It was now evident that further search on Hinchinbrook was useless.  There was no reason to doubt the truth of what they told us, for Lizzie would have gathered information had there been any outrage, or some small piece of rag or blanket would have betrayed them.  That the unfortunate men might be on the Macalister was not improbable, and thither we must bend our steps, as the last resource.  If we were unsuccessful then, we could only conclude that the vessel had foundered at sea, and we should have the melancholy satisfaction of knowing that we had done everything in our power to rescue the sufferers.

We camped for the night at one extremity of the little bay, while the natives occupied the other, in which there was a well sunk, where we supplied ourselves with fresh water.  We soon became on friendly terms with our wild neighbours, but took care never to linger amongst them singly, and always had our weapons ready for immediate use.

In the evening Lizzie came over from the blacks’ camp, where she had been holding a great palaver, and asked us if we should like to see a “corroborrie,” or dance; and much pleased at getting a glimpse of the native customs, and glad of anything to break the monotony of our lives, we followed her to the group of palms, and there took up our positions to watch the proceedings.  A tremendous fire was soon flaming on the beach, near it the gins and piccaninnies assembled, with bits of stick, clubs, and calabashes, on which to beat time.  Some thirty of the men then stood up, armed with spears, tomahawks, nullah-nullahs (war-clubs), and boomerangs, and commenced a series of ludicrous antics, to a most melancholy dirge chanted by the women, a kind of rude time being observed.  Gradually, however, they grew excited, and worked themselves up by going through a sort of mock fight; and when at the last the women danced round them with torches, all howling and shrieking at the top of their voices, and banging the calabashes with kangaroo bones or anything that would add to the noise, the whole scene reminded one of the infernal regions broken loose.  This lasted an hour, at the end of which time we withdrew, after expressing ourselves highly gratified, and the whole camp was shortly buried in repose.  We kept double sentries, but we might all have gone to sleep, for there was no symptom of treachery.  At daylight we had breakfast; gave the warriors and gins a few trifling things we could spare, such as knives, two or three blankets —­ for we hoped to reach the township that night —­ and, wonder of wonders to the savages, some matches (nearly all of which they expended in verifying the fact that they would go off), and then took our departure from the “bora ground,” guided by a native, who showed a very short way, unknown to Lizzie, by which we arrived at the ‘Daylight’ early in the afternoon, to find that the latter had been joined by the ’Black Prince’, the steamer that had brought up the Cleveland Bay party.  We quitted in our little craft for Cardwell, and the Townsville men went south in their steamer, intending to get some shooting at the Palm Islands before going home for good.  Eleven o’clock that evening saw us at our township, fully determined to carry out the work thoroughly by searching the Macalister River, an account of which I hope to give in a future chapter.