I put the party in movement towards Buree and rode across the country on our right with Piper.  We found the earth parched and bare but, as we bounded over hill and dale a fine cool breeze whispered through the open forest, and felt most refreshing after the hot winds of Sydney.  Dr. Johnson’s Obidah was not more free from care on the morning of his journey than I was on this, the first morning of mine.  It was also St. Patrick’s day, and in riding through the bush I had leisure to recall past scenes and times connected with the anniversary.  I remembered that exactly on that morning, twenty-four years before, I marched down the glacis of Elvas to the tune of St. Patrick’s Day in the Morning as the sun rose over the beleaguered towers of Badajoz.  Now, without any of the pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war, I was proceeding on a service not very likely to be peaceful, for the natives here assured me that the Myalls were coming up murry coola, i.e. very angry, to meet us.  At Buree I rejoined my friend Rankin who had accompanied me from Bathurst to the camp, and Captain Raine who occupied this place with his cattle.  A hundred sheep and five fat oxen were to be furnished by this gentlemen to complete my commissariat supplies.

Corrobory-dance of the natives.

In the evening the blacks, having assembled in some numbers, entertained us with a corrobory, their universal and highly original dance. (See Plate.) Like all the rest of the habits and customs of this singular race of wild men, the corrobory is peculiar and, from its uniformity on every shore, a very striking feature in their character.  The dance always takes place at night, by the light of blazing boughs, and to time beaten on stretched skins, accompanied by a song.* The dancers paint themselves white, and in such remarkably varied ways that no two individuals are at all alike.  Darkness seems essential to the effect of the whole; and the painted figures coming forward in mystic order from the obscurity of the background, while the singers and beaters of time are invisible, have a highly theatrical effect.  Each dance seems most tastefully progressive; the movement being at first slow, and introduced by two persons displaying graceful motions both of arms and legs, others one by one join in, each imperceptibly warming into the truly savage attitude of the corrobory jump; the legs then stride to the utmost, the head is turned over one shoulder, the eyes glare and are fixed with savage energy all in one direction, the arms also are raised and inclined towards the head, the hands usually grasping waddies, boomerangs, or other warlike weapons.  The jump now keeps time with each beat, the dancers at every movement taking six inches to one side, all being in a connected line, led by the first.  The line however is sometimes doubled or tripled according to space and numbers; and this gives great effect, for when the front line