Preparations for sending the vessel to Timor.

As Mr. Lushington was to accompany the schooner to Timor, and I was anxious to ascertain which would be the best direction for us to move off in on his return, I determined to commence my exploring trips as soon as possible.  All hands still continued busily engaged in landing the stores and conveying them to the tents; but though the men worked hard our progress was slow.  Everything had to be carried on the men’s shoulders, for the path, after the great trouble and labour we had bestowed on it, was still so intricate and rocky that it was impossible to use even a hand-barrow.  The intense heat of the sun, too, incommoded the men very much at first; but by the 16th of December all the stores were landed, and a considerable supply of water was taken off to the vessel.  I determined therefore now to start in my first exploring excursion, leaving to Mr. Lushington the task of seeing the watering of the schooner completed before he left for Timor.

CHAPTER 6.  HANOVER BAY AND ITS VICINITY.

NATIVES SEEN.

Sunday December 17.

This morning directly after breakfast I read prayers to the men, and then commenced my preparations for the excursion on which I intended to start in the evening.  Whilst I was occupied in arranging my papers Mr. Lushington observed two natives sitting on the rocks on the top of the cliffs which overlooked the valley, and gazing down intently on us.  The instant that he made friendly signs to them they rose from their seats and began to retreat.  Some of the party then called to them and one of the natives answered; but they still moved rapidly away.  I would not allow them to be followed for fear of increasing their alarm, and in the hope that they would return, but was disappointed.  It must have awakened strange feelings in the breast of these two savages, who could never before have seen civilized man, thus to have sat spectators and overlookers of the every action of such incomprehensible beings as we must have appeared; and the relation to their comrades of the wonders they had witnessed could not have been to them a whit less marvellous than the tales of the grey-headed Irish peasant, when he recounts the freaks of the fairies, “whose midnight revels by the forest side or fountain” he has watched intently from some shrub-clad hill.

Commencement of first excursion.

I started in the evening, accompanied by Corporal John Coles and Private R. Mustard, both of the corps of Royal Sappers and Miners, and for a short distance by two or three others of the party from the camp.  We moved up the ravine in which we were encamped in a nearly due south direction, and after following this course about a mile turned up a branch ravine to the left, bearing 87 degrees from the north.