitary tent. Billy Too-gal, his wound still raw, creeps from a
background of cycads, noiselessly as dew, tomahawk in hand. He enters. A
pause. A thud. A grunt. Several groans. Silence. Billy Too-gal gropes his
way out, carrying a rifle. He looks round. Putting down the rifle, he
picks up two thin sticks and squats, and holding one with his toes, twirls
the other between his palms. Presently a faint blue smoke arises. A glow
appears like a ruby in a black setting, and is gently flicked on to a
leaf. Tenderly he breathes on it, waves it to and fro, and it flames. With
a torch of grass he fires the tent and watches, and gathers dry cycad
fronds to ignite the smouldering blankets. He seizes the rifle nervously,
carries it to the brink of the lagoon, and, leaning over so that his
footsteps may not impair the muddy margin, drops it so gently that
neither lily leaf nor bud wavers, and--without once looking back--slowly
disappears. After an interval he reappears with wide-open, slobbering
mouth and a hooked stick, fishes for the rifle, and with it--exit!

Thus, though Billy Too-gal does not nightly walk the beach in
ungovernable, voiceless rage, the camp clatters and chuckles over the
mimicry of his revengeful deed.




THE PASSING OF SAM



Sam was ever a masterful man. Big and strong, hasty, passionate to a
direful degree when aroused; gentle to his chubby children; corrective to
those whom he deemed to be wrongdoers, he had some of the essential
qualities of the schoolmaster and no little of the persuasive eloquence
of the preacher. It boots not to dwell on his defects, for Nature has
claimed her final penalty; but it may not be possible to understand his
character aright if the popularly-believed reason for his banishment from
his native isle be not referred to.

He was born on one of the islands of Torres Straits which has benefited
by Papuan influence in many respects. There the type is far more
intelligent than that of the mainland of Australia. Men and women learn
some of the advantages of civilization more readily, and under judicious
training become in some cases quite worthy of exercising certain of the
privileges of self-government. The late Sir William MacGregor testified
to this, and has given instances of the wisdom and moderation with which
the "Councillors" of the Straits Islands exercise their administrative
and judicial functions.

Born of such a race, it was natural that a big, strong, lusty man should
have opinions of his own, and should be given to expressing them. Though
no positive statement has come to my ears, it is said that in a fit of
justifiable wrath he inflicted punishment so violent on his wife that she
died. He knew something of the scriptures, and perhaps interpreted all
too dreadfully that injunction to pluck out the offending right eye and
cast it away. Sam's punishment for so wicked an offence against the laws
of humanity was lifelong banishment from the island he called home.

He married again, and had a family of four round-eyed, happy children,
and at the Settlement his was the first hut to show regard for the
decencies, if not the niceties, of life. He began his garden with sweet
potatoes and taro. The flowers and shrubs that followed bloom for others.
Thanks to the good policy of the State in respect of the population of
the Straits Islands, Sam was early able to read and write. Several of his
pencilled notes prove that he spelled correctly and wrote neatly.

Being thus, generally, so much superior to the great majority at the
Settlement in type and attainments, Sam became an unofficial leader--a
tutor and a pastor. He established a night-school in which the children
were taught their alphabet and rudimentary spelling. He delivered
addresses, read the Bible, taught the singing of hymns, and in other
matters endeavoured to persuade young and old to live decently and in
order. His Sunday services became, for a time, an institution.

Under his directions, and with his thick-voiced., solemn words, the dead
were buried at that spot where, as one epigrammatic native of the
locality said, "Boy he sit down altogether!" They had been wont to strap
their dead, knees to chin, and so to place them in a shallow grave, until
Sam persuaded them to swathe the body in a blanket and to rest it in the
sleeping posture in the sand, with head to east.

What was in his mind when he forbade the mourners to kill a death-adder
which slowly twisted past an unfilled grave of one who had died suddenly?
Did he look upon the deadly little snake as one of the emblems of
immortality of which he had so often talked--living, yet the
personification of evil and of death?

Sam's intellectual qualities were in harmony with his physical capacity.
Like one of Shakespeare's characters, he was in the best sense "a good
man of his hands;" he used edged tools so neatly and effectively that a
professional carpenter regarded him as a useful and capable assistant.

Such a man among such a community of